To Honor and Obey....our Parents

My dear friends,

Upon reading posts from others, we seem to be in the generation that has aging parents. Some with illnesses, some who are dying and some who have rested in peace. I too can receive a phone call at any given time with my mother. I just wanted to reach out and say, our parents generation that brought us into this world and taught us all that we know is the last of their kind. A gener...ation that has seen and done more for us and America than we can ever imagine. I can't imagine their fear of their children not reaping what they had sowed into America as they knew it could give us. Freedoms. My only thoughts are of our own children today. I struggle to think now too, that they will never have the story book childhood as we had. The simple life. The chores, eating at the dinner table, playing jump rope, earning and learning what we put into, a college degree that puts them in a prospective work place, buying their first home, getting married and doing the cycle all over again with their children. What I do know, is what I can do in my own world. And that is to honor my parents by teaching my children the same values, dreams, aspirations and determination to will them into a world that may or may not heed to the same values. For we don't know or never have been in a situation where the kind of survival deals with the survival from our own government and or country. The freedoms that are being suppressed or will be taken. Laws that should still apply but are outdated simply because we can't see eye to eye. But that's what's ironic. If we were raised on the same moral principles of our great parents generation, then where did we go wrong? Is it really because we lack the spiritual need of having God in our hearts? In all that we do and utter from our mouths? Some people are sick of hearing about religion or lack there of, as the cause of our situation. But it's not religion. It's what's in our hearts. That is the beat of our country. What we immitate in our hearts to be can only come from one source. LOVE. And who is love, kindness, generous, honest, humble, truth, respectful, teacher and most of all takes you unconditionally? Just like our parents on where they got their inspiration from. GOD. Following our parents teaching is following their values from HIM. So where did we go wrong? The answer is right in our faces. I will continue with my ways of my parents. Will you honor them too? ~ Maria

Don't throw it away!

Remember when I said not to throw anything you have written away until that one day you may want to use it? I wrote this in 1980 and took the picture in 2012 and put it together. Now it's ready to be shared!

Blessings or Answered Prayers?

        I ran into a gentleman at church that I hadn't seen in 12 years. Upon recollecting everything about this man, brought tears to my eyes for the second time. Because I never really got to thank him fully. His name is Don. When I first moved to Boise I was without a lot of things trying to get by as a single mother. We met in church, then gained him as a customer at the hair salon. On our last encounter during our first Christmas in Boise, he had asked if I had gone Christmas shopping for the kids yet. I said not yet, I may have to do it at the last minute to see how much money I can save up if all goes well. With a smile, I shrugged and prayed inside my head that I hope to God I can give my kids a good Christmas. After more idle chit chat, I finished his haircut and he paid.
        He came back within 3 minutes and I was hoping I hadn't done anything wrong with his haircut, so I approached him at the front desk. It was then he took out his check book and wrote out a $200 check in my name and handed it to me. He said, "don't thank me, it wasn't my idea, Merry Christmas..." I was dumbfounded and started to cry and then he was gone..... I never saw him again until recently. It was my first of many blessings or shall I say an answered prayer? I hugged Don and looked at him and made sure he heard my thanks. Until this day, it was something I had never ever forgotten as well as the smiles on Christmas Eve when the kids opened their presents. 
          To be honest, God had heard my prayer and at that moment and so whispered in Don's ear that made him come back and hand me Christmas money. I know that's what happened and I'm sticking to it. God does answer prayers, you just never know how, when or from whom it will be delivered. He is amazing!

To love or be loved, that is the question....

All I ever wanted was to be loved...
But I found out that I really didn't know what it felt like to be loved or how love felt like. I knew how to love, that was easy. I'm a giver. Always have been, always will be. And when I love, I love deeply, unconditionally, loyally and without regard to the sacrifices I may incur while doing what I needed to do to make them happy. So at some point of my maturing age, I finally realized I too would like to have the same for myself. Why not? It seemed to be a logical way of thinking. It would be nice to be treated the same way I treated them! So yes, after a few failed relationships, I wanted to finally be loved.

Then it happened....
Someone loved me for who I was, how I was and would do anything for me as much as I would when I was in love. My first reaction? I ran. I didn't reciprocate and I was beside myself. I didn't know what was going on, what I was doing. Then I stopped. Had to think. I had to be absolutely sure. I had to be sure that those three words were not being tossed around blatantly. I swore I would never utter those words again unless I truly knew that the man would say it first and meant it and that I did too. After awhile, I knew that my prayers were answered but not in the way that I thought. God had given me another giver. And I had to learn to be on the receiving end. To receive graciously and to accept the kind gestures as genuine and not something misleading. Yet still, I ran when I heard those words. I was afraid of living up to his expectations of me and failing him at the end. That I would soon bore him and he would leave. I had a lot to learn about being "loved." But at this point I would never know what love was if I didn't give him the chance to show me. At the same time, I owed it to myself to finally know what love was all about, it's what I had set out to do. To Be loved.

Until this day when he says I love you, I say "I love you more, for loving me."
Since then, the question has become the answer.
I had learned to love and be loved at the same time.

LOVE, so complex, so real, so good, you gotta have it. When you get it, hang on to it.

Not a hand out, a help up. My Welfare story

Not every welfare recipient is created equally. Nor do we all have the same agenda. I can only speak for myself and what I have contributed to the "stereotype" of welfare moguls across America. At the risk of incriminating myself by letting the cat out the back, I can only say by experience, that yes, drug testing would be in Americas best interest when receiving food stamps or any other help from the government. Other than the uniqueness of illness, physical, mental or otherwise debilitating conditions and single mothers/fathers, that would render the need for assistance, the other half of recipients are addicts of one form or another, then the answer to drug testing is a big fat YES!
Let's just say, food stamps are as good as cash when it comes to drug addicts and dealers. It may not be the same exchange rate but it's still valuable nonetheless.

I had my use for assistance when I needed it the most and without it, I would have literally been lost. I used my resources available to women with children to the highest degree. I am not ashamed of it, for I did work and reported my income as was required. For day care, food stamps, section 8 and medicaid for my kids and myself when I gave birth to my kids. Having an absent father for my kids was at best, the only thing I could do to survive was to be on welfare. Lucky for me, I was raised with higher expectations for myself and finding myself on welfare wasn't the end result to my lifestyle. I vowed I would only use welfare for as long as I needed it. When I started a new life in 2000, I set a goal of five years to get my life in order and off welfare completely. At the epitome of my welfare years, I had acquired all the resources of a recipient to not give myself a hand out, but a help up to where I needed to be. Self sufficient and reliant on my own abilities as a functioning working class citizen.

I worked full time as a hairstylist and at the same time put myself through Massage school. I knew having another trade under my belt would help bring more income to my household. At the age of 37, I relentlessly gave it my all. Being a single parent was hard but again, without the use of my resources I would not have made it and for that I am grateful. I had a beautiful three bedroom house which I paid partial rent for because of section 8, food stamps to fill the tummies of my kids along with their classmates that every now and again came and raided the refrigerator before I got home from work. It was all good. No child should be without food and I was happy to feed what I had for as many mouths it could fill. 

Tho' I had a job, it was treated as only a means to pay off all my debt incurred from my marriage  that ten years had built up. From evictions, to medical bills, credit cards and just bad debt.  I was being garnished big time. My ex husband was not employed and the bills were mostly in my name anyways, so they never caught up to him. A mistake soon recognized and I wont do that again. Needless to say, after it was all said and done, I was happy to be debt free. When I was finished with school and working for myself as a (CMT) massage therapist and hairstylist, I found myself to be in a position where I can now fend for myself. I wrote a letter to the Health and Welfare to thank them for all the years they helped me. I was now on the other side of the fence and in the bracket of making enough money not to qualify for assistance. Therefore, I took myself off of Welfare and proudly, I might add, on the 5th year of the goal I had set for myself to be completely off assistance. 

The need for Welfare in this country is not by any means a hand out, but by all rights, should be to help people get their feet on the ground. Respectively, people should be on it long enough to do so, not to live off it for the rest of their lives. Consequently, regulating it, is another story. Welfare Reform? I'd write one up if someone would actually read it...then again, timing is everything, maybe someday I will.

My Co-Pilot

Twelve years ago, year 2000, I left Seattle to embark on a new life in Boise for myself and my three kids. It was a big step, but I was driven purely by faith that what God had told me to do was what was my destiny. It was my time and more so, on His time for it was He who came to me and said that I must change my ways and to follow Him to greatness and move hearts in His name. Fast forward twelve years, He was right, but with no doubts on my part. He has been with me everyday since and He has blessed my every move, every desire, every passion that my heart yearned for. I cannot, in one post tell you what He has blessed me all with. It would take a book, which I am in the process of writing my sequel to my first book, "LIFE DERAILED". You see, I was a drug addict for fifteen years, strung out on crack cocaine on the streets of Seattle, turned Drug dealer as a single mother of three. And now, now I am a business owner of a Men's Hair Salon and a Coffee shop in Boise and was one of the recipients of an award from the Idaho Business Review for "Women of the Year." I could not have been all that I am today, tho' the potential I knew also resided in me, I just needed the help that my Lord opened my eyes to. By obeying HIM, I found my life had turned a three hundred sixty degree. Timing is everything and timing is all on His watch, not mine, for HE too, has written my book, all I have to do is faithfully turn the page, one day at a time. I know now that life without Him in my life would result to a life unfulfilled. When the time is right, and it will be, I will complete my next book to share with everyone what you too can accomplish by having Him as your co-pilot in Life, Love and Happiness. 

  

MNF~ Thank goodness it wasn't the Superbowl!

Last night's Monday Night Football was the epitome of "bad timing" and awarded "The Worst Officiated Game" in the history of Football! The confusion at first was whether or not the Refs were actually favoring one team over the other, but in actuality, they were just stupid! Neither Packers or the Seahawks, deserved to win or lose! It was a joke and there is no taking it back. The redemption of the loss of Seahawks Superbowl game against the Steelers has long been buried, yet we have talked about it all these years. It has now been replaced by this game that will haunt us forever! What have they done to the NFL! I am wondering how the Refs on strike are actually benefiting from this? Was this planned? Was this their hope for a speedy resolution? I will say it will be sooner than later when they all come to an agreement. Perhaps, by next MNF?