It’s Monday . . .
It is said that it takes three to five weeks to cement a new routine, but it takes just days to break one. At least for me. The weeks that lead up to Christmas and New Year are often filled with activities that alter routines, though I stopped blogging about my Monday reading well before the holiday sprint, Thanksgiving to New Year, arrived. So, I’m not beginning from the beginning of creating a routine, but close.
It is Monday. In parts of the world the freedom to alter a routine might mean not eating, or having drinking water, or missing a bus that takes you to a job that you may be grateful to have, but it also takes advantage of your sweat, the unregulated labor laws of your country, and only allows you a bathroom break twice a day. You might be ten years old or sixty years old or somewhere between, and whatever it is you are making you cannot afford to purchase.
It is Monday. The earth spins on its axes and is seven days into a new orbit of the star at the center of our solar system. People I know are grieving for loved ones and friends near and far away. The hurt is real, shocking, and up close. Tears are trying to cleanse. Time provides the pace to living without and the void, well, is. Many are comforted by their scripture, and their sense of God, and their community.
It is Monday. There are opportunities to be good news for someone. A note, smile, a phone call. Maybe today is the day to give the person panhandling at the corner a dollar? Maybe a day without snark, cynicism, or being sarcastic. There is as much beauty as there is danger in the world. More to community than my clan having the power to legislate what benefits my clan. Since the turn of the century, our politics are like we are living out the cave anthem of Mel Brook’s 2000 Year Old Man: “Let them all go to hell accept cave 76.” Maybe a day to send my representative an authentic, ‘thank you’, for serving email or tweet or call even if I’m working to vote him or her out of office this year.
It is Monday.
How Would Jesus Drive?
David Brooks, The New York Times (Jan 4, 2018)
Why 2017 Was the Best Year in Human History
Nicholas Kristof, The New York Times (Jan 6, 2018)
Gratitude: A Way of Teaching – An eCourse for Educators, Starting Soon!
Gratefulness.org
The Horror of the Never-Ending Performance
Christine Rosen, Commentary Magazine (Dec 14, 2017)
Researchers Discover Two Major Flaws in the World’s Computers
Cade Metz and Nicole Perlroth, The New York Times (Jan 3, 2018)
Most Personality Quizzes Are Junk Science. I Found One That Isn’t.
Maggie Koerth-Baker, FiveThirtyEight (Jan 2, 2018)
Oprah Calls For Day When No One Has To Say ‘Me Too’ During Golden Globes Speech
Taryn Finley, HuffingtonPost (Jan 7, 2018)