Showing posts with label friends. Show all posts
Showing posts with label friends. Show all posts

Monday, August 31, 2020

Virtual is Reality

 We are not in the Twilight Zone. We are in the 2020 zone. A year of breaking points, catalysts, and pivotal change. Globally, we have seen enough and heard enough, bled enough. Our planet is in transition, gasping and fighting back against her attackers. 

In the United States, we have seen the willfully ignorant scramble to cling to privileges they claim don't exist. They are killing people because they exist and denying that it is genocide. We have faced so many things this year alone, and now our virtual world is more real than ever. We are looking to technology to ease the burdens of our reality and our weariness. We are hoping it will keep us safe from the treats, microscopic, environmental, and violence. We are depending on each other more, though we are further apart. 

As we move into home learning for the five-year-old's step into formal education, I am incredibly grateful for the opportunity to homeschool. We are working on a Kindergarten/First grade hybrid learning model and things are starting to settle into an understanding, a respectful routine for learning and growing. I understand that we are blessed beyond measure, for this opportunity, for this time together.

I am also constantly aware that my safety and my blessings come with an enormous weight. The responsibility of my calling is a constant weight. A constant gnawing at my nerves. I must speak up for the voiceless. I must call out to those in power to take action and create a more equitable world. I must do all I can to serve those who are in need. 

There are more communication resources, more opportunities to enact change more power in the individual than ever before. Though, this power goes both ways. There is more power for one dark minded individual to gain a following. That means we have to be vigilant.  The director of a human-trafficking rescue program said something profound, that she is committed to "sharing as much light as we witness darkness." I love her work and her leadership, and her soul. We must act on the impulses for good, that we may be the light and ignite the lanterns of community, service, and love. Together we can drive out hate and darkness. Together we can connect with our consciousness, being virtually everywhere, while going virtually no where. 

I know that these thought of mine are not profound. They are not unique, not vital, not most eloquent nor succinct. However, if we continue to speak them, our chorus of encouragement might change one heart, buoy one spirit, spark one idea... and those are the little things that have the power to change the world.  

So, as I sit at the dining table of my friend of 22 years, listening to our 5 year-olds playing in the living room, drinking coffee and writing this, I am aware of my blessings and the great responsibility that lies ahead. 

Saturday, April 6, 2013

Saturday Morning Observances

Having breakfast at the local grocery market cafe every Saturday, I see and hear an abundance of things.

I over hear conversations in a variety languages, moms spending a less stressful morning at breakfast with grandparents and kids, fathers getting to know their kids and asking them about their week, husbands and wives eating having breakfast in silence sharing a paper, and a variety of different groups of friends meeting to catch up on life, etc.

This morning, while I sat waiting for my students to arrive, I was privileged to overhear a very interesting series of conversations with a group of old friends.
The players: a pilot for a commercial airline {A}, his wife {B}, a newly appointed local judge {C}, his wife {D}, another man who seems to know much about the City Counsel & local politics (I guess he's a lawyer or journalist) {E}, and another woman who also knows a lot about city politics, but who still seems to be a few steps removed from the actual city government {F}.

Topics they've covered so far:

  1. Travel. 
  2. Pro Sports
  3. The sordid details of the civic drama
  4. New Laws, good and bad
  5. Suspected embezzlement within the top ranks of a local company
  6. Medications and the decline of medical education
  7. The best search engins to use
  8. Religion, to corruption in the church
  9. Lack of faith in the church
  10. The impending fall of the Texas Tech infrastructure
  11. Horrendous injuries sustained on vacation 
  12. Horrendous injuries sustained in the work place
  13. Kids, lack of ambition and over ambitious
  14. Grand-kids, spoiled and deprived
  15. Upcoming vacations & upcoming elections
  16. Views on local fitness centers
  17. Hospital Politics
  18. City Management vs Business Management theory
  19. Weight gain of friends who aren't here
  20. Running Half Marathons
  21. Local Arts & Local Music
  22. The best vacations to take
  23. Movies
  24. Getting older
  25. and so many more... 


I have learned so much this morning and wish that I could have joined in the conversation...