reverse threading

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be kind. [two artists tuesday]

be kind collage with color font copy

we have a new frog in our pond! two actually.  this feels like perfect timing for us; we needed the good sign of a frog in our midst.  both of these frogs are different than previous pond-frogs we have had in past years; these two are leggier, less body and more frog-legs.  we’ve named the bigger one ripple and the little one pebble.  neither comes when we call their names, but ripple is not as shy as pebble.  we’ve advanced toward the pond and pebble will dive right in before we get close, but ripple sits quietly on one of the rocks and waits.  when he (or she) eventually dives in, it’s with a flourish and we get to see the concentric circles that spread outward, which is where it got its name.

it’s where we sit in our belief – as artists, as people – that the concentric circles spread outward from the center.  the only place from which we can really make a difference.  any difference.  it hearkens back to my sweet momma…her very core believing that all should start (and end) with being kind.  on her website www.beakysbooks.com is quoted mr. fred rogers, “there are three ways to ultimate success.  the first way is to be kind.  the second way is to be kind.  the third way is to be kind.”  it’s how she lived.  she would point to her life and asked what she had accomplished.  greatness.  she accomplished greatness.  because she spread kindness.  out and out and out it went, the ever-widening rings into the world.

it doesn’t seem that complicated.  it doesn’t take wealth or a super pac or any kind of grandeur to accomplish.  it is simple.  basic.  in the words of john wesley, “do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in all the ways you can, in all the places you can, at all the times you can, to all the people you can, as long as ever you can.”  or my sweet momma’s favorite verse, ” i shall pass through this world but once.   any good therefore that i can do or any kindness that i can show to any human being, let me do it now.  let me not defer or neglect it, for i shall not pass this way again.”(stephen grellet)  or from the dalai lama, “be kind whenever possible.  it is always possible.”  right at the center, right where ripple quietly sits before the great hop – right before we move or speak or rebel or undermine or chasten or deflate or insult – is the place where we can choose to be kind.

for BE KIND products – so many things with this basic message – click here OR click on the BE KIND collage box above or below. you will be linked to a t-shirt, but be sure to scroll down on that society6.com page to see the “also available as” products.

be kind collage with color font copy

read DAVID’S thoughts on this TWO ARTISTS TUESDAY

TWO ARTISTS TUESDAY – ON OUR SITE

Screen Shot 2018-08-07 at 12.27.50 PM

please visit our kerrianddavid page and like us on facebook! thank you! 🙂

be kind ©️ 2018 kerri sherwood & david robinson

 


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be kind. [two artists tuesday]

be kind collage with color font copy

we have a new frog in our pond! two actually.  this feels like perfect timing for us; we needed the good sign of a frog in our midst.  both of these frogs are different than previous pond-frogs we have had in past years; these two are leggier, less body and more frog-legs.  we’ve named the bigger one ripple and the little one pebble.  neither comes when we call their names, but ripple is not as shy as pebble.  we’ve advanced toward the pond and pebble will dive right in before we get close, but ripple sits quietly on one of the rocks and waits.  when he (or she) eventually dives in, it’s with a flourish and we get to see the concentric circles that spread outward, which is where it got its name.

it’s where we sit in our belief – as artists, as people – that the concentric circles spread outward from the center.  the only place from which we can really make a difference.  any difference.  it hearkens back to my sweet momma…her very core believing that all should start (and end) with being kind.  on her website www.beakysbooks.com is quoted mr. fred rogers, “there are three ways to ultimate success.  the first way is to be kind.  the second way is to be kind.  the third way is to be kind.”  it’s how she lived.  she would point to her life and asked what she had accomplished.  greatness.  she accomplished greatness.  because she spread kindness.  out and out and out it went, the ever-widening rings into the world.

it doesn’t seem that complicated.  it doesn’t take wealth or a super pac or any kind of grandeur to accomplish.  it is simple.  basic.  in the words of john wesley, “do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in all the ways you can, in all the places you can, at all the times you can, to all the people you can, as long as ever you can.”  or my sweet momma’s favorite verse, ” i shall pass through this world but once.   any good therefore that i can do or any kindness that i can show to any human being, let me do it now.  let me not defer or neglect it, for i shall not pass this way again.”(stephen grellet)  or from the dalai lama, “be kind whenever possible.  it is always possible.”  right at the center, right where ripple quietly sits before the great hop – right before we move or speak or rebel or undermine or chasten or deflate or insult – is the place where we can choose to be kind.

for BE KIND products – so many things with this basic message – click here OR click on the BE KIND collage box above or below. you will be linked to a t-shirt, but be sure to scroll down on that society6.com page to see the “also available as” products

be kind collage with color font copy

read DAVID’S thoughts on this TWO ARTISTS TUESDAY

TWO ARTISTS TUESDAY – ON OUR SITE

Screen Shot 2018-08-07 at 12.27.50 PM

please visit our kerrianddavid page and like us on facebook! thank you! 🙂

be kind ©️ 2018 kerri sherwood & david robinson

 


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shayne. the trilogy. [d.r. thursday]

square shayne for melange 21

my sweet momma’s birthday is today.  she would have been 97.  she died shortly before her 94th birthday but remains a force in the world.  her kindness and her zealous belief in kindness continue to ripple outward.  i heard beaky firsthand when My Girl was talking about the world and its issues and said, “the best thing i can do is to be kind to people.”  i’ve seen beaky firsthand when My Boy has stood firm in raising pride awareness.

now, i know this story has been told before, but i risk being called redundant to tell it again.  back when my momma was 93 and facing down stage four breast cancer having had a double mastectomy a few months prior, she told us she felt like she had accomplished little in her life.  there could be little farther from the truth.  but she insisted she had no title (“engineer”, “architect” etc) to put after her name.  we knew she had, however, three manuscripts she had written decades prior – stories about the family dachshund named shayne – stories she had tried to have published with no success back in the day.  stories told from shayne’s point of view and simply wholesome and delightful, we searched for – and found – the manuscripts.  and immediately got to work.

my amazing husband david illustrated the first of the trilogy, named SHAYNE.  i laid out the text and the graphics of the book itself,  designed merchandise like an “author” shirt, banners and a shayne iphone case for momma, built a website, contacted newspapers and we hastened to put together a release party with a reading and press and a celebration with brownies and asti spumanti at her assisted living facility in florida.  when we told her – on MY birthday in march (for what could be a better thank-you-for-my-birthday than this?) what was happening on april 11th, she squealed like a school girl and started practicing signing her name with a sharpie.  it was BY FAR one of the pinnacle moments of my life to see my mom – the AUTHOR- hold her book, read aloud to the dozens of people who attended and sign “BEAKY” on her books as her fans lined up to purchase the earliest copies.   eighteen days later, my sweet momma was no longer on this earth.

david has since illustrated both the second and third books.  the second, SHAYNE AND THE YELLOW DRAGON, was released a couple years ago and today, on her birthday, i am so excited to tell you that the third SHAYNE AND THE NEW BABY will be released shortly.  the trilogy will be complete!   my sweet momma, beatrice h. arnson “beaky” the AUTHOR would be pretty jazzed to sign each of these, but i know her blessing is on them as she reaches through the invisible line between heaven and earth.

we will keep you posted on the release.  i have this sweet vision of so-so-many-many-books being sold (to individuals, to schools, to libraries, to dachshund owners, to families with small children, to families with dogs, to dog lovers, to teachers, to scholastic press or to some entity that sees how important it is to have dreams come true – at ANY age) that we might start a beaky-beaky foundation and help – in some well-thought-out way – in momma’s name.  if you have any ideas, let us know.  we want to keep beaky’s ripples going.

my sweet momma’s website:  www.beakysbooks.com/

SHAYNE on www.amazon.com

frontcoverscreenshot

momma effusive at shayne

read DAVID’S thoughts on this D.R.THURSDAY (DAVID ROBINSON THURSDAY)

D.R. THURSDAY – ON OUR SITE

SHAYNE, SHAYNE & THE YELLOW DRAGON ©️ 2015 kerri sherwood & david robinson, beatrice h. arnson

 

 


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chicken marsala monday

sometimesfaith WITH EYES jpeg copy 3“…well, i will walk by faith, well, even when i cannot see, because this broken road prepares your will for me…” (lyrics from a really great 2002 song by jeremy camp called ‘walk by faith’)

“we walk by faith and not by sight….” (19th century lyrics from a 1984 hymn ‘we walk by faith’ by marty haugen)

trust.  practice.  faith.  repeat.  not necessarily in that order.  through the ages, a common challenge – faith without seeing.  ‘we’ are no different now than ‘they’ were ‘back then.’  faith.  it’s ambiguous.

it’s funny.  you might think that the most faith-reinforcing moments come during a service and this true for some.  as a minister of music for three decades, i have always sought to create those moments for others…when all things come together:  music, lyrics, emotion to amplify the words (and the word) spoken in the service and resonate within someone’s heart and reinforce their feelings of faith. it is a job i take seriously; sometimes you only have one chance to help connect a service with a person’s heart, one chance to reassure, one chance to raise awareness, one chance to have them ask questions within their faith, to challenge their assumptions for and otherwise.

for me, though, the most faith-reinforcing moments are outside of the faith-based venue, be it a church, temple, cathedral, mosque.  they are the moments that i can feel the hugeness of this universe of God and my absolute tiny-ness within it:  walking in the woods, standing in the sunlight, looking out on a mountain, holding hands, seeing the moon rise over the lake, watching the surf, seeing love pass between two people’s eyes, hearing my children’s voices, finding the right chord for a song, eating breakfast on the deck in the sun with cardinals, hearing music swell…

as a minister of music, i have heard a lot of sermons and been at an un-countable number of services.  think about it.  (and this is not counting all the years not spent in this position, nor does it count all the extra services at certain times of the year…you’re thinking, “ok, ok, ohmygosh, we get it!” )  so thirty years multiplied by 52 weeks multiplied by at least two services a sunday (sometimes three, but we will round it to two, as you roll your eyes.)  that equals 3,120 services and sermons.  and let me just mention, some have been…ummm…way better than others.  so you would likely deduce that i would know all the stories of the old and new testaments pretty well by now.  well, i beg to differ with you.  for me, those stories are peripheral.

what really counts for me is the stuff you can’t see with your eyes, the things you can only experience:  love, kindness, peace, generosity…  simplicities.  complexities.  these are the foundations of my faith.  faith in goodness.  faith in being held.  faith in grace. choosing actions that are life-giving.  knowing that if i fail today, i can try again tomorrow.  walking the broken road, faithfully believing that there is a higher power that i can’t see but i can experience.  one that surrounds me in my joy and in my pain.  ptom, in his lenten sermon the other evening, said, “God is for you.”  it takes a little (read:  a lot of) practice; it’s a new day every new day.  but i believe.

FAITH TAKES PRACTICE – we have different products for this on both www.society6.com/chickenmarsala and www.society6.com/kerrisherwood

society 6 info jpeg copy

 

CHICKEN MARSALA MONDAY – ON OUR SITE

 

faith takes practice FRAMED ART PRINT copy

wall art, cards, home decor

 

faith takes practice SQ PILLOW copy

 

faith takes practice LEGGINGS copy

‘faith takes practice’ LEGGINGS

 

faith chicken mug copy

 

 

 

faith white mug copy

 

faith chicken iphone case copy

read DAVID’S thoughts on FAITH TAKES PRACTICE

 

sometimes faith takes a little practice ©️ 2016 david robinson & kerri sherwood

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


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two artists tuesday #2

card with frame be kind jpegmy sweet momma had a favorite quote.  it reads, “i shall pass through this world but once.  any good, therefore, that i can do or any kindness that i can show to any fellow creature, let me do it now.  let me not defer or neglect it for i shall not pass this way again.”  (this is generally credited to stephen grellet.)  the thing about favorite quotes and humanness is that sometimes we tout them, but fail to live by them.  momma really truly lived by this one.  she chose kindness, even over her own comfort, even over how she might humanly default in a given moment.  a little card with this quote hangs on a piece of tin in our kitchen.  being thready and all that means i love to gather things around me that remind of, well, things and people and places and ideals and moments.  mmm…you know what i mean.

ptom recently spoke about what it means to be in community…what building a sense of community boils down to.  he answered his own question, “radical kindness.”  can you imagine a world – everywhere – that was radically kind?  KIND.  sheesh.  what on earth would happen?  if kindness was everyone’s first response.  if everyone led with kindness.  if kindness superceded competition and agenda and reactionary anger and brazen cruelty.

when i drew this image i have to say i had never before noticed that the word “kin” is IN the word “kind”.  somehow it hadn’t occurred to me.  but after i drew all the stick people in a field of hopeful yellow scribbles (representing sun and warmth and generous days) i saw the word KIN.

be kind.  be kin.  yes.  we-are-all-in-this-together.  in the whole wide world.  should be simple, eh?  this week’s melange two artist tuesday.

BE KIN/BE KIND MERCHANDISE

mug BeKind

TWO ARTIST TUESDAY

www.kerrianddavid.com/the-melange

check out DAVID’S thoughts on this TWO ARTIST TUESDAY

framed printBeKind

be kind tote bag

be kind. ©️ 2016  kerri sherwood & david robinson


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#MeToo

Screen Shot 2017-12-27 at 5.10.57 PM i believe in inherent goodness.  the inherent goodness of each and every person.  born in beauty, walking in beauty.  i blame my sweet momma.  she looked this way at every single person who crossed her path.
          but then, there’s the rest.  predisposed psychological genetics.  environment.  social prejudices.  bigotry.  elitism.  lack of empathy.  the inability to walk in another’s shoes.  the lack of wanting to try to walk in another’s shoes.  some kind of warped misinformed yet embraced caste system.  jealousy.  bitterness.  the web of ‘ugly’ has many faces.  and people twist.  and that inherent goodness seems to go underground.  we wonder if there is, indeed, any goodness left.  we are confronted with this question over and over again it seems, especially these days.
          we had a discussion about goodness recently.  it became heated.  the dog left the room and retreated to the bathroom.  we were intense.  too intense.  arguing for the same point, we came from two different directions, two different backgrounds.  but we were heading, actually, in the same direction.
          each of us carries our gift of inherent goodness.  we choose each and every day whether we access it or not. my momma’s adherence to the adage, “i shall pass through this world but once.  any good, therefore, that i can do or any kindness that i can show to any fellow creature, let me do it now.  let me not defer or neglect it for i shall not pass this way again.” often rings in my ears.  we all make decisions each day; some steeped in good, some not so much.
          as we approached the holidays and the end of the year, we were deeply diving into cleaning out.  seems right at the end of the year.  old boxes of random items that had accumulated in the years lived in this home, vestiges of life before, of life growing up, of goodnesses shown and received.  we had so much fun as we cleaned; i’d show d pictures or mementos from places or people or the children, every one of them an opportunity for a story.  some carried aha moments, some elicited sighs of where-does-the-time-go, some made me laugh or teary, some stopped me in my tracks.
          i came across things from way-earlier-life, the time i had spent growing up on long island.  my seagull collection, plastic seagulls suspended on wires attached to rocks or shells or pieces of cork, a 70s thing for sure.  my horse collection, which was, in my mind, massive, but when i unpacked it was more like 15 horse statues and ribbons from showing in horse shows, drawings i had painstakingly drawn, books i pored over and over and studied at a much younger age.  a doll collection with hand sewn or hand crocheted outfits made lovingly by my grandmother ‘mama dear’s’ hands.  books and notebooks and old calendars.  trinkets and rocks and feathers.  cards and letters i saved for decades.  artwork by the girl and the boy.  little notes they wrote to me.  an old electric typewriter and a case of 45rpm records we played the night we found them.
          and then there are the reminders from a time i don’t talk about so much.  a time when i became a #MeToo.  it takes my breath away to think of that 19 year old girl.  me – an idealistic, innocent, youngest-by-far child who looked at the world through poetic eyes and trusting-colored glasses.  my heart breaks now for this young woman who found her way through a terrifying -and life-changing- time pretty much alone, seeking little help for an act that drove to her core and was more than difficult to voice in a late 1970s judicial system.  because, you know, not everyone is good.  not everyone holds their inherent goodness ahead of their selfish, controlling, violent behaviors.  back then, counseling, and even prosecuting, was rare.  i didn’t experience either one.  the help of counseling nor the satisfaction of prosecuting this person who took away my belief and trust in goodness.  for a time, fear coursed through me.  my view of others became jaded and distrusting.  i sought refuge in varying ways, but never really explained why to myself or others.  i didn’t understand what caused this man to behave as he had, nor did i understand that it wasn’t mine to understand.  what i do know, is that i grew.
          and now, as our world opens their listening hearts to women and girls everywhere, i am grateful.  grateful for their collective voices and the deserved help extended to them. grateful that even in giving individual voice, they are moving through the processing of it, the reason for being a #MeToo becoming smaller than #MeToo survival.
          i was once told wise words from a friend when i was grieving my momma’s death.  joan said, “the only way to get to the other side is through it.”
          as i sort through all the pieces of life i have carried in boxes, in bins, in photographs, in my heart and soul, through all these years, i realize again that these words are so true.  in so many situations, so many life arenas. the only way to get to the other side is through it.  and then, you can find inherent goodness again.

 


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common ground. on this good earth.

yesterday i received a message of generosity.  i was struck by its kindness. it read, “dear kerri, though politically i am on the opposite side of the spectrum of you, i want to tell you i always love reading your articles. we are both wives, mothers, lovers of nature, animals and our families. i choose to take what you write in and love to live in it awhile…”

paper mache earthcommon ground. we have common ground, despite our differences. and we can meet there – on that good earth – to celebrate the ways we are the same. in generosity.

too often we cling to our differences. ptom talked about the icy grip of our own stubbornness and i cringed thinking of the times i had fiercely hung on with that icy grip. we believe it is our right to harbor resentments and hatred. we hold our deposits into a grudge bank tightly, haughty looks on our faces and in our hearts. there is a common ground there too, but no generosity enters that place and the soil is tainted with our own ideas of self-importance.

i was talking to d the other day and we passed a place in our town that always reminds me of a plethora of memories, some of which are not entirely pleasant. i am grateful to the menopause wizards who have somehow blocked the synapses in my brain making it impossible for me to remember all the details of the unpleasantness and difficulty that took place there. the details have become fuzzy; ok, who am i kidding? the details aren’t even fuzzy. it’s more like a very low dense fog. it makes it impossible for me to hang onto the grudges i’m sure i’m “supposed” to still have. i can’t remember them. for that matter, i can scarcely remember all of what happened. what a good thing. instead, with no credit to me or any intentional decision i made, i remember the positive things that happened in that place, on that good earth. i can’t help but wonder what might happen were i to intentionally make decisions that way…releasing the things i have felt that have made me cling to useless negative energy.

i can’t help thinking that our world would be radically transformed if we could release the grudges (and over-important-ized-memories of how we were somehow wronged and prejudices and bigotry and inequity and walls we have built) that hold us back from meeting together, from finding common ground. we could choose to celebrate the ways we are the same. in generosity.

it’s there. the possibility. the space around us could become saner, with grace for each other, a place of peace.  on this good earth.

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there are angels all around you.

angelsallaroundyoujpeg“there are angels all around you,” pete said. he said this a few years ago now and it has stuck with me like glue. it was snowing – fiercely – and i had chosen to go drive in it with my inordinately-low-to-the-ground little xb. maybe not a terribly smart decision, but i needed to purchase a special gift and overnight it, so i left home determined to get to the little shop called ‘peacetree’ and find the perfect present. i took wrapping paper, a card, tape, scissors and a fedex envelope with me, in an effort to be organized and confuse the universe with my illogical logic.

having found and wrapped the perfect gift at the shop, i looked outside the big front window and saw that, not only had inches of snow piled up in my short time there, but the plows had gone by, encircling my little scion with drifts. i looked at pete, wrinkled my face in worry and said, “uh-oh…this should be an interesting drive home.” he looked back at me, his eyes kind and clear, and said, “there are angels all around you.” there were several moments of silence between us and then he said, “really.”

my husband just wrote a beautiful post about the angels all around us…the ones who help us, cajole us, take care of us, leave us favorite groceries on our front steps for when we return home from a difficult trip, make us soup, drop off a bottle of wine, bring us brownies….people in our everyday lives who make things easier. we all have them. sometimes we appreciate them a lot, sometimes we have no idea how life would be without them. they are indeed angels and life is better simply by their being in our lives. angels all around us. i was moved when the girl told me about someone she bought a sandwich and water for outside a convenience store…he was a veteran and she felt like she was drawn to helping him by her pa, my dad and a WWII ex-pow. with not much at all to spare, she was an angel for this man, who needed help. yes, angels all around us. ones we know, ones we don’t know.

and then there are the angels that i believe pete was talking about. the ones we can’t see. the ones who are present with us, but just on the other side. how many times have you felt the presence of someone you love who is no longer on this plane of existence? truth be told, i rely on that. i talk to my sweet momma, i tell my daddy stories. i ask my big brother to help me out, to give me clear, precise thinking, as he had. i’ve seen evidence of them, trying to get my attention…my “coincidental” noticing of the big semi on the highway going the opposite direction with the words “WAYNE WAYNE WAYNE” written across it…the two cardinals repeatedly swooping in the backyard over the deck, in moments i am missing my parents desperately…the intervention i can’t explain in an accident that could have proven to be tragic…the slight smell of cologne or perfume in the air…the can falling off the shelf in the green room beside the stage on the last take of the last song (called “divine intervention”) of my very first album (the-best-producer-on-the-planet-ken and i left this sound in the recording, feeling it an important message)…

i’m not sure we can seek these angels out.   as much as i’d like, i can’t just call them up. but i do know that they are there. and that blizzarding day i was out in the snow and got stuck by the fedex box, there is no explanation as to why i was able to just – all-of-a-sudden – drive out of the enormous drift into which i had slid. pete was right. pete is right.

occasionally, i see pete out and about in town. one of these times i will stop and tell him how much it meant to me that he said that. undoubtedly he won’t remember. but me? i will never forget. there are angels all around me. and yes, there are angels all around you.

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angel you are: track 10 on AS SURE AS THE SUN

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i want what you have.

photo-1“i want what you have,” she said. in the wee hours of the night, my sweet almost-94 momma, in intense pain from falling, was talking to her emergency room nurse, a young woman who was clearly exhausted and who couldn’t reach the energy she needed to smile. the nurse looked intently at my momma. “what?” she countered. “your beautiful smile,” momma said, with light-transcending-pain in her eyes. “you have a beautiful smile.” and yes, in the moments that followed, that was so obvious as we witnessed a huge eye-sparkling smile come to the nurse’s tired face. tears came to my eyes (because i am a geeky mush like that) as i watched my mom gently and brilliantly gift this hardworking nurse with something she already had inside herself.

how did momma do it? every where she went she gifted people….with things they already had.

yesterday i was at a garden party. it was really lovely. the flowers were stunning and the community of people who gathered were from different walks of the hosts’ lives. i was wearing a pair of clunky dr scholl clogs that i bought on a bringing-my-daughter-to-college-in-minneapolis trip in the fall many years ago. i still have them because 1. they are super comfortable and 2. they remind me of this trip to minnesota with my daughter, my son and his best friend (because i am a geeky mush like that.) a woman complimented me on them at the party, asked where i got them. i was able to tell her that there is a boutique near here where she can still purchase them (and of course, there is always the internet.) the fact of the matter is – most of the people at the party had on newer shoes than i did, newer styles, cooler stuff. but -and this is simple- this woman complimented me on mine and that made me look at what i had.

how many times have you looked at someone’s outfit, shoes, car, house, garden, work, relationship, life and wanted it?

a couple days ago my dear friend and i were talking about resentment. he asked, “what do you do with resentment? how do you combat it?” i have no easy answer. geez, i barely have an answer at all. but i remember that i had to memorize a reading in high school and i chose ‘desiderata’ (because i am a geeky mush like that.) the (not-verbatim) line that stands out in my mind is – “do not compare yourself with others, or you will become vain and bitter. for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.” my friend and i talked about that. at length. we cited examples and promised to hold hands -even virtually-through all the challenges ahead (because i am a geeky mush like that.)

it can become insidious – resentment. it eats away at people and families and workplaces and towns and nations. photo-2what if we all took a moment to look at someone and remind them – gently and brilliantly, with light in our eyes – of what they already had. maybe there would be a little less resentment going around. and maybe a little more momma.