By Rolland Smith, on May 18th, 2012
I am thinking about Motherhood and giving today.
Yesterday I mowed my proverbial meadow; the one with the pond at the lower elevation. As I was riding my mower I looked toward the pond and there on the other side was a young boy. I recognized him as a neighbor’s child. He’s probably around nine years of age.
He was electronically guiding a remote controlled boat in the pond. He didn’t let it get too far from shore just in case it got snagged or it lost power.
I understand that from youthful personal memory. At nine one is very protective of toys and to have such a sophisticated mechanism stuck or afloat in the middle of the pond would be a catastrophe.
He guided it in and out of weed clusters as his Mother sat in the overgrown grass in the shade a few yards away. Their dog Piper, a mixture of a Lab and a Poodle, played and pranced between the child and the Mother.
I’m observing this every time I make a mower turn and head back toward the pond. It was a heart-warming scenario.
Here was a Mom, a college professor, giving time to her son to play outdoors amidst the mosquitoes and ticks and grass crawly things.
Some Mothers have the ability to be at one with their children and it is a gift, not only to the children, but also to the rest of us who observe the unconditional gift of true Motherhood in action.
It’s one of the many reasons why I love ponds, and Mothers and kids at outdoor play.
By Rolland Smith, on May 17th, 2012
I had dinner last night at a marvelous Mexican restaurant and it reminded me of how available cuisine has changed since I was a youth.
Within a fifteen to twenty minutes from my home today there are excellent restaurants of numerous ethnic cuisines. French, Indian, Spanish, Italian, Japanese, Thai, Chinese and so on. It also helps that we are not too far from the Culinary Institute of the Hudson Valley.
I grew up in a very small city, population 12-thousand at the max. There were a few elegant eateries within twenty miles of that small city, but that was about it. Italian fare or what they called American cuisine was what one found in my small city.
Fast food? Nothing. No McDonalds, no Berger Kings, no Roy Rogers. There were a couple of diners for coffee, a coke and a burger, but that was about it.
The nearest big city had one fast food restaurant. White Castle. In my time WC was the home of the 5-cent burger. One bite and they were gone, but it was a burger with cheese if you wanted it and some tiny chopped onions. It hasn’t changed much today accept for the price.
White Castle is the oldest fast food restaurant in America. The franchise has been in business since 1921. I think I had my first one when I was fifteen and I still like them.
By Rolland Smith, on May 16th, 2012
“PORT ST. JOHN, Fla. • A Florida mother who fatally shot her four children before killing herself Tuesday called three of the kids who had sought help from a neighbor back to the house before firing the fatal shots, authorities said.
Thirty-three-year-old Tonya Thomas fatally shot her four children, who ranged in age from 12 to 17, said Lt. Tod Goodyear, a spokesman for the Brevard County Sheriff’s Office.
Three of the children had gone to a neighbor’s front door before dawn to say their mother had shot them. The mother then called the children back to the house and killed them, Goodyear said.”
This kind of thing happens all to often. One time before I wrote the following:
There is a place of cuddling comfort
and dancing Peaceful wonder,
Where bumps and bruises cannot hurt
and toys and crayons never break,
Where pillow fights and giggles last,
and frosting’s taller than the cake.
Where teddy bears talk in colors
and puppies wait to play.
Where candy is for breakfast
and presents fill the room.
Where no one knows what fear is,
no shadows can consume.
This special place is one of peace,
of grace, and joy and games,
Where all the mothers of the past
hold children who die young
And make for them a breasted warmth
and memories always fun.
I believe that in this lighted place,
there’s no need to understand
How another takes a life
and causes innocence to die,
But it does make me more aware
of the child in all who cry.
Then truly does my judgment fade,
and anger change to light.
When love is unconditional,
forgiving then is pure.
Even so, my heart is heavy
and I cry and cry some more.
By Rolland Smith, on May 15th, 2012
There is an AP story that I’d like to share with you just in case you did not read it.
It is a wonderful story of perserverance and dediction and one that emboldens the human spirit.
Here it is:
NEW YORK— For years, Gac Filipaj mopped floors, cleaned toilets and took out the trash atColumbia University.
A refugee from war-torn Yugoslavia, he eked out a living at the Ivy League school. But Sunday was payback time: The 52-year-old janitor donned a cap and gown to graduate with a bachelor’s degree in classics.
As a Columbia employee, his classes were free. His favorite subject was the Roman philosopher and statesman Seneca, he said during a break from his work at Lerner Hall, the student union building he cleans.
“I love Seneca’s letters because they’re written in the spirit in which I was educated in my family: not to look for fame and fortune, but to have a simple, honest, honorable life,” he said.
His graduation with honors capped a dozen years of study, including readings in ancient Latin and Greek.
“This is a man with great pride, whether he’s doing custodial work or academics,” said Peter Awn, dean of Columbia’s School of General Studies and professor of Islamic studies. “He is immensely humble and grateful, but he’s one individual who makes his own future.”
Filipaj, now an American citizen, was accepted at Columbia after learning English. His mother tongue is Albanian.
An ethnic Albanian and Roman Catholic, he fled Montenegro in 1992 as a brutal civil war loomed. He was about to be drafted into the Yugoslav army led by Serbs, many of whom considered Albanians their enemy. He had nearly finished law school in Belgrade.
He earned the Columbia degree after years of studying late into the night in his Bronx apartment, where he would open his books after a 2:30-to-11 p.m. shift as a “heavy cleaner,” his job title. Before exam time or to finish a paper, he would pull all-nighters.
On Sunday morning in the sun-drenched grassy quad of Columbia’s Manhattan campus, Filipaj flashed a huge smile and a thumbs-up as he walked off the stage after shaking hands with Columbia President Lee Bollinger.
Now, his ambition is to get a master’s degree, maybe even a doctorate, in Roman and Greek classics. He hopes to become a teacher, while translating his favorite classics into Albanian.
For now, he’s trying to get “a better job,” maybe as supervisor of custodians or something similar, at Columbia if possible.
But he’s not interested in furthering his studies to make more money.
“The richness is in me, in my heart and in my head,” Filipaj said. “Not in my pockets.”
Soon afterward, the feisty, 5-foot-4 janitor picked up a broom and dustpan and returned to work.
By Rolland Smith, on May 14th, 2012
I believe it as Emerson who wrote, and I am paraphrasing here, how mankind would wonder if the stars appeared only once in a thousand years.
It is still spring where I live and I have watched the slow emergence of leafy green over the past several weeks to its fullness of splendor. I wonder too how today’s humankind would marvel if all the green in our spring season, on all the trees and plants and flowers should appear all at once. Wow! What an explosion of color that would be.
I’d have to ask an artist, but I think there are more shades of green than there are any other color, maybe blue comes in a close second, but green is my choice.
Think of all the vegetables and fruits and trees that we enjoy and their various colors of green.
I once wrote a poem entitled, “Ode to Green” that seems to work with my current thinking.
“There’s leaf green and grass green.
There’s dark green and light green,
Evergreen and pea green.
And all shades in-between.
Clover green, a dream green.
When leafs of four convene.
Olive green, forest green,
Pale green emerald green
Shamrock green and thumb green
And the green of green bean.
There is sateen green
Of nature’s scene terrene,
The greenest ever seen,
When Erin’s land serene
Comes “wearin’ o’ the green.”
By Rolland Smith, on May 11th, 2012
Some thoughts this Sunday on Mother’s Day
We know them and call them by different names, Mother, Mom, Mum and Mommy, but they all means the same thing. Love!
The word, the name, the affection we feel, just in the saying of it, never changes throughout our adult life. Our mother’s are our first nurturer, our first care giver, our first friend.
I honor all Mother’s this Sunday by remembering some of the wonderful gifts my mother gave to me and even though she long ago passed away, she lives in vibrant memory in my heart.
I remember…..
A kiss hello and a kiss good-bye.
A hug when I was hurting, even when I was an adult.
Understanding, when she didn’t.
Worry when she needn’t.
Bragging when she shouldn’t
Giving when she couldn’t.
And I will always remember her smile.
I remember too, her happy tears and laughter and her unconditional love for me that came with every hope, every success and every failure. And in the positive memory and love for my own mother, comes an acknowledgment and an appreciation for all Mom’s this Sunday especially Ann, the one who made me a Father.
Happy Mother’s Day!
By Rolland Smith, on May 10th, 2012
President Obama has announced his support of same-sex marriage.
He will no doubt benefit from the gay community and the ultra conservatives and religious right will disdain him, but he wasn’t getting their support anyway.
So be it!
It is time in our expanding democracy for each of us to look lovingly and non-judgmentally at all other choices.
Each of us can believe whatever we want marriage to be. Its sacredness will hold singularly to each belief.
If you can’t do that, you may be narrow minded, prejudice and a homophobe. That’s fine. You can be whatever you choose to be just don’t demand others think the same way and take no offense at another’s belief.
Acknowledge what you are and let us get on with life.
By Rolland Smith, on May 9th, 2012
It is no wonder that a number of my former and current colleagues in the press are critiquing the intransience and partisanship in Congress.
In point of fact. House Republicans a couple of days ago advanced a package of six bills. It is proposed legislation that would stop an already existing law from reducing military spending.
Here’s the rational. Cut the fat in order to provide 554 Billion dollars for the Pentagon. The Department of Defense only asked for 525 Billion, but the GOP controlled House Armed Services Committee’s bill added another 29 Billion just for good measure.
How is the GOP planning to pay for this since raising taxes is a Republican no-no?
Cut the fat by reducing monies from Medicaid, food stamps and other social services and programs that help the poor.
The GOP is trying to do is an end-run around the Budget Control Act. That’s the bill Congress passed last year that would make automatic cuts since a select bi-partisan committee failed to trim the budget.
The bills have no chance of getting through the Democrat controlled Senate, but ethical and moral questions of priorities remain. We are a nation of people and their needs and congress needs to be reminded of that every day.
By Rolland Smith, on May 8th, 2012
A long time and wonderful friend of ours recently was diagnosed with a cancer re-occurrence and is now going through the debilitating treatment of chemotherapy and all its ramifications.
Illness always gives new meaning to each life. Granted, what I am suggesting may not work for all, but for some it will help.
First of all, talk about your feelings and fears whether it’s you or someone you love that has cancer. Ask the tough questions to the doctors and then hear and hear and hear the answers.
Do not hold back your fears to the one diagnosed or to yourself and especially let them or you talk about the fear, and worries and things that need to be said. Yes, it is tough, and it is freeing in the long run.
If the diagnosis is terminal, even though it’s couched in possibilities, talk about that too. Denial is detrimental to the understanding of life and its closure.
Have truth in all conversations, for it is the pathway to internal peace for those who are dealing with the possible ending of their lives. Saying what is true does not mean giving up the fight, it means fighting what you know with knowledge and understanding. Honesty starts the physical and spiritual healing process.
Rejoice when you can. Laugh when you can, dance when you can and know that it’s OK to cry.
footnotes:
If it’s a child it so much harder, but be honest.
If it’s a spouse it is equally so, but be open and share worries and fears and listen.
If it’s a parent, be strong, be truthful, and listen and listen some more.
If it’s you, listen only to your heart. It will tell you where you are and what you need to do.
By Rolland Smith, on May 7th, 2012
The reality of the common man is often lost on the super rich and the pampered powerful of the world.
A few years ago a custom diamond studded Mercedes was made for Prince Alwaleed of Saudi Arabia. It cost 4.8 million dollars.
Not one of us will begrudge the right of anyone, including princes, to spend their money anyway they choose, but sometimes common sense suggests that flaunting one’s opulence where the oppressed and poor can see it, is not only over the top, it’s arrogant, conceited and out of touch with real life.
This old world has a lot of prejudice, pain and hatred harboring in the minds and hearts of so many everywhere.
This old world needs fixing for the future to be sustained in a balance of honor, dignity, culture and beliefs.
This old world has children who bellies are distended in the body’s ache and search for nourishment. It has millions dying daily from hunger and hunger related diseases because some believe security is having more.
Can you imagine what could happen in the world if governments spent the billions they do on arms and wasteful projects on making a cripple child walk, the blind to see, feeding the hungry, and curing the chronically ill.
I can!
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Motherhood
I am thinking about Motherhood and giving today.
Yesterday I mowed my proverbial meadow; the one with the pond at the lower elevation. As I was riding my mower I looked toward the pond and there on the other side was a young boy. I recognized him as a neighbor’s child. He’s probably around nine years of age.
He was electronically guiding a remote controlled boat in the pond. He didn’t let it get too far from shore just in case it got snagged or it lost power.
I understand that from youthful personal memory. At nine one is very protective of toys and to have such a sophisticated mechanism stuck or afloat in the middle of the pond would be a catastrophe.
He guided it in and out of weed clusters as his Mother sat in the overgrown grass in the shade a few yards away. Their dog Piper, a mixture of a Lab and a Poodle, played and pranced between the child and the Mother.
I’m observing this every time I make a mower turn and head back toward the pond. It was a heart-warming scenario.
Here was a Mom, a college professor, giving time to her son to play outdoors amidst the mosquitoes and ticks and grass crawly things.
Some Mothers have the ability to be at one with their children and it is a gift, not only to the children, but also to the rest of us who observe the unconditional gift of true Motherhood in action.
It’s one of the many reasons why I love ponds, and Mothers and kids at outdoor play.