Happy New Year 2026, ladies.

Dear Irma, Elle, and Laura: May 2026 bring you all peace, tranquility, joy and love. Happy New Year to all three of you. With love and warm affection. Bernie the Monkey xxxooo insert heart and arrow here

Happy 31st birthday, Elle. It is Friday, Nov. 28, 2025, and I am thinking about you. It is a cold day in Rockland this morning. Thinking of you warms my heart and touches my soul, Elle. You are the best of me and the best of your mom. I am proud of the work you are doing for kids everywhere. Helping to create quality animation shows for kids, with simply, empathic themes like those in Lu and the Bally Bunch, is of lasting value for society. I just watched an episode where Lu faithe led to find any of of the coloured stones hidden in the park. Suddenly her friend, the Bee, suggests that each friend re-hide the stone they found so that Lu can re-find it. Imagine a kid watching that episode and seeing how little effort it takes to be kind and empathic with someone in distress. The Bee saw a friend in need and proved himself or herself to be a friend indeed. The Like Barnaby Bubblebee, you strike me as someone who derives her greatest joy by helping others. Helping to empower others is what life is all about, in my opinion. The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others, wrote Thoreau. Einstein apparently said something similar when he said that Only a life lived in the sevice of others is a worthwhile lif.. well lived. Not everyone will agree, In the book "Give and Take: A Revolutionary Approach to Success", author Adam Grant classifies people as givers, takers, and matchers. Givers help others without expecting anything in return, takers focus on what they can get, and matchers operate on a reciprocity system of "you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours". Grant argues that givers, contrary to common belief, are the most successful type. Your support and care for others, Elle, is a wonderul quality. People who focus on helping others and contributing value without expecting an immediate return may be exploited, yet many achieve extraordinary success. While you must protect your personal space and ensure that you do not burn out, there is nothing more rewarding to a giver than giving unconditionally with all your heart. Lots of love on this special day. Dad XX00 insert heart with arrow here

Lots of love, dear daughter Elizabeth

Dear Elizabeth, I trust you are doing well. i miss you and love you a lot. I think you already knew that but, just in case, i wanted to let you know My love for you is unconditional and everlasting. I am 61 and, though we have not communicated in a long while, please know that I think of you every day. Since we are not in direct communications, I send you positive, loving thoughts daily. Unlike a message in a bottle, it is my hope that my positive loving thoughts for you are received by you without any static or psychic interference. I am proud of you and the woman you have become. You were a caring, lovely child and young woman and I know that you will remain true to your core nature all the days of your life. It goes without saying that my love for you will never diminish despite the passage of time. While it goes without saying, i just eanted to put it in writing today. So that, on those days when stormy weather causes reception interference or in long, dark nights when doubts invade our thoughts, you can simply re-read this blog entry and rest assured that my love for my daughter Elizabeth burns as just bright as ever. Lots of love, Dad xxoo insert heart with arrow here

Happy New Year 2025 / Feliz Año Nuevo, familia querida. Que el 2025 esté lleno de momentos especiales, amor y mucha salud para todos.

Que cada día del 2025 nos traiga nuevas razones para ser felices. ¡Feliz Año Nuevo, familia querida!

Twas the night before Christmas 2024 and all through the house, not a creature was stirring.... Merry Christmas Irma, Elle and Laura.

Dear Irma, I trust this CHristmas Eve letter finds you, and our two daughters well. This time of year was always special for your late father-in-law and, by extension, for me. IT is my hope that it remains, or has become, a special time for you too, Irma. Meeting a Canadian in OKayama City back in 1990 changed your lifepath just as much as meeting a Mexican changed mine. This morning I wish to count it among our family's blessings. Elle and Laura are now around the same age you and I were when we first decided to share our lives together and form a family. While we didn't really know each other well enough yet, we hitched our wagon to the Fates and took the plunge. Do young people still do that? Not with the same ease and confidence, it would seem. All of us are a product of our childhood and we carry that legacy, like a turtle carries its shell, all the days of our lives. Do you recall the three lines of French poetry that I once composed and gave to you? "Le moi, pour toi, je le risque. Le toi, pour moi, tu le risque. Le tout, pour nous, risqu'on le." If you, or any of you, ever have questions or feel the need to talk, let me know. For me, those three lines sum up my thinking back in 1991. in the interim, may the three of you bask in the knowlesge that you are well, that your extended family is well, that each of us is living as healthy and productive a life as we can, and that love is often expressed implicitly if not explicitly. MAy the Sprit of Christmas, like my momoties of my DAd (who cherished December 25 more than anyone I ever knew) inhabit each of you this week, this month and for the coming 12 months. Peace on earth and goodwill to all. Merry Christmas 2025 and Happy New Year 2026. Love, Bern

Happy 28th birthday, Laura. May the coming 12 months be healthy, joyous, productive, and prosperous ones for you and those around you whom you love.

Good morning Laura: Dec. 23, 1996, was a wonderful day. Every year at this time, God is thanked for sending you into our family to brighten the world a little bit and lift the spirits of everyone whose lives have been touched by your kindness and intelligence. Know that your family continues to root and cheer for you as you make your way through life, like a shooting star, guiding others with your wisdom and touching the lives of those you meet along the way. A precocious child, you never failed to impress your paternal grandparents with you ability to reason and verbalize things at a time when other children were still trying to string letters together and form words. It was as though you were in a hurry and had the knowledge and raw horsepower well before your peers. Your paternal grandfather reminded us frequently that: "To those to whom God gave much, much was expected.". From where I sit, Laura, you have always been a contributor, a hard worker, and a tireless defender of the rights of others. From the impoverished corn farmer in Mexico to the vulnerable and unrepresented LEX client in Montreal, you have been in their corner. It remains my hope that the love and joy of a father for his daughter will be felt and received. Like a distant star in a far off galaxy, I shall persist in transmitting light and heat long after my inner force has extinguished... In the hope that even just a glint or a glimmer will one day land on your cheek and be felt not as a sunburn but as a flickering glow of warmth and unconditional, unadulterated love. Stay well, dear Laura in the coming year. Continue to use all your talents, communications ability and fine brain in service to others. You have your Mom's raw intelligence and sense of justice. Use it in service to others. The life path of the gifted child is never easy yet it can be most rewarding. None of us will make it out alive. The best we can hope to achieve is to somehow lighten the load for others along the way. Service towards others is what leads to joy and happiness, I believe. For your paternal grandfather it was his modus operandi,.. his natural state. He led by example and thought by living a good, clean, exemplary life, Laura. And, like the rest of us, Austin Edward cheered the day you entered the world. Dec. 23, 1996. May you feel only the love and warm embrace of an extended family that loves you unconditionally, that is proud of your many talents and how you are putting them to use in service of others, of your inner and outer beauty and intelligence. Happy birthday, today, Laura. Know that you are loved and that your love is felt by others including me. With love, Dad

Letter to Laura

Dear Laura, I trust this letter finds you well and safe. I know that things have been very difficult between us, and I wish to acknowledge how painful and confusing this time must be for you. I am truly sorry for any hurt or frustration you’ve felt. I want you to know that I love you very much. My wish is for us to have a healthy and happy relationship. I understand that rebuilding trust will take time. I am committed to being patient and respectful of your feelings and boundaries. If you ever feel ready to talk or share your thoughts and feelings with me, I am here to listen. You can express yourself in any way that feels right for you, whether it's through words, art, or any other means. I promise to listen with an open heart and without judgment. Please know that my love for you is unwavering. I am here for you whenever you feel ready to take that step towards reconnecting. In the meantime, I shall continue to work on myself and to do everything I can to be the person I was meant to become. With all my love, Dad