Take your vitamins ~

My dad was funny as he got older. After I was an adult anytime that I would call and maybe have a cough or a catch in my throat or runny nose you would express his concern about my health and then asked me did you take your vitamins?

According to him vitamins would prevent a whole array of illnesses. I think he just took a basic multivitamin, nothing fancy. But he took one every day.

Despite all the stories about vitamins passing through your system undigested I remember one where Geritol had been pushed for a couple of years through marketing as baby boomers were getting older. And then they did big stories on how porta potty companies would find that after they filtered through the sludge and waste they had all these whole Geritol pills in the screens left over. So I guess the marketing was working, but the pills weren't really being digested and absorbed.

I went through a time where I thought you had to take all your vitamins separately instead of a multivitamin plan. So I bought the little packets that he ripped open and ate a handful of vitamins. That was expensive, so I figured out if you spent a little extra and by individual bottles of the different vitamins and you could make your own mix and feel better about yourself and feel like you're smarter than everybody else because you're only taking what you need.

I guess that's what it boils down to. The placebo effect is real and if you put your faith in taking a vitamin to keep you well more than likely it will. I know that through the COVID experience I have picked up the habit of taking zinc every morning. I read in several places where the common cold like what COVID started out as before it evolved, however it evolved, was a lot like the common cold. So I take zinc to prevent several things. And so far it seems to be working!

But I always thought it was funny how Dad. would ask that every time I or my wife would get sick. I'm glad that he cared!

Watering down our language ~

I read an article recently about our over use of positive and encouraging words is leading to the watering down of the English language. The author focused on words like excellent and unbelievable and incredible. Those over-the-top words that are used so often now in order to get attention.

One of the interesting things in the article was one he said that overuse of the word waters down its special feeling and descriptiveness. When you hear something is "amazing" over and over and over the next thing that is "amazing" isn't quite so much because amazing now means less than it did before.

Sometimes I wonder if social media has done that to us too. Relationships with people use to be different, especially at a distance. When you had friends outside of your daily circle of existence or even your weekly or monthly circle of existence you would plan special trips to go and see them, you would make the effort if you were in their town to stop by or at least call, and those events were special and cherished afterwords because they don't happen all the time. Now with social media you see and hear from them all the time. Or at least you think you do. And so people tend not to call or make the effort to see you when they happen to be in your town.

At least that's been my experience. What about yours?

Rotting the foundation ~

I don't like it when in a stretch to to be cute or make things more like pop-culture people erode the very foundation of our society.

I remember after my father died my mother was talking about a woman the Dad had worked with for many years. My mother referred to that woman as my father's "work wife"

That just flew all over me! I thought about it for a minute and then I said please don't call her that again.

For me the word "wife" has a very specific meaning. It's the woman a man marries and spends his life with.

They watered it down to something a little bit less when they had to accommodate common law marriages. Special-interest groups have made it so people try to figure out which one in a relationship is husband or wife.

I remember a neighbor's wife had gotten involved with camping with another set of people in the neighborhood. The man's wife wasn't really in to camping but the first woman really enjoyed it. So she would go camping with them but she would go with the other man and help set up camp. She jokingly referred to herself as his "camp wife" I automatically thought that she was probably not faithful to her husband. Sad.

Words mean things! If they don't mean things then we all have to spend a lot more time explaining what we mean. And we have to remember that words define the laws we count on to help protect our rights.

Luckily my mother has not used the phrase "work wife" around me again. And I don't hear it often, which means it may not be completely infused in the pop-culture around us.

And please don't get me started on the phrase "dog mom" or "cat mom"...

Certain flowers ~

I have a weird relationship with flowers. I love flowers! But I'm learning that not all flowers love me.

When my wife and I are out and about when I see pretty flowers I like to take pictures of them. I do this in our hometown as well as when we are traveling short and even long distances. I like to add the pictures to a flowers photo album in my Google photos at and then I view those photos on our wall screen parentheses otherwise known as RTV). That way we have beautiful things to look at on our screen when it's on and we don't want to be watching actively some show or video.

I like to grow flowers, but they're not my favorite thing to grow. I have a Christmas cactus the wind kept alive for several years, but I never get it to bloom at Christmas. I have a pitcher plant that its blooms are like pictures that have liquid in them that catch flies so that the plant can digest them. But I can't get the thing to bloom and so it's just a really long line. I also have what my parents called and loved Lily. It looks like a red starburst on the end of
its stem when it blooms. Typically it only blooms once a year, and it's a bold thing that we keep in pots so that we can bring them in during the winter. But is beautiful and it blooms. And it brings back memories of my father in Florida.

I used to think because of what I saw in my life and the advertising in my life that the way you really showed love to your wife was to buy her flowers. The only way that I need to do that was to order them from a florist. I saw the flowers and grocery stores but I always thought they were overpriced. And it didn't make much sense to buy flowers at a grocery store and then come home and hand them to my wife. Until I got older and figured out that was the best way to do it!

But I got away from that when I ordered flowers from a florist trying to get my moving target life and missed repeatedly. I had several times where my $50 purchase sat on the front porch for days because we typically don't use our front door for our comings and goings. And after a long period where I didn't buy any flowers at all I figured out that buying them at the grocery store and bring them home and handing them to my wife earned me kisses and other expressions of love and appreciation that was a lot of fun!

Over the years, though, I have learned that there is a certain type of flower that florists like to include in their bouquets that my sinus system reacts strongly to. It's the lily-looking plant. It's very pretty, but when we have one of those on her table I discovered that my nose would start running and I would have to constantly blow my nose until I left the room and was away from the plant for an hour or so.

Recently we had a death in our family and my wife brought home a beautiful flower trees that was at the memorial service. It had a lot of carnations in it and a lot of those Lily flowers and. When she went to put it in the cab of our truck for the long drive home I informed her that that would not be riding in the truck with me. So she ended up putting it in my son's trunk and brought it home. Now it's in her office and I can't go on her office without sneezing and blowing my nose for an hour or two after being in there. I guess she's now found my kryptonite!

But I love flowers! And I love the way those lily flowers look, I just really don't like the headache and runny nose that they cause for me.

Becoming a sage ~

I've tried to listen to or read a chapter of Proverbs every day. This book in the Bible (https://www.bible.com/bible/97/PRO.1.MSG) is supposed to contain wisdom that Solomon and a few others learned and shared centuries ago. It has a lot of good advice on how to live your life, things to be careful of, and things to do.

When I read or listen to Proverbs I typically focus on whatever day of the month it is. If it's the third day of the month then I'm reading or listening to chapter 3. If it's the 22nd day of the month I'm listening to chapter 22.

It's worked out well! I've listened to or read the book of Proverbs over 20 times now, in consecutive months. That wisdom is slowly sinking into my head, although I'm still not quite where I want to be.

So often people focus on where the faults are and how not to be a fool but lately I've been focusing on what it says about sages and how to be one of the "wise" people.

Not a wise guy like in the Mafia, or funny guy on stage, but wise in thinking, discerning, and deciding things.

I hope that by doing this I am becoming a sage. It says in Proverbs that a gang of cynics can upset a whole city but a few sages can calm things down. (https://www.bible.com/bible/97/PRO.29.8.MSG)

Proverbs has a lot of other things to say about sages. I think that that's a word we don't use enough nowadays.

I hope that I'm becoming like a sage!

Prayer is like meditation ~

I have now "meditated" for over two years daily. I use the calm meditation at to help lead me in a 10 minute meditation each day. One of the challenges that I have with meditation is that it's so woo woo and new age. When I read articles about it there's gurus that meditate for hours each day. I even read a couple books by a guy that meditates each day for at least an hour in silence. He wrote a couple books that were awesome, but he's a homosexual that is an easy atheist and so it seemed odd why I was led to read his books. But I digress.

From what I've learned meditation is different for each person. For me it is pausing in my day and taking time to stop and focus my attention on listening for God. I don't empty my mind I don't try to yoke myself to the cosmic energy center. I'm actually trying to listen and hear God speaking to me. As woo woo as that may sound that's what I'm doing.

I'm not very successful at it. When I am meditating I tend to throw weights around exercising. I tend to play with my iPad and shop on Amazon which when I realize what I'm doing I stop and chastise myself. I rolled my eyes open to the back of my head and then I chastise myself over rolling my eyes stare at the wall or the picture on the wall. I probably had a change that picture been up there long time. Again, I digress.

One of the memes that I've seen repeatedly on my Pinterest board is that prayer is talking to God and meditation is listening to God. I have taken that in and have tried to apply that in my life. It seems to work okay, but it is imperfect. God is not always the way I want to hear so policy clearing quietly wait listening I don't usually get what I more often I get things when I'm driving or when I am doing other things and flashes of insight happen. When I pause and pray about my daily prayer focus I getting insight about something else not the prayer focus and get frustrated because I'm trying to focus here God what are you doing? But I try 10 minutes a day meditation brings.

I don't know if this is what they did in biblical times. I'm sure that they didn't wait for the rain to fall or press play on some rain stick that somebody turned over and over repeatedly to make the reigning sound. That would be funny to see, have a person in the corner turning a rain stick over and over for 10 or 15 minutes trying to relax you so that you can meditate.

But I try to meditate. And I learn while I meditate

Having adult children ~

As a father of four it is interesting to have all adult children.

When I read books from the past I read about children that died and people that went on to have other children despite children dying. I'm sad for them, but I cannot relate to that. Because all of my children survived.

I remember reading a Frank Herbert book called "The Dosadi Experiment" where there was this alien race on the planet Dosadi called the Gowachin. They were a frog-like race and the males would eat their children that were too slow and could not escape them. I never wanted to do that, but having read that book in my teenage years it always struck me as funny. In a weird way.

https://www.amazon.com/Dosadi-Experiment-Tor-Science-Fiction-ebook/dp/B007PRZP0G/ref=sr_1_1?crid=YGNCTTZXAOYY&keywords=dosadi+experiment+frank+herbert&qid=1689704663&sprefix=dosadi+exp%2Caps%2C702&sr=8-1

All of my children are adults. My wife and I had a goal that our children would grow up to be fine upstanding members of their community. We weren't focused on having doctors or nurses or scientists or lawyers or tycoons or any of that, we just wanted them to take our values and take the launchpad that we set up for them and launch out to be successful adults in whatever community they decided to be a part of. We hope that they will be part of the community that we were a part of, but knowing the way the world works we also understood that they might be in a different part of the world.

My wife and I have been wildly successful! Our adult children are doing good things, paying taxes, helping others, and growing into adults that are doing good things. It's so exciting to see! I'm looking forward to all the accomplishments they achieve.

But it is an adjustment having adult adult children. I can't tell them what to do. I can't tell them where to go or when to be there. I can only smile and say this is what I'm doing and I hope I see you there. It's awesome! They are responsible for themselves, which is awesome! I watch so many of my peers take on responsibilities that are not theirs and then watch as they get so frustrated when they can't exercise and enforce that responsibility on children that are not directly theirs.

I'm very happy with my adult children. I'm happy with what they are doing and achieving. I'm happy with what they are teaching me and I'm happy with what they are learning.

But it is weird being the parent of adult children.