Thursday, August 27, 2015

Introduction from Paul Winters

      Hi! I'm Paul Winters and I am #newtoOSU and loving it so far. I love hanging loose in an uptight world and being able to slow down and enjoy the finer things such as great views in the woods while hunting or hiking. I work at a retirement home, so I love, love, love, my old people and all that they are. They are treasures and so precious. I took a year off after high school and I started a book of them and all their stories, and wow, I didn't know what I was getting into. People have layers and when we talk to them we get to see more from them that isn't at the surface. Their wisdom has helped me with making life decisions and making sure to enjoy every moment as they do say it wasn't long ago they were my age. It has really made me stop and think and look around at everything and say what is it that I would wish I would have done in this time.  Then I go and start to do it. I once feared not going after my intuition and had dreams about just being old and sad because I didn't follow my intuition and I was the person other people wanted me to be and now my time was up and the regret was too much even in the dreams. From that point on I started acting on all the things I thought were just too far to reach. I have nothing to loose and everything to gain and I will not stop until I have ran my race in life.  One thing I have started is writing a book and striving towards the life I want to live, not the cookie cutter life that can be imposed on us.
     The theme that has really been sticking with me from chapter 1 is always treat the places and people you are by and with like it is the last time you may see them. When Ishmael and his friends left for Mattru Jong little did they know it was going to be the last time they saw many of the people they once knew and the area as it was in before it is destroyed by the rebel forces. It really hit me to think about how we don't know when it will be the last time we see people or the places we love.
while we are luckily in a an area of the world that this sort of thing will not happen on the scale that it did in his country, people still pass away and places catch fire and things can go away and we don't get to say goodbye. As he thinks back about the last time he saw his parents and not knowing if he will ever see them again I think, wow I can't even begin to imagine the distress and the state of worry that I would be in if I was in his position. This theme really stood out to me in the first chapter and I will apply it in my life going forward as I don't know the timing of the things and I need to be grateful for all the people and things around for I don't know how long it will be before it is too late to really appreciate them. 

This is a picture from my favorite beach in Hawaii, heaven on earth. A spot right outside of Honolulu that not many tourists get out to and as seen above it is a breathe of fresh air you won't forget. I hope everyone gets a chance to get out there.



This is one of my senior pictures with my dog Deek. Shortly after the picture was taken he got really sick and we had to put him down. I love this picture as a good memory as the way things were. 

5 comments:

  1. If you don't mind me asking do any of your elderly people you work with tell any old war stories or any stories about heroic medals they have received? Good choice of theme that jumped out to you.

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    1. Yes Cameron, many of the have been through World War II and they have been shot down and ran from the Germans and sheltered and helped by some of the locals. Some of them have have crazy stories about the depression about barely making ends meet and then becoming very successful, many of the times as they tell the stories it is hard not to get emotional with them they really worked hard to get where they are.

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  2. If you don't mind me asking do any of your elderly people you work with tell any old war stories or any stories about heroic medals they have received? Good choice of theme that jumped out to you.

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  3. I think they theme you chose really goes well with what is going on in the book. It is very true and a setting like that, you never know what will happen the next day or a week from now. That did pop up in my head as well as I read the book.

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  4. I love that you can appreciate the outdoors so much ! I also really liked your theme it was deep.

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