Just Have to Say it...

Happy Birthday Robert Redford!

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40 Years Later

Once upon a time there was a very young Princess and a handsome, kind of older Prince. They fell in love the first time their eyes met and decided to get married, have a castle full of beautiful children, and live happily ever after, surrounded by loving relatives, wonderful friends, and blissful moments.

I don’t think so. That kind of story belongs to Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan in a Nora Ephron movie. Our story doesn’t even make the Fairy Tale section in the back corner of a rundown library. We had rough beginnings, terrible middles and life still keeps handing us challenging moments.

If we didn’t experience all those trials and tribulations of marriage, children, ex’s, in-laws, family, religion, unpaid bills, late charges, paycheck to paycheck years, arguments, addictions, failures, losses, births, deaths, betrayals and all of the other hardships of life we would not have learned the lessons that, I believe, we are here to learn.

The one constant through all of our trying experiences is that we started out as friends and we remain goods friends. We have shared all of the emotions of life, together, and we have survived and learned that no matter what is handed to us we can manage as long as we have the one thing that most people forget about…respect. That, my dear, is why we are still married. Okay, that and the fact that you have the best set of legs I’ve ever seen in my whole life!

I have always said, “Life is definitely not the Donna Reed show.” And it certainly has not been for us. But, we have learned a lot and have come a long way. Now, anger does not have to be explosive, fear and worries are calmed down with a talk in the quiet room, guilt and jealousy are no longer necessary. We have learned the true meaning of family, and friends, and that most of “the other stuff” can be solved with a pound of See’s candy. Okay, two bites of See’s candy.Besides all this, it has given me plenty of characters and situations to write about for which I am ever so grateful.

Thank you for taking this journey with me.

I love you still, Wifey

…to be continued…

San Clemente Serenity

When life hands you lemons, make lemonade. Everyone’s heard of that. But, when you can’t drink the lemonade because it’s way too sour, you need to have a back up.

One solution that works for me is to take a look at something that is bigger than life itself. It’s all around us. Like a lake, a sprawling desert, a sunset, a mountain, the Milky Way, or the ocean. Hold up your problem to the ocean’s horizon and say, “How insignificant is this?”

There is so much more to life than our 10% brain waves can ever imagine, and the magnitude of all that water could care less about “Why your sister isn’t talking to you…again.” Grab a surfboard, a raft, or just roll up your pant legs and get your feet wet. Take a ride up a mountain pass and leave your worries under one of the massive rocks that make a mountain magnificent. Listen to the quiet of the desert just before dawn and let your anger fade into the serene silence or let it blow away with a tumbleweed.

There’s always a solution to any given problem. We will all experience similar situations during our lives. That’s what we’re here for. We just have to take the time to realize how trite most of those problems really are and learn how to handle the big ones.