Add to the Beauty: Words

I heard an actor recite this and thought it was amazing.

I can not say this has been my philosophy but I find many parts of it inspiring and uplifting!

Passing on the splendid torch sounds just right.

“This is the true joy in life, being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one. Being a force of nature instead of a feverish, selfish little clod of ailments and grievances, complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy. 

I am of the opinion that my life belongs to the whole community and as long as I live, it is my privilege to do for it what I can. 

I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work, the more I live. I rejoice in life for its own sake. Life is no brief candle to me. 

It is a sort of splendid torch which I have got hold of for the moment and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations.”

George Bernard Shaw

I have a video which I can not ad here for all my trying.  It's the conclusion to Peter Kreeft's commencement address given at Franciscan Univ. last year.  If you like the conclusion  you can find the whole speech on YouTube.

But here is the text.  It's different from the Shaw quote but  I was tickled by the use of the flame metaphor used in both.

"Well, I'm finished.

I fully expect to be charged with hate speech for this talk, and if you too, oppose these lies, you

may also receive hate, for cavities hate dentists, and cancers hate radiation, and cockroaches hate flashlights, and demons hate truth.  But love cannot stop warring against hate and light cannot stop warring against darkness, as you see every time you light a candle in a dark room.

And that little experiment is a clue about what is inevitably bound to happen in the end.  No matter how smoky and stinky and slimy the darkness is, it cannot endure the light.  However successful the darkness may be, for however long a time, and however it may increase, and however many more times we continue to lose every battle in the culture war, the light is imperishable.

All lies die.  Truth alone remains.

So there's my commencement address, then.  It wasn't very long, and its positive point is very simple.  Just go forth and preach the truth, the good news, by both word and deed, and then let the chips fall as they may.

And please remember Mother Teresa's life-changing and liberating principle:  God did not put you in this world to be successful.  He put you in this world to be faithful."

~Peter Kreeft

Pass it on,

Donna

Add to the Beauty: Surprises

A few weeks ago Katie sent me this picture.  It's our car, parked outside of her apartment in Madison.  She was startled and a little worried to find it wrapped in what looked like police tape.

No ticket.

Not parked illegally.

hummmm

On closer inspection I noticed the tape says Findorff.  

Findorff is a huge construction company in Madison.

They happen to be building apartments across the street from Katie.

Ah.  It's all becoming clear.

No doubt some young workers saw Katie come and go in this car and went in for a good old fashioned prank on the cute girl.   This is how we did things in the 70's.

Rocks in the hubcaps.

40 pumpkins left on the stoop.

Short sheeting a bed

innocent. stupid. memorable.

pranks.

Tell me the best prank you can recall.

Donna

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Add to the Beauty: Words

“The first week of August hangs at the very top of the summer, the top of the live-long year, like the highest seat of a Ferris wheel when it pauses in its turning. The weeks that come before are only a climb from balmy spring, and those that follow a drop to the chill of autumn, but the first week of August is motionless, and hot. It is curiously silent, too, with blank white dawns and glaring noons, and sunsets smeared with too much color. Often at night there is lightning, but it quivers all alone. There is no thunder, no relieving rain. These are strange and breathless days, the dog days, when people are led to do things they are sure to be sorry for after.”

Tuck Everlasting by Natalie Babbitt

I've never read this before but it was brought to my attention yesterday when a woman read it on her Instagram post.  It's so beautiful and poetic and I bet many of you have read this book over the years.  It has the dreamy descriptive prose I can't get enough of.

I love the idea of taking in this very moment and loving it for it's unique splendor.

Just like a snapshot, for your soul.

Encourage one another,

Donna