wife, mother, grandmother, great grandmother coming to 90

 Audio of Paul trying to read this.

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As a teacher by instinct and experience, I can tell you 

• there are some people you can't teach, and there are others you don't want to teach… and 

• lasting the distance, showing up & participating, may not be everything, but it sure is something, and 

• (her) actions speak much louder than (my) words.

I'd like to be a better teacher. I can see Dell growing through the hellish things she's actually lived through (two house-covering floods, bowel cancer, loss of husband, loss of many friends, just to name a few) to be a better person. If I was a better man! - but, maybe I'm just a better! You win some, you lose some.

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"But (Nanna) Dell has lasted well" they say.

At 90 years, through floods and fears of more,

she's come, though some who're close aren't here today.

Well, many close have come to ends before-

hand - left this time and place to face the next..

next shore, or realm, or stage. The page has turned,

as birth brings mirth for new, but also vexed

responses - coz old ways we'd boldly  learned

before don't work - they're jerk-y don't quite fit

in larger world unfurled, or body yet

to come (our way of taking on the bit

more life that's rife). Well, "Did we win the bet?"

What better would commit to it, if sure

that it would never happen? ... Lappin' up,

alternatively, options which give more..

more odds against them, yet the better's gut,

or other senses tell it's well on way,

and then the better's sure it will occur.

What better thing to bet on? I would say.

And in that sense, this life is better for

the game and fun, of race that's run. Better

be where not just "the odds", but insights go!

What better way to bet than if you met

a person with some news from inside? Oh,

I know that the insider story on 

our Dell is that she grows more  grateful each

& ev'ry year that goes. My nose knows one

I'd like to learn from, much more than to teach!

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