Tag Archives: writing

Christmas Season 2025…

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We are in the Christmas Season. That time of year where we begin to think about different things. What we think about depends on how old you are. We all look forward to presents, but if you are a child, less than 12 years old, it is toys and more toys. Today is my birthday and being 15 days before Christmas, my parents decided to make my birthday about clothes. Christmas would be reserved for toys. My younger brother’s birthday was on December 5th. I can remember some of the toys. One Christmas I received a set of pistols and holster from the TV show “Have Gun will Travel”. I still have one of the pistols.

As I grew older, Christmas became about family. All my family, parents, brothers, aunts, uncles, cousins and grandparents would gather at our home for the Christmas meal and fellowship. All the men were in the front room watching football. All the ladies were in the kitchen cooking the meal and talking. All the cousins were outside playing. All my first cousins are boys. Growing up we played on the same football and baseball teams. Of the 9 first cousins on my mother’s side, there are only 6 of us left. With most families, my family lives across the country. My sons and there families join us for Christmas. But I miss 30 to 40 members of my family filling my home. My grandparents, parents, aunts and uncles are all gone. We are now the older generation.

I miss my family terribly. What we did for Christmas was to make memories that would last a life time. Make sure that you and your family make memories that last. Because once the time slips by and you don’t, you can’t go back.

I pray that you and your family have a blessed Christmas.

Crain Blanchard.

Joseph1637@juno.com

Joeseph1637.com

Who is in Control?

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If you look around yourself and the world, you will see people trying to control their lives and the world around them. People are scurrying to control their destiny or reality. To shape what happens to them by being in control. Except that control is an illusion. When the Covid pandemic started in 2020, what little control people had disappeared in a cloud of smoke. It is not to say that we don’t have some control. We do, but the real control over our lives is not ours. There is always something larger that controls our destiny.

We chose our paths when we are young. We are influenced by our circumstances and situations are we grow up. Even if we had the perfect circumstances in our lives, there is always something that will skew our lives in a different direction. My dad, after he came home from WWII, wanted to go to college to be an engineer. He married my mom and settled down and was attending university. Then my mom became pregnant with my older brother. Dad quit college and began to work to provide for his family. As I got older and began reading our evening newspaper, I would see engineering problem written on the newspaper. Dad never returned to college.

The bible says that when we are young, we can go where we want. But when you are old, you are led where you don’t want. Understanding who we are and where we belong in the universe is the questions we have to solve in our lives. Everyone knows from the beginning of our lives who is in control of the universe. It has been written in our hearts and minds. I see many people struggle against this knowledge over their lifetime. You see there is only one person who is in control of our lives and the universe and His name is Jesus.

Crain Blanchard.

Joseph1637@juno.com

Joseph1637.com

When Home Calls…

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Have you ever been somewhere when home calls? It’s that deep yearning in your heart to go home. It’s where warmth, familiarity and safety abounds. The call comes even though there is no home to return to. It is the yearning that we have for a safe surroundings. I know that some people have never had safe surroundings growing up. But that doesn’t stop the yearning for it. It can happen at any time of your life. I am a grandfather and my parents are gone and I still yearn for the wonderful family gatherings in our home. Our family would gather every Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter, since I can remember. Although, things would happen and there would be fights, it was always about the warmth, familiarity and safety of that day. My mom and her two sisters would fight to have those gatherings in our homes. If my dad even thought about not having it, there would be a fight he wouldn’t want. They brought together three generations, so we would know each other and share a memory that would last a life time. Those memories are as real today as they were seventy years ago.

There is more to this than meets the eye. People say home is where the heart is. That is a true statement, but it is not the whole truth. I miss my home when I was a youth. But today I have a home that is calling me. It is in front me, not behind. I have glimpses of what it looks like and I can clearly see it. But I’m on my way home now. It is not only a comfort to know that I am headed home, it is a relief that I’m heading home again.. What is the cry of your heart?

Turn thee unto me, and have mercy upon me; for I am desolate and afflicted.The troubles of my heart are enlarged: O bring thou me out of my distresses. Psalm 25:16-17

Crain Blanchard.

Joseph1637@juno.com

Joseph1637.com

War and Peace…

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War and Peace is a novel written by Leo Tolstoy in 1869. It show life in Moscow when Napoleon attacks Russia. It’s a moral play about the purpose of life. The book is 1400 pages long. There are many plots and twists in the book. A lot of people say this is why it is difficult to read the book. It is considered a masterpiece in literature. Tolstoy wrote the book to show everyday life, despite the war.

Everyday life has not changed since the beginning of time. Children grow up and marry, have children, who have children and so on and so on. The only thing that has changed over the years is our technology. I was watching this farmer who has a YouTube show. He lives in up state New York. He has a small farm of 45 acres. His passion is restoring old Farmall tractors. His latest video was at Tractor show. It had over a hundred years of tractors, from steam to gasoline to diesel. All the tractors did the same thing, but the technology kept improving. The stream tractors were almost as large as trains. Where the gasoline and diesel ones kept getting smaller. Now tractors are getting bigger again. But life goes on.

Everyone can remember the crazy guy on street corners holding a sign saying the world is ending. As he tries to convince people to prepare for the end of the world. Everyone thought he was crazy and paid him no mind. If you are old enough to remember the Y2K pending disaster. All digital framework was based on Cobalt code. When year 2000 was going to come, all digital framework was going to reset itself to the year 1900. Had not the people figured out how to change the computer language, it would have a disaster. But life goes on.

Everyday life counts on all situations being normal. And if the situation changes, it seems that our life becomes tenuous. Thus the Covid-19 pandemic. There are still lasting effects from the pandemic. And I am not talking about the medical side of it. People became deathly afraid. Many people did die from complications of the virus. But depression settled on people and it still hasn’t gone away. So how do we counter these abnormal situations? In all my life I have found only one way to counter the end of the world as we know it. That is to have peace in your heart. Not the peace that man brings, because it doesn’t last. It is the peace that only God can bring to your heart. And the only door to the peace of God is through Jesus Christ. It is when we surrender our lives to Him and let the peace reign and rule in our lives.

Crain Blanchard.

Joseph1637@juno.com

Joseph1637.com

To Thine own Self be True…#2.

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Shakespeare’s famous quote from Hamlet was “This above all, to thine own self be true.” What was Shakespeare talking about? And why be true to yourself?  King Solomon talked about the same subject. He said, What was before, shall be again…there is nothing new under the sun. Evil is not just for one period in history. People have lied and betrayed others since the beginning of time. Shakespeare wrote a whole play about betrayal. It’s called a tragedy because everyone died because of betrayal.

We have all known people who have lived a lie. It is a sad situation where they believe how they are living is the truth. But it really isn’t. Everything they are doing is a lie. You want to shake them up and show them that they need to wake up. But they are deceived and believe the deception. For the most part people are the same. They may have different backgrounds. But people are basically the same. We were born with parents. We need to be reared and taught how to live. We learn a skill or job to be able to eat, clothe ourselves and have a home. We learn the language of our parents. And if we are fortunate, we learn other languages. We do so to go out into this world and communicate with others. When we do we find that people have different beliefs than we do. It seems that their truths aren’t the same as ours. If we don’t have strong belief system, things can become complicated. I have seen people switch their beliefs to other cultures. I don’t have to defend myself. I know who I am and where I am going. I know where I will end up. I am being true to myself. Because 45 years ago, I was drifting through time. I had no anchor and didn’t belong anywhere. Now I have a worldwide family and I belong. To Thine Own Self Be True.

Crain Blanchard.

www.joseph1637.com

joseph1637@juno.com

Life is it’s own Reality show.

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Life starts out the same for most people. We grow up going to school and learn what we can do in this life. If life hasn’t beaten you down by the time you graduate from high school. There is a chance that you will be able to accomplish your dreams. There was a big fade 25 years ago, to begin teaching your children at 4 or 5 years old. Wanting them to have an advantage over the other children in school. What happened is that all the children seem to catch up to each other at age 7. In Texas, every child must be 7 years old to start 1st grade. Their high school graduation rate is 90%. Then 62% go on to college. College diploma doesn’t mean that you will be successful. There are plenty of examples of people with a high school diploma that went into technical work that have succeeded. Did you know that Caterpillar Equipment company is paying 6 figures for high school entry jobs. It’s not about your education that counts. It’s is about what you want in life and are willing to pursue it.

I look at the news and it hasn’t changed since I was a kid. Someone is always threatening to go to war over something or other. This restaurant has a bigger, better burger than any one else. Everything is always to expensive and prices are going up. And the President of the US, that we elected, isn’t worth anything. The strange thing about all that is that life goes on. People are being born, growing up, going to school, getting married, having kids and getting old. It doesn’t stop for anyone. Life in every generation repeats itself. And if you astute enough to recognize this, you can take advantage of it.

You know what the sad part of this whole drama, is that with all the getting, education, money, things and power, people still don’t know what they are looking for. We have heard the saying, that being rich is never enough. The answer is very simple. It isn’t always easy, but it is simple. And simple isn’t stupid. There is a hole in us that can’t be filled with education, money, things or power. There is only one thing that will fill that void in us. It is the love of one man, Jesus Christ. With that love, we can live our lives because it will have meaning. Then when we are through with this life, we can go home to heaven with a grateful heart. This is the reality of life.

Crain Blanchard.

Joseph1637@juno.com

Joseph1637.com

People, People, People.

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Everyone wants to be in the position of leadership. We have our own ideas about what needs to take place in that role. The strange thing about that is that not everyone is suited to be in the leadership role. In my working life, I have seen different kinds of leader. Some were great and I wanted to work for those people. Some were not so great and you just tolerated those people. Usually when some the leaders who didn’t know what they were doing would have high turn over. They would also have poor production in the factory or office.

I was a Department Manager and Assistant Manager for our beloved Walmart. There I had every kind of leader you could think of. I did my job to the best of my ability. I was always cooperative with my employees. I tried my best to help them wherever I could. Every year the company would ask the employees to rate their Assistants and Manager. I consistently received an 80 to 90 percent approval rating. I always made sure people were doing their jobs. And if they weren’t doing what was expected, I coached them right out the front door. Each coaching was a call for them to improve their work ethic. They had 3 chances to do so. If they didn’t improve, they left the company.

I always treated people fairly. Always trying to coax or cajole them into working as hard as they can. I never yelled or belittled anyone. I would speak to my employees with respect never wavering about the task at hand. Christmas was coming and I had 2 young men moving pallets of goods into different shipping containers. At first it was liking pulling teeth. They resisted doing anything. At lunch time I brought them to a Subway store and bought them lunch. The results were day and night. Those two young men moved more pallets faster than our receiving team. It’s all about how you treat people.

The point is how you treat people. When the work got hard, I would pitch in and help them. People appreciated that I valued people. They would work for me because of that work ethic. I always believe that working hard and doing your best was the right way to do things. I wasn’t working hard because of what people thought. I worked hard because it was who I am. And because I worked hard all the time, I rose in management. I never wanted to be a store manager because it was too much politics and paper work. But I would always do my best to help people.

Crain Blanchard.

Joseph1637@juno.com

Joseph1637.com

The 4th of July.

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As an American, I celebrated the founding of our country. I marvel at the efforts put for by our founding fathers to create this nation. Our nation is not so different than many others that were founded throughout the ages. Mankind has not changed since the beginning of time. Technology has come a long way, but who we are has not. We live longer because of discoveries, but people are people. All you have to do is to read the history of anybody throughout the ages. And the pattern of who we are will emerge.

The first thing that comes to mind is family. It is the very first institution ever invented, both in mankind and animals. Then there is work to feed yourself and your family, then there is shelter and last but not least is clothing. Our basic needs have never changed. There is an old saying that is true, history repeats itself. Since the beginning, how many times has fathers worried about caring for their family? How many times have mothers been concerned about their families safety?

My son was being deployed to Iraq several years ago. As our family gather with others to see their sons and daughters off to war, I started watching people. Some were laughing, some were crying, some soldiers held their children as I wondered how many times has this gathering occur since this country was founded. As I was watching all the people, a song kept playing in my head. The song was “Johnny has gone for a soldier”. It is a song from the American Revolution.

We may all speak differently, have different origins, believe in different religions and are culturally different. But as a people we are the same. We all have the same desires for family, freedom, being able to provide and protect our families. So, I celebrate this 4th of July by remembering who we are and what was started in this country 400 years.

Crain Blanchard.

Joseph1637@juno.com

Joseph1637.com

Blast from the Past, An Observation.

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That Idiom refers to a song from the past. But a song doesn’t mean that it has to be music. I have been recently listening to the music of the 1960’s and 70’s. Some I like and some still turn me off. When I was in high school, I collected all the top songs of the day. Back then they were 45rpm singles with one song on it. I had a hard case to carry the 45 singles around. When I would go to parties, I would bring the case with me to listen to music. If you wanted, you could buy the whole album to listen to. Radio stations would play the music and we would listen and dance. The DJ’s of today came from people playing music back then.

People listen to songs from every different genre. I even like classical music. But the song I am referring to isn’t the music that you hear with your ears. The song I am referring to is the one that you hear with your heart. Everyone grows up wanting to become something. As a kid, we wanted to be firemen or soldiers. Some wanted to doctors or lawyers. But no matter the path we took, we all heard the song that call us to a particular path. That particular song was strong enough in us to motivate us to become whoever.

I have observed that the song in our heart never goes away. It became strong enough in us to choose a path that produce a lifetime of melodies. All along the way in life, people heard our song. Some people agree with our song and some didn’t. But no matter what direction that we took in life, it was our song. The strange thing about that song is that we hear is as strong as it was in the beginning. The blast from the past is our life, our song and our melody. This is just an observation that refers to family, friends, school or work that we orchestrated in our life.

Crain Blanchard.

Joseph1637@juno.com

Joseph1637.com

To Life and Perspective

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This happened about 10 years ago. A young friend of mine married for the first time. The father of the bride asked his daughter what she wanted to do. He was going to give her a set amount of money and she could spend like she wanted. She and her Fiance and Parents sat down and planned a modest wedding, by some accounts. She didn’t want an ostentatious wedding. She was going to have a nice wedding and keep some of the money for their future. She didn’t spend thousands of dollars on a wedding dress, but it was beautiful. The groom wore a suit and looked handsome.

Her mother fell off a ladder the Monday before the wedding and broke her foot and took 7 stitches in her head. She said she was going to the wedding come hell or high water. She look good and her sons helped her to her place in church. They have 6 six kids, 4 girls and 2 boys. The wedding was lovely. It wasn’t over the top. The daughter used her money wisely and planned everything. Even the 86 year old grandmother looked good. Grandma was going to her granddaughter’s wedding to celebrate life. She got up and danced several times. She had to be assisted to the dance floor by 2 men. But she was going to dance at her granddaughter’s wedding. The mother with the broken foot hardly left the dance floor. The dad talked to everyone and danced with his wife and everyone that asked him. The food was good and party was fun. They all came to celebrate life itself. Everyone had a smile on their face. They didn’t throw rice when the couple left which is traditional. They blew bubbles. In all it was a really sweet time for the family and all the guest. This is about what God gives to us on this earth. Life is hard enough as it is, but God wants to enjoy and celebrate our lives. As it says in the bible: Ecclesiastes 8:15 “Then I commended mirth, because a man hath no better thing under the sun, than to eat, and to drink, and to be merry: for that shall abide with him of his labour the days of his life, which God giveth him under the sun.”

Crain Blanchard.

Joseph1637@juno.com

Joseph1637.com