There's a Hole in My Sidewalk, by Portia Nelson

I:
I walk down the street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I fall in.
I am lost…
I am helpless.
It is not my fault.
It takes forever to find my way out.

II:
I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I pretend I don’t see it.
I fall in.
I can’t believe I am in the same place.
But it isn’t my fault.
It still takes a long time to get out.

III:
I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I see it there.
I still fall in…It’s a habit.
My eyes are open.
I know where I am.
It is my fault.
I get out immediately.

IV:
I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I walk around it.
I walk down another street.

Copyright 1993, Portia Nelson from the book, There’s a Hole in My Sidewalk, Beyond Words Publishing, Hillsboro, Oregon. Autobiography in Five Short Chapters.
http://www.mendontlisten.com/article_sidewalk.html

How to set up Google Voice to forward to your cell phone

Setting up a Google Voice business line to your personal cell phone:

1. Download iPhone app for Google Voice (so you can make calls from your phone as if from your Google Voice number. This won't actually affect your settings though).

2.  Go to Google Voice on your browser and go into Google Voice settings:

Under the "Phones" tab, check "forward calls to mobile."
DO NOT check "activate Google Voicemail for this phone."

3. Under "Voicemail & Text" tab, record a greeting for Google Voice & name it whatever you want. When you click "record new," it will call you on your phone. When you answer, a recording will prompt you to leave a message. (You'll have the option of doing it over if necessary.)

If you want anything else -- voicemails transcribed, etc., check those settings.

4. Under the "Calls" tab, change the default to "Call Screening On" (note: I don't have the box checked for requiring callers to announce their name because I believe that hinders customer service, but if you want this, it won't affect the final outcome).

Caller ID radio button: choose "Display Google Voice" (then, on your phone, add a contact for your business line so whenever it rings, you'll see the incoming call from that business name. I personalized the label so it says my business name and "Google Voice" in small letters (underneath instead of "iPhone" or "home" or "work" or the usual labels).

Check "Place missed calls in inbox."

5. Last but MOST IMPORTANT step: on your phone, you must deactivate conditional call forwarding (which is set as a default):

On your phone, dial ##004# and hit "send." This will ensure that calls coming into your phone are not all going to forward to Google Voice (the conditional call forwarding default).

RESULT from all these steps:

• Calls to your business number forward to your cell. If no answer, they will route to business voicemail (or whatever you set as your Google Voice voicemail).
• Calls to your personal number forward to the same cell. If there is no answer, they will route to your personal voicemail.

It doesn't matter if you decline the call or it rings long enough to go to voicemail, the correct voicemail box should still engage.

I keep my phone on silent almost all the time to keep disruption down when working so it was important to me that the correct voicemail picked up for its associated number. I hope this information is useful if you're having problems setting up your Google Voice account.

For Allison.

“The deep pain that is felt at the death of every friendly soul arise from the feeling that there is in every individual something which is inexpressible, peculiar to him alone, and is, therefore, absolutely and irretrievably lost.” Arthur Schopenhauer

Allison

Everyone has an important friend from childhood, their earliest friend, the one they first discover what it means to share laughter with someone outside the family. Allison was that person to me. We met in first grade. I was five, right about the age where my memories begin. On the last day of school, Mrs. Rose handed each student a special award for their talents and Allison got the "best behaved" distinction. It was the prize most revered because it was the hardest earned.

Allison, humble and wise even as a kid, did not brag like the others but instead stood quietly still, surprised by this unexpected badge as other students crowded around her to admire the well-deserved honor.

She was my first best friend and she shaped me. And she will never be forgotten.

I'd been looking for her online ever since I got online. (1994?) One day I Googled her name and found... her gravestone. I looked at my screen and started to cry.

I dreamt about her not that long ago and wrote:

Visiting Allison. (a dream)

I was 1,000 miles from home and visiting a college bookstore when I suddenly ran into my childhood friend, Allison, my best friend from about ages 6-12 before I moved away. I was somehow traveling backwards through time. I didn't ask how -- dreams are funny like that. I just knew it was happening.

She was young and beautiful in my dream, a sophomore in college. She was with her boyfriend who I knew would soon become her husband.

I watched her peruse through merchandise and pick up party lights."Ah," I thought. "You were not yet dead." She didn't know that two years from then she'd be gone, a victim of childbirth gone terribly wrong.

I went over and talked to her in my dream, wanting so badly to hold onto our conversation, the connection. Outwardly it seemed light, airy. We laughed together. I winced inside. She couldn't possibly know or understand that her foreshadowed death rattled around in my innards like a broken bottle, that I needed to double over and wrap my arms around myself to hold in the pieces that were coming apart.

One of the tiny lightbulbs dropped on the floor and bounced but did not break. I bent over to pick it up and thought, "Is this what it's like when you travel back in time to spend an instance with someone?" I thought. "Consumed only with when you would lose them, unable to fully enjoy the moment?"

I wanted to cry great racking sobs for the future as I knew how it would play out. I felt cheated. I went back to see her -- worked so hard for this moment -- and yet even then could not bring back the innocence that existed before I knew the pain of her loss.

We continued our light banter. I swallowed more glass. I found her a sweater she could wear on her way home. There was some comfort in giving her that, on that last occasion that I would see her. And we parted. She bought her party supplies. I watched her fade and slowly became conscious that I was dreaming. That's when I began writing this post in my head.

I woke up thinking of her and of all the other losses in my life I would know one day. How I'd be forever changed by each one, bent and gnarled like a charred, twisted oak, scarred by countless storms and fires.

Maybe this is the thing that makes us old. Loss. Because it robs us of our innocence that the world will stay as we know it.

RIP, Ali. Miss you.

Be kind anyway.

“People are often unreasonable and self-centered. Forgive them anyway.
If you are kind, people may accuse you of ulterior motives. Be kind anyway.
If you are honest, people may cheat you. Be honest anyway.
If you find happiness, people may be jealous. Be happy anyway.
The good you do today may be forgotten tomorrow. Do good anyway.
Give the world the best you have and it may never be enough. Give your best anyway.
For you see, in the end, it is between you and God. It was never between you and them anyway.”
― Mother Teresa

Choose carefully...

"Choose these people, these things, these surroundings- gingerly, with curiosity and optimistic hesitation. These are the characters that will hang their hats and kick up their feet, atop all of your treasures, the ones we see and the ones we don't...they'll complicate your plans and make appearances in your day-to-day thought patterns.... they'll consume parts of you, even if you are careful. Let the pieces they consume be some of your favorites...."

-- Chelsea Latimer

From her blog post Making Space...