One at a Time

I was talking to a border patrolman one day, and I asked him about his job. He shared with me some of the risks of getting hurt, and even the chance of being exposed to disease. He said he was careful to change clothes and shower before he hugged his children after work. But he also said he'd gotten to know many of the illegal aliens by name because he had come in contact with them so many times, picking up the same people over and over again.

I asked him if he ever got discouraged since there seemed to be no end in sight to the flood of people coming across the border. It looked like he was attempting to plug up a huge number of cracks with only so many fingers in a bursting dam.

He told me, "You can't look at it that way. If you do, you'll get discouraged and defeated, and you won't be able to do your job. You have to take one day at a time, one person at a time, and just do what you were told to do."

That advice really stuck with me, especially how it relates to so many aspects of my life. At times I become overwhelmed and discouraged looking at the big picture of a job, instead of breaking the job down into manageable portions and focusing on one task at a time. I used to try to find a stopping place when I first started working at the library, but would find myself working hours after closing time and never actually finding a point where I could say, "It's finished for today." Most folks think that all a librarian does is shush people, check out books, and read bestsellers all day long. Before I started working at the library, I actually thought librarians did have a lot of free time on their hands, but I learned quickly that library work is never-ending. And I eventually learned to just stop when the library closed because the work would still be there waiting for me the next day-- just like housework.

Thinking about the never-ending tasks of housework used to be enough to paralyze me into sitting down and doing nothing. But when I finally learned that filling dishwasher and wiping the cabinet only takes about ten minutes, or mowing the lawn means about a half hour of exercising, or disinfecting the bathroom or sorting the laundry takes about five minutes each, and so on, I can tackle those jobs if I focus on the task at hand instead of the whole shebang. And a whole lot of little jobs can quickly add up to accomplishing a great deal.

Charitable organizations and ministries would be crushed under the weight of the burden of helping the needy if they constantly focused on the huge numbers of people needing help. But they can't look at it that way or they'll get discouraged and defeated and won't be able to do their jobs. They have to take one day at a time, one person at a time, and do what they were told to do. And one by one, and family by family can add up to a multitude of people that have been helped.

Even in the midst of difficult or simply mundane jobs, we can still find jewels in the mud and the muck if we just keep our eyes open:

• watching a bumblebee get nectar from the wilting flowers I'm having to water for the gazillionth time this year...
• the mockingbird serenading us from the telephone pole as we work in the yard...
• the student who actually got excited about learning something we were teaching in the midst of too many other kids who think school is interfering with their social lives...
• a helping hand or a smile of encouragement during a frustrating moment or day or week...
• a comment by a reader who said my book or blog really touched them, and to tell me to keep on writing.... after I've been sitting there staring at my computer struggling to write and wondering if I should keep doing this...

You have to take one day at a time, one person at a time, one task at a time, one shovel at a time, and a mountain can eventually be moved. 

Keep Learning; Keep Improving

I'm currently reading a book called Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell, another one of his books that makes one stop and think. He talked about how successful people like Steve Job and Bill Gates and the Beatles had opportunities to hone their crafts from early ages, and that he figured it involved 10,000 hours of dedicated practice to get them to their level of proficiency. Other people say that figure is debatable, but there's little doubt that excellence in any talent or skill takes a lot of time to develop.

I did a presentation at a school function yesterday in front of three adults and one child. That's the first presentation I'd done in about a year, so I needed the practice or I start to get the jitters all over again when it comes to public speaking. The last presentation I'd done before that was at a reading conference at a college in front of over a hundred people. I try to be prepared whether it's speaking to one or one hundred, and I don't rank the success of any speaking engagement based on numbers. I ask God to bring whomever needs to hear the presentation, and trust that the message was meaningful and helpful to someone there.

I told my daughter it's part of the 10,000 hours. : ) I have no idea where I am when it comes to the total of time spent honing these skills, whether it's writing or speaking, but I know that for as long as I'll be doing either or both, I'll continue to learn and try to improve along the way.

My mother worked in a bank for many years, and she made it a point to learn whatever she could while she worked there. When she finished her responsibilities, she always helped someone else finish their work. By the time she retired from working there, she could do the work in any department in the bank.   She multiplied her skills while she worked there.

Don't sit around and watch the clock when your work is done. Learn more than what your position requires. You become more marketable that way. You add new skills to your resume. Become indispensable and your boss and co-workers will definitely feel your absence when you're not there.

Keep learning. Keep Improving.

To Covet or Not to Covet

Her name was Tina, and I was jealous of her. She was petite, like her name, and wore starched petticoats that would make any square dancer proud. She had a piercing, feminine scream that could shatter glass. My limp petticoat (singular) did not stand at attention, and my scream sounded more like a male moose. But more than anything, I was especially envious because she wore cute glasses and a leg brace.Why couldn't I have cute glasses and a leg brace in the third grade? Some kids were just luckier than others, I decided.

Isn't it odd some of the things we covet throughout our lives? Somehow Tina's attitude about what many would consider disabilities didn't make us feel sorry for her, but rather desirous of what she had. And how many other folks have we known that seem to have everything going for them and were still discontent?

What is it about us that causes us to always want what someone else has? If it's not material things-- bigger house, nicer car, fashionable clothes, the latest toys or electronic gadgets-- it's someone else's looks or personality, talent or skills. Why can't we learn to be content with who we are and what we have in life?

We are visually assaulted daily by advertisements trying to convince us that certain products or lifestyles or body shapes are the secrets to happiness. Capitalism would literally crumble without the tremendous support of covetousness and self-indulgence.

My grandparents left such a wonderful example of living simple and contented lives, but I was too busy to notice. They worked hard and lived frugally; they never lived beyond their means. They didn't buy something until they had the money saved to do so, and that included new vehicles and even a new house. My mother told me her stepfather never paid more than $17 in interest his entire lifetime. That is amazing! Most of us wouldn't know how to function these days without credit cards and interest payments.

When will we get it through our thick skulls that the true source of our joy and happiness is not in material things or circumstances? My grandparents had so little of what the world considers material signs of success, and yet they seemed to be so content with life.

My friend Tina's disability didn't disable her. I actually had to start wearing eyeglasses two grades later, but by seventh grade I was too embarrassed to wear them. And I was blind as a bat without them. I didn't realize back in third grade that it really wasn't Tina's glasses and leg brace I wanted, but rather her attitude about them.

And I think that's one of the few things that it's okay to covet-- a good attitude.

The Only Expense was Time

The Casey family on Easter Sunday before heading to church in Dell City 20 miles away; 

This is near the part of the yard where we spread the blanket to watch the meteor shower in the middle of the night

"Wake up! It's time," my father said to us in the middle of the night when we lived out in the middle of nowhere in far West Texas. We stumbled sleepily out of the house to a blanket spread in the front yard. We lay there looking up at the night sky, witnessing something we'd never seen before and haven't seen since. Falling stars covered the sky like a fireworks show. It must've been some kind of heavy meteor shower. I'll never forget it, nor many of the other experiences Dad and Mom took us through. And when I think about it, the only cost in most of those experiences was time-- their time.

Hiking up Bone Creek Canyon at the foot of Guadalupe Peak ten miles from our house

I can still look up in the sky and find Orion, the Big Dipper, the Seven Sisters, and the planet Venus that Dad taught us to recognize. For years we took empty baby food jars with us on vacation to collect soil samples from all over Texas and the other states we visited. We had every kind and color of soil imaginable, including pale caliche with bright yellow specks of uranium in it. [That accounts for our glowing personalities and nuclear appetites]. We visited educational places such as museums, historical parks, and the State Capitol, and went beach combing for shells and unbroken sand dollars at the coast.

The Casey Kids on vacation in the mid-sixties in our usual firing squad pose

During one of my dad's FAA training stints in Oklahoma City, our budget was very tight. For entertainment we found the book mobile nearby and discovered the joy of reading, or we'd walk several blocks to play in a park, and one day we even toured a meat packing plant. They warned us that we'd probably never be able to eat another hotdog or bologna sandwich after that, but unfortunately, it didn't phase us. Mom and Dad still had to knock us away from the dinner table. [that uranium thing].

My parents pose in front of our home in Salt Flat before heading to a party; 

the picket fence in the backyard housed the "fort" playhouse

Dad built a cool playhouses for us out of a large equipment crate during our elementary years when we lived in Fort Stockton. Due to its huge size and the fact that it didn't cost anything to build, it had to remain when we moved out to far West Texas to a place called Salt Flat. But the next big equipment crate that arrived turned into a cavalry fort within the picket fence yard behind our isolated house. Our imaginations soared in a place where TV reception was almost non-existent. Mom and Dad taught us many games and played with us often. We lived twenty miles from the very small town where we went to church and school, and ninety miles from the nearest doctor, dentist, and adequate grocery store. We spent many, many hours in a vehicle together, which allowed for plenty of singing and conversation, as well as the occasional debate [Did, too! Did not!], and wrestling match. [pre-seatbelt days]. 

Visiting friends in Cloudcroft, NM 

I started reading a book recently that stated all families were dysfunctional, and the unrealistic Walton and Brady Bunch mentality about happy, functional families were why people in general were so messed up. I put the book down. My family was far from perfect, but my parents were onto something right when it came to spending time with their children. They had the same number of hours in the day everyone else had. They were and have always been there for us kids. We never had to question their love for us.

Those things don't cost money, just a little time.

Academy Awards Fashion Sanity Winners

In all the frenzy of fashion swirling around the Academy Awards, and the media spending way too much time covering haute couture, it was refreshing to see a couple of beautiful women who weren't pressured to succumb to promoting designers' fashions on the red carpet.

Photo by www.popsugar.com

Bradley Cooper already earns double points for bringing his mom as his date. But when Kristen Chenoweth asked Gloria who she was wearing, she answered, "Just something out of my closet." I just about fell off the couch with joy. And I learned she was wearing comfy tennis shoes under there, too. Finally, some sanity around that place. Gloria, you looked beautiful, and you're my kind of gal!

Photo by www.news.softpedia.com

Helen Hunt also looked gorgeous in her H&M off the rack dress. 

I can't imagine the pressure piled on the stars to seek physical perfection and/or to make no mistakes pertaining to the ever-changing, always subjective fashion trends. And that's coupled with the fear of being ripped apart for their fashion choices by the tabloids and the Joan Rios of the entertainment news (oxymoron?) shows. 

Descendants of the tailors from the Emperor's New Clothes are alive and well today. Fashion's goal is to make you think the perfectly good clothes you have in your closet this month are totally inadequate. And after you buy the latest fashions, they will tell you the same thing again next month. 

Don't buy into that never-ending merry-go-round. 

Storing & Rotating Water

For years I've wanted to get in the habit of storing extra water in case of a natural disaster or the occasional 'boil water' notices our community issues when the water supply has been contaminated for some reason. In years past when I kept gallons of water on hand, I never had a good system to make sure I was using up the oldest water first. But I finally came up with an easy method now that tells me at first glance the order in which I should use the gallons of water we keep on hand. And I don't have to lift and shift them around at all.

My father built shelves for storing the 24 gallons of water over our chest freezer in the garage, which is handy to load and unload right by my vehicle. If you notice, some of the jug handles are facing different directions.

The handles that are facing to the right, or farthest from my reach, are the newest jugs of water I've set on the shelves. We use about six or seven gallons a week for cooking and making tea, so when I go to the grocery store once a week, I only have to handle and fill up six gallons of water. We can get gallon refills from HEB for 20 cents a gallon. 

The handles that are facing forward are the next newest gallons of water. Every time I bring a new batch of water from the store, I turn the existing jug handles to the center or left, which is easy and quick to do.

The handles that are facing to the left are the oldest jugs of water, which I use before the others. It's a simple system and doesn't involve constantly moving the jugs to keep them in order from the oldest to the newest water. Voila! 

Stop in the name of the law

• Someone took something that didn't belong to them,  so a law was written prohibiting stealing. 
• Another person committed an assault on someone else, so laws were made to protect others from deliberate harm or death.
• Someone else went back on their word and reneged on an agreement, which started signed paper contracts to attempt to make agreements binding. 
• A student ran in the hall at school and collided with another student causing bodily harm, so the rule was birthed that banned running in the hall.
• Two of the earliest vehicles collided at an intersection, and somebody decided that traffic signs and rules would help keep people safe.
• Some individuals took it upon themselves to erase and correct answers on the TEAMS, TABS, TAAS, TAAKS tests to raise their campuses' accountability ratings, so TEA required all teachers, administrators, and paraprofessionals to sign multiple oaths at every stage of training and testing, hoping that would make everyone honest.
• Somebody took a gun into a school and shot somebody, so now attempts to ban guns are applied to everyone.
• Someone figured out they can steal others' creative works and sell them for their own profit, so laws were written to protect artists' livelihood.
• And multiply all of that by hundreds of thousands of laws to arrive at where we are today.

Law-writing began thousands of years ago... and you'd think we would have reached a saturation point, having enough laws to cover every conceivable abuse, but every year new laws are written for the next round of dishonesty and abuse that changes with the times.

"Today's Reforms are Tomorrow's Abuses"

I heard a New York Times journalist make that statement back in 1992 in San Antonio, Texas. I've forgotten the journalist's name, but his statement stuck with me all these years. Laws and ordinances and rules aren't necessarily written for the honest folks, they were written because someone abused a situation or a person. New laws are written for the changing technology as thieves figure out new ways to steal. Look how thick the stack of paper has become just to attempt to force people to keep their word. Compare that to not so many years ago when a handshake was enough to seal the deal. 

Most laws were written with good intentions for the general public's good, but too many laws can make criminals of us all. 

• Because somebody at some time was unsafe driving a certain speed limit, laws now limit everyone's driving to a certain speed limit, and now safe drivers can be fined for breaking that law.
• The IRS tax filing system has become so complicated, an honest error could mean breaking the tax law.
• City ordinances differ from town to town, and something as simple as posting garage sale signs on streets can bring a heap of trouble on an unsuspecting citizen attempting to make a little money. 
• Does missing signing one of those TAKS (and now STAAR) oaths on the correct day make someone a criminal if they sign it on the next day? Do those oaths actually make someone more honest?
• Is New York City actually going to fine businesses for selling soft drinks in cups deemed too large by the mayor? 
• A woman spilled hot coffee on her lap and successfully sued McDonald's for something that was her fault, which is only one example of winning the lottery by lawsuit abuse these days. 

We're to the point of fining people for stupidity or making unhealthy or unwise choices. 

And we're supposed to be living in a free country. 

God gave us only 10 Laws in the Old Testament:

1. You shall have no other gods before me.

2. You shall not make for yourself an idol.

3. You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God.

4. Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy.

5. Honor your father and your mother.

6. You shall not murder.

7. You shall not commit adultery.

8. You shall not steal.

9. You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.

10. You shall not covet.

But in the New Testament, Jesus simplified the Law even further when someone asked Him what the greatest commandment was. He replied, 

"'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments." Matthew 22:36-40.

How would our lives change if we all were to live those two commandments? But even if we erased all the hundreds of thousands of laws and replaced them with these two, people will continue the abuses until these simple, but profound words are written on their hearts.