“Oh, what a beautiful mornin’
Oh, what a beautiful day
I got a beautiful feelin’
Every thing’s goin’ my way…”
Oscar Greeley Clendenning Hammerstein II
1895 – 1960 and
Richard Charles Rodgers
1902 – 1979
There are days when I feel everything is going my way. Like today for instance. First of all I perused the news, and found three articles that I found worth reading. I had to consult five different media news web pages to find them. But I did find them. Score!
A good morning is when I accomplish a task in the kitchen before I put the kettle on for coffee. This morning it was making Switchel for Attila’s lunches. Not complicated to do, and not quite done. There wasn’t enough filtered water to complete the task, so one of the jugs sits on the counter waiting for the water filter to finish filtering the needed water. Still, almost done, and an appreciated task soon completed. Score!
You can see where I am going with this. Little things make the world go round, although the news media would have us believe that the big terrible awful things in the world should dominate our thoughts and our psyches. Our day to day lives are of no interest to the news media, unless something occurs in our life that provides them with sensational melodrama. I find sensational melodrama quite boring. Give me a quiet morning, talking to Ginger The Cat, as I make a beverage for my partner’s lunches.
I like to imagine my friends in their daily lives: settling into a favourite chair with their cup of morning tea or coffee; taking their dog for a walk; wind in their hair; amusing their feline companion; preparing a delicious meal. Yep, these are the kinds of thoughts that I prefer. My attitude to all the misery in the world is that if the universe presents me with an opportunity to make it a better place for any living creature, or ecosystem, then I will take advantage of that opportunity. I know people are suffering every single moment of every single day on planet earth; if and when I can do something about it, then I will.
Sending money to people earning a living, by claiming to actively care about other people and ecosystems, hasn’t been improving the world for most people. Activist effectiveness is patchy at best, just as patchy as my intermittent forays into contributing to the public good. The difference is no one knows about my efforts except the beneficiaries, sometimes they don’t even know, and I don’t ask anyone for money to do what I do. I think there are a lot of people just like me, contributing only for the sake of what is right.
But I do not need to read about the big terrible awful things that are happening in the world right now, as I breath. It serves no purpose to feel bad, or sad, or frightened, or angry, or righteously indignant most of the time. For me the purpose of knowing what is going on, is to understand opportunities to help when the opportunity arises. If I am rested and feeling optimistic, I will be in optimum condition to step into effective action.
The most important activity I offer the world is listening… not to the news media, but to people, all kinds of people, who see things in all kinds of different ways. In addition to listening. I favour communication that seeks to explore and enrich understanding. I avoid communication that seeks to direct, mislead, project personal angst onto others, or interfere with healthy communication in any way. For some the digital world is a soapbox, I am not stopping to listen.
The amount of knowledge I need about the big terrible awful things in the world is pretty basic. Since the media is, in my opinion, 90% strategic embellishment, it offers me very little in the way of knowledge, my perception of it is emotional manipulation masking as information. Some information is there, but it is far from the whole picture, and is seldom presented without a spin to elicit inner panic/despair/sadness etc.. As a journalist doing a news story on my students once said, “the story has to sing”. A very polite way of putting their strategic selection of what is newsworthy.
So today, everything within my power is going my way. The universe is swirling, my eyes are open to passing opportunities to extend what is in my power that will benefit others. That is the best I can do.
Hydro Note:
We are now heating exclusively with electricity. I just compared our hydro usage for January 2022 with our hydro usage for January 2023. We used twice the amount of hydro in January 2023, compared to January 2022. I think that the usage will almost triple in February, compared to last year, because of the extreme cold we experienced early in the month.
When I look at the electric usage by the day, we used over twice as much electricity as usual, during the 24 hours of the cold snap (-39C). The “toaster” is a power guzzler, but it does a great job.
Sudden cold snaps were the reason I was so concerned about completing the furnace install. I knew, from past experience with frigid weather, that it can occur at any time during the winter months, and when it does occur, you need your heating system in full working condition. Our heating system was not in full working condition until two days before Christmas. Luckily mother nature did not send frigid weather before that time!!
Worldly
Weather
Updated on Tue, Feb 7, 10:15 AM
-1°C
FEELS LIKE -8
Partly cloudy
Wind 28 SE km/h
Humidity 76 %
Visibility 22 km
Sunrise 7:18 AM
Wind gust 42 km/h
Pressure 101.7 kPa
Ceiling 5800 m
Sunset 5:25 PM
Quote
“You’ve got to be taught
To hate and fear,
You’ve got to be taught
From year to year,
It’s got to be drummed
In your dear little ear
You’ve got to be carefully taught.”
Oscar Greeley Clendenning Hammerstein II
1895 – 1960 and
Richard Charles Rodgers
1902 – 1979
I hope the extreme bitter cold stays away! (Rodgers and Hammerstein musicals, those have some lovely music.)
I came across an interesting article the other day, it said the reason Ontario has a doctor shortage is because the province approves the number of medical degrees based on how much they’re willing to pay out in doctor salaries in the near future. The recent medical school admissions were supposedly capped at 3,000 people with targeted numbers for certain specializations.
I’m trying to remember where I found this interesting article. I might have to try looking through the History on my tablet. I do remember thinking the source appeared to be a valid one. If this is true, the people are victims of a manufactured need due to the province thinking money was better spent elsewhere, so doctors were shorted. Then of course covid came along and through a monkeywrench into everything, making the shortageof doctors even more apparent and desperate.
Okay, enough on that. As for contentment, I do sit in my chair every morning, sip my water or iced tea, have a small something for breakfast, and enjoy my dogs. There’s no doubt I’m very grateful for our warm house and that we were able to pull finances together over many years to somehow cobble out a comfortable retirement, especially compared to how little we had when DH and I met 18 years ago.
Thanks Joan, I don’t anticipate another cold snap like last Saturdays, not this year or any year soon! We are still getting lows of -15C, which are balmy compared to -39C. Our daily power usage dropped like a stone on Monday, thank goodness. When I was a kid I loved musicals! I was disppointed to find out people don’t really burst into song like that in the real world.
Teri, that is an interesting article. It could be that other provinces took the same approach, as there are other parts of Canada where a doctor shortage is a serious issue. My niece is a medical doctor, and there was pretty tough competition to get into medical school, it seemed unreasonably tough in my opinion. I doubt a politician would ever admit to such a grave and devastating error in judgement.
You and DH have certainly been able to create a comfortable retirement and a happy home, well deserved. Home is where the heart is.