Siggy's Blurbs: Siggy's Edge of Country …

I still never forgot the passage from Proverbs in the Bible, which states and this is a paraphrase:  it is better to have a meal with others where much love is displayed and the pickings are thin, than to have a feast where very little love is exhibited.  Of course, the passage stated this much more succinctly.

Everyone has been in a crowd and felt very lonely for he/she did not have one genuine connection with anyone.  Love matters.  It always does.  It dispels fear, worry.

How many people have moved to a strange, unfamiliar area because they knew one person.  One person is all it takes to dispel loneliness and give you the courage to venture out into foreign territory.

Our mate ought to be a helpmate, your best friend, your only lover.  Yet if she/he is the only one it places too much pressure on that person.  It is better to have a network set up of friends–others who also love you too.

The well which you draw from to love others is endless.  Love is infinite.  The more you can give the more you have.  And it comes back ten fold.  It is the only thing that matters.  When everything is stripped from you that is all that is left:  love.  It is the only thing that matters in life.

There are many very lonely millionaires out there who have discovered:  money can’t buy happiness.  The best part about it is love is free.  So give it away.  You will never be disappointed.

Tags: best friend, Bible, friends, give love away, God, helpmate, lonely in a crowd, lonely millionaires, love, love dispels fear and worry, love is infinite, love the only thing that matters, lover, mate, millionaire, money, money can't buy happiness, network of friends, one person, Proverbs
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My twenty year old daughter observed, “You are not too old for you can still play basketball.”  Basketball is a game I have loved all my life.  There still is something esthetically pleasing to me about being able to shoot a basketball through the hoop.  If I can do it without touching the rim, it is even better.

I am sixty-one and not foolhardy enough to play a running game with the youth.  I am afraid to play with the abandon I used to in my youth.  I still find my daughter’s observation interesting.

I have loved basketball as far back as I can remember.  I was only a mediocre player but still loved playing.  I made up for my lack of talent with tenaciousness on the court.  I was not afraid of playing against anyone, any size.  Those days are over but I still enjoy shooting basketballs and see no reason to stop.

I can still use the sport to get back my wind and do that by shooting from different corners of the court and increasing the tempo gradually.  All I need is a basketball and some warmer weather.  I had forgotten how much I still love the game.  My daughter reminded me of that.  God bless her for that.

Tags: age, basketball, my daughter, not too old, old age, shoot hoops, sports, warmer weather, youth
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I am convinced that the only reason marriage was put on this earth was to teach one another how to love.  I know I am extremely self-centered and am forced in this relationship to consider another.

Your mate see everything about you.  Given enough time together, your other sees all the different sides of you–the worst as well as the best.

Each partner has rough edges and what ensures the success of the marriage is how well you work our your differences.  That takes time and the process can be rough as it often is and hopefully as time goes some of these rough edges are smoothed out.

Each marriage is incompatible.  Each of us comes from different backgrounds–raised by different people all imperfect.  At best, our childhoods were somewhat similar but sometimes not.

Imagine how boring it would be if we understand each other perfectly.  One lifetime is really not enough time to learn about each other.

Love and forgiveness is the glue that holds a marriage together.  And mystery and mystique drives it.

Tags: childhood, different backgrounds, forgiveness, God, incompatible, love, marriage, mate, mystery, mystique, partner, relationship, rough edges smoothed out, self-centered, teach you how to love, we are all imperfect, work out differences, your mate
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I love my dogs.  No matter how unlovable I have acted, they do not hold any grudges.  They never give me the silent treatment except when they are asleep.  They just love me, come up to me snuggle up to me, lick my face eagerly.

Despite the fact I may have committed several indiscretions in a row, they do not punish me.  This was one of these days.  Despite how badly I have behaved today when I went to bed, both of my blacks pups joined me in the bedroom, one cuddled up next to me and the other lay at the foot of my bed.

I know I am not always that forgiving and I can certainly learn from their example.

They always greet me at the door like I had been away for days (and weeks) instead of the hours I have been.

There is no guile:  they either like you or don’t.  They don’t play “pretend” or hide their feelings like some humans do.  I always know how they feel about me.

There are so many reasons I love dogs but these are just a few.

Tags: dog sleeps on bed, dogs, dogs do not hold grudges, dogs greet me at the door, dogs just love me, forgiving, God, guile, hide your feelings, learn from their example, lick my face, love, love dogs, no guile, pets, pups, silent treatment, snuggle up, unlovable
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I was looking out my back door window and just thinking.  A large section of our front yard no longer has grass and for a short time my wife was considering laying down sod.  I really do not care.  I always felt American’s obsession with having a large neatly manicured lawn was and is an exercise in futility.  I want a garden not a lawn.  In fact, a landscaper is going to help us with developing that.

The back yard is another story:  most of it is wild.  Toads appear at our doorstep every year–all sizes from tiny to humongous.  They are attracted to the bugs that come to the porch light.

There is a small creek in the back–most of the time just a trickle. You never know when a box turtle will appear.  We also saw wonderfully orange colored salamanders at least twice.  Rabbits play in the undergrowth.

I do not want to cultivate this area.  I love not knowing what I will see next, what unusual bird or whatever comes my way.

I love the wild.  It gives me a sense of the mysterious, the unknown, a feeling I love.  That is why I won’t cultivate the back of our property.

Last year after living here for over four years, to my delight and amazement I discovered a large patch of wild raspberries on the far corner of my property.  And I love raspberries.  I even picked enough berries for two pies.

I do not know exactly what lives there but I am always expectant when I peer out my kitchen window wondering what will come along next.  It is out of my control.  That is the way I want it.  This is one plot of land that will grow wild.  I rejoice in it.

Tags: bird-watching, birds, box turtle, bugs, creek, exercise in futility, garden, God, grass, landscape, lawn, manicured lawn, my wife, nature, rabbit, raspberries, raspberry pie, salamander, the unknown, toads, wild, wild land, wildlife
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I live in paradise.  My house is on the edge of the country.  There is a farm a quarter of a mile away.  Within a mile a family has chickens, goats, and horses.  I love seeing the baby goats when they are so tiny.

The view from my large living room window is another portal into paradise.  I watch a steady stream of birds come into my view.  Birds I have never seen anywhere appear at my feeders like the magnificent red bellied woodpecker.  About once a year I see the exotic fifteen-inch red crested piliated woodpecker although it is far more likely I hear its wild cackle first.

We even had a brush or two from the local black bear who now stays away.  Our four dogs who now are enclosed by a large wooden picket fence now frighten him away.

There is so much beauty here and sometimes I do not see it.  I forget I grew up in the city–a large town.  I can see cottontails play outside from my kitchen window.  My two friends, a couple I have know for years, are going to visit us next week from NYC.  To them this is wild country. I now have to view the land from their standpoint, change my perspective.  It is too easy to become blind to your surroundings.  Somehow I need to lift the veil that has grown in front of me and again see the beauty around me.

I had fallen in love with Central Pa.  I knew things had changed when once I was coming back from NJ (where I had lived for the past two decades) and I thought, “I am coming home”.  It is paradise here and I have to remind myself of that fact.  Every time I drive up the Juanita Valley, my breath is taken away by its magnificent view of the River and its surrounding mountains.  Even closer to home, when I drive into town from the back way and peer down into the Susquehanna River Valley, I can easily imagine I am viewing the fjords of Norway.  The universe is in my own backyard.  All I have to do is open my eyes.  It’s here.  I do not have to travel to Maine, Alaska or Hawaii.  It is all here.  Paradise.

Tags: baby goats, beauty, bird-feeders, bird-watching, birds, black bear, chickens, cottontails, country, country-life, dogs, edge of country, farm, fjords of Norway, four dogs, goats, horses, Juniata Valley, mountain, NJ, NYC, PA, paradise, pets, piliated woodpecker, red bellied woodpecker, river, see the beauty around me, Susquehanna River, universe in my own backyard, valley, woodpecker
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It is so easy to get lost in the moment (or let us say the urgent).  You can flow from task to task never stopping.

I know.  I have been there.  You must stop, get off your treadmill, take in what is really going on.

Proverbs in the Bible says, ”Be still and know I am God.”  How can you possibly listen to that tiny voice inside of you if you do not stop your frantic activity.

The tiny voice, your conscience, is always there buried perhaps.  The only way you can possibly hear what that tiny voice inside you is telling is by stopping, changing your routine, permitting yourself to drift, do nothing.

This is very hard to do in a society that values action and does not reward quietness and being.  Yet if you do not stop how can you possibly know where you are or where you want to go or even where you are heading or the course of action you have chosen.

“Be still and know I am God.”  Very very good advice.  That is the only way you can tap that tiny voice that really never leaves.

Try taking an aimless walk or letting your mind drift.  It does not matter how you do it.  Just that you do it, slow down and tap that voice that never leaves you.  It might change the whole course of your life.  It is always there.  You just have to listen to it.

Tags: Be still and know I am God, be-still, Bible, change your life, drift do nothing, get off your treadmill, God, listen to your tiny voice, Proverbs, quietness and being, slow down, take a walk
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I get so absorbed in the beginning of the day I simply do not notice the birds coming to my feeders.  In the first few hours I am waking up.  I really do not know what happens to me the first hours of the morning.

I am very focused in the beginning and can’t relax.  I make my daily trip to the post office, spray their fern, check my box.  There are always the pets I have to take care of:  we have a menagerie–eight cats and four dogs.  The dogs are always eager to go out and do their thing in the yard and they are none too shy about telling me.

At some point, my concentration switches.  I have done the most pressing tasks and can relax a bit.

I did notice some others things earlier:  I forgot that in the middle of the woods someone once planted a clump of daffodils.  I noticed that they were white and also a larger variety unlike the others in our yard.

I also noted that the blackberry and raspberry bushes had new growth (I can not tell them apart this time of the year).  I was thrilled to notice that.  In June and July I will be picking raspberries and blackberries respectively.  I can’t wait.  The only downside, I attract ticks picking berries and they gross me out when I discover one on me.  I just want to get rid of them as quickly as possible.  My wife always wants to gently release them in our yard.

I still remember once last summer discovering seven ticks on me after one berry picking expedition and frantically shook them off of me.  This year I plan to put repellent on me and expose as little skin as I can when I pick the berries.

My wife made several pies last year and I can’t wait to taste another one.  I absolutely love blackberry and raspberry pies.  Last year at the end of the season I accidentally discovered a gigantic patch of blackberries I did not know was there.  I was trying to reach some berries and had gone further into the woods than I had ever gone and there it was.  I will have to fight my way through a wall of briers but I will have more blackberries than I can ever pick.  This time I will freeze some and give away more pies.  Of course my wife will have to bake them.

To get back to the birds, who I do not see right away when I get up, sometimes I am not really here and I am in some different place and at some different time.  It might take a few hours to settle down in the present and do nothing for awhile.  Then I will notice the birds who come in a steady stream all day.  I just have to slow down.  And do nothing.  For awhile.

Tags: berry bushes, bird-feeders, bird-watching, birds, blackberries, blackberry pie, cats, daffodils, deer-tick, dogs, eight cats, flowers, four dogs, my wife, pets, pies, plants, post office, raspberries, raspberry pie, ticks, woods
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Everything is by grace.  Your new day, the next dawn, is only by grace.  I am so aware of that.  I have gotten a solid night sleep, drunk my morning coffee and now await the dawn.

I know that is a privilege.  It is so easy to take the next day for granted.  And sometimes I do.  But not today.

I am waiting for the darkness to lift and then see the steady stream of the birds come to my feeders.

Today I see my optometrist.  I am glad I can.  I have never seen one who has such a gentle touch.  I think of the many people who service my wife and me, the shop we bring our cars which we depend on.  Bob’s customer service is so good.  I do not take it for granted.

There is my family doctor who I go to for checkups (and their support team).  There are so many people whose services I use who I try not to take for granted.  I am well aware everything is by grace.  And I appreciate everything given to me.  They are all gifts.  I did nothing to deserve them.  And that is such an incomplete list.

Tags: bird-feeders, bird-watching, birds, customer service, dawn, do not take for granted, doctor, everything-is-by-grace, gifts, God, grace, morning, morning coffee, my wife, new day, optometrist, service, they are all gifts
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The first thing you do with broken records is realize you are one, too.  Our mate appears, at times, to be a broken record:  the same problems come up again and again and the same solutions are offered.  And your partner does not seem to approach their problems any differently.

Be compassionate.  You are no different.  As you do not want your mate to give up on you, do not give up on your mate.

Each of us are very flawed and not only that appear “stuck” sometimes.  Give your mate the same privilege.  You do not want her to give up on you so do not give up on her.

I often wondered why someone should never give up on a drug addict.  Bear with me.  This is an appropriate example.

Sometimes a drug addict is repeatedly in and out of facilities.  One should never give up on that person and I have to say you do not want to enable the person but nevertheless you should never give up on that person.  The reason for that is simple.  One never knows when that person is going to turn the corner, recover and stop being an addict.

In the same way, entrenched habits sometimes will change.  The thing is not to alienate the other in the process.  In a marriage each person comes with baggage.  The person often is not aware of some of that baggage.  That is one thing marriage does:  change the other.  That is the most common institution to do that.

Every marriage is really dysfunctional.  The family each of the persons grew up in was dysfunctional.  The only question is to what degree.  We are all imperfect.

What marriage does (or any other primary relationship) is to bring out your shortcomings.

In a relationship nothing is usually hidden for too long, and to go back to the original topic every partner hears the same old story from the other.  Anyway, that is the way it seems after awhile.

All you can do is love your partner.  Sometimes a partner will turn the corner in a certain area and sometimes not.  Each partner has to love the other.  I am convinced marriage was set up for one reason–to teach us how to love unconditionally.

We are all broken records at times but all we want is to be loved despite our faults.  So next time your partner sounds likes a broken record realize you are one, too, just a different one.  Flaws are flaws.

Tags: be compassionate, broken-record, do not give up, dysfunctional, faults, God, habits, love, love unconditionally, love your partner, marriage, problems, relationships, same-old-story, we all have baggage, we all want to be loved, we are all flawed, we are all imperfect
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