Mr. Rogers' Wisdom

From a young age my parents instilled in me a deep, unending love of reading. I grew up being read to and then reading books every night. I remember picking many a Nancy Drew book off of my bookshelf before bed and reading the entire book before I could go to sleep. This habit started when I was in the fifth grade and has continued on to this day. Just ask Chad. He is "thrilled" to go to sleep each night by the light of my bedside lamp.

My parents also nurtured this habit by giving me books as gifts. When I was younger, it was the Bernstan Bears, then Nancy Drew. As I grew older, the books changed. At the end of my college career, (pre-Chad) I was given a book by my parents called, "Finding the Love of Your Life" because as my mother so kindly pointed out, and I quote, "you will not find a guy to marry in a bar." I did not read this book. I did however, in my own good time find the "love of my life." :) (I did sell this book at my garage sale this summer, so perhaps someone will "find the love of their life" via this book....you never know!)

At about the same time, my mother also gave me a little book called The World According to Mr. Rogers: Important Things to Remember. Although I do admit I loved Mr. Roger's when I was little, I was very skeptical of this book...as in, why is my mother giving me a book about Mr. Rogers of all people, but I did read it, and guess what?? It is wonderful. Pure wisdom. Seriously. My all time favorite quote that I have actually written down and posted in many places throughout my life has come from this book. After talking with a friend about parenting this weekend, I thought, we all need to listen to Mr. Rogers...I am sure by now you think I am crazy, but I will just put a few of his more meaningful (to me)thoughts/quotes and you can judge for yourself. I will admit, his thoughts have directed my parenting/living stance more than once.

Now, before we begin, if you could all just change your cardi and shoes...

1. In life, we are all juggling. The key is knowing which balls are rubber and which balls are glass.

2. "Some days, doing 'the best we can' may still fall short of what we would like to be able to do, but life isn't perfect- on any front- and doing what we can with what we have is the most we should expect of ourselves and anyone else."

3. "Often when you think you're at the end of something, you're at the beginning of something else."