"tis a gift to be simple"

My daughter Elissa bought me a simple gift today.  It's a pretty framed saying with a universal message that speaks to all of us, and especially our Sylvania family at this time in our journeys.  "Life takes us to unexpected places.  Love brings us home."  When my daughter Michelle saw it on my kitchen wall, she had tears in her eyes, a smile on her face.

In a flash my life runs by me: Rochester to Massachusetts to Wisconsin to Toledo, Ohio, to Washington, DC, to St. Petersburg, Florida, to Ukraine for two years;  travels across the USA and around the world;  sun rises, full moons, and rainbows in unexpected places;  and then the decision, a year ago, while in Starobelsk, to move back to Toledo, Ohio.

It was a surprise, but this is where my children and grandchildren have always lived, and still live.  I've come full circle.  Love brought me back. It's just like the Shaker song, written in the 1840s, says: "'tis a gift to be simple." And "when we find ourselves in the place just right, "twill be in the valley of love and delight."

'Tis a gift to be simple, 'tis a gift to be free, 'tis a gift to come down where we ought to be, and when we find ourselves in the place just right, 'twill be in the valley of love and delight. When true simplicity is gained to bow and to bend we shan't be ashamed, to turn, turn, will be our delight till by turning, turning we come round right.