The Rhythm of Summer

Chicken Soup for the Soul: Devotional Stories for Women

BY: Karen Talcott

This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.
Psalm 118:24


We had been counting down the days to summer vacation, and it had finally arrived. No more cold lunches to pack, no more nights spent checking homework, and no more early morning alarms. Life was about to get a whole lot sweeter.


But, of course, if I have one plan in mind, the opposite is almost always certain to occur. The kids all roused from their beds at 7:00 A.M., hungry and wanting breakfast. By 9:00, they were already bored and looking for me to start "Mommy Camp." Wasn't summer about sipping ice-cold lemonade in a hammock under the shade of a lovely oak tree? I guess not when you are the mother of three.


But after a few days, we began to discover our summer vacation rhythm. The kids started to find things to amuse themselves. Climbing a tree and swinging down from a rope was absolutely thrilling for my five-year-old son. My daughter loved having a pretend tea party for her stuffed animals, serving them soggy crackers and water from her tea set. We didn't need to fill our time with busy theme parks and expensive attractions. Fun could be found in our own backyard or nearby park.


In my life as a mother, wife, and woman, it is so easy to get caught up in the drama of life. I micro-manage my life and fill every waking hour with things to do. What if I spent a day or two and started to notice the little things going on around me that could bring me joy?


Challenge yourself today to become more childlike. Look at this magnificent world that God created and find the wonderment in it. Laugh often, smile more, and appreciate all the beauty
that exists around you. This is the day the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it!

http://www.beliefnet.com/Inspiration/Chicken-Soup-For-The-Soul/2010/06/The-Rhythm-of-Summer.aspx?source=NEWSLETTER&nlsource=49&ppc=&utm_campaign=DIBSoup&utm_source=NL&utm_medium=newsletter

Retaining Memories

From Chicken Soup for the Soul: Thanks Mom

By Robert S. Nussbaum

Son, you outgrew my lap, but never my heart.
~Author Unknown


"Yes, Mom, I am in Utah with Robin and Steve, our friends from Philly. We're visiting Alex, who's working at a mountain and will be starting graduate school in New York in the fall. We'll be home Wednesday morning."


With that, I get off the phone and shake my head. This is at least the 500th time in the past six months that I have had the same conversation with my mom about her granddaughter. My mom is ninety years old and her short-term memory is long gone.


It is hard watching a parent grow old. If we are lucky, we have a fixed image in our minds of our parents in the prime of their lives. My dad passed away almost thirty years ago. I try to remember all the things that made my dad who he was to me. Every once in a while, this offensive image of how he looked the last time I saw him, ravaged by the effects of his cancer, creeps into my mind. I try to disgorge this image from my brain and replace it with the images of him that I treasure.


I grew up in a Leave it to Beaver household. My mom adored my father, and made my sister and I feel like we walked on water. My dad was the man who graduated first in his class from NYU Law at twenty-one years of age, was an all-American fencer, a successful attorney, and an utterly devoted father and husband. My sister, from the time she was little until this day, attempted to protect me and make sure my life was filled only with good thoughts.


I want to make my mom whole again. I want her to wake up this morning with clarity of mind and purpose. I want her to be able to pick up the phone and discuss new matters of import and interest. I want her to be able to drive her car again, like she loved to do. I want her to be able to live independent and strong. I want the mom I remember and still see in my dreams.


But reality does not deal in sentiment. It can be a cruel and unforgiving foe. It does not let us rewind, or cherry pick the moments we retain. It takes us where it wants to take us. If we don't like it, that is of no concern.


My calls with my sister now always begin with, "I just spoke to Mom and she is okay, but..." I never wanted to have a conversation like this with her again. Acceptance of what is, rather than what should be, is not an easy task.


My son has a wonderful capacity for being able to look past the images he sees and hears of his grandmother and interact with her in a gentle, effective manner. While he sometimes has to deal with five or more calls in an hour on the same topic, he never seems to lose his patience. We learn much about others and ourselves in times like this.


I know my mom struggles to cope with what is happening to her. She wants to say she is fine, and always asks what she can do for us. But she comprehends that her difficulties are our difficulties. She knows she can no longer remain thirty-nine, as she tried to do for almost fifty years. She knows that her role as matriarch of the family has been replaced by a new and unintended position. She can recall the glory days, but she has a hard time remembering what she ate for lunch.


I start every morning by picking up the phone to tell her we are all doing well, and asking her how she is feeling. I know she will try to do the best she can to be positive so that I can begin my day without having to call my sister and start the cycle of concern again. I know she wants us to retain the images of her as vibrant and independent, and carry those around with us each and every day.


It is now almost 9 AM in New Jersey. I am sitting in Utah, at the computer, knowing that when I finish my thoughts, I must pick up the phone. I hope it will be a good day for her. I hope she will be my mother again. I hope that there will one day be a cure for dementia so that the next person sitting at the computer does not have to remember the good times past, but can live in the moment. I hope today is the day that the present comes back into focus for my mom. I hope.

http://www.beliefnet.com/Inspiration/Chicken-Soup-For-The-Soul/2010/06/Retaining-Memories.aspx?source=NEWSLETTER&nlsource=49&ppc=&utm_campaign=DIBSoup&utm_source=NL&utm_medium=newsletter

Breakfast

Chicken Soup for the Soul: Thanks Dad

BY: Donna Buie Beall

Old as she was, she still missed her daddy sometimes.
~Gloria Naylor


"Well, hello!"


"Morning."


My father reaches into the top pocket of his shirt and pulls out a five-dollar bill before I can even consider reaching into my purse for my wallet. Every day that he has been in town since the day after Christmas, I have stopped by the McDonald's on De Renne Avenue, which he frequents whenever he is in Savannah visiting me. It is a simple affair: he is always there first, finished with his sausage biscuit and coffee, his eyes focused on the newspaper in front of him, pen in hand, reading glasses balanced on his nose, looking unassuming when I walk in. I am no surprise at this point -- he has been in town for a week, leaving my house early each day to "get out of the way" as I prepare my daughter for school -- and I am tickled that each morning he raises his head from his crossword puzzle to watch me as I approach his table, his whole countenance lighting up as if my coming were a surprise.


"Thank you," I say as I take the five-dollar bill. Our faces wear expressions of mutual pleasure, and I enjoy being surprised with every visit that he is Daddy again, reveling in the fact that this means that I get to be a daughter again. Not wife, or mother or teacher. Not dishwashing machine expert. Just daughter. For this morning, I get to just be a girl.


As I approach the counter where the menu glows above me, seeming more to me like a five-star restaurant than a fast-food joint, the scents of sizzling buttered things tickle my nose and I feel comforted by the robotic buzzing of soda machine beverages trickling into plastic cups. Since I no longer have a childhood home, or kitchen, to meet my father in for breakfast, this has become a surrogate home, and it is really fine by me.


Here, there are no memories of family arguments or reminders that the room is too light or too dark or needs updating. There is only us, the gentle chorus of laughter from the post-holiday retirees who also frequent this popular spot at their usual tables, and my father's five-dollar bill between us, which I use each morning to buy the same favorites: a breakfast combo #1: one egg McMuffin, a hash brown, and a sugary-brown Coke that bubbles through the straw into my mouth and wakes up my still-sleepy eyes.


Over these meals, my father and I talk. We debate politics and finances, share a newspaper, and review the past. We are interrupted only by the casual comment my father makes to a person passing by: "Need any help with that?" he says to the woman with a walker who is struggling to squeeze by the Christmas tree, or "How 'bout today's crowd? Pretty good today, eh?" to the mustached-manager of the McDonald's with whom he has become friends.


But my favorite topic of conversation over our meal is my father's memories.


"I was the fastest thing in Darlington County," he says, and his eyes light up like they have fire in them as he reminisces about playing football, about how playing for St. John's High School in South Carolina was the closest thing to pure glory he had ever known. He reminds me of just how fast he was as he trades his crooked smile for a grimace, shifting in his seat since "that bad shoulder has taken to aching again."


We sit at a small square table as close to the direct sunlight as we can get. My father positions himself in a way that the sun's rays scissor straight down upon his bad shoulder and hip through the restaurant glass, this portrait of him sitting there reminding me of a cat. My father the cat, who could once sprint across a football field like one, like a mean cougar, and who now stretches his limbs under the small restaurant table so that the sun can massage away the aches of too many years of work and sacrifice and miles of football fields.


The morning hours pass into the afternoon. How long since I first strolled in to see him sitting here? The egg McMuffin and sausage biscuits have long been eaten, coffees and Cokes filled and re-filled, and my father's ritual of pulling out the breakfast "dessert" before I get up to leave has now come: homemade ice-lemon cake from an old neighbor who lived across the street from my childhood home.


"Just one slice," he requests before I go, pulling out the plastic knife to make the incision.


I have one small slice, and it is delicious. But I certainly don't need it. I just want to enjoy the taste. But not the taste of the ice-lemon. I want one last tangible experience of my father. One for the road. Tomorrow he leaves.


With the final serving of the lemon cake come a few more stories about him as a boy, and I can't resist. I chew my cake. I close my eyes and listen to his laugh -- the mix of a rumbling clearing of his throat and a wise-cracking guffaw. I memorize this laugh, soaking it in like the warmth of the sun flowing in through the restaurant glass that is covered up by decorative holiday paintings of snowmen and candy canes. As I rise from my seat to return to the rigors of life, I am filled with gladness and comfort. Whether I am age five or thirty-five, my father still rescues me sometimes from life's responsibilities and feeds me breakfast, and in the process, nourishes both my appetite and my spirit.

http://www.beliefnet.com/Inspiration/Chicken-Soup-For-The-Soul/2010/06/Breakfast.aspx?source=NEWSLETTER&nlsource=49&ppc=&utm_campaign=DIBSoup&utm_source=NL&utm_medium=newsletter

Furring the Nest

Chicken Soup for the Soul: What I Learned from the Dog

BY: Mary E. McCloud

One man's trash is another man's treasure.
~Kevin Smith


There's dog hair everywhere! Oh, that Bo! Why does he shed so much? I know. My fault. One look at those big brown eyes, pleading with me from the back porch, is all it takes for me to open the door. Into the house he bounds. Nose sniffing. Tongue hanging. Tail wagging.


Bo is our four-year-old golden Labrador Retriever. He's loyal, gentle and affectionate. Bo can plop his sixty-five pounds of love and fur in your lap, and lick your face at the same time. There's only one small annoyance. His thick, golden, hairy coat sheds -- a lot. One morning, as I was sipping coffee and absorbing the sights of the budding trees, five little sparrows landed on the porch. Bo was in his usual laidback pose, oblivious to the feathered friends hopping around him. As my half-awakened eyes focused, I noticed something in one bird's beak.


What is it? I thought. Oh... it's Bo's hair. What's that bird doing? It's gathering some of Bo's soft fur to line its nest!


I remembered all those times I silently grumbled about his cast-off hair. Sweeping. Vacuuming. Assembling the vacuum hose and its attachments. All the times I made sure everyone had a turn using the lint roller before leaving home. Now, I'm observing a bird about to use something I consider a nuisance.


I watched it as it flew to its nest. The back porch scene I had just witnessed swayed my view of Bo's shedding hair. My sentiments were transformed from irritation to the realization of nature's superb resourcefulness. In the cycle of life, nothing is wasted. Through time, things that appear destroyed, that are shed or discarded are used again. Endings decompose and nourish beginnings.


I sat and imagined how the new hatchlings would feel as they nestled and snuggled in the comfort of their soft nest. Naked and defenseless, yet warm, secure and protected in the plush surroundings of Bo's golden fur.

http://www.beliefnet.com/Inspiration/Chicken-Soup-For-The-Soul/2010/06/Furring-the-Nest.aspx?source=NEWSLETTER&nlsource=49&ppc=&utm_campaign=DIBSoup&utm_source=NL&utm_medium=newsletter

More than a Medical Kit

From Chicken Soup for the Soul: Campus Chronicles

By Jaclyn S. Miller

Luck can often mean simply taking advantage of a situation at the right moment.
It is possible to "make" your luck by always being prepared.
~Michael Korda


"Anybody have a bandage?" a voice echoed down the dorm hallway.


It was our first week at college and we were all experiencing "forgot-it-itis." I had neglected to bring snacks for late-night munchies. Some poor girl on the wing had apparently forgotten bandages. We all felt a little displaced.


Several months before, I sat at my high school graduation party admiring my gifts and battling waves of post-high school sentimentality. The usual and beloved inspirational books were scattered around my feet, silently proclaiming the wealth of wisdom they wished to share. A small pile of personal checks lay nearby. Laundry items, desk supplies, sewing miscellany -- all well-intentioned and well-received. They would demonstrate their givers' thoughtfulness over and over during my college career.


But one gift struck me as strange. I frowned when I opened it. Medicine? A small packet of pills and creams, ointments and lozenges lay within the wrappings. Who would give that as a gift?


"You'll need that once you're at school," Mom pointed out. "You won't have to chase down the campus nurse for every cough."


Good point.


Not long after, in August, I packed my life into a borrowed truck and slipped the bag of medicine in with my toiletries. I barely thought about it once I reached campus, caught in the whirlwind of unpacking, book-buying, scheduling and meeting new friends.


When "anybody have a bandage?" rang out in the dormitory hall that day, I remembered my little medicinal package.


I swallowed self-consciously. "Actually," I gave a little wave, "I have one."


"Great," my new wing-mate chimed.


As I dug out the kit, we began to chat.


Soon, many of the other girls on the wing heard of my little kit and paid me a visit. One had bug bites -- anti-itch cream popped out of my supply. The wing-mate with the headache nearly kissed my hands when I passed her simple painkillers. As cold season approached, many needed cough drops. Each girl stayed to chat for a few moments.


The little gift I had questioned now led me toward new friendships. As it broke fevers, it also broke the ice, allowing me to meet and befriend many on the wing.


Gradually, the others purchased their own supplies and my kit rarely left the closet.


Eventually, I graduated and threw the dangerously outdated bottles into the garbage, along with stacks of papers and trash -- all items now unnecessary. I began my adult life, forgetting the simple medical kit and how it helped me befriend others.


Then one day, I received a party invitation. A young friend was graduating from high school. "Come celebrate with Sarah!" read the cheerful type. Memories of my own party rushed back to me, and I smiled at the opportunity presenting itself.


As I drove to the pharmacy, I knew exactly what gift I would give her. The chance to be a friend.

http://www.beliefnet.com/Inspiration/Chicken-Soup-For-The-Soul/2010/06/More-than-a-Medical-Kit.aspx?source=NEWSLETTER&nlsource=49&ppc=&utm_campaign=DIBSoup&utm_source=NL&utm_medium=newsletter

A Ride Down Memory Lane

Chicken Soup for the Soul: Thanks Mom

BY: Christopher Hartman

Life is like riding a bicycle -- in order to keep your balance, you must keep moving.
~Albert Einstein


It was a bright sunny day. I was enjoying a nice cold Coca-Cola and lying in my backyard hammock when I heard children shouting and quarrelling in the back alley. I turned my attention to the conversation between two little girls for only a second before I figured out what they were arguing about.


"Quick, get back on the bike, you almost had it that time," said the older girl.


"I can't do it, let me put the training wheels back on," said the younger of the two, whose legs were covered with scrapes and Band-Aids.


"No, this is my bike, and I don't want to drive around with training wheels all the time because you think you can't ride without them."


I chuckled at the innocence of the two girls, sisters who lived across the alley from me. I readjusted my ball cap over my face and continued to rest my eyes. I tried to get back to the state of total relaxation I was in before it was interrupted, but their conversation took me back to the memories I had the day I learned how to ride a bike. I was about four years old.


"Christopher," my mother called from the family room doorway, leaning against it with a tea towel thrown over her shoulder. She had snuck up on me as I was playing with my toy cars on the carpet. Pushing the cars around, I drove to and from the imaginary neighbors, stopping over in the field to say hello to my father. I had been playing all morning with my little brother but he had tuckered himself out and was napping on his back, arms stretched away from his body, his head to the side with drool coming from his little face, his fat little belly protruded from underneath his shirt.


"Yah," I said when I briefly turned my head toward my mother then back toward the car that was exiting the imaginary field.


"Come, let's go outside," she said. "It's a nice day out today and I'm finished with my work."


At that moment, I really wasn't interested, thinking she would want me to help her in the garden or something like that, so I continued playing and asked, "What are we going to do?"


"Oh, I don't know," she paused. I looked up at her and a smile came over her face. "I thought you could learn how to ride that bike today."


I jumped up in joy as a rush of excitement spread through my body. I ran through the house as fast as I could, out the door and onto the deck. I grabbed my muddy rubber boots from beside the door and dove out into the sun, grabbing my sister's little purple bike with white tires. My mother came out of the house behind me, "Take the bike over to the garage."
I was wound up, so I ran the bike toward the garage. The driveway in the farmyard was slanted slightly; we were going to use it for a starting hill. I jumped on the bike and waited for my mother's instruction.


"Okay, Christopher, when we start, I'm going to hold on to the bike and you pedal as fast as you can and don't stop."


"Don't let go," I warned.


She placed a hand on the handlebars and the other on the back of my seat, "I won't," she assured. "Okay. Ready?"


I nodded and stared straight ahead; ready to take off like a gust of wind.


"Go!" she shouted. I started pedaling fast as the bike started to move down the small hill, picking up speed. My mom was running alongside me with both hands on the bike like she promised; I had all the faith in the world when I was with her that nothing bad would happen. She started to tire. Out of breath, she hollered, "Good job, but stop the bike and we'll try again."


We did the exact same thing four or five more times. Each time we both gained more confidence in my abilities. The next couple of times, Mom took her hand off the handlebars, giving me more of a taste to explore balance on my own. When it looked as if the bike was wobbling too much, she guided me back to safety.


"Okay, now this time, I'm going to let go of the bike," she warned.


"No! Don't let go!" I pleaded. "I'm not ready yet."


"Okay, I won't let go this time."


I started out again just like the times before. I was pedaling furiously as Mom sprinted to keep up, holding the seat in one hand, pumping her other arm in sync with her legs, her voice always making its way to my ear, constantly reassuring and encouraging, "Good job, keep going. Good job. I'm letting go now."


"Don't let go!" I shouted in fear. "I'm not ready, don't let go. Don't let go!"


"Fine. I won't," she lied. "Keep going, faster, faster, you're doing so well."


Her voice became quieter and quieter. Then I realized what she had done and became angry.
"You let go!"


"Keep going; you're doing it all by yourself. Good job!" she shouted. My anger suddenly turned to joy at the realization that I was riding a bike for the first time.


I flew down the driveway toward the gravel road. My old tired dog woke from his afternoon nap on the deck and came up to run beside me, barking as though he was applauding me as the wind blew through my hair. The smile on my face was a mile wide as I slowly turned the wheel and made a large turn back toward my mom. I rode the shiny purple bike up beside her and came to a wobbly stop and was greeted with hugs and kisses, and a good lick on the cheek from my loyal dog.


A car in the alley woke me from my daydream. I had a feeling I had only reflected for a matter of seconds. I smiled; I hadn't thought about that for a really long time. Mom passed away later that winter, and my few memories of her had faded away like footsteps in the sand. I try as hard as I can to never forget our times together. My brothers and sister and I gather during the holidays and share our memories of her to help us to never forget. The stories have been getting old and repetitive lately but this one is a new one; I have never told this memory. I have never remembered it before now. It is a memory as simple as learning how to ride a bike, yet cherished more than words can describe.


I rose from the hammock, reached down into my cooler, and pulled out a couple of cans of pop. I walked across the lawn toward the back alley where I could still hear the girls arguing over the training wheels. I offered them a drink to quench their thirst in the hot summer sun. Their eyes lit up as they gladly accepted my offer. I turned back to go into the house when I heard from behind me, simultaneously, "Thank you!"


The two words hit me in an unusual way as if I didn't deserve their thanks. I turned back and waved. I was in debt to them for rescuing the memory. Softly I muttered back to the girls, "No.
Thank you!"

http://www.beliefnet.com/Inspiration/Chicken-Soup-For-The-Soul/2010/06/A-Ride-Down-Memory-Lane.aspx?source=NEWSLETTER&nlsource=49&ppc=&utm_campaign=DIBSoup&utm_source=NL&utm_medium=newsletter

The Golf War

Chicken Soup for the Soul: The Golf Book

BY: Eric Stark

Golf, he replied, was much too serious a matter to be called a sport.
~John Pearson, James Bond: The Authorized Biography

It's not that Jimmy and I were warmongers bent on finding trouble. We were just two typical forthright Scots who didn't put up with nonsense on the golf course. If a slow foursome didn't let us play through, or a group perpetually took too long to hunt for lost balls, we got vocal. Jimmy, especially, received a typical Scottish pleasure in confrontation. Being of a similar nature, this never put me up or down. But the return to golf of a chap named Gordon Angus made us reexamine our ways.

After an absence from the game that lasted years, Gordon turned up one Saturday morning with a set of old clubs to play a round on his own. Gordon had gone to junior school with Jimmy, some forty years earlier, and despite being opposite personalities (Gordon was studious and serious while Jimmy most definitely was not) the two were good friends. Jimmy and I wouldn't hear of him playing alone. So we invited Gordon to join us that Saturday, and from then on the three of us started playing regularly.

The behavior of Jimmy and I was no doubt a shock to Gordon. Once, when someone hit a ball that just missed my head without shouting "Fore!" and Jimmy and I waited for the culprit to ignite a loud verbal battle, Gordon nearly fainted. After it was over, Gordon meekly suggested, "I'm sure he didn't do it on purpose. Maybe you should just have had a quiet word of advice with him later in the clubhouse."

"What?" Jimmy demanded, as if he couldn't believe what he was hearing. I didn't give Gordon's suggestion much credence either.

So it went on. And if Jimmy and I didn't have any problems, we would instead take up arms on Gordon's behalf. Why was his entry into the golf club taking so long? Why couldn't he get a locker when we knew someone else who had got one? And so forth.

For these battles, Gordon always had a much more peaceful solution, but we never listened. "It's Gordon's way," Jimmy explained to me. "He always was a bookworm. Very quiet and never spoke up for himself."

One morning, there was a single playing in front of the three of us. On one hole, the man left his caddy cart with his golf clubs just off the edge of the green and disappeared.
We waited and waited, Jimmy in particular growing more and more irate. Finally, we all played our shots and began to walk up to the hole.

As we neared the hole, we saw the man sitting in a small old pavilion near the 12th green. Jimmy roared over at him full throttle, "What the... what do you think you're doing... who do you think you... why didn't you waive us through..." And so forth.

It was Gordon who said, "Jimmy, wait, I think he's in trouble."
We walked nearer. The man was grey in the face and clasping at his chest, barely conscious. I realized right away the man was having a heart attack. I had once served as a medic, and so proceeded to do everything I could for him while Jimmy used his mobile to call an ambulance. By good luck, the 12th hole was not far from the main road and within fifteen minutes, the man was off in the ambulance.

All three of us were silent. Jimmy sighed, "I hope my shouts of abuse are not the last words he ever hears on this earth." We called the golf to a halt and went back to the clubhouse, where Jimmy remained much quieter than usual.

A few days later, we heard that the man had "died" in the ambulance but that the doctors had miraculously managed to bring him back again. He was in intensive care for a week, but finally made a complete recovery.

Once he was out the old man lost no time in contacting us to give his thanks. As we spoke of the day, it was obvious that the man had not been aware of Jimmy's shouting.

The next week, we were halfway around the golf course when Jimmy turned to Gordon and said, "There is some sense to what you say, about always giving people a chance to explain before you tear into them." Gordon and I stared at Jimmy, and then at each other, in amazement. Jimmy shrugged, "I've been thinking about my roaring at the guy having the heart attack."

Two weeks later, a man and his dog walked straight in front of the 4th tee just as Jimmy was about to drive. "What the he..." Jimmy cut himself off on mid-sentence, "He... have a nice day."

The man smiled back. "Hi Jimmy. I thought I recognized you. Say, I have some golf balls for you. The dog picks them up all the time."

Jimmy turned to Gordon, "You are definitely right, and this proves it."

Jimmy has passed away now, and it would be fine to say that from that time onwards he took a calmer approach to golf and to life. But in fact, his change of heart only lasted until a remarkably lethargic foursome playing in front of us did not wave us through. When Jimmy discovered two of them were men he had never liked since his teenage days, he ran ahead and gave them a verbal blast and a lecture on the etiquette of golf in his own special terminology.

Years after Jimmy had passed, Gordon and I were reminiscing. "You know, I was glad his transformation of character didn't last long." Gordon said. "It was his volatile outbursts that made me like him so much. You knew exactly where you stood with Jimmy. He was the most honest man I ever met. Sure, I got on him about being nicer to people, but really I admired his courage."

http://www.beliefnet.com/Inspiration/Chicken-Soup-For-The-Soul/2010/06/The-Golf-War.aspx?source=NEWSLETTER&nlsource=49&ppc=&utm_campaign=DIBSoup&utm_source=NL&utm_medium=newsletter