There are many little ways to enlarge your child’s world. Love of books is the best of all.

–Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis

The Two Goats

Two Goats, frisking gayly on the rocky steeps of a mountain valley, chanced to meet, one on each side of a deep chasm through which poured a mighty mountain torrent. The trunk of a fallen tree formed the only means of crossing the chasm, and on this not even two squirrels could have passed each other in safety. The narrow path would have made the bravest tremble. Not so our Goats. Their pride would not permit either to stand aside for the other.

One set her foot on the log. The other did likewise. In the middle they met horn to horn. Neither would give way, and so they both fell, to be swept away by the roaring torrent below.

It is better to yield than to come to misfortune through stubbornness.

“One ought, every day at least, to hear a little song, read a good poem, see a fine picture, and, if it were possible, to speak a few reasonable words.” 
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship



Be gentle

Do what you can understand, to help people. 

Step inside their grief, their desolation. 

Step down from the heights of your self-sufficiency to the valley of the people out in the open who are without shelter and without security.

Never be hard. Never judge them.

Be gentle and try to understand their inexpressible

Longing for lost happiness, as well as their sometimes

Silly hankerings and needs.

Then you’ll be happy yourself, there will

come moments of serenity which will lift you right out

of the daily grind of life. You will have a heart big

enough to comfort everyone, to hold them all.

In gentleness lies never-ending comfort, for all people

Who are left in the icy cold of our form-filling,

Computerized society.

• The Æsop for Children

The Crow & the Pitcher

In a spell of dry weather, when the Birds could find very little to drink, a thirsty Crow found a pitcher with a little water in it. But the pitcher was high and had a narrow neck, and no matter how he tried, the Crow could not reach the water. The poor thing felt as if he must die of thirst.

Then an idea came to him. Picking up some small pebbles, he dropped them into the pitcher one by one. With each pebble the water rose a little higher until at last it was near enough so he could drink.

In a pinch a good use of our wits may help us out.

• The Æsop for Children

The Plane Tree

Two Travellers, walking in the noonday sun, sought the shade of a widespreading tree to rest. As they lay looking up among the pleasant leaves, they saw that it was a Plane Tree.

"How useless is the Plane!" said one of them. "It bears no fruit whatever, and only serves to litter the ground with leaves."

"Ungrateful creatures!" said a voice from the Plane Tree. "You lie here in my cooling shade, and yet you say I am useless! Thus ungratefully, O Jupiter, do men receive their blessings!"

Our best blessings are often the least appreciated.

Sometimes certain people, teachers included, feel that they have done their duty by simply trying to teach others to read. When you decide to act the teacher it's of primary importance to help the pupils or students get something worth reading. 

Books, stories,tales,fables,verses which stir  their imagination, will help them make sense of their own lives and encourage them to reach out toward people whose lives are quite different from their own. 

Hope this evening, Phil Bossman will help us feel good and be helpful whenever needed.

fm


 A hunting image

One evening,

During the TV news,

I was shocked by a picture,

A picture flashing between

The usual nightly scenes

Of wars and calamities.

Just before the sports news

There was a picture that got in between

For just a second.

A picture from one of the richest

Countries of the world,

With remarkable welfare services,

Where, from candle to grave,

Everyone is cushioned.

A picture from Sweden.

I saw an old man lying on the pavement.

I saw people walking past him.

The announcer said

that this man had been lying there for hours,

without anybody turning round to look at him.

Finally, a police car came.

The man was dead.

This picture haunts me,

It is a picture

from a dead, decadent civilization.

Did nobody see this man fall?

Why had nobody covered him up?

This is a public murder by indifference.

Or, to his fellowmen,

perhaps this man had already been dead

for a long time.

You know how small, how poor, how lonely, how

weak and how vulnerable people are.  

You know that there are tears that nobody will ever care about. 

You know that there is almost no sorrow greater than that of

a heart which nobody understands. 

You know that life

is an unbearable pain for some people.

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• The Æsop for Children

 Hi there,
Wish you all had a nice day today and hope tomorrow will be better. I simply wanted to share a quote with you this evening.

Reading is important.

In fact, it is one of the most important ingredients to becoming all that you can be.

Reading develops your brain, provides a window into the world around you and helps you do better in all school subjects.

Most importantly, reading can not only help you become a better student, but a better person.  You can learn from the brightest people whenever and wherever you choose.

As important as reading is did you know that:

• 800 million people around the world cannot read or write
• Many families (and some schools) have no books for children to read

There are likely many children and people in our town that fall into this group.  My hope is that one day you become a strong reader. Helping others to read is an amazing gift that you can give.

Enjoy the following fable!

fm

The Gnat & the Bull

A Gnat flew over the meadow with much buzzing for so small a creature and settled on the tip of one of the horns of a Bull. After he had rested a short time, he made ready to fly away. But before he left he begged the Bull's pardon for having used his horn for a resting place.

"You must be very glad to have me go now," he said.

"It's all the same to me," replied the Bull. "I did not even know you were there."

We are often of greater importance in our own eyes than in the eyes of our neighbor. The smaller the mind the greater the conceit.

Jungle

When I come into contact with people and with human need, I often get the feeling that I’m in the jungle. 

I watch the way people are being crushed, sometimes in

the friendliest possible way, simply flattened by a

human steamroller.

Modern barbarians are often neatly-dressed gentlemen

Sitting behind shining desk. They push buttons and

sign letters. They never dirty their hands. 

Their weapons are locked up in the safe. In the world of business and the world of finance there are merciless

gangsters who make it their business to strangle the

small and the weak.

 In the world of the sick, of the old, of the disabled, 

In the world of people who once made mistakes, 

In the world of people who are totally dependent on others, there is a sort of monstrous exploitation. Weak people and people in distress are extra-vulnerable. 

This is why greed and

Love of money are even more horrible where these

People are concerned. Isn’t it inhuman to grow rich on

the back of someone else’s need? 

When I work among helpless people, love-not money-must come first.

If my profession is to care for the sick, the old, the

disabled or the suffering, I must above all, understand

and love them. 

Here, it is much more important to

serve than to earn, anyone whose only interest is to

make money out of need is guilty of one of the lowest

forms of exploitation.