Join This GroupApril 6, 2008
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Soft rain falls upon my flower garden,
leaving crystal drops of moisture,
upon each leaf and bough.
Moisture gathers in the broad leaves
of the Hosta,
hang supended , then fall to the ground.
Rose petals are garnished with iridescent
jewels that hold and catch the light !........jen
Koko Gardens: One of the less known hiking trails on Ohau is the Koko Gardens. This area has so many different kinds of plants and vegetation and is a quiet place to spend the day. Some of the many plants found are:
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KOKO CRATER BOTANICAL GARDEN is home to a collection of rare and beautiful plants from the tropical regions of the world. Some are rare or endangered in their native habitat. It is a cinder cone remaining from the last active volcano that occurred on O'ahu approximately 10,000 years ago. This crater is the tallest tuff ring in Hawaii, measuring 1,207 feet in height. The slopes of the crater drop steeply into the Molokai Channel, an area which lacks protection from any offshore reefs, causing very turbulent seas in this area.
We have never seen so many different nor such large Cacti. They grow in one whole section that is amazing both in the variety of plants and their individual size. This collection is amazing. This is a little known treasure on the island. From our experience, this park has few visitors and is one of the island's best kept secrets.
I will be out of touch for a little while I have had quite a lot of things going on. For those who don't know me I started a project about a year ago ( Used Medical Aids Foundation ) I just got several truck loads of wheelchairs walkers scooters from a county hospital and have 2 truck loads from another hospital to get. I go threw the items and fix them up as close to new as I can then I post them in other groups that I belong to. There is no money involved no donation required only the need. I have several letters from people in my area that need something so I am trying to get as many ready as i can. I am getting help from the Boy Scouts in my area because I'm still not up to par yet but I can turn a wrench. so if I don't respond to the wonderful stories, poems, jokes, or pictures its because this santa is really busy right now.
Dennis
The Present
By Dee
Christmas is a wonderful time of year walking along the store fronts lingering at the bakery shop with the fresh smell of goodies. Watching people go in and out of shops, with arm loads of packages. Hearing a bell ring at in front of a toy shop is reminding us, that there are others that need help.
As you drive home you stop at a park where the kids are going as fast as they can down the hill on their sleds. There are no barriers between kids, no black, white, red, or yellow they just want to have fun. A little girl falls down and a woman picks her up and brushes the snow off and then gives her a hug.
Then Rose wakes up and realized it was a dream, remembers this last summer her husband and three kids, 2 girls and 1 boy won’t be sharing Christmas together anymore. Coming down out of the canyon her husband lost control of the car and went over the side. All Rose has now are pictures of times past that they shared together.
Rose goes out to get her mail the wind is bitterly cold and it looks like snow will soon come. As she gets to her front door a neighbor waves to her and says Marry Christmas. She waves back but says nothing. Looking at the mail that came that day reminds her of her lost family once again. She looks up into the mirror of the bathroom and sees a tear running down her cheek.
Why am I doing this still, it’s been 5 months and I need to get on with my life she says to herself. But a small voice says to her, “Mommy I love you”.
Her heart is aching and she can here herself saying I love you to. Then the tears start to flow and the tissue box is empty, so she uses the paper on the roll to dry her eyes.
Just then the phone rings and the man on the phone say’s “I am trying to raise money for those children that won’t have a Christmas”. Rose cuts him off by hanging up the phone.
As she goes to the bedroom and lies down on the bed to cry her eyes out like she has done so many in the last 5 months. She is saying to herself I’m not strong, I can’t take it anymore I don’t want to live. Again she hears another voice say “watch what I can do mommy”.
By the December 23rd Rose is loosing her will to live and is trying to think of the best way to end the pain and suffering. But nighttime has come and she takes a pill to help her sleep.
In the morning she goes to the drugstore to pick up her medicine for depression and for sleeping. As she drives home she sees some girls in front of a store selling cookies. Again she hears a voice that says “Mmmmmm mommy they taste so good can I have another one”.
At home she says to her self NO! NO MORE! And then she sees the medicine that she just bought and says that’s how I will do it. When I go to bed tonight I will take all my meds and never wake up.
That night was the 24th of December the worse night of the year to her remembering how the kids would try and sneak in to the living room to see what Santa had brought. Her eyes are red and her mind is filled with the missing images of Christmas in her home. She sits down to watch some TV but is started feeling sleepy so she lay down on the couch and closed her eyes.
The headline in the morning announces, “ANOTHER TRAGATY HAS HIT A HOME IN LESS THAN 6 MONTHS”.
Rose could hear something then she heard it again but she had a hard time understanding what it was she heard. It came again but this time she heard mommy?
Rose opened her eyes and there in front of her was a little girl and beside her was another little girl with a little boy beside her. And standing behind them was a man holding out his hand. As she touches it, all of her thoughts comes to her. It’s her family she hugs them and kisses them. And starts to cry and says, how can this be. It’s another dream you are not real I have to wake up.
Her one little girl says, no mommy it’s not a dream we are here with you.
Headlines on the local news, “ANOTHER TRAGATY HAS HIT A HOME IN LESS THAN 6 MONTHS”. A local woman dies in her sleep it seems that she had a faulty water heater and the pilot light went out but the gas didn’t stop.
Rose looked at her husband and said you mean I didn’t take all those pills like I was planning?
Her husband said no I was watching over you this whole time and it hurt me so to see you in such pain. I went to plead to help you and was told that I didn’t need to you where coming tonight to be with us forever.
Just then she heard singing it was the most beautiful song she had ever heard. And then there was a bright light, brighter than any she had ever seen before.
CHRISTMAS
Now that Thanksgiving and Black Friday are over with and you have plenty of leftovers what else could you need.
Christmas is just a few weeks away and if you where smart you would have all your Christmas shopping all done.
My self I have a hard time sleeping because so many people have fallen on hard times. There is a family down the street that is just at the end of their rope and its 300 feet to the bottom.
Every year my wife and I look for just a family. To no fault of their own he has lost his job the first of the month and his wife is expecting their 4th child. He is working part time just to put food on the table. His wife does a lot of craft things and has helped in cub scouts and as a room mother for her oldest child who is in 2nd grade. But this year she has not been able to do much because the doctor told her that she should have waited another year to have another child. She has to be on bed rest till the middle of Feb.
My wife and I choose to do sub for Santa to a family just like this and we have gotten a few things for the family. I received a e-mail from someone that I helped this summer with a wheelchair. In the e-mail it said we know that you will not take money for your foundation. And we also know that your wife has been working to pay bills and help taking care of her mother. Tomorrow a truck will come to with presents for a family that you feel needs some help with Christmas. Along with an envelope with a check for $1,000.00 the payee will be blank. Plus there will be a special card that will have $200.00 on it for gas.
I couldn’t believe it I know this family could use it and more but the biggest thing was that there was a job for either the father or mother working as a janitor at a place that is really good to the employs.
They had also heard that I had been in an accident and wasn’t able to do my part this year.
I have to tell you that I have put on a Santa suit almost 30 years and I have helped deliver sub for Santa to families from other people. But this year I feel that for one night I really am Santa and its like magic far stronger than even superman. They have three little girls and they are the cutest always with a smile. And I know that when the time comes there will be the wonderment in their eyes anticipating what’s in the boxes. I just wish I could be there when they open their presents but I’m afraid that I may have some plumbing problems that I couldn’t control.
I remember one Christmas when my girls where little and they had cut backs at my job several had been laid off and the rest that still had a job our hours went from 40 to 32. I had told my wife that it was going to take everything I got on my check just to pay the bills. But then someone told me about a place where I could do some piece work making rubber valves for pipe lines. I worked real hard for 5 weeks in my spare time and was able to get enough to have a little Christmas. But the week before Christmas one of our girls got real sick and was put in the hospital for a couple of days.
Back then we had to pay a co-pay which took everything we had for Christmas. It was the 23 of Dec. and all of a sudden we heard some noise outside and there where friends and neighbors with boxes of things.
I have always thought of myself as someone who doesn’t need help. I didn’t want to feel like a charity case but I always knew how I felt when I was able to help someone in trouble. My wife told me its time you let someone else feel good by helping you.
So if you think you see something in the night sky on the 24th don’t be surprised if you see me in a sleigh.
Ho, HO, HOO Marry Christmas
Dee
CLICK BINGO MAN TO JOIN
http://www.gfes.tpc.edu.tw/board/abc-song/Bingo.swf
ABOVE IS OUR THEAM SONG FOR OUR "BINGO CLUB"
GO AHEAD ,CLICK ON IT, AND "SING" ALONG.
HERE ARE OUR MASCOTS
FIRE DOG and SMOKEY
AND ME
BINGOMAN
MY OTHER SITE
Poetry Is… |
| by Beth Hammontree |
| Poetry is a window to the soul, Transcends time and place, Transforms the mundane and everyday Into the mystical and enchanting. Poetry invites intimacy, It brings us together. Poetry is art. Poetry is life. It is a gift that sits dormant In the soul of everyone, Waiting to be awakened. Poetry is a way To lose yourself to creativity. Poetry paints a thousand pictures Or is painted by them. Poetry is breath. Without it we are struck dumb, Flailing in uncertainty, Helpless to express our deepest emotions Without losing control of them. Poetry is thought, Crystallized Set in lines of ink That blur before Tear-filled eyes. Poetry is the only magic left. |
I just want to thank all of you for your prayers and support, It means a lot to me and my husband, It's nice to know that in this busy world we live in, that there are still kind and caring people out there, God Bless you all for taking the time to show you care.
It's almost six here, and we just got home, I brought Denny home today, I think this is the best place for him, all the tests are done, the second CT imaging scan. revealed that the anyureism was an old one, and was calcified and not bleeding, and was not an immediate danger,his altered mental state is still in question, he did not show ALL the classic signs of stroke, but there was evidence of old strokes, We will be doing followup neurological testing and evaluation, but We will be doing in in facilities close to home, .....
This whole experience has been both a nightmare and a blessing, The nightmare is watching someone you love lose himself, And the blessing is finding joy in that someones just being here, alive and as well as he can be, He may not always know what year it is or the name of a certain object, but he knows me , and he knows he's home and he's happy, All of the rest we can work on, and if this turns out to be some form of dementia, we will deal with it one day at a time, I'm just THANKFUL he's here, and at home with me..........
Again, to all my Friends, What a wonderful display of caring, THANK YOU!
Jen (Peg & Denny)
galloping hard and fast;
For the eyes of those desperate riders had sighted
their man at last-
Sighted him off to Eastward, where the Cree en-
campment lay,
Where the cotton woods fringed the river, miles and
miles away.
Mistake him? Never! Mistake him? the famous
Eagle Chief!
That terror to all the settlers, that desperate Cattle
Thief-
That monstrous, fearless Indian, who lorded it over
the plain,
Who thieved and raided, and scouted, who rode like
a hurricane!
But they’ve tracked him across the prairie: they’ve
followed him hard and fast;
For those desperate English settlers have sighted
their man at last.
Up they wheeled to the tepees, all their British
blood aflame,
Bent on bullets and bloodshed, bent on bringing
down their game;
But they searched in vain for the Cattle Thief: that
lion had left his lair,
And they cursed like a troop of demons - for the
women alone were there.
"The sneaking Indian coward," they hissed; "he
hides while yet he can;
He’ll come in the night for cattle, but he’s scared
to face a man."
"Never!" and up from the cotton woods rang the
voice of Eagle Chief;
And right out into the open stepped, unarmed, the
Cattle Thief.
Was that the game they had coveted? Scarce fifty
years had rolled
Over that fleshless, hungry frame, starved to the
bone and old;
Over that wrinkled, tawny skin, unfed by the
warmth of blood.
Over those hungry, hollow eyes that glared for the
sight of food.
He turned, like a hunted lion: "I know not fear,"
said he;
And the word outleapt from his shrunken lips in
the language of the Cree.
"I’ll fight you, white-skins, one by one, till I kill
you all," he said;
But the threat was scarcely uttered, ere a dozen
balls of lead
Whizzed through the air about him like a shower
of metal rain,
And the gaunt old Indian Cattle Thief dropped
dead on the open plain.
And that band of cursing settlers gave one trium-
phant yell,
And rushed like a pack of demons on the body that
writhed and fell.
"Cut the fiend up into inches, throw his carcass on
the plain;
Let the wolves eat the cursed Indian, he’d have
treated us the same."
A dozen hands responded, a dozen knives gleamed
high,
But the first stroke was arrested by a woman’s
strange, wild cry.
And out into the open, with a courage past be-
lief,
She dashed, and spread her blanket o’er the corpse
of the Cattle Thief;
And the words outleapt form her shrunken lips in
the language of the Cree,
"If you mean to touch that body, you must cut
your way through me."
And that band of cursing settlers dropped back-
ward one by one,
For they knew that an Indian woman roused, was
a woman to let alone.
And then she raved in a frenzy that they scarcely
understood,
Raved of the wrongs she had suffered since her
earliest babyhood:
"Stand back, stand back, you white-skins, touch
that dead man to your shame;
You have stolen my father’s spirit, but his body I
only claim.
You have killed him, but you shall not dare to
touch him now he’s dead.
You have cursed, and called him a Cattle Thief,
though you robbed him first of bread-
Robbed him and robbed my people - look there, at
that shrunken face,
Starved with a hollow hunger, we owe to you and
your race.
What have you left to us of land, what have you
left of game,
What have you brought but evil, and curses since
you came?
How have you paid us for our game? how paid us
for our land?
By a book, to save our souls from the sins you
brought in your other hand.
Go back with your new religion, we never have
understood
Your robbing an Indian’s body, and mocking his
soul with food.
Go back with your new religion, and find - if find
you can -
The honest man you have ever made from out a
starving man.
You say your cattle are not ours, your meat is not
our meat;
When you pay for the land you live in, we’ll pay
for the meat we eat.
Give back our land and our country, give back our
herds of game;
Give back the furs and the forests that were ours
before you came;
Give back the peace and the plenty. Then come
with your new belief,
And blame, if you dare, the hunger that drove him to
be a thief."
AUTHOUR P.JOHNSON "MOHAWK" MOHAWK NAME = "TEAKHIONWAKE"
I go to sleep;Im forty five.
With my five kids and spouse alive
We're at our cottage by the lake.
We swim,we sail and then we take
A boat ride to blueberry hill
Where we all pick for pies to fill.
The evening comes, the lake's is like glass
That cracks as loons and bevers pass. .
Then crickets start their nightly tune
Which ends the day,oh far too soon.
It was a time of so much fun.
I wake alone; I'm ninety - one.
BY DOUG E. BAR
