Serve by Design

I’m sure that health-care professionals have done extensive analysis about self-talk. If not, they should! I know a few jokes that have evolved from such mumblings. One of my favorites starts by asking,   “Do you believe in the hereafter?” This is a question many of us ask in our daily and episodic forgetfulness. We will wander (and wonder!) room to room throughout the house asking ourselves, “What am I here after?” 😊 "Shhhh!!" Image: adobe.stock.com We also have another type of self-talk these days of our “golden years!” “Television Talk!” We do it during news programs as we boldly interject, “I can’t believe he said that!” And we do it during sport’s programs as we shout out, “It’s a free-throw! And they still can’t make it! Don’t they know? It’s free!!” At our house, we see this derivative of self-talk even more during game shows! There are some sacred half-hours during mid-afternoon and early evening at our house! It’s a time when everything stops, and everyone focuses...

Most every late afternoon we get a call from our eldest son. He uses the time to update us on his day and we then reciprocate regarding our days as well. This daily chat has kept us connected. On many occasions our pre-teen granddaughter is sitting nearby and oblivious to the particulars of the conversation. She usually has her headset on and is playing a game or listening to music. This is her time to decompress following a busy day at school. What kind of listener are you? Image credit: www.clipart-library.com After a good fifteen-minutes of carrying on with our “Number One,” Matt will interrupt himself, look at Eloise sitting on the couch with him, and ask “Eloise, your thoughts?” He loves to tease his daughter and delights in catching her off guard with this playful interaction. She’s a good sport in all of this and responds to this surprising interruption by scrunching her up upper lip and flaring her nostrils to show that she is annoyed by this uninvited attention. Unless presse...

We are on grand kids' care duty these days while the parents are away on school business. One of our favorite outdoor activities during the summer is to patrol the neighborhood hot-spots with bicycles, scooters and for the littlest guy, on a hot wheels trike! We start out at a nearby church to cruise on the spacious paved parking lot. Then,  we walk down to a little watershed branch that runs between the church and several houses on our street only to find that it that was dry this mid-July morning, but we still threw our sticks into the crusty dirt trough where water once shed from the farm field across the way. After this first phase of our "ritual ride," we like to move into the retirement  apartments next door to the church and to the center courtyard where an American flag flies proudly above its pole and flower-adorned base. It is here that we have recited the Pledge of Allegiance every time we have gathered in this place.This has been our patriotic practice since...