A Thank You to Jay Mathews and Joanne Jacobs

Considering that this blog has been in existence less than 30 days, I am deeply appreciative of the vote of support given it by Mr. Mathews and Walt Gardner in yesterday's Washington Post listing of edublogs worth looking at. Further, many of you who have discovered this blog, have come from Joanne Jacob's referral -- thank you, Joanne. I recommend that you visit the other edublogs listed in the article. I've learned much about blogging from reading these on a daily basis. I plan on posting some background of why and how I started blogging and, in particular, why I began connecting with Jay several months ago, but for now, I'd like to share a sentiment that was emailed to me by a close friend. You may have already seen this, but it does send a message about one's values that bears repeating (thank you Elisa for sharing this):

One day a father of a very wealthy family took his son on a trip to a farm with the firm purpose of showing his son how poor people live. They spent a couple of days and nights on the farm of what would be considered a very poor family.

On their return from their trip, the father asked his son, "How was the
trip?" "It was great, Dad." "Did you see how poor people live?" the father asked. "Oh yeah," said the son. "So, tell me, what did you learn from the trip?" asked the father.

The son answered: "I saw that we have one dog and they had four.

We have a pool that reaches to the middle of our garden and they have a creek that has no end.

We have imported lanterns in our garden and they have the stars at night.

Our patio reaches to the front yard and they have the whole horizon.

We have a small piece of land to live on and they have fields that go beyond our sight.

We have servants who serve us, but they serve others.

We buy our food, but they grow theirs.

We have walls around our property to protect us, they have friends to
protect them.

The boy's father was speechless. Then his son added, "Thanks, Dad, for showing me how poor we are."

Isn't perspective a wonderful thing? Makes you wonder what would happen if we all gave thanks for everything we have, instead of worrying about what we don't have.

Appreciate every single thing you have, especially your friends!

Life is too short and friends are too few.