Remembering

I'm finding that before I can head to bed, I need to process for a minute what today has been for me. Like most Americans, I have spent at least part of the day remembering the attack on our country 10 years ago. It was my first experience of feeling unsafe in my own country, wondering if further attacks were forthcoming. Hamp was in Chicago at a printing trade show and it took him several days to get home since air travel had been halted. While he was never in harm's way, having normal life interrupted in such a way underscored the point that life in America as we knew it had changed forever. An innocence was taken and while not necessarily a bad thing, a forced growing up in any capacity can leave scars.

When we stop to remember anything - good or bad - it seems that usually pictures or symbols of some kind do what words sometimes cannot. All of us probably have images in our mind of what 9/11 was to us, but one that particularly stood out to me was this picture.

I suppose I could be accused of not wanting to deal with the graphic reality of the day, but I think this picture does that well. While covered in dust from the debris in the air and standing on rubble that possibly has entombed some of their own, they still chose to make a statement of hope. America had been attacked and many were lost, but those who remained were standing together in a new-found commonality to face together what might lie ahead.

And then it occurred to me this morning that God left us a similar reminder in the last hours of Jesus' life here on earth.

Mankind had been attacked centuries before in a garden of perfection by the enemy of the Creator. Just like ten years ago in America, the ripples from that first attack have taken out more than just the original target. Yet, in the midst of the pain and suffering, we were given a symbol of hope in which to remember the only One who could save us from our enemy. A broken body and spilled blood remind us that our Savior came, lived, died, and rose again and that He will come again and all will finally be as it should. With that hope, we're to encourage one another to not lose heart and to remember that this is actually not as good as it gets.

While not perfect, America has gotten it right often down through the years. I, for one, am still praying that we remember again before it's too late.

The World According to Pooh

Have you ever begun a task and ended up doing something so totally different from what you started with? Yeah, that was my afternoon. I really was being productive, but then found myself looking up Winnie-the-Pooh quotes. I know, it boggles the mind as to how I made that transition, but I quit trying to understand myself a long time ago.

As I read through some of them, I realized that A.A. Milne was actually quite brilliant. So I thought I'd pass along some of that wisdom to you on this first day of September that doesn't seem to know it's the month that ushers in fall. Right now in middle Tennessee at 5:00 central time, it is 96 degrees.

I keep telling myself that before I turn around good, I'll be wishing for warmer days, but my self isn't listening right now.

Anyway, back to wisdom from Pooh and his friends. First, though, did anyone besides me ever know all the words to the Winnie the Pooh song that listed the names of his friends? If not, let me reacquaint you. Click here for the link that will let you not only hear the song, but you can sing along if you so desire. I won't tell. :)

In case you're wondering where Tigger was, he didn't show up until later. If you know Tigger at all, you'll understand that he must have his moment of fame as well, so if you click here you can meet him too.

A little side note - when I was in high school one of my best friends decided I reminded her of Tigger and nicknamed me that. To this day, I'm not sure if I should have been offended or not.

Back to the quotes. Here are a few of my favorites that I came across this afternoon and you can let me know if you agree that there's much more here than meets the eye.

"Sometimes, said Pooh, the smallest things take up the most room in your heart."

"You can't stay in your corner of the Forest waiting for others to come to you. You have to go to them sometimes."

"I'm not lost for I know where I am. But however, where I am may be lost."

"Oh, Tigger, where are your manners?"
"I don't know, but I bet they're having more fun than I am."

"When you are a Bear of Very Little Brain, and you Think of Things, you find sometimes that a Thing which seemed very Thingish inside you us quite different when it gets out into the open and has other people looking at it."

"Pay attention to where you are going because without meaning you might get nowhere."

"Nobody can be uncheered with a balloon."

"Rabbit's clever," said Pooh thoughtfully.
"Yes," said Piglet, "Rabbit's clever."
"And he has Brain."
"Yes, said Piglet, "Rabbit has Brain."
There was a long silence.
"I suppose," said Pooh, "that that's why he never understands anything."

"We can't all and some of us don't. That's all there is to it."

"Mind over matter, will make the Pooh unfatter."

"I don't see much sense in that," said Rabbit. "No," said Pooh humbly, "there isn't. But there was going to be when I began it. It's just that something happened to it along the way."

And last, but certainly not least,

"Some people care too much. I think it's called love."