The Choice -24

The Choice by Tim Lawrence

You know my Friend there’s prudence in an optimistic view
for dark imagined peril, has no place in life renewed

A soul aligned with fear has made a devastating pact
The role of anguished victim is an all consuming act

A heavy heart diminishes the beauty of the morn
A hopeless mind obscured by doubt is rakish weak and torn

Forgiveness is a sword that cleaves the darkness into day
And Faith a shield of Providence which holds despair at bay

The countenance of joy, tarries not in guilt and blame
The conscientiously happy suffers not the weight of shame

The pitfalls and the pratfalls are but pylons on our road
The weights and woes we face will make us stronger by the load

We are Warriors of our destiny and Guardians of our fate
To heal and bind anew is not an insubstantial trait

To draw upon the limitlessness of love within our hearts
Is to truly share the gift that each new blessed day imparts

For each sunrise holds a promise, each horizon’s new light, gold
The choice of dreams’ fulfillment... of ecstasy untold

Life’s greatest gift is Life itself, and the Power it entails
Our outlook is our choosing, and our option to prevail

This world is ever changing, its’ pace a mad turnstile
Yet time and space are no match for a shared and tender smile

So seize the dawning sunlight with every fiber of your soul
Make today your “day of days”, and a loving heart your goal

Make each day your marionette, and give to them your voice
Take a pass on pessimism and let rapture be your choice

When the curtain falls on your journey, be fulfilled with lessons learned
Choose a life of Peace and Glory; no regret, no stone unturned

If there’s a place for me in Heaven, I shall humbly share my worth
In the meantime I’ll be busy, having a Heavenly day on earth !


*With thanks to God, for TODAY, and the POWER to make it one of my choosing!
Love tImMy:/

Laugh as much as you breathe
and love as long as you live ( enthusiastically)

Duty Calls - 23

Morning Friend,

It is perhaps best that you cannot see the grim set of my steely and "opaline-eyed" ( ala Dirk Pitt) features in front of the computer monitor this morning.

The source of my consternation is a telegram which arrived yesterday from the International Botanical Society of which I am a certified card and T-shirt holder, and "consultant at large".

I've been interested in plants and plant life since I was a fair-haired lad eating dirty carrots out of the garden of my childhood home.

That interest - like tape worms and other associated parasites, found FERTILE GROUND in young Abraham Stainer; a Prairie whelp of unbridled ecological enthusiasm, and rich agricultural ancestry.

A diligently earned Cub Scout merit badge in "houseplant care" didn't exactly shake the Geoponic world at large, but to me it was the first tendril in what has now become a fully rooted and life-long commitment to our World and its' plant life.

( If I REALLY wanted to push the envelope of believability I could say the decades I spent in a drunken "potted plant-like" stupor were for "research sake", but you could easily replicate and condense that experiment by feeding your dieffenbachia beer for a few weeks and see how IT "thrives"? )

That history aside, my membership in the I.B.S. means more than just the key chain, nifty badge and t-shirt I received in the mail.

It means more than the countless hours spent in agricultural chat-rooms comparing notes on nitrogen levels, plant husbandry and soil maintenance.

It means more than earnestly researching and monitoring the growth of my tomato plants for countless hours under the hot summer sun with little more than a paperback novel and a spray bottle for mental and dermatological respite.

It means being ON CALL for any botanical emergency requiring my inimitable wealth of skill and knowledge ; my horticultural "heap", if you will...the WORLD over !

Therein lies the reason for the aforementioned telegram; it is one of THOSE emergent calls....and it's not pretty.

Nor is it a "pretty" thing to be called away from my beloved homeland to some horrid nadir of this, the freshest, loveliest and most invigorating of seasons.....blessed Winter!

Yes my friend, a cry for help has sprung up like a miasma of fear from the Caribbean Agricultural Coalition of an emerging and potentially catastrophic fungus affecting their sugar industry and economic life-blood.

It's sounds initially like none other than the dreaded CANE BLIGHT, and the I.B.S. ( with authorization from Passports Canada), have decided to send their BEST "field" man.....yours truly !

I have a mere nine sleeps....I mean DAYS... to slough off these extravagant trappings and comforting layers of Winter euphoria before heading off to the estimated source of the scourge; the wretched and untamed isle of Barbados, some 3305 long miles to the south-southeast!

A cursory glance at an atlas tells me this little coral "rock" some 900 miles from the equator must me breeze-blown, snow-free and sun INFESTED!

I must, if I can, in the coming short days before my reluctant but resigned departure, SOAK UP as much of Winter's ambrosiatic essence as possible because the hellacious environs which await are likely to be almost inhumanely "tropical" in nature?

Hopefully I can manage some rest in the fearful days ahead because my work there will surely involve long and intense days along the shoreline where my instincts tell me the BLIGHT's cursed seed lies dormant in a menacing sand dune, or perhaps lurks unassumingly in some ominous chlorinated pool water somewhere?

But as the great Mexicali patriot Josita Perez bravely said to his followers on the eve of his trial for vagrancy, "Don't Cry For Me Montenegro!"....or something like that?.....

This is the life I've chosen, and I knew going in, that the life of a Botanist at Large would be equal parts hair-raising excitement, back breaking drudgery, heart-stopping thrills as well as perilous adventure and sacrifice....not for the feint of heart, questioning of sprit, or lacking of soul. ( "girly-men", home-bodies and Chia Petters need not apply !)

I know I'm trading the comforting stability of solid snow and ice for the treacherousness of foreboding beaches; a rosy cheeked glow for some ungodly hue of ecru, and sub-zero zestiness for equatorial ennui, but the sacrifice and hardship will fade like melting snow should I somehow solve this Caribbean cane conundrum.

I shall find my solace in the salvation of the sugar cane farmers; their joy and peace of mind in knowing that there will be another crop to harvest, and mine in knowing that there's always NEXT Winter to luxuriate in.

Love tImMy :/

( I B.S. you not )

Laugh as much as you breathe

and Love as long as you live. ( all inclusive)

Milestones - 22

Morning Friend,

Recently at the lush and catered "Gala" of my brother-in-law's 50th birthday, I overheard an elderly woman confide to another, how in her lifetime she'd not until lately seen so much preoccupation and "pomp" devoted to one's reaching of 50 years of age.....the "BIG FIVE-O" - to use the vernacular.

"In my day," the old girl said, "if you reached 90 or 100...THAT was something to make a big deal out of....most EVERYBODY makes it to FIFTY?"

I'm certain she was in no way mitigating the gaiety of the event, nor was she tempering her affection for my brother-in-law, - a FINER man of his VAST accomplishments, steely moral fiber and profound faith you will NOT find easily - but was instead commenting generally on our modern society's preoccupation with MILESTONES, particularly the "BIG-O" variety.

Now she raised a good point - unless of course she was simply a septuagenarian approaching the "BIG Eight-O" lobbying for a similar fete??? - she nevertheless got me thinking.

We DO make mountains out of these milestones as if each DECADE of life is a gargantuan struggle to be trumpeted triumphantly, vanquishing time is a commendable conquest, and birthdays not ending in zero are just "pit-stops" between the "BIG" ones.

Well, as usual my Monday Mind woke up with a contradictory spin on it today and I'd like to suggest that there are FAR more significantly commendable birthdays in life than the big "O" 's?

Anyone who's witnessed the perilous and precarious day to day life of a toddler has seen a truly adventurous, daunting and awe-inspiring "life on the edge"....crashes, gashes, falls, bumps and tumbles....mystifying discovery and horrifying fear..... near maimings, poisonings and head trauma.

To see first hand, a child emerge relatively UNSCATHED after a head over heels plunge down a flight of stairs is to fully understand the adage, "God looks after drunks and small children".

To witness the explosion of growth, the flowering of knowledge and the unfathomable wonder of a growing child in a world so fraught with danger, is like watching exquisite pottery being shaped on a mystical wheel by loving, Heavenly hands... in a hurricane !

To share, to guide and to protect a life so precious is to breathe for a time the air of omnipotence, to hear for a time the Siren song of boundless youth and to be for a time a surrogate Angel of God.

THESE, my friend, are the bold and brave conquerors of time and survivors of space whose birthdays should be HERALDED with all the pomp and circumstance, froth , finery, joy and salutations apropos on the "BIG 1" or the "BIG 2", "3", etc.

These truly "BIG" occasions are the call for "irreverent reverence" - balloons and streamers and cake and pop and games and music and "controlled" mayhem shared with cherished celebrities, special guests ( and even a clown or two?).

No offense to the "Big-0" crowd with their...

"Two-0...teen no more",

"Three-0...fun's over",

"Four-0...gettin' old",

"Five-0...crisis time",

"Six-0...pension time", or

"Seven-0...REALLY old"....

As far as I'm concerned, once you've run out of fingers to display your age then it's time to leave the REAL birthday partying to those who DESERVE and so enthusiastically appreciate it.

Many "Big-0" parties I've attended were more "excuses for drunkenness" than "tributes to longevity", ( EVERYONE was a "clown"! ) and having seen more than one impaired reveler take a tumble down some stairs and emerge "relatively" uninjured, I again witnessed the Good Lord's affinity for inebriates and infants.

I don't mean to take the "bloom off the rose" of anyone whose lives ARE marked by 10-year blocks of personal growth and development and are WORTHY of special recognition. ( My brother-in-law Marv is a Father, a Surgeon, a Marathoner and an accomplished musician for example!)

I just don't believe that simply "surviving" or "existing" for a number of years constitutes the need for a "celebration"?

I believe that a person is "as young as their dreams...and as old as their fears".

For me, June 20, 2005 is my "real" birthday because that is the day I said goodbye to fear forever and began to dream every night like a kid at my own BIG party, with balloons and streamers and EVERYTHING!!!!

And with the Good Lord's continued assistance, the love and support of my family, and the DAILY vigilance and required application of this new way of living, MY next "Big-0" might simply be conspicuous as the SUM of many fruitful, beautiful, and delightfully cherished days.

In the meantime....I'm 1302 today.

But I don't look a day over 40! HA!

"Happy Birthday to Me....."

Love tImMy:/

"Laugh as much as you breathe,

and Love as long as you live." ( your dream)

Turning Out Nice -21

Morning Friend,

I don't consider it display of braggadocio when I say I'm a "nice" person.

In the first place, a "nice" person wouldn't be bragging about it now would they?

Not that "boastful" people aren't "nice", they're just folks whose insecurities require a little supplemental self-promotion.

One should be slightly wary of those whose ONLY attribute is their "niceness"?

For example, "Well, I'm a drunk a cheat a liar and I beat up my wife, but DEEP DOWN....I'm a pretty nice guy!".

Moreover, one cannot automatically assume that a person who is "diligent, honest and temperate" is also, a "nice" person.

A well developed sense of propriety and social responsibility is a "nicety" shared by nice people and "Jerks" alike.

It's far easier to APPEAR to be nice, than to DO nice things for people.

TRULY nice people don't advertise it; either as a supplement to their achievements, or the "saving grace" of an otherwise misspent life.

NICENESS, I would venture to say, can be easily measured by what a person does WHEN NO ONE IS AROUND to see them.

Like a tree falling in a forest beyond the range of human hearing, the sound of niceness is like an atomic blast; the atoms converging in the caring soul, splitting in the humble heart and deafeningly rising to the heavens in a clamoring mushroom cloud of selfless compassion and God-given love.

Now this is one instance where I'm not going to apologize for going a little "adjectivally overboard" because there is a palpable, physiological, psychological and spiritual "RUSH" that accompanies simple acts of human kindness that you CANNOT find anywhere else on this earth. ( nor can you replicate it with drugs or purchase it online).

For me, it's all about a clear and healthy conscience and a strong relationship with God, but even if religion is not your "thing", you MUST have felt the glow after doing - what is not always the "easiest"- but what you know is the RIGHT thing....something "nice".

One of the benefits of religion being my "thing", is knowing that the trees falling in the forest of my life are making a heavenly "racket".

One needn't wonder about what I do when I'm "alone" because I never am.

But regardless of your religious persuasion my friend, unless you're a sociopath, I daresay the conscience of a "nice" person doesn't take days off, (which is why the note left on the window of your "just dinged" car in the parking lot could just as easily have been left by an Atheist as a Baptist ).

If the note says, "I'm writing this because someone is watching me. Have a nice day. HA HA! ", then you know you've been dinged by the aforementioned "jerk", who is probably DEEP DOWN "nice", but doesn't have insurance.

At any rate, I've surely not covered any profound territory today and while it's nice to be "nice", it's also important to recognize that I AM flawed as we all are and therefore not ALWAYS so.

Recognizing that, and the fact that the RIGHT choices are often the most difficult, makes life a daily and often fulfilling CHALLENGE.

I was blessed however, in my childhood to learn first-hand about REAL "challenges" and those lessons guide and inspire me to this day.

As part of her Nurses' Training, my Mother did a "rotation" at St. Amant Centre. ( a Hospital for handicapped and mentally retarded children)

I remember vividly the "aura" of the place when on occasion we visited her there and she took my brother and I on a "tour".

We played with a boy about the same age as us, the shared laughter and innocent joy of children belied by our diverse destinies and poignantly distinct challenges.

In a small, dimly lit and alien-smelling room I peered through the bars of a large "crib" where a baby with severe hydrocephalus ( his head larger than his body), lay sleeping and I was stricken with just about every emotion and contemplative thought a young boy can comprehend in a few brief moments.

How did this happen? ....What was he experiencing? ... Will he "get better"?...Does his family come to "visit"?...Is he in pain?....Does he "sense" I am here?

I dreamt of that dim room and the silent bonding between me and that "challenged" child for many months.

The enormity of the experience conveyed invaluable lessons in humility, humanity, mercy, compassion and love I will never forget: to realize how incredibly fortunate I am and to SHARE that fortune with others whether they even REALISE it or not.

I'm fairly certain I'm a "nicer" person for it. ( Thank You Mother! )

love tImMy :/

“Laugh as much as you breathe
and love as long as you live." ( unto the least of my brothers)