Making Tired Eyes Smile®
begins with a picture
to tell a story,
Friends
It is nice to
have friends.
We can tell our
friends secrets.
Things we would
not tell our mothers.
Friends make us
feel special.
They make us
feel liked.
Friends can
like more than one person.
Lynn’s
first friend was at school.
Martha was her
name.
Lynn and Martha
walked home from school together.
They talked
about school and other friends.
Could they get
A’s?
Yes! Lynn
got A’s. |
to play with words,
Other
names for friend
dduby buddy
alp pal
ylla ally
panioncom companion
humc chum
|
to compose a poem,
F-R-I-E-N-D-S
Friends are pretty special,
Right for us.
Immediately we are at ease.
Everyone has friends.
New friendships are pretty
special.
Dear friends
Smile at each other.
|
to savor the poem of another,
The Arrow and the Song (Henry Wadsworth Longfellow)
I shot an arrow into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not
where;For, so swiftly it flew, the
sight
Could not follow it in its
flight.
I breathed a song into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not
where;
For who has sight so keen and
strong
That it can follow the flight of
song?
Long, long afterward, in an oak
I found the arrow, still
unbroken;
And the song, from beginning to
end,
I found again in the heart of a
friend.
|
to express gratitude,
Today we are thankful for . .
.
being alive, being available,
thinking of friendships,
having money, good husbands,
when Barbara finds her glasses,
to get up and get around to see
a lot of things,
being loved, good health and education.
|
and ends with a story.
Grandmother’s Friends
My grandmother observes one of her favorite Finnish
customs. Once a week she and her Finnish lady friends come together for a
community sauna. I remember six to eight
grandmothers speaking Finnish sitting on wooden bleachers as the water is
tossed onto the hot rocks. I don’t know what they are saying so I just look at
them. I am eight years old.
I see wrinkles. All the ladies are wearing wrinkles. And
yet, I don’t think they notice. These ladies sit proudly on the sauna boards.
No towels clothe their bodies from the eyes of their friends or a curious
granddaughter. I doubt the Finnish chatter is about sagging breasts, potbellies
or cellulite. There is a comfortable reverence for the body sculpting nature
has given them.
So at age fifty-five could I sit proudly on sauna boards
with my friends without a towel? Would I
be so comfortable in my own skin that I could speak without wondering what my
friends were thinking about the sculpting my nature has done to my body? I don’t think so. At least not until I lose
ten pounds.
|
At first glance one might think it is the group
story, word play, poetry events, expressions of gratitude and listening to a
story that are the outcomes of Making Tired Eyes Smile®. Don’t be
fooled.
The real outcomes are:
the smiling faces,
the outbursts of laughter,
the delight in creating
something meaningful and
the camaraderie of community.
It is each friend in the circle feeling:
respect,
validation,
joy and
friendship.
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