Fun Friday - Reading is fundamental

One morning the husband returns after several hours of fishing and decides to take a nap.

Although not familiar with the lake, the wife decides to take the boat out. She motors out a short distance, anchors, and reads her book.

Along comes a Game Warden in his boat. He pulls up alongside the woman and says, 'Good morning, Ma'am. What are you doing?'

'Reading a book,' she replies.

'You're in a Restricted Fishing Area,' he informs her.

'I'm sorry, officer, but I'm not fishing. I'm reading.'

'Yes, but you have all the equipment... For all I know you could start at any moment. I'll have to take you in and write you up.'

'For reading a book?' she replies.

'You're in a Restricted Fishing Area,' he informs her again.

'If you do that, I'll have to charge you with Sexual assault,' says the woman.

'But I haven't even touched you,' says the game warden.

'That's true, but you have all the equipment. For all I know you could start at any moment.'

'Have a nice day ma'am,' and he left.


MORAL : Never argue with a woman who reads. It's likely she can also think. *****************************************************
Sick Leave

I urgently needed a few days off work,
But, I knew the Boss would not allow me to take leave.
I thought that maybe if I acted 'Crazy'
Then he would tell me to take a few days off.
So, I hung upside-down on the ceiling and made funny noises!
My co-worker (who's blonde) asked me what I was doing.
I told her that I was pretending to be a light bulb,
So, that the Boss might think I was 'Crazy' and give me a few days off.
A few minutes later the Boss came into the office and asked,
'What in the name of good GOD are you doing ?'
I told him I was a light bulb.
He said, 'You are clearly stressed out.'
Go home and recuperate for a couple of days.'
I jumped down and walked out of the office...
When my co-worker (the blonde) followed me, the Boss asked her,
'...And where do you think you're going?!'
(You're gonna love this....)


She said,
'I'm going home too, I can't work in the dark!!
******************************************************
See Below - warning you might die laughing -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYmsr8Sy4K0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=un_PjRXV5l8&feature=email

Laughing is inner jogging.

Love,

Chatty


See the You Tube Below too....

Thursday's Thoughts - How To Handle Problems

Walk away from it until you're stronger. All your problems will be there when you get back, but you'll be better able to cope." ~ Lady Bird Johnson

This too, will pass.

Love,

Chatty

Tuesdays Ramblings - Timing is everything

TIMING IS EVERYTHING

CHATTY

Monday Mullings on challenges

"Challenges make you discover things about yourself that you never really knew. They're what make the instrument stretch -- what makes you go beyond the norm."– Cicely Tyson

Chatty

Be Unsettled!

“People wish to be settled: only as far as they are UNSETTLED is there any hope for them.”
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

Love,Chatty

http://wandascountryhome.com/whitechristmas/index.html

I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas . . .

Everyday is important . . .

There is no such thing in anyone's life as an unimportant day.
-Alexander Woollcott

Love,

Chatty

The Quality of the Harvest

The Quality of the Harvest

"Gardening, like your life, isn't a project you tend to when it's the right season. It takes planning and readiness all year long," the man told me.

I went to the local hardware store on Saturday looking for some parts I needed to fix a faucet in our kitchen. My wife has much confidence in my ability to figure how to do such things, but also knows it will take much longer than necessary and I'll injure myself. It did and I did.

Don't ask me how it happened, but I didn't injure myself working on the plumbing. I cut myself laying down contact paper under the sink. No, I didn't cut myself on the paper. I have no idea how this happened but it did. And it always does.

Maybe I should call this story "Things you can depend on." Not only because I injured myself but the fact that whenever I head out into the world I can depend on meeting someone with a message I needed to hear. Saturday was no different.

I wandered into the garden shop in search of Spring and signs of life. Spring is life and as I tell you often, life is in the details. Winter's details are brilliant, but I can't wait for Spring.

Although people maybe thinking and longing for Spring here, very few if any, are headed to the garden supply shops. Except for Peter.

Peter was about my age, average height, touches of white around each temple and when it came to gardening very knowledgeable.

"I didn't expect to see anyone in this section so early," I said as I entered the room.

"Why not?" he replied.

"Well Spring hasn't arrived yet. Although I've been carrying it around in my heart for months now." I said smiling.

"Well, my uninformed friend, gardening, like your life, isn't a project you tend to when it's the right season. It takes planning and readiness all year long," Peter told me.

Okay, he had my attention. I know I don't know much about gardening, but life? I pride myself on my life skills.

"But gardening is seasonal. I never saw anyone in their garden with snow up to their knees," I said.

"That's because a good gardener is inside planning, reading and yes growing. There are things we can grow early enough to get a head start on the season. Just like you should in life."

"Go on," I urged him.

"About five years ago, my wife died. One never plans for that. How could you? In life there is a season for that and we hadn't even come near that time. Using the same comparison, our two children were in their growing season. Like in gardening we tended to their needs with nourishment, special care and lots of love. The saddest thing is we never got to the best season of all," he said as he shook his head.

"Harvest time?" I asked.

"Yes, the harvest of our lives. The season after you have worked life's garden, planted for the future, and pulled all the weeds. The time to sit back and enjoy the fruits of our labor never came. At least not together. Our children are growing and they bring much life into my world. I see them blossoming into all that God had created them to be. But I see it alone." he said now lowering his head and turning away from me.

"Let me ask you something. I plant a seed and the flower grows. At the same time my neighbor down the street plants the same flower and it grows. Mine is thin, with few blooms. Hers is full and healthy looking. The same seed, different gardener. I would guess then that the gardener is reflected in the beauty of the flower, right?" I asked.

"Yes, I guess so."

"Then you are not alone, my friend, for the beauty of your wife is reflected in your children. God provided the seeds, you and your wife made them to grow, and when her harvest came early, she left the garden in good hands," I said.

"I never thought of it that way. You are right. The beauty that I see in my world is a reflection of her and I. They are with me always. Then so is she," he said now smiling.

Taking advantage of the moment I replied, "And I have gained a new insight on gardening and my life. You do reap what you sow and the quality of the harvest lies in the gardener. When it seems that the Winter in our lives will never leave, remember that "All the flowers of all our tomorrows are in the seeds of today." Robert H. Schuller"

Just then his children came running through the door.

"Here comes tomorrow's flowers," he said.

"Daddy, could we plant Daisies again this year?" one child asked.

"Yes, of course. They were Mom's favorite," he said.

"Ours, too!" they said in unison.

"That doesn't surprise me," Dad said as he smiled and kissed them.

Galatians 6:9 Let us not grow tired of doing good, for in due time we shall reap our harvest, if we do not give up.

Pretty story to end the week,
Chatty

Stroke of luck . . .

This was an interesting story - it appeared in the November/December AARPS magazine and on Opray October 21st. It's also a book - saw it at Barnes and Noble.

http://www.oprah.com/article/spirit/inspiration/pkgoprahssoulserieswebcast/20080512_oaf_oss_jboltetaylor
This is taken from Oprah's Website - hope you enjoy -

Jill Bolte Taylor

"When she was a young girl, brain scientist Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor became fascinated with the functions of the human brain. Jill, one of Time magazine's 100 most influential people of 2008, has a brother with schizophrenia, and his brain disorder led Jill to dedicate her career to studying severe mental illnesses as a Harvard-trained neuroanatomist. While she worked to uncover the differences between the brains of people born with mental illnesses and those who were not, something remarkable happened to Jill's own brain—it went silent.

On December 10, 1996, at age 37, Jill awoke with intense pain behind her left eye—a blood vessel had exploded in the left hemisphere of her brain, and within hours, Jill could no longer walk, talk, read or write. She was suffering from an arteriovenous malformation—a rare type of stroke. While Jill struggled to phone for help, she was aware that the left hemisphere of her brain was shutting down, taking with it her language, organizing and other analytical skills. Without the dominant left side of her brain controlling her thoughts, Jill says her mind went silent, leaving only the right side of the brain functioning. Through the right side of her brain, Jill says her consciousness shifted away from reality—and the trauma her body was suffering through—and into a place of inner peace and Nirvana.

The experience was life-changing. Not only did Jill face years of recovery after her stroke—and major brain surgery to remove a large blood clot in her brain—she also discovered a better quality of life through increased use of the right hemisphere of her brain. She's now an artist as well as a scientist, creating anatomically correct stained-glass replicas of brains that are sold as fine art. She's also published My Stroke of Insight: A Brain Scientist's Personal Journey. The book explains in scientific detail exactly what happened during Jill's stroke and how she recovered. It also takes a closer look at how the right hemisphere of the brain works and how Jill says people with normal brains can access it to find their own inner peace and improve their quality of life and the lives of others. "

AARPS-November/December 2008

"Can a person tap into this bliss without suffering a stroke? Absolutely. When you're really paying attention to the richness of the present moment, that's right minded awareness. The left hemisphere is preoccupied with past and future, projecting fears, contemplating ideas that aren't relevant to the hear and now.

You have to learn to choose.

Stress is a frame of mind. If you're in traffic, relax and enjoy the moments. Standing in line? Observe rather than engage.

How can we learn to pull the plug?

Use your senses to pay closer attention to your environment. What does the air smell like? What are the sounds, the colors? What's happening in the distance. Focus on details. Try dancing."

In other's words - like I keep saying, breathe and pay attention to the movement of your breath - look at your diaphragm moving up and down.

If I ever got the nerve up to get a tattoo (one thing on my list that I want to do one day ?) - I would have the word ~breathe~ tattooed on my left wrist. Simply breathe. I've seen it done - it's beautiful.

Love, Chatty

Inspirational People Week - Christina Applegate

Okay - something that always - always - always makes me feel better - is to look at others. Some people have it pretty bad - yet they take it in stride. They are heroes and they give me such inspiration. (I also stop feeling sorry for myself - it gives me strength).

Hopefully this week we can take a look at some inspirational people and see if we can gain anything from their strength. I think that is one reason we are here on earth - to help others.

It is one of the most beautiful compensations of life that no man can sincerely try to help another without helping himself.-Ralph Waldo Emerson

Some pursue happiness, others create it.-Anonymous

From an interview of TV GUIDE- Christina Applegate

"It's good to be back," she said in her recent interview with TV Guide. "I get tired quickly. But it's nice to have a focus for a minute outside of that."

That of course, is her recovery from breast cancer. The 36 year old actress was diagnosis in late March and ultimately underwent a double mastectomy in July. Applegate is cancer-free and, slowly but surely, healing both physical and emotionally from an ordeal that she admirably sugarcoats.

"Yes, it's hard. It sucks. But I'm not a victim."

Applegate is a profoundly different woman form the one who sat down with TV Guido last year. Then she lived and breathed work, almost to the exclusion of everything else.

All that shifted early last spring . "I started looking for a beach house the day I found out I had this little disease." "You just kind of go what am I waiting for for to get the things that you want and the things you dream of."

She bought a peaceful, quiet, beautiful place where she spent three weeks recuperating post surgery surrounded by friends and family, including her own mother, actress Nancy Priddy, who had also bravely battled-and beat - the disease. "I allowed myself to fall into their care, which is very hard for me personally because that is not my personality.

I have an extremely hard time asking others for help - for attention - for anything. It goes against what I learned from childhood - when someone gives you something - there's a price attached to it. Therefore, I tend to be pretty self reliant - which isn't a bad thing, but it's not a great thing either, some times. It seems I can give to others forever, but asking for something and taking from someone is something I have to work on.

I've learned without replenishing myself - it's a good way to burn out. We have to learn to take some time for ourselves and we may have to ask others for what we need. I've also learned that while we may get up the courage to ask for what we need, we risk the answer to be no -we will survive a no - it doesn't mean it's a personal rejection - there may be others reasons for a no. We have to say yes to ourselves and go on alone. No one said it was easy.

But, we are survivors.
Love,
Chatty

This, too, shall pass . . . Monday Musings

Are you having a bad day?

You've heard these words before I'm sure 'this too shall pass'; but, sometimes when we're going through stress or problems, these are the last words we want to hear from anyone - even from a good friend!

I read them in a book recently and it's going to be my new mantra.

This, Too, Shall Pass

If I can endure for this minute
Whatever is happening to me,
No matter how heavy my heart is
Or how dark the moment may be-

If I can remain calm and quiet
With all the world crashing about me,
Secure in the knowledge God loves me
When everyone else seems to doubt me-

If I can but keep on believing
What I know in my heart to be true,
That darkness will fade with the morning
And that this will pass away, too-

Then nothing in life can defeat me
For as long as this knowledge remains
I can suffer whatever is happening
For I know God will break all of the chains

That are binding me tight in the darkness
And trying to fill me with fear-
For there is no night without dawning
And I know that my morning is near.

...Helen Steiner Rice

Love, Chatty

Tuesday's Thoughts - wouldn't it be lovely . . .

I began writing a list over the weekend about what it means to me to be alive - to be in a live relationship with someone whether it be a friend, family member, husband , or other. Every one including myself says 'just live' - 'live life to the fullest'.

What the heck does that mean exactly? Sometimes I know what It means exactly and other times I tend to lose sight of it. Sometimes I am living and sometimes I did.

Does it mean the same to everyone? (No, I'm sure not). And if anyone has any comments on what it means to be alive - I'd love to hear from you. I love people and what and how they think.

Since everyone would define 'life' differently, I can only define what it means to me to be alive in this world - as seen through my eyes. I've also found that no matter how close you are to some one - you cannot see things out of the same two eyes. Some thing will be different - even if it's just a centimeter different.

And the really wonderful thing is that it's great to see things differently! If everyone saw things like I did - the world might be _____(I'll let you fill in the blank - Lol)! Plus everyone being the same would sure be boring. Variety is the spice of life.

So I want to define 'living' as it means to me. Real living. Being. Being alive starts within the self. It extends to the world.

Do you ever wonder what draws you to some people and while others repel you? What is it that makes you happy to be around certain people and cringe to be around others? Are you pulled toward some people and feel like you want to run away from others? I think it is the pain they carry around in them. It can be literal pain from the body itself or pain they carry around in their soul.

Pain in the body is something I do know about as well as spiritual pain. Physical pain can radiate outward from a person. Everyone around them if they are in tune can sense their pain. You have to be careful if you're a person in pain to not let it damage your soul and make it bitter. Before I had my hip replaced I was in pain for 20 years, the last five to ten were almost unbearable. I believe (and it may not be true if you ask others) even though my body was in pain, that my eyes and soul were clear - meaning that while people could see my pain, my pain never won over me personally and I did not let the pain embitter me. I couldn't do the things I wanted too - but I am a person that for some reason (God) carries eternal hope that things will get better. So while people might have done some suffering with me - I don't think they felt that I was unhappy or depressed. They did not feel guilty because I had accepted it and live my life in spite of it. Same with my soul pain. Now I was not Mrs. Perfect, I don't mean that. However, I was always working on trying to get better and trying to improve myself.

So how do I want to live?

1) Accept what the moment brings. Try not to judge it. If you fail at this, forgive yourself and try again. I make mistakes all the time and the person I tend to get the maddest at is myself! I have to forgive myself and take it easy on me at times. When you can be in just the moment in hand - it is one of those ah-ha moments that feels so good.

2) Listen to what others say about you - and see if there is any truth in it. There usually is some truth in what others say. I get a lot of 'corrective criticism' - sometimes I wonder if they even know me (Lol), but seriously, I do take to heart what they say. I bring it out and look at it, as painful as it is, analyze it, let go of some, and try to change what I can.

3) Realize there is no gain without pain. Accept pain as pain. Pain teaches us. It is there for a reason. Pain makes us stronger.

4) Things are always changing. Be a person who can change on a dime.

5) Try to rest your mind. Be with the moment at hand. A hard one for me as my mind is always on warp speed. That is why mediation is so great for me.

6) Speak the truth - and if you are going to say something 'corrective' breathe first. Be kind.

7) Be as positive as you can - negativity is a disease - that can cause your body to expel pain that others can feel and want to run away from. And if you fail and have moments of negativity that's okay. Try again. Don't be hard on yourself. Forgive yourself - forgive others - try.

8) Keep your promises if you can. Sometimes you can't and you have to accept that too. No one is perfect.

9) Use your senses - taste, touch, feel, smell, and listen - to live.

10) Have fun. Laugh. Find joy.
Now with relationships and how to feel alive -

1) Truth must come from both ways - take some time to think and breathe first. Don't be afraid of telling the truth. Even if the truth is hard - do it anyway. Truth is core.

2) Tell me your opinions even if they are different than mine. Own them. I'm a very open person. I love the opinions of others. If I do something wrong - tell me (nicely with respect).

3) There is a time for closeness and a time not to be close. When your time to be close is at hand - be close. When it is time for other things, let go and don't be demanding. Learn to stand alone when necessary and learn to lean when you need to lean.

4) Be a promise keeper. If you say you're going to do something, do it - even if it is painful to do it. Otherwise know it is okay to say no. Be a person of your word. Your word is your bond. It's core.

5) Be kind to one another. No one is perfect.

6) Let's not talk bad about others. Too negative.

7) Listening is two ways. Sharing. Taking turns.

8) Have a soft and gentle heart.

9) Do new things - learn new things - try new things. Taste - touch - smell - hear - feel.

10) Laugh a lot with each other.

Now if you think this is my actual life - think again. I'm only human too. Know that 'living' isn't for the weak - it's hard work - but what wonderful results.

Nothing feels as good as being alive and close feels.

Love,
Chatty