Mama Always ~ L.A. Brown, Author

URGENT PLEA FOR HELP ***UPDATE*** While there is still quite a bit of work to do, we here in Houston are well on the road to recovery. There are still some who have not had someone in to evaluate their situations, but Recovery Teams and FEMA are doing their best to get to those in need. We still covet your prayers for all involved. For the teams that are going in to do the initial assessments, the mud-outs, and the repair work...for the FEMA teams and most especially for the families who's lives have been affected by the flooding. With more rain on the way, some things will have to be put on hold until areas are dry. Thank you so much for all of your previous prayers and support. Please keep praying. Thanks, L. Good morning, Everyone! Have a question for all of you. Have you been blessed by God today? I know a good deal of you will give a resounding "yes!" to that question, and that's a wonderful thing. But. Here in Houston, there are some who...

Good day, Mr. Trump! I've been watching your campaign for quite a while. You see, while I am a registered Republican, I do tend to watch all of the Candidates...that are worth their salt. Unfortunately, if one were to measure quantities of salt and apply said quantity to each of the five Candidates on both sides, I'd say the total measure may not even add up to a cup. But hey, that's my opinion, and that's not why I'm writing this blog. Its about Texas, and the scarceness of the Candidates so far. Yes, Ted Cruz is our Senator/Candidate, and I am thinking that you think that he will sweep the State. While that may be true,and Primaries aside, I still haven't seen his face grace our newscasts. If the nomination goes to contest, all bets are off, all delegates go back to square one and it's a free-for-all for the remaining candidates. But you know that already. You may have heard while on the Campaign trail that Houston was hit with the worst flooding tha...

Okay, so maybe not, but there's some serious rain going on over the Gulf Coast. We've been in this house since March of '01. Not the most sturdy house in the neighborhood, heavens knows that we've had our fair share of fixes and repair, after all, the house is forty-three years old. However, through Hurricanes/Tropical Storms Rita, Allison and Ike, never once have I had water in the house. Bees, yes, water no. Apparently this year is different. There's been talk on the neighborhood sites that this could very well be a 500 year flood season, and that's possible, but all I know is I have a bunch of chickens disguised as dogs in my house. Okay, well, my big girls, Bailey and Izzy are better than my daughter's Japanese bred pooches, and as I think about it, they should have the ability to tread or even maybe even like water in their DNA. Nope. The Min Pin will swim the small lake on my back porch, go to the grass, look around and swim back. Because he doesn...

Tonight was a tough night for me. Not because something bad happened, but actually, something good happened. Our Worship Pastor, Marty, encouraged us to (paraphrasing here) feel our lyrics. We can sing and mimic all we want, but to engage those who are listening, we need to allow the lyrics to seep into us and pull out our story. Paraphrasing here, mind you. Then we went back over a song that we're singing on Sunday: *My Story by Big Daddy Weave. What happened next is nothing short of extraordinary, at least to me...because I allowed the words to be my  story, and it was tough. In order for you to understand what I'm saying, I'm going to incorporate the words of the song along with my testimony. So if the members of Big Daddy Weave are reading...thank you for sharing your story so I can share mine. If I told you my story You would hear Hope that wouldn't let go In January, it was thirty three years since my life changed. No, there was no traffic accident that ma...

Yes...that's me...sarcasm at its best. Let's forget that this is March 31st and tomorrow's April Fools Day. Let's forget that we're coming up on the deadline for income tax returns. Let's forget that insurance kicks in the first of the year and we're stuck with the choices we made only because we looked at the deductibles, co-pays and out of pocket expenses and not much else. Wait...let's not forget that one for now. Let's forget that Punxuatany Phil, or however you spell the critter's name was right and spring has sprung. Let's focus on something else. Like yellow crud everywhere. It infests your air ducts, spreads like gangrene on your car, leaves yellow running puddles when you water and sticks to black clothes like it was Velcro. Pollen. The yin and yang of Spring around here in Southeast Texas. On the one hand its great, it means the flowers are blooming, and so are the trees, grass and weeds...but it also means great allergies. Yeah....

You know, this is a question that I seem to ask a lot lately. Mostly to myself, but on a couple of occasions it's been out loud. God gave me the heart for the underdog, for the abused, for those rejected by society...doesn't matter if that individual is a human or an animal. Every day I see at least one post showing an animal in distress. Usually, its more than five that I see in my timeline. At least twice a week, I see a child who has been abused or is gravely ill. About that many times a week there are posts about adults or seniors going through chemo treatments or are finding themselves at the end of their roads. Every once in a while I have a friend or two who are so deeply depressed that hope is something that everyone else has. No, its not one person in particular, there are many on my friends list that have depression and have shared via PM the pain they feel physically from the emotional pain of loneliness or depression. And every single time, my heart breaks. I w...

Oh my goodness! Where did the time go? It's said that as you grow older that time seems to fly by. Maybe its a cruel joke or maybe its a merciful thing, I don't know. What I do know is that I've learned that if I don't make the most of every day, that I've missed out on that day's blessing, one that would never make an appearance again because it was unique for that time. This year has been fraught with violence, threats, and fear and it seems to be getting worse, but... But, there is so much more that is going on around us, and if we are not mindful of that fact, we will miss it. We will miss the blessings. We will miss life. There's a song in the Christian community by Brandon Heath called Give me Your eyes.  The chorus goes this way: Give me Your eyes for just one second  Give me Your eyes so I can see  Everything that I keep missing  Give me Your love for humanity  Give me Your arms for the broken-hearted  the ones that are far beyond my ...