Julie Bowers

[PROTECT ALL WILDLIFE @Protect_Wldlife]

Riding the wave 🌊🐬

Sometimes nature reminds us that moving with the flow can be just as powerful as fighting against it.

In this brief moment, two dolphins emerge from a wave that has traveled thousands of kilometers across the ocean.

What looks effortless is actually the result of perfect timing, awareness, and harmony with their environment.

Why this matters:
➡️ Oceans cover more than 70% of our planet.
➡️ Protecting our oceans means protecting our future.
➡️ Dolphins are among the most intelligent marine species.
➡️ Healthy oceans support life both above and below the surface.
➡️ Every marine ecosystem plays a role in maintaining Earth's balance.

Perhaps one of nature's greatest lessons is this: Not every wave is an obstacle ~ sometimes it's an opportunity to ride.

Credit: André Rodriguez.

[Anthony Scaramucci @Scaramucci]

Trump told Leslie Stahl something years ago that everyone should hear.

She asked Trump he kept calling the media fake news.

He said, I do it because I need to discredit you, so that when you say negative things about me, nobody believes you.

That is EXACTLY what he’s done.

The problem everyone has with him is that most of us grew up with values, ethics, and integrity.

That is not Donald Trump.

He figured out a long time ago that he can bully his way through any rule and if he keeps pushing harder and harder, people will relent.

For most of his life they did, but we must stand up against it.

[Rebecca Pickens @VolMomPickens]

🩷🩷 #growthegame

[Senator Reverend Raphael Warnock @SenatorWarnock]

Part of how we love our country is telling the truth about our story.

America's story is one of extraordinary progress and painful injustice.

We dishonor both when we pretend only one is true.

[Jo @JoJoFromJerz]

Every record has been destroyed or falsified, every book rewritten, every picture has been repainted, every statue and street building has been renamed, every date has been altered. And the process is continuing day by day and minute by minute. History has stopped. Nothing exists except an endless present in which the Party is always right.
George Orwell, 1984

[Amunet @freakoutsideofx]

These words are inscribed into the facade of the Barack Obama Presidential Center building.🤎

[‏ً @omgsidewalks]

We lost the plot when we started viewing Earth as a giant store or landfill instead of a life-supporting miracle we’re part of.

[UT Knoxville Alumni @tennalum]

There's a new dog in the house! 🍊 Meet Smokey XII!
https://t.co/yaceeQC3NJ

[Fifty Shades of Whey @davenewworld_2]

House Republicans approved a budget to eliminate the federal government's only dedicated arts-education grant. Cutting this will hurt the artistic development of a lot of children.

The program supports primary and secondary schools, teacher training, community partnerships, accessible programming, and projects serving disadvantaged students and children with disabilities.

Low-income communities can't afford to pay for art programs, instruments, and lessons on their own without assistance, so it seems obvious to me that fascists want art to be a luxury that's only reserved for the children of affluent families and wealthy school districts.

Creativity is therapy. Activities like drawing, music, theater, etc. are important for all children to learn. Anyone who disagrees is an uncultured robot who's never been moved by a work of art.

[Todd Spence @Todd_Spence]

Prince was such a massive fan of THE MUPPETS, he asked if he could host the Muppets Tonight show in 1997, leading to one of the rare instances we saw a more comedic version of himself instead of the quiet and reserved persona fans were used to 😂👏

[Crazy Vibes @CrazyVibes_1]

Michelle Obama had a problem.
She was standing in Buckingham Palace, about to sit down to a state dinner hosted by Queen Elizabeth II — one of the most formally dressed women in the world, wearing jewels that had adorned British royalty for centuries — and the gift she had brought was a $50 brooch from an antique shop in Washington D.C.
It was May 2011. President Barack Obama and the First Lady were on a state visit to the United Kingdom — only the second time in history a sitting American president had been granted that honor. The palace had pulled out all the stops. Chandeliers blazing. Footmen in livery. The Queen in full regalia, diamonds catching the light.
And Michelle's gift was a small moss agate brooch from a vintage store called Tiny Jewel Box.
Barack Obama would later recall the moment with a smile. "The Queen was dressed up quite a bit for the state dinner," he said. "It was a little bit concerning for Michelle, because as a gift to Her Majesty, Michelle had selected a small, modest brooch of nominal value."

The brooch was beautiful, in its quiet way. Made in 1950 in America, crafted in fourteen-karat yellow gold, set with diamonds and pale green moss agate in the shape of a small flower. Delicate. Personal. The kind of thing you find when you're not looking for something grand — when you're just looking for something true.
Michelle presented it to the Queen that evening, alongside the official state gift — a carefully assembled album of photographs and memorabilia from King George VI and Queen Elizabeth's historic 1939 visit to the United States, something the Queen was said to have been visibly moved by as she turned the pages.
But it was the little brooch that told a different story.
The following evening, the Obamas hosted their own reciprocal dinner at Winfield House — the official residence of the American Ambassador in London. It was a room full of heads of state and royalty, an evening of its own formality and grandeur. The Queen arrived.
And on her lapel, she was wearing Michelle's brooch.
Not one of her legendary pieces. Not a diamond parure gifted by a Commonwealth nation or a sapphire set that had passed through generations of the royal family. The small American flower from a Washington antique shop — worn the very next night, in front of everyone.
Obama said: "The one thing we immediately noticed is that she was wearing the brooch that Michelle had given her. It was an example of the subtle thoughtfulness that she consistently displayed. Not just to us, but to everybody who she interacted with."

The Queen understood something that is easy to forget in rooms full of expensive things: the value of a gift has nothing to do with its price. It has everything to do with what it says. That brooch said — I chose this for you. I thought of you when I saw it. I wanted you to have something made by American hands, something personal, something that wasn't pulled from a state inventory.
The Queen heard every word of it.
She kept the brooch. It became known in royal circles as the American State Visit Brooch, and it appeared on her again on notable occasions over the years — a quiet signal, each time, of the warmth she carried for the people who had given it.
The exchange, it turned out, went both ways. The Queen gave Michelle a gift of her own that visit — an antique brooch of red coral and gold, shaped like a rose. Two women, surrounded by all the machinery of state protocol, quietly giving each other flowers.
When Queen Elizabeth died in September 2022, Barack Obama released a video tribute. He talked about how she reminded him of his grandmother — the same wry humor, the same no-nonsense grace, the same ability to make everyone around her feel genuinely seen. And he told the brooch story. The $50 antique. The state dinner. The moment the next evening when they walked in and saw her wearing it.
"She could not have been more kind or thoughtful to me and Michelle," he said.
Queen Elizabeth II owned jewels that belonged to empires. Pieces that had passed through the hands of kings and queens across centuries of history. Stones worth more than most people will ever see in a lifetime.
And when she wanted to tell someone that their gift had mattered — that the thought behind it had reached her — she pinned a small moss agate flower to her lapel and walked into the room.
That is the kind of person she was.
Kindness, when it comes from a genuine place, doesn't need to be expensive.
It just needs to be worn.

[Tennessee Basketball @Vol_Hoops]

VFL WFH

[Reggie B. @reggiebblue]

Michelle Obama talking about Barack Obama.

"He is showing young men that it's okay to love your wife forever. It's okay not to cheat and lie."

[Brian Tolentino M.Ed @TolentinoTeach]

Most people who don’t work in schools can’t fully understand why teachers sometimes restrict bathroom use.

From the outside, it gets framed as a “bathroom rights” issue, as if teachers are simply being unreasonable or dismissive of students’ needs.

Here’s the reality:

There are schools where students can use the bathroom freely with no problems.

And there are schools where, if you allow unrestricted access, mayhem ensues.

-Students leave for 40-minute stretches.
-Student wander into other classrooms and throw water balloons.
-Students vape.
-Students meet each other and box in the bathroom (with gloves).
-Students scream through the halls as they run past rooms.
-I can go on with another 2,000 issues.

What looks like a simple policy decision (from an adult's perspective) is actually quite complicated.

Once again, if you are not working in a school--you probably don't get it, bruh.

[Pope Leo XIV @Pontifex]

We can experience joy in difficult circumstances only if our lives are rooted in a relationship with God as a loving Father. Only God's love can give us true and perfect joy. If we are deeply convinced that God cares for us as His beloved children, we will not be confused or discouraged, even in the midst of hardship. https://t.co/duKCEN0LpU

[The Prince and Princess of Wales @KensingtonRoyal]

“It is vital to preserve the spirit of childhood alongside healthy development. Childhood is foundational in developing a healthy balance between mind, body and spirit. But children are not simply learners of information. They don’t analyse joy but live it; they don’t intellectualise connection, but embody it. They experience the world through feeling – through love.”

🔗 Read the full essay by The Princess of Wales on the Centre for Early Childhood's website: https://t.co/VutllPgJNg

[John Pavlovitz @johnpavlovitz]

Dear Former President Barack Obama and Former First Lady Michelle Obama,

I’ve watched you and your children attacked with a ferocity and cruelty that defy any sense of decency and that certainly have no precedent.

I’ve watched your birthplace called into question, your personal faith ridiculed, your patriotism mocked, your gender contested, and your very humanity discounted.

I’ve watched you endure the incessant, bitter venom of those for whom the color of your skin was always going to be a problem.

And through all of it, I’ve watched you be the better humans, always going high despite their sickening depths.

In the face of a sustained, spitting, violent, raw-throated hatred, you’ve never responded in kind.

You never allowed yourselves to be defined by the bigotry of your critics, and you never dehumanized them or let them win by becoming them.

[Jane Forda (PARODY) @AngelaLark66613]

That is how it's done too! 🙌🏼

[Lucas Sanders 👊🏽🔥🇺🇸 @LucasSa56947288]

RETWEET if you support Barack Obama!

[Gianl1974 @Gianl1974]

BREAKING: HAHA! Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton burst out laughing at the dedication ceremony for the Obama Presidential Center after Michelle brilliantly shades Trump over the Nobel Peace Prize.

This is just too good...

"You were unflappable at every turn, always focused, always calm, always looking at the long view," the former First Lady said to her husband. "How absurd it is to even imagine that you might have buckled under the pressure even once, lashed out in frustration, lost your temper. How absurd it is to imagine that you might have done anything but make our family and this entire country proud."

We can think of another President who regularly loses his temper, buckles under pressure the moment that difficulties arise, and lashes out in frustration on Truth Social daily. There is an infuriating double standard at play. Obama had to always keep his cool to avoid getting labeled with the "angry Black man" racist trope. As an entitled white man, Trump can blow his top whenever he wants and nobody bats an eyelash.

"No, you were too busy. I'm not done, y'all! Not done," Mrs. Obama continued as the crowd roared with approval. "So much to say. You were doing the people's work, rescuing our economy, expanding healthcare, ending a war, ordering the Bin Laden raid, saving an auto industry, winning a peace prize."

She paused and smiled at that point in the speech, giving the audience a chance to cheer. Seated in the wing, Hillary Clinton burst out laughing at the obvious jab and President Obama laughed along with her.

It's well-documented that Donald Trump is absolutely obsessed with the fact that Obama has a Peace Prize while he himself has been denied the distinction. Trump aggressively lobbied in vain for one, cajoling foreign leaders to nominate him.

He was so incensed by the Norwegian Nobel Committee's refusal to award him that he wrote to Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre: "Considering your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 Wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace."

He lived up to the implicit threat in that letter by going on to launch a pointless, costly, child-murdering war against Iran that ultimately ended in defeat and surrender for the United States.

And Michelle wasn't done there...

"Keeping us safe from Ebola, regulating the banks, standing up for marriage equality, listening to science, and comforting an entire nation in the face of unspeakable tragedies," she continued, listing more of her husband's accomplishments. "And you did it all with such grace and class and cool that you made the hardest job in the world look like a walk in this beautiful park."

The Ebola bit is another jab at Trump who, with the assistance of RFK Jr. and Elon Musk gutted research and pandemic prevention. This is the most virulently anti-science administration that this country has ever seen.

One thing is certain. The Obamas will have a lasting, radiant legacy in this country. Trump will be reviled by future generations, his name used a byword for incompetence, failure, and corruption.

Please ❤️ and share if you love the Obamas!