Life is good.

My FTP is back (thank you, J!).

My Final Client project is done (if you see something that looks like crap, it's because the new DNS pointer hasn't propagated yet... I hope).

I had a good jewelry class, wherein I learned a specific new skill.

I'm getting better at the whole waitressing thing, and may actually eventually earn enough to get by.

AF.

The risks are beginning to show their rewards. It's early days yet, but I'm feeling positive, and that's more than enough for now.

Frustration

So I finally have a small amount of time to write. And my freakin' FTP goes down.

*sigh*

Cold hard cash

I'm about to invoice the Final Client.

Even though I'm making a ton more on this development work than at the restaurant, it feels less signficant. They'll pay me by check, and it'll go straight to the bank.

At the restaurant I'm getting paid in cash. Cash. The green stuff. I can hold the crinkled saggy bills in my hand. There aren't very many of them, and the denominations are unimpressive, but they are physical, they are in my hand, they are real.

The monkey brain is funny that way, it's a remarkably literal organ.

Show me the ocular proof.
I want tangible results.
Oh, I get it now.

It's a wonder I manage any abstract thought at all.

Where were you when...?

I have too many answers to questions that start that way.

...when Robert Kennedy was shot (I was too young to remember specifics about JFK)?

...when Martin Luther King was shot?

...when Nixon resigned?

...when Saigon fell?

...when Challenger exploded?

...when the Marine barracks in Lebanon were bombed.

...when the World Trade Center and the Pentagon were attacked?

...when anthrax threatened your mail?

...when a sniper began to commit mass murder in your city?

...when Columbia was destroyed?

The most traumatic elements of memory in my childhood came in clumps, but nothing like the onslaught we've experienced in the last year and a half.

As I said to my Final Client this morning, I've decided that it's more important than ever to celebrate the good stuff ~ if only as an antidote to the oppressive weight of difficult and stressful events.

We need to get together and congratulate one another when we complete a significant project or reach a major milestone. We ought to have a party for the friends and family we love. We should give each other presents, and deserved compliments, and hugs and smiles... just because we appreciate each other, because it's good to be alive, and because we are grateful for the daily blessings we receive through no particular merit of our own.

With all the clouds looming on our collective horizon, it is our responsibility and our privilege ~ individually and collectively ~ to create shafts of sunlight to bask in, if only for a while. It doesn't take much to bring a little extra pleasure and joy into the world: pay attention, be considerate, go one step beyond the expected, speak kindly. The smallest offering makes such a difference. A burden is lightened, impatience soothed, anger defused, courtesy returned.

Let's treat one another beautifully. We were made for faith, not fear, and for love, not despair.