“Can you do 3 treatments a day?”
“Some days.”
“Try, if you can.”

“It is all too much for me.”

“You can’t get life insurance?”
“No, I don’t live long enough for them to get enough money out of me.”
“That discriminates.”
“Yes.”

Even a 10-year old can do it (paraphrased).

The Elements of Style

The War That Saved My Life

“It is such a great story . . .”

Bill, Bob, Jill, Jackie, Jane.

“My lung infection hasn’t cleared all the way. I am not quite back to my baseline.”
“Dr. B. ordered another 2-weeks. We will send it in now.”

“I love you.”
“I tell my kids daily that I love them.”
“I wouldn’t want to spend my life with anyone else.”
“Miss you.”
“Love you.”
“You are the best thing that ever happened in my life.”

“Is that a cavity?” Looking sideways.

“We have this great new coffee from Uganda. It is a little nutty. I like a little nutty.”

“Be safe.”
“Have safe travels home.”
“Time to get some nourishment. You can’t get far in life without nourishment.”

“Are you excited?”
“I am. I am very thankful. Blessed. Appreciative.” Voice is trending down, as if saying to oneself.

“Your head is a long way from your foot.” – Kimberley Bradley

“What can you do?”
“What can one person do?”
“Do I just keep calling my representatives?”

“You can create your own community. It starts with you.”

“Exercise your agency.”

“Can exercise increase my lung function?”
“It could increase your FVC, possibly, by expanding and making it your lung muscles stronger. However, we haven’t seen many results in patients FEV1.”

“What will it take?”

“Have you ever read Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point? Great book.

“Know that you are loved.”
“Know that each kindness in which you create only creates more.”

When your brain is hit with uncertainty – messages go in your mind and come out again, trying to make sense. Trying to remember. It could be trying to hold on, or let go.

I don’t know many things, but what I do know is your truest intention comes to light.

I know living an honest and hardworking life keeps you grounded.

A friend of mine told me many years ago and I believe it is true – “If you take people that wish to do harm or have harmed and put them on a farm (she was from Iowa), and made them work sun-up until sundown, they will be so dang tired they won’t have the energy except to eat, sleep, and rise to do it all over again.”

I also learned a couple years ago “the mark of the quality of life, of society, is how much free time a person has.” By that standard alone, since we are not all farmers and gathers anymore and not working 6-days a week, there is a mark of a quality of life.

We, humans, fill it our time one way or another.

“I love you.”
“I love you too.”
“Thank you for being in my life.”
“You are the best thing that ever happen to me.”
“You are the best.”
“Love . . . you.”