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*Lunch Hour in Utica* 5/13/02 ____________________________ If you enjoy this free daily email service, I encourage you to spread the word to family and friends that we may bring inspiration into the lives of many! If you are not on the list and this has been passed along to you, join the thousands of HeartTouchers.com readers around the world by sending an e-mail with the word "Subscribe" in the subject line to: HeartTouchers@aol.com Visit our inspirational web site and read all the past stories in our archives at: http://www.HeartTouchers.com ____________________________________________ Are you looking for the perfect gift to give for Mother's Day, Father's Day, or Graduation? Then check out Michael's Video Production business: Video Imagery! You can transfer your photos over to videotape, or even DVD, all set to music that will make your images come alive! The cost is only $1 per photo, which means no matter what your budget is, you can give the most meaningful gift you have ever given because you determine how many photos you transfer, and therefore, how much you spend! Want to make Mom, Dad, or your favorite graduating senior cry happy tears? Then check out all Michael has to offer at the following web site: http://www.hearttouchers.com/video_imagery/ AOL Users click here: Video Imagery "My whole family wants to thank you for the wonderful job you did on the video. Time went by so fast we never got a chance to call and let you know how happy we were. We had wrapped one and put the other in the VCR. We started it and they were so surprised. My dad was speechless, which is a rare thing, and it brought tears to my mom's eyes. They loved it!! We know it was really time consuming, and we wanted to thank you and your wife also. She was always so nice whenever we called with any questions. Thanks again and have a wonderful holiday season." The Creighton Family..........Janesville, WI _________________________________________ We wanted to wish a very happy birthday day to Kaaryn Hermsen! Kaaryn hope you had a wonderful birthday and that you know you are loved and appreciated! From my family to yours, Michael _________________________________________ Lunch Hour in Utica By Kenneth L. Pierpont, © 2002 ken@kenpierpont.com If my life were a movie I would fast-forward though Junior High. My Junior High years were painful. Like every Junior High kid I was dealing with awakening sexuality, and struggling with who I was and how I would make my mark in life. But I was sure I was alone with these strange feelings. I was trying and failing in a number of things. I wanted to excel in athletics but had not yet figured out that that would never happen. I wasn't academic enough to spell academic. (I'm a little surprised right now that I was able to spell that without the aid of my nifty little Microsoft Word Spell Checker). I was trying to gain a spot in the pecking order as a new kid in school. All the while I remember suffering the rejection of most of my peers, being cut from the basketball team, failing to play football that I so wanted to play. It was a time of questioning how girls saw me and wanting so much to be loved and accepted. To be loved and accepted seemed to me at the time something I could never in all my life achieve. During that time I would go through the cafeteria line and eat alone feeling unloved and unnoticed. As spring came one day I was starting out the door and complaining that I had no one to eat with. Mom said to me; "If you want you can come home for lunch." That day when lunch came it was a beautiful spring day in the hills of central Ohio. The bell rang at noon and I bolted from the school and ran across the little village home to eat. I wondered if my mom would remember. When I got there mom was getting a little chicken pot pie out of the oven for me. It was a very humble lunch. It was just one of those four-for-a-dollar pot pies with little diced pieces of chicken, frozen peas and carrots, in some chicken gravy. Mom set a cloth napkin beside my plate at the end of the table just beneath the window. I sat at our humble kitchen table in our tiny white rented home on Maple Street in Utica. Mom listened to me while I talked about whatever was on my mind. In about 15 minutes my time was up and I ran back to school. That was in about 1972, thirty years ago. My mom at the time was in her early thirties. She seemed so old to me then and thirty-year-olds seem like children to me now. She sat across the table for about 15 minutes and looked at me and listened to me and three decades later I remember those times with fondness. She just paid attention to me. It's a powerful thing to pay attention to people. Now you know a little more about how I see home. Home is a place where you don't have to sit alone and eat. Home is a place where people don't ignore you and avoid you. Home is a place where it doesn't really matter that much what's on the menu, simple things are sweet to the taste in an atmosphere of love and security and acceptance. Moms are people who listen to you when no one else is interested. And Moms don't ever think the small mundane things you do don't matter. Moms don't laugh at your dreams. Good moms pay attention. Great moms fix you something warm to eat and pay attention. I'm not sure what was happening at the time but I know those little chicken pot pies were not worthy of a sprint across town. With the clarity of vision that the years bring, I now know that I needed a friendly place of warm acceptance for a few minutes a day. I didn't need my stomach filled as much as I needed my emotional fuel tank refilled. And refueling an emotional fuel tank is a good mother's specialty. Kenneth L. Pierpont ken@kenpierpont.com Write Ken and let him know your thoughts on his story! _________________________________ Ken Pierpont and his wife Lois live in Fremont, Michigan with their eight children. Ken is the Senior Pastor at First Baptist Church. He publishes the Stonebridge Newsletter every Monday morning and sends it free on request. You can read more of Ken's work at www.kenpierpont.com or communicate directly with him at ken@kenpierpont.com ******** The copyrights to the stories that appear in HeartTouchers.com are owned by the authors and are used with their permission. We refuse to run stories without the author's permission and contact info listed after the story. We also refuse to publish stories listed as "author unknown." (All of which violates Copyright Law and the rights of the authors.) This e-mail may be forwarded in its entirety, but it is expressly prohibited to cut and paste the stories from here to be used elsewhere unless you have contacted and been given permission by the individual writer. Thank you so much for honoring the rights of those writers who graciously share their stories with us! _________________________________________ Reader Feedback! Michael, D. Anne Jones' story, "The Poinsettia Plant in All of Us," really hit the spot today! I need that encouragement that my three sons (ages 18 to 29 and "good people") will one day bloom again spiritually. Thanks for the lift! Karen, kdeloach@frontiernet.net ______________________________________ REQUESTS: I wanted to ask you to put a prayer request on your website. My parents are in the final stages of the adoption of Estania, and we're all hoping that she will be here very soon! Mom and Amy went to visit her and said that she is a perfect fit for our family. Anyway, there have been some delays with some of the other adoptions through Haiti and we're just praying that Estania's will go through without any of those problems. We would appreciate your prayers, too! I am planning on finishing the second half of my story when she gets here! Thanks so much for your website! Love, Trisha ajlacoste@gulftel.com _____________________________________ Can't get enough inspirational stories in your life? Would you like to send a unique gift to your friends and family? Then order a personalized autographed copy of the inspirational book: Straight From the Heart "A Celebration of Life" by Michael T. Powers for only $13.95. And best of all, we'll pay the shipping! Michael is an award winning writer whose stories have appeared in numerous newspapers and magazines around the world and in the following books: Chicken Soup for the Sports Fan's Soul, Chicken Soup for the Grandparent's Soul, Stories For the Extreme Teen's Heart, Stories For the Extreme Teen's Heart 2, Stories for the Teen's Heart 2, Heartwarmers, God Allows U-Turns Volumes 1 and 4, Creating Emotionally Safe Schools, and in the upcoming books: Don't Sweat the Small Stuff Story Collection, Chicken Soup for the Romantic Soul, Chicken Soup for the Grieving Soul, and The Miracle of Boys. He has signed several contracts for future Chicken Soup and other inspirational books. Still not convinced? You can preview his book by visiting: http://www.HeartTouchers.com/michael_powers AOL Users click here! To order your autographed copy have a check or money order for $13.95 for each book made out to Michael T. Powers, and then send it to: Michael T. Powers 1918 Liberty Lane Janesville, WI 53545 (Please allow about 2 weeks for delivery.) _________________________________________ _ /_/\/\ MICHAEL T. POWERS \_\ / HeartTouchers@aol.com /_/ \ "For I have been crucified with Christ and I no \_\/\ \ longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I \_\/ live in the body I live for the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me." Galatians 2:20 ___________________________________________ The copyrights to the stories that appear in HeartTouchers.com are owned by the authors and are used with their permission. We refuse to run stories without the author's permission and contact info listed after the story. We also refuse to publish stories listed as "author unknown." (All of which violates Copyright Law and the rights of the authors.) This e-mail may be forwarded in its entirety, but please do not cut and paste the stories to be used elsewhere unless you have contacted and been given permission by the individual writer. Thank you so much for honoring the rights of those writers who graciously share their stories with us! ___________________________________________ Would you like to see your story in HeartTouchers.com? Writer's guidelines can be found on our Web site here: http://www.HeartTouchers.com/guidelines/ AOL Users click here: Writer's Guidelines ___________________________________________ SUBSCRIBE: "I need a daily source of inspiration and encouragement in my life!" To become a HeartTouchers.com Member send an e-mail with "Subscribe" in the subject line to: HeartTouchers@AOL.COM Then get ready to laugh, cry, and be deeply touched by some of the best stories on the Internet! __________________________________________ UNSUBSCRIBE: All you have to do is send an e-mail with the word "Unsubscribe" in the subject line to: HeartTouchers@aol.com Give it a day or two to be processed... __________________________________________ Do you feel as if life has no meaning for you? http://www.greatcom.org/english/four.htm AOL Users click here: The Four Spiritual Laws ________________________________ |
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Touching Lives - One E-mail at a Time! Author Michael T. Powers - HeartTouchers @ aol.com
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