Due to a power outage, only one paramedic responded to the call. The
house was very, very dark, so the paramedic ask Kathleen, a 3-year-old
girl, to hold a flashlight high over her Mommy so he could see while he
helped deliver the baby. Very diligently, Kathleen did as she was asked.
Heidi pushed and pushed, and after a little while Ricky was born.

The paramedic lifted him by his little feet and spanked him on his
bottom. Ricky began to cry. The paramedic then thanked Kathleen for her
help and asked the wide-eyed 3-year old what she thought about what she
had just
witnessed.

Kathleen quickly responded, "He shouldn't have crawled in there in the
first place .... smack his ass again!"
==========
TWO EYES; TWO HANDS
--by Steve Goodier

An older couple lay in bed one morning, having just awakened from a
good night's sleep. He tenderly took her hand, but she pulled back
responding, "Don't touch me."

"Why not?" he asked.

"Because I'm dead."

Her confused husband said, "What are you talking about? We're both
lying here in bed together and talking to one another."

"No," she said, "I'm definitely dead."

He insisted, "You're not dead. What in the world makes you think you're
dead?"

"Because I woke up this morning and nothing hurts."

It is good to be able to laugh when we can, and especially about daily
aches and pains or normal problems. But sometimes our difficulties and
losses are so staggering we wonder how long we can cope. Lingering and
chronic illness, loss of someone we love and overwhelming worry can
devastate us. All of us have known almost unbearable pain and hardships.
Heart-breaking times. We might think we will never again wake up feeling
good.

A wise obstetrician at a university teaching hospital once made a
comment about suffering. Someone asked the doctor what advice he offered to
his students, future doctors and nurses, when caring for mothers who
gave birth to stillborn infants.

The doctor paused for a moment in thought. Then he said this: "I tell
them that they need two eyes. One eye is not enough; they need two eyes.
With one eye they have to check the I.V.; and with the other eye they
have to weep. That's what I tell them," he said. "I tell them that they
need two eyes."

He knows the secret of hard times: we need two eyes. One for seeing,
the other for weeping. And we need two hands. One for holding on, the
other for reaching out.

I don't know all there is to know about suffering. But I do know the
way to survive it. Two eyes; two hands. That's how we get through this
life best.
==========
MARITAL BLITZ

A man and his wife are dining at a table in a plush restaurant, and the
husband keeps staring at a drunken lady swigging her gin as she sits
alone at a nearby table, until the wife asks,

"Do you know her?"

"Yes," sighs the husband. "She's my ex-wife. She took to drink right
after we divorced seven years ago, and I hear she hasn't been sober
since."

"My God!" says the wife, "Who would think a person could go on
celebrating that long?"
==========
TWO WOLVEs

One evening an old Cherokee told his grandson about a battle that goes
on inside people. He said "My son, the battle is between two 'wolves'
inside us all."

"One is Evil. It is anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret, greed,
arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride,
superiority and ego.

"The other is Good. It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility,
kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and
faith."

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his
grandfather "Which wolf wins?"

The old Cherokee simply replied "The one you feed."
==========
WET PANTS STORY

Come with me to a third grade classroom. There is a nine-year-old kid
sitting at his desk and all of a sudden there is a puddle between his
feet and the front of his pants are wet. He thinks his heart is going to
stop because he cannot possibly imagine how this has happened. It's
never happened before, and he knows that when the boys find out he will
never hear the end of it. When the girls find out, they'll never speak to
him again as long as he lives.

The boy believes his heart is going to stop, he puts his head down and
prays this prayer, "Dear God, this is an emergency! I need help now!
Five minutes from now I'm dead meat." He looks up from his prayer and
here comes the teacher with a look in her eyes that says he has been
discovered.

As the teacher is walking toward him, a classmate named Susie is
carrying a goldfish bowl that is filled with water. Susie trips in front of
the teacher and inexplicably dumps the bowl of water in the boy's lap.
The boy pretends to be angry, but all the while is saying to himself,
"Thank you, Lord! Thank you, Lord!" Now all of a sudden, instead of being
the object of ridicule, the boy is the object of sympathy. The teacher
rushes him downstairs and gives him gym shorts to put on while his
pants dry out. All the other children are on their hands and knees cleaning
up around his desk.

The sympathy is wonderful. But as life would have it, the ridicule that
should have been his has been transferred to someone else - Susie. She
tries to help, but they tell her to get out. "You've done enough, you
klutz!" Finally, at the end of the day, as they are waiting for the bus,
the boy walks over to Susie and whispers, "You did that on purpose,
didn't you?" Susie whispers back, "I wet my pants once too."
==========
ALL is ONE