MISCELLANEOUS
"So, lastly, why is my affection for all these people so extravagant, what are some reasons nobody forgets their high school years?
Class Reunion
(Elizabeth Lucas)
It was my class reunion, and all through the house,
I checked in each mirror and begged my poor spouse
To say I looked great, that my chin wasn't double,
And he lied through false teeth, just to stay out of trouble.
Said that 'neath my thick glasses, my eyes hadn't changed,
And I had the same figure, it was just a mite rearranged.
He said my skin was still silky, although looser in drape,
Not so much like smooth satin, but more like silk crepe.
I swallowed his words hook, sinker and line
And entered the banquet feeling just fine.
Somehow I'd expected my classmates to stay
As young as they were on that long-ago day
We'd hugged farewell hugs. But like me, through the years,
They'd added gray to their hair, or pounds to their rears.
But as we shared a few memories and retold some class jokes,
We were eighteen in spirit, though we looked like our folks.
We turned up hearing aid volumes and dimmed down the light,
Rolled back the years, and were young for the night.
Ramblings of a Retired Mind
I was thinking about how a status symbol of today is those cell phones that everyone has clipped onto their belt or purse. I can't afford one. So, I'm wearing my garage door opener. I also made a cover for my hearing aid and now I have what they call blue teeth, I think.
You know, I spent a fortune on deodorant before I realized that people didn't like me anyway. It's okay. Who cares! I learned I can't allow others to give me sleepless nights.
I was thinking that women should put pictures of missing husbands on beer cans!
I was thinking about old age and decided that old age is 'when you still have something on the ball, but you are just too tired to bounce it.'
I thought about making a fitness movie for folks my age, and call it
'Pumping Rust'.
I've gotten that dreaded furniture disease. That's when your chest is falling into your drawers!
When people see a cat's litter box, they always say, 'Oh, have you got a cat?' Just once I want to say, 'No, it's for company!'
Employment application blanks always ask who is to be notified in case of an emergency. I think you should write, 'A Good Doctor'!
I was thinking about how people seem to read the Bible a whole lot
more as they get older. Then, it dawned on me, they were cramming for their finals.
As for me, I'm just hoping God grades on the curve.
Enjoy Your Days & Love Your Life,
Because Life is a journey to be savored.
You've heard about people who have been abducted and had their kidneys removed by black-market organ thieves.
My thighs were stolen from me during the night a few years ago. I went to sleep and woke up with someone else's thighs. It was just that quick. The replacements had the texture of cooked oatmeal. Whose thighs were these and what happened to mine?
I spent the entire summer looking for my thighs. Finally, hurt and angry, I resigned myself to living out my life in jeans. And then the thieves struck again.
My butt was next. I knew it was the same gang, because they took pains to match my new rear-end to the thighs they had stuck me with earlier. But my new butt was attached at least three inches lower than my original! I realized I'd have to give up my jeans in favor of long skirts.
Two years ago I realized my arms had been switched. One morning I was fixing my hair and was horrified to see the flesh of my upper arm swing to and fro with the motion of the hairbrush.
This was really getting scary - my body was being replaced one section at a time. What could they do to me next?
Well, it was my poor neck! Suddenly, it had disappeared and was replaced with a turkey neck . I decided to tell my story.
Women of the world, wake up and smell the coffee! Those 'plastic' surgeons are using REAL replacement body parts -stolen from you and me! The next time someone you know has something 'lifted', look again - was it lifted from you?
*THIS IS NOT A HOAX*. This is happening to women everywhere every night.
*WARN YOUR FRIENDS!*
*P.S. Last year I thought some one had stolen my Boobs. I was lying in bed and they were gone!
But when I jumped out of bed, I was relieved to see that they had just been hiding in my armpits as I slept. Now I keep them hidden in my waistband.
EVIDENCE THAT YOU LIVE IN THE 21st CENTURY
Author Unknown
2. You have a list of fifteen phone numbers to reach your family of
3. You call your son's beeper to let him know it's time to eat.
5. You chat several times a day with a stranger from South Africa,
6. You check the ingredients on a can of chicken noodle soup to see
7. Your mom asks you to send her a JPEG file of your latest
8. Every commercial on television has a web site address at the
9. You pull in your own driveway and use your cell phone to see
10. You buy a computer and six months later it's out-of-date and now
11. Leaving the house without your cell phone, which you didn't
12. Using real money, instead of credit or debit, to make a purchase
13. Cleaning up the dining room means getting the fast food bags out
14. Your reason for not staying in touch with family is that they don't
15. You consider 2nd-day air delivery painfully slow.
16. Your dining room table is now your flat filing cabinet.
17. Your idea of being organized is multiple-colored Post-It notes.
18. You hear most of your jokes via email instead of in person.
19. You get an extra phone line so you can get phone calls.
20. You disconnect from the Internet and get this awful feeling as
21. You get up in the morning and go online before getting your
22. You wake up at 2 AM to go to the bathroom and check your
23. You start tilting your head sideways to smile.
24. You now think of three expressos as "getting wasted."
25. You haven't played solitaire with a deck of cards for years.
Just because...
WORDS TO LIVE BY
The most destructive habit.........Worry
The greatest Joy................Giving
The greatest loss...........Loss of self-respect
The most satisfying work.............Helping others
The ugliest personality trait..........Selfishness
The most endangered species..........Dedicated leaders
Our greatest natural resource............Our youth
The greatest "shot in the arm"..........Encouragement
The greatest problem to overcome..........Fear
The most effective sleeping pill.........Peace of mind
The most crippling failure disease..........Excuses
The most powerful force in life.............Love
The most dangerous pariah.........A gossiper
The world's most incredible computer........The brain
The worst thing to be without............. Hope
The deadliest weapon........The tongue
The two most power-filled words........."I Can"
The greatest asset..............Faith
The most worthless emotion............Self-pity
The most beautiful attire..............SMILE!
The most prized possession.......... Integrity
The most powerful channel of communication........Prayer
The most contagious spirit...........Enthusiasm
This article appeared in the "Daily Breeze", Article ID: 0000841632
Date: October 24, 2001
Publication: Daily Breeze (Torrance, CA)
Page: A2
High school reunion is a time to celebrate `the invisible people', Richard Burton
Few things grab us by the collar and humble us as much as our high school reunions. They come back, every ten years or so, to haunt us like a ghost from the past. And maybe that's just what's so humbling about them... our youthful past is exposed once again-laid bare like an open wound, and brutally juxtaposed with our current reality.
I'm from the class of 1969. What a year. Nixon was President; the Vietnam War raged out of control; men landed on the moon; a half million young people gathered for the Woodstock Festival; the New York Mets won the World series; and gas was 35 cents a gallon.
And so, having graduated, barely, a little over 30 years ago, I have had much time to consider, ponder, meditate on, and wrestle with the reasons we even bother to go to our high school reunions. I've gone to my 10, 20, and 30-year reunions. Of course, we all stay in close touch with a few old friends that we've known since kindergarten. And we often bump into old classmates around town. But why would an otherwise sane person subject himself to such extreme scrutiny by people who you knew way back when.
First of all, things were simpler back then. I know for a fact because I have a teenager in high school today. Back then, you were either a jock or a non-jock. I suppose if you really wanted to complicate things, you could divide the non-jock category into four basic sub-divisions: The Brains; the Prom Queens; the Hoods; and the endless rabble of nameless students known simply as the Invisible People. Fortunately, most of us fit into this latter category.
I say fortunate because reunions are the great equalizer. There is a satisfying irony in finding out that the captain of the football team now has bad knees, a beer belly, and is thrice divorced. That the gal whom you thought was a goddess now looks more like the gal at the checkout counter at K-Mart. And that the star honor student who later went on to receive a Ph.D. in nuclear astrophysics, has dropped-out, moved to Oregon, and opened an ostrich farm.
Now this is the best part. Because most of us were among the Invisible People in high school, we actually held up much better over the years than our more visible counterparts, the Jocks, the Brains, the Queens, and the Hoods. Our legacy is too blurred to really hang a label on. We were diamonds in the rough. We hadn't blossomed yet. Had not reached our peak. And thus, it is all but impossible to notice a glaring difference between then and now, because we seem today, about how we seemed back in high school... only with wrinkles.
We survived high school without too much baggage, and therefore, assimilated into proper society without much difficulty. Many of the Jocks, Brains, Queens, and Hoods had a far more difficult time of it out in the "real" world in spite of their former lofty positions.
Actually, from my keen observations at these reunions, I would say that after the Invisible People, the Hoods fared best in the long run. Some had gone into the Marines after high school. That'll usually straighten a person out. Some had even done a little prison time. Ditto. But most had simply outgrown their bullish and antisocial ways. These Hoods are now, for the most part, respectable members of society, married with 2.5 kids, and coaching soccer on weekends.
But back to the undefined masses, the multitudes of us who didn't stand out. Who just did what our parents and teachers told us to do. Who simply went to class, did our homework, got a good nights sleep, and did it all again the next day for 4 long, inglorious years. All without our 15 minutes of youthful fame. Here's to the true survivors... us...the Invisible People.
A REASON, A SEASON OR A LIFETIME...
People come into your life for a reason, a season or a lifetime.
When you know which one it is, you will know what to do for that person.
When someone is in your life for a REASON, it is usually to meet a need you have expressed.
They have come to assist you through a difficulty, to provide you with guidance and support, to aid you physically, emotionally or spiritually.They may seem like a Godsend and they are.
They are there for the reason you need them to be.
Then, without any wrongdoing on your part or at an inconvenient time, this person will say or do something to bring the relationship to an end.
Sometimes they die. Sometimes they walk away.
Sometimes they act up and force you to take a stand.
What we must realize is that our need has been met, our desire fulfilled, their work is done.
The prayer you sent up has been answered and now it is time to move on.
Some people come into your life for a SEASON because your turn has come to share, grow or learn.
They bring you an experience of peace or make you laugh.
They may teach you something you have never done.
They usually give you an unbelievable amount of joy.
Believe it, it is real. But it’s only for a season.
LIFETIME relationships teach you lifetime lessons
Things you must build upon in order to have a solid emotional foundation.
Your job is to accept the lesson.
Love the person, and put what you have learned to use in all other relationships and areas of your life...
It is said that love is blind but friendship is clairvoyant.
Thank you for being a part of my life whether you were
a reason, a season or a lifetime.