Well.... whaddaya know?  A couple of my cyber pals from years ago sent me a surprise!  A sweet little note to let me know they were still out there and that they thought maybe I should post again. So.... I think I will.  What to say?  Let's see....  How about I start with:

I LOVE MY LIFE!

At the moment, I'm sitting on a small deck that is just outside the french doors to my bedroom.  It has tall, VERY tall pine trees in front of me and to my right.  To my left, there is scrub oak, lawn and a creek.  One of my several flower beds is growing lavishly underneath the pine trees that are on my right.  It's a glorious place to spend time.

We spend half of the year (the winter months) in St, George Utah.  It's a cute little home with some unusual views of mountains and valleys for that area.  We enjoy it immensely while we're there....but, that being said, I forget while we're gone just how much I love it here!  Life moves at a slower pace in Pleasant View.  Oh, not the town in general.... but OUR lives, HERE...at our home among the pines. The tender breeze coaxes the windchimes to softly sing their melody.  The Mourning Doves and Finches chatter and banter, claiming their territory, as they flit among the higher branches of the Oak trees.  I love the throaty whisper of the creek, and all of the emerald shades of the leaves, grasses, and stems bobbing with their heavy heads of blooms. Our yard is my own private Eden.  I sit on my deck in complete wonder at it all, and I am forever and always full of gratitude for the sweet blessing of living here.   We are so fortunate, so lucky... so blessed.  And, the best part of it is, I get to share it with a hunk of a guy who makes me laugh, still gives me butterflies, and is one of the most honorable men ever to breathe.  Yup! I LOVE MY LIFE!

Is it odd that I have found that such happiness is often tinted with a light Cobalt  blue shade of melancholy? There is an underlying touch of sadness when I reflect on how many women are struggling daily to find some measure of joy...just a smidge of peace.  I want to find a way to have all of them share in what I have.  I don't mean by giving them a good lunch or dinner now and then,  I do that.  I volunteer at the local homeless shelter, and I have learned that a hot plate of meatloaf and a baked potato may very well fill the belly, but it doesn't begin to fill the void left by loneliness and the nagging fear that no one really loves them.  One evening late in the month last October, I saw one of the women who comes to the shelter standing on the street.  It was mildly chilly outside and she was rubbing her arms through a thin sweater.  I waved, she waved back and gave me a nearly toothless smile.  I stopped my car, talked to her for a few minutes, took off my heavy scarf, wrapped it around her shoulders, took her face in my hands and told her I'd see her tomorrow  The look in her tear filled eyes was the warmest coat I wore the remainder of that winter.  It takes so little of the abundance that some of us enjoy to fill the bucket of those who walk with dropped shoulders and a gut wrenching emptiness in their lives.  Anyway... I'm beginning to sound a tad lugubrious, here...  Let's move on.

Well....enough for one day. I shall be back.  Hopefully soon, although I make no promises.