"We find what is funny"

I recently met 'Isabel', a lovely woman who is rapidly approaching her 90th birthday, and her daughter 'Rhea' at my day job. Isabel is an intelligent, alert lady who despite a serious heart condition displays an active interest in others and her environment. Rhea has a good natured, healthy, fresh-air feel about her, and clearly enjoys her mothers company. Isabel proudly told me that Rhea works out every day, walks and bikes on a trail nearby their home...and that she has had MS for 30 years.

They asked questions, told stories and laughed. While they were laughing Isabel piped in, "We laugh all the time. We think so much is funny--we find what is funny. That's what we do."

from The Quiet Eye by Sylvia Shaw Judson

"When you love someone, you love him as he is."

Charles Peguy, French (1873-1914)

Cloth Napkins

We decided a few years ago that we would commit to using cloth napkins instead of paper. My daughter protested at first when she realized it would be her ongoing chore to fold clean napkins and put them away. Then one summer she went to a day camp for homemaking skills. Besides menu planning and a field trip to the grocery store, lo and behold there was a unit on napkin folding. There she learned to fold napkins in the shape of a rose, a bishop's hat, a pyramid, and a flute for champagne glasses. She was taught where to place the creation on a table setting. It changed everything. Now if a friend is at the house on a 'napkin day,' he or she will be brought into the ritual, and patiently taught to fold a rose.

Sunday Afternoon

"We apprehend Him in the alternate voids and fullness of a cathedral; in the space that separates the salient features of a picture; in the living geometry of a flower, a seashell, an animal; in the pauses and intervals between the notes of music, in their difference of tones and sonority; and finally, on the plane of conduct, in the love and gentleness, the confidence and humility, which give beauty to the relationships between human beings."

Aldous Huxley