'You can't cry over spilled milk'',
My dad would say with a grin,
''Keep your nose to the grindstone,
and take criticism on the chin'':
'Life is not a piece of cake',
he hammered in my head,
'but faith will move mountains',
He would add in the same breath:
''Keep away from toffee-nosed people,
who on your skills,feel ill at ease,
for if you sleep with dogs,
you will wake up with fleas'':
''Be up with the lark and practice,
the act that warms the cockles of your heart,
put your heart and soul in the dream you prefer,
and go hell bent for leather'' :
''As the twig is bent,
so is the tree inclined,
thus, if you build habits,
like these as a child;
You will grow up happy,
as a clam at high tide'' :
"So take life with patience abound,
in for a penny,in for a pound;
as life is not a bed of roses,
success and failure come in phases":
''You may loose games,
but keep winning hearts,
life is tough,
that's the way cookie crumbles'' :
Thus you see,my father has saved his idioms,
for all my victories and troubles.
