I am, obviously, a bit behind in my efforts at blogging. Or maybe there has just been so much good recently. Either way, this great Op-Ed was sent to me by my friend Matthew from Savannah. It reminds me of Outliers: The Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell – which I have been heard to (loosely) quote from recently. The bottom line – and great news – is that we can all do just about anything that we set our minds to do…as long as we are willing to practice being good at it. I can hear my father saying over, and over again, ”Practice makes perfect. Practice makes perfect.” I guess that he was right.
Genius: The Modern View
By DAVID BROOKS, New York Times, May 1, 2009
Some people live in romantic ages. They tend to believe that genius is the product of a divine spark. They believe that there have been, throughout the ages, certain paragons of greatness — Dante, Mozart, Einstein — whose talents far exceeded normal comprehension, who had an other-worldly access to transcendent truth, and who are best approached with reverential awe.
We, of course, live in a scientific age, and modern research pierces hocus-pocus. In the view that is now dominant, even Mozart’s early abilities were not the product of some innate spiritual gift. His early compositions were nothing special. They were pastiches of other people’s work. Mozart was a good musician at an early age, but he would not stand out among today’s top child-performers.
I returned home from my travels last week to find a box from Cathy and Robin @ 
Another article I had saved on my computer and was reminded of recently…
Great organization doing a really good thing:
I keep thinking, over and over again, about this quote that I read on 
My grandmother Christine once told me that she “sewed every dress that the girls” – her three daughters – “wore until they left home.” I remember as a little girl how she sewed everything from nightgowns and underwear to prom dresses and quilts. Although her eyes don’t see well enough to sew these days, she is an inspiration to me and can sit for hours telling stories about fabrics, scraps and how one can tell the weather just by looking at the sky. I am starting tonight to make “Mamaw Chris” 
