Monday, August 22, 2011

Eternal Optimism

‎"My friends, love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic. And we’ll change the world." 
~ Jack Layton

Today NDP Official Opposition leader Jack Layton passed away.  I am not a fan of the NDP, but did admire how optimistic he was, how much he loved our country and how he always believed in the power of democracy.  Our country lost a great man today.  Rest in peace, Jack.  You will be remembered.

Sunday, August 14, 2011

Life is Good...now focus on that.

It's so easy to get sucked into life's materialistic side and succumb to the "if only I had...." mentality.  I've been guilty of that lately.  It took a post by a fellow blogger, Sara ( Sara's Blog ), to make me really wake up and smarten up.

Before I read the post, I was lamenting about how things weren't nice enough in my house, how my things were hand-me downs, about how others had so many nice new things and trips.

But Sara's "grandma" is right.  My kids won't remember or care what my couch looked like, if my floors were clean, my beds made or my mirrors streak-free.  They won't remember if our house was colour-coordinated or if we had the fanciest newest things.

They will remember laughing and playing.  They will remember making crafts, held together with rolls of scotch tape, using everything in the recycling box.  They'll remember snuggles and stories.  They'll remember decorating their own room exactly how THEY wanted to do it even if it meant four million pin holes in the walls.  They'll remember drawing chalk roads on the driveway and playing hot wheels.  They'll remember making "art" on the kitchen table and the masterpieces displayed on every magnetic surface.  They'll probably remember fighting with each other too!

They will know and remember that they had fun and that they were loved and encouraged to be exactly who they wanted to be.  They are loved.  So very loved.  And that memory matters more than any other.

So I will now focus on how lucky I am to have a loving immediate and extended family, wonderful friends, a safe, warm-in-winter, cool-in-summer, house, a vehicle of my own, more clothes than we need, food so we never go hungry, enough money to keep the diet Pepsi and diet Dr. Pepper companies in business and space enough so each of my kids has their own room.  I am so very blessed.  So very lucky.

Life is good.  Now remember that!