Thomas Edison's teachers said he was "too stupid to learn anything." He was fired from his first two jobs for being "non-productive." As an inventor, Edison made a 1,000 unsuccessful attempts at inventing the light bulb. When a reporter asked, "How did it feel to fail 1,000 times?" Edison replied, "I didn’t fail 1,000 times. The light bulb was an invention with 1,000 steps."
I was tired of the lack of civility in today's world and took a pledge.
http://thedahnreport.blogspot.com/2010/05/my-pledge.html
Some of you took the pledge with me. How did you do? I give myself a C and hope to improve that to an A in 2011.
One of the most memorable and fun events for me was the cousin reunion here in July. Because Mom really couldn't travel to the cousins, the cousins traveled to Mom's. I was put in charge of pulling it all together. Frankly, I did a damn good job.
Google has a stat service on all blogs. It really doesn't tell you much but one of the more interesting features is it will calculate the most read posts. The most read post on the blog of 2010 was my report about the cousin reunion:
http://thedahnreport.blogspot.com/2010/08/reunion-full-story.html
After the reunion Mom and I spent a lot of time going over family pictures preparing for cousin Barbara's visit. Barbara was and is working on the family history. Getting ready for Barbara's visit produced the second most read blog entry of 2010.
http://thedahnreport.blogspot.com/2010/08/family-history-in-pictures.html
It was a wonderful look for me at the past and how I arrived at where I am today. I just didn't think anyone else would be all that interested in pictures of my family or my history.
Your comments are appreciated. Remember you can share your memorable moments of 2010 at any time.
WHO AM I?
I was born in 1850 and was the first American citizen to be canonized by the Roman Catholic Church. I was the tenth of eleven children to rich cherry tree farmers. Only four of the eleven siblinhd survived beyond adolescence. Small and weak as a child I remained in delicate health throughout my life. I became the mother superior of the House of Providence orphanage in Codogno, where I taught. The orphanage was closed. Myself and six other sisters that took religious vows with my founded the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. I composed the rules and constitution of the order, and she continued as its superior-general until my death. The order established seven homes and a free school and nursery in its first five years. Its good works brought me to the attention of Giovanni Scalabrini, bishop of Piacenza and of Pope Leo XIII. The Pope sent me to New York City to help the Italian immigrants "Not to the East but to the West". I obtained the permission of Archbishop Michael Corrigan to found an orphanage. It was the first of 67 institutions I founded in New York, Chicago, Des Plaines, Seattle, New Orleans, Denver, Golden, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, and in countries throughout South America and Europe. Long after my death, the Missionary Sisters would achieve my goal of being a missionary to China. I died of complications from dysentery at age 67. My legacy is healing, teaching, and caring around the world. Who Am I?
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8 comments:
I'm going to give myself a B. I think I'm pretty darned good on those things (most of them) that are applicable to me. I fall way short on telling people I love them, but if I started to do that every day with my daughter, she'd think I'd gone senile for sure. I'm sure she knows.
You certainly do have a lot of memorable family moments. Do I envy people with large families? Sometimes, in some ways. At other times, I'm quite glad to not be too close to extended family. It certainly makes things easier at Christmas time. {eg}
Hi Pat
Good going on the B! I think the love you everyday meant our moms and dads since we just don't know how long we will have them.
My dad had five sisters so that allowed for a lot of relatives. And we had second and third cousins at the reunion. So not to bad.
Bill
I think I did pretty well on the pledge, although not sure what kind of grade I'd give me. I don't tell my family I love them everyday, as if I started making daily long distance calls, one or more of them would have me carried away. But the rest of it went pretty well, especially trying to be a blessing to someone each day.
Yes, I remember how much we all enjoyed hearing about the reunion and your time going through the pictures and all the wonderful memories (and how hard you worked, to make it all come together.
I'm lumping a bunch of memorable moments together, which should count for half a dozen or more (g). The line dance shows we do for the nursing homes and assisted living facilities. There's no way to describe the joy we get and the fun we have, visiting these places, dancing, doing sing-alongs and later mingling with the residents. Looking out over the audience, seeing the smiles, seeing people singing along, having fun, while we have fun ourselves. The military salute shows in spring, the Elvis shows in the summer and the Christmas productions are all different, but most of the residents interact with us and have a good time and it's just... a treat. I don't know how else to describe it. We did our last Christmas show yesterday and a good time was had by all. There was a woman in the front row, a double amputee. She came early, enjoyed watching us get ready, I don't think I ever saw her without a smile on her face and she sang every song and clapped along with the music. Her joy and sense of fun was better than many people in perfect health, thirty years of age and with two good legs. Most of the residents were as excited about having a visit from Santa, distributing candy, as any five year old I've seen. And the "hootin' and hollarin'" for the Elvis shows, the tears in some eyes when we do the patriotic shows are pictures that can be called up whenever I want to. I think most here saw the Elvis show video, so you know what I mean. Each show is memorable in its own way, like the one where the gentleman pulled me into a huge bear hug afterwards and said what fun he'd had.
Hi DR
My second attempt at this message.
I will post the pictures that you emailed me on Friday as part of the Christmas Eve post. Thanks for sending them.
The memory of the line dance shows is a real treat. Just think of how many lives you have impacted and improved with those shows? You made my day with the description of yesterday's show. Is there a you tube video of it?
It looks like I did the worst with my pledge of anyone!
Bill
Unfortunately, no video of any of the Christmas shows. Our videographer moved to AZ, as you may recall, unfortunately. One of the nice things MA did, which didn't show up on YouTube, but we have CDs, was to take pix of the audience during the show.
I don't think you did less than Pat or myself, I think you're too demanding and hard on yourself, when I think back over the blog entries since we took the pledge.
Hi DR
I wish there was a family member among all the line dances that had a video camera that you could take with you on your performances. The CD would have made a great Christmas gift for a lot of people.
Thank you for the nice comment about the pledge.
Bill
Not sure what grade to give myself either without sounding as if I am tooting my own horn. :)
But I will say, I think I have stayed true to this as well as most here. I do always tell everyone in my family and some outside it, that I love them, and I am a "hugger", my mom was also I think its in my blood.
I am however not sure on the last one of expectations. I think with my living situation, I may tend to project my expectations onto others more than I need. :)
Hi Dona
OK I will toot your horn. You get an A plus.
And it ok to project your expectations to other one them. Like get your shit together and be nice. That should be the least you expect of them.
Bill
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