by Viola Branch
Do you nurture the friendships that you have? Do you make an effort to assure that your friends know that you care about them? I have to admit that there are times when I allow work; tasks and life get in the way of taking the time to let the people I care about know that they are special. That is when I realize that I need to take a time out and get my life back into perspective. It is easy to forget that the important things in life are the relationships we make along the way.
The anecdotes of modern astronomy affect me in the same way as do those faint revelations of the Real which are vouchsafed to men from time to time, or rather from eternity to eternity. When I remember the history of that faint light in our firmament which we call Venus, which ancient men regarded, and which most modern men still regard, as a bright spark attached to a hollow sphere revolving about our earth, but which we have discovered to be another world, in itself,—how Copernicus, reasoning long and patiently about the matter, predicted confidently concerning it, before yet the telescope had been invented,... and that within a century after his death the telescope was invented, and that prediction verified, by Galileo,—I am not without hope that we may, even here and now, obtain some accurate information concerning that OTHER WORLD which the instinct of mankind has so long predicted.
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
A few weeks ago I realized that I had not talked with my best friend for close to a month. We had emailed each other, but we had not spoken on the phone or seen each other for quite some time. I called her and suggested we spend some time shopping together. When I called her we were both at work. We were comparing schedules and having a hard time coming up with a date and time that we were both available. She announced that she had compensation time coming from work so she could go during the day. I told her I had worked several hours over time also and could take time. We impulsively decided to meet that day. We would take off for an early lunch and not go back to the office. My friend said that she needed to get a present for her mother’s birthday so it would be perfect to go shopping. She said we needed to look for womens clothing.
We met for lunch and spent almost two hours catching up on events in each other’s lives. We then went shopping for womens clothing for her mother. Her mother has had issues with her weight for most of her life. Due to this she has a difficult time buying clothes. My friend said that misses sizes no longer fit her mother so she needed to go into the womens clothing section. Her mom tends to pick out things that are over sized to help hide her weight. This causes her to look even bigger. My friend wanted to get her a jacket that she could leave opened with a shirt underneath.
Since you are my readers, and I have not been much of a traveler, I will not talk about people a thousand miles off, but come as near home as I can. As the time is short, I will leave out all the flattery, and retain all the criticism.
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
As we were shopping in the womens clothing my friend was surprised to see the nice selection of clothes available in larger sizes. There were many updated styles to choose from. My friend was having a hard time making a decision on which jacket to buy and what size to get. I suggested a gift card to the womens clothing store and a lunch date for her mom. My friend decided that spending the time with her mother would be the nicest gift of all.