$24 A Day.

Sieving through some old emails the other day and found one with a slide presentation attached entitled "The Cost of A Child".

Read (in slide format) like this:

"The government recently calculated the cost of raising a child from birth to 18 and came up with $160,140 for a middle income family. Talk about price shock.  That doesn't even touch college tuition.

But $160,140 isn't so bad if you break it down.  It translates into:

*    $8,897 a year;

*    $741 a month;

*    $171 a week;

*    A mere $24 a day;

*    Just over $1 an hour.

Still, you might think the best financial advice is: Don't have children if you want to be 'rich.'  

Actually, it is just the opposite.

What do you get for your $160,140?

•   Naming rights - first, middle, and last!

•   Glimpses of God every day.

•   Giggles under the covers every night.

•   More love than your heart can hold.

•   Butterfly kisses and Velcro hugs.

•   Endless wonder over rocks, ants, clouds, and warm cookies.

•   A hand to hold usually covered with jelly or chocolate.

•   A partner for blowing bubbles and flying kites.

•   Someone to laugh yourself silly with, no matter what the boss said or how your stocks performed that day.

You get to:

•   Finger-paint,

•   Carve pumpkins,

•   Play hide-and-seek,

•   Catch lightning bugs.

You get to frame rainbows, hearts, and flowers under refrigerator magnets and collect spray painted noodle wreaths for Christmas, hand prints set in clay for Mother's Day, and cards with backward letters for Father's Day.

You have an excuse to:

•    never grow up;

•    keep reading the Adventures of Piglet and Pooh;

•    watch Saturday morning cartoons;

•    go to Disney movies;

•    and wish on stars.

You get to be a hero just for:

•    Retrieving a Frisbee off the garage roof,

•    Taking the training wheels off a bike,

•    Removing a splinter,

•    Filling a wading pool,

•    Coaxing a wad of gum out of bangs,

•    And coaching a baseball team that never wins but always gets treated to ice cream regardless.

You get a front row seat in history to witness the:

•    First step,

•    First word,

•    First bra,

•    First date,

•    First time behind the wheel.

You get to be immortal.

You get another branch added to your family tree, and if you're lucky, a long list of limbs in your obituary called grandchildren and great grandchildren. You get an education in psychology, nursing, criminal justice, communications, and human sexuality that no college can match.

 

In the eyes of a child, you rank right up there under God. 

You have all the power to heal a boo-boo, scare away the monsters under the bed, patch a broken heart, police a slumber party, ground them forever, and love them without limits - so one day they will, you, love without counting the cost.

For a mere $24 a day, there is no greater bang for your buck.  That is quite a deal for the price. 

Love and enjoy your children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren.

It's the best investment you'll ever make."

[courtesy of www.tommyswindow.com]

Made me smile.  

For about 3 seconds...

To My Beautfiul Daughter #1

To my beautiful daughter,

I confess that I was lost and helpless, not knowing what I’d have to do to stop you from crying.  I remember my only knowledge of you at the time was that you smelt nice.  And you still do, by the way.  Everyone else around me appeared to be a better parent to you than I was.  Letting fatherhood kick in naturally felt anything but.  So I took guidance where it was given, and I enjoyed being schooled in a role that I thought I was being naturally bad at.  I thought there was progress.  You stopped crawling away from me and began welcoming me into your space.  You started to laugh with me.  I was happy.

Then IT happened.  

The threads of life began unraveling.  The spiraling.  The cold and piercing darkness.   I felt fear of how painful it would be when I hit ground fast and hard.   And fast and hard it was.  There were more questions than there were answers.  The blame game started and the man in the mirror loathed me for losing control.  What had happened?  Why now?  When and how?  I was frantic.  Desperate.  Hopeless.  I lost my emotional compass, my confidence, in what I had wanted to do and become. 

Never before.  I thought I had life reasonably well charted out.  I had side stepped and dodged many the slings of outrageous fortune, ripped out arrowheads like a barbarian on a war field.  In my mind, I was indomitable.  Impenetrable.   And then in a flash, my heart was somehow beating outside my chest, exposed to the harshest of elements.  I had to continue projecting that I was still the same man in the day, the same force at work, the same father who would catch you as you fell off my shoulder while you attempted to climb me like the tallest castle wall.  I have been tethering on insanity, babygirl.

All this, while I would have you perched over my head, so that you would not see that the other half of my smile was draped with a tear.

The choices before me are simple.  Continue to feel lost and helpless, or ride the crescendo that is life with wild vigour.  Today I choose to step out of the darkness, because I am no good blind – to those that I love and care, and to you my sweet child.

Loving you has been a welcome intense and profound experience.   

One fear nevertheless remains, and constant it has been – that of hurting you because of the choices made by those you put your trust in.  This is perhaps the most painful experience ever, and I know it may get worse and be too much to bear.  As your father, I vow to protect you from the world.  But I realize that I may instead have to protect you from me, as I may potentially be the one who would end up hurting you the most.  My heart breaks when I flash forward, imagining you speak of me with disdain, ashamed of my failures and my choices when you are an adult.  

Despite what I think is light, it is really still dark, and just too dark for me to properly see.  The future remains blurred.  I forge ahead nevertheless with you as my beacon in hope that I can grow into the hero that you so deserve.

Daddy.

Love Rock

Life couldn't get any better. At this moment. Right now. Its winter in Mauritius, yet the sun continues to shine gloriously and the waves play tag by crashing and ebbing from the shores, while the other handful of vacationers laze away on an otherwise vacant private beach front. The woman our hero has wed lies sprawled on a beach chair, and our hero cannot help but smile somewhat gleefuly on his achievements over the past 2 weeks. Triumphantly found himself a bride, this lazy ass has. Joy.

And these events echo through an iPod playlist arranged within 2 weeks before the matrimonial endeavor. Lame and even gag-worthy to some, but don't we all love to hear love sometimes..

66 Wedding Reception Songs
(crescendoing into post dinner party)

Someone To Watch Over Me - Ella Fitzgerald
As time goes by - Billy Holiday
How Deep Is The Ocean - Dianna Krall
I Get A Kick Out Of You - Frank Sinatra
At Last - Etta James
I Left My Heart In San Francisco - Tony Bennett
Dream A Little Dream Of Me - Tony Bennet feat KD Lang
When I Fall in Love - Nat King Cole
Truly - Lionel Richie
Have I Told You Lately - Rod Stewart
You Decorated My Life - Kenny Rogers
Stuck On You - Lionel Richie
Smoke Gets In Your Eyes - Platters
All My Life - K-CI & JoJo
She’s the one – Robby Williams
Always and Forever - Heatwave
Georgia - Ray Charles
Summer Wind - Frank Sinatra
You Are The Sunshine of My Life - Stevie Wonder
Isn't She Lovely - Stevie Wonder
Love and Marriage - Frank Sinatra
My First, My Last, My Everything – Barry White
Fly Me To The Moon - Diana Krall
The Way You Look Tonight - Harry Connick Jr
La Mer - Charles Trennet
It's Your Love - Tim McGraw/Faith Hill
We've Only Just Begun - Carpenters
Fallen - Lauren Wood
She - Elvis Costello
Your Song - Elton John
Kissing A Fool - George Michael
I Only Have Eyes For You - Ella Fitzgerald
Can't Take My Eyes Off You - Gloria Gaynor
For Once In My Life - Steview Wonder
My Girl - Temptations
It Had To Be You - Harry Conick Jr
I Could Not Ask For More - Edwin McCain
I Got You Babe - Sonny & Cher
Ain't No Mountain High Enough - Marvin Gaye
We Are Family - Sister Sledge
Brown Eyed Girl - Van Morrison
Love Is In The Air - John Paul Young
I Believe In Miracles - Hot Chocolate
Believe It Or Not – Joey Scarbury
Celebration - Kool & The Gang
Shout - Otis Day & The Nights (Animal House)
Love Shack - B-52's
Copacabana - Barry Manilow
You're The One That I Want - Olivia/Travolta
Mustang Sally - Blues Brothers
I Can't Get No (Satisfaction) - Rolling Stones
I Feel Good (I Got You) - James Brown
Fast And The Furious – Teriyaki Boys
Let's Go Crazy - Prince
Jump - Pointer Sisters
Twist & Shout - Beatles
Walk This Way - Aerosmith
Dancing Queen - ABBA
Mambo #5 - Lou Bega
Conga - Miami Sound Machine
Baby Got Back - Sir Mix A Lot
Lets Talk About Sex – Salt n Pepa
Wild Thing - Tone Loc
Whoomp! (There It Is) - Tag Team
Pump Up The Jam - Technotronic
Another One Bites The Dust - Queen

Hey, one man's honey...

Grow up? Never.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with being “childish”. Society has become so disillusioned with its competitive pursuits throughout time, of being emotionally superior, more technologically advanced, financially empowered, and intellectually primed, that certain traits are unfortunately wrongly attributed as child-like. For example, the act of crying is perceived as a character flaw, a sign of weakness, which are attributed to babies. An inability to forgive is also perceived to be a child-like quality. Not pursuing the rat-race and achieving high standards of material gain are also scorned as not ‘grown up’. All quite the opposite, actually.

We are essentially beasts at our core and our emotional reactions to love and hate are instinctive. The difference between our furry four legged friends and the human species is that our brains allow us to make choices and to a certain extent regulate our instincts. Theirs don’t. In a communal mass, these choices, often translated into action, are aggregated into the development of social morality. A natural and unexplainable sense of knowing what is right and wrong, of good versus evil.

Children have the same feelings of hurt and joy as adults do. But they do not have the benefit of wisdom, that is a collection of different applications of our knowledge and the resulting experiences thereof, throughout their relatively limited time horizons.

As a child, we do not enjoy disappointing others, as we similarly do not enjoy the feeling of being disappointed. We absorb and live in the moment and approach each experience as something new, fascinating and relevant. We bear no grudge nor resentment in our relationships. We are life’s greatest students.

In comparison, as adults, we have grown aloof in our relationships, not thinking twice about disappointment, treating it as a normal feature in life, as we have grown used to it and as there is no guide to correct that feeling of loneliness when it does transpire. We develop an arrogance that is borne out of rejection and our resulting defense to it, and consequently shut ourselves out to the discovery of life’s bountiful offerings. It is this arrogance that we also think that our standards are the right ones, and we harbor varying degrees of ill-will to those who do not share them. We become life’s worst cancer. It has degenerated en masse into an irreversible, incurable and invisible plague that has devoured society’s fabric of faith and love, as evidenced by betrayal and wars that have marked the passages of time.

So what is the answer to living a life that is full. And what does being a child have to do with any of it. If we could formulate life and our approach to it into a few variables, it would be this:

• Wisdom = Experience x Time


• Experience = Attitude + f(Manifestation and Application of Thought into Action)


• Wisdom = Attitude + f(Manifestation and Application of Thought into Action) x Time

Wisdom is the measure of experience that we gain throughout time. And our experience is the summation of our attitudes employed with a factor of how we have translated them into thought and action. This equates to wisdom being a summation of our attitudes and how we have translated them into thought and action.

And so it is that if we remove time, which is a measure of our progression in life, wisdom would still be demonstrated as the sum of all our attitudes, that are governed by our emotions that we choose in dictating our approach to life.

My point is this. Do not become bitter victims of age. Do not be jaded by the negatives in life, but approach each experience positively and charge yourself with enthusiasm. You do not need to be an adult to experience positive emotions and to exercise constructive actions. To view life through the eyes of a child, would be a big improvement from where we all are now.

Think about it. Slow down for a minute and consider stopping for a breather. Invest a few minutes of your life blossoming, instead of wasting a few days ageing and dying. And think about it.

There really isn’t any point making the wrong choices in life. Come to an early realization. Do not become slaves to time. Do not sign up as pawns to today's social normalcy. Do not give in to hate, envy, greed, and ignorant prejudices. Because you can make the choices on how you want to feel. You are in charge. You are one spirit. You are your own spirit. There is only one brain, one heart, that rules over who you are. And there is no other who can be more responsible for who you can potentially be.

Go play. We came into this life as kids. And we shall leave as kids. What happens in between those fifty, or sixty, or seventy years, is a product that you create. Do not grow up into such ‘adults’ that we forget to live our lives as children. We were not born to be politicians, policemen, soldiers, kings and rulers. We were all born equal and we will all die equal. Do not choose to fight. Do not choose to give in to pessimism. Keep a safe distance from the frills and distractions in life so that you are not swallowed whole by them. Instead approach them simplistically and with an awareness and a willingness to learn and with gratitude if they become gifts.

Love like a child. Unconditionally and perhaps even innocently. Do not expect anything back. Go back to basics and strip 'complexities' down to their bare bones. Because life really isn't at all that complicated. When we make a conscious effort to choose and to constantly communicate this message through our attitudes and deeds to all throughout our time on earth, I am confident that our lives will be more fulfilling and meaningful. Our world, that much more a wonderful home to experience and share our lives in.

And only because everyone loves a child.

It

How we fight for It. How we yearn to experience It. To be a part of It. How we sacrifice what is dear in our reckless pursuit for It. How its absence, its resulting betrayal, can warp its delicate form. And how vengence, pride, hatred, lust and greed, can banish it from our hearts, minds, and fleeting souls.

And so it is not beyond imagination and mortal fathom that many have fallen in the Quest, unable to be charged with the requisite vigour in rising again and facing It. But in the same vein, so many have continued to soldier the journey and challenge the odds, blessed by the aid and gift of Fate's hand. Some will persevere and will know it, live it, and will with natural ease, be living sacrements and messengers of divine expression to the mass of fallen and broken spirits. While many of the initiated make worthy attempts at communicating this expression, none embody its truest significance better than an age old Corinthian inspired script;

Love is patient, love is kind.
It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.
It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.
Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.
It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Be tolerant. Be benevolent. Be thankful. Be humble. Be polite. Be patient. Be calm. Be forgiving. Be sincere. And you shall find It no further away than behind your left coat pocket.

Legion, despite your propensity to fight, I also live because you can love. Because I can love. Because I am loved. But by the high heavens, do not be mistaken. Love, in all its fruitful splendour, is also the heaviest and sharpest double-edged bastard sword that hovers with its pointed tip delicately kissing the skin over your hearts...