Dear Reader:

Back in the 80’s and 90’s decades ( as a teacher) I thought I would start screaming sometimes if I heard one more student say something like ” Cool man… that’s awesome.” I should have kept a daily tally of all the variations and paraphrases that included the word ” Awesome!” It would have been in the hundreds weekly.

But now… with time separating this overused word I find myself looking at a new plant or flower blooming and whispering ” awesome.”

* This was true yesterday when this “awesome” day lily popped up surprisingly-probably from all the recent rain showers. “

What started me thinking about the term again was an interview with a young girl who had graduated from college recently with honors.

She had been raised by her grandfather in a small cabin with no heat and she had to go to a well daily for fresh water-for cooking and cleaning.

Her grandfather self-taught her until high school when she rode her horse to the nearest rural high school in the Appalachian Mountains!

Her grandfather was an avid reader and was always borrowing books from the mobile library and reading to his granddaughter daily.

The book mobile driver told both the grandfather and granddaughter one day she thought they were “awesome!” They immediately fell in love with the word!

After the granddaughter started high school she would come home some days frustrated with a homework assignment she didn’t understand or an essay she had to write.

Her grandfather sat her down one day and told her that , not only could she do the assignment, but she needed to convince herself that she might as well ” be awesome ” while she was at it. It became her mantra when she received a full scholarship to college. And then graduated with honors!

So until tomorrow… If we are going to accomplish something ” awesome ” we must rely on faith!

” Today is my favorite day” Winnie the Pooh