COFFEE BREAK 126

+ updated at 5:21pm EST, Tuesday, January 19, 2010, another anniversary of my day of birth.

+ Democracy Now! offers “Haiti is Shaken to the Core”: Amy Goodman Reports from Port-au-Prince.  Excerpt: "And what we did yesterday is what few journalists have done: we left Port-au-Prince, and we went along the coast to Carrefour and to Léogâne. This is the epicenter. This is where the United Nations issued its statement, saying they acknowledge 90 percent of the buildings were down, that thousands of people were dead. But, they said, unless they could ensure security, they would not be providing aid there. Now, this is tremendously frightening. As we passed through the epicenter, a young man hailed down our car, and he said, 'Please, we see some helicopters overhead, but they don’t stop here. We have no aid. We have no food.'"

+ The thaw which began last week continues.  Most of the snow which fell in early January has now disappeared along much of the Erie Canal.

+ Sufi Wisdom:

My Sufi master once said: If you put the world between you and God, the world becomes a spiritual obstacle; if you use the world to remember God, the world becomes your spiritual friend. — Robert Frager in The Wisdom of Islam

"To Practice This Thought: See the world around you as evidence of God's presence." This is The Spiritual Practice of the Day at Spirituality and Practice.