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Friendly Skies, and Friends in General

The Skies above Chicago

“Each day holds a surprise. But only if we expect it can we see, hear, or feel it when it comes to us. Let’s not be afraid to receive each day’s surprise, whether it comes to us as sorrow or as joy. It will open a new place in our hearts, a place where we can welcome new friends and celebrate more fully our shared humanity.” -Henri Nouwen

Sometimes we forget we have a shared humanity. We become unwelcoming, no longer friends, not even friendly.

Sometimes we forget the spirit behind a slogan or a word, and we act in ways that “get the job done” and nobody is supposed to take it personally – but at what expense to our shared humanity?

What does it look like the next morning, when we will welcome the day again? Will we give each other a friendly surprise or a rude awakening?

What can we do with integrity to reignite a spirit of friendliness? Please comment with your thoughts on being friendly and sharing friendship.

Remember this tune?

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You’re Witty, Pay Attention!

“The World is full of magical things patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper.” — Bertrand Russell

There are so many inherently witty and sharp people on this planet.

But to be able to express your sharpness and wit you have to be aware of your surroundings. You must be hip to the things and folks around you. Without this awareness, your wits have no material.

The magical things thought of in this quote could be paintings, poems, songs, flowers, or conversations with people, to name a few. There are forms of magic and beauty surrounding us most of the time, just sitting there to be noticed.

Let’s relax and allow ourselves a few moments to look, listen, and converse. We might realize that our wits have been waiting for us to catch up.

Songs like “Within Dreams” by the Album Leaf have always helped me sit back and hope that my senses are growing sharper.

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Palm Sunday in the Middle East

A Gate in Jerusalem
Today marks Palm Sunday in the Middle East and all over the world for Christians of every tradition.
 
I had many possible ideas for this Sunday, the beginning of the Christian Holy Week. Often the Western and the Eastern traditions celebrate this day on different weeks, as the date is arrived at using different methods. This year, however, they are actually the same day. 
 
No matter your faith tradition, you would think that this day should be one of reverence and respect, as a holy day of any faith would be. However, the bombings in Egypt against Coptic Christians this morning were the very antithesis of this respect, and inhuman and senseless acts.
 
I searched for some kind of answer within the Scriptures of the day. And I found a most appropriate one. I would humbly ask you to join us at RitA in pondering this one reading from the Hebrew Scriptures from the great prophet Isaiah. And we might give it more focused thought than we may have on another occasion.
 
Isaiah 50:4-7
 
“The Lord GOD has given me
a well-trained tongue,
that I might know how to speak to the weary
a word that will rouse them.
Morning after morning
he opens my ear that I may hear;
and I have not rebelled,
have not turned back.
I gave my back to those who beat me,
my cheeks to those who plucked my beard;
my face I did not shield
from buffets and spitting.

The Lord GOD is my help,
therefore I am not disgraced;
I have set my face like flint,
knowing that I shall not be put to shame.”
 
In a spirit of common humanity, let us listen to and join with the Coptic Church in their hymn for the Holy Week as it should have been.
 
 
Palms for Palm Sunday
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RitA’s Instagram for the first week of April

Here are RitA’s Instagram pics of the week!  (@rosesinthealley).

Click on our Instagram logo below or here and follow us!

This weekend's wine and movie paring, Annibals Rose and Water for Elephants
Hope Springs Eternal! Baseball is here and that means Spring!! The Cubs showed us last year that there's reason for us all to be optimistic
Can you find the moon??
"Clouds come floating into my life....to add color to my sunset sky." -- Rabindranath Tagore
Pretty now, wait 'til Spring is in full bloom!
Annibals
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Water and Wine for Elephants!!

Beautiful, majestic, and super smart they are…

Ringling Bros. and Barnum and Bailey Circus is closing in a month. You can’t survive without Elephants.

With much respect paid to the “Main Attraction” of every circus, this week’s movie and wine pairing is Chateau Des Annibals Rose with Water for Elephants.

The Annibals estate, as the story goes, is named in homage to Hannibal the Conqueror. Around 200 B.C. he led an army of Elephants and Men in an attempt to take over Rome, they trampled the grounds where the winery now lives.

When you watch Water For Elephants you realize how terribly these traveling circuses treated their animals. But it was set in the Depression when you had to survive. The Animals, or us!

I’m assuming that “Hannibal the Conqueror” wasn’t too easy on them either. But, at least his were able to run, and weren’t confined to a train car or a Big Top.

The star of this movie is not human, it is an Elephant named Rosie.  She is purchased  to bring the show back to life, sell tickets, and basically sustain a living for all the Circus workers. Although she suffers great abuse, she is there to save the Circus!

To set the stage for the movie, check out Camille Saint-Saens’ The Carnival of the Animals. Let your imagination hear and see!

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Who Do You Think You Are?

Who in the world do you think you are, anyway, some great (fill in the blanks)? 
 
“The great sin of mankind, the sin typified by the fall of Adam, is the tendency, not towards pride, but towards this weird and horrible humility.” – Gilbert Keith Chesterton
 
How many times in your life have you not been heard, not been taken seriously, or downright ignored? How many times have you shared your talent, only to be told about the great gifts and talents of someone else, as though yours must somehow pale to insignificance?
 
How easy it is to sell each other short, to sell ourselves short, or to simply not pay any attention to the creativity, goodness and uniqueness of the persons we engage with everyday.
 
Here is a great musical example of NOT paying attention to the talents around us. This scene is of Joshua Bell, one of the nation’s greatest violinists, as he played in a D.C. subway. Could this only happen in D.C. ?
 
Who does he think he is, anyway? And who does the street musician in the photo at the top of this post think she is?
 
Maybe we would find out if we listened!