Listen to Jim:

 http://redclaydiary.com/mp3/ivegotabrandnewpairofrollerskates.mp3

or read on…

THE KEY is the key to successful roller skating.

This is way back when…in 1949, when I am eight years old.

Without The Key there is no way to get those skates to stay on. The only roller skates I know about are the kind you clamp right onto your shoes—or your sandals.

Even back when, it is obvious that roller skates are the poor person’s substitute for ice skates, ice skating being way more sophisticated. But I observe that only people who live in cold-winter places get to ice skate. In the movies, ice skating looks so smooth and graceful and kind of high-falutin’. Everybody from the debonair Fred Astaire to the round-faced Sonja Henie ice skates.

They make it look so easy, so possible, you know.

Never having ice skated, I am puzzled about why skaters skate backwards so much of the time. It doesn’t make a particle of sense, since I never see runners running backwards or bicyclers bicycling backwards or scooter-riders riding backwards.

Of course, the exception to this is my Uncle Adron, who can ride a bicycle backwards—a feat that is fun to watch because it is absolutely meaningless and useless. For the rest of my life, it’s the pointless capers I’ll witness that will give me the most enjoyment.

ANYHOW, back to the subject of roller skating.

Roller skates are sexless in 1949. If you have a skate key and a pair of pliers, you can adjust anybody’s skates to any foot length or shoe width.

Now and then, one of the skates will fly off a shoe and endanger other skaters and passersby. The shame of the failed designated skate-adjuster is akin to the shame a parachute-packer might feel if a ‘chute doesn’t open on cue.

Oops!

There are two kinds of skating that I know about. The most fun skating is done on the asphalt in front of our house. It is fun mainly because I can pretend to be the world’s greatest skater. There’s no-one around to testify otherwise.

The other kind of skating takes place at a skating rink, where there is lots more space…the downside being that I and my fellow amateur playmates are always outflanked by skaters who are more skilled!

But the fascinating part of this story is that some of us kids now know what it is like to walk in one-sixth Moon gravity, because that’s the way you feel after a couple of hours wearing those heavy metal skates. First, you strain to carry the unfamiliar Jovian weight and you move in slow, painful motion, as if gravity has doubled up on you. Later, you take them off and you’re suddenly raising your feet higher than normal with each step. In just a short period of time, your body deserts its normal rules of conduct and adjusts to newer laws of physics.

Moon walking and Jupiter walking and earthbound walking overlap in just one after-school afternoon, just like I read about in the astronomy chapter of my science book in class!

And talk about complicated—trying to skate holding hands with someone else takes all the skill and concentration I can muster. Forget that!

Another thing—at my age, my buttocks are—what—just about two feet off the ground, but when my rollered feet swoop out from under me, in a jiffy that hardwood floor or the rising asphalt whaps me on the rear like God’s big fly swatter.

Suddenly, the one-sixth Moon gravity transforms itself into a humongous magnet and makes me aware of the one consistent boss I will have for the rest of my life—Gravity!

So, what have I learned by skating that will carry me through to advanced age? Even at the age of eight, I know that:  1. Controlling The Key imparts a certain status; 2.  Not everybody is destined to be a skilled athlete; 3.  Science helps explain a lot of mysteries, such as how gravity works in different ways, how skates that fly up will surely drop down, how rear ends are good at breaking falls; 4.  Things that happen in movies have little relation to what happens in everyday life; 5.   You can have just as much fun imagining things as actually experiencing them—and usually more safely, too; 6.  The Past is the safest place to live; 7.  Doing things backwards or the opposite way is real entertaining on an otherwise eventless afternoon

 © Jim Reed 2014 A.D.

jim@jimreedbooks.com

http://www.jimreedbooks.com

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Listen to Jim:

HOW TO BECOME 

or read on…

How many times have I told that same true story during my considerable lifetime? You know—the story that usually begins with, “Did I ever tell you about…?” or “Stop me if you’ve heard this…” or “That reminds me of the time I…”

How many times have I told that story?

An even more interesting question is, “Even though the story is the same, how has the telling of it evolved over the decades?”

And, to me, the most interesting question is, “How does each identical telling change each time I alter the medium in which it is told?”

Seriously.

You can find out how YOUR true story changes by switching media. For example:

Write the story using only a quill and ink on parchment paper.

Then…

Write the story using crayon on butcher paper.

Then… 

 Write using ballpoint pen on a napkin.

Then… 

Use large felt-tip marker on a legal pad.

Use an old non-electric spidery typewriter and typing paper.

Dictate the same story to a secretary or scribe.

Recite into a recording device.

Talk to a video camera.

Use an old inky fountain pen on acid-free paper.

Employ an electric typewriter.

Use a computer device.

Spray paint the story on a wall.

Carve the story into stone with a chisel.

Try to fill an exact space with the entire story (140 characters?).

Write with the other hand—see how different the story becomes.

Put the story to music and sing it entire.

Tell the story to a four-year-old, then write down how the child re-tells it.

Do a blog.

If you try these exercises, the results will be rather remarkable. You’ll begin to understand how the medium changes the message, how the settings alter its flavor.

And, most dramatically, you’ll see what a thoroughly practiced storyteller you really can be.

Give it a shot

(Adapted from HOW TO BECOME YOUR OWN BOOK by Jim Reed)

 © Jim Reed 2014 A.D.

jim@jimreedbooks.com

http://www.jimreedbooks.com

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Time to re-visit a time, six decades ago, when for a year I had my own bodyguard. This story is true as well as actual:

Listen to Jim:

MY BODYGUARD 

or read on...

MY BODYGUARD

Arthur Voss was my bodyguard in the eighth grade. Dot Jones was my girlfriend. Pat Flood was my best friend. How did all of this come about? Well, I’ll tell you my version of the story, since most people in the story are dead or distant or disinterested.

This is a true story. It is also actual.

First day of eighth grade on the school grounds of Tuscaloosa Junior High. It must be recess time on the first day of eighth grade. I’m wandering around the red-dirt dusty summer grounds of the school. The sun is bright and stark and unflattering to the uncontrolled acne on passing faces, a bit too revealing of the unprofessional makeup work most of the coeds have done at home before school time.

One scowling guy struts by me and catches my eye. He must think I’m glaring a challenge at him, because he comes over, still staring, and punches me on the shoulder. I continue to stare back because I’m startled, because I don’t dare turn my back on him, because I don’t know any better. He’s a rough-hewn country-looking kid who wants me to know who’s boss. His scowl deepens and he punches me again, harder. I avert my gaze, pretending to suddenly remember an important engagement. “Dear me–must run. I left my baby on the bus!” is what I want to say, but I have no way of knowing whether that would just make him madder.

“Why’d he do that?” a tow-headed, barrel-chested student asks. I am standing to the side of the playground, wondering whether I am going to be punched again.

“I dunno,” I say.

Arthur Voss is this kid’s name. He is shy, too, and seems relieved that I’m willing to talk with him. Arthur is tough and knows a little about schoolyard survival. He never picks fights. But you can tell just from the way he stands that nobody is going to pick on him. He has a clean-cut no-nonsense air.

The bell rings and Arthur doesn’t go right in. Like me, he waits for the crowd to disperse. “Stick with me. Nobody’s gonna punch you again.” Arthur says this. I make a joke out of it because that’s usually how I survive. “You mean you’re my bodyguard?” I ask. “Yeah,” is all Arthur Voss says. We go our separate ways to class.

“Hey, this is Arthur, my bodyguard,” I say to Dot Jones, a very cute and perky petite blonde I meet at recess the next day. Dot is impressed and giggles her approval. Arthur just stands nearby and looks pleasant and alert. He really is my bodyguard! He’s always close by when we’re on school grounds before, during and after class. He makes no demands. We kid around, but he’s not prone to idle conversation. He’s just there. At lunch, we sit together with Dot and my other new friend, Pat Flood. Arthur is quiet, Pat is frenetic and funny, and Dot is giggly and cute. I actually have friends in junior high! Maybe I’ll survive eighth grade.

The two-step is all I can muster. If I want to dance with Dot Jones at the Friday night junior high gymnasium dances, I’ll have to learn how to dance. Dancing is the only way I know how to justify getting my body close to Dot’s body. We hold hands during school breaks, but there’s no body contact and definitely no kissing. Not even any smooching, whatever that is. I don’t know what smooching is, but I know I’m going to like it.

What is the perfume called that Dot uses? We do the two-step. We are exclusively paired and don’t want to dance with anyone else. Will I be in love with Dot forever? Will Arthur Voss remain my bodyguard for life? Is Pat Flood going to remain my best friend? I now know the answers to these questions, but in junior high I don’t. Shall I reveal the ending or leave you guessing? I’ve always felt I don’t want to know my own fortune, but in these pages, I sometimes do know how things turn out, but the story must be told while simultaneously the characters within don’t know outcomes even when their later versions do know the answers. Time travel is always confusing like this, but time travel must be done in order to get the stories told.

Will Pat Flood be my best friend till we’re 80 and barely able to remember the stupid and silly gags we loved, the snickering fun we had? The junior high school gymnasium doesn’t smell like sweaty locker room mildew tonight while the dance is going on. The nostrils only pick up what the sweet hormonal couple wants them to pick up. The smell of Dot’s perfume. The fragrance of the flower in her hair. The smell of Wildroot Cream Oil hair tonic from my fevered scalp, the rustle of one too many petticoats, the riding up of my underwear, the squeezing-toe leather shoes, the slow dance music, the dimmed gym lights, the chaperoning teachers, the coeds all transmogrified by their acne treatment salve, their new lipstick, freshly Pepsodented teeth, lacquered nails, home-permanent natural curls, saddle oxfords and penny loafers shuffling over the polished hardwood flooring, the scuffed shoe polish, the crepe paper decor, watery Kool-Aid punch, cool kids outside catching a smoke, brittle teachers, hawklike, searching for cool kids outside catching a smoke, pre-air-conditioning gym floor humidity-laden, red dirt and weeded grass and cool fungus fragrance outside the school while we wait for her father or my father to pick us up and deliver us to our respective homes.

Dad drops Dot and me off at her house while he gives us a full three minutes alone, during which he drives to the end of the block on the pretense of U-turning the damp green Willys car, and taking his time to do it as if he couldn’t just turn around in front of her house, but that would be dropping the pretense, wouldn’t it? Dad is complicit in the romantic effort to give us lovebirds a chance to cuddle, but all I can get the courage to do is shake Dot’s hand and run to the car, never having been kissed, never having kissed. Kissing would break the spell, don’t you know? The magic spell consists of never realizing your dream, which gives the dream such power, such magnification. The intense pleasure of anticipation is all there is, the knowing that if you break the spell with a kiss or a too-too touch, you just might fall from the grace of unfulfillment. The pressure of Almost is so powerful, so fantasy-making, so just plain carnal, though I’m not yet sure what carnal is, nor can I ever be sure. The overwhelming pleasure of knowing Dot and handholding Dot and dreaming of Dot and talking too long on the phone with Dot in the hallway of my parents’ home just feet away from their bedroom door, trying not to stand over the floor furnace too long, trying not to be heard by anyone but Dot.

You see, at this point, here at this moment, I close the red clay diary and close my eyes and almost nap, then open up, get alert, and start again that which is never ended–the story of me and Dot and Arthur and Pat and who we are and who we were before now and who we were before the before time, and then who we will yet be and who we might be once we stop being we four who walk the dusty earth of 1954 Tuscaloosa Junior High.

The faux doze starts once more, and I am closing the page, topping the pen, ready for the next episode of what’s happening these many decades later, tonight, on Planet Three.

Does Arthur Voss ever have to fight anybody on my behalf? No, but nobody picks on me the rest of eighth grade, thus I am afforded the opportunity and mixed-feeling pleasure of living to enter the ninth grade

 © Jim Reed

On being cold and stranded and in love with Birmingham

Listen to Jim:

http://redclaydiary.com/mp3/onbeingcoldandstrandedandinlove.mp3

or read on…

Last week seems like a week ago. Wait—it actually was a week ago.

Remember how uncharacteristically cold it was in this Deep South city? How blindsided we all were when the Sunny South became a deep freeze? When short sleeves and toeless shoes suddenly seemed precisely the wrong things to wear?

Here are crumpled notes I found in my pockets, once the temperature rose into the 60′s:

The cold day surrounding us tells its own story, while we attempt to survive being within the belly of this icy beast.

Babies’ rosy cheeks become chapped.

Out-of-shape adults walk the Tim Conway walk to avoid sprains and breaks.

A woman sheds tears and wrings her hands out of fear that she won’t make it home to warmth and safety.

Helpers appear magically out of nowhere, making themselves available to those of us who feel helpless.

The snow cushions sounds and makes the world seem tranquil, amid the chaos.

Some stranded drivers decide to remain calm. Others panic. Others curse.

Others just take notes for later stories.

The Southern tradition of going barefoot suddenly seems a laughable concept.

Visiting snowbird tourists wonder at The Sunny South they are seeing.

Heroes abound: hospital and nursing home workers, firefighters, self-sacrificing motorists, teachers and school staff, good neighbors, police officers, 911 and Crisis Center operators, little kids rescuing little birds, city street workers.

Caring instantly trumps Selfishness.

What lessons did we learn from the Great Disruption?

1. It doesn’t take much to bring out the best in some of us.

2. It’s nice to know that people can be kind when given the opportunity.

3. Strangers can became lifelong friends in just a few hours.

4. Whether we like it or not, we do depend upon each other.

There were more lessons learned. Can you add to this list?

Perhaps it would be an uplifting exercise for all of us to compile a list of lessons learned.

It could always be referred to next time we wonder what this world is coming to

 © Jim Reed 2014 A.D.

jim@jimreedbooks.com

http://www.jimreedbooks.com

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Listen to Jim:

http://redclaydiary.com/mp3/circumstantialevidenceoflifeonearth.mp3

or read on…

There are more amazements on the frozen streets of Birmingham than are dreamt of in all philosophies.

The vampire wind tries to nip a pedestrian beneath her scarf as she scurries to work. She tries valiantly to clutch the cloth to her throat. She successfully keeps the bite away, thus forcing the carnivore air to search elsewhere for her skin. She thinks: I have to face this again on the way home tonight.

Ignoring the temperature and all parental precautions, a group of seventh graders and eighth graders invades the shop, writing students from the Alabama School of Fine Arts who hope to pick up new ideas in well-thumbed pages. They warm their hands and minds with ideas burning inside each volume. They think: This is great, but what’s to eat?

I visit for an hour with students at Birmingham-Southern College, spreading the gospel of reading and writing and thinking outside the hum of the hive. They sit around the Arthurian table to see what I have to say, or to see what the teacher wants them to hear me say. Perhaps my most attentive listener is the teacher. She thinks: I wish class could be this much fun every day.

The college room walls are lined with books locked inside sturdy cabinets, longing to join their freeranging comrades but resigned to the concept of Waiting. Waiting for someone to unlock the shelves and touch them once more. They think: I have all this wisdom. Wish I could share it.

Back at the shop, an Atlanta bookdealer braves the weather to stroll and examine my paginated orphans, to see what’s in the store…to see what’s in store. He thinks: How can I make some money off all this stuff I’m purchasing?

Outside the shop, the coldness becomes mundane. We’ve all talked about it too much and want to go on to some other subject. But the vampire wind will remind us who’s really in charge, when we brave the sidewalks once more, with only large warm books hugged tight against the chest to keep the heart warm and the mind afire

 © Jim Reed 2014 A.D.

jim@jimreedbooks.com

http://www.jimreedbooks.com

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Listen to Jim:

http://redclaydiary.com/mp3/wheresilencereigns.mp3

or read on…

“Where words fail, music speaks.”

–Hans Christian Andersen

That seems true, Hans. The opposite also seems true. What’s that about?

In other words, one might say:

Where words fail, music speaks.

Where music fails, words sing.

Where silence reigns, all is calm and bright.

The world is so full of highly pumped sound, over-the-top words, whispers corrupted into shouts, noise filling every possible solitude. So full. So loud. So chock-full.

Do you recall what non-sound sounds like?

Do you ever listen to the quiet?

Do you long for a Cone of Silence to descend over you once in a while?

Would you like to spend an hour inside a bubble of solitude?

Some will say, “Yes, bring me a reflective, soundless interval, away from everything that is being pushed at me. Make me a non-consumer for an hour. Pretend I’m not anywhere you can get at me for a while. Eventually, I may return to you refreshed and invigorated.”

Others will say, “Whattayatalkingabout? Who wants to spend one minute without music and commercials and texting and tweeting and continuous conversation and television talk and unreality shows? Who wants to be bored? Silence is disturbing!”

Still others will say, “There’s no solution. Sequential, aggressive, repetitive sound is everywhere and impossible to escape. Everybody embraces it, so it must be right.”

And those who are up to the brim will say, “There is a solution. I can take charge any time I wish. I can stop abruptly, pull the plug, remove the batteries, throw the circuit-breaker, run and hide from the wordy and the wired, close my eyes to the horrorsayers and vulgarians, resist the temptation to see and hear the Next Thing Up.”

Looks like three alternatives are presenting themselves to us.

Ready to chose? What’s behind Option Number One. Or Two. Or Three?”

And am I prepared to open the door and take the consequences?

Here I go

 © Jim Reed 2014 A.D.

jim@jimreedbooks.com

http://www.jimreedbooks.com

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Listen to Jim:

http://redclaydiary.com/mp3/whathasvaluewhatisworthwhile.mp3

or read on…

“Everything has value, except money.”

–Jonathan Gash

 ”Can you tell me the value of this book?” says the walk-in customer at the shop, carefully removing a moldy bible from its Saran wrappings.

“How much is this worth?” asks the caller, after telling me the date of a book—but failing to mention the title.

“The guy at Mike’s (pawn shop) told me you can tell me what I can get for this,” the customer says, proudly holding up what’s left of an old comic book.

“They told me you buy old newspapers,” says another walk-in, never mentioning who “they” might be.

My days are filled with encounters like these, and each of my replies sounds like a smart-aleck retort. But there is no smart-aleckness intended. I’m just doing my job. My job is to show each person that I’m telling them the truth, that I am providing, free of charge, a reality check, saving them much time and effort and speculation, and hopefully protecting them from unscrupulous traders.

Customer: “What’s this worth?” My reply: “It’s worth a million dollars. But, then, all books are worth a million dollars to me.” (This is the truth.) “If you’d like to know how much it would sell for, the answer is, ‘about a dollar, if you can find a buyer for it.’”

Customer: “Can you tell me the value of this?” My reply: “It’s priceless. So much went into its design, creation and publication…there’s a story behind every item in the shop.” Then I have to break the news, gently, “However, it has no monetary value, so there are no customers waiting to purchase it.”

Of course, once in a long while, something really is special in terms of the “market.” Sometimes, the object of desire is saleable. In those instances, I am happy to inform the object’s owner of what money can be realized from its sale.

This means two things:

One: I disappoint a whole lot of people who, because of their devotion to Antiques Road Show and Pickers and other such shows, enter the shop already believing they are holding a fortune in their hands and have only to learn when they can get paid.

Two: Now and again, I have good tidings of great joy and can help the customer make some money.

The would-be customers are either thrilled or saddened, but they do leave with more information than expected.

Customers react in different ways. Some are not satisfied with my evaluation and continue visiting other dealers to see if anybody has a different tale to tell. Some are relieved to know the facts and can now move on to other concerns in life. Some are convinced that I don’t know what I’m talking about—unfazed by reality, they keep on hoping to find a buyer. They remain filled with hope and expectations. This winning-the-lottery kind of dreaming can be described as the receiving of unearned riches just by wishing real hard.

What’s a book worth? To me, that’s like asking what your child is worth.

I look forward to meeting the next customer who brings in a treasure to peruse. I learn something every time. But I also try to remain level-headed, because I know that not everybody feels the same way I do about found objects. To me, they are precious because of the silent stories they tell. But to many, the objects are just Ebay fodder waiting to be sold to a high bidder.

If I had my way, I’d purchase every relic offered me and place it on display in the world’s largest Museum of Fond Memories. To do that would require lots of money. And, as Jonathan Gash and his fictional character Lovejoy well know, unlimited amounts of money have no value.

It’s the things that have value that I most value

 © Jim Reed 2014 A.D.

jim@jimreedbooks.com

http://www.jimreedbooks.com

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Listen to Jim:

http://redclaydiary.com/mp3/sittingprettyhigh.mp3  

or read on…

In the foyer of our ancient home stands a very tall red-and-yellow chair—too high for humans to sit on.

This chair is a piece of art created by Liz Reed—lovingly made of wooden stars and wooden crescent moons and wooden legs and wooden spheres, and decorated in simple, primary colors.

The name of this piece of art is SITTING PRETTY HIGH.

When you first see the chair, you’re a bit disoriented—good art often causes such an effect—and you find yourself either dismissing it to gaze at something more immediately understandable, or stopping cold and examining it for its meaning.

Sometimes, there’s a small figure sitting on the edge of this chair at eye level—a glittery soft mermaid, maybe a Pee Wee Herman doll, perhaps Mister Bean’s Teddy—just to demonstrate that dangling is part of the chair’s meaning.

If you dare ask Liz what this object is, she’ll tell you a story that only people who are short of stature will absorb.

You and I don’t know this, but petite people have challenges that are not always apparent. Sure, they see more bellies up close then we do, they have to tiptoe at lecterns, clerks lean over registers to see them, there’s trouble finding fitting garments, and so on.

But what this work of art told me that I did not know, is that petites have to deal with dangling legs. When you and I sit in the average chair, we take for granted that our feet will be planted solidly on the floor. We are accustomed to the stability and security this provides.

Liz and others her size have to compensate for this lack of stability. When you can’t plant your feet, you tend to sway or wobble when you reach out. Disconcerting to say the least.

So, as a tribute to shortness in our society, Liz created a chair that pays respect to dangling limbs. A chair that makes you want to learn more about what it is like to be Liz, a person who seems larger than life in personality, humor, wisdom and talent. She’s spent so many years compensating for and overcoming this gently ignored handicap that nobody notices a thing. She’s just that remarkable woman who can do just about anything she tackles better than you and me.

Watching her function inspires me to plant my own feet firmly in my mind, even when there’s nothing solid to stand on.

As a result of living with Liz, I’m always sitting pretty high

 © Jim Reed 2014 A.D.

jim@jimreedbooks.com

http://www.jimreedbooks.com

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Listen to Jim:

http://redclaydiary.com/mp3/earningyourstripesonchristmaseve.mp3

or read on…

Orange and white stripes make today’s fashion statement.

Or rather, orange and white-striped soiled cloth cut and stitched into loose-fitting outfits make today’s fashion statement.

It’s Christmas Eve morning and I’m driving north on Richard Arrington Boulevard toward the civic center, in the process passing between the Museum of Art on the left and the County Jail on the right. In front of the jail (the “Criminal Justice Center” to you), under the watchful gaze of Branko Medenica’s statue of a fallen warrior, “Centurion,” several inmates are sweeping and cleaning the front plaza.

It is cold, and the workers are focused on their task, as if sheer concentration might stave off the icy bite breezing up the sleeves of their uniforms.

To you and me and the rest of the city, it is merely a quiet, sunny, freezing day. All you and I can feel is how WE feel, so that if we’re in a good mood, the world seems to be filled with goodwill. If we are ill-tempered, the world is grouchy.

Should we briefly spy a handful of prisoners outfitted in orange and white getting some cold sunshine and exercise we can empathize for a moment, sympathize a second, even project ourselves into this outdoor scene. But we can’t BE these folks. We can’t lift their personal burdens. We can’t shorten the icy sunshine sentences they are serving right before our eyes.

All we can do is ruminate, speculate, even appreciate…then move on to our own specific worlds, whatever they contain.

Well, maybe we can do one thing more.

Maybe we can freeze in time this momentary picture—this snapshot of real lives on hold,  framed by an open plaza, overlorded by a humbled statue and spied upon by a passing motorist. Maybe this selfie of one moment in time can be studied and analyzed and pored over and re-imagined by people more proactive and creative than you or me. Maybe down the road some kind of social upheaval will cure the world of having to imprison or punish or enslave or subjugate. Maybe one day there will be no need for memorials, living or inanimate…memorials that rue the day someone was unjustly taken from us.

Maybe one day the only prisons in existence will be those within our own private thoughts and imaginations.

Meanwhile, the least we passersby can do is note the moment, bookmark the scene before us, return to it again and again until we come up with something better than voyeurism

© Jim Reed 2013 A.D.

jim@jimreedbooks.com

http://www.jimreedbooks.com

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It’s just another day in the many lives of Birmingham.

Listen to Jim:

http://redclaydiary.com/mp3/25000christmasesandstillgoingstrong.mp3

or read on…

One great thing about Santa Claus is that his energy is boundless.

During my many decades of living, I’ve observed Santa’s behavior closely–maybe more than most Santa observers. I’ve seen him take a nap now and then, but I’m always energized when he pops alert, wide eyed and ready to get on with the job of Santa-ing his way through life, through many lives.

My good fortune began at birth. My mother turned out to be a Christmas Mother, a woman who made each day of childhood a special occasion for all us five kids. Each day was a special gift to be carefully unwrapped and examined in awe.

Every day was Christmas in our home.

Mother had no patience with impatience. If things were gloomy, she tossed joy into our young faces and made sure we knew the secret of never being bored.

Not until middle age did I decipher her secret, not till then did I put into words the legacy Mother was trying to leave for her family: You’ll never be bored if you’re not being boring.

Another way to express this amazingly simple lesson:

Stop boring everybody and do something worthwhile.

And so on.

This thought is not necessarily earth-shaking, but its simplicity will work its way into your thoughts, your thought processes will massage and re-work it to your own liking, and–if you’re lucky–you’ll find a way to phrase it in words best suited to you.

Santa is never bored, because he’s too busy doing no harm. He’s too busy setting an example. He’s too busy never being bored.

I’m a lucky guy. I have experienced Christmas more than 25,000 times, and each day increases that number.

Mother’s daily example of good behavior, Santa’s daily example of goodness for the sake of goodness…they both live with me and make my best days even better than my previous best days.

Don’t miss Santa. He has much to tell you. And believe me, it won’t be boring

© Jim Reed 2013 A.D.

jim@jimreedbooks.com

http://www.jimreedbooks.com

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