Happy Friday, All!
Yes, don’t worry … you can say it if you feel it … T.G.I.F.!
Seems change is all around me … it’s about to “get” me, too! Over the past two or three weeks, I have had to handle making some needed changes in my life, professionally and personally. And I am good with that. There are more lessons for me to learn and the changes that loom ahead are there for a reason. A couple of days ago when I got home from working a full day and then tutoring a student in Weston and finally getting home around 10pm, I realized how tired I was and fell fast asleep in a short time. Now, trust me, I look around as I go through this place and I see people who work harder than me and seem to keep on going … on and on and on and on. Yet, I know that they, too, have their moments when they have to slow down, rest, recharge even! I am not blowing my own horn, I am just sharing it with you all … that’s what I do! Thanks for putting up with me … I keep such words in my heart … “Still … I rise!” from Maya Angelou’s poem.
Just yesterday, I had multiple occasions to say the Serenity Prayer and the 23rd Psalm just to calm myself down. I had started a position at a new office and had to give up my volunteer work at the non-profit during the day as my unemployment compensation ran out! Cool. I am good with that! I am always looking for work. I had to adjust one client’s schedule that I tutor and the family was flexible with me, especially since they will be moving to South Carolina in July or August because the father’s job is relocating him and his family. After the class I tutored Wednesday night in Miramar, I came out and my vehicle didn’t turn over … didn’t start … didn’t even click!!! The lights worked well, the horn blew loud and even the radio worked … but it wouldn’t turn over. I had to call GEICO with whom I have a great roadside/tow plan that costs nothing if taken to an affiliate of the insurance company, try to get jumped – that failed; had to call a tow truck who also tried to jump the vehicle and finally towed it to the other side of Broward County where I live … to a Firestone in Lauderhill. A good friend, Burke, met me there as the tow truck driver (whom I found out grew up in Dobbs Ferry, NY) dropped me and the car off. Firestone did not have the equipment to diagnose the problem so I had the vehicle towed to a Hungarian mechanic I met through Burke. Some cool “new” co-workers picked me up Thursday morning and another dropped me off home after taking me to Publix Supermarket! “Still … I rise!” I had nearly teared up when my client in Miramar had mentioned to me that Maya had passed away … expired.
The whole time I had to walk alone while waiting for the two different companies that GEICO had sent out to help me, I thought of Maya, her poems, her life, her contributions to humanity! What a beautiful person who went everywhere and did everything and was honored by everybody … from the youngest school child to the POTUS!!! I enjoy Maya’s life because I am always hearing or reading about something else she did, someplace “new” that she went, how she appeared at still another location … but made it home in time there in Winston-Salem, NC to go and meet her “Maker”! In many of her pictures, it seemed that she was tired … she had a very “mixed emotion” face when the POTUS gave her the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2010 … “Oh Happy Day”! Her life encompassed generations (she and my mother are contemporaries, though on different levels, if you will …) and her interests took her way beyond many a human being … from the likes of the greatest athlete or rap mogul to the wealthiest of billionaires on the face of the Earth … and she “knew why the caged bird sings ….”.
I’ve done my best … I tried to keep it simple … This is a true tribute to greatness … the life and times of Maya Angelou!! Thank you, Maya …
Peace,
John I. Cook
Educational Excellence 