I was thinking about the people we meet in all our walks in life, today. I was thinking how in some simple words shared they have made such a tremendous impact on my life. It is with the simple exchange of thoughts.

When I lived in Singapore there was a man I saw every day at the Singapore Polo Club. He always had a happy greeting and always a smile on his face. He always made me smile and enjoy my day. One day right as were readying to leave Singapore, I took a moment and asked him what made him so happy. He thought for only a second and he told me that every day he wakes up and is alive is the very best day. We were young and he was in his seventies, this made a huge impact on us after he told us this.

I am a little worried that this simple exchange of thoughts is a dying art, unless we live in a smaller town and take the time to exchange life thoughts. We all have a more technological form of communication now, something like this Blog. This is all so unique to be communicating with people you somehow trust and have never met.
I am hoping that the act of texting that so many teens now use, will not have a negative impact on their ability to verbally discourse with one another. Whatever will happen to the home phone? Will it go away? We will all just have mobile phones that are mostly used for texting. Needless to say, the people we meet whether or not in person is kind of like small town living in a little community.

Our thoughts are relayed, read and absorbed, just like the person at the checkout counter I may see maybe every day. Sometimes, it's the the simplest of encounters, which can be life changing. An unexpected smile, or a stranger complimenting what a lovely family you have, or a tride and true friend saying how much they respect you. How special a little community we have to share on this big Earth.

n.

Stench follows me
from barn to house,
it drifts up from my boots,
I hardly notice, but I'm sure
others do.

This barn stench, out-stenches
even my own sweat stench. My family
rarely notices, 'cept my youngest daughter
She has a rare and precise olfactory sense,
as do I. When she walks into the room after
being w/horses, I remark, "Aah, you have been in the barn"
Just to be obnoxious, like pointing out a poppy seed
in her tooth.

We are quite the pair of horsey girls,
We don't care about our stench, we are
loved by all, including the stinky dogs.
I don't think twice about running to
the market with riding boots still on,
Life is good, the lettuce doesn't wilt as
I meander by. The check out person doesn't wince,
just asks me how the horses are. I always have
some story, today it was that my nasty pony bit my
finger...the nerve, the other pony has his grazing
mask back on as he is beginning to founder again,
too much rich grass...too much rain
in these parts.

Well, now that I have revealed this
little secret, aren't ya glad you don't know
me other than here on this blog??


n.

Each day
that comes to pass,
brings a sense
there is something more. A longing for something, I can't quite
put my hand on.

When I look out at the fields
and see the same
pile of rocks, never different,
always rocks, there is nothing
more.

The lab barks if something is
out of place, like pieces of the
puzzle have gone into the wrong spot,
He finds this a threat and alerts all
to this abnormality.

Unfulfilled longing, is like a piece of
puzzle out of place. It is not right to
the big picture. Just the word, longing, conjures
a sense of melancholy. It is not a need for something,
it is less concrete. Longing is somewhere in there
with craving, one of the heart and one of the mind.

I have a longing for world peace. I have a longing to end
world poverty and hunger. These are tangible longings,
which could, with baby steps be fulfilled. Lost love longings are
intangibles or longings to re-live a special moment in our
life, simply a dream longing.

As sad as some longings are to occupy ones heart and mind,
to have never longed is much more sad.

n.