Welcome, May!

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The past few weeks have been stressful. Training new employees, dealing with difficult customers, not sleeping well, not exercising (I’ve gained 20 pounds in the last two years), getting through family drama (two life-threatening events in the same day, 2000 miles apart: my dad’s heart attack in NM and a 9 year grandchild starting the rest of his life with Type 1 Diabetes) . . .  My CrossFit lifestyle withered into oblivion when I lost my job at the University in 2020, as Covid got going. Deep depression brought me to a standstill as I took a few months to try to reset. Since then, my physical status has been on steady decline. Now my daily schedule looks something like this: Work 3-11 pm (on a good day), Go to bed at 4 am, get up between 10:30 am and noon, get booted up and go back to work. If I get one day off a week I’m fortunate. At least I don’t have to work all night for now. That was the worst.  So I haven’t had time or energy to do much, even read, much less write. And since my

No Worries

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A recent e-mail sits in my "In-box" tagged with a gold star. The message is so incredibly profound, so complicatedly simple that I can't archive it. Not yet. I need it under my fingernails. The e-mail tells the story of John "Max" Staniforth who in 1916 wrote a letter home describing how he and fellow World War I soldiers of the 16th Irish Division dealt with the reality of their war-time situation on the Western Front. Staniforth wrote:

“If you are a soldier, you are either:

(1) at home or (2) at the Front.

If (1), you needn’t worry.

If (2), you are either (1) out of the danger zone or (2) in it.

If (1), you needn’t worry.

If (2), you are either (1) not hit, or (2) hit.

If (1), you needn’t worry.

If (2) you [your wounds] are either (1) trivial or (2) dangerous.

If (1), you needn’t worry.

If (2), you either (1) live or (2) die.

If you live, you needn’t worry: and – If you die, YOU CAN’T WORRY!!

So why worry?"

The choice for whatever we face is this: either we don't need to worry or the situation is so serious that worry is pointless.


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