Then - Possibly now

Harry Truman gets in the cab:

If someone else can do it, so can I. Accomplishment
Honesty was the best principle. Easier to remember also.
Anything worthwhile required effort. Laziness
If at first you don’t succeed, try try again. Perseverance
“You be good.” Be proud of yourself
Right was right and wrong was wrong. Ethics
Honor your father and mother. Respect and appreciation
A good name is rather to be chosen than great riches. Thought before action
Be of good cheer. Be strong
You are the salt of the earth. Personal uniqueness
Say what you mean, mean what you say. Think!
Keep your word. Integrity
Never get too big for your britches. Know your place
Never forget a friend. Loyalty
Loyalty, love of home and unquestioning patriotism. Ethical
Be respectful of elders. Respect experience
“I’m fine, and you?” the only response to a greeting Private and strong

Here’s one that until this morning, I didn’t know the source:
“The people’s good is the highest law.” Cicero Generous, others first.

These are what was, as a boy growing up in the Great California Sacramento Valley in the late 1940’s, ‘50’s and early ‘60’s. Can you find much of this today.
Without a thought?

I see a whole other defined life where I am now in my life. I do not have it in me to define it.

I can recall my grandfather, Louis Troyer Meisner, ‘Gramps,’ saying in such amazing sincerity, “I was born 50 years too late.”

I can remember my mom saying at the August of her life, “I was born 50 years too late.”

I am nearly there, Mom, Gramps. I am weary and downtrodden. I have experienced recently a coming down. It is really sobering and comforting to, at this age, be able to recognize it as sage and observant, not as a slippery hill that just has no footing.

I look at the clouds this summer with a renewing reverence for power and significance of living, communicating, commiting and caring. You see, I am loving powerful free.

I was told once that my Indian name would have been “Cloud Watcher.” I am that.
The power and inspiration I gain daily when I see what a complicated thing like the daily clouds can feel, seem and offer to my spirit and soul. If clouds can lift me, I wonder if that is why I am the way I am?

Why do I read what I read? Why I am so anxious to awake and greet the morning light? Is it this same locked and loaded being that causes me to reflect about the wonder of still being alive and seeing the shadow I cast? Is any of this the same for anyone else?

Do you get up in the morning and say in your head, or out loud, or just think: “Fucking A, Dale (your name) lives today.

Do you arise before the sun so you can cherish that first light? Do you have a sense of the majesty of living and being and doing, when you first arise? Do you like being up when the birds first greet each other (and you)? Do you like smelling the grass before the heat of the day causes a ‘wilt’? Do you partake of a cupa and sit to ‘see’ and ‘be’?

Do you search for the first visible cloud to affirm the arising sun? Do you sit and read for two hours and celebrate each interruption by the birds, the newspaper slapping the driveway, the sighing of the trees, the smell of your cupa, the event of your disappearing into the present of your book, the magic of early morning fresh air, the rested feeling of relaxation from sleep, the amazing experience in all of the senses freshly alive, refreshed and not distracted?

Do you like hearing others begin to stir in the morning? Do you like the alone? Do you have an expectation that is fulfilled by all of this?

If I couldn’t do some of this, preferably all of it, each day, I would like to have my end occur as a part of that shortage.

The purpose for this note isn’t clear to me, nor is the content something I expected when I started playing a particular song of such power in my life. I just knew that if I heard this song over and over while writing, I would no longer be sage and observant; I would be in the present. Damn life is good.

Have you ever flown with your arms spread wide and had your spirit lift you to laughter that rings the room? If not, why? It is possible, ask me about it…

David, you are amazing.

Song; "Go The Distance" Michael Bolton

If you’ve read this far, the fare is paid
CABBY