random thought of the day

There's an ooold, oold ani difranco song (before she had dreds or even green extensions, I think her hair was an even 2" all around at this point) with a lyric that's stuck in my head:

"You can talk of great philosophy/But if you can't be kind to people every day it doesn't mean that much to me/It's the little things you do, the little things you say/It's the love you give along the way"

Well, not exactly, but close, far as I'm concerned. Actually, it's being able to BOTH think strategically AND be kind to people every day. And by 'kind', in this case, I define that as whatever the recipient of the kindness identifies as 'kind', which can take a hell of a lot of paying attention to what the recipient thinks, says and does. I wrote a lengthy piece about how I'd like to operate in the world that's consistent with my politics, attempting to include the incredibly subtle stuff about ways I interact and understand the world, limited though it may be. This piece was part of an exercise from (*shudder* - am I about to publicly admit this? I suppose so...) The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, which has people go through a process of distilling their core beliefs and principles. Not a bad idea, especially for a person like me, who thinks about principles all the time in a broad stroke.

I may put that up here. I'm debating. Goad me into it if you want to see them...meester1_toth2@lycos3.com4 (remove the numbers from the address to use it, this is to prevent spammers. I've been blissfully spam-free thusfar)