show me, don't tell me

Beauty begins the moment you decide to be yourself. My mom always told us to be ourselves, do onto others as you'd have done to you, be kind to the underdog and work hard. I love this photo for the confidence in my Mother and the beauty of the composition.

What you do today is important because you are exchanging a day of your life for it. Not sure why my Grandma Marvel is holding my mom while chilling with a bear. But I love her sense of adventure. Life moves so fast, especially when you have kids. You have 940 Saturdays from the time your child is born until they are 18 years old. 260 Saturdays gone by the time your child is five years old. Use your time wisely.

Sometimes you will never know the value of a moment until it becomes a memory.

A lie can get half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes. Drama, drama, drama. Do NOT save it for your mama. She doesn't want it and neither do you. Don't fool yourself lies, gossip, cliques and cold pricklies are not contained to junior high and middle school. They romp around for decades after. Not much you can do, but try to stay ahead of it or keep your head high.

A good laugh and a long sleep are the two best cures for anything. My Grandfather is the little guy standing.

Live in the sunshine. Swim in the sea. Drink the wild air. My Grandparents always had a sense of wonder and adventure. Lucky for my mom she was part of fun road trips as a small child. My sister and I got to go many places with our Grandparents: Oregon, Washington, Washington D.C., Florida, South Carolina, Hawaii, California, Trinidad, Tobago, the Cayman islands, Canada, Europe and even China. I am sure I missed a few other places. Bottom line, we had a sweet life with them. I am grateful every time I look through old photos.

 

Exist to be happy not to impress. Do your own thing. Do not worry what other people think, just make yourself happy.

 

You are not a mess. You are a feeling person in a messy world. I am a feeling person. I have been that way all my life. Even though I am 100% deaf in one year, I catch most everything around me. It's a blessing and a curse in the same. Some days I wish I could tune it all out. Life would be simpler.

I remember this day at the park. While we were walking to the playground we took a brown dirt path, green grass surrounded the path. I said to my mom "We are like the ants on a log. The green grass is the celery, the brown path is the peanut butter and we are the raisins... only we are walking raisins". I wonder what my Mom thought when she heard that. If she was like me as a parent she was thinking "When can I take a nap later today?".

Wonder where this all first started? click here.