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WITandWISDOM(tm) - February 9, 2005 ISSN 1538-8794 ~~~~~~~ THOUGHTS: "The problem is not that there are problems. The problem is expecting otherwise and thinking that having problems is a problem." -- Theodore Rubin Source: The Funnies, http://groups.yahoo.com/group/andychaps_the-funnies ~~~~~~~ SPECIAL THOUGHTS: A story tells of a merchant in a small town who had identical twin sons. The boys worked for their father in the department store he owned and, when he died, they took over the store. Everything went well until the day a dollar bill disappeared. One of the brothers had left the bill on the cash register and walked outside with a customer. When he returned, the money was gone. He asked his brother, "Did you see that dollar bill on the cash register?" His brother replied that he had not. But the young man kept probing and questioning. He would not let it alone. "Dollar bills just don't get up and walk away! Surely you must have seen it!" There was subtle accusation in his voice. Tempers began to rise. Resentment set in. Before long, a deep and bitter chasm divided the young men. They refused to speak. They finally decided they could no longer work together and a dividing wall was built down the center of the store. For twenty years hostility and bitterness grew, spreading to their families and to the community. Then one day a man in an automobile licensed in another state stopped in front of the store. He walked in and asked the clerk, "How long have you been here?" The clerk replied that he'd been there all his life. The customer said, "I must share something with you. Twenty years ago I was 'riding the rails' and came into this town in a boxcar. I hadn't eaten for three days. I came into this store from the back door and saw a dollar bill on the cash register. I put it in my pocket and walked out. All these years I haven't been able to forget that. I know it wasn't much money, but I had to come back and ask your forgiveness." The stranger was amazed to see tears well up in the eyes of this middle-aged man. "Would you please go next door and tell that same story to the man in the store?" he said. Then the man was even more amazed to see two middle-aged men, who looked very much alike, embracing each other and weeping together in the front of the store. After twenty years, the brokenness was mended. The wall of resentment that divided them came down. Source: Tidbits Daily Devotional, mailto:the-tidbits-devotional-subscribe@strategicnetwork.org ~~~~~~~ THIS & THAT: Celebrity Epitaphs Tiger Woods at Six Under Col. Sanders Kicks the Bucket Mike Myers, "Wayne's World" Star, Lives -- Not! Lee Iacocca Recalled by Maker George W. Bush Deceasifies Clinton Doesn't Inhale Ed McMahon's Relatives May Have Already Inherited 10 MILLION DOLLARS! Autopsy Confirms Death of Keith Richards Meat Loaf Goes Cold Roger Ebert: 10 Toes Up Source: Top Greetings ~~~~~~~ KEEP SMILING: When a new permanent turned out to be a disaster, I phoned my husband and issued a one-line warning: "Don't say anything about my hair." During dinner, we discussed the weather, his day at the office — anything but my hair. I began to feel uneasy. Finally, when we were washing the dishes, he said in a serious tone, "You'd better go now. My wife will be here any moment, and she wouldn't like to find me with a strange woman." Source: Top Greetings ~~~~~~~ TRIVIA: Note: Just a correction, to the Adventist Review article in the 28 January 2005 newsletter. Ireland and Finland are not the first countries in the world to impose bans on smoking in public places when they did so in 2004, South Africa did so in 2001, followed by some other countries prior to 2004 - see below... http://www.suntimes.co.za/2004/06/06/news/news17.asp http://www.suntimes.co.za/2004/06/06/news/news18.asp Submitted by Wolfe Braude ~~~ Suffering from chronic arthritis pain? It might be time for a little Mozart. Sixty-six elderly arthritis patients took part in a study recently reported in the Journal of Advanced Nursing. Half of the participants sat quietly and listened to 20 minutes of music by Mozart each day for two weeks. The other half just sat quietly or read something for the same period of time. Those in the music group experienced steadily decreasing pain scores over the 14 days, while those in the control group did not. Music, it seems, can calm the savage beast of arthritis pain as well. So, along with other pain-management techniques such as exercise and your doctor's advice, don't overlook the soothing, pain-reducing potential of music. From – HealthNews Source: Adventist Review, ISSN 0161-1119, (c) December 23, 2004, http://www.adventistreview.org/ Submitted by Mary Thayne |