Keeping an eye out on the changing times

Teachers being laid off.
600 in our county. Performance
based.

Library closings being discussed
downtown as I write.

Who wants to be a teacher now?
Where will they get a job?

Who wants to be in the medical
profession? Need to ask my brother
who is a PA. What is the talk in his
office now? My nephew is in his
third year of Medical School.
Wonder what his take on this is.


Need to Keep our eyes on Jesus.
So much changing. Too fast.

Any comments on where you live
with all of this. Encouragement
needed!

Being thankful is sometimes hard

We walked into the library branch we
use that is not closing and found them
purging books , moving books and then
I saw a friend. A friend who is a librarian.
She was laid off on Friday. I almost cried.
I thought the libraries and their employees
were closing. NO,they are moving some to
other branches and others at the branches
still open will have to leave in 2 weeks.
Easter.

I almost cried also because I was on the tail end
of a phone call with a friend who is mourning
the freedoms in our country.
What other freedoms will change?

Another friend was laid off from her job
on Friday. So now my prayers are full : mercy.

It is hard to be thankful when loss comes
God is good.
I am thankful.
He is merciful.

Well, here's a interesting thing to be thankful
for: Snow up in the mountains!

I am thankful for Mercy.
Every morning.
New.
Every morning.

The sun still comes up every morning.
The artists still capture its beauty.

Norham Castle, Sunrise 1845

A Sympathy Card for the loss of the libraries

This dear friend who keeps letters
in my mailbox to me ..........
and to my daughter .........

sent me a Sympathy Card about the
loss of the 12 libraries in our city-
county. Changes that aren't good.
Not just the sign of the times but
a clear worldview to the community
of what is important.

What is? Definitely not the closing of
libraries!

on NO, some of our libraries are closing

Very sad news here in Charlotte:
12 branches of the Library System
are closing on April 3rd.

I am mourning the loss.

New Julia Child Book: Her Letters

As I have a passion for real
letters , finding out about this
new book of her letters to Avis DeVoto
on the web on Makoto Fujimura's
Twitter! Coming out in the Fall.
So remember. There should be some
media hype!

“As Always, Julia: The Letters of Julia Child and Avis DeVoto,”

Read here in the NY Times.

Berry Poem

A Purification
by Wendell Berry

At start of spring I open a trench
in the ground. I put into it
the winter's accumulation of paper,
pages I do not want to read
again, useless words, fragments,
errors. And I put into it
the contents of the outhouse:
light of the sun, growth of the ground,
finished with one of their journeys.
To the sky, to the wind, then,
and to the faithful trees, I confess
my sins: that I have not been happy
enough, considering my good luck,
have listened to too much noise,
have been inattentive to wonders,
have lusted after praise.
And then upon the gathered refuse
of mind and body, I close the trench,
folding shut again the dark,
the deathless earth. Beneath that seal
the old escapes into the new.

Great lesson ....

I'm going to put a plug in for
Gileskirk ( High School Humanities Curriculum)
which will soon be
available again.

Lessons learned about the
King James Bible and why and
what it did to change culture and
the world:

"Sometimes what looks like failure
can be the very thing that God will
take to shape and change the world."

If you know anything about James I,
you may get why this absolutely beautiful
version of Scripture, written by 47
Geniuses , and how God answered William
Tyndale's prayer as he was burned on the
stake: " Oh , Lord, Open the King of England's
eyes."