What Is Love?



1. When my grandma got arthritis, she couldn't bend over and paint her toenails anymore. So my grandpa does it for her now all the time, even when his hands got arthritis too. That's love.
Rebecca - age 8

2. When someone loves you, the way they say your name is different. You just know that your name is safe in their mouths.
Billy - age 4

3. Love is when a girl puts on perfume and a boy puts on shaving cologne and they go out and smell each other.
Kari - age 5

4. Love is when you go out to eat and give somebody most of your French Fries without making them give you any of theirs.
Chrissy - age 6
5. Love is what makes you smile when you're tired.
Terri - age 4

6. Love is when my mommy makes coffee for my daddy and she takes a sip giving it to him, to make sure the taste is OK.
Danny - age 7

7. Love is when you kiss all the time. Then when you get tired of kissing, you still want to be together and you talk more. My mommy and daddy are like that. They look gross when they kiss.
Emily - age 8

8. Love is what's in the room with you at Christmas if you stop opening presents and listen.
Bobby - age 7

9. If you want to learn to love better, you should start with a friend who you hate.
Nikka - age 6

10. Love is when you tell a guy you like his shirt, then he wears it everyday.
Noelle - age 7

11. Love is like a little old woman and a little old man who are still friends, even after they know each other so well.
Tommy - age 6

12. My mommy loves me more than anybody. You don't see anyone else kissing me to sleep at night.
Clare - age 6

13. Love is when mommy sees daddy smelly and sweaty and still says he is handsomer than Robert Redford.
Chris - age 7

14. Love is when your puppy licks your face even after you left him alone all day.
Mary Ann - age 4

15. When you love somebody, your eyelashes go up and down and little stars come out of you.
Karen - age 7

16. Love is when mommy sees daddy on the toilet and doesn't think it's gross.
Mark - age 6

17. You really shouldn't say "I LOVE YOU" unless you mean it. But if you mean it, you should say it a lot. People forget.
Jessica - age 8

And the winner was a 4 year old child whose next door neighbor was an elderly man who had just lost his wife. When the child saw the man cry, the little boy went over into the man's yard and climbed on top of the man's lap and just sat there.

When the boy's mother asked him what he'd said to the neighbor, the little boy said, "Nothing, I just helped him cry."

Make every effort to live in peace with everyone and to be holy;

without holiness no one will see the Lord.

Hebrews 12:14

Letter Written by Fra Giovanni



I am your friend and my love for you goes deep. There is nothing I can give you which you have not got, but there is much, very much, that, while I cannot give it, you can take.

No heaven can come to us unless our hearts find rest in today. Take heaven!

No peace lies in the future which is not hidden in this present little instant. Take peace!

The gloom of the world is but a shadow. Behind it, yet within our reach is joy. There is radiance and glory in the darkness could we but see - and to see we have only to look. I beseech you to look!

Life is so generous a giver, but we, judging its gifts by the covering, cast them away as ugly, or heavy or hard. Remove the covering and you will find beneath it a living splendor, woven of love, by wisdom, with power.

Welcome it, grasp it, touch the angel's hand that brings it to you. Everything we call a trial, a sorrow, or a duty, believe me, that angel's hand is there, the gift is there, and the wonder of an overshadowing presence. Our joys, too, be not content with them as joys. They, too, conceal diviner gifts.

Life is so full of meaning and purpose, so full of beauty - beneath its covering - that you will find earth but cloaks your heaven.

Courage, then, to claim it, that is all. But courage you have, and the knowledge that we are all pilgrims together, wending through unknown country, home.

And so, at this time, I greet you. Not quite as the world sends greetings, but with profound esteem and with the prayer that for you now and forever, the day breaks, and the shadows flee away.

Fra Giovanni

 "I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will havetribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.”

John 16:33

And If I Did Not Make Mistakes

And if I did not make mistakes
And give too brief a thought to heavy questions
And too much time to little matter;
Or if I always knew which road to travel
Where every step would lead me into daylight
And if each face that turned to watch me pass
Was broken by a smile;
Or if whenever I should choose to lay my heart
Bare upon the sun-warmed grass,
It always was returned with tender touches
And carried by a song;
And if my heaviest burden were only to be
A breeze upon my back, and blossom in my hair,
And my brow was never crossed with lines of pain;
If all this endless summer were my lot
And winter's fury never beat me back,
Then I never would have seen the stormy nights
Through which I've struggled, fought and won;
I never would have known the joy of needed comfort given,
Or the essence of a friend.

Katie Paton

Scottish Poet

Though he fall, he shall not be cast headlong, for the Lord upholds his hand.

Psalm 37:24        

Being Polite

I walked with a friend to the newsstand the other night, and he bought a paper, thanking the owner politely. The owner, however, did not even acknowledge it.

"A sullen fellow, isn't he?" I commented as we walked away.

"Oh, he's that way every night," shrugged my friend.

"Then why do you continue being so polite to him?" I asked.

And my friend replied, "Why should I let him determine how I'm going to act?"

by Sidney J. Harris

And the King will say, 'I tell you the truth, when you did it to one of the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were doing it to me!'

Matthew 25: 40

Friendship Improves Happiness and Abates Misery



By Doubling Our Joy, and Dividing Our Grief

They call themselves the "Ladies of the Lake" but they never set out to be a club.  Rather, the group began when one of the women returned home exhausted from a business trip and came to the conclusion that she had too much of one thing in he life:  MEN!  With a husband and two boys at home, a work environment that was mostly male, and an elderly father and uncle for which to care, she resolved to set some time aside for herself and a few female friends.

Over the years, Paula hadn't cultivated very many friendships with other women, but she was determined to see that change.  Eventually she discovered three like-minded women:  one owned a machine shop, one worked or a contractor, and one ran a truck stop.  The women pulled out their calendars over dinner one evening and agreed on this schedule--"A trip to the lake at least once a quarter!"

At the lake, the women would listen to Mozart, fix gourmet dinners, and sit on the deck overlooking the water.  They would talk for hours--about everything--without an agenda.

Over the years, they became very close and often refer to each other as "sister."  Says Paula, "Nobody understands like another woman."

For all of my "sisters" I love you and I thank you!

A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity.

Proverbs 17:17