Cliff diving any one? I am not saying go jump off a cliff. While Congress clenched their fiscals we came to the end of the year surrounded by life, liberty and the pursuit of happenings. There is evidence lying/laying everywhere including teenage girls strewn about on our basement floor. Our house filled and emptied over night and fireworks could be seen just over the distant tree line as time and space birthed a new year. I thank God the Mayans weren’t the only ones who designed a way to keep track of our earth’s laps around the sun. For breakfast I drank dark Cafe’ Verona roast and consumed beans & franks and a miniature spice cupcake.

My finger tips now rest lightly on the keys here and I wonder if I will have anything in 2013. Gathering words from the swirling brain cells (Both of them.) and pushing down the plastic squares to form sentences worth reading seems a bit scary of late. I have been taking strolls around the writer’s block for months now it seems. I read much though and experience life here in the revolving door of our house of happenings. They say write from your experience. There is experience everywhere I look. So, what do you want to read about? Or rather, what do I want to write about?…or both.

Snowflakes drift down just far enough apart that if I tried really hard I could count them.

Bacon sizzles as a zombie daughter stands over it.

Buford the bloodhound snores on the couch…

New Year’s Eve, in the midst of convoluted conversation noise, I heard a blues riff in the corner of the living room. Over and over two guitarists laid down the well known ba dah dah ba bum… I sat betwixt them and waited on my muse to lyric the music. Nothing came. No words. They kept laying it down and I sat on me duff.

I am determined not to come up empty in 2013! We all have something to say. In fact, we say much with or without words. Like I responded to a text from a long time friend’s wishes of ‘Happy New Year’…”The world is still spinning and we are hangin’ on!” There were many times in 2012 in which letting go flashed across my mind. The world seemed to spin faster and out of control with Innocents killed, wars and rumors of them, fallen leaders, economies with faint pulses, and not to mention my own faint of heart self. Hmmm.

I am still here. You are still here. Ever ask why? Don’t spend a lot of time with this question, but do ask. Maybe when your eyes first peel open as you lie on a new day is a good time to ask away. I ask with the expectation of a still small voice response. The other day I said a short prayer: (My prayers seem to be shorter and shorter, but more to the point.)  Lord, touch my heart.

The day went as expected. Lisien, my special needs child, asks every evening when I arrive home “how was your day daddy?” My standard reply is “Long and arduous.” That night she even answered the question herself with a smile…”I know, long and arduous, right?” Hmmm. What is my family catching from me with these words? Better change the conversation even if each day IS long and arduous.

My wife and I planned a date to see the movie Les’ Miserables that evening. I almost backed out because I was kind of whipped from a day of grannie stepping deliveries to each door because of ice and snow. I tend to nod off in movies anyway and I heard Les Mis was stellar. I didn’t want to miss any part of it. We went with my oldest son. My heart was deeply touched and I remembered the morning prayer. After the credits and music stopped I thought: We need more Jean Valjeans in this world. Can I become one? Can you?

Short Prayer: Lord, mold my heart. May the choices I make today be the change for a better tomorrow.

I mean it. This isn’t a Hallmark commercial…:)