Moving and Retirement
Ferida Wolff's Backyard: A Colorful Spring and Delicious Herbs
Ferida Wolff writes: "I tend to talk to my herbs as I water them. I compliment them on how big they’re getting and nuzzle them so that I get whiffs of their delicious scents. It reminds me of the time my friend tried an experiment with two of the same plants. One plant she spoke to daily and smiled at as she passed it during the day. The other she merely watered but didn’t try to connect with. The spoken to plant thrived while its twin barely survived. I think all living things interact through energy. When we offer positive energy, whether to plants or people, we encourage connection. And that stimulates growth and our relationship to all around us. It opens a door to the broader sense of life and helps us to feel how important our input is in our world." more »
Joan L. Cannon Wrote: Pets, Pleasures, a Black and White Great Dane and a Kleenex Cat
Editor's Note: We found ourselves considering a copy of Knit Your Own Dog that we had acquired some years ago but hadn't followed through on that order. Beyond that our grandchildren may be of the age that this might no longer have an appeal in their dorm rooms. But for Joan Cannon the subject held appeal: "My son-in-law is allergic to cats. I don't know about his sons, who are polite to our dogs. No one in that group seems ever to have wished for a pet. It makes me nervous about their children, should they ever have any ... "Reams have been written about how animals — pets, in most cases — contribute to the comfort of human lives. Most of us have wept over Flag in The Yearling, Black Beauty, Old Yeller, and many more." more »
Fact Sheet: The American Families Plan: Add at least four years of free education; Provide direct support to children and families; Extend tax cuts for families with children and American workers
"Add at least four years of free education. Investing in education is a down payment on the future of America. As access to high school became more widely available at the turn of the 20th Century, it made us the best-educated and best-prepared nation in the world. But everyone knows that 12 years is not enough today. The American Families Plan will make transformational investments from early childhood to postsecondary education so that all children and young people are able to grow, learn, and gain the skills they need to succeed. It will provide universal, quality-preschool to all three- and four- year-olds. It will provide Americans two years of free community college. It will invest in making college more affordable for low- and middle-income students, including students at Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), Tribal Colleges and Universities (TCUs), and institutions such as Hispanic-serving institutions, Asian American and Native American Pacific Islander-serving institutions, and other minority-serving institutions (MSIs). And, it will invest in our teachers as well as our students, improving teacher training and support so that our schools become engines of growth at every level." more »
On Earth Day Find Your 'Local' Waterkeeper Organization; Biden's National Climate Task Force
Cabinet members and White House leaders discussed pathways that will significantly reduce greenhouse gases while growing the economy, creating good-paying, union jobs, and cutting pollution on a sector-by-sector basis, consistent with direction from President Biden to develop a 2030 greenhouse gas target as part fulfilling his promise to re-enter the Paris Agreement. Regions: CANADA, CHESAPEAKE, EAST ASIA, GREAT LAKES, GULF, INTERNATIONAL,LATIN AMERICA, NORTH ATLANTIC, PACIFIC, SOUTH ASIA, SOUTH ATLANTIC. There are over 300 Waterkeeper organizations and affiliates on six continents fighting for communities’ clean water rights. Waterkeepers can be large or small, but every member patrols their waterway and enforces clean water protections when agencies and the federal government fail to do so. more »