Columns

Editor’s note: This is a reprinted column from Jack Purcell’s “On the Journey” archives. It originally appeared in The Star in 2013.

Cibolo Creek Quilters Guild members’ generosity offers a magnificent year of support to local charities. While COVID-19 continued to prevent opportunities for members to get together and sew, it failed to impact donations to local charities. We appreciate the donation of precious time, talent and treasures of our arts partner guild members.

People, at least most of us, are a worrisome bunch by nature. We often get concerned about common things as well as things specific to our individual lives.

Near the one-year mark of his presidency, I thought it important to review some of the things that Democrats led by President Joe Biden have accomplished this year.

The Texas Health and Human Services Commission is again extending emergency food benefits this month, with more than $307 million in emergency allocations expected to help more than 1.5 million Texas households.

Q: After a difficult divorce, I remarried several years ago. At first my son got along OK with my new husband. But once my boy reached puberty, conflict flared into open hostility between them. I feel caught in the middle. Help!

Too often people will acquire property and start undertaking management actions that they have “heard” are good for the land. These new land stewards will later take a workshop or invite a natural resources expert for a site visit and celebrate their missteps, with comments like: “I’ve cleared all of the cedar and I’m ready to manage.”

Have you and your emerging reader made a New Year’s resolution to improve his or her reading skills? Our library can help! Share a book with a trained and certified therapy dog one Saturday a month in the Youth Department.

Carriage House Gallery of Artists invites you to celebrate a new year with new art of Katrina Gorman from 4 to 7 p.m. on Saturday, January 8. Enjoy a glass of wine and chocolates while becoming acquainted with Gorman and her passion for fiber art.

I am beginning an amazing 17th year writing my “From the Heart, Lifeskills for Today” column. My hope for all readers rests in believing the articles written over the years have been helpful and rewarding for each one.

When we stop to think about the world we are living in today, it would seem that wisdom is in short supply. Our country appears to be in complete chaos, and the rest of the world is no better and seems to be in peril.

Life can be so funny, yet so fragile. It’s certainly something we should never take for granted.