Living Large In Our Little House

The first time I saw it in the store, Dale asked me if I wanted it and I told him I would get it on my Kindle.

He said, “Are you sure that will fit on your Kindle?”

I laughed and told him it would.

For me, books are as tempt­ing a buy as candy is to a kid and when I saw “11–22-63,” the new book by Stephen King, it was like that great big lol­lipop, just beg­ging to be devoured.

The events of that day in 1963, changed the course for America, not just dur­ing that decade, but altered our nation’s his­tory from that day for­ward and made more than one per­son won­der what the world would have been like if President Kennedy had con­tin­ued to be a part of it.

It was that generation’s Pearl Harbor and our generation’s 9–11. A day so hor­ri­ble for our coun­try that no one who was alive would ever for­get where they were or what they were doing when they heard the news and a date even most of those who weren’t alive know.

I wasn’t born yet, but the events of that day helped begin my life.

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I admit that I’m a true crime junkie.

As a Kansan, my mother became inter­ested when Truman Capote released “In Cold Blood.” The hor­rific mur­der of a small town farm­ing fam­ily in Kansas was so unbe­liev­able to most peo­ple at the time that the book drew read­ers who wanted to under­stand how such a thing could happen.

The superb writ­ing and com­mer­cial suc­cess of the new genre ensured it would con­tinue long after Capote’s book was off the best seller lists.

It made a life-long fan of my mother of the genre and by exten­sion, myself as well. “Helter Skelter” was the first “big” book I read as a 8 or 9 year old.

But it isn’t enter­tain­ment so much as it con­tin­ues to be that need to under­stand what makes these mon­sters tick.

That is what makes “The Last Place You’d Look,” by Carole Moore, such an excel­lent read for peo­ple who enjoy the true crime genre in books or tele­vi­sion mag­a­zine shows such as “Dateline,” “48 Hours” and “Disappeared.”

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On this day that we are sup­pos­edly giv­ing thanks for all of our bless­ings (and not mak­ing it about fam­ily squab­bles, the size of the meal, shop­ping, or who won the foot­ball game), I’m, of course, tak­ing this oppor­tu­nity to blog about gratitude.

On most days, I have an “atti­tude of grat­i­tude,” I find it within myself to be thank­ful for at least one thing in my life that is good. Oftentimes, when I am writ­ing in my vision jour­nal, I try to find as many things as I can, not lim­it­ing myself by find­ing “at least five,” or “at least ten.”

Sometimes I come up with a whole page of things I am thank­ful for.

I think for some peo­ple, it isn’t so easy. They will always find their glass half empty, or wish­ing for more than what they have. They see grat­i­tude as a fine line of accept­ing what they have as “defeat” or that they may not ever have more money, that big­ger house, the newest tech­no­log­i­cal device or the lat­est car.

They fail to see that we all must be truly grate­ful for every­thing in our lives in order to attract more.

On the days I find many things to be thank­ful for, it cre­ates a pos­i­tive energy that allows me to accom­plish more in my per­sonal and my work life.

That’s how grat­i­tude plays into the Law of Attraction.

I hope all of our Living Large com­mu­nity, whether you reside in the U.S. or some­place else, will find time to count your bless­ings today.

It will make you feel bet­ter and just might help attract more of what you want into your life.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Dakota

I apol­o­gize for my unex­pected absence from the blog on Tuesday. It has been the “Week of the Dog” around here.

Dakota, our Doxie/Beagle mix is hav­ing ter­ri­ble prob­lems with her aller­gies again. This past spring, she dug her eyes so badly that she actu­ally cre­ated what the vet called a “divot” on her cornea. It took us sev­eral weeks for us to get that to heal so she wouldn’t lose her eyesight.

This past week­end, she began dig­ging every­where (except her eyes, which now required two med­ica­tions, twice daily). By Monday, she had scratched her­self raw and by the time the vet could see her on Monday after­noon, she was bleed­ing from her ears, her neck….you get the idea. She was mis­er­able, we were mis­er­able and it was a mess.

Fast for­ward to this morn­ing and she seems to be heal­ing, the allergy meds and antibi­otics to clear the bac­te­r­ial infec­tion from scratch­ing are start­ing to take effect and she is act­ing more herself.

The vet has no idea what sud­denly caused this out­break, but sus­pects it was a diet change more than a month ago. We switched from one high qual­ity food to one I felt was even bet­ter. While they all seem to enjoy the new food, Dakota’s sen­si­tive allergy sys­tem didn’t, so back to the old food for her.

Now, Abbi has severely cut her paw and she will not allow me to put any­thing on it (she imme­di­ately licks it off), so I fore­see another trip to the vet in our future.

We hate it when our dogs are ill or in pain and can­not tell us what is wrong.

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