Whenever I am feeling petty about minor things in life, I often step back and take a look at life in other places or other times. It helps put life in perspective. When you look at what people went through to make a better life for future generations, it is hard not to be humble and appreciative.

February is a good month for getting such inspiration because it is Black History Month. (And – duh! What moron didn’t catch the irony of giving them the shortest month of the year? I mean, really!) Anyway, it is a month when interesting and inspirational stories about the struggle for human freedom are more plentiful, and I always look forward to it.

Take for example the story of Sidney Steel, a woman enslaved in Maryland in the early 1800′s. Her husband, Levin, had escaped some years earlier and she had attempted to join him, fleeing with her four young children. Unfortunately, they were caught and returned. Sidney realized that escaping with all four children would be next to impossible (like escaping in the first place wasn’t hard enough!) and she made an almost unbearable choice. One night in 1807 she left, taking her two little girls but leaving her two little boys in care of their grandmother. She kissed her sleeping boys goodbye, consigning their fate to God, and following the North Star, she ran.

Can you imagine being that mother?

Sidney and the girls made it to freedom and they were reunited with Levin. He had changed their last name to Still and they then changed Sidney’s name to Charity to conceal her true identity. Only a few trusted friends knew that Charity Still had been the slave Sidney Steel. Sidney and Levin went on and had another sixteen children, and their youngest, William Still, became involved with the Philadelphia Anti-Slavery Society and worked tirelessly helping slaves escape to freedom via the Underground Railroad.

The unimaginable courage of these people! We complain about a long walk across a parking lot – this woman and her children walked from Maryland to Philadelphia! Being pursued by people who might kill them, running from tortures and degradation we can barely comprehend. And anyone helping them put their own life at risk. But they helped anyway.

William Still helped so many people that he became known as the Father of the Underground Railroad. He was, naturally, inspired by his mother and how, despite having sixteen other children, never forgot the two boys she left behind.

One day in the summer of 1850, a man named Peter Freedman from Alabama arrived in Philadelphia and was directed to seek out William Still for assistance in finding his lost family. As he always did, William asked Peter to tell him his story. Peter knew that before he lived in Alabama that he had lived in Kentucky and somewhere else before that where he and his brother had been kidnapped and sold. William asked for any other information Peter could remember.

You guessed, right?

Peter remembered that his father’s name was Levin and his mother’s name was Sidney! :’) And William Still realized that he was sitting across the table from his own long-lost brother. And – yay! – even though it was 43 years later, Sidney was still alive.

Can you imagine that reunion?

Despite everything, mother and son found each other again. Despite suppression and slavery. Despite the fact that an angry master had sold her children south so she could never find them in retaliation for her escaping. Despite the fact that she had changed her name and almost no one knew her real identity. Somehow, Peter Freedman Still ended up in the right city sitting across from one of the few people who knew the truth and could help him find his mother – his own brother, William.

I was sitting here trying to figure out how to end this post and everything sounded a bit too preachy. Let’s just say that life is good and precious and worth living. We’re so lucky to be here in this place and these times, difficult as the past few years have been economically. And sunnier days are ahead.

It’s natural to wonder sometimes about the road not taken – what if I’d done this, what if I hadn’t done that, where would my life be right now? Today was one of those days for me. It started off with my morning pages where a small thing got me thinking about where I could be right now compared to where I actually am. And then I moved on to a writing exercise that included making a list of 50 things in my life that I am proud of.

I ended up in a wonderful place with a feeling of immense gratitude for my life: warts, bumps, dead-ends, wrong turns, and all. I am married to The Best Man and together we’re building a great life, making up for lost time, and dancing in the sunlight.

It’s a great exercise and I encourage you to do it. Right now. Write down 50 things that you’ve done that you’re proud of. If you’re like me, partway through you may think you’ll never get there and that you haven’t done enough with your life. But by the end, everything will be looking pretty good. Enjoy!

So appropriate for the sunniest day of the year – love this! Hope you do, too.

So we’re at this restaurant celebrating her birthday and they bring the cake. She looks at it and says there was a mistake – she’s got someone else’s cake. Really? Oh, yes. It says “Bert Wilson” right here. They gave me Bert Wilson’s cake! We have to get it back to him!

Believe it or not, no alcohol was involved. But there was a lot of laughter when she realized that the cake actually said Best Wishes. We all laughed about that one for years.

Truth be told, there was always a lot of laughter when she was around. Her friendship and humor were a lifeline for me in tense times and she saved my marriage more times than I can count. Even when she was quite ill and being rushed to the hospital, she told the nurses, “I can’t die. I have tickets to CATS!”

Her family lost their sunniest member on the longest day of the year and the first day of summer is always a bit bittersweet. But now, more then 20 years later, it is that light that remains, bright and lasting like the summer solstice. What a legacy to be remembered for bringing that much light, life, and laughter to the lives of others.

Bert Wilson!

“Too many people grow up. That’s the real trouble with the world, too many people grow up. They forget. They don’t remember what it’s like to be 12 years old. They patronize, they treat children as inferiors. Well, I won’t do that.” – Walt Disney

It was summer, I was twelve, and we were going to Disneyland. Since we were lucky enough to live in Southern California, a trip to Disneyland was an annual occurrence. But this time was extra special because I was allowed to bring a friend. There were two girls my age on our street and I hated the idea of having to choose between them. It must have been good economic times because Mom told me to go ahead and ask both of them.

I ran across the street to Tina’s house and told her the good news. She could hardly get the words out when we asked her mom if she could go. We jumped up and down and then ran down the street to Jan’s house. We were laughing and giggling and out of breath when we found her on her front porch. She looked at us like we were crazy. And then we told her the good news.

“I don’t know,” she said, “It’s so hot. And the lines are really long.”

Tina and I looked at each other in total disbelief. Was she saying no? She was! She was turning down a trip to Disneyland. What twelve-year-old does that?

“And it’s so crowded…”

How sad to be only twelve and yet be so old!

Here’s to feeling young, to sunny days, corn dogs, make-believe, and mouse-ears. May we never be too old to enjoy them. May we always remember what it’s like to be twelve.

Judgement Day was on my mind yesterday.

No, I wasn’t expecting to be raptured. I am not religious in any traditional sense and my views are more in line with my cousin Sarah’s, “God is bigger than all of the religions put together.”

But my heart was with my Christian friends. I can hear some of them saying, “But the Bible doesn’t SAY that!” It must be frustrating to have so much attention given to such a small minority on the fringe who misrepresent their faith. In fact, it seems that most often the media focuses on reporting about the loud few with wild or hate-filled extremist beliefs and ignores the millions of loving and tolerant Christians who would no more burn a Quran than set fire to your house. They’re just not newsworthy. But they are there.

And my heart is with my friends who are other faiths (atheists included) who have experienced condemnation and intolerance. Your right to believe according to the dictates of your own conscience should be respected, but often it is not.

So let’s put aside Judgement Day for a while. How about if we take this opportunity to have Non-Judgement Day?

Let’s resolve to treat people with respect, even if we don’t agree with them. Even if they provoke us. Let’s take the high road.

Let’s resolve to not jump to conclusions about people just because they are of a different faith, different political persuasion, different nationality, different race, different sexual orientation, or who are otherwise different from us.

Let’s do whatever we can to love our fellow human beings.

Why? Because it works. Nothing else does.

Non-Judgement Day.

Pass it on.

Once upon a time, a woman with a lucrative but boring writing career and a serious case of Empty Nest Syndrome decided on a lark to move halfway across the country to join a tutoring program at a disadvantaged and underperforming high school in the South.

As she looked for an apartment and got to know her new home, people would notice her strange accent and say, “What y’all doin’ here?” And she would explain that she was working for a special program at a place called Booker T. Washington High School. And the reactions were surprising.

If the people were black, they would smile and mention that they’d gone there, or their mother had gone there, or their grandfather had gone there. And we’d have a nice chat.

If the people were white, most of them would look at me like I was from Mars and ask me why. The conversations varied a bit, but the upshot was that I was a silly white girl from California (probably a liberal) who just didn’t understand that some people didn’t want to better themselves. In other words: Why bother?

Sure, they’d admit. There were some black people who did all right. But not those black people. Not at that school.

It was a recurring theme during my time in the South, this idea that “certain people” could never change, didn’t want to learn, and weren’t worth the effort. Even churches focused more on foreign ministries while ignoring the poor in their own backyard. Why bother?

Why bother? Because. Because it’s the right thing to do. Because every child has potential. Because everyone can learn. Because this is the United States of America. Just because.

My time at BTW High School was, unfortunately, all too brief. It was heartbreaking to leave when the grant money ran out. The new principal had such great ideas and we really wanted to be part of them. But I ended up going back to writing and left Memphis forever.

Fast forward five years later. That enthusiastic principal did what no one thought she could do. A school that once graduated just over half of its students now graduates over 80%.  A school where only 4% went on to college is now sending 70% of its students on to higher learning. In just five years.

They entered a nationwide contest and today the President of the United States delivered their commencement address. Why? Because somebody bothered.

Spring is trying to make it here.  Skies brighten up for a few days and then cloud over and then brighten up again. It’s exasperating to hope for warm days and be surprised by a sudden chill.

The weather is again mirroring my life.

I have been surprised and puzzled by the coldness with which some people regard others, how they can take an unforgiving stance against an individual they’ve had problems with, or hold a completely unyielding grudge, or jump to the worst possible conclusion about a friend, or totally condemn someone on very skimpy evidence.

Although none of this has been aimed at me (crossing my fingers here), there have been too many unexpected bursts of cold showing up when they are least expected. It has been as disheartening as, well, snow in April.

What is this? Where is the warmth, the sun?

Sometimes seeing traits in others gives you insight to your own life. And seeing all of these spirits encased in emotional ice made me look at my own life, checking for storm damage. Yeah, there’s a bit of that.

So I decided to do a little spring cleaning of the soul.

Life happens. Not everything is nice. Not everyone is nice. And there are people that I won’t work with, loan money to, or live with again. But this week a few boxes of resentment went out the door along with a couple of useless grudges. Cobwebs of regret were swept way. And I found a few places to plant flowers to enjoy in the future.

The sun’s coming out. I can feel it.

The Japanese call their country Nippon, which means “where the sun originates” and which has been interpreted in the West as “The Land of the Rising Sun.”

We have all witnessed this week the dignity and grace of the Japanese people. We have also seen scenes of destruction that are very difficult to witness even at our comfortable distance half a world away. Even now, their fate is uncertain.

But part of being Sunny Anyway is the belief in humanity and our potential to survive and rebuild. To help us hold in our minds the beauty that is Japan, I’ve chosen to share the works of my favorite Japanese artists. Along with this I offer my prayer for recovery and rebirth – and a bright new day for The Land of the Rising Sun.

“Today I met the boy I’m gonna marry
He’s all I’ve wanted all my life and even more…”

Today is the anniversary of the day The Best Man and I met five years ago and we are celebrating, because what’s more worth celebrating than love?

He gets me. He just does. From the very beginning, he saw that unique spark that makes me different from everyone else – and loved it.

He also wanted to nourish that spark: to provide a supportive environment to just let me be myself, to grow and thrive and live fully. And I’m blooming. Together, we create life and love and happiness.

He is my earth. I am his sun. And all is right with the universe.

“(Today I Met) The Boy I’m Gonna Marry” written by Ellie Greenwich, Phil Spector, and Tony Powers. Performed by Darlene Love. Video by disneydreams89.