STORYTIME TAPESTRY

The Newsletter devoted to spreading love and cultural awareness throughout the world

July 24, 2005 

Today we welcome a wonderful new song writer, Mark Hughes to our fold of writers extraordinaire. Mark is writer #225.  I love his song, he is very talented. He has a cd out.  I know

many of you would like to purchase it.

Happy Birthday Norah Matheka, may your day be as special as you are.

Happy Anniversary to a very special Storytime Tapestry couple, Bob and Ronni Shaw.  This couple has had their share of health issues this year and through it all they have kept their spirits high.  Bob continues to write and Ronni continues to support.  We love you both Bob and Ronni, you are an inspiration to us all.

Now on to the good stuff..........

Today's Queue Stories
~**~**~**~

Listen to Your Heart

B.J. Cassady  

   My first marriage ended bitterly, custody battles, etc.  One day my

sons were in my life, the next they were gone.  Not only gone, but all

letters were sent back.  I do not lay blame anywhere.  There are times

When emotions become strong and people do things they normally

would not do. 

    Ten years passed.  No contact.  This was the most pain I went

through in my life.  I used to take off from work to enroll my sons in

school.  I worked part-time at the school to be closer to them.  I was

their baseball coach(on two separate teams), their cub scout pack

master.  I got down on the floor with my kids and played with them.

To lose this??¦ is beyond words.

     One day I was home alone while my wife was visiting her kids.  I

went into the bedroom to get the laundry.  While in the bedroom, I

heard a voice in my head that said, ???Pray.???  I ignored the voice and

did the load of laundry.  Later, I came back into the bedroom for a

second load and this time the voice came, ???PRAY!???  A command, not 

a request.  I got down on my knees to pray, for what I did not know,

but  I prayed.  I prayed for my family, for my friends for His will to be

done.  After saying amen, I stood up and the phone rang.  I answered

the phone, ???Hello???

    ???This is Chris??? replied the voice, ???your son, Dad???

    My son who I haven??™t seen for ten years phoned me.  Because I was

calm from the prayer I was able to make contact and arrangements to

meet.  After we met, he essentially moved in to my house and we had

a wonderful life together.  He never forgot the good times.  Now he is

in Florida after making some bad choices in his life, but I know he

and I are okay.

B.J. Cassady

BJ.Cassady @ af-group.com

B.J. Cassady is a Stephen Minister at

Edmond Trinity Church and ISD professional

in Guthrie, Oklahoma.  A disabled Vietnam

era USAF vet,  BJ enjoys giving back to

the world with his writings and is putting

together a CD audio collection of his best

writings.  For further information please

write: bj.enterprises @juno.com

Also look for his story 'Medals' in

"More Patriot Hearts" by Lt Col William

Coffey and "The Quilt".

~**~**~ 

ValueSpeak

A Weekly Column

By Joseph Walker

valuespeak@msn.com

A MATTER OF OPINION

            Opinionated?

            Me?

            Opinionated?

            Never mind that I??™ve spent the biggest part of the past 15 years using this forum to share with readers my unsolicited opinions on everything from aging to Zen (which I don??™t really understand, but that hasn??™t prevented me from having a thought or two on the subject).  I like to think of myself as open-minded, understanding and tolerant of all points of view.   The last thing any reasonable person would call me is ???opinionated??? (well, no ??“ the last thing any reasonable person would call me is ???handy,??? because I??™m sort of a klutz when it comes to handling tools and stuff . . . but I digress).

            But there it was in my daughter Beth??™s high school essay, which she asked me to edit for her last night: ???My parents are very . . . you know . . opinionated.???

Opinionated?  Me?

Now, I can understand Beth referring to her mother as opinionated.  Anita comes from a long line of opinionated people.  She can trace her opinion-alogy back to the guy who reminded Queen Isabella of Spain that the world was, after all, flat and so it probably wasn??™t a good idea to fund this Columbus fellow.  So it??™s in her blood.  She can??™t help it.

            And in Anita it is an endearing thing.  You always know where you stand with her.  She has a clear view of right and wrong, and she is absolutely fearless in standing up for what she believes to be right.  It is one of the things that first attracted me to her, probably because I am so NOT that way.

            In other words, I??™m NOT opinionated.

            Sure, my mother was sort of . . . well, you know . . . opinionated, as was her father before her.  That line up there ??“ ???you always know where you stand with her??? ??“ I stole it from my Mom??™s funeral.  And, come to think of it, my Grandpa Arrowsmith??™s.  But while my sisters sort of tend toward the Arrowsmith way of thinking (years ago Kathy actually had the nerve to think that the Beatles were better than the Beach Boys, and we argued about it for HOURS), my brothers and I are purely Walkers.  We are gentle, approachable, even-tempered and open.

            Well, OK.  Dick and Bob are that way.  Bud was more like Mom.  A salesman who was in his car a lot during the day, he liked to listen to talk radio, and when someone would say something with which he disagreed he would call me and we would go off on the subject ??“ and the poor, misguided, misinformed caller ??“ until we both got it out of our respective systems.

But we did it patiently.  Kindly.  Tolerantly.  Open-mindedly.

            OK, who am I kidding?  Maybe I AM opinionated ??“ a little.  I??™m only opinionated about the things I am absolutely, positively, 100 percent sure of.  Everything else . . . well, who really cares about auto racing, anyway?

            But did Beth have to put that in her essay?  While it??™s true that when you read the entire context of the paper, her reference to her ???opinionated??? parents is pretty positive, it was still sort of eye-opening to read that she perceives us that way.  And it??™s a little disconcerting to know that her perception is now out there for all her English class to see.  In a way it??™s sort of like . . . oh, I don??™t know . . . a newspaper columnist who writes about his family and shares their experiences, thoughts and feelings with the world.

            Yeah, I know ??“ the shoe is finally on the other foot.

            And I don??™t like the fit.

~**~**~ 

ADVICE THAT RINGS TRUE

Steve Goodier

An efficiency expert once concluded his lecture with the comment,
"Please don't try these techniques at home."

"Why not?" he was asked.

"I used to watch my wife prepare breakfast and wondered why she made
so many trips to the table carrying only one item at a time," he
replied. "One day I asked her, 'Wouldn't it be quicker and more
efficient if you organized yourself to carry several things to the
table at once?'"

"Did it work?" he was asked.

"Oh, yes, it worked," the expert replied. "It used to take my wife
twenty minutes to prepare breakfast. Now I do it in seven."

Not all advice is readily received. And sometimes it is not heard the
way it was intended. But neither should all advice be followed;
rather, wisdom learns to separate kernels of truth from weeds.

Some advice worthy of consideration, though, comes from one of the
richest people in the United States, offered to 380 high school
students in Omaha, Nebraska. Here are five suggestions
multi-billionaire Warren Buffett gave his audience:

1. Avoid credit cards. If you are going to make progress, you will not
do it by borrowing at 18 to 20 percent interest.

2. Develop integrity, which guides intelligence and energy. Buffett
said he looks for these three qualities in hiring people. "If they
don't have the first one, integrity, the other two will kill you."

3. Establish good habits, picking people to admire and following their
example, while learning to weed out attributes that are not admirable.
"If you do that," he admonished, "two or three years from now you'll
find out the person you admire most will be yourself."

4. Learn about companies before investing in them; do not rely on
someone else's advice.

5. Choose professions for love of the work, not money.

My "Internet" friend, Alan Hillman, who sent this list, adds an
excellent comment:  "I believe the same advice is true for all of us,
even someone like me who is about to enter my sixth decade of life.
Seven years ago I decided to do what I loved most - loving people.
Since that time my cup has slowly been filled and is now flowing over
the brim with love. Simultaneously, while seeking humility and
significance, I lost pride and prominence. In the meantime, I became
debt-free and have a high six-figure net worth.

"During those seven years I have had several mottoes. Probably the
most significant one is: If you are not loving life, you are not
living love."

Some advice just rings true. The wise will follow.

__________

Steve Goodier's books & newsletter: http://LifeSupportSystem.com

~**~**~ 

Poetry Section

~**~**~

Northern lights
Shankar Hemmady

how long can I expound
on the rationale
behind my dream?

how much can I sketch
the vivid dreams
amidst my reality?

one day the dreams
will give way to
rational streams

and myths will
emerge out of
unseen reality

out of pitch darkness
then shall we see
aurora borealis!

Shankar Hemmady
Shankar@Hemmady.com
_____

Shankar Hemmady's bio:

Shankar Hemmady is founder & CEO of SereneFlow, a social venture based in the
San Francisco Bay Area, focused on Integrative Healthcare & Wellness. Prior to
SereneFlow, Mr. Hemmady was CAD Ambassador at Sun Microsystems.  Before
Sun, Shankar founded PharmQuest, a Pharmaceutical regulatory automation
company, and Guru Technologies, an electronic design services company.

Shankar's interests include entrepreneurship,  education,  hiking,
camping,  dance,  poetry,  music,  traditional therapies,
spirituality and meditation. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area
with his wife, Seema, and his two children, Shona and Anand.
~**~**~

Looking at the Taj Mahal from Agra Fort
Ashish Gorde

no one heard the wailing of metal over marble
that afternoon, the masonry of agony
was too persuasive in its percussion
for ears to intrude and decipher its pain.

the worn-out workers, too, seemed unaware
of the plaintive cries the palpitating walls made
as their hands toiled and hammered
at this ashen-faced monument

to imperial anguish.

slow patricide was how the story unfolded
eventually, and the river became a witness
to the slaughtering that took place,
while shaking the earth from his axis

the chasm like river had its own version
of what happened, and the crying calligraphies
on the walls simply digressed into poetry
to explain this mournful mausoleum??™s demise

into an imperial anecdote.

(C) 2005 Ashish B. Gorde


Note: In his declining years, the Mughal Emperor Shahjehan who built the Taj Mahal in memory of his wife Mumtaz Mahal, was imprisoned in the Agra Fort by his son Aurangzeb. A river separates the Taj Mahal from the Fort, and the deposed Emperor would spend his time watching the construction of the Taj from the place where he was imprisoned. Aurangzeb killed all the other claimants to the throne, which included his brothers among others. Although history is rather cruel on Aurangzeb, nevertheless, I feel, one should commend him for not completely suspending the construction of the Taj when he assumed power. As an emperor, he would have been able to do that but he didnt. However, he did manage to imitate the Taj when he constructed a similar monument in memory of his wife. "Bibi ka Maqbara" in Daulatabad, Central India, pales in comparison to the real McCoy.

 My email, however, is ashbg@rocketmail.com

As far as bio is concerned, let me try. I was born on 19th November 1965 in an obscure town in south central India called Miraj. But when I was four years old, I went with my family to Bahrain, an island in the Arabian Gulf (or what most people call as Persian Gulf). I grew up and interacted with people of different nationalities and ethnic backgrounds in Bahrain and that has been one of the main reasons why i feel and consider myself cosmopolitan. I went to India for my higher studies and eventually got myself an MA in English Literature but university life was also the time when I indulged in a lot of writing and, in particular, theatre. After my studies, I came back to Bahrain (and went to Bangalore, too, in between) and worked as a copywriter for many years. Presently, I am the Editor of the University of Bahrian's official magazine and I, also, teach English on a part-time basis.

~**~**~

The Angel Song

Mark Hughes

There are Angels watching over me and you

Guiding us home seeing us through

Anytime, any day, anywhere, anyway

There are angels, there are angels

There are angels watching over you

There are angels watching you.

If the world was ok would we be here today

And would we need to pray the way we do.

In our lives there are times when the reasons and the rhymes

Are not clear in our minds - you know it??™s true.

Where do we turn to? How do we learn?

Where is the voice that guides and leads us on?

Chorus (There are Angels..........)

Don??™t you know that each day is exactly the way

We have planned that it should be.

You may consider it strange but if you want it to change, it can all be arranged so easily.

Where do we turn to?

How do we learn?

Where is the voice that guides and leads us on?

Chorus

Up in the sky above, down on the ground,

The love you have for us, the love you give to us, the love you hold for us - is all around.

Chorus

hughes_mark@btconnect.com

Mark Hughes can best be described as a spiritual singer/songwriter. Over the past few years he has perfomed at many spiritual festivals and centres in the UK and also in America. In 2001 he composed and recorded The Angel Song in response to a competition to find a song for World Angel Day. The song won against over 100 entries. It has subsequently been played on radio worldwide and re-recorded with The London Community Gospel Choir. He has performed his music alongside such spiritual lumniaries as Doreen Virtue, James Twyman, Gary Quinn and Diana Cooper. In 2004 the title track from his album 'It Whispers Love' was chosen to be included on a compilation peace album being released this year by the American organisation Musicians and Fine Artists for World Peace. This will be used to raise funds for peace organisations worldwide.

More information about Mark and his music can be found at www.markhughesmusic,com  CD's can also be purchased through the site. Mark can be contacted at mark.hughes@dial.pipex.com

~**~**~

Writers Feedback

Jodi Flesberg Lilly ??“ ON Turning 50 - I am so happy that I have lots of family and friends.  I look forward to
seeing my family at every reunion. 
I moved away from my home state in 1979.  This was not by wanting to but
by career choices. 
I am close to my family by emails, phone calls, reunions, funerals,
births, and by staying in touch by cards and when they need me.  I pray
for them daily. 
I could not live without my family which consists of around 100 members.
These are siblings, in laws, nieces, nephews, great (or grand) nieces
and nephews and great great nieces and nephews plus my three adult
children and 6 wonderful grand kids. Not every family has our special
closeness.  I wish they did.
Everyone makes a choice in their life.  I did not choose how many family
members  I have, however I have chosen to be excited and happy to be
with them.

After reading B.J. Cassaday's abuse story awhile ago, my
blood pressure went up.
Just think, law west of the Sabine River, violate the
court order, BANG, you're dead. NBD. Too simple.
Thanks
Mark Crider

Thanks Carol,

My few words here are not being sent with an intent to have them published unless you personally wanted to use them which would be okay with me.  I am simply writing because I loved your article.

This story is worth far more than a pot of gold.  You have in an eloquent manner taught an invaluable lesson.  Just as you expressed I too learned the same lesson from personel experience.  

I continually tell others that they are not any more qualified to judge a persons opinion simply due to their facial expressions.  That is one of my pet peves when it comes to shows that depict the police as they judge people due to their body language and facial expressions and ot polygraft test.  

I know from personel experience that I have body pain that comes and goes.  The pain often changes my facial expression.  My body may at times jerk which can also trigger a false signal.  I do not have an instant recall of all of my actions and activities and at times I get times, occasions and activities confused as to occasion or origin.  

A few years ago I was stopped in a distant county simply because of the color of my van.  At that time there was a thief that drove a van that looked like mine.  He had been breaking into houses and the sheriff had issued an alert to watch for him.  My age and white hair worked in that case.  What would have happened if my son had been driving instead of me. 

I have met many people that have had change of hearts and learned to have happy expressions simply by giving them due compliments and words of encouragement.  One lady in particular that was on the verge of divorce changed so much that now she delights in teaching a class and sings beautifully.  She is now is the choir and just told me that she was practicing one of my all time favorite songs, "Living By Faith"

Thanks Again, Bob

Carol, There was recently a story you printed and the author stated that he had never seen a smiling face that was not beautiful.  Your story today is an extension of that for smiles do warm and heal.  Huge power, We forget sometimes for life is too busy with the serious stuff.            Louise

 I must have missed something. I haven't received anything
with Ron Gold in it. I even went back through the past weeks
issues, no luck.
Am I getting more DUH! than ever, :-)

Prayer Requests and Updates

Here is a note from my Cousin, Cindy, please continue to keep them in prayer as they begin another long week of cancer treatment.  Love, Barbara

Well, here's the latest update on Sean. Some of you already know that Sean has lost his hair. Last Friday his hair started falling out. But, the sweet child that he is, after pulling out his tail, he used it as a mustache. His spirits and energy remain high. He doesn't have to take the Neupogen shots this week (his numbers, i.e. ANC and white count) were better than good. He was allowed to go swimming (not allowed when the numbers are down) in his Aunt's pool. Some days his appetite is down, but I think that happens normally. He starts his next chemo round on Monday - please pray for both of us - we'll be down there Mon, Tues, Wed. Monday is the longest day.

Margaret's chemo is on hold until the doctor determines whether her kidneys are functioning well enough. She holding up as well as can be expected -- hang in there Margaret!! Please continue to pray for her and her family also.

With Love always,

Cindy

Dear Prayer Warriors

Please pray for this sweet little baby Lainey and her parents.  Lainey is sick and only 6 months old, doc don't know what's wrong.  Father please guide the hands of the doctors and care givers, guide them to a diagnosis and always with kindness and compassion for Lainey.  Please give strength to her parents as they go through this ordeal.  In Jesus' Precious Name, Amen and Amen...  thank you for your love and prayers!

Love,

Barbara

Dear Prayer warriors:

Please pray for Linda, she has been struggling for some time now...  guide her doctors and care givers hands to diagnose and treat her, always with compassion and love and return her to full health.  I pray these things in Jesus Name, Amen and Amen

Thanks for your love and prayers!...  love, Barbara

SENIOR WRITERS

Agee, Vance;  Apted, Violet;  Baker, Kathy;  Batt, Al;  Berry, Nell;

Boda, Ginger;  Bryant, Sharon;  Buhagiar, Victor; Cassady, B.J.;  Crider, Mark; 

Deming, Barb; Goodier, Steve;  Harris, Kathy Anne; Hunt, Sharlette; 

Jacobson, Gary;  Kiser, Roger Dean; Kerens, Claudia; Jenkins, Pamela;

Liles, Norma;  Mazzella, Joe; Ojeigbe, Georgewaters;

  Petry, Dianna Doles; Roberts, Susan;  Shaw, Bob; Sims, Richard; Swarner, Ken; Vaknin, Sam;

Walker, Bill;  Walker, Joe; Warner, Gorden K;

Whirity, Kathy;  White, Robert;

STORYTIME TAPESTRY STAFF

Publisher: Carol Roach-founder

Moderator: Thelma Hartselle-co founder

Moderator: Clara Westerfer

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