SHAUN'S 30th BIRTHDAY

Wow, Shaun, are you 30?? Doesn't seem possible! April 16, 1979 will be forever etched in my memory because it was YOUR day! I am the one who was blessed by God on that day. You have grown to be a loving, mature Christian man, and I am proud of you. Enjoy this 30th year of life. A friend of your's wants to have a say on this wonderful day, so watch his video and bring back the memories!! I love you, Shaun. Love, Mom.

Reality: Fish Scales, Trees & Me

In my local newspaper I noticed an article about a woman at the Department of Fish and Wildlife in Oregon who studies fish scales. One little scale from a salmon tells the life story of the wide- traveling, delectable fish. Amazing! The rings are arranged much like a fingerprint, and can be compared to the concentric circles in trees. The rings and groups of rings on a fish scale determine the age, species, environmental conditions and other factors that have affected the fish. A cross section of a tree tells us the story of that tree. Amazing! If a scientist had a cross section of me under his microscope, what would my "rings" tell him?

Hopefully the scientist would see rings of humility, kindness, tenacity, strength, peace, love, compliance. Would he detect the rings of tough times? Times of plenty? Rings of sin? How about the ring of truth? I know he'd see 2 wedding rings for me. My childhood years would have made a Ring-Around-the-Rosey. I hope my ring-around-the-collar is not readily apparent. He might see a 3-ring circus or a hollow ring. For certain, plenty of onion rings. This makes me think of when I will meet God, face to face. He will read my rings, whorls, and loops, and He will see my life on earth and what I made of the life He gave me. Does THAT ring a bell? Thanks to the salmon and the trees, it helps me be better prepared for the day my rings will be read.

Salmon Scale

Reality: 10 lb. Bag of Potatoes

For me, 2008 was the year spent on the computer and the phone. Now I have the equivalent of a 10 lb. bag of potatoes strapped to my midsection. It's as if I went to the supermarket, chose those great little red potatoes on sale, brought them home and got out the duct tape and wrapped the tape around the sack of potatoes, strapping them onto my belly and surrounding areas. Now, that is quite the load I'm lugging around, night and day. It's time to do something about this. So, I got onto the Mayo Clinic website and researched aerobic exercise, got my facts, and started a 150-day regimen of aerobics I can do in my limited living space. By the end of the first day I was quite sure I lost the weight equivalent to the plastic bag in which the potatoes come. Whew! That was intense! Now I'm on day 7, which means I have shed a spud about half the size I would put on my plate for dinner. Only 143 more days of "Sweatin' of the Oldie" and I can wave goodbye to the potatoes AND the duct tape! I am very happy that I don't have to deal with a 50 lb. sack of Russets, there's not enough duct tape in my house to handle that. Lord, help me stick to this exercise thing, and, Lord, please leave 2 nice-sized taters up top, will You?

Reality: Neighbors

Everyone has neighbors. Good, bad, weird, quiet, loud, neat or messy, we all have them. In the microcosm where I live (an RV Park), I have 5 neighbors. One lives in a house, one in a mobile home, and three live in RV's, fifth wheel or motorhome. The couple that lives in the house are a riot. They never walk their trash to the dumpster, which is 100 feet away, they always drive to the dumpster, always. She has some good recipes and shares them. They hold BBQ's/picnics in the summer and invite all of us. She is loud and boisterous, but she will drop everything to do you a favor. He is out of a job; the car dealer where he had worked for 10 years went out of business, so he collects unemployment; there are not any jobs in the area right now.
In a fifth wheel, there is the mom, the dad, and the 14-yr old home-schooled son, Kevin. Very nice, very quiet people. Kevin distributes the mail to us. Darla used to hate him, but now he is her favorite friend, bar none. The dad has had rotator cuff surgery and the doctor has not yet released him for work. The mom is a sort of camp host here.
In the mobile home, lives a father and son. The father was a marine in the Vietnam war. The son holds a job no more than 4 months and is trying to collect unemployment. The both have severely disgusting language, the father loudly, the son less loud. They have 2 cats and a dog. Every time they step foot outdoors, they each have a beer and a cigarette in their hand. They start with the beer early in the morning and stop at bedtime. they have very little money, but always enough for beer and cigarettes. They don't pick up their dog poos. They have a nice HDTV/satellite. They owe the owner of this RV park $1,500 in back rent. They would probably do any favor for anybody, but talking to them is excruciating, with that filthy language they spout. They are moving to Las Vegas this Friday. (Whew!)


In a small fifth wheel live two brothers. One cooks at a local restaurant, one broke his back working in the oil fields and is on disability. They are mountain men of sorts, very simple life, very quiet people. Neither one drives. They recently were given a nice canoe but have not taken it to the river yet, they are waiting until it warms up. They often have a granddaughter visit, her family got evicted from the park; they were my next-door neighbors.


In the motorhome lives a retired couple. He worked for the government in task force. They both make wonderful jewelry items that implement porcupine needles and copper beads. They are very nice, quiet people, and would do anything to help a neighbor. He likes good knives, she likes to gamble. They bring me a local publication every week and sometimes the local newspaper. They are both uneducated, self-admittedly, but mean well even if they don't pronounce words correctly.


My 6th neighbor lives on the other side of this RV park. He is 6 year old Curtis. He is the most self-assured person I've met in recent history. He comes around to sell me rocks and sticks, probably out of my own yard. Just before Christmas, he came around asking for a job around this place so he could have gift money. I had him take out the recycling trash and Windex my headlights and taillights. I paid him handsomely. He hand-wrote a Christmas card and today brought me a Valentine with a mini candybar inside. He is tough. He rides his bicycle, falls off sometimes, gets right back up and keeps riding. He is very well-spoken, above his years. He got a whistle the other day, and blew it in short bursts all day long. I could hear it from here, inside my RV. He blew it for at least 36 hours. Today, he doesn't have it. I think his parents hid it. This kid will go far. He will start a company and become rich and famous, mark my words. He has qualities that we adults need to learn. He is an inspiration, he does not give up, he does not cry, he knows exactly what he wants and does not expect a handout. He will never collect unemployment, the rich and famous rarely do!


The nice thing about having neighbors is that when it rains you never see them, but when the sun breaks, we all congregate in the road and catch up with all the goings on. We pretty much respect the others' privacy, except for sunny days. I hope your neighbors are characters, too, and you can learn to appreciate their personalities, differences, and ways of life. And, I hope you have many sunny days in your neighborhood. You might just make a new friend!

Reality: Winter

Ah, the harsh reality of winter is here. It rains where I live, not constantly, but often enough. There are many a bright sunny day as well. One thing that might distinguish MY winter from YOUR winter is, it is outright green around here. My hardy fuchsia is blossoming. My Greek oregano keeps producing. My chives are thriving. My aloe has not succumbed to the occasional freezes. The English Laurel tree is budding like crazy. The holly and the ivy are ever-present. My thyme is on my side. It's like spring with very cool temperatures. It's 40 degrees at night, 45 degrees in the day. Just like your refrigerator. When we have a rainstorm, it warms up to 50-60 degrees because of the marine influences. Anything but bleak. Most of my life I shoveled snow all winter. When it snows here, there is no accumulation because the rain soon follows and melts everything. It hails, but the stones are tinier than a petite pea and barely make a "ping" on the roof. I once froze a hailstone as big as a grapefruit to show the insurance adjuster in case he doubted that I had roof damage. That was in Nebraska, the capitol of severe weather. Winters on the Oregon coast are not something you suffer through. Yes, it rains, which for me offers opportunity for introspection. When the sun breaks, all the neighbors go outdoors and we all get reacquainted. I don't even own a snow shovel or an ice scraper. I own wild bird food, because the birdies are abundant all winter, but that's another story. The sunsets are gorgeous, very pastel. The nutria poop on the docks. The steelhead run in January and February (ocean-going trout). It's just not bad at all. I better wind this up, because I bet you have to go heave a bunch of the white stuff and suffer a little frostbite. I'm sorry :)

Reality: You can't be a loser if you're a wiener

Darla the daschund is fierce, brave, watchful, clean. She is also a clown, clever, mushy, loving. We should all aspire to be more like her. Why? She is positively certain of her purpose in life. Her self-esteem is such that she will never need counseling. She knows she must give a warning bark to any being that is in her line of vision, for this is HER earth for as far as her eyes can see. She endows her affection to certain people, after they have earned her trust. Until she loves you, she hates you. She thinks nothing of challenging a dog much larger than herself, she does not know she would lose that fight, she just knows she will fight. She knows not to bark at birdies, for birdies are my friends. This takes restraint on her part, but because she loves me, she is silent. Darla goes full steam at every aspect of her "job", never asking for a raise, fully understanding her job description. She knows when she deserves a treat and is content between treats. She allows herself to sleep in because she knows how demanding her job is when she clocks in. She knows when to shush up if I look really serious. She doesn't lick herself "down there", because she makes sure no bits of poo poo are remaining after a session. She is unhappy if I dress her up, she is a wild animal in her brain, a wild animal with comforts I afford her. Imagine your outlook if you had her outlook. Seizing each day with full enthusiasm, knowing exactly what you must achieve, knowing exactly your strengths and talents, and using them to the maximum. She is a mentor of sorts. And, in the race of life, wiener takes all!

Reality: The Hampster Wheel

Today's reality is what I fondly call the Hampster Wheel. It is a community service where I live, that displays classified-type ads on an ever-turning wheel. They type up these ads that people call in, and affix them with tape to the wheel. The wheel goes around and around for several hours every morning. Sometimes I am treated to viewing a scissors snipping one ad out and then a hand taping the newest ad in its' place. The wheel must go on. The humor is in reading the ads. Many are misspelled, some with hilarious results. "1998 Toyota Camry, new breaks, $375 OBO". "FICA tree, 6 feet, $50". (is FICA that new social security withholding tree?). "Seashore Literac y needs you help locating...." "Sinning auditions this Wed......" (What type of songs do they expect?). One morning our area was covered with a blanket of snow overnight, very wet, ice on top. The hampster wheel channel had a stationary message displayed: Some channels are off because of snow build-up on the satellite dish. I'll scrape it off. Didn't expect snow this morn. Al. And Al doesn't even know that he treated me to my day's dose of humor. He was serious. Okay, i'll give him a brake.

Reality vs. Humor?

Is reality opposed to humor? Are they opponents, rivals, willing to duke it out on the field every Friday night? Can reality have a fantasy team? If reality is scrambled eggs, then humor added is scrambled eggs with salsa and cilantro. I want the toppings on my scrambled eggs. A side order of thick-sliced crispy bacon on my plate would make reality taste even better. Toast with real butter smeared on it would make reality a breeze to face. Then, what we have is the breakfast of champions: reality with several sides of humor. Not a dreadful meal, but made palatable with salsa, bacon and toast. Reality, the most important meal of the day!!!!!!