"The first step is always in your court."

The words seemed to leap off the page at me.

It may seem obvious to some, but when you are dealing with learned helplessness, with the feeling that no matter what you do, you can't make a difference, with rock and hard place choices, it is easy to forget.

You cannot go back and start over. You can decide to change the ending from here, by the next step you take. That step is always in your court.


Today is:

Cromwell's Day

Day of Universal Alarm -- Fairy Calendar

Feast of Atqksak, Baffin Land

Independence Day, San Marino, Qatar

Lost Day

National Welsh Rarebit Day

Running of the Sheep, MT

Skyscraper Day

St. Gregory the Great's Day (invented Gregorian Chant; patron of music, popes, singers, teachers, school children; against plague)

St. Marinus' Day

South Carolina Applefest


Birthdays Today:

Charlie Sheen, 1965
Mort Walker, 1923
Kitty Carlisle Hart, 1914
Alan Ladd, 1913
Nicolo Amati, 1596


Today in History:

Sextus Pompeius, son of Pompey, is defeated in the Battle of Naulochus by Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa, admiral of Octavian, which ends the resistance to the Second Triumvirate, BC36
Saint Marinus founds San Marino, one of the smallest nations in the world and the world's oldest republic still in existence, 301
King Richard I (the Lionheart) crowned, and 30 Jews are massacred as part of the celebration, 1189
The first large group of Swiss and German colonists reach the shores of North and South Carolina areas, 1709
Gregorian calendar adopted, 1752
Signing of the Treaty of Paris, end of the US Revolutionary War, 1783
John Dalton, English scientist begins using symbols to represent different atomic elements, 1803
The first daily newspaper, a "penny paper", the NY Sun, begins publication, 1833
68th and final transport of Dutch Jews, including Anne Frank and her family/friends, leaves for Auschwitz, 1944
Wally Gator premiers, 1962