Hamburgers for Breakfast

  

                Aloha Dear Ones,
      Happy New Year and respective holiday greetings to you all. For my atheist friends, drop the holiday reference. I truly hope you are all well and content. If not content, I hope you at least have enough wherewithal to open a bottle , do a push up , meditate, or pray yourself to a better state of mind.
      Before I go on with this I want to say "Hi" to my Mom- Hi Mere- love you! Priorities you know.

       I tend to get retrospective around the new year as I'm sure many do. This past year has been another doozey , so many things unexpected, understood, and misinterpreted. For one was the lingering problem of our president from Kenya who has good abs and a smoking habit. Thank God we have intelligent people looking into things like that during these turbulent times .
There is also WikiLeaks. Didn't we use that to fix radiators? And if our new Speaker of the House can have a year round tan, can't Mitch McConnell get a chin? I understand he has great health coverage (let's not even go there). All in all though, the best thing to occur this past year was the success of our biggest banking institutions to overcome the crushing power of moral collapse and stupefying greed and turn record profits. I applaud them and our brave, crusading government for ushering us into the brave new world.
      I really don't want to drop into the vast wasteland that our once "..by the people,.for the people..." has become, suffice to say that we are becoming a much different nation in a relatively short time, and it's going to take more than a political party to get us back on a healthy course.
      I have tried in the past few years to simplify my life without stepping on too many toes or causing others any anguish or pain. It's fairly easy to do this in a material sense, though you need great diligence to keep from accumulating "extra" stuff. I've certainly not mastered  that yet. It's a work in progress, but one that gives me a certain focus. I've never been too goal oriented; I am easily distracted and I tend to let my mind wander...perhaps a poster child for ADD, but , none the less, the practice of living simply in what can be a very complex world, is something I think of as worthy. If there is one resolution I'd like to stick to this 2011 it would be that, to live more simply.
      How to live more simply? Listen to the sounds of early morning, regardless of where you are. Watch birds. Plant or grow something (mold on the top of a forgotten leftover in the fridge doesn't count). Planting a seed and watching it develop is a wonder for humans of all ages, in a pot or a garden. I once had a seed sprout in the floor mat of an old car I was driving- magnificent! Turn off the T.V. Try to remember something in the past that was really funny or incredibly touching and let the thought linger in your mind, especially if it had to do with someone who is no long on the physical plane. Take a walk. Smile , even if you're by yourself. Talk to a loved one. Write a letter, a real pen on paper letter, it's a dying art form, some schools have stopped teaching cursive letters. As an aside, I have not written in cursive for decades, my hand writing is not legible- I print. Cook a meal from scratch, the whole shebang; share it with someone and eat it by candlelight. This could lead to all sorts of interesting things. List your activities of one day and review it to see what you did- it might really surprise you. List everything. Sing out loud; in a shower or into a pillow-extra points for doing it outside, in front of strangers(not while showering). And for God's sake, laugh at yourself. We are so far from being perfect, yet we hold ourselves to such ridiculous standards at times.
    for what it;s worth, this is my 2011 new years email to you all. I wish you all the best.
                                                                        Much Love
Oh, and about the title of this letter; it's what I had for breakfast- nothing like a good burger!