Dear Reader:

I don’t think any school age child takes in the significance of two important words learned during grammar lessons on verb tense. The words are “was” and “is.”

The first picture of the “fledgling” garden was taken in October of 2013. The second picture was taken early last evening…June 2016. The first photo depicts a “beginning” and the second photo a “middle.” I see no “ending” to my dreams that still live in the present in the garden. As long as I am, my dreams are too.

I am sure I never fully understood the meaning when my elementary school teacher explained that “is” is an intransitive verb which means a “state of being.”

“Was” is the past tense of “is” and refers back in time to when it was still  a “state of being,” (But now it is that no longer. It is a state of non-being.)

Our whole lives are lived in the “is” stage of our life….but only remembered in the “was” stage.

I believe what got me thinking about the impact of these words in our lives was when I discovered, sadly, that Gloria Houston, one of my favorite children’s authors, died March 21, 2016. I was shocked. I knew her last updated email on her health looked pretty bleak but she was determined to keep fighting her rare cancer.

Then suddenly, the other night, her biography popped up but now all the words in it had been changed from “is’ to “was.” 

Her last email to me was to thank me for a “holding cross” I sent her for Christmas. She indicated then that she was weak and a friend was opening and reading her mail to her.

Still her spirits were good and she talked about her hope for a sequence publication to  The Year of the Perfect Christmas Tree.

We are all one breath away from being removed from the “Living Catalogue” to the non-living one. It is a stark realization but a true one. One breath away from “is” to “was.”

While I was giving this some serious thought…suddenly I found myself smiling again.

“Jesus Christ ‘IS” risen today…. Hallelujah!” We don’t sing the past tense of the verb  “is”….”Jesus Christ “WAS” risen today…Hallelujah!” Christ in God is and is and is forever. Hallelujah!

So until tomorrow…Christ in God has never been, or will never be a “non-being.” He is in a perpetual state of “being” there for all of us for eternity. Now that’s something to smile about!

“Today is my favorite day” Winnie the Pooh

*Yesterday I was “in a state of happy being” when I met Kaitlyn and got to see Tommy’s office in Brooks Styles law office off Rivers Avenue. Later we all went  to lunch.

I was so excited. It brought back memories of traveling to different colleges to see where my three “children” were living so when we talked on the phone I had an image of their rooms and them in it.

I am so proud of Tommy and loved where his work “being” is located.