Random Thoughts

Blog entries about various topics
annerobertson2
Egrets and cows in Florida

My personal website needs a facelift and this is where I'm working on it. It will probably take months. So if you've ended up here and can't find what you're looking for, please still use annerobertson.com. All the old stuff is still there.  Some has been transferred here and any new blog posts are only here.  Clear as mud?  Hopefully things will get sorted out soon.

annerobertson2

YARD WORK - AS VIEWED FROM HEAVEN*
(overheard in a conversation between God and St. Francis):

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It keeps coming and coming and coming. We've barely dug out from one storm and the next one hits, sending us back out with shovels, snowblowers, plows or just our own mitten-bedecked hands to try to make a way simply to get out of our homes.  

annerobertson2

I mourn for the French in these days of fear and grief after the attacks on satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.  I share their outrage at being attacked and killed for acts of self-expression, and I agree that two of the rights that are foundational to a democracy are freedom of speech and freedom of the press.  I support those principles and am exercising that right even now, as I write this blog.  Attacks on liberty of any kind are always something that deserve a full-throated response if society and the individuals within it are to grow and thrive.

annerobertson2
Gandalf the Grey from Lord of the Rings

"All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us."
                                                                                                                  J.R.R. Tolkien, Fellowship of the Ring.

annerobertson2
Pink bow

I was one of a legion of children who was shepherded through third and fourth grade Sunday School by Maybritt Muller.  In my day she didn’t just teach, she ran the whole department for those grades, which comprised a number of classes. Her passing on July 13, 2013 has caused me to reflect, and I post this as a tribute to her. 

annerobertson2
Minuteman Statue in Lexington, Mass.

In the poem entitled "Concord Hymn," Ralph Waldo Emerson called the first shot of the American Revolution the "shot heard 'round the world."  That shot was fired in Lexington, Massachusetts on April 19, 1775 and Emerson's grandfather, a local minister, was the first man to show up, gun in hand, after the alarm was sounded.  Seventy-six other men joined him.  By the time they reached Concord, Mass. they were 400 strong.  By day's end, there were 3800 colonists engaged in the battle for freedom. It is this first battle of the war that is commemorated in Massachusetts on Patriots' Day.

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Sacrifice of Jepthah's Daughter

"It is a snare for one to say rashly, 'It is holy,' and begin to reflect only after making a vow." Proverbs 20:25

 

As businesses, economists, and foreign governments look on with disbelief, the political talk in Washington has somehow become all about vows.  Suddenly there seem to be all these vows that politicians are being asked to sign, from vows about opposing same-sex marriage to vows to avoid tax increases no matter what.

 

annerobertson2
Picture of Caylee Anthony

"The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath."  Mark 2:27
 

Like millions of others in America this week, I watched the verdict in the Casey Anthony trial being handed down.  Like just a handful of others, however, I was not surprised at her acquittal.  Yes, I think she's guilty of killing her young daughter and I would bet most every juror thinks so, too.  But I have realized for some time now that, with just a few exceptions, we no longer have a justice system.  We have a legal system.
 

annerobertson2
Grim Reaper

Milo was a boy of about 11 years old, who lived in a small village by the edge of the sea with his mother.  Milo was a big help to his mother.  Every morning he would take some money and two sacks to go and buy the groceries.  First he went to the butcher and bought some bacon and salted pork.  Then he went to the farmer on the hill who sold him lettuce, beans, and sometimes corn.  Lastly he went to see Miss Gretchen, who sold him the eggs that Milo and his mother would have for breakfast as they listened to the sounds of the sea. 

But one day there was no money on the table and Milo found that his Mother was still in bed.  He went on tiptoe into her room, but saw that she was not sleeping. There were moans coming from her bed, she was shivering under the covers, and her face looked very red and tired. 

 “Mother!” cried Milo.  “What’s wrong?  Are you sick?”

She could barely speak.  “Yes, Milo,” she answered.  “I am very sick.  I don’t think I can even stand up. You must go and bring the doctor from the other side of the farmer’s hill.”