So I fooked around with my layout. I was going to go down the road of setting up a blog on my own web server, but then I did here what I was going to do there, so I thought to my self, “self, why go to all the trouble?”, and so I'm not.
My goal is to write more. More about what interests me. More that might offend, provoke, or inspire – if not you, then me. Let us begin…
Let Me Walk In Beauty
Native American Prayer
Oh, Great Spirit
Whose voice I hear in the winds and whose breath gives life to all the world.
Hear me.
I am a man before you, one of your many children – I am small and weak. I need your strength and wisdom. Let me walk in beauty and make my eyes ever behold the red and purple sunset.
Make my hands respect the things you have made, my ears sharp to hear your voice. Make me wise, so that I may know the things you have taught my people – the lesson you have hidden in every leaf and rock.
I seek strength not to be superior to my brothers, but to be able to fight my greatest enemy – myself. Make me ever ready to come to you with clean hands and straight eyes, so when life fades as a fading sunset my spirit may come to you without shame.
– Native American Prayer
Translated by Chief Yellow Lark in 1887
Native American Missionary and Medicine Man
Lakota Tribe
Sometimes, when I go to bed at night (like last night), I have grandiose thoughts about plans and ifs and whens, but when I awake in the morning, most (if not all) have vanished like the forgetting of a memory.
“A father's chief duty is not to instruct or to discipline. A father's chief duty is to be present.” ~Tim O'Brien, A Letter To My Son, LIFE (October 15, 2004)
If you have kids or are contemplating having kids, you should try to read the article from which I pulled this quote.
My Locked Thread Of Shame: http://www.evboard.com/showthread.php?p=564645#post564645
http://www.evboard.com/showthread.php?goto=lastpost&t=1746
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Oct 15 08:37:09 ToB lol Wade
Oct 15 08:37:12 ToB Dhamma
Oct 15 08:37:13 ToB hahaha
Oct 15 08:37:20 Dhamma what?
Oct 15 08:37:27 * Dhamma looks innocent
Oct 15 08:37:31 EmmaTehGoat lol
Oct 15 08:37:33 ToB posting on your IY thread a year after you joined
Oct 15 08:37:52 ToB dr0k
Oct 15 08:37:59 Dhamma can you see deleted posts ToB ?
Oct 15 08:38:30 ToB duh
Oct 15 08:38:32 ToB were you baiting codger?
Oct 15 08:38:50 Dhamma I was baiting whoever wanted to bite first – it just happened to be Codger
Oct 15 08:38:58 ToB lol
Oct 15 08:38:59 ToB idiot
Oct 15 08:39:02 ToB not you
Oct 15 08:39:02 Dhamma what gets me is the two that posted AFTER Jason
Oct 15 08:39:02 ToB him
Oct 15 08:39:09 ToB rofl no shit
Oct 15 08:39:09 Dhamma no no, I'm an idiot too
Oct 15 08:39:12 ToB hilarious
Oct 15 08:39:22 ToB ok ok
Oct 15 08:39:25 ToB you are an idiot, codger is a complete idiot
Oct 15 08:39:29 Dhamma ay
Oct 15 08:39:30 EmmaTehGoat lol
The profound power (and danger) in being a parent is the awesome opportunity to instill core values in your children that they won't dare question until they are much older, if ever. How convinced am I that I am on the “right” path? How certain am I that I'm not damning my sons to years of misconception and strife?
Here are two snaps of some clouds I took while walking home today.
high res
high res
Conscience is the soul of freedom, its eyes, its energy, its life. Without conscience, freedom never knows what to do with itself.
~ Thomas Merton
So I'm off to Vermont tomorrow morning for 5 days. I'll try to catch up on my reading and perhaps some more posting then, but if any of you are near Burlington, give me a holler.
Tragedy struck close to home yesterday. We found out that one of Heather's best friends lost her baby boy at the 38th week. He was due to on September 15th, but his heart stopped beating in utero on Tuesday. The friend had the hardest time getting pregnant with this one. She suffered a few miscarriages along the way, but we thought this one was going to be OK since it lasted so long.
While this is a horrible thing to happen to our friends, it is a blessing in disguise for me. It jolted me into appreciating my own kids that much more when I contemplate that in the very next moment, one or all of them could be gone; or for that matter, I could be gone. There is a wisdom teaching that says the way to live your life is to live as if death were right around the corner. Because it is really. None of us knows when our time will come, and we should all live accordingly.