On a scale of 1 to 409,756,960....

  It's been a pretty good day. Remembering to stop and breathe...to understand that only a very few things are really that important anyway...and to mindfully take the day one bit at a time.  I had plans, of a sort, for the day, and not a single one of them worked out.  So, I took a breath and did something else. 

 I heard a wise woman say once that ..."if I start hitting roadblocks, then I change where I'm going."  It is a lot easier to do that than to get my knickers in a twist and be angry or resentful or frustrated.  Keeps the blood pressure down and keeps the song in my heart. Flexible.  That's the key...and keeping gratitude at the forefront of my mind helps me to remember that it's all a gift anyway.

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   The first part of the day was incredibly beautiful--sunny, 65 degrees when I woke up, blue skies. I absolutely reveled in it.  By late afternoon, the skies were getting dark and the wind was picking up and the clouds started rolling in.  There was thunder and lightning and not a lot of rain. Yet.  lol  It was so warm that when Roxie and I went in search of pine shavings for bedding for the chicks, I had to put the cars AC on. We went to 3 different places and found only cedar, which won't work. It's too strong for the babies...And since we were there, we went ahead and got the oil changed in the car and new windshield wipers put on. All ready for the big trip on Saturday.  I stopped and picked up a few groceries too and then we came home.

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  I have a big stockpot of vegetable tailings simmering away on the stove...been saving them in ziplock bags for making soup stock. I'll can it tomorrow, maybe. Although I'm thinking of freezing this batch.  So the house smells like cabbage and onions, lol, since there's a lot of cruciferous  vegetables being eaten around here lately.  Pat came in from work and said "Mmmm...what's cooking?"  lol

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  I didn't cook anything or bake anything today. I did make egg salad from the eggs I boiled yesterday. My lunch was a bit of leftover salad with an egg salad sandwich made on a whole wheat bagel.  It was really good and really satisfying.  The Irishman went off tonight to the shindig at the Jacoby Arts Center and I stayed at home. For supper I had a big soup bowl full of sauteed onion, Chinese cabbage and spinach with salt and pepper and a cup of leftover steamed vegetables on top. It was awesome.  

  Tomorrow I will sit with my neighbor's husband for about 4 hours so she can get away and have lunch with her friends. Then I'll come home and figure out what we're going to do for date night...usually dinner out and a movie. Then I' up early on Saturday morning to go pick up my cousin and my youngest sister and the three of us will take a trip to southern Missouri to meet (for the first time) my paternal grandfather's brother's family.  It's about 3 and a half hours from here.  We've chatted online, but none of us have ever met...

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  I need to get the flyer made for our family reunion in June and get that out. I want top get it made so that we can take some down to Missouri with us and hopefully some of these folks can come to the reunion and meet more of us crazy Morss'... Exciting stuff. 

   I have the day use site all reserved and paid for, so that's a done deal. I do this every year for the last too many and I think it's time somebody else took over. I'm putting it up for discussion at the Sunday noon meal at the reunion.  

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  Thinking today about all the things in my life I have to be grateful for... it's funny how we go through our lives and never even look around...only focusing on how bad we've got it, or how good we've got it..and not realizing that somewhere in the  middle is where all the good stuff is...in the days where we get a respite from pain, or from poverty or from tedium.  In the moments when someone calls and says "I've had you on my mind"...and we suddenly don't feel so lonely anymore.  Those times when we get to do something for someone else, even if it's just make them smile, or feel cared about, or fed.  I know people who don't feel like they matter, who think they are a waste of space.  I know people who are the opposite--who have SUCH high opinions of themselves that they set themselves apart from the rest and become lonely beyond comprehension.  

 There was a guy in the grocery store parking lot today that triggered some of this. He was sitting off to the edge of the lot, in a beat up old car that had definitely seen better days. When I was driving by, he had his head on the steering wheel, shoulders slumped and looked just..hopeless.  I circled around to see if he was okay, when I saw a woman and a little girl coming through the lot towards him. The mother had one small grocery bag in her hands and the little girl was skipping alongside as they made their way to the car. They got to the door the same time I pulled into the parking space beside them. At first they didn't notice me, and he was smiling as the little girl climbed in to the front seat with him. Then the little girl waved and I waved back...and rolled down my window and said "How are you guys today?"   The little girl excitedly said "We got bananas!!! "  I laughed and said "I got bananas too!"   He started the car and I watched them drive across the street to the little park.  I sat there thinking..I've sure been there. And once again, I was gobsmacked by a gratefulness so strong that it nearly knocked me over.  There isn't nearly as much gratitude in my daily life as there should be. Not nearly.  

   We don't have a lot, but we have everything we need.  We have a roof over our heads and two cars and enough food to keep us fed.  We have enough money to pay our bills and then some. And we have family and pets and books and computers and the list just goes on and on.  And like the little family in the beat up old car...we have love. And that, my friends, is one of the most precious commodities on this planet.

Namaste.