I had a wonderful opportunity to visit with a friend from long ago recently. Thanks GC for the lunch and the time. I’m so glad we had the time to share with each other. And thankful for the promise to keep in touch. (Good grief, we’re not good at this!)

GC and I met when we were young college girls. That was a long time ago. I’m pretty sure that she adopted me and shared her sweet family with me at a time that I was far away from my own.

And a few weekends ago, Fred & I attended his 40th high school reunion. I’m just amazed. This is a group of people who are still friends 40 years later! They are so different in some ways – there are the cheerleaders, the entrepreneurs, the firemen, the school administrators, the rich, the famous, the infamous. It’s just a lot of fun to sit back and watch them. They never seem to run out of things to say to each other. I’ve never seen a clique in this group..and that’s REALLY amazing! And they’re NICE to each other.

I’m just thinking about how I can’t necessarily predict who will be friends. Can you? Like GC offered me a connection to family. Plus she’s just one of the nicest people you could ever meet. Very giving.

I have another friend, WGF, who I can just sit with and I don’t have to be someone special. She makes me laugh! I’m not even sure how we started being friends. We went to church together…and then we were friends. She is the BEST cook – like your grandmomma cooked!

I often wonder if people start being friends with me first and then I just kind of follow along?

I’ve watched the phenomenon of the Ice Bucket Challenge over the last few weeks. I laughed when Laura Bush didn’t want to mess up her hair & George got to write “her check”. And I’ve been “entertained” when celebrity after celebrty has accepted the challenge, not to keep from making a donation, but normally in addition to making one. I even read a Linkedin article about the great marketing components of the challenge. (Read the article here) And I’ve had more conversations in the last week or 2 about ALS, what it is, how the disease has affected someone who knows someone…

Then came the negatives. I was so irritated when I read some of the comments on that same LinkedIn article about how horrible it is that we are “wasting” water when there are people in desperate need of water in other areas of the world. And I threatened to stop reading any more internet comments after I read an article about a Christian pastor who after being asked to say a prayer at a national event got blasted because of a sermmon he’d preashed 15 years earlier and NOW the comments were OFFENSIVE to some.

WAIT! When did we stop accepting GOOD as good? And what message are we sending when NOTHING can just BE good?

“Little Timmy that was a great score, but you should have swerved left, not right.”
“Jane, great piano recital, but you missed a note in the 3rd bar.”
“Great donation to a good cause, but you know, there are thousands more important causes you should have paid attention to.”

That is a message in defeat. Nothing can be good…ever. So why try? Why do any GOOD?

While I don’t argue about the need for clean water in areas of the world, and perhaps if this was occuring in those areas, I could understand an outcry. But let’s look at the futility of nothing ever being without detraction.

I know. I know. First amendments rights. I.KNOW. And I want to protect those rights, but not by giving a voice to criticise everything…everyone…every time. Is this a right we NEED to exercise?

Think about this a minute….before you post a negative comment on a blog post, or about a magazine article or to an ALS challenger or about one single aspect of a person who’s inspired others in many good ways. Is it a comment that’s needed? A comment that contributes? One that needs a voice?

Remember the story about those who live in glass houses? Can your words from 15 years ago or yesterday…or your every action stand the scrunity…or will you become the next negative?

“What made her strong was despite the million things that hurt her she spoke of nothing but happiness.” j.a. (Pinterest)