Words of Encouragement

Please click on this photo to enlarge, for these flowers are for YOU.

"The millions of Americans who live decent, praiseworthy lives deserve our highest admiration because they have opted for the good when the good is not the only available option. Even amidst the temptations that a rich and free society offers, they have remained on the straight path. Their virtue has special luster because it is freely chosen." ~~ Dinesh D"Souza, What's So Great About America

Slow Down

Lovers' Stroll at Midnight

A radio news story irked Tom, wouldn't let him alone.

Unkind words to me - from a stranger - looped and spun my mind around and around in an off-kilter sort of way.

We were grumbly, frowny, withdrawn, and tense. Not upset with each other, just unable to unwind. Relentless frustration blocked reasonableness. We knew what was happening, even tried to console each other. It didn't work.

Midnight found Tom changing from street clothes into sleeping clothes and me changing from pajamas into walking clothes.

"What are you doing?" asked my tense husband.

In muted tones I responded, "I'm going for a walk to clear my mind. Feel free to join me. It's nice outside."

"Okay, sure."

Arm in arm we walked, speaking in hushed tones so as to not disturb a slumbering neighborhood. After just half a block the cares of the day began to flow and smooth off our backs like a wake behind a boat, only to dissolve amidst green, freshly-mown lawns, bulbous red tulips, infant rhododendron blooms, and new leaves sticking out of dark, twisty branches silhouetted against the night sky.

I could feel my muscles slowly relaxing, my mind regaining its equilibrium. Tom's arm felt softer under my hand as his elbow drew my closer.

"Oh, Tom," I whispered as we stopped on the park's winding path, "Look at the stars!" Bright, twinkling, comforting. Right where they were supposed to be.

"Makes you feel better, somehow, doesn't it?" Tom responded.

"Yeah, it does."

We stood there for a few minutes, just gazing upwards, letting the universe calm our silly stresses.

As we walked the last three blocks home, our conversation turned to funny things we'd experienced during the day. By the time we reached our welcoming front porch we were completely calm and happy.

We both slept marvelously well last night.

Midnight walk under a romantic sky. Good choice.

Movie Woman

If you are in the mood for a movie, perhaps one nobody you know has heard of, or if you want to be forewarned of a clunker, I recommend visiting Cassie's blog. She finds trailers for all sorts of interesting movies, offers her lively opinions, and often, after she has viewed the films herself once they become available, gives spirited, insightful reviews.

Many a drippy, dreary weekend evening around here has been lightened, rescued, and enlivened thanks to Cassie's deep-digging research.

Enjoy your visit to A Little Step Into My Head!

Liberal Political Madness

Here is an excerpt from the book, The Liberal Mind, by Lyle H. Rossiter, Jr., MD. Haven't read it, yet. Must say, it's intriguing.

"The Liberal Mind is the first in-depth examination of the major political madness of our time: the radical left’s efforts to regulate the people from cradle to grave. To rescue us from our troubled lives, the liberal agenda recommends denial of personal responsibility, encourages self-pity and other-pity, fosters government dependency, promotes sexual indulgence, rationalizes violence, excuses financial obligation, justifies theft, ignores rudeness, prescribes complaining and blaming, denigrates marriage and the family, legalizes all abortion, defies religious and social tradition, declares inequality unjust, and rebels against the duties of citizenship. Through multiple entitlements to unearned goods, services and social status, the liberal politician promises to ensure everyone’s material welfare, provide for everyone’s healthcare, protect everyone’s self-esteem, correct everyone’s social and political disadvantage, educate every citizen, and eliminate all class distinctions. Radical liberalism thus assaults the foundations of civilized freedom. Given its irrational goals, coercive methods and historical failures, and given its perverse effects on character development, there can be no question of the radical agenda's madness. Only an irrational agenda would advocate a systematic destruction of the foundations on which ordered liberty depends. Only an irrational man would want the state to run his life for him rather than create secure conditions in which he can run his own life. Only an irrational agenda would deliberately undermine the citizen’s growth to competence by having the state adopt him. Only irrational thinking would trade individual liberty for government coercion, sacrificing the pride of self-reliance for welfare dependency. Only a madman would look at a community of free people cooperating by choice and see a society of victims exploited by villains."  ~~From The Liberal Mind; The Psychological Causes of Political Madness by Lyle H. Rossiter, Jr., MD

Gay and Opposed to Gay Marriage

Just read a really great article by Doug Mainwaring entitled, I'm Gay and I Oppose Gay Marriage. The author does a proper, succinct job of explaining how gay marriage hurts children, which is the reason I keep writing and talking about the dangers inherent in the idea. I am a mother. I adore children and see that life is hard enough these days without stacking the deck against them. It's time we adults put our selfishness aside. For the children's sake.

"Same-sex marriage will undefine marriage and unravel it, and in so doing, it will undefine children. It will ultimately lead to undefining humanity. This is neither “progressive” nor “conservative” legislation. It is “regressive” legislation." ~~quote from above named article

Without further ado, I leave you to clicking on the above link so as to allow your mind to ponder the many useful points made by Mr.
Mainwaring.

Be brave. Feed your mind.

And I hope you have a wonderful day.

Un Père, Une Mère, C’est Élémentaire!” (“One father, One Mother: It’s Basic!”)

"Wish as you might, a mom and a dad are not interchangeable."  ~~ Anonymous

There is a mighty debate about whether gays should be allowed to marry and raise families. Passionate opinions on both sides.

For me, I cannot get past the idea that men and women are not interchangeable. Not at all. My sister, brother, and I were raised with my married-to-each-other mom and dad who were - besides personality differences - very different from one another because of their sexes. Different physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually. They had different perspectives about life and I needed them both to understand the world - and its differences -  so that I could participate when adulthood found me. The synergy between a woman and a man cannot be duplicated in a same-sex union. It just can't. They are not interchangeable.

Children need a mom and a dad. They deserve the best shot at as good and healthy a life possible. 

As far as I can tell from my limited research, never in the history of the world has their been sanctioned gay marriage until now. Ever. It has always been believed to be a bad idea. Sure, homosexuality has existed. Ancient Greek and Roman soldiers participated in homosexuality. But then they went home to their wives and children. They valued their heterosexual family units because that is where legacy lives, where the family name is passed down, where culture and tradition are bestowed upon the next generation via a mother and a father. It was a no-brainer.

“Marriage exists to bring a man and a woman together as husband and wife to be father and mother to any children their union produces. Marriage is based on the biological fact that reproduction depends on a man and a woman, and on the social reality that children need a mother and a father.” ~~ Ryan Anderson

So, if marriage today is predominantly for family building, and if same-sex parents building families is not ideal for children, then why is it so hard for people to come to consensus about whether gay marriage is necessary or not?  

Because we are a different sort of people these days. We are selfish and morally adrift. In ignorance we have abdicated our responsibility and thus our power. We now sit down and expect the government to define the moral order for us, for we have lost our way. And we remain so at our peril.

"A people who allow government to redefine the moral order according to changing social standards or political expediency will not be able to resist tyranny because they no longer believe that right and wrong are universally based but rather man made and thus subject to decree. When the government can define right and wrong it will inevitably define its own actions as right by definition. It is not an accident that the decline in morals of the last generation also corresponds to the near death of the Bill of Rights. People who do not believe in Right, cannot stand up for rights. We have rights because justice is rooted in the Universal order. It is Right. Without a belief in a transcendent, absolute moral order, there is no Justice, no rights, only the whim of the state, our new god. Emperors and dictators have always sensed that moral decadence enhanced their own powers, and so it is today." ~~ Bill, from a comment forum

We find ourselves there, at the whim of the state, bickering, divided, the needle of our moral compass spinning.

In March of 2013, Chief Rabbi of France Gilles Bernheim wrote an interesting article entitled Homosexual Marriage, Parenting, and Adoption, the adapted version of which can be found here.

Another very relevant article, written by Doug Mainwaring (a gay man), pertaining to the importance of children having both a mother and a father plus the harm same-sex marriage does to humanity can be found here. It's entitled, "I'm Gay and Oppose Same-Sex Marriage." This article does a great job of answering some of the arguments my readers have left me in the comment forum of the above post.

River of Sludge

The three free tickets to see a nationally popular ventriloquist came with a moderate warning that the show may be a little coarse, though the performer is hilarious and excellent at his craft.

The tickets were given to my teenage and twenty-one year old daughters who opted to take me along for a mother-daughter outing.

Along with an audience of all ages, including young children, we attended the first half of the show.

We'd been warned. But the warning was not stern. 'Coarse' is one thing. The fellow was coarse, yes, but he was also profane, and obscene. Terribly. I can put up with a certain amount of smut - the world has always been full of it - but this was a River of Sludge that swept me away. My reaction began with a little discomfort, quickly slipped to disgust, then sunk to complete offense. Truly good, clever bits sadly drowned in the sewage making it difficult to enjoy anything. Finally, feeling overwhelmed, the three of us exited the show halfway through wondering why and how so many people could stay, could laugh, could find pleasure in the artist's juvenile attempts at humor.

Weirdly, the laughter of those surrounding us sounded like animal noises. Brays, snorts, and hyena-giggles. One woman loudly proclaimed, "Oh my God! My cheeks hurt from laughing so much!" Really?

"I kept hoping he'd clean it back up, pull out of his nosedive. He just never did, but dove in further," said one daughter. The other two of us agreed.

Disturbing.

It's been said that a culture can be measured by its art. It's also been said that a culture is passed to succeeding generations through art.

Worrisome.

Adults have a responsibility to children and young adults, to teach and model, to uplift, encourage, inspire, motivate, and to pass to them a society that is basically good and worth continuing. A sacred responsibility to bestow wisdom, beauty, and compassion - to hold before us a shining idea of excellence - compels us to live lives worthy of our calling, worthy of our freedom.

Last night I encountered a huge sports stadium filled with crudeness rather than refinement, mental sludge rather than nourishment, discouragement rather than refreshment. The audience's natural reaction of enthusiasm rather than revulsion for the ugliness alarms me most.

If this form of art is an acceptable cultural standard today, then we as a society are in trouble.