Reaching Up

I thank my friend who sent me this video clip from a Harvard professor.
It is 90 seconds.
I hope you like it.


https://www.youtube.com/embed/YjntXYDPw44



One reason I like this is because this professor is an "older" man speaking, still engaged, still willing to serve.  
He has suffered a heart attack, cancer, and a stroke.  None of that has stopped him from forging on with learning and teaching and traveling.


You can see at the end that permission is granted to pass this on as long as it is not edited.

Grateful for your visit,
Riverwatch

Christmas is coming!

Christmas is coming and it occurs to me that it is probably time to start getting ready.

You can never start getting ready for Christmas too early.  Heck, I had a friend who was always ready for Christmas in August.  God rest her soul.  She wore out quick in life.

I usually wait til the last minute.  I need the adrenalin rush to get me through the ordeal.

But this year is going to be different because I recognize that the earth is going through some major rapid changes and I have decided it is easier to decide what to buy for folks when climate chaos is in the works.

This year I am buying everybody the same thing.  A towel.
One beach size bath towel for each person on my Christmas list.

I got my idea from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

That book has a few things to say on the subject of towels.

A towel, it says, is about the most massively useful thing a hitchhiker can have.  Partly it has great practical value.  You can wrap it around you for warmth as you bound across the cold moons of Jaglan Beta; 

 you can lie on it on the brilliant beaches, inhaling the heady sea vapors; imgur.com
om

you can sleep under it beneath the stars which shine so redly on the desert; imgur.com


use it to sail a miniraft down the slow heavy River Moth; 



 wet it for use in hand-to-hand combat; imgur.com

wrap round your head to ward off noxious fumes or to avoid unwanted gazes;  

and of course dry yourself off with it if it still seems to be clean enough.

More importantly, a towel has immense psychological value.  
For some reason, 
if a non-hitchhiker discovers that a hitchhiker has a towel with him, he will automatically assume that he is also in possession of a toothbrush, washcloth, soap, tin of biscuits, flask, compass, map, ball of string, gnat spray, wet-weather gear, space suit, etc., etc.  
Furthermore, the non-hitchhiker will then happily lend the hitchhiker any of these or a dozen other items that the hitchhiker might accidently have "lost".  
What the non-hitchhiker will think is that any man who can hitch the length and breadth of the Galaxy, rough it, slum it, struggle against the terrible odds, win through and still know where his towel is, is clearly a man to be reckoned with.

gem-a-day.blogspot.com






Thanks for stopping by.
Hope HARP is not pointed over your sky.
Be prepared.


Keep track of your towel,
Riverwatch

My Struggle With Being Humble

My favorite quote of Golda Meir:

            Thank you. Spot on!  I feel better.

Israel's Golda did make a mistake, though, when she said there were no Palestinians
there on the land
when the Jews took over the land to make a nation! 

                                                                                                                                                                 

However, I know she was talking semantics:
There were Arabs, not Palestinians.
There was no nation.

A bit like when the Europeans immigrated to this great land of ours here in America 

and said there were no people here,
 only Indians.

As a hybrid  Indian, I don't think those Europeans were talking semantics.

                                 "Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee" by Dee Brown  is a history of America looking East instead of looking West.

"Westward Ho the Wagons" is no longer how I visualize our early
immigration and land grab in America.
I stand looking East.
                                                               
       I recommend this history book to everyone who thinks 

the uninvited immigrants crossing our borders today
are horrible people,
criminals with bad intent.

I appreciate your visit today and wish you well,
Riverwatch


PS    The big fight over land seems to be centered around Who Was There First.

         You know, entitlement.  

     "We were here first!"

         But as a person who walks daily through the misty fog of local polygamy
here in the southwest desert,
looking at  strings of women following one man,  

                                          I can safely assure all entitled people:

          it is definately not Who Was There First.  

     The real winner is Who Got There Last.

Life is fluid.

Entitlement sucks and is a set-up for a rude awakening.

And I am entitled to say that!!

Education

I don't know how it is in your church,

or mountain side open-air cathedral, 
or lake side beach chair,
or even cassino,

but in the church I attend, every Sunday there is a portion of the worship service where we can turn in cards requesting prayer for a specific person or circumstance.

Not only do we get to pray for each others' concerns and dilemmas as Pastor leads us in prayer, but we also get to hear the concerns and dilemmas of the crowd.

This Mother's Day Sunday we prayed for several people, war-torn nations, weather and travel.
But the prayer request that pierced my heart was the prayer for education and educators.

I believe that was the first time I heard that prayed over.....
or maybe just the first time it pierced my heart.
My daughter, a school teacher, had called me the night before in such anguish over how education has gone in our nation.
My heart was open to the anguish of educators.

As I have added education and educators to my prayer list, I wonder what specific should I pray for?
It is all complex even in America.........
                     and fraught  with many  issues,
                                  dangerous issues, in some other lands
                                                       and for some other peoples.

But since science disproves science (again and again), I will start praying for lifelong learning for all of us.
We must be ever learning .

Go tell it on the mountain, over the hills and everywhere,


                                                                                                     
                                                                                                                                        fotosearch.com


 



Go tell it on the mountain.

zoeaustrailia.org


I appreciate you and your visit,
Riverwatch



2 Timothy 1:7   For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power,
                          and of love, and of a sound mind.

"Project"

I like being old.  Sort of.

I am 71 years of age, and I am still learning.

Here is the latest.

As you probably know, I am a nurse
                                            a born reformer, even revolutionary
                                                 a missionary of God's love for you,
                                                     a missionary of ideas,
                                                          a skilled rescuer,
                                                               a fixer.
                                                     

I am not quite sure, being of good cheer and all, but I have always had a little suspicion down through the ages that I get on other people's nerves.

        "Project!  Project!"     

So along came a big "Project!" a few weeks ago and I was so tired I couldn't even begin to think about the solution for my loved one.  Old, I am.  So I prayed for help.

Here came the inspiration:  A solution is not required.

I was astounded.  Doesn't everything require a solution??!!!

Apparently not.

I did nothing.

Nobody did anything.

Doing nothing felt so good.

Why did I not hear this wisdom when I was young?

It is liberating.

 

 










Having built a lot of my life around finding great solutions, not just for me but for others, I have entered a new phase of my life.

A solution is not required.  

Thanks for dropping in to see how I'm doing,
I'm doing better and I hope you are, too.
Riverwatch

It is ok. Really.

One of my favorite authors is Anne Lamott.

Here is a particularly comforting quote from her:

"You own everything that happened to you.

Tell your stories.

If people wanted you to write warmly about them, they should have behaved better."

Here is my own little quote:

"It is not always a good thing to be a close associate of somebody who loves to write.......and it is particularly hazardous to give birth to somebody who loves to write!"

Riverwatch

November Rain

 I saw a young woman with a name tag on recently
 that said  November Rain.

"Is that really your name?" I asked.

Yes it is.

I want to be called November Rain, 

not Riverwatch!!!

Like my college-student granddaughter says, 

"Some people feel the rain.  Others just get wet."


thereinventiontour.co.uk

A Changing World

So the little class was on "Turning What We Know Into Action in a Changing World".



How does an old person cope with a world that is changing more rapidly than it ever has in the known history of mankind?

How does an old person change "slowing down" into "speeding up" as opposed to "getting out of the way"?

I know there is a way, because I have a close friend who does it!
She is a social doer.
Not exactly a social butterfly (she isn't lithe and pretty or even able to locomote well) but she keeps herself extremely busy with the social affairs of town and country.


No minutes to pause and take a breath.

I know why she does it.
She told me why.
"I am NOT going to think about dying!"

So there!

Well, that works well until you have a stroke or something!

 

Actually, she did have a stroke.  

She climbed out of that abyss faster than I thought possible.          

She climbed out to get back to the social scene and volunteering.
She is NOT going to think about dying.  She is NOT a poet.  She is NOT a philosopher.

I admire her and love her but I do not pretend to understand her.

We are surrounded by the death of others...should not that give us pause?


Pause and take a deep breath.


I personally draw the conclusion that we are supposed to think about death!

Once upon a time, we did think about death.                                                                                         People died at home.
"Wakes" were held at home.
Sit up with the deceased.  Talk.  Cry.                                                                                                         Maybe have a little party.....close by the casket, not off at some social venue where death can be momentarily forgotten.

Awareness, keen awareness, that death is part of life and that the "departed" were not gone-gone, just gone.   And the solemn thought that our day is coming.


Is it not in our best interest to have developed some internal coping skills so that we don't need to stay constantly engaged with entertainment to avoid thinking about death?

Now I am NOT judging!
After all, I turn thinking into entertainment all the time.
I take classes.

This little class said we turn what we know into action in this changing world
by knowing WHY we exist and by knowing WHAT we stand for.

Oh my stars!!!  Am I in trouble!!
Why do I exist?  I am no longer sure why I exist.
I still am sure, pretty sure, that I do exist.        
Why is less clear these days.
I think it has something to do with "the whole" and little to do with "the me".

And why is what I stand for changing, growing, roping around, fraying, and becoming fluid??

Oh my stars!!!  Am I in trouble!

Of course, people who have love do not ever wonder about why they exist.
They know the purpose of life.

Philosophers are love-lorn.  It's true.

When I was young I knew easily why I existed.
I existed for LOVE and excitement and learning and adventure     .....,,,,,,,,,,,,
                                   
                                     and then I grew old,
                                                                     and became a philosopher.

Thank you for your visit to the aging crazies.
Your visit means more than words can say.
Thanks, Riverwatch

"Go out and honor all people..."

Church

It is always a joy to be a vital part of a worthy victory.

We have sensed the needs of this poor, stricken world, grievously vexed by doubts, confusions, anxieties, sorrows, cruelties, and deepening fears.

The church with our help can change this situaltion.

The church, a church,  is the open channel through which we can work to establish truth, mercy, justice, brotherhood, confidence, faith and love.

The church must be victorious.

Happy Morning!  I aappreciate your visit,

Riverwatch

John F. Kennedy