1) Overdose Awareness – August 31 is International Overdose Awareness Day. Let’s have the goal of #NotOneMore loved one lost to drug overdose.
“May you never get that call. I did on October 24, 2010. Worst day of my life. I was lucky…he survived………..so many don’t…….These people are someone’s daughters, sons, mothers, fathers, friends…….Don’t judge. Listen to their stories. We need change. Many people need help and there is not always help out there.” – Jeanne Barney
Photo Credit: Facebook, International Overdose Awareness Day
“National Overdose Awareness Day! It still surprises me on how many people I talk to seem oblivious to this epidemic in our country and throughout the world. In 2017 the official number of deaths was over 72,000 people [in the US]. More in 2018. These 72,000 people were Mothers and Fathers, Daughters and Sons. Aunts and Uncles. Just think about how many peoples lives were affected by 72,000 deaths. Addiction is real……..Addiction kills……..Lets all get together and find ways to talk about this beast that kills more people than car accidents, guns, breast cancer, The Vietnam War. I pray that my Facebook friends never have to be touched in anyway by the Overdose of a loved one. Unfortunately, the math says …………..you more than likely will.” – Jeanne Barney
2) Quiet Influencers – We have all had them in our lives: these quiet influencers. People who gave us their best without needing to be center stage themselves. People who helped us to mature into people of influence ourselves…for some even, people of significant power or renown. These quiet influencers could be our parents. Or peers who saw in us maybe someone we couldn’t imagine ourselves.
Writer Rachel Pieh Jones urges us to capture the stories of our quiet influencers:
Power resides not only in the obvious leaders, the loudest voices, or the wealthiest donors, but also in the quiet influencers.
Search out these leaders, collaborate with them, use their own words, be wise in the details emphasized, and be mindful of how the story will be heard. Pass the mic to these influencers and do your part to elevate their voices. – Rachel Pieh Jones
How (and Why) We Should Be Telling the Stories of Quiet Influencers – Rachel Pieh Jones
I personally am so thankful for the many quiet influencers in my life and work. They are many and they are “just a little lower than the angels” (Psalm 8:5).
Thanks to Jones, I am feeling the need to capture some of their stories…so hopefully you’ll read about them here. How about you? Please comment about your quiet influencers in the Comments below. It’s a good start.
Photo Credit: Facebook, Julie McGowan
3) Primary Physicians – You know you’re getting some age on when your doctor retires…especially when he is not so old, or so it seems.
Not everyone in the world has the privilege of having a family doctor. One who both cares for you and possibly your own adult children.
For over 10 years, we have had Dr. Bill Harrington as our primary physician. He’s been with us through all sorts of life transitions…as well as quite a few medical scares. I won’t go into the details here, but a physician who can get a hunch and follow it through – to discover cancer or a potentially life-threatening cardiac malfunction – is a tremendous asset. That is the kind of person Dr. Harrington has been to us. Wise, funny, thoughtful, and intuitive. We will miss him.
I’m counting on him still writing the poetry we have gotten to read – which he began writing just a short time ago. Definitely models for his patients how good life can be around every corner. Retirement blessings, Dr. H. Well-done!
4) Habits of Purpose – I’ve written about Justin Whitmel Earley. He is a very successful attorney who is now also a writer, speaker, and life coach.
Photo Credit: Joshua Straub
His book The Common Rule: Habits of Purpose for an Age of Distraction has become one of my favorites. Below you can find a graphic that gives his habits of purpose in brief (some are daily practiced and some are weekly).
Earley’s website has lots of free helps on it and now he has produced a video series (also free) to help us move our lives more toward purpose. I’m hoping to gather a group of friends to have weekly evenings of watching the short video and talking about how we might incorporate those ideas into our lives. Good stuff!
The Common Rule – Book Review – Darryl Dash
5) Museums for All – We have a family membership to Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden. 
Photo Credit: Visit Richmond Va
My daughter, grandchildren, and I visited the garden earlier today. It was a marvel, as always!
As we were leaving, I commented what a privilege it was to be able to afford a membership to such a beautiful place. It was then my daughter told me about the Museums for All program.
It flows out of an initiative of the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) based in Washington, D.C. For anyone who has an EBT card (for supplemental food assistance), that person can buy and individual annual membership for a museum for $1 or a family membership for $5. That is an incredible benefit for those in our city who couldn’t afford a membership otherwise. So, yay for Museums for All!
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That’s it for this week. Although we still have days in the 90s, with the start of school and the small but clear changes in the environment around us, Fall is coming! I will leave you with a few images we all look forward to. Have a sweet weekend peopled with those you love.
Bonuses:
For you guitarists out there: Beyond the Guitar Academy
The Surprising Benefits of Talking to Strangers –
On slavery in North America 400 years ago this August and slavery in the world today:
Photo Credit: Twitter, D. B. Harrison
The Atlantic Slave Trade in Two Minutes – Andrew Kahn & Jamelle Bouie
Photo Credit: Gzero Media
U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory: Marijuana Use & the Developing Brain
https://twitter.com/drantbradley/status/1166318186989592576
Perfect dessert at a friend’s house after we shared lunch. Fruit in a bowl from North Africa:
Photo Credit: Amazing Things, Facebook
Photo Credit: 
