The World is Hard and Strange and Loving. I think!

The world is not always the world I want, but I fear it is the world I have. If I want to make the world a better place I have to make myself a better person. I believed that years ago and I believe that today. "Everything has a price."

"The key to a happy life is to accept you are never actually in control" Jurassic Park. Wisdom can come from some surprisingly strange sources.

I tend to lean on love, what wisdom I can muster, and beauty, like Mahalia Jackson singing a beautiful Christmas carol: Christmas Comes To Us All Once A Year

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wo3kWwnA5fg

I so want this beautiful sentimental Christmas carol to be true, it lifts my spirit, but I believe the truth is more along the lines of there are a lot of non-Christians that December 25th comes too also. I wish them peace and love, and babies born in a world without fear and guns and ambushes and death.


Mary Carstensen shared a fabulous speech from Australia on Facebook; Nine Life Lessons. I embraced it and want to share it because I believe in the basic truths in it. I've spoken these thoughts myself, but Tim Minchin said in minutes what I have tried to say for years in my inarticulate way.

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=855352884549930&theater

In case you don't have the time to listen, here is his list. Nine life lessons:
1.  Don't have a dream.
2.  Don't seek happiness.
3.  There is lots of luck involved.
4.  Exercise (this was a hard one for me.)
5.  Be hard on your opinions, examine them often.
6.  Define yourself by what you love, not what you are against.
7.  Be a teacher, share your wealth of knowledge.
8.  Respect people with less power.
9.  Don't rush.

Quotes:
A true sign of intelligence is not knowledge, but imagination.
Albert Einstein
Strive not to be a success but rather be of value. Albert Einstein
Talent perceives differences, genius, unity. William Butler Yeats

Best six doctors: Sushine, water, rest, air, exercise (there it is again), diet. I can't remember where I copied this from. Sometimes I love the world so much when little gifts like this drop in my lap. I'm lucky -- life lesson #3.

It's weird how traditions come and go.

I can't believe how sad I am about not smoking. My friend for years is sorely missed, but I'm still NOT smoking no matter how much I want one during stressful moments, after dinner, sitting at the computer, writing, after a shower, before going to see Connor, while cooking, watching a movie, reading a book, before I go to sleep, after I wake up, and on and on and on...

Jerry, I finally finished Strange Fruit. That was a hard hard book. How did the South ever change? How did it ever progress to a more tolerant era? How did it give freedoms and understanding where there was none?  How did reasonable win out? Did it? Can reasonableness win again?

Does this mean there is hope for change now, with the current hatreds rampant, with old hatreds resurfaced?

The world is hard and strange and loving and finally full of wisdom.
I think!

I love a world where I can "lift" wisdom from here and there and every where. Thank you world for sharing, teaching, and giving -- Life lesson # 7.