Gratitude makes the journey better and so does kindness

Tag: mindfulness Page 3 of 10

Weekly Column: What’s The Best Way To Deal With Lack Of Empathy?

Originally published as a column on CFJC Today Kamloops and Armchair Mayor News on Monday, November 19, 2018. 

Every now and then certain news makes me go silent. ‘How is that possible?’ is all I can think. Such was the case of the recent break-ins (yes plural, since it happened in two consecutive nights) at the Merritt compound of the Nicola Valley Search and Rescue. In one word: heinous. The organization, like the rest of them across B.C., is run by volunteers. An admirable group of people to say the least. You’d think even a thief (or however many) would just believe enough in bad karma and skip the ‘job’.

Weekly Column: Remembrance Day Files – It Feels Like Family

‘In Flanders fields, the poppies blow

Between the crosses, row on row,

That mark our place, and in the sky

The larks, still bravely singing, fly

Scarce heard amid the guns below…’

It is impossible to describe the deep reverence the reading of Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae’s famous poem conferred to the sea of people gathered around the cenotaph on Remembrance Day. It is one of those situations that can be summed up by an overused but adequate phrase: ‘you had to be there.’ The words of the poem are haunting, and the images they conjure stay alive in the hearts and minds of us all. Every single time.

Weekly Column: Let’s Always Remember

Originally published as a column on CFJC Today Kamloops and Armchair Mayor News on November 5, 2018. 

My grandfather was a WWII veteran. He died when I was nine, and so did the stories that he might have been inclined to share. I have old photos of him in uniform, and I know a few of the jolly stories – including how he courted my grandmother – family folklore that made us kids giggle. But I do not know the anguish, the pain, the horror he experienced as a WWII soldier.

Hence the silence that was draped all over my thoughts when, as a kid, I was passing by the cemetery. There were many rows of graves of WWI and WWII soldiers; the tombstones that said ‘unknown soldier’ were far more numerous than the ones with a name. Back then, as a child, I shuddered thinking what it must be like to lose my mom or dad that way.

Weekly Column: Restriction On How We Use Cannabis Have Their Place

Originally published as a column on CFJC Today Kamloops and Armchair Mayor News on October 15, 2018. 

October 17 is just around the corner. Cannabis will be legal (and the province expects a hit from the first orders, predicted to come as a huge wave as many want to make history by ordering as soon as cannabis becomes legal,) and many others are bracing for what the legalization brings about.

One of the concerns is driving while under the influence.

Let Fall Be A Joyfull Mess

I will start with this: I do not like plastic fall decorations. No plastic leaves, even when they mimic the real ones so well, and definitely no plastic pumpkins or plastic fruit to decorate with. There, I said it. I know they are convenient to put up and take down, but they are fake. That’s their problem (fake is in general a big problem, philosophically speaking, but fake decorations made of plastic create an environmental one too.) The appeal is likely the fact that they are not messy, but… mess is good. 

Weekly Column: Grateful in Kamloops

Originally published  as a column on CFJC Today Kamloops and Armchair Mayor News on October 8, 2018.  

The first morning of October was cold and drizzly and the tall withered grass was wet and just as cold. Dog and I went on our daily hike, heading up the steep trail as fast as we could to keep warm. By the time we reached the plateau the wind had picked up. It spoke of winter, pretending that fall was not part of the schedule anymore.

Weekly Column: Stories Of Fall Magic And Why We Should Be Part Of Them

Originally published as a column on CFJC Today Kamloops and Armchair Mayor News on Monday, September 10, 2018. 

Fall has a special place in my heart. When I was a kid, until I left my parents’ home to go to university, as soon as the grapes would start to ripen, I’d go around the yard and get myself a bunch of sweetest ones, usually by holding up the bottom of my T-shirt for an impromptu fruit-picking bucket. Then I’d sit in one of my special places under the quince trees and eat them. One by one, green, black and red spheres, all juicy and sweet, their flavour divinely irresistible.

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