Some gifts we receive in childhood aren’t fully appreciated until adulthood. Like the way Ray and Gola served as backup parents for my dad from the late 1940s onward. My sweet grandmother became a single parent when Dad was two years old and began working a factory job to provide support. That's when Ray and Gola graciously befriended my grandmother, loved my dad, and treated them like their own family. Years later, my brother, sister, and I became their grandchildren in love.

My first car was dark green with a wimpy stance and weak engine. That old Ford cost $600 in mowing money and carried me through high school and college. The three-speed manual shifter sat on the steering column between the steering wheel and dash. After one too many hard shifts, the handle broke off in my hand, leaving the vintage ride stuck in second gear, limping along, but moving forward!

A boss from years back asked for end-of-deployment awards and performance write-ups for my platoon's troop leaders. As an inexperienced, young leader with a large ego, I casually wrote and submitted the work by the due date and waited with confidence for his approval.

In a 2018 analysis, the Government Accountability Office found that two out of every five brand name products purchased online were counterfeit. These clever knock-offs look precisely like the real thing on the outside, hiding their lack of authentic design, craftsmanship, and material quality on the inside.

At nearly ten times the saltiness of ocean water, the Dead Sea is known for dense, mineral-filled deposits bordering its shores. Since ancient times, workers have harvested the minerals and refined them into useful preservatives, fertilizers, and therapeutic agents.

President John F. Kennedy said, "We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard..." No one knew then how much the hard work of space exploration would change our world.