it's become a morning ritual of mine to listen to NPR on the way into work...i really love their reporting style and stories...one of my favorite bits on morning edition is called the Perspective. Each day at precisely 23 before the hour they feature a different person, not a celebrity, just an everyday person sharing a certain perspective on life. i love these bits every morning, but yesterday's was particularly inspiring for me.
a physics teacher from san francisco talked about how even though he only grossed 16,000 dollars last year (impoverished by bay area standards) he felt like he lived better than most that have gone before him...not for posh or extravagant reasons but for many simple reasons that I often take for granted. For example, he talked about how he lived near the ocean and was healthy enough to wake up and go surfing some mornings, how he had been able to travel to continents that even kings of the past were unaware existed, he gets to eat fresh fruit and vegetables every day, he doesn't have to worry about fatal disease like the plague, he has a healthy set of teeth and has plenty of clean drinking water so much that he actually gets to shower with it--an unheard of luxury except for royalty back in the day.
listening to his perspective gave me a sense of peace and a feeling of gratitude for the life l lead. I , like anyone get down about trivial things from time to time and it was wonderful to be reminded of just how rich most of us are here in the states.
On a side note, I saw the most beautiful flower today and found out that it is called a passion flower....I included a picture up top!
