I found something out last night as I was preparing my lesson for next Sunday...Over half of the words in the New Testament were written by Luke.  I would have guessed it was Paul.  But counting just words, it was Luke.  The book of Luke, and Acts.

He is my favorite writer.  Paul is my favorite also...just a little behind Luke.  I like the way Luke is concise.  Orderly.  Like when he was the only one who said “If any man will come after me, let him take up his cross DAILY and follow me.  The others didn’t get the “daily” in there. 

We know he wrote the book of Acts, which is the only history book in the New Testament.  He calls his writing a “treatise” about all that Jesus began to do and teach.  He is writing to a friend named Theophilus to catch him up to date.  Luke was an investigator.  He went to the source for what he wrote.  Mary, Joseph, Elizabeth, etc. It is doubtful that he met Jesus personally, but he was a solid believer and we can be thankful that he preserved his research about the Lord.

I was able to go to church yesterday.  What an uplifting experience.  I have always been a three-times-church a week in the past.  But with all the sickness the devil has been throwing at me--coupled with the cold weather--I couldn’t get from my car and into the building.  So I taught my class by phone.  That is terribly difficult because when you can’t see a person’s face, you don’t know how are receiving it.  We tried Zoom--it didn’t work because only one person could talk at time and this class is a “jump right in” group.

February is almost over and I haven’t let go of 2023.  Time is in a speed race of some sort.  I’ve been watching less of TV.  It is so depressing.  Those of us who are in our 70’s and 80’s are wondering why we didn’t see this coming.  The 1940’s and 50’s were so wonderful.  Everybody seemed to love their neighbors and kids played outside up and down the block.  We didn’t have anything to fear.  But when the “God is dead” movement took hold in the 60’s and 70’s everything went down hill and nobody trusts anyone anymore.  And children are afraid.  You would never let a child walk a mile to get to school.  We did.  If anyone touched a child to harm them, they would end up dead.  Every ya-hoo in Oklahoma who drove a pickup had a rifle rack in the back window, but I never heard of anyone using it.  

 I will be in Tulsa on March 7.  If you want a signed book, give me a phone call and I will try to meet you somewhere.  I don’t have any of the books, so you will have to bring your own to me.

This entire “book” thing has been an education for me.  I am hundreds of dollars in the red mostly from gasoline and postage and shipping...but at least there are books in the bookstores and on Amazon.

I have finished a third book, but getting it out there is so difficult.  Even if you have a publisher who is working with you, getting it into their hands requires finding a time in their schedule to go over each page for editing.  And at my age, time is precious.

I appreciate everyone of you who are helping me.  Reading the books, and telling others about them.  Bless you.  Thank you--each one--for your positive encouragement.  It means a lot.

 I got my tax stuff mailed to the accountant.  I will never understand how anybody could endure four years of agony in econ. and accounting classes to become a tax specialist.  But--I am glad they did so that I don’t have to figure it out.  My sister did it, and is the top dog of payroll in the city of Jenks. 

I never did like arithmetic.   Memorizing and remembering all those adding and multiplying combinations.  Mathematics, however, I enjoy.  Many people don’t see the difference between arithmetic and mathematics.  Arithmetic is to math what letters are to words.

Molly does math.  Each evening, she crawls in my lap and conks out at exactly 6 o’clock.  When the sun starts going down, she has figured out that it is bed time.  I don’t know how she figures daylight savings time out in that formula, but she seems to know what time it is.  When she crawls in my lap, I tell her, “Go get in your crate,” and she runs to the bedroom and crawls in it.  It is her only redeeming quality.  We are working on the other qualities.

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People in the news have started using a new buzz word.  “Calculus.”  They say things like, “It’s just not in the calculus at this time,” etc. etc.  Or something like: “The calculus isn’t working.”  As a person who taught calculus over my 20 year career at NEO A&M college, I have no idea what they are talking about.  And I am positive that they don’t know what they mean either...it’s just one of those words that someone used and every one in the news liked the way it sounded and started using it.  And have no idea what calculus is.

Many of my students didn’t understand the word either...but they were able to use the principle involved to go on to upper division math classes that use calculus.  And to complete Physics and engineering classes.

I wish someone on the news desk would say something like, “Calculus?  What do you mean?  What are you saying?   What is the calculus of what you are trying to say?......I”m waiting on that.

 Every time I leave the house, I have to Molly-proof it.  Her favorite target is cords.  Lamp cords, charging cords, house-robe sashes, etc.  She especially likes the cord on the electric blanket I keep on my chair to warm my feet and the electric blanket on the bed. So I have been taking her in the car with me when I leave the house so that I can contain her.  And she gets cold, but won’t let me put her sweater on her.  The only thing she isn’t interested in is shoes.  It makes me regret that I didn’t brag on Squig more while he was here.  He was such a good dog.  The only thing he ever ate was the the cover and first five or six pages of a leather Bible.  He was filled with the word of God.

I miss him.  He was calm.  Loving and tender hearted.  Molly is a mess.  But she is endearing in her own way.  Just stubborn.  She is growing on me.  When 6 PM rolls around, I say, Molly, go get in your bed.  And she goes and hops in her crate.  At 2 in the morning she needs to go out and when she comes back, I tell her, “You can get in the Mommie’s bed and she crawls under the cover, wiggles down to my feet and never moves again until I get up in the morning.  It’s the only time she is good.  We’re working on the rest of it. 

Becky Bacon fell today and cut her head really bad.  She has a concussion and is really weak.  Pray for her.  The only good thing was that at the time, she was taking a donation check to the EMT’s, Firefighters, or Police--something like that--and the place was crammed with EMT’s who knew immediately what to do.  She said her clothing was so blood soaked that she threw everything away. 

I watch myself carefully anymore.  They say that the number one thing that older people do that is dangerous to their lives, is to fall.  

I received notice yesterday that my book “The Letter” has made the list for a national award.  This is so strange.  I am the same person as I’ve always been.  Nobody.  And then I turn 80 years old, write a book, and people read it.  and I’m having a hard time taking it all in.  Who would have ever thought such a thing?  I didn’t write it to sell books.  I wrote it for all of the people who were children back in the 60’s---and saw their parent walk out the door to go fight in a war that nobody wanted.   And get spit on when they came home. 

When the disciples (concerning Prayer) said, “Teach us how to do that.”  It was because they had a background of having to go to the temple and having to have someone else intercede for them.  Talking to God went through a priest.  You had to go to the temple.  On the Sabbath.  They didn’t have a daily prayer time.  Only rarely in the Jewish religion did people speak to God.  (David being the exception.)  So the disciples wanted to know how Jesus just wandered off somewhere and talked to God directly.  “Teach us to pray,” they asked him.  We want to do that, too.  

The book of Hebrews is a masterpiece.  All about the removal of priests from the lives of Christians and the insertion of a HIGH Priest--Jesus.  The writer lays out a brand new contract on how to reach God--how to pray.  It is through the High Priest Jesus.  He has replaced the old prayer channel.  He is the new way.  He is the High Priest forever for you and me.  “In Jesus name.”  Not some earthly priest who is himself a sinner, but a perfect lamb, slain from the foundation of the earth for our sins.  The holy of holies on earth was just a prototype of the heavenly holy of holies.  Read Hebrews.  Under line the words High Priest. Hebrews is not like any other book in the Bible. It lays out a new covenant between you and God.  Your covenant, contract, is sealed in blood. The blood of Jesus.  Our lamb.

And after Becky and Kathy brought tea and hot rolls for me, Carolyn brought me a stack of ken-ken puzzles to feed my brain.  She had cut them out for me, every day, for weeks and weeks.

I’ve been trying to teach Molly to do what I tell her.  She thinks she is in control...and regularly proves it.  This morning, I took her to the groomer where a big dog was going in the door. (she weighs 14 pounds--she is little)  She tore the collar off her neck and pulled the leash out of my hand and ran to check him out.  I like to never got her back on the leash.  I  just don’t know how to bring her under control--and it is a problem.  She is not afraid of anything.  She may have to go to obedience training.  I’m wobbly on my feet and I’m afraid that she is going to pull me over--all 14 pounds of her.  I’ve never had a dog that seems to be untrainable.  

I would send her to the pound, but she has come such a long way I hate for her to adjust to another family.  She is a street dog that was abused, broken ribs, deep cuts.  Wounded, and she loves me.

    Friends are the most important part of my life right now.  They take care of me.  Like I said yesterday, at the book signing, Becky Bacon brought me tea, Kathy Davidson brought me rolls.  When I got home, Jeanette texted that she had made me a coconut custard--which will be breakfast for the next week.  Six eggs and a cup of heavy cream and toasted coconut.  Delish!!  And Josh brought me french fries last night.

    Jeanine--across the street calls every time she goes to the grocery store.  I gave her a credit card to keep.  I haven’t been to a grocery store five times in the last six months.  She won’t even let me come to her house to get the sacks.  She delivers them.

    What would I do without friends!!??  And I also have two daughters close by.  My girls both are working full time, but take off when I need them.  Pat drove me to Pryor for the book signing.  She had to take a personal day off.  Becky drove me to Oklahoma City (downtown) to a doctor’s appointment.  I don’t drive in Oklahoma City.

    We need to be thankful for what we have rather than what we don’t have.  I may be shot physically, but I have family and friends.  And today, my physical therapist dismissed me.  She declared me “fit.”  I just have to keep on doing my exercises.  Which I will do--even though I really, really, really don’t want to.

    The book signing on Saturday was a lot of fun.  Dozens of friends came to visit.  Becky Bacon--who knows that I love darjeeling tea brought a thermos of it, along with a porcelain cup for me to pour it into to drink.  She knows that I always (always) drink out of bone china.  No mugs for me--ever.  So I sipped tea and signed books.  

    Then Kathy Mitchell Davidson brought two pan of fresh baked rolls she baked that morning for me, because she knows my love of her bread.  I popped one out to eat with my tea and everyone in line wanted one...the pan got passed and Kathy was dubbed the bread queen.  I got home with a pan and a half.

    What did I ever do to deserve such friends?  It takes a life time.  And I regret moving to Edmond every time I visit Pryor.

    One fun thing is that when the stories start, you find out things that you never knew! About everybody.  Even about myself.  

    My brother came and everyone wanted him to sign the book as well.  He said, “I didn’t write this”  They answered, “The book is about your life!”  He relented and signed the books as well.    

I always saved the best until last.  But Ken always said, “Eat the best you have, wear the best you have, go to the best place you want to go...” and so on.

I asked him, why would you want to do that???  I told him: If you save the best till last you will always have something to look forward to!!! The best is on the horizon.  

He said, “If you eat, wear, do etc...the best, then----the things that are left will have a best thing in them.   And you can do that next.  That way,  you will always be enjoying the very best of everything.  Every day.  All the time.

He had a way of looking at things that changed the way I thought sometimes.   I guess we grow up hearing something,  and think that is the way things ought to be...but sometimes we need to rethink.