The thing that keeps coming to me today, is this.  Hidden Treasures.

Oh, who doesn’t love to find a hidden treasure?  That thing that gives you great cause for surprise.  The buried Pirates’ Gold.  The $50 bill that was in your dress jacket.  An egg with two yolks in it.

But most hidden treasures aren’t so hidden at all.  Most are in plain sight, if we take notice.

This morning, as we watched birds and drank coffee… we saw a squirrel in one of the trees in the meadow.  This little gal ( Okay…. well…., it  is a big fatty squirrel, in all honesty.  This thing sits in our trough, filled with deer corn, and eats and eats.  Like Liz Taylor after a divorce……..  this thing eats.  Little fist full after little fist full of deer corn.  Frankly,   I am surprised this thing could scamper anywhere, let alone to the top of a tree.  But here I have gotten off track.  Please forget that it is a big fatty squirrel, and think more along the lines of athletic, and graceful Skippy. )  Yes, this squirrel made its skillful way from one branch to the next, up, up, up, all the way to the top of the tree.   And once there, it seemed to just look around and bask in the glory of the morning.  After a few moments of “taking it all in” from the highest high in the wood, it turned around and made its way back down.  What a treasure this was to watch.  Yet another one of life’s hidden treasures in plain sight.

I think sometimes, we feel like the world gets hum-drum.  Perhaps…. that we are just numbers on a computer screen, or another person standing in line.  Yet that isn’t the case at all.  There are great and wonderful treasures in each day… if we care to find them.  The greatest treasures lie within ourselves.

You are completely and totally unique.  You are a  beautiful creature in your own way….  with many gifts, passions, abilities, and talents.  You have your own personality, and experience that only can be you. No one else can duplicate you.  No one else can live your life for you.

This is a treasure… our hidden treasures….. in plain sight.  Each one of us.
So whether you can sing like a lark, or paint beautiful landscapes, fix a carburetor, or bake killer brownies… it is your great talent.  Your gift.

So today…. perhaps…..  climb to the top of the very highest branch, and bask in the beauty of moment, the view, the accomplishment.

Yes.  You are completely special, singular, and distinct.  Unique.
We all are.  We truly are.   Unique together.  Hidden Treasures.  Everywhere.

“Our time here is magic! It’s the only space you have to realize whatever it is that is beautiful, whatever is true, whatever is great, whatever is potential, whatever is rare, whatever is unique, in. It’s the only space.”  —  Ben Okri

Fortune Cookies.  They are the icing on the cake when you eat at a Chinese Restaurant.  Boy, oh boy, do I ever love Chinese Food.  Thai, too.  Yep.  And then there is the fortune.

Tonight I went down to Yum Yum in Oxford to pick up dinner.  They certainly serve some incredibly good food.  Unfortunately, the place isn’t much to look at.  No ambience.  No special service.  I don’t think they are going to make it, dag nab it.

Don’t get me wrong.  I think it is totally great.  Like I said, the food is delicious.  The people who run the place are so kind, and sweet.  But for a college town, well…. kids want a hopping spot.  And this isn’t it.

Anyway.  I am the Schlep of Fortune Cookies.  If there is a table of 10 people, I am the one who always gets the “dog” of a Fortune Cookie.  “Be aware of the green shoelaces in the factory.”  Whhhhaaaaattttt?  Did I get the one Fortune Writer who hates his job, and just spits this out to disappoint?  How will his bosses ever know?  Those fortunes get tucked right away in the conveyer belt cookies.

Or how about this one… “The frozen ground is where the bear walks with shells.”  Ooohhhhhkkkaaaaay.  Now I have Life Clarity.

So tonight, after I finish my Pad Thai and Veggies, I reach for the cookie.  Now, once again, it is NOT the one that other people get, like “You are wise and beautiful and people love you.”  Or perhaps “Your life is filled with endless good friends and fortune.”

No.  Tonight I am supposed to Slay the Dragon.  Or something along those lines.

But, for once this one makes sense.   “Slaying the Dragon of Delay, is no sport, for the short winded.”

So there you have it.  The Old Beast of Hesitation.
Slay he.  And be long winded about it.  Now, finally…. I KNOW.

But remember…  Always remember one very important thing……
Fighting the Dragon is often easier Slayed… then done.

Commercials.  I’ve been thinking about them quite a bit lately.  You know… you can’t live with ’em… and you sure could do without ’em.

There are so many different kinds… but the ones I get preoccupied with are the prescription drug commercials.  You know the deal.  The introduction is mostly always the same.  It is a beautiful scene,…   a fall day… and the sun is shining…. the leaves are drifting through the air.  Everyone is having a great time, laughing and frolicking around… except for ONE.  That one person is standing there.  Distraught.  In pain.  Disconnected.  Preoccupied.  And that one person is YOU, consumer.

And you know the drill.  Then comes the question… from the guy with the silky voice.  “Do you suffer from chronic itchy earlobes?”  Then Platooba may be right for you!

Of course… the next line… is literally the killer.

In some cases, Platooba may cause certain side effects.

OH GAWD… NOT the SIDE EFFECTS.

It follows…

The most common side effects noted with Platooba are nausea, dry mouth, constipation, diarrhea, fatigue, difficulty sleeping, and dizziness. Some patients may experience  things like their faces falling off, loss of their favorite tricycles… and an inexplicable hunger for liverwurst.

Tell your doctor right away if any of these serious side effects occur: confusion, bleeding, decreased interest in Captain America, muscle cramps/weakness, difficulty peeing anywhere, persistent nagging, vomiting, yellowing eyes, dark urine.  Or humungous  Bovine calves in your living room.

So at this point… I am wondering if it will ever end?  Oh, not yet.

Get medical help right away if any of these rare but serious side effects occur: black/bloody stools, vomit that looks like coffee grounds, seizure.  Horns growing from your head.

Get medical attention if you have hallucinations, loss of coordination, swelling of the tongue and throat, skin melting, toenails popping off your feet, smelly armpits  or spontaneous combustion.

In rare cases, death may occur.

OKAY.  At this point, I don’t know about YOU all, but I am planning on living with the itchy earlobes.  Holy smackerolies.  Who wouldn’t?  Apparently, millions and millions of American would not.    In fact, the Pharmaceutical Industry spends about $3 Billion per year on advertising.

And people listen.

Nearly 70 percent of Americans are on at least one prescription drug, and more than half take two.  That is according to the Mayo Clinic researchers.

I just know for me personally, I would rather scratch my ears than I would vomit coffee grounds.  Any day of the week.  And I don’t have to PAY to have itchy earlobes.  But I do have to fork over big dollars for the little pill that makes my tongue swell up like a balloon, and makes it very difficult to pee.

So what’s my point?  Well.  I am a big fan of scientific proof and results.  However, I think the Pharmaceutical Industry has gotten blown way out of shape.  The likes of which we will never recover from.  I mean, just the absurdity of the commercials ought to tell us something…. no matter how much Cymbalta, Lipitor, or Abilify we are on.

And to offer full disclosure, I am one of the 7 in 10 Americans on a prescription drug. I don’t know what the answer is… but for me personally… I couldn’t stand those itchy earlobes any longer.  The paranoia took over and I thought everyone was talking about me… hence… the itchy ears.

So it was either take the Platooba for the ears…. or Trekookix for the paranoia.

Rock and a hard place I’ll tell you.  Rock and a hard place.

I try to learn something new every day.  I mean it.  If I can learn something about myself, all the better.  You know, a way to improve, or perhaps something which might make me a better citizen of the world.

Yesterday, here is what I learned.  I am thick.  Thick as a brick.

The long and short of it…is this.  If you didn’t read here yesterday, I talked about my egg-cracking adventures.  Someone told me cracking eggs on the counter is the “correct way” to perform the task.  So,  for a year, I tried to perfect the counter-egg-cracking-method.  To no avail.  It was a mess.  Egg shells everywhere, broken yellows, eggs spilling all over the counter.  Disastrous.  The yolk, it turns out… was on me.

The key phrase in all of that…. “so, for a year….”

After I posted my perilous tale, many people wrote in… “Yeah. I tried that for a couple of times and it didn’t work, so I went back to the old way.” OR…. “Yes.  I heard that too.  But it didn’t prove to be very good, so I went back to how I did it before.”

WHhhhhhhhhaaaaaatttt?  After one or two times…. they learned it didn’t work?  ME???   Numbskull that I am… I continued to try…. and fail.. and try…. and fail….. in my quest to perfect this “WAY I was supposed to do something”!

There is something terribly wrong with me.   I am convinced.  But I have been this way my whole life.  If someone, especially an “expert” gives me clear instructions… I follow them.  I call it “The Nun Force”.   The behavior stems from the fear of getting it wrong… and facing the humiliation that ensues.  Welcome to Catholic Grade School of the Yesteryear.   Bad habits aside…..

I believe that often times, it is really important to follow instructions.  A great example, “Stop at a red light.”   But there are those times in life, when the instructions we are given aren’t quite right.    Or maybe… not quite right for us, in that moment.  Remember the old deal… how do you get 7?  5 + 2. Correct.  But so is 4 + 3.

This morning, I cheerfully tapped my eggs on the edge of the frying pan.  I went 4 for 4.   Lesson learned.   Another case cracked.  And you know what 4 for 4 mean?  It means… I ate.

I know, I know.  You’ve heard this from me before. But I can’t say it enough.  I have a thing for the chicken.  You see… I truly love the chicken egg.  In fact, I eat about 3 every morning.    And it got me to thinking about how different people….. can be right, about different things, using different solutions.  But I will get to that in just a moment.   Back to the Incredible, Edible, Egg.

What’s not to love, really?  The whole fowl-up about cholesterol (no pun intended) gives us egg-eating-privileges with no-worries.  Eggs are NOW good for you.  So is white-pasty food, but that will be discovered by the scientific world in due time.  Anyways… Chicken Eggs.  Oh boy, oh boy.

There are a whole big bunch of chickens in the world.  Like 25 billion.  There are more of them than any other bird species.  Now, I didn’t think too much about the personality of chickens.  That is, until I saw “Chicken Run”…. one of the best movies of all time.   From that point on, I had a new appreciation for the bird.  And for  Mrs. Tweedy.

Back to it.  They can be smarties, sometimes.  They are able to remember and recognize over 100 different chicken faces; they can also recognize humans.  They have dreams too. And vocalizations like crazy.  Oh, I could go on and on about their positive qualities.

But here is the deal I am sort of ticked off about today.  It was about a year or more ago, and I was visiting my Mom.  We were watching Rachel Ray, one of my Mom’s favorite cooking shows, back then.   Old Rachel was telling us that there is only ONE correct way to crack an egg.  And that is a good knock, right on the flat surface of the counter.  She continued to say that if you are doing it any other way… you are just dead wrong.

Imagine my surprise.  All those years, I had been using the edge of the frying pan.  So… for the past couple of years…. dag nab it….. I have been trying to “get”  and “perfect” this flat knock on the counter top.  Every morning it was egg destruction of mass proportions.   I would get raw egg everywhere, sometimes the whole egg spilling out on the counter.  And to make matters worse, about 3 times out of 5, I would break the yolk.  Now if you scramble eggs, this is no big deal.  But if you eat them fried, and over easy, this is a TRAVESTY and a catastrophe.

So… after a long hard battle… I switched back a couple of weeks ago.  A little tap, tap, tap on the edge of the skillet and in it goes.  Guess what?  I haven’t had one casualty.  Well…. I guess truthfully, every single one is a casualty. But no broken yolks, no spilled eggs…. no shells in the pan.

It is like the one “Poster” on Facebook:  2 + 5 = 7 is correct.  But so is 3 + 4.
Yep.  That is the deal.  Often times in life, there is more than one solution to any given situation. And both might be perfectly feasible.  And good.

I also feel it is important for us to realize this, and keep an open mind when considering others’ suggestions for a resolution.

Unless, of course, you are Rachel Ray… and you have been screwing up me and my chicken eggs  for over a year now.  In that case…. you can just go stuff a turkey.  Lurkey.

Sure.  I love my dogs…. but what if one got sick?
What do you give a dog with a fever?
Mustard.  It is the best thing for a hot dog.

Now… we live out here on a few wide open acres, and we are thinking about getting some goats, and rabbits.
What do you call 10,000 rabbits walking backward, all in a row?
A receding hare line.

Speaking of where we live.  We used to have a home in Charleston, SC.  There are lots of pirate stories down there….
For instance.   Novice pirates make terrible singers because they can’t hit the high seas.

There are a lot of places to eat and drink in Charleston too….
Once….. Charles Dickens walked into a bar and asked for a drink.  The bartender said to him, “Okay buddy.  Olive or Twist?”

The weather is mostly decent in those parts.  People ride bikes everywhere!
What’s the difference between a nicely dressed man on a tricycle and a poorly dressed man on a bicycle?  A tire.

Okay.  Enough of that.  How about this?  It is a fact that I love science.
So here is one for you.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until they start talking.

Finally…. I am a big bird watcher.  But this…..
Two Robins were stuffed heavy with worms.  They waited on the ground to digest those worms…. before they would fly back to their nests.  Basking in the sun, they fell asleep.
A cat came along and ate them, thinking “Boy oh Boy!  Do I ever  love Baskin’ Robins.”

.

Now the Hunchback of Notre Dame is one heck of a story, isn’t it?  I loved the old movies depicting this tragic tale.

Cool-Man Quasimodo.  Just the name makes you want to watch.  Who knew a bell-ringing Hunchback could be so jammin’.

The movie I remember the most is the famous 1923 silent film version starring Lon Chaney.

But there were several remakes over the years.  I liked the first talkie a bunch too.  Maureen O’Hara as Esmeralda.  Of course, all the films are based on Victor Hugo’s 1831 novel.

My favorite scene, ALWAYS, is when Quasimodo sweeps down… …as much as a humpback can do…   and then grabs Esmerelda.. and THEN rushes into the Cathedral yelling “Sanctuary! Sanctuary!”

If you have never seen this scene… see it. It is a classic.

Anyway… I was pretty young when I first watched this movie.

Not long after that…. I can remember playing outside all day… and being all covered from head to toe in dirt.  My knees were skinned raw from an accident…. earlier in the day.  I tried navigate a skateboard down a hill.  Unsuccessfully.

But back to the HB of ND.  I figured I might be in some trouble when I got home that day.  I was pretty scruffed up… more than usual.  So when the streetlights came on, I headed home.  The kitchen screen door slammed shut as I tried to slink in.

So…. With all the dramatic flair that I could muster … I walked through the kitchen, reenacting the Quasimodo One-Legged-Limp. … with my arm all scrunched up behind me.  Throughout the length of the performance…. . I was calling out … “Sanctuary.  Sanctuary.”

My antics weren’t met with much of a reception. In fact… I probably would NOT have gotten in any trouble had I left the joke at the door.  As it was… straight to the bathtub and then to bed.  No discussion.

These days… I still yell out “Sanctuary.  Sanctuary.”  You know… when I am having a rough day… or a bad time of things.   As with my childhood… just calling it out doesn’t have much effect.  But it makes me feel better sometimes.  Like….. when I am in the middle of Walmart…. surrounded by Walmart.

Seriously though, when I am smart enough to recognize those places in my day… which may seem hard or difficult…. I try to remember that they are truly blessings.

It is during those times which challenge us, that we have the possibility to grow.   I am supposed to be there, where ever “THERE” may be.  And I tend to believe… that during each moment in our lives…. we can choose to grow and learn from our experiences … or we choose to stay the same.

When we choose to begin again, and the ensuing growth, awareness, and compassion that follows, we have found the true form of sanctuary.  The haven of inner peace.

Quasimodo may argue this one with me.  I don’t blame him.

When I was a kid, I loved to watch the Saturday Morning Cartoons.  Oh my word.

First and foremost, we were off school.  Sure, we had to do a load of chores on Saturday… but there were NO nuns at our house.  And that was a good thing… I don’t care if I did have to scrub toilets.

Anyway… back to the Toons.  It was all about the atmosphere.  Another thing that was great…. above and beyond the NO NUN Policy at our house… .. was breakfast.  No fried eggs, fried bologna, and toast on Saturday Morning.  This was Pancake Day… or Waffle Day… or French Toast Day.  And I would ALWAYS be psyched.  Six days of perfectly wonderful breakfasts… with the chicken eggs.  But on Saturday… there was SUGAR.

I think the Waffles were my favorite.  Loaded with butter and powdered sugar.  Yowza… sugar ’em up and put ’em to work.  Mom and Dad were pretty smart.

ANYWAY…. back to the TOONS.  I had my favorites, that is for sure.   But the Woody Woodpecker Show was way down on my list.  That little dude annoyed the heck out of me… all the way from the theme song… to his annoying little laugh.

Which brings me to this.  It is funny how we can change.  Oh sure… sometimes we stay very much the same.  But there are other times in life when we have the capability to transform.  And we do.

Now while this may seem inconsequential… I used to loathe woodpeckers… because of this dang cartoon.  BUT… it wasn’t until I got to KNOW a REAL woodpecker…. that I really gained a complete appreciation for them.  I love a good woodpecker now.

And so it goes with life.  We may THINK we know something or someone.  And we may not like it.  But once we give it a chance… if we get past the cover of that book… we have the capacity to change.   We may end up actually liking the very thing we once did not.

Like a triple woodpecker visit… in one day.  Now THAT is a woodpecker song.

I love music.  For as long as I can remember… I love to listen to it… sing to it… dance…. to the music.

Right now, my tool of choice in Pandora Radio.  For those who don’t know Pandora… it lets you choose the “stations” you want.  For instance, I am a huge fan of “The Talking Heads”… so I created a Talking Heads Station.  I have a wide assortment of stations.  Everything from “Alt J,” to “Vampire Weekend,” “David Byrne” … .. to “Leonard Bernstein.”  I know I’ve mentioned all of this before.  But there is a story. Sort of.

This morning I was working out.  As I do most every morning.  I go downstairs, get out my little mat and weights.. and crank out the tunes on Pandora Radio.  (It is not like the Navy Seals workout or anything… but for a 51 year old scrawny woman… it is par for the course.)

Anyway… this morning… right after “Hozier” belted out The Work Song….. what comes on?  The cast of “Fiddler on the Roof” singing Tradition.  Oh… BET ME!

It was all it took.  I couldn’t hold back.  I had to start dancing around the floor like the dudes up balancing on the rooftops… you know… The Fiddlers.  With their little prayer shawls draped around their wastes and cute little hats atop their heads. …. … keeping their arms crossed and kicking their legs out this way and that.

I scared the dogs.  They come down every morning and watch me work out.  Clearly… this was a routine they had never witnessed before.  Ollie started chasing her tail… and Frances took cover behind the couch.  I think my Russian Dance Routine was simply too much for their little doggie-brains to handle.

The point is… music can have a powerful effect on us.  It does everything from making the Merry-Go-All-The-Way-Around…. to charming the snake…. to inciting 40,000 humans to flick a lighter and hold it in the air.

Today… it caused me to move like …. no one was watching except the dogs… … and then laugh out loud at myself.

Music Sweet Music.  What a blessing. What a gift.  At least… for some.  For the dogs… it was traumatic.