March  13, 2021

HOW TO MAKE ANOTHER SMILE?
JUST DO IT!

 

How to make another smile?
Just do it! Take a chance!
Smile till you bring tears to
the eyes of the others!
In the mall, at church,
on the street, at the family table.
Sing! Dance! Blow the trumpet!
Till they stop to listen! 

Till they sing. Till they cry. 

Till they smile. There you did it.  

Smile.

 

© Andy Costello, Reflections 2021

 

March 13,  2021

 

Thought for the Day

 

“The most exhausting thing in  life is being insincere.”

 

Anne Morrow Lindbergh

March  12,  2021

WHERE  I’M  WALKING

 

Waxed wooden floors ….
Black macadam parking lots ….
Fluffy soft – as well as hard crew cut rugs ….
Tiles …. various colors, sizes and shapes ….
Crossing the street ….
My feet know the feel of where I walk.
My feet still remember the green grass
of my favorite park – Bliss Park –
Brooklyn, N.Y. -  running down the
hill in March with my kite. Then there was
the time Tom and I were on
the Fishing Jimmy trail in New Hampshire –
with its nasty black flies, slippery planks
stretched across muddy and mucky waters. 
Much easier were the 9 days we
were on the Long Trail in Vermont –
with its rocks, logs, mud, easier and  less trickier.
But it rained every day – like it’s supposed to
but it was a nice summer rain -
easy on my feet – soft on my face.

 

 

© Andy Costello, Reflections 2021

 March  12,  2021

 

Thought for the Day

 

“If we could all hear one another’s prayers, God might be relieved of some of his burden.”

Ashleigh Brilliant

March  11,  2021

SLOW  DOWN

 
Took a speed reading course once ….
First lesson was: people read at different speeds.
Second lesson: there are no speed limit signs for reading.
 
Never took a speed speaking course ….
First lesson: people speak at different speeds.
Next lesson: different situations dictate different speeds.
Next lesson: Put up STOP signs at times
and ask people to tell you what they are really saying.
Third lesson: maybe you’ll find out people 
sometimes don’t know what they are really saying.
Fourth lesson: Ask whether people speed speak at us
so as to slide difficult comments past us.
 
Take an inner speed speaking course ….
First lesson: human beings are thinking in loud
to themselves all their life long - at different speeds.
Second lesson: jotting down in a journal
or on a computer what we're thinking

can really slow our thinking  down.
 

 

© Andy Costello, Reflections 2021

March  11,  2021

 

Thought for the Day

 

“If a Plant’s Roots Are Too Tight, Repot.”

 

Gardening headline,

The New York Times

March  10,  2021 

WHY’S I DON’T KNOW THE WHY OF

Read enough history,
live enough life, and
you’ll come up with
a list of different “Why’s!”
 
Why won’t people
forgive each other,
when forgiveness is
in our  own self-interest?
 
Why do people kill
each other in Holocausts
and on the dark nights
of our city streets?
 
Why do people bully
other people – not only
in school as kids, but in
nursing homes as adults?
 
Why don’t people celebrate
Sabbaths – when it’s there
for the taking and it’s free –
and it’s something we need.
 
Why don’t people acknowledge
God – when they see Jupiter
and the stars of night and they
are there beyond our reach?
 
Why are there answers
to our “Why Questions,”
but for some reason  they
never seem to be accepted? 

© Andy Costello, Reflections 2021

March 10,  2021

Thought for the Day

 

 

“Forget what hurt you,
but never forget what
it taught you.”

 March 9,  2021

 

UNDERNEATH

 
When we’re with another, don’t forget
the surprise of the out of sight underneath.
 
I was just wondering about
what I didn’t know about you.
 
Moreover,  I might not see you
again – so I might not find out.

 
I didn’t know what your breakfast
was like this morning. Nope.
 
I don’t know if you’re beginning to feel
your kids have written you off as boring.
 
What’s in the O – in the middle letter
between the G and the d in your God?
 
Any dreams, any nightmares, any
hopes that seem to sliding away?
 
Escape to your inner room, or to the
mountains or the desert – and go underneath

 

 

© Andy Costello, Reflections 2021

March  9,  2021

Thought for the Day

“I got a rejection letter from an editor at HarperCollins, who included a report from his professional reader. This report shredded my first-born novel, laughed at my phrasing, twirled my lacy pretensions around and gobbed into the seething mosh pit of my stolen clichés. As I read the report, the world became very quiet and stopped rotating. What poisoned me was the fact that the report’s criticisms were all absolutely true. The sound of my landlady digging in the garden got the world moving again. I slipped the letter into the trash…knowing I’d remember every word.” 

 

David Mitchell

March  8,  2021

Thought for the Day

“All risk risks rejection…Very often, it is perseverance—not talent—which wins the day. Too often, we become discouraged by a single rejection. We forget that negative criticism is only one person’s opinion. Discouraged, we fail to go forward. This is where we often need the help of a “Believing Mirror”– someone who sees our potential and the potential of our work.”

 

Julia Cameron

March 8, 2021

WATER, WATER, EVERYWHERE

 
 
Living on the edge of the Atlantic ….
There are many morning thoughts ….
 
Back in the days of way back when,
what was it like after many days, or
weeks or months to see another boat
at a distance? Friend or foe or what?
 
Like this morning, there are no boats
on the waters…. Where is everybody?

 

 © Andy Costello, Reflections 2021

 

  

 March  7,  2021

“PRESENT!”

 
Each day, each morning,
the world pauses and
cries out our name.
 
What’s our answer?
Is it “Present!” or does
someone yell out for us, “Absent!”
 
They see our face.
They know our thoughts.
They know we’re elsewhere?
 
We’re in yesterday or last year
or tomorrow or next year. So
we’re not here – not right now.

 

© Andy Costello, Reflections 2021

March  7,  2021

 

Thought for the Day

 

“Failure is part of it. You will be rejected dozens and dozens of times. The best way to prepare for it is to have something else in the works by the time the rejection letter arrives. Invest your hope in the next project. Learning to cope with rejection is a good trait to develop.”

 

Po Bronson