Delicate Beauties that Charm Me



I have COVID. It was pretty miserable for the first week with six symptoms competing to see which could make me feel worse. I felt as though I’d been trampled by a herd of cattle. The symptoms had largely disappeared by the second week, but now a third week has passed and I’m still testing positive. I’m grateful that the symptoms didn’t kill me or put me into the hospital fighting for my life. Grateful indeed. And, I sure will be even more grateful when I test negative. Three weeks of quarantining is giving me cabin fever. I’m grateful for calls from friends and family. They have helped me to deal with the boredom.

What’s all this have to do with photos of beautiful flowers? They too have brought beauty into my life as I feel the warmth of the sun during my daily outings into my backyard when the walls of my home seem ready to suffocate me. They are like fleeting friends who remind me to absorb and appreciate all the beauty I can while it is available to me.

With love and gratitude,

Russ

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Helpful for Deeper, More Meaningful Friendships

I found some terrific questions on this list and believe many of you will find value in it.

With Love and Gratitude,

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I love symbolism and contrasts in photographs. In these photos I took along my back fence I was, of course, attracted by the the beauty of the flowers themselves, but I especially enjoyed the many contrasts the scene elicited in my mind: Fleeting beauty vs. aged fence, silken vs. coarse textures, delicate vs. sturdy, vibrant color vs. subdued tones, uniform lines vs. varied wood grain.

Such images remind me how differences in people can enhance life and relationships when I look beyond individual surface attributes to see larger blessings all around me.

With love and gratitude,

Russ

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Things I Found to be Fun, Interesting, and/or Beautiful

>>Today’s Funny

While flying from Denver to Kansas City, Kansas, a lady was sitting across the aisle from a woman and her eight-year-old son.

She couldn’t help but laugh as she heard the mother say to the boy, “Now remember…after we land, run to Dad first, then the dog.”

>>>Today’s Thot

I don’t need anger management. I just need people to stop making me mad.

Source: Mikeys Funnies

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The Journal of Applied Social Psychology published a paper that showed that when a food server leaves a mint or piece of chocolate with a bill, they typically get a larger tip.

One piece of candy yielded tips that were 3% larger than they otherwise would have been. And leaving two pieces yielded tips that were a whopping 14% larger than they would have been if no candy was left.

That’s what I call a sweet return on investment!

Source: dan@nowIknow

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“If you haven’t got charity in your heart you have the worst kind of heart trouble.”

–Bob Hope

With Love and Gratitude,

Russ

Source: 1440

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A Special 4th With Military Families

My extended family and I enjoyed celebrating the 4th of July with Air Force and Navy personnel and their families at Joint Base Anacostia-Bolling in Maryland this year. It seemed a most fitting way to celebrate our independence with those who sacrifice to keep us free. Our son is an officer in the Air Force.

Nature put on its own glorious display while we waited for the man-made fireworks to begin.

With love and gratitude,

Russ

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I Love this Quote

“When you’re good at something, you’ll tell everyone. When you’re great at something, they’ll tell you.” –Walter Payton
Source: 1440
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Canyons Captured in Crystal

I awoke this morning, turned my head and saw these images reflected in my table lamp.

With love and gratitude,

Russ

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Greetings from Sunny California

Your kind welcome warmed my heart. Thank you. My Beloved planted sunflowers not long ago and one is already about twelve feet tall. Her green thumb combined with the fertile soil of Silicon Valley creates some amazing harvests.

With love and gratitude,

Russ

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I’m Back

Hi, everyone. I’m back. Anyone here? I’ve missed you and decided to check in to see if there is any interest in my beginning to post here again.

With love and gratitude,

Russ

Russ

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A Good Man is Gone

Robert H. Fukuda passed away on June 25, 2021. Bob was my wife Heidi’s father. He was a man of few words, so few, in fact, that during the more than forty years that I knew him—and even though we only lived about six blocks apart for most of that time and frequently saw each other—I doubt there was a year when we spoke more than a hundred words apiece to each other. We had virtually no shared interests other than family. 

Heidi was nineteen and I was twenty when we began dating. She lived with her parents at the time. Cell phones and caller ID hadn’t been invented yet. When I called for her on their family phone and Bob answered, I said hello, told him my name, and asked for Heidi. He never replied to me. Bob just shouted for Heidi and set the receiver down.

During my visits, at some point usually early in the evening, he would stand, leave the room without saying a word, and not return. 

I was convinced that he neither liked nor respected me.

I soon learned that Bob answered the phone that way no matter who called. He went to bed at the same time and in the same way no matter whether I was there or not. He was a carpenter and had to rise early for work, so he went to bed early and without fanfare. 

Our first child, born thirteen months after Heidi and I were married, was her parents’ first grandchild. I remember Bob’s big smile as he played with our kids. He’d get down on his hands and knees and give them horse rides or wrestle with them, inspiring delighted laughter. 

He designed, and then he and I built, a large treehouse in our backyard for his grandkids. 

Bob and his wife Jane were always there for us. When Heidi and I relocated to my new job back in our hometown and our temporary corporate housing wasn’t yet available, Bob and Jane took us in. We lived with them until it was. 

At times when money became especially tight for Heidi and me, they always offered to help us. 

When my business grew to the point where it needed more space, Bob worked several weekends in a row and turned the detached two car garage at our home into a three-room office for my employees and me. Bob worked on the project seven-days a week for about two months, never complaining, nor requesting or accepting payment of any kind. 

We never heard him say that he loved us. He didn’t need to.  Bob showed his love for us through his actions.

He never tried to tell us what to do or how to do it, but he was always there when he was needed, just quietly and competently doing what needed to be done. 

Toward the end of his life when he and I were alone together I told him, man to man, that he was good man and father-in-law. He just replied in typical Bob Fukuda fashion, “Well, I don’t know about that.” But the look in his eyes let me know he was deeply touched by the comment. 

I’m blessed to have had Bob in my life, and am forever grateful to him.

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