The Mayonnaise Jar

When things in your life seem almost too much to handle; when 24 hours in a day is not enough;remember the mayonnaise jar and 2 glasses of Root Beer. A professor stood before his philosophy class and had some items in front of him. When the class began, wordlessly, he picked up a very large and empty mayonnaise jar and started to fill it with golf balls. He then asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was. The professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured it into the jar. He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles rolled into the open areas between the golf balls. He then asked the students again if the jar was full. They agreed it was. The professor next picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar. Of course, the sand filled up everything else. He asked once more if the jar was full. The students respondedWith an unanimous 'yes.' The professor then produced two cans of root beer from under the table and poured the entire contents into the jar, effectively filling the empty space between the sand. The students laughed.. 'Now,' said the professor, as the laughter subsided,'I want you to recognize that this jar represents your life. The golf balls are the important things - God, family,children, health, friends, and favorite passions, things that if everything else was lost and only they remained, your life would still be full. The pebbles are the things that matter like your job, house, and car. The sand is everything else -- the small stuff. 'If you put the sand into the jar first,' he continued,'there is no room for the pebbles or the golf balls. The same goes for life. If you spend all your time and energy on the small stuff, you will never have room for the things that are important to you. So...pay attention to the things that are critical to your happiness. Play with your children. Take time to get medical checkups. Take your partner out to dinner. There will always be time to clean the house and fix the dripping tap. 'Take care of the golf balls first -- the things that really matter. Set your priorities. The rest is just sand.' One of the students raised her hand and inquired what the Root Beer represented. The professor smiled. 'I'm glad you asked'. It just goes to show you that no matter how full your life may seem, there's always room for a couple of sodas with a friend.

A funny story...

One summer our daughter was home from college and as she was driving our family truck out of the neighborhood, she thought she had run over something. Checking her rear view mirror, she didn't see anything in the road, so she continued on her journey. About five miles away, she was stopped at a red light when she noticed the guy in the car next to her was trying to get her attention. He yelled to her, "YOU HAVE A MAILBOX STUCK IN YOUR DOOR"....Sure enough she had hit our neighbor's mailbox and it was stuck in the hinge of the door....post and all....and the mail was still inside!! Now it's a federal offense to steal someone's mail, so she returned the mailbox to their home and left it on the front porch since no one answered the door. The next day the mailbox was back out on the street. They never did find out who kidnapped their mailbox. Her punishment for denting the side of the truck was that we could tell this story for the rest of her life!! Problem is a tree fell on top of that truck during a hurricane and destroyed all the evidence. Oh well, it's still a fun story to tell...

If life was fair.....

"If life was fair, there wouldn't be so many bra sizes!!" ~ Julia Sugarbaker

Livin' in the South

Living in the south has been a learning experience.....a whole new language. I remember when we first moved here, I went to the school to register our son and as we walked in, a woman came running down the hall yelling, "Ho de doe, ho de doe, ho de doe!!!" What in the world??? Then I realized she wanted me to "hold the door". There are southern words that you just have to learn to understand. For instance, the word, "jeet". Which means "did you eat" as in "jeet yet?" Then there's the proper use of the word "ya'll"...."ya'll" is singular, "all-ya'll" is plural, and "all ya'll's" is plural possessive. I also learned that women in the south don't have PMS, they have FTS....they're "fixin' to start". If the weatherman says we might get a dusting of snow, everyone runs to the grocery store to stock up on bread and other necessities.... which includes a whole lot of movies cuz the schools will be closed for at least a week. My boss asked me once what he was supposed to wear to a meeting. I told him "a collared shirt"....he asked, "what collar??" You gotta love the south!! especially the southern people....they're the best people God ever put on this Earth!!

It's a great life.....

My life's a little crazy right now. Preparing for a one-way trip to Utah and deciding what stays and what goes is making me more than crazy. In our first 25 years of marriage, we moved 13 times. Those moves weren't without trials. Like the time I opened a box and the smell about knocked me out. The movers had packed a plastic container of leftover stew!! Or the time we trusted a truck driver to care for our hamsters in the cab of his truck, only to find them bloated and dead inside our car that had been shipped across Texas, New Mexico and Arizona. Or the time we couldn't find the truck that was carrying all our earthly goods. A few days later the driver pulled in and said he had decided to stop in the mountains and do some fishing. A driver told me a story once about a woman, who after the truck was loaded and ready to go, couldn't find her cat. Five days later, the cat crawled out from inside a sofa as it was being unloaded. Anyway, I will be strong and carry on and try to remember what my mother always says, "It's a great life, if we don't weaken!!"

Full Circle

My husband and I have decided to go back to Utah....the state we left 40 years ago. We've always laughed that we have retirement property in Utah...at the Orem City Cemetery!! Yep, we're going back home. It took some coercion to get us there. Our youngest son is starting a business and wants his father's help. So, we're packing our bags and heading west. We've come full circle!!

Pedigree

It's July and I'm looking like a native American Indian. We spent the day at the beach yesterday and even slathered in sunscreen, I look like a piece of fruit leather. My sister's dentist once told her he could tell by her teeth that she has Indian blood. Not long after that, I was going through my grandmother's geneology and found a pedigree chart that shows one of my grandfathers, Steven Garlick, was born in 1756. His mother is listed as a "Mohawk Indian maiden". I can walk a little prouder, knowing I have Indian blood and in the summer, I can even look like my Mohawk Indian grandmother.