AMEN, EDAN, AMEN

     Out of the mouths of babes can come some amazing things. Most of them are not usually conflicted with bad memories which cause shadows on the psyches of the children. They see things with pure hearts, like Jesus said when He said. “To the pure in heart, all things are pure.”
     At six years old Edan sees life as a series of enjoyable adventures, especially when it involves playground jaunts. She is definitely a city girl but is not limited with parks in close proximity to her house.
     On a recent trip to visit Edan and her parents, she and I were spending an entire day together without parental involvement. The day began about two hours earlier than her usual holiday morning arousal with the proclamation of “Are you ready to start our day together, MeMe?”
     Of course I was, and wishing we could spend more frequent days together which are ony limited by the fifteen hundred miles which separate our residences.
     The morning was spent playing with her many Christmas gifts, mostly crafts of some kind. After lunch the playground beckoned us since it was a sunny day outside.
     Edan skipped all the way to the playground while I followed behind, hampered only by a healing broken foot or I would have skipped along with her.
     Her first venture on the play structures was on a U shaped metal ladder which was anchored to the ground at both ends. She climbed on it, hung from it with both legs, then with one leg. While doing those ventures many times she also rehearsed over and over the words to the Do, Re, Me song from the Sound of Music. She was determined to get it right. That rehearsal took about 25 repetitions, all while she was playing on the ladder. Her singing the words were done with a vibrato voice with very dramatic and sustained emphasis on the words, all which cracked me up. I was able to temper my laugher so as not to intimidate her.
     Swinging on the swings in the background was a young baby who was being gingerly pushed in the swing by her mother. I know they were enjoying the repetitive song that Edan was singing many times, determined to get it perfect.
     When Edan went to the big slide I admired the baby in the swing. The mother and I conversed for a few minutes about the beauty of the baby. Edan joined into the conversation asking the mom the age of the baby and if she could talk and if she could walk, etc., about which six year old girls always seem to have an interest.
     I exited the conversation as Edan and the mother of the baby began a long, drawn out dialogue with Edan contributing most of the conversation. She asked the mom if the baby goes to day care to which the mom answered, “Not yet.”
     Edan assured the mom that it was a good thing for the baby to go to day care since she had made really good friends at day care and they are still good friends even after going to different schools. The mom was gracious enough to act interested in Edan’s assessment of day care.
     After about fifteen minutes of the adult’s and six year old girl’s verbal exchange I sensed that the mom wanted to move on to another area of the playground with the baby in tow. She excused herself and walked away with her seven and a half month old baby.
     Edan told them goodbye, then infomed me that she was getting a little chilly so we should make our way to her home which was a few blocks up the hill.
     As we exited the playground Edan graciously proclaimed, “ There are a lot of very, very nice people in the San Francisco area, MeMe."
     My reply was, “Amen, Edan, Amen.”
     We started up the hill and my precious granddaughter suggested to her Oklahoma grandmom that we practice talking “British” while we walked home. I’ve never talked British before but I didn’t want to let her think that I was too inhibited to attempt it. So I chimed in with the only British phrase I could think of at the time. I said, “Bloody good idea.” That was a new phrase for Edan, so I had to explain what it meant. Then she began to talk with the most affluent British accent I’ve heard a six year old attempt. She talked “British” all the way home.
     I agree with Edan, “There are a lot of very, very nice people in the San Francisco area,” one of which is a very loquacious little girl whom I get to claim as my granddaughter. She’s a precious product of the San Franciso area and its culture, one of tolerance, respect and inclusion. Edan is a perfect example of the nice people in the San Franciso area. I know the mother of the baby agrees with me. She’s probably telling someone right now about the darling little girl who assured her of the benefits of day care for her baby.
     I've found that that's the way the people I've met in San Francisco are, always reassuring, just like Edan. 



Edan does that, she reassures everyone, just like all the nice people in the San Francisco area.

QUITE CONTINENTAL

     I disagree with the song that says that, “A kiss on the hand can be quite continental, but diamonds are a girl’s best friend.” I guess it depends on whose hand is being kissed and who is doing the kissing on the hand.
     A situation presented itself to me where I experienced the heartfelt thrill of being on the receiving end of a special kiss on the hand. It came from the most unsuspected source and it was accompanied with an infusion of a special kind of love, one that is steeped in respect.
      It was my birthday, my 77th, and I was feeling very, very special on that day. My son and his family who live locally were taking me out to my favorite restaurant for dinner. I had received birthday wishes from my other children, the grandchildren who live on the West Coast, as well as my local grandchildren, my sisters, sisters-in-laws, nieces and nephews who live out of town. It had already been a wonderful day. I had also received a birthday blessing from my husband who died several months ago. He had arranged for a yellow rose, which is my favorite flower, to be added to an arrangement of flowers which were sent by another relative. That was phenomenal and heart warming and unexplainable, yet wonderful.
    The added surprise of the kiss came from Ray, the owner of the restaurant at which we dined that evening. He has been very special to us for years, having owned, operated and cooked at his restaurant for many years. He originally came from another country but came to the US to seek freedom and become prosperous. My husband and I had befriended him when he originally opened the restaurant.
    On the evening of my birthday Ray came out of the kitchen to greet us and hugged me, which was his usual form of greeting.
     After we finished our meal and we were leaving, Ray again came out of the kitchen. I reached up and hugged him again. He hugged every member of my son’s family. Then he did the most unexpected thing. He gently took my left hand and with kindness and great respect kissed the back of my hand. It was almost a ceremonial kiss. The emotional result for me was that I felt very honored and respected, like a member of royalty.
    The act was so unexpected but it carried with it an attitude that I never expected from a person who is not a member of my family.
    We are all used to being kissed, hugged and honored by our families. We don’t expect it, but we treasure it when we know the outward signs of affection are genuine.
    This kiss on my hand was different. It was undeserved and unsolicited, with no family ties, but it conveyed a sign of deep and abiding respect which is an outgrowth of a special kind of love and regard.
     I left the restaurant feeling like a queen, like a member of a royal family. Only a person from another country who has been taught the importance of kissing the hand of an older person in a sign of deep respect and love can make that kind of an overture.
    What Ray intended to deliver to me was definitely received. His message came across powerfully Just a gentle, tender and lingering soft kiss on my hand was worth all the diamonds in the world. Its message came across loud and clear, that I am special to the man, to my family and to others.
     Not diamonds, not rubies, but what I consider one of my best gifts that I ever received is the special kiss that I will continue to treasure, the respectful, gentle, love-filled kiss on my hand from Ray, the pizza man, that warmed me from my head down to my toes. I will carry that feeling with me forever.
     Thank you, Ray, for portraying to me how special you think I am. That kiss came straight from heaven.

PRISONER OF MY PANTS

                                                PRISONER OF MY PANTS    
                                                                             T. Wieland Allen
     I'm hoping that other people have not been in the same predicament in which I was a couple of weeks ago.  Maybe they have.  Maybe I'm not the only one in the world who has found herself in a pitiful situation, the kind in which you don't know whether to laugh or cry.  Preferring to laugh at myself, I ended up giving out loud laughs from deep within me for a few minutes.  They weren't chuckles or little lady-like snickers, they were from deep inside of me, the kind that makes you tired when you finally compose yourself
     Here's the story.  The morning had started off great.  I did my usual morning breathing exercises, then went to the computer and typed up the words of encouragement that I put on one of my blogs every morning.  Then I knew that I needed to shower and wash my hair to get ready to attend the funeral of a dear and wonderful young man who had died very unexpectedly.
     Previously I had sustained a broken bone in my left foot and in the big toe on my right foot in a fall down the basement stairs a few weeks ago and I found it necessary to wear one of those huge orthopedic boots, per the doctor's orders.  I call it the Frankenstein boot because it makes me look like the monster when I weave back and forth and side to side while walking.   I had easily dressed every day and had been successful in pushing the left leg of my jeans into the boot before strapping it up.
      HOWEVER, the day of the funeral I had decided that I needed to find a pair of pants that were very wide legged, hoping that I could get the pants leg up over the huge boot..  I looked way back in the closet and found a black pair of pants that had much wider legs.  They are very old but I thought they would suffice and at least cover up the boot, hoping very few people would notice the boot, which caused people to always ask what happened.  I measured the pants legs, and the figures convinced me that I could get the pant leg over the boot.
       I meticulously put my makeup on because I had been out of the house very few times and was eager to be with people while looking my best.  Then I put on my shirt and jewelry after fixing my hair.  It happened to be one of those good hair days.  My matching jacket was hanging on the door ready to be put on right before my friends picked me up for the funeral.
       The first mistake was that I had left the wide legged pants to be put on last, thinking that they would slide on easily over the really wide and long knee length orthopedic boot.  After all, the measurements showed that it might be a tight fit but it would work.  In actuality, I had also left the chore of putting the pants on until last because I knew I would need a short rest in my recliner with my legs up before completing the task of dressing because at that point showering, washing my hair and putting on makeup was an exhausting two hours effort with the broken bone in one foot and a broken bone in the other big toe.
       I sat in a large chair in my bedroom, all perfectly groomed from the waist up and then I started to slip on the wide legged pants.  I put on the right leg easily over the taped broken toe, pulled that side of the pants up to my waist and began to put the booted leg into the left leg of the pants.  The toe of the boot went easily into the pant leg but when the pant leg got up to the wide part, the instep to heel width,  it refused to budge.  No problem, I thought, I'll just inch the pant legs slowly up until it clears all of the orthopedic boot.
        Tugging and pulling was of no effect.  The little minuscule fractions of an inch that I managed to move the pant leg up past the heel and the instep of the boot only resulted in the pant leg getting more tightly stuck.                      
        There I sat, all beautifully groomed and coiffured from the waist up, feeling like a prisoner let out of confinement since the fall.  From the waist down I looked like a three year old learning to dress herself with one leg in the pants and one leg caught in a vise on the ortho boot.  I couldn't move it up or down.  I was trapped there.
         A thought came to me to take the ortho boot off.  Great idea, I thought.  Well, that wasn't going to work since the tight pant leg was blocking the seven long straps that had to be unstrapped to get the boot off.
          Maybe you haven't been in that predicament before.  Maybe you're smarter than I was.
          The phone rang and I knew it was my friends wanting to pick me up for the funeral.  After all, I couldn't drive with one broken foot wearing a Frankenstein boot and the other foot having a broken big toe taped to the other toes.  Luckily the foot with the problematic big toe wasn't quite as swollen as the other foot so I could get a big athletic shoe on it, being glad for the firm support. 
        Sure enough, the call was from friends asking if I was ready to be picked up and escorted to the funeral.  I replied that I had decided not to go to the funeral.  There I sat, with one leg of the pants wedged onto the ortho boot so tightly the only solution was to cut it off.
         By this time I was exhausted from the preparation in getting dressed but also from having a tug of war with the pants, neither being able to get the one leg off nor geting it on over the orthopedic boot while having the other leg successfully pulled up to the waist.  I was a hilarious sight; pitiful but hilarious.
         After the laughing spell ended from seeing myself in the ridiculous position, realizing that living alone does give a person opportunities to laugh at oneself because of the situations that can happen, I decided to move to my recliner and rest by either cutting off the leg of the pants or by walking ever so slowly down the hall to the recliner, dragging the pants.  I chose to walk down the hall since the wooden floors would allow me to scoot the imprisoned pants down the hall so I could plop myself into the recliner.  That worked.
          I fell into the recliner, put up the foot rest, took a deep breath and relaxed.  I woke an hour later in the recliner with my pants still hanging from the boot.  What an embarrassing sight to wake to.
           Being refreshed, the task didn't seem quite so ominous.  It took a while but I was able to move the pant leg quarter inch by quarter inch down until the pant leg finally fell off of the big ortho boot.  I was free at last.
           I was sorry to miss the funeral of such a wonderful young man, desiring to extend my sympathy to the family.  Some people to whom I've told the story have said that maybe I didn't need to be at the funeral since it had only been a few months since my husband died. Maybe that's right.
          You probably already have the situation figured out.  It came to me later on.  I should have put the wide legged pants on before I put the boot on.  Then I could have inched the top of the pants down over the top of the boot because the width of the boot at calf level is not as wide as the distance from the instep to the heel of the boot.   My mistake.
           It called for more exercise trying to accomplish the difficult task than I had had in the two weeks since the fall which necessitated wearing the orthopedic boot.
           I still laugh when I envision myself in the compromised position.  It was either laugh or cry and I preferred to laugh at myself, of which I seem to be doing more as I get older and the longer I live by myself.  I can be very entertaining to myself on occasion, never intending to do so, of course.  It just works out that way.
                       
         

DARN CELL PHONE

    

                                                DARN CELL PHONE
                                                                                   T. WIELAND ALLEN

      So here I am, standing in my kitchen laughing out loud at myself.  I must be the funniest person I know or I just do silly things that always make me laugh at myself.  Today was the topper, I mean the absolute topper.
      I run a small home based business alone since my husband died and so I have to carry the business phone around with me everyplace in the house.  Don't want to miss a single business call. 
      Since my husband died, my adult children have been very attentive to me, calling regularly to check on me to make sure I'm not laying dead on the floor or maybe laying flat on the basement floor again, where I was a month ago after falling down the basement stairs. So that necessitates my carrying around my cell phone also.  If they can't get hold of me, they start calling around to make sure I'm still alive.  I really appreciate that.
       Per usual, this morning I had carried the business phone and my cell phone to various areas of the house so I could answer whichever one rang.  Feeling a little bit in bondage to the phones has been tough on me, independent soul that I am.   But, it's been a necessity to have both phones near by me at all times.
        Neither phone had rung yet this morning, but I had sent and answered several texts.
         I had done some office work and had sat down to finish a business chore when the cell phone rang.  Surely it was my son who lives in sunny California because he usually calls at about the same time every week.  Intending to reach for the cell phone sitting alongside the business phone, my hand came up empty handed. No phone there.   The phone kept ringing its merry tune. 
         Looked all over the kitchen.  No phone.
         Looked all over the office.  No phone.
         Looked all over the office bathroom where I take it when I take a potty break.  No phone.
         Back to the kitchen, further tearing up the kitchen, there was no phone, even though the ring sounded like it was in that room.
         Back to the office, tearing up the office, moving papers, moving documents, frantically trying to answer the cell phone. The caller was obviously persistent.   No phone, even thought the ring sounded like the phone was in the office, too.  Again, no phone and I left the office in such disarray that it will take a week to reorganize it. 
          Back to the bathroom, where the sound now came from.  It seemed to be saying that the lost cell phone was in the bathroom.  I opened the vanity, thinking I might have inadvertently shoved it in there while putting away some cosmetics.  No, no phone.   
          However, I had dialed my own cell phone number with the business phone, hoping to be able to follow the sound of the ring to the right room.  The mystery was that every room I entered, it sounded like that was the room where the cell phone was hiding.
           I had had too much coffee so that alarming feeling came upon me that said that I better go to the bathroom or I would be changing underpants and pants in a few minutes.
           The cell phone was still ringing from the last call I had made to my own cell phone, hoping to be able to follow the sound of the ring.  I was desperate to potty so I sat on the toilet and was amazed that the ringing sounded like it was coming from the toilet stool.  How could that be? 
           Suddenly I remembered that I had decided to take the advice of a friend and put the cell phone in the back pocket of my jeans. There is was, all safe and sound, neatly enclosed in my back pocket.
           It didn't take me long, astute as I am at my age, to figure out that the reason the cell phone sounded like it was in every room I rushed into is because it was, in reality, in every room I entered.  It was in my back pocket ringing its annoying little ring, trying to tell me where it was hiding.
           Never again will I put it in my back pocket.  I'll do what I have always done in the past, put it right beside the business phone where I can see it and where it is accessible.
           It could have been worse, it could have ended up in the toilet stool like what happened to my youngest sister when she rushed to go to the bathroom after a long walk and it fell into the toilet when she pulled her jogging pants down.  Her cell phone went to never, never land, flushed down the toilet and into the sewer system.
           At least my cell phone was retrievable, found in the back pocket of my jeans.  Short term memory has never been a problem for me.  Maybe I better check for other warning signs.
            Oh, well, the top of the cabinets in the kitchen need to be cleaned off anyway and the unorganized clutter in the office needs to be reorganized and the vanity in the office bathroom needs to be cleaned out.  Frantically looking for the cell phone might have done me a favor.  I'll need to get with the chore quickly now, instead of waiting until the mood strikes me.               
             Now that I think about it,  I kind of felt like a dog chasing his own tail, oblivious to the fact that what he is chasing belongs to him.
             My father-in-law always said that getting older isn't for sissies.  It's not too bad, really, because I spend a lot of time laughing at myself.  I think I'm funny, even if nobody else does.   
           

COUNTRY COUSINS AND ALL THAT JAZZ

COUNTRY COUSINS AND ALL THAT JAZZ
T. Wieland Allen
I am Texas born and Texas bred. My hubby and I moved to Oklahoma fifty years ago. That's not far from our roots, although when we moved here the Texans told us nobody moves to Oklahoma, everybody moves away from Oklahoma.
Let's face it, we moved to southeastern Oklahoma because of the trees. The tallest trees in the towns we left in Texas are considered bushes in the rest of the world. When we saw the huge trees lining the streets of the towns in southeastern Oklahoma, we fell in love with them. They actually gave a person shade, something we didn't know anything about.
Grass is green here, too, something we knew very little about from experience. All we knew about in Texas was lawns with stickers which a person would pick up every time bare feet tried to walk across the yard from one house to another.
Although growing up in Texas, my family traveled occasionally to California where our relatives moved after the depression. Those trips were like going to another part of the planet. It would take days for the slow living lifestyle of us Texans to adjust to the hurried up lifestyle of the West Coast.
One area of interest was the vocabulary and the rate of speed with which the California relatives talked. They spoke in lightning speed sentences, barely pausing for a breath. The words they used were confusing to us Texans. We were used to Southern talk, not the crisp, staccato pronunciation of words. We were occasionally laughed at by the Californians for our southern drawl but we never thought we were so very different in our speaking.
It all came back to roost fifty years later. Two of our children moved to California after college, quickly becoming West Coast talkers. After a few years we had to listen to them intently in order to understand their comments, as well as their crisp. rapid pronunciation of words. I'll have to admit, they only changed in their speaking, not in their sweet personalities.
They married and had children in California. Several years ago the grandsons from California asked us one day if their Oklahoma cousins still sounded like Deputy Dog. Huge laughs were generated by that comment. When we thought about it, we had to admit that yes, we had noticed the difference in the Oklahoma grandchildren's manners of speaking from the California grandsons.
I'll have to admit that years ago I wanted to tell my California cousins, "Slow down," when they talked. Then, years later, I wanted to tell my own children to slow down when their speaking began to evolve, changing from Okie talk to California talk.
Our six year old grand daughter from California solved the questioning in my mind that had been there for years relating to the difference in the speaking. She told me on her last visit to Oklahoma, "Meme, sometimes you sound like a cowgirl."
Now, really, I still can't figure out how to interpret that comment. Was it a compliment or was it a criticism? I'm sure it was a compliment, coming from the sweet grand daughter who wouldn't criticize me at all.
Later she told me, "Meme, sometimes you talk like you speak English."
Maybe I'm mixing the Okie and the California manners of speaking. It has to be confusing to her.
My daughter told me that the only exposure the grand daughter has had to cowgirls is in the Toy Story movies. Jessie is the name of a cowgirl in the movies, so she thinks I sound like the cowgirl Jessie.
I like that. That assures me that she thinks I'm a cool grandma and that her first remark to me was a compliment. She did say that she likes to hear me talk. I thought she was commenting on my wisdom, never thinking she was talking about my cowgirl manner of speaking.
Maybe you can never take the Texas out of a Texan, like the saying goes.
I'll settle for our grand daughter believing that she has a grandma who's a cowgirl. Maybe I'll sing Home on the Range to her at the next visit. That will certainly confirm her thinking that I'm a cowgirl grandma.
I particularly like the part where the song says, "Never is heard a discouraging word." That will make me proud to be a cowgirl grandma if she never hears a discouraging word from me or from her Deputy Dog talking Oklahoma cousins.

WRONG CONNECTION

WRONG CONNECTIONS
T. Wieland Allen


Every time we wanted to watch a DVD on our big TV it took at least 10 to 15 minutes for Hubby to be able to get the DVD player to work with the big digital TV. Frustrating comes close to being an adequate enough word for what went on in our home. It was immensly frustrating for Hubby and frustrating for me as I sat there calmly waiting for the movie or family recording to appear on the screen. I can proudly say one thing for Hubby, he was tempted to give up every time but he never did. Magically, somehow, he would be able to push random buttons and the long awaited picture would finally appear. Every time Hubby professed that NOW he knew how to work the contraption.
Every time I cautioned Hubby to write down the proper steps so that he would know what to do the next time we decided to watch a movie. Every time Hubby professed that he would not forget. I never guessed that every time he had success in the endeavor it was purely a lucky combination of button pushing magic and he was counting on his random button pushing to accomplish the deed every time.
The last time it happened I told Hubby that we would sit down and read the instruction book together and go step by step until we had the mission accomplished. We never did take the time to do that and, boy, am I glad we didn't . Knowing what we know now, it would have ended up with insurmountable frustration for both of us, angry words and sure defeat.
Our oldest son was visiting one night with his children and we decided to watch some family videos that we had transferred to DVDs. As we all patiently waited for the beginning of the video I cautioned everyone that it might take a while to get the thing loaded. Sure enough, within a few minutes we were in the same frustrating activity with Hubby randomly pushing buttons, hoping that his luck would be good this time and the images would magically appear on the screen.
No such luck. Within a few minutes the room became empty of the teenagers who are not commonly known for their patience. They are never rude with their impatience, there were other important mechanical devices awaiting them that they knew how to expertly operate on their own.
Our son got the instruction book out, willing to help his dad figure out why it would take a computer whiz to operate the DVD player. So we had two men working on it now. I would say that it suddenly became clear to our son what the problem might be, but it wasn't suddenly with lightning speed. It was 15 or 20 minutes later when the only people in the room were me and the two men with instruction books in hand. Teenagers had vanished from the room long ago.
Finally our son remarked, "Dad, you have the wrong cord connecting the DVD player to the TV." Sure enough, two years of frustration was wiped out by that revelation, that the wrong cord was connecting the two machines. Now it truly was apparent that any success we had in the past was luck or magic. How Hubby ever managed to get it to work in the past was pure luck, random acts of magic for sure.
Our son attached the right cord and it took only two button pushes to get the movie to play. Success was sweet.
I began to think how often in life we have the wrong connections but we keep expecting life to get easier. Often we are connected to the wrong friends who are demanding and they cost us our peace, our joy and our love.
Other times we are connected to the wrong avenues of entertainment, ingesting damaging information into our minds. The effects of that kind of entertainment will result in bad thoughts, bad attitudes and possibly bad actions.
A more damaging cord is the one connecting us to limited human reasoning. Human reasoning can only go so far in helping us solve our problems. There is spiritual help available from God who has a complete view of things from His dimension and He knows the ins and outs of every troubling situation that we encounter. He has what is called supernatural spiritual power that He can give to us through His Connecting Cord who is named the Holy Spirit.
I tried for years, searching for answers to my problems, endeavoring to have them supplied through human knowledge and reasoning. It never sufficed. It only put Bandaids on spiritual problems.
When I found the Holy Spirit, the proper connecting cord to God, then supernatural wisdom, insight and solutions to problems began to flood into my mind. The strange thing is that I immediately recognized them as Truth because Truth always sets a person free, and I became more and more free of the limits of human knowledge.
I often think about the life changing time when was I sitting in my living room faced with a decision of whether to ask God for His Holy Spirit to enter into me, connecting me to God in a supernatural way. As I was contemplating whether or not to make such a dramatic and life changing decision, these words ticker taped across my mind, "You can continue to live in familiar garbage or you can choose to have unfamiliar gold."
It only took a second for me to choose to shuck the pig pen and it's garbage where I was barely existing, and I made the decision to have God's gold. I immediately was covered with an invisible comforter, a tangible feeling of supernatural comfort. The garbage immediately fell off. That was only the beginning of a joyful, love-filled, exiting life.
When you have the proper cord to connect you to Life's solutions, just like the proper cord our son attached between the DVD player and the TV, everything falls into place and the images become clear on the screen of life.
It's interesting that our son provided the proper connection for the mechanical devices, just like God's son Jesus provided the proper connection to Him when He went to the Father and sent the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, to be available to men.
No wonder it's called the FULL GOSPEL, because God provides everything we need to have fullness of life through the proper connecting cord, His Holy Spirit, who connects us to God's love, through which His wisdom, His insights, His knowledge and His gifs flow to us.
Seek God and His proper connecting cord, His Spirit, and everything you need will be supplied to you.

ANGEL ON THE COMPUTER KEYBOARD

ANGEL ON THE KEYBOARD T. Wieland Allen I was only five years old when I heard the song Kitten on the Keys. My sister was taking piano lessons and that song was in one of her books. As a small child I thought that was the cutest name for a song and I would imagine in my mind the picture of a kitten walking up and down a piano keyboard making musical sounds that might or might not be pleasing to the ears of the listeners. We experienced a similar experience lately which I would call Angel on the Computer Keyboard. After writing a tribute to my husband relating to the heroic way he had handled two serious surgeries and six rounds of very strong chemotherapy, emerging cancer free, I sent a tribute writing about him to friends and family who had prayed for and lovingly supported us during the adventure. In the writing I wrote that my husband deserved the Medal of Honor for bravery during his war against cancer. Everyone who received the email of the tribute responded, agreeing that my husband Steve certainly deserved the Medal of Honor. While working on a particularly hard work assignment later during the day, I decided to check my emails as a diversion. One relative, who will remain nameless because of her embarrassment, responded with a loving comment, that she agreed with the tribute and that Steve certainly deserved the MEDAL of HOMER. I immediately busted out laughing, which pushed the dreariness of the cold, wet March day right out of the house, the town, the country and off the planet. I continued to laugh every time I thought about it, wondering who Homer was. I actually knew that it was a typo, but I became convinced that the typo was the work of an angel on the computer keyboard who typed the wrong, but really right, keys and that the angel knew that I would respond with joy and laughter to the Medal of Homer comment. It was a wonderful thing to happen, causing me to laugh every time I thought about it. The thought also came to me to send the pertinent email to a friend whom I knew was also having a bad day, with a son in a foreign country who was lost in a flood, a pregnant daughter whose raging hormones were causing conflict in her house and a worker who had betrayed her. I obeyed the prompting, and immediately received a reply back stating that she was laughing uncontrollably and had changed from sadness and worry to life-giving laughter. The typo ministered joy to her also. My laughter continued into the next day. While taking my vitamins, the thought about a Medal of Homer crossed my mind and I spewed water and vitamins all over the cabinet. The angel accomplished what it intended, bringing joy and happiness and laughter to two women who were bogged down with earthly pressures. God does such wonderful things and we never know what to expect. The mistype by my relative, although accomplished by an angel for sure, provided the necessary impetus to catapult two women from the doldrums into hysterical laughter. Maybe there is a Medal of Homer. If so, my relative deserves it for her part in changing worry and fretting into laughter and joy. She deserves some kind of medal, why not a new medal called the Medal of Homer. Maybe I'll get to work designing that one.