Sidetracked Charley

I was an adult of middle age before I encountered the phrase argue for your limitations and they are yours . Until that point I had seen my limitations basically as those forced upon me by others. If you are female you are most likely familiar with most of those beginning with nice girls don't do that . And I usually responded with, Who wants to be a nice girl?  And in my youth I wasn't even sure I wanted to be a girl.  Who wants to be labelled a second class citizen at birth. I was raised in conflict on so many levels from a father who told me I could be anything I wanted to a mother who sent me away on my freshman year in college to earn my Mrs. degree. I was encouraged by society to go along to get along. And it wasn't until and it wasn't until I was teaching adaptive skiing to adults and children with perceived limitations I encountered the concept of arguing against your perceived limitations. I learned to not see them in my students and in my role of teach...

First blooms of 2019 The new year thus far has be like herding cats. I read somewhere once that more people die in February, when the ground is too frozen to dig new graves, than any other month. I also think more mechanical and technological things also fail in February. That is particularly sad because it usually is the time we are most short of funds. I usually avoid sweeping New Year's resolutions in January because so much else is going on. But this year I unconsciously was swept up in some life changes. It was not unlike standing on the edge of the White River below Table Lake Dam when the alarm goes off signalling release of water. I didn't get swept away but I gathered up my fishing tackle and made a hasty, maybe too hasty, retreat. I am just beginning to find my footing again, and be able to quietly take stock of anything I might have missed in my haste. Some changes we have a modicum of control over like cutting back severely on coffee, upping water consumpti...

Lying seems to be all the rage these days.  We are told so many lies in a day it is hard to know what the truth is. Alternate facts are not the truth regardless of what the spin doctors tell you. I recently got involved in a conversation about the nature of truth and lies and when lies become your truth. As a child I was an excellent liar. My brother got the blame for a lot of things I did because my version of the truth was believed over his. In my early years I was a military brat. Military brats lie. There is even a comprehensive study of the phenomenon. John Irving in Cider House Rules points out orphans lie too. His reasoning in the book is because it is the only thing in their lives over which they have control. I believe that is true of military children too. Three bases in the second grade is definitely out of your control. But it can be really freeing because you are never held accountable. You could reinvent yourself and your history every new school or house. My ...