Passing the stress test....

When we were looking for a place to live after T. was declared 100 percent disabled by his VA doctors, there was a lot of stress.  We were leaving familiar and striking out into the wild blue yonder without a parachute.  Or something very like that, anyway.  Once we decided the location and then  found a house - I decided I needed something to relieve all that stress of moving, leaving family and friends and moving so far away.  I settled on a little keychain  dangler shaped like an elongated egg.  It was white.  There was a small plastic latch that let the top flip up to reveal the scene inside the egg.  It was a farmyard scene with plastic green grass, a small  fence and two black and white cows.  One was large and the other small.  Mother and calf.  Whenever the lid was opened, the larger cow would move slightly back and forth to mimic eating.  Small gears would grind and at last the mother cow would come to a stop and the cycle was complete.  I would close the lid and open it again, time after time.  The little bucolic scene recalled to me the  peaceful country side we would be living in and the slower pace of life we could expect.  I could almost feel the muscles unknotting in my neck and shoulders as I let the little keychain toy unwind.  I played with it a lot.  The clasp finally snapped and I couldn't close the lid any more.  I sealed it with a rubber band so it wouldn't get broken.  When I slipped the band off the egg, the little cows would work their tiny magic and I'd consciously relax and feel less harried with the demands on our lives.

The other day, I was coming up Rough Way and spotted a scene of cows eating near the roadway.  Big cows.  Little ones.  One of the big cows was eating.  That's when I realized - I hadn't played with my little keychain in a while - probably because I have the real thing living just across the road and - for the most part, those neck and shoulder muscles of mine have come unclenched while we were been making this little piece of the state into our home.  I still miss friends and family but I do enjoy watching the squirrels run in the grass and butterflies dancing on the breeze.  I enjoy the slight change of seasons - the trees shed leaves and at night you can see stars through the lacy structure of the underlying limbs.  We might even get snow in our area.  It has happened before and could again.  There have been flurries.  I'm sure I've seen them.  And if there are flurries, isn't that a grand excuse to call out of work?  I never learned how to drive in snow. 

On This Date

On this date in 2001 the towers fell and we watched.  We were pierced through with the magnitude of the event.  Tears streamed down.  How can this happen, we asked.  Nobody had an answer, except Usama.  He said it was our fault.  He lied.

It was in no way our fault that extremists listened to the voices of hate urging them on to do such damage in our country; striking at our our values and our very way of life.  It is not our fault and I refuse to accept that this great land was or is in any way to blame for the extreme hatred that still spews.  We open our doors to legal immigrants and offer help to the tired, the poor...the wretched refuse of those teeming shores.  All others need to go to the back of the  line and wait their turn. 

I recall with pride the sights on television in those days in the aftermath of September 11.  I saw people helping each other out of harms way.  Newsmen reporting on the events with tears in their eyes.  The funeral of a beloved priest who lost his life and all the other funerals that ended with the piper playing taps for a fallen hero - while a city came together to recover the lost and clear the rubble.

One image stands out in my mind from those days; a man standing beside the road with a cardboard sign in his hands, steadfastly holding it up for the passing cars to see.  The sign said simply, Be Brave.  Be Strong.

A message worth remembering.

Be brave. 

Be strong.

Sights and Scenes

T.  and I were on the way into Wally-World to do our Saturday grocery shopping when I glanced up at a sign. Then my eyes travelled on towards the top of the building where the camera array was.  I found myself looking around for Tippi Hedron!

Like a bad Hitchcock movie........