My Amazing Birthday Ride !

A couple of weeks ago, I realized I wanted to do something BIG to celebrate my (then) upcoming birthday. Something different and exciting, but not dangerous.  Something friendly and kind but not common. I had seen the large bus that is parked in the Bearden section of Kingston  Pike in Knoxville (TN). And I had noticed that, after a while, a second bus had joined the first one.  Both of them are wildly and beautifully painted all over with colorful designs and phrases promoting love and peace.  So yes, this would be the perfect plan ... an exciting birthday treat without my needing to parachute out of an airplane :)  I made the call, reserved one of the buses, and Dixie Lee and I boarded the bus at 2:30 yesterday (September 1st) in front of our house. Dixie Lee, herself, had celebrated her own birthday recently ... her 12th, so she is an aging doggie but nonetheless took everything in stride and enjoyed the adventure.  

Our driver, whose name is Carlene, is a wonderful lady and a very skilled bus driver. As we drove around, I felt good as I realized I was sort of giving a gift to the community as well as myself.  People beeped their horns, waved their hands, and smiled ... as the Big Love Bus, with its complete set of sound effects and music, wove its way from one end of town to another. Something so cheerful was and is so majorly needed. We made a few scheduled stops, first going through a church parking lot where the few people still inside had been alerted that we'd be driving through (we sounded the sirens, bells, and whistles for their amusement); then we headed "north" and stopped in front of my best friend's house ... he came strolling across his lawn, camera in hand, and took some great pictures of the bus and one of me on the bus stairway. I asked Carlene to "play the animal sounds" and there was a chorus of moos, roars, and all sorts of animal noise, which was tolerated cheerfully by my friend and his neighbors  :)  We needed to be on our way to our next stop, the home of one of my stellar piano students.  On our approach, the bus zoomed past her house because we didn't see the house number in time, so we had to drive around and around to find a road that would loop back and that was wide enough to accommodate a turning bus. Finally we did get on the correct road again and, as we approached the house this time, Carlene said excitedly, "Oh, you're gonna love this ... it's so CUTE"! From her vantage point in the driver's seat, she could see the people in the yard and when we got there, my student and her boyfriend and their three dogs were in the yard, each wearing a little party hat. One of the dogs had her hat partially removed and was busily trying to eat it.  It was a fun stop for all of us.

How awesome to be a kid again for the hours we were on the Big Love Bus! The Bus has its own website and I think you can read its telephone number in one of the pictures I will post.  For those near Knoxville, I wholeheartedly recommend you check out the Big Love Bus :)    

 

Thanksgiving ... A Beautiful Holiday –

In and of itself, Thanksgiving is a wonderful holiday. It’s always beneficial to us, as individuals and as a species, to take the time and set the occasion for meditating on those things for which we are grateful, those things with which we are blessed. Regrettably, this holiday is used, for the most part, as the book-end on the left side of the shelf -- with Christmas considered to be the prize being shopped for, showcased, supported (by the book-ends) and New Year’s Day is used as the right-side book-end. To me, that left-side book-end deserves center stage. In addition to everything else for which my spirit gives thanks ... to all that is good, thanks be for the breath, the very essence, of life!

One Year Anniversary!

It’s been one year since computer Clarence III was vacuumed and bit the dust and replacement computer, Dexter March, came on the scene. They are both HPs. Clarence has since been repaired, I’m happy to say, and joins Dexter in celebration :)

Christmas Card Of The Mind --

Yesterday, for a little while, I took the nostalgia trip down the lane of Christmas Past. When I was very young, my paternal grandmother played a prominent role in things festive. She was a wonderful pal and playmate and really enjoyed talking and drawing and glueing and cutting out paper shapes at the kitchen table. She had a nice smile that made her eyes twinkle. Her eyes were kind of almond-shaped (like mine are). Living in Connecticut, we usually had snow for the holidays; in fact, we often had a lot of snow ... and in Connecticut, it can hang around into mid-April, in layers of old, crusty re-frozen, and new snow. Anyway, my mother had a great sense of humor when it came to what Santa would put in the "stockings hung by the (pretend) chimney (we didn’t have a fireplace) with care". Every Christmas, there would be an apple, an orange, a "book" of Lifesaver candies, and a tube of toothpaste, among other little trinkets! Sometimes on Christmas Eve, my father would walk around the outside of the house, jingling bells, especially as he passed my bedroom window. He did it mostly to have fun, though it was under the guise of cautioning me that Santa was approaching and all should be quiet in the house. So I would always comment, the next day, that I’d heard Santa, and I know my father was delighted. My mother would cook a big dinner on Christmas. Actually, I remember thinking of the season that ran from Thanksgiving to Christmas to New Year’s Day as "The Big Three" in terms of her dinners. We always stayed home for these holidays and our house was like a train station – with friends and relatives trudging up the hill by foot or, occasionally, driving up the hill if there wasn’t fresh snow or ice on it. It was a different time then, unhurried, and not very commercial in those days preceding malls and discount stores. Memories of Christmas Past bring a mix of feelings, especially as we recall the people, things, ways, that have exited – and smile at those that now grace ... our lives. It all makes a colorful, picturesque, and mindful holiday card.