Dear Reader:

Sly and the Family Stone…”We Are Family”…now that brings back some wonderful memories…I must have played that tune hundreds of times as both a teacher and a workshop presenter over two decades at least.

I would give out post cards to the students or teachers…depending on whether I was in the classroom or presentation room at a school…the post cards  given out to each participant..started with…”Name, Town, County, City, State, Country, Continent, World, Planet, Constellation, and Universe.”

While the peppy music played…I would toss a beach ball globe  to the first participant and they had to stand in the middle of a circle dancing to the music as we all sang together “We are Family.”

Then the first participant tossed the ball to the player holding the Name card… He/she shouted out their name and  stood beside the first player and danced together  …then the ball was tossed to town, then county, then state, etc. until all the participants were dancing around the first “world/globe” student…each filling in the correct personal response connecting them to the universe.

The idea, of course, was that we are all connected in this universe…in every sense of the word…we are all family.

I think, right now, that is the most important thing we need to remember. Everyone breathing on this planet is part of the universe of life and as such…family. We are all related as human beings.

We must remember during this transitional time…that we have much more in common than we do differences….we are all “possibilitarians” in the sense that we want every possible opportunity to be made available for our generation, our children and  grandchildren, and so on. We all want to keep the ‘American Dream” alive.

We might disagree on how to achieve some of these goals…but by working together and letting our voices be heard… compromises be reached…together we can achieve family unity.

Personally…I will have to say that these past few days have brought my family closer together …texting, emailing or just poking fun at ourselves. ***Pulling together for shared beliefs…and especially consoling each other over Clemson’s first loss of the season. 🙂

When the going gets tough…family is everything. And the nice thing about family is that it can come in all shapes and sizes, all forms of gatherings…defined only by care, kindness, compassion, and love.

We all have “extended” families outside our own particular family units… as in our church family, our community and town family, our state family, American family, and world family.

So until tomorrow…Let the healing begin. “We are family.”

“Today is my favorite day” Winnie the Pooh

Look what I found putting the Halloween part of fall back up…my silver pumpkins…how could I have forgotten them? At least I found them now, before Thanksgiving, and not Christmas!

And speaking of family…I babysat for Eva Cate and Jake Saturday night…so we were together playing, dancing, and building…as well as consoling…sorry Tigers…you played your hearts out even with so many players injured…so proud of you! You did “Believe in Yourself.” As you can see Jake is doing quite well – as he proclaims…he’s got some “moves”…and Eva Cate is the queen of Legos!

Brooke…that beautiful camellia bush you gave me for my birthday two years ago…is blooming for the first time! And it is gorgeous!!!! Going to call Flowertown Nursery where you got it for me and see if Charlene remembers the name of it…it was an exquisite name, too, I remember. (but just not the name?)