Thursday Treasure: Remembering to be Thankful for Those Who Serve

Happy Thanksgiving! I want to give a special shout out to some very special people and their families. The United States Military Personnel at home and abroad. Thank you for your service to our country.

To my family currently serving: Thank you and I am so very proud of each and every one of you!

Valerie H. - United States Air Force
Sean N. - United States Army National Guard
James H. - United States Army National Guard
Bobbie S. - United States Navy
Robert M. - United States Marines


To the family who has given their service in the past; Thank You.

Charles M. - United States Air Force
Michael W. - United States Army National Guard
Bruce C. - United States Navy Veteran
Robert S. - United States Army Veteran - Korea
Hazel S. - United States Women's Army Corp. WWII Veteran
Elnora J. - United States WAVES - WW II Veteran Deceased
Robert S. - United States Army WW II Veteran Deceased - European Campaign
Ken J. - United States Army WWII Veteran Deceased - European Campaign
Spencer S. - United States Army WWII Veteran Deceased - African and European Campaign


Please remember the brave men and women who are not celebrating Thanksgiving with their families. Remember to offer a kind word, a hand of assistance and a listening ear to family members of a service person on this day and throughout the holiday season.

46 days missing

Sunday Conversations: 10 Positive Commandments

I am a collector of old books. I do not collect them for their monetary value, but for the value they contain between the covers. Before she passed away, my grandmother gave me a box of books she said she no longer needed. I was filled with gratitude for the books because they were mostly from the nineteenth and early twentieth century. My grandmother had also been a teacher. Among the books in the box was a 1922 edition of A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens, an old Bagster's & Sons Bible with concordance from about 1896 (uses words like unicorn, dragons, satyrs etc very interesting), and Elbert Hubbard's Scrapbook.

I am not, and never have been a transcendentalist, but it was all the rage at the turn of the century, especially in literary works. Elbert Hubbard was no exception to the rule, as set by the likes of Emerson and Thoreau. Elbert Hubbard was born in 1856 and died tragically with his wife, Alice, on the Lusitania when it was sunk by a German submarine in 1915.

As I was packing more boxes today, to be moved in the coming week, I came across a sheet of paper on which I had copied Elbert Hubbard's Ten Positive Commandments, from his book.

Ten Positive Commandments

1. Thou shalt think well of thyself and well of thy neighbor.

2. Thou shalt add to the health, wealth and happiness of the world.

3. Thou shalt be on good terms with sunshine, fresh air and water.

4. Thou shalt get eight hours of sleep a day.

5. Thou shalt eat moderately, and exercise every day in the open air.

6. Thou shalt love the memory of thy mother, and be true to the friends that have done so much for thee.

7. Thou shalt recognize the Divinity in all men.

8. Thou shalt remember the week-day and keep it holy.

9. Thou shalt remember that thee can only help thine by helping other people, and that to injure another is to injure thyself, and that to love and benefit others is to live long and well.

10. Thou shalt love the stars, the ocean, the forest, and reverence all living things, recognizing that the source of life is one.

 Although they are not THE Ten Commandments, they seem to be some pretty good rules to live by in addition to the original ten.

42 days missing.

Veterans Day 2011


The United States of America is now preparing for the annual Thanksgiving feast. Families are planning their menus, seating charts, and sleeping arrangements. On that day, we will all sit around a table preparing to offer thanks giving for those things that are near and dear to our hearts.

Tomorrow, November 11th, is a different sort of Thanksgiving day. It is the giving of thanks for those who took the oath of service knowing full well the cost of freedom. Our Veterans, and current serving military personnel, are among our national treasures, to be treated with respect, compassion, and love.

As United States Citizens, it is our personal obligation to show Loyalty to those who bear the true faith and allegiance; our Duty to fullfill this obligation without hesitation; our expectation to Respect those who treat people as they should be treated; to offer Selfless-Service to those who are, or have been wounded - physically or mentally; to Honor those who gave the ultimate sacrifice for our great nation and their comrades in arms who grieve such losses; to act with Integrity through doing what is right - legally and morally; and to exhibit Personal Courage to assist those who face fears, danger, or adversity (physical or moral) before, during and after their service.

Thank you to all those who have served and are serving in the United States Armed Forces - at home and abroad.

Happy Saturday: The Better Angels of Our Nature

"Let triumph 'the better angels of our nature'." ~ Abraham Lincoln

In the early morning hours of the day, I sit to write. The sun has yet to creep over the horizon and I am already clicking away at the keys.

As the words begin to flow onto the page, I wonder; what good will come of this? How will it make the world a better place than I found it?

Coming off Halloween and racing headlong into the holiday season, thoughts of humanity come to my mind. I wonder if the great classic authors and poets had the same thoughts when they wrote their stories and poetry. Did they think about humanity? Humanness? Or, more importantly, the impact their prose would have on society? Did they wonder about their legacy?Every genre, in the writing world, has the opportunity to triumph the better angels of their nature.

The authors who write romance triumph the better angels of their nature through the propogation of what is it to be a human being in love. It doesn't matter in what sub-genre of romance they are writing, it's all in the perspective of the reader. Hundreds of years from now, when 'old' romance novels are downloaded from the e-libraries, the world will know exactly what it was to be in love, in the 21st century.

Fantasy, Science-Fiction, and SteamPunk writers triumph the better angles of their nature through the wonders of imagination. Carefully building worlds where strength, courage, endurance, and sometimes love prevail over the darkness of evil, the world will know these authors had hope for the future; hope for the continuation of the human existence.

And let us not forget those authors who craft stories of the horrific and terrifying. Yes, even they too triumph the better angels of their nature through exposing the true fears of the human being. When the world has morphed into something we cannot fathom, in our 21st century mind, they will know what it was that frightened us the most.

The list of genres is long and comprehensive. It is the wholeness of the human existence. Each printed word, sentence and paragraph, tell the story of the human being; the story of Earth in the times of each author. Today, we look back on those we consider the greatest authors of all time and find comfort in the words they left for us; their stories and recordings of the days in which they lived, loved and laughed.

The people of tomorrow will look back on those they consider the greatest authors of all time and read the legacy we have left for them - the better angels of our nature.