How To Apologize

Apologies are one of the greatest things in the world.  Giving and getting. Apologies can make you feel like you just stepped out of a shower, you're clean, forgiven and beautiful. And they are so powerful. A heart felt apology can make so much anger, resentment, frustration and sadness melt.  Once you get the words "I'm sorry" out of your mouth, things get better, almost instantly. We all dread  apologizing, but most of the time, once you say your are sorry  people generally think, "wow, he's pretty brave. That took guts". It's really hard to hold a grudge once someone has sincerely said, "I'm sorry". The secret to saying you're sorry is keeping it short. People don't want to hear you going on and on and on. They know what you did. And they don't some long drawn out explanation as to why you burned their house down. Just say you made a mistake, you'll never do it again and you're sorry. Then hand shake or hug it out. Get in, get out, get in done. 

Puney Little Humans

Lightening, thunder, hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, straight line winds.  I love kick ass weather. I know it often brings heart ache and destruction but I love really powerful weather because it proves one thing. God and Mother Nature are still totally in control.  We can do and say anything we want but we do not have the ability to control or even slow down the weather. If 70 mile an hour straight line winds blow a tree down and it falls right on my house, not a thing I can do.  If a tornado plows across Arkansas, picks up my house and drops it in Lake Hamilton, not a thing I can do about it.  (Though I'm thinking I should consider more homeowners insurance).We can't even protect ourselves from bad weather.  All we can do is pray. Profound and violent weather is absolutely awe inspiring and reminds me how small I am. So, fellow  human beings, we are not in control, face it. God has all the power when it comes to life and death issues and the weather. And I'm really glad He does.

I Love Fearless Teachers!

There are two things I love this morning, not counting my dog, children and husband.  But I feel I need to write about teachers today.  This morning Sandor (who is 8) got into the car with a Tupperware full of the most disturbing, wretched mixture of egg, dog food, milk, curry power, flower, mushrooms, peanut butter, green food coloring, Crisco, the list goes on and on.  If Big Foot ate a coyote then threw up in a plastic bucket it might look like this mixture. But this grossness is a homework assignment.  Sandor has a great teacher who told the kids to make a disgusting mixture of food stuff, the only catch, they had to carefully measure everything they put in the bucket.  So my boy spent almost an hour carefully figuring out 1/3 cups, 3/4 cups, teaspoons and tablespoons.  He measured every vile ingredient he added to the mixture. This morning the teacher will judge all the horrendous concoctions and kids will win prizes for most disgusting texture, smell and color.   So today I want to say thank you to the teachers who use their imagination to inspire our children to learn.  Kudos to the teachers willing to deal with containers full or horror in the name of education.

I Found My Other Best Friend

     There is nothing better than finding an old friend and discovering they are still your friend and really cool.  I had a friend in high-school. We were great buddies, though radically different. (We never dated and now I'm wondering what my freakin' problem was.Teenagers are so monstrously stupid) Anyway, we found each other two years ago. And the fact that we had not seen or spoken to one another in 30 years didn't matter at all. We are still exactly as we were then, though we've both changed so much.  I think between us there have been four or five marriages, six or seven kids and millions of dollars, but when we talk or e-mail it's as easy and silly as it was in 1976. We argue about everything from politics to music, we make fun of each other, and there's nothing we wouldn't do to help. Finding out an old friend is still one of your best friends is one of the sweetest feelings in the world.