One Hundred Things My Mother Taught Me A Million Times – Chapter 89

#89 – “Socialize with people younger than yourself. It will keep you young.”

All of us have memories so crystalized that we remember the color of the air around us, what we were wearing, where we were standing. One such moment for me was the day I asked my mother why all her friends were so much younger. She said, “Because they keep me young.” But I quickly realized the real reason mom hung out with people younger was because friends her age were dead, and I think that was my first realization of my own mortality. Life goes on, but not everyone is along for the ride.

What must it feel like to watch your friends leave this world one by one?  I remember feeling a little untethered when my mom, my last remaining parent, died. And as the baby of my family, I think I’ll feel a similar loss, when and if all my siblings go before me.

From a less morose perspective, I can certainly relate to mom’s #89. It seems many people my age, rubbed raw by the trials of life, can be cynical, grumpy and boring. So, like mom, I gravitate towards young, optimistic, cheerful friends to buoy my own attitude and to drag me out of my rut.

My young and young-minded friends still believe in the possibilities of life, the goodness of man and womankind, and the value of activism. They jump up and down when they hear great music, are fearless and adventuresome, embrace overindulgence, and stay up past 8 pm. All things I feel slipping from my grip.

Of course I can’t give up my old, cynical, grumpy and boring friends because I’ve fallen in love with them. They don’t suffer fools, know when to hold ‘em and know when to fold ‘em, are packed full of wisdom, always have your back, and don’t mind going to bed at 8 pm.

So I have both old, cynical, grumpy friends, and young, optimistic, cheerful friends, which is really nice.

Mom was right. We should socialize with people younger than ourselves. And, I would add, cling to and value friends who have stuck by us in spite of the fact that we are old, cynical, grumpy and boring,

Have a happy and safe 4th.

Summer Fun With Grandkids

I hope you will take 2 minutes to view this little video of two of our grandkids' week with us in Austin. Great Kids - Great Memories.

Little Princes: One Man's Promise to Bring Home the Lost Children of Nepal by Conor Grennan

Several decades ago, while managing a small dude ranch in the mountains of New Mexico, I met an elderly woman who had served for five years in the Peace Corp after retiring from teaching.  It never occurred to me that anyone over the age of 25 would do such a thing. Since then I’ve harbored a secret desire to “save the world” in some exotic location (with air conditioning). I've also become a sucker for stories about do-gooders, like Three Cups of Tea, and  today’s book review, Little Princes: One Man's Promise to Bring Home the Lost Children of Nepal by Conor Grennan.

Little Princes is about Grennan’s founding of Next Generation Nepal, a non-profit dedicated to reconnecting trafficked children with their families, and to combating the root causes of child trafficking in rural villages in Nepal. His adventure begins when he signs up to volunteer in a Nepalese orphanage as an excuse to take a sabbatical from his government job in Prague. He quickly falls in love with the little children in the orphanage and, when he discovers that the children were rescued from child traffickers, he becomes determined to return the children to their parents. 
There are a number of conflicts in Grennan’s story that make it compelling. First is the issue of child trafficking. The fact that there are children held in dark basements for months with little food and no sanitation, and then sold into slavery, made me feel separated from reality and sheltered from the ugliness of humanity. It also made me want to toss my computer aside, sell my house and search door to door for unprotected children, which is pretty much what Grennan does in his story. But he soon runs into political and cultural barriers – corruption, poverty, ignorance, etc. – all part of the reality of why child trafficking persists. Click on Read More Below...