Have you ever watched the highlights of a sporting event. The stations glorify the violent dunks, violent hits instead of the artistry and beauty that can be the game. And that’s true of many things in life.

For now we look at the conflict in Columbia. The leading photograph in this article is that of the beauty of a Colombian city. The people, the music, the culture that is this South American country is beautiful. The pictures that are glorified are violence, conflict death and revolution.

Very little goes into saying what people are protesting against. In this case it is higher taxes. In United States it is a myriad of reasons and for now it is centered on equity and race. And by design, the focus is on the violence and conflict.

Then again I always underestimate the publics insatiable thirst for what is violent and what is conflict. That is what sells newspapers, and clicks on webpages.

One common denominator across countries.,a common thread vaguely goes back do religion. Those in power, promise great rewards to the common people in a far off time which may or may not exist. Not to piss anyone off, I Lean towards the later.

I don’t have an answer, other than dig deeper, understand the issues, See the inherent self-worth of humans and take to the streets if need be.

Namaste

Hell that’s like every single story should start even though it was actually a real dark and stormy night. The lights on the house flickered once, flickered twice and flickered one last time. Lightning flashed across the western horizon, the thunder was immediate .Doing the math from old wives tales, my mom told me that antidote when she was a young wife, I figured the storm was another 10 or 15 minutes away. In retrospect, the weather patterns on the West Coast have no similarity to those my mom tried to pretend to know when we were kids. One thing we did keep know for sure, was that if you could see the underside of the leaves there was a storm brewing. And in their true hour of disbelief, we were led to believe that’ some angelic figures were bowling way up there in the clouds.

In that little row house on Delta Avenue thunderstorms were a cause for celebration even if the storm came in the middle of the night. It’s not like we had a choice as nobody could possibly sleep through a storm such as this. Our dad was sound asleep as he had a few beers that evening. But mom was up and we kids were up as we sat on the front porch and watched the storm move in. The neighbor next-door came out on her porch as well as the storm seemed to have stirred her from her sleep.

Mrs. Byers was trimming the rosebushes at quarter after 12. A childhood memory surrounded me as I sat and watched the storm.

Here I take a second to reflect on this beautiful morning and in reality society wants me to produce produce produce. Back many years ago there was a presidential candidate known as Paul Tsongas and he ran against Bill Clinton and eventually faded out on super Tuesday.

He had one idea that I found worth exploring. He proposed the idea of producing financial statements every two years as opposed to the mandated every three months. Our current system wants to see results every three months and rewards people for those results no matter, OK despite, what the long-term vision is. Or even if there is a long-term vision.

I have worked in industry and even educated about industry and I can’t say I can figure out what the inherent beauty really is. The goal of most every company stated in their mission statement is this.

We shall maximize shareholder wealth.

There is very little said about maximizing employees health and the health of the world we live within.

What is the use of building a massive nest egg that we can eventually pass on to our children. I’m not sure if that is a statement or a question so I’ll leave it as a statement. Our responsibility just to pass on a world that is better for them to live.

This is where our short term vision has short changed our children for generations to come.

Tonight, take a second and look at the sky at sunset, listen to the birds, smell the earth and figure out what is really important.

On some social media the poster asked what were your visions as A child as to what you were going to do in the future. My dream as a child was limited as I really wanted to be a truck driver, and see the world. That was my world, the United States woth Kansas, Ohio, the Grand Canyon and the biggest ball of yarn. Somewhere along the line that changed and maybe not for the better. I decided to get a masters degree in business.

Produce produce produce. Who knows if that was a good choice. It gives the best chance to make a change in this world. And that’s a small glimmer of hope.

If given the chance, I would’ve done something different. I guess we all say that.

The cutting edge subject for today is what we shall be addressed as when we become grandparents. When I was a kid we had our Nanny on our father’s side. We called her that and I have no idea the origin. She was always Nanny Schofer to us. The grandmother on the other side was Gram Hoover and our grandfather was Gramps. I honestly have little context to why we called them that, and I think I would be safe to say these words just didn’t magically come out of our mouth but was something that we were shaped to do. And it worked really really well for the longest of times. Then we introduce stepparents and grandmother became known as grandmother . One of my favorites is the surname of my stepmother as she was referred to as Mimi. That’s just damn cool.

And then there is GG. My wife’s mother was referred to as GG and it was short for Grumpy Grandmother. It eventually became a much beloved term of endearment

For many years I walked this planet with German background and heritage and none of the customs and mores. Then I became part of a German family and the terms, Oma and Opa became part of the vernacular. The kid’s grandmother is kindly referred to as Mama Bear. That was simply a nickname I had for her and that’s what the kids called her. It also worked well for a long time.

So for the most part we were shaped and molded to use a particular name for a grandmother or grandfather. As brothers and sisters started having kids, the names came in a more authentic way and in some cases the names flowed from the mouth of babes. We ended up with names like Pop and P pop as monikers for grandparents. And my mom she was simply Mom Mom.

I don’t know what’s right and what’s wrong. So I have argued they have preferred names that they like to be called. There is the school of thought of whatever comes out of the mouth of the child that she’ll be the name.

I am no expert on the subject. It’s an interesting subject and when my Nanny got together with Gram and Mimi came to visit I don’t think they discussed the subject even once. They just went about their business of being grandmothers. In retrospect, Mimi wasn’t even a grandmother at the time.

Please, when I become A grandparent please don’t call me sir. And that’s you the clerk in the supermarket and the person taking my ticket at a soccer game. Please call me by my proper name. Grandpa works fine.