Now

Enlightenment for a wave in the ocean is the moment the
wave realizes that it is water." 
~ Thich Nhat Hanh The Age Of Awareness.



'Freedom from fear' could be said to sum up the whole philosophy of human rights. 
Dag Hammarskjold

It is when we all play safe that we create a world of utmost insecurity. 
Dag Hammarskjold

Just One More Day

Wow I miss my Mom “But there's a story behind everything. How a picture got on a wall. How a scar got on your face. Sometimes the stories are simple, and sometimes they are hard and heartbreaking. But behind all your stories is always your mother's story, because hers is where yours begin.”  ― Mitch Albom, For One More Day https://mitchalbom.com/books/for-one-more-day/ For One More Day is the story of a mother and a son, and a relationship that covers a lifetime and beyond. It explores the question: What would you do if you could spend one more day with a lost loved one? As a child, Charley “Chick” Benetto was told by his father, “You can be a mama’s boy or a daddy’s boy, but you can’t be both.” So he chooses his father, only to see the man disappear when Charley is on the verge of adolescence. Decades later, Charley is a broken man. His life has been crumbled by alcohol and regret. He loses his job. He leaves his family. He hits bottom after discovering his only daughter has shut him out of her wedding. And he decides to take his own life. He makes a midnight ride to his small hometown, with plans to do himself in. But upon failing even to do that, he staggers back to his old house, only to make an astonishing discovery. His mother — who died eight years earlier — is still living there, and welcomes him home as if nothing ever happened. Albom has said his relationship with his own mother was largely behind the story of the book, and that several incidents in “For One More Day” are actual events from his childhood. Winner of Spain’s prestigious  “La Pluma de Plata” Award. One last column for a one-of-a-kind mom by Mitch Albom | Jan 25, 2015 | Detroit Free Press | 1 comment Over the years in this space, I have, occasionally, written about my mother. I once wrote a Halloween column on how she made me the Mummy. (She wrapped me in toilet paper, which was fine until it started raining.) I wrote about how she marched me into the library after a librarian had told me “that book’s too hard for you” and my mother yelled, “Never tell a child something is too hard for him! And never THIS child!” I wrote about how she insisted I stay in college, even when my father lost his job. How she refused to learn e-mail because she feared I would stop calling her. How I beckoned her to the stage at the Fox Theatre during a charity benefit, and a friend yelled out, “She’s in the bathroom!” I wrote what it was like feeding her after her stroke, a spoonful at a time. And, finally, what it was like to stare at her as she withered, wondering whether she knew me at all. The difference between all those columns and this one is pretty simple. I could show her those. I can’t show her this. She is gone. Funny, fierce and loyal We lost her gradually, first her balance, then her movement, then her speech, her recognition and finally, last weekend, her breath. She did our family a final kindness going that way, because she was too great a force to disappear all at once. Instead, like one of those NASA rockets, she stripped away piece by piece en route to the heavens. How can I tell you about my mother? How do I fit her 84 years into words? She didn’t change the world. Only our world. She didn’t run a country. Only our country. She lost her father when she was 15, and with him went her dreams of college and medical school. Instead, she became a teenaged parent to her heartbroken mother and younger brother. She married the only man she ever dated, my father, when she was 20. They wed on Christmas Eve, because the restaurant was available. For six years they lived with my grandmother, who made no apologies for bursting through their bedroom at any hour. No surprise, my folks remained childless until they moved out. How can I tell you about my mother? She went by Rhoda, Rho, Aunt Rho, Mrs. A or Bubby. She was funny and fierce and loyal and brilliant and while she never became a doctor, everyone ran to her for advice. She was loving, wise and patient and she cared not a whit what the world thought. She used to say, “The masses are asses.” She volunteered as a clown in hospitals and in fund-raising for ALS. She taught herself interior design and became one of the most-respected designers in the Philadelphia area. In death, she leaves her mark all over the country, in armoires, ottomans, wallpapers and throw pillows. Remembering her voice She loved to walk while holding her children’s hands, she loved to sing and twirl us around in a dance. She loved to jump into our affairs, no matter how much we might resist, and she once actually said to me, “Mitchie, if you let me, I could straighten out your life.” Yes. She called me Mitchie. Only a mother can do that, right? It’s funny. Over the last five years, as she slowly slipped away, I lost the sound of her voice. I only saw the suffering body in front of me, the locked arms, the grimaced expression, the 80-pound skeleton wearing an adult diaper. The horror of that seemed to muzzle my memory. But now that she is gone, her voice is coming back. And so is the reminder of how truly, truly loved I was, and how much I miss it. How can I tell you about my mother? This might sound silly. But in the 1941 movie”Dumbo,” there’s a scene where the captured mother elephant, through the bars of a cage, cradles little Dumbo in her trunk and sings: Baby mine, don’t you cry Baby mine, dry your eyes Rest your head, close to my heart Never to part Baby of mine I choke up whenever I see that, because I know that feeling. Forever loved, forevercomforted, through whatever bars may separate you, never to part. If this is the last column I write about my mother, then you should know. That was what it felt like to be her son. And it was glorious. Contact Mitch Albom: malbom@freepress.com. Check out the latest updates with his charities, books and events at MitchAlbom.com. Catch “The Mitch Albom Show” 5-7 p.m. weekdays on WJR-AM (760). Follow him on Twitter @mitchalbom. To read his recent columns, go to freep.com/sports/mitch-albom.

Writing quote; life quote John Steinbeck

“When I face the desolate impossibility of writing five hundred pages, a sick sense of failure falls on me, and I know I can never do it. Then gradually, I write one page and then another. One day's work is all I can permit myself to contemplate.” 
― John Steinbeck, Travels with Charley: In Search of America 

  

I could spend many mornings browsing Steinbeck quotes. Enjoy!

Travels with Charley: In Search of America

by 

John Steinbeck

A quest across America, from the northernmost tip of Maine to California’s Monterey Peninsula

To hear the speech of the real America, to smell the grass and the trees, to see the colors and the light—these were John Steinbeck's goals as he set out, at the age of fifty-eight, to rediscover the country he had been writing about for so many years.

With Charley, his French poodle, Steinbeck drives the interstates and the country roads, dines with truckers, encounters bears at Yellowstone and old friends in San Francisco. Along the way he reflects on the American character, racial hostility, the particular form of American loneliness he finds almost everywhere, and the unexpected kindness of strangers.  

Here is a link to an interesting article about the book

https://nytimes.com/2011/04/04/books/steinbecks-travels-with-charley-gets-a-fact-checking.html

John Steinbeck Biography

Born: February 27, 1902 
Salinas, California 
Died: December 20, 1968 
New York, New York 
American writer

John Steinbeck, American author and winner of the Nobel Prize in 1962, was a leading writer of novels about the working class and was a major spokesman for the victims of the Great Depression (a downturn in the American system of producing, distributing, and using goods and services in the 1930s, and during which time millions of people lost their jobs).

Early life

John Ernst Steinbeck was born on February 27, 1902, in Salinas, California, the only son of John Ernst Steinbeck Sr. and Olive Hamilton. His father was a bookkeeper and accountant who served for many years as the treasurer of Monterey County, California. Steinbeck received his love of literature from his mother, who was interested in the arts. His favorite book, and a main influence on his writing, was Sir Thomas Malory's (c. 1408–1471) Le Morte d'Arthur, a collection of the legends of King Arthur. Steinbeck decided while in high school that he wanted to be a writer. He also enjoyed playing sports and worked during the summer on various ranches.

Steinbeck worked as a laboratory assistant and farm laborer to support himself through six years of study at Stanford University, where he took only those courses that interested him without seeking a degree. In 1925 he traveled to New York (by way of the Panama Canal) on a freighter (boat that carries inventory). After arriving in New York, he worked as a reporter and as part of a construction crew building Madison Square Garden. During this time he was also collecting impressions for his first novel. Cup of Gold (1929) was an unsuccessful attempt at romance involving the pirate Henry Morgan.

Begins writing seriously

Undiscouraged, Steinbeck returned to California to begin work as a writer of serious fiction. A collection of short stories, The Pastures of Heaven (1932), contained vivid descriptions of rural (farm) life among the "unfinished children of nature" in his native California valley. His second novel, To a God Unknown (1933), was his strongest statement about man's relationship to the land. With Tortilla Flat (1935) Steinbeck received critical and popular success; there are many critics who consider it his most artistically satisfying work.

John Steinbeck.

Steinbeck next dealt with the problems of labor unions in In Dubious Battle (1936), an effective story of a strike (when workers all decide to stop working as a form of protest against unfair treatment) by local grape pickers. Of Mice and Men (1937), first conceived as a play, is a tightly constructed novella (short novel) about an unusual friendship between two migrant workers (laborers who travel to wherever there is available work, usually on farms). Although the book is powerfully written and often moving, some critics feel that it lacks a moral vision.

Steinbeck's series of articles for the San Francisco Chronicle on the problems of migrant farm laborers provided material for The Grapes of Wrath (1939), his major novel and the finest working-class novel of the 1930s. The Grapes of Wrath relates the struggle of a family of Oklahoma tenant farmers forced to turn over their land to the banks. The family then journeys across the vast plains to the promised land of California—only to be met with scorn when they arrive. It is a successful example of social protest in fiction, as well as a convincing tribute to man's will to survive. The Grapes of Wrath received the Pulitzer Prize in 1940.

Other subjects

During World War II (1939–45), which the United States entered to help other nations battle Germany, Italy, and Japan, Steinbeck served as a foreign correspondent. From this experience came such nonfiction as Bombs Away: The Story of a Bomber Team (1942);Once There Was a War (1958), a collection of Steinbeck's dispatches from 1943; and A Russian Journal (1948), with photographs by Robert Capa. More interesting nonfiction of this period is The Sea of Cortez, coauthored with scientist Edward F. Ricketts. This account of the two explorers' research into sea life provides an important key to many of the themes and attitudes featured in Steinbeck's novels.

Steinbeck's fiction during the 1940s includes The Moon Is Down (1942), a tale of the Norwegian resistance to occupation by the Nazis (German ruling party that scorned democracy and considered all non-German people, especially Jews, inferior); Cannery Row(1944), a return to the setting of Tortilla Flat; The Wayward Bus (1947); and The Pearl, a popular novella about a poor Mexican fisherman who discovers a valuable pearl that brings bad luck to his family.

Later decline

In the 1950s Steinbeck's artistic decline was evident with a series of novels that were overly sentimental, stuffy, and lacking in substance. The author received modest critical praise in 1961 for his more ambitious novel The Winter of Our Discontent, a study of the moral disintegration (falling apart) of a man of high ideals. In 1962 Travels with Charley, a pleasantly humorous account of his travels through America with his pet poodle, was well received. Following the popular success of the latter work, Steinbeck was awarded the Nobel Prize.

Steinbeck's work remains popular in both the United States and Europe, chiefly for its social consciousness and concern and for the narrative qualities displayed in the early novels. Although he refused to settle into political conservatism (preferring to maintain traditions and resist change) in his later years, his all-embracing support of American values and acceptance of all national policies, including the Vietnam War (1955–75; conflict in which the United States fought against Communist North Vietnam when they invaded Democratic South Vietnam), lost him the respect of many liberal (preferring social change) intellectuals who had once admired his social commitments. He died on December 20, 1968, in New York City.

Biography from: http://notablebiographies.com/Sc-St/Steinbeck-John.html

From some of the interesting facts about Steinbeck: 

Steinbeck shied away from the public eye, and largely avoided interviews, awards ceremonies, lectures, and publicity events. “The fact that I have housemaid’s knees or fear yellow gloves has little to do with the books I write,” he once said. One notable exception was his Nobel Prize acceptance speech, delivered on December 10, 1962. Here’s the speech in full: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SKEODtaQUU 

For More Information

Benson, Jackson J. John Steinbeck, Writer: A Biography. New York; Penguin Books, 1990.

Lynch, Audry. Steinbeck Remembered. Santa Barbara: Fithian Press, 2000.

Moore, Harry T. The Novels of John Steinbeck: A First Critical Study. Chicago: Normandie House, 1939, revised edition 1977.

Parini, Jay. John Steinbeck: A Biography. New York: H. Holt, 1995.

Steinbeck, John IV, and Nancy Steinbeck. The Other Side of Eden: Life with John Steinbeck. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2001.

Attachments area

Preview YouTube video John Steinbeck gives Nobel Prize Speech

John Steinbeck gives Nobel Prize Speech

For Pete

“Do what you love to do and give it your very best. Whether it’s business or baseball, or the theater, or any field. If you don’t love what you’re doing and you can’t give it your best, get out of it. Life is too short."

Al Lopez

Al Lopez, (Alfonso Ramon Lopez; “El Señor”), American baseball player and manager. The child of Spanish immigrants, he was called “El Señor” for his gentlemanliness. Lopez entered the Hall of Fame in 1977. 

This week's quote is in honour of my brother in law, Pete Heeney, who died suddenly last Wednesday. Pete loved baseball and was a gentleman. He touched many lives as a teacher, baseball and hockey player and coach, friend, and family guy. Pete was 59 and had only another year or so to go until he could retire. I was in the bottom of the Grand Canyon when it happened, expecting everything to be the same when I returned and it wasn't. No time to say goodbye, no time to say the words "we love you Pete and are happy you have been in our family for the past 23 years". I am comforted that I'm sure he knew we felt that, but man what I wouldn't give for a chance to actually tell him! It was funny to me (in a comical funny way) that Pete was one of the few people who said he didn't want to be on my "Quote list". I think he thought I send out "spiritual mush" each week lol. Ironic that this is the mushiest I've gotten (I think...)

For any of my close friends and relatives reading this if you are interested there is a scholarship in Pete's name started at the school in Burlington where he taught. Here is the link:

https://www.gofundme.com/peter-heeney-scholarship

Live what you Love!!

Jeanne

Trevor Noah Quote

“Nelson Mandela once said, 'If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his language, that goes to his heart.' He was so right. When you make the effort to speak someone else's language, even if it's just basic phrases here and there, you are saying to them, 'I understand that you have a culture and identity that exists beyond me. I see you as a human being” 
― Trevor Noah, Born a Crime: Stories From a South African Childhood 

I had this quote listed to send for one of my Thursday quotes after reading Trevor Noah's book "Born a Crime" where he gives his personal accounts and explanations of apartheid and racism that illustrate on an individual and societal level how irrational and dangerous it is to perpetuate the myth that we are different from each other.  Then yesterday I heard the following story on the CBC and it struck me as a great illustration. 

Cheers

Jeanne

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/police-shooting-mental-illness-1.4699217 

'Enough is enough'

"Jimmy Cloutier was the fourth homeless man to be fatally shot by Montreal police over a period of about six years. No officers were charged in any of the previous cases. Cloutier's case is currently before Quebec's director of criminal and penal prosecutions, who will decide if any officers will be charged

A CBC News investigation published in April found that 461 people died in Canada as a result of police encounters from 2000 to 2017. Like Cloutier, many of the individuals who died had mental health issues. "

..."The partnership between the Old Brewery Mission and Montreal police was announced in February 2017, weeks after Cloutier's death. To date, more than 240 police recruits have completed a mission-led training session, which covers myths surrounding homelessness, services offered by the mission, and how to intervene. In addition to the recruits, nearly 800 officers are expected to complete the training by the summer.

"It's an opportunity to really, really get to know each other. But not only that, it's how to better intervene," says Carlo De Angelis, the force's Aboriginal liaison officer. "Sometimes we're making an intervention and we realize it's not working exactly like we'd like, but [mission staff] might have that piece that we were missing."

There has also been an effort to build more trust. Since announcing the partnership, dozens of officers have visited the mission to serve dinner. Officers also stop by the shelter's internet cafe.  

"We don't want police officers to come and serve a meal dressed in their civilian wear," Pearce says. "We want them to look like police officers so people realize that behind that badge, behind that uniform, is a human being as well."

Cloutier's legacy

Mission staff appreciate what they see as a more humane approach from officers.

"They're not rough and tough as they used to be," Vincent Ozrout says. "They'll offer choices to the person: 'You can either leave on your own or we can help you out.' Instead of just barging in, grabbing and leaving."

Pearce says the new police chief, Martin Prud'homme, seems as committed to the partnership as his predecessor.

Since Cloutier's death, dozens of Montreal police officers have served dinner at the Old Brewery Mission. (Old Brewery Mission )

And about Trevor Noah (copied from trevornoah.com):

Trevor Noah is the most successful comedian in Africa and is the host of the Emmy and Peabody Award-winning The Daily Showon Comedy Central. This year The Daily Show has been nominated for a Writers Guild Award (Comedy/Variety Series). Noah joined The Daily Show with Jon Stewart in 2014 as a contributor.

It was recently announced that Noah will debut his 9th new comedy special Afraid of the Dark on Tuesday, February 21 on Netflix. The special was shot before a packed house in New York City at the Beacon Theatre on November 5, 2016. Last year, Noah debuted his one-hour stand-up special, Trevor Noah: Lost in Translation, on Comedy Central. Noah was the subject of David Paul Meyer’s award-winning documentary film You Laugh But It’s True which tells the story of his remarkable career in post-apartheid South Africa. His Showtime comedy special, Trevor Noah: African American premiered in 2013. He was nominated for “Personality of the Year” at the 2014 and 2015 MTV Africa Music Awards and won the award in 2015. Trevor’s success has also spanned to sold out shows over 5 continents.

Born in South Africa to a black South African mother and a white European father, Noah has hosted numerous television shows including South Africa’s music, television and film awards, and two seasons of his own late night talk show, Tonight with Trevor Noah.

In November 2016, Trevor released his first book Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood, which was an instant New York Times bestseller. Additionally, his performance on the Born a Crime audiobook was Audible’s highest rated audiobook of 2016, and has remained one of the top selling titles on Audible since its release. It was also nominated for two NAACP Image Awards, one for Outstanding Literary Work by a Debut Author and another for Outstanding Literary Work in the Biography/Auto-Biography category.

The book is collection of personal stories about growing up in South Africa during the last gasps of apartheid and the tumultuous days of freedom that came with its demise. Already known for his incisive social and political commentary, here Noah turns his focus inward, giving readers an intimate look at the world that shaped him. These are true stories, sometimes dark, occasionally bizarre, frequently tender, and always hilarious. Whether subsisting on caterpillars during months of extreme poverty or making comically hapless attempts at teenage romance, from the time he was thrown in jail to the time he was thrown from a speeding car driven by murderous gangsters, the experiences covered in this book will shock and amaze, even as they leave you rolling on the floor with laughter. The audiobook version performed by Trevor Noah is currently available from Audible Studios.

Quote May 10th

“I DO NOT FEAR DEATH, I HAD BEEN DEAD FOR BILLIONS AND BILLIONS OF YEARS BEFORE I WAS BORN, AND HAD NOT SUFFERED THE SLIGHTEST INCONVENIENCE FROM IT.” 

Mark Twain

  

This week's quote came from a movie we saw at the Ancaster Film Festival on Monday night. It was engaging, funny, sad and hopeful. About living and dying and the nether land in between where some of us hang out thinking we are alive until something wakes us up (if we are lucky). 

Cheers

Jeanne

​

Reviews:

RogerEbert.com/Susan Wloszczna

Finding Your Feet finds its own footing by putting its trust in its sturdy performers and avoiding many of the usual tea-time clichés as it allows its British cast to be defined by their relatable human circumstances more than quaint Anglo quirks.

Women's Voice For Change/Alexandra MacAaron
There are things that the British simply do better than we do. One of them is creating romantic comedies with old people. Here's a new one, with a marvelous cast that's living it up.

Washington Post/Jane Horwitz
This dramedy about middle-class Londoners in their 60s and 70s getting on with life has a genial watchability - even a stubborn relevance - thanks to its crackerjack ensemble cast, who play characters just eccentric enough to keep things tasty. 

Mark Twain Interesting Facts from the Farmer's Almanac

November 30 is the birthday of Mark Twain, born in 1835.  Samuel Langhorne Clemens, aka Mark Twain, provided us with endless entertainment through numerous novels, nonfiction books, short stories, and essays—all despite having ended formal schooling after the fifth grade.

10 CURIOUS FACTS ABOUT MARK TWAIN

When Was Mark Twain Born?

Baby Clemens arrived prematurely in a two-room shack in Florida, Missouri, on November 30th, 1835. He was a frail infant and sickly child, prompting his mother to admit, “When I first saw him, I could see no promise in him.”

Mark Twain’s Many Cats

The Clemens family had 19 cats at one time during Twain’s childhood. Over the years he gave his cats inventive names such as Bambino, Famine, Pestilence, Satan, Sin, Sour Mash, and Stray Kit.

What Is Mark Twain’s Real Name?

Sam Clemens tried out several pseudonyms, including Rambler, W. Epaminondas Adrastus Blab, and Josh, before settling on Mark Twain (the phrase used by Mississippi River steamboat crews when measuring water depth).

Mark Twain’s Typewriter

In 1874, the author spotted one of the first typewriters, a Remington, in a Boston store window. Although it could only type capital letters and he had to operate the carriage return with a foot pedal, he bought it for $125. Twain also claimed to be the first person in New England to have had a telephone for private use.

How Tall Was Mark Twain?

This literary giant stood 5 feet 8 ½ inches tall and was so well known that he once received a letter addressed “Mark Twain, God Knows Where.”

Mark Twain in New Hampshire

In 1905, he spent the first of two summers in Dublin, New Hampshire (home of The Old Farmer’s Almanac). There he wrote (but never finished) a book called Three Thousand Years Among the Microbes. To keep him company, he rented three kittens from a local farm. While lecturing at the Dublin Lake Club, he noticed that an audience member was knitting a pair of socks while he spoke. Infuriated, Twain declared that he had never played second fiddle to a sock and left the room. The following year, he returned to the Lake Club and spoke for over 2 hours on various topics. He received a standing ovation.

Mark Twain’s Clothing

Twain made headlines in 1907 by walking from his London hotel to a public bath across the street attired in his blue bathrobe and slippers. Back in America, he often wore scarlet socks and all-white suits, which he called his “don’tcareadam suits.”

Mark Twain’s Leisurely Habits

Twain loved to write in bed, and reporters chatted with him there more than once. He said, “I have never taken any exercise, except for eating and resting, and I never intend to take any.”

Mark Twain’s Memory

He once observed: “When I was younger, I could remember anything, whether it happened or not; but my faculties are decaying now and soon I shall be so that I can not remember any but the things that never happened. It is sad to go to pieces like this, but we all have to do it.”

When Did Mark Twain Die?

He was born and died when a comet passed, once noting: “I came in with Halley’s Comet in 1835. It is coming again next year [1910], and I expect to go out with it. It will be the greatest disappointment of my life if I don’t.” He got his wish. He died on April 21, 1910, just two days after Halley’s Comet had reached its point closest to the Sun.