View from the hill

That's a VERY tiny take off on the Sermon on the Mount...I doubt I created much confusion.

Note to Lori: I agree completely with everything Jess had to say to you. Hopefully that point made it through my convoluted blog a while back.

Note to Jess: Thank you for listening all those years. Hopefully watching reinforced a little too. You are the most amazing legacy I could have hoped to create. It's fascinating to me that Lori and Tommy were raised in a 'church' environment and took away from that the same lessons Jess and Jas were given in a completely non-congregational setting. It's always seemed far more affirmative for me to try to live by the golden rule because it is the right thing and because I selected it as the 'right thing.' I didn't need a group of same thinking people around me for encouragement.

I sort of think that maybe what you guys took away from your parents may well have been a sense of human morality and the knowledge that you had the personal freedom to choose. I've always known, Lori, that your Mom and Dad had a need for and enjoyed being a part of the congregation, and too, what the "group" had to say. But they've NEVER been preachy with John and I. And I sure don't see your Mom as any sort of unopinionated shrinking violet. I get a sense from her that she values the ability to choose (at least in SOME things).

I know she wasn't too thrilled about cohabitating without the proper ID and I may have mentioned something to the effect that "you never really KNOW someone until you've lived with them first." So we obviously disagree on some things but I think we may have more similarities than even Elaine knows. Lori you make your own decisions and they're always based on kindness, morality, and total willingness to step up to the plate for the needs of others. Somehow you managed to leave a home steeped in organized religion with the most important and true tenets of "religion." And Jess, you totally GOT IT too, without the organization. Maybe we shouldn't ignore the very real fact that BOTH of you girls choose to be caregivers because it's your very nature to be that. None of your parents taught you those attributes. You guys came out of the chute already preformed with your own sense of morality.

Tabula rasa is a GREAT theory but you girls are the exceptions that prove the theory wrong. Teaching by words and example may be reinforcing, but for those born without a heart, there's nothing to reinforce. And walking your own path sure isn't always as much fun as filling a football field with a few of your closest friends all shouting the same slogans.

OK. That's the view from the hill. Not sure I'm getting a lot of support from above though. Just heard some thunder joining the downpour.

And I'm not ignoring the recipe exchange. I'm just a little technically challenged.

Love you guys, Ma