"Henny Penny the sky is falling!"
This is an old cumulative fable about Chicken Little who believes the sky is falling. It has been passed down for generations as a common idiom indicating an hysterical or mistaken belief that disaster is imminent.
Yesterday was such a day.
There are days you aren't quite certain that you are equipped to get through. There are days that are frantic, frenzied and frenetic. There are days you feel trapped by circumstances and by life. There are beautiful days you hope will never end. Then there was yesterday.
I was maligned by many, and quite simply slandered by people who meant to cause me pain, brought about by false assumptions and things they knew nothing about. Not at all suspicious or odd, the only person in this group who was kind to me was a soldier.
But you know what? I made it through. This morning the reason doesn't matter. Words, once said, cannot be taken back. But we mend, we heal, we learn, and we go on.
I ended the tumultuous day by visiting soldiers and their families at the Lackland AFB Fisher House. Perspective returned and kindness and openness and generosity abounded. After homemade pineapple and ham pizza and yellow cupcakes with chocolate frosting and sprinkles, the world seemed a bit softer. Soldiers and their family members sat on the floor with our working therapy dogs and laughed and smiled and talked, and for a few moments their concerns and fears dissapated - as did mine! Once again my soldiers had my back and deflected the verbal weapons flung at me.
The people with the harsh, crushing words for me have been my teachers. Today I thank and bless them. They have left me a better person and more committed than ever to the mission of Penny's From Heaven Foundation Soldiers' Angels Operation Support Dogs.
So this morning I leave you and our fighting men and women, who always have our backs, with fitting words from my favorite poet, Mary Oliver's, "What is the greatest gift?"
"What is the greatest gift?
Could it be the world itself - the oceans, the meadowlark
the patience of the trees in the wind?
Could it be love, with its sweet clamor of passion?
Something else - something else entirely
holds me in thrall.
That you have a life that I wonder about
more than I wonder about my own.
That you have a life - courteous, intelligent -
that I wonder about more than I wonder about my own.
That you have a soul - your own, no one else's -
that I wonder about more than I wonder about my own.
So that I find my soul clapping its hands for yours
more than my own."
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"Hold fast to dreams. For if dreams die, life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly."
~James Langston Hughes~
"Troubles are a lot like people - they grown bigger if you nurse them.~
~Author Unknown~
"If people concentrated on the really important things in life, there'd be a shortage of fishing poles."
~Doug Larson~
Your donations are graciously accepted to help our men and women in harm's way.
Contributions will be used to purchase baby wipes, protein bars, hard candy, and multiple other items that you and I take for granted each and every second of the day.
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