PRESIDENT'S CORNER
President’s Corner for January 8, 2016
Happy New Year! I trust you all made it through the holidays with much joy, not tooo much excess weight, and your own list of New Year Resolutions you have no hope of fulfilling! Here are some recommendations for resolutions you might want to consider…all easy!
- Turn off your cell phone, ask a friend out to lunch and have a great conversation.
- Give away smiles and hugs to people you may not even know but clearly need one…remember that man that gave away $100 bills during the holidays? This is cheaper and just as effective. Humans have just two needs: to love and be loved. Get it?
- Love OLLI by taking a class in something you know nothing about and repeat the two items above at the class.
- Did you forget your holiday gift of $$$ to OLLI? Oops…still time to fix that.
- How many books have you read for pleasure in 2015? Top that in 2016 by at least 10%.
- How many times have you said “I love you” to your wife/husband/best friend so far this year? DO it now, please.
Jews and Christians both know God as I AM. Did you know there is no future tense in I AM? That means it is always NOW. Without getting religious on you, that idea of living in and for NOW is a great lesson. Why worry about tomorrow? Be here now.
This New Year is going to be really interesting in so many ways. There will be political theater, some bad effects of El Nino on weather, more political theater, and your OLLI will continue to offer super classes in Morgantown and Charleston. We’re only six months out from our annual meeting and the beginning of our new year on July 1. We need you and your ideas and your continuing membership. All the best to each one of you. I’ll close this first column of 2016 with a longer poem about the New Year…it’s kinda theatrical, so I hope you enjoy it.
The Passing of the Year
Robert W. Service, 1874 – 1958: was a British-Canadian poet and writer who has often been called "the Bard of the Yukon". He is best known for his poems "The Shooting of Dan McGrew" and "The Cremation of Sam McGee", from his first book, Songs of a Sourdough.
My glass is filled, my pipe is lit,
My den is all a cozy glow;
And snug before the fire I sit,
And wait to feel the old year go.
I dedicate to solemn thought
Amid my too-unthinking days,
This sober moment, sadly fraught
With much of blame, with little praise.
Old Year! upon the Stage of Time
You stand to bow your last adieu;
A moment, and the prompter’s chime
Will ring the curtain down on you.
Your mien is sad, your step is slow;
You falter as a Sage in pain;
Yet turn, Old Year, before you go,
And face your audience again.
That sphinx-like face, remote, austere,
Let us all read, whate’er the cost:
O Maiden! why that bitter tear?
Is it for dear one you have lost?
Is it for fond illusion gone?
For trusted lover proved untrue?
O sweet girl-face, so sad, so wan
What hath the Old Year meant to you?
And you, O neighbour on my right
So sleek, so prosperously clad!
What see you in that aged wight
That makes your smile so gay and glad?
What opportunity unmissed?
What golden gain, what pride of place?
What splendid hope? O Optimist!
What read you in that withered face?
And You, deep shrinking in the gloom,
What find you in that filmy gaze?
What menace of a tragic doom?
What dark, condemning yesterdays?
What urge to crime, what evil done?
What cold, confronting shape of fear?
O haggard, haunted, hidden One
What see you in the dying year?
And so from face to face I flit,
The countless eyes that stare and stare;
Some are with approbation lit,
And some are shadowed with despair.
Some show a smile and some a frown;
Some joy and hope, some pain and woe:
Enough! Oh, ring the curtain down!
Old weary year! it’s time to go.
My pipe is out, my glass is dry;
My fire is almost ashes too;
But once again, before you go,
And I prepare to meet the New:
Old Year! a parting word that’s true,
For we’ve been comrades, you and I --
I thank God for each day of you;
There! bless you now! Old Year, good-bye!
Jim Held, President