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July 29, 2025 3 mins

It is always a joy to receive warm thoughts from readers. These special gifts can then be shared with the reading audience of this column. The column a reader once gave me entitled, "Count Your Blessings," received many comments, so it was very special this week to receive these additional thoughts on counting blessings from a special friend: "Count your garden by the flowers, never by the leaves that fall. Count your days by golden hours. Don't remember clouds at all. Count your nights by stars, not shadows. Count your years with smiles, not tears. Count your blessings not your troubles. Count your age by friends, not years."

Abraham Lincoln once said, "My friends are my best treasure, the best part of life." I recently heard someone say, "You are more than a friend. You are a blessing." "Friends are like flowers in the garden of life. A friend is like a sunbeam that can always warm your day and bring you endless treasures as you travel on life's way." William Ellery Channing once stated, "True friends have no solitary joy or sorrow." In my collection of thoughts on friends and friendship, I found this thought by John Addison, "Friendship improves happiness and abates misery by doubling our joy and dividing our grief." Coleridge describes friendship as "a sheltering tree." Friendship and friends are truly gifts.

The Gift of Friendship. Friendship is a priceless gift that cannot be bought or sold, but its value is far greater than a mountain made of gold. For gold is cold and lifeless. It can neither see nor hear, and in the time of trouble, it is powerless to cheer. It has no ears to listen, no heart to understand. It cannot bring you comfort or reach out a helping hand. So when you ask God for a gift, be thankful if he sends...not diamonds, pearls or riches, but the love of real, true friends." Thanks for being a friend!

Warm Thoughts from the Little Home on the Prairie Over a Cup of Tea written by Dr Luetta G Werner

Published in the Marion Record July 30, 1998.


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Till next time,

Trina

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