The point of a journal is to hear your own voice

 

December 31, 2021

January 7, 2022

Before there was Red, there was Fat Boy

     I miss feeding squirrels and birds, but they would not tolerate my little dog, even if he would them.  So I’m glad for the easy photo process of cel phones and the pics I took of the entertaining  critters.  I learnt and even taught kids in my public school art classes how to use an SLR camera, develop and print B&W film, and “read” photographic compositions.  But nobody does that these days, to my knowledge.  My college boy, I, has taken at least two photography classes, I think all digital, and sans sharing his images with grandma, to my dismay.  He may be using his photographic work as covers on his music vlog.  Looks like it, but he never explains his work, at least to me or on his posts. 

    Check him out, though.  His songs and pictures get better and better.  He’s been posting since he was a youngster: CursedSk1y on YouTube.  Private, introverted as he is by his own admission, this work demonstrates the value of having a medium for self expression.  Blogs and video blogs, for example, allow you to “sing your own song,” to discover your own thoughts even with few or no listeners, like me. Then of course we’ve all heard of the “jackpot” bloggers, building their material worlds off such electromagnetic productions.  What a world!  Squirrely?

     Regarding my own electronic journals, they are so much cleaner and personal and pretty than social media, also a form of self expression, journaling, if you will. But I abhor and avoid those forms.  Troubles, quarrels, advertising…just the beginning of their flaws.  

     So start a journal.  Blogs are practical, so easy to write and save, so satisfying to illustrate.  Only be careful to watch for scammers; don’t toss out your personal data.  After all, someone may be reading yours, if not mine.

Bluebirds of happiness

GA resident, as nature intended 

OH birds, Make-up please! Highly edited, as OH likes best

And they leave me speechless for now.  Enjoy the day.

                           

                                          

Blah? Remains to be seen

 

Me and Julio down by de skoolyard, again

      That was then, this is now.  

      Walking the trail in unplowed snow cover is tricky for an old lady without a cane or branch.  Feels like slogging through dry sand at the beach, only cold, not “burning desert.”  Usually we wouldn’t attempt it, but we felt brave and thought about what was expected which, in fact, we got today: rain, sleet, higher temps til night, and hopes for no ice.  All good excuses to stay in, read through blurry eyes, avoid TV, maybe make phone calls, probably nap with Red, nosh on leftover sweets (note to self—there is a veggie platter).  Oh yeah: I am required by accident last night to mop floors.

      It’s a plan?

      

Deer Me

 

GA deer, Kennesaw Mtn State Park Pk, 2021; E’s house 2022

Nothing else to be said, except we’ve had the critters in our neighborhood yards since fall, but,do I see them?  Nooo!

 

Bro runs a tight kitchen

And produces a mean meal. Especially on holidays.

 

Yum. Wish I could have been there  And here at the same time.  Where is the Time Machine in that kitchen?

Smiling all the day

 

Phil, the magic man

    The highlight of Christmas Day was our dinner out at the buffet just the two of us have gone to for the last decade or thereabouts.  Our favorite entertainer performs card tricks and other sleights of hand at the tables there, and we joke around, exchanging pats and hugs after all these years.  

     Besides a good meal—I enjoyed the butternut squash ravioli and beet citrus salad the most this time—, I chatted with other patrons and staff quite a bit.  I’m never shy with strangers.  The lovely blonde one table over had wonderful gold sparkles in her eyeshadow, which I complimented. A man surprised me as I walked past his table, saying, “I like your necklace.” My eyebrows shot up because my jacket was covering it.  “I saw it when you walked by the other way.”  “Oh.  Thank you.  I like it, too.  I thought you were going to say you liked my glasses,” replied I, wiggling them up and down, big smiles among me, him, his wife.  

     I was very touched by the exchange, it felt like spiritual code, because I was wearing the small red and green Mexican silver cross that sister D gave me years ago. It’s pretty and sentimental as well as symbolic; and I think I have given away all my “richer” crosses.

    Our server told me that she appreciated all the smiles from the ladies in her section, and I realized I had been smiling pretty much nonstop for 2 1/2 hours. Not a bad thing on Christmas Day. 

Whitest Christmas ever?

Probably

 

                   Lights make it even better sometimes.

Merry Christmas

 

   

     Red and I went to Redeemer’s Christmas service at the gazebo in the park after today’s nine inch snowfall. It was delightful.  I especially enjoyed the off-key carols (me being the most off-key), the hugs, and the hot cocoa with marshmallows, and the cheerful spirits.

Beloved children redux

 December 23, 2015. Just a decade ago.

December 20, 2015

Closer and closer

Someone left a slder for next snowfall. No thank you!

     After Julio and I went “down to de skoolyard” for 45 minutes in the chill, we drove to the mall for 45 in the warm.  I’m no mall rat nowadays, but I collect nostalgia strolling through the familiar old concourses to scope out other holiday shoppers for random acts of festivity. Only spent $20 on—you guessed it—sugar: BAM’ s millionaire mocha edged out my first impulse, hot chocolate, but it let me down. Better example of “good advertising” than “yummy.”  Two bars of Dubaya chocolate disappointed me when I sampled them at home, but that guy fascinates me.  I mean, the salesman is something else, a small Persian with gorgeous white hair and a handsome unlined face.  This will sound unPC, but he works it like a real Arab trader. This was our second encounter.  Whatever bill I have in my hand he takes, saying “For you,” like he’s handing me a gift as he passes me more candy instead of cash change.  I’m a real sucker for these Middle Eastern merchants.  I just smile and say thank you.  Oh well.  Cultural differences in a minor key this time.   The bargain was a little bag of Godiva, only five bucks by using up a Macy gift card from last Christmas.  Thanks again DD, for the gift that keeps on giving the whole year through.

     The real fun at the mall is people’s reactions to Red.  He attracts many admirers who compliment and pet him while they tell me about their own dogs.  I hope I’m not wearing him out.  Or collecting excess germs. I really do enjoy sharing him.  Merry Christmas it is, Boy.

Beloved Children

 

My great grandmother and three of her children 

Harold and two of his siblings 

    It is late. My intent was to post about the dear youngsters at the Redeemer SB church which I attended this morning, but I will leave to your imagination and my memory their Christmas music and interplay, only noting that I felt nostalgic and privileged to observe the little band so close to the Big Day.  

Play Ball!

 

Tillie and Red catching the orb 12-2-24

    As noted in my other blog, icy snow from the last two weeks disappeared after serious rain and wind yesterday. Red this moment just insisted that I take him outside in the Brisk for a game of ballie-ballie.   Brrrr! I wasn’t dressed warmly, but he didn’t object. He may have been guilting me: two or three weeks of snow on the ground but no snowball ballie-ballie.  I did remind us both that I acquired a dog this time partly to insure daily exercise.  He’s no nag, but he holds me to it.

      I won’t post a link but will recommend to dog-lovers a YouTube short (more than one, actually), Dogs Choose Their Owners, Class of December, 2025. Can’t tell you where this placement program is conducted, but the video sure tugged my heartstrings.

     For another species of ballgame, ‘tis the season of football playoffs, so our TV may be overheating.  It’s just too darned exciting this year, college and pro.  In a different court, my Maineiac husband A is thrilled to track the progress of homeboy Cooper Flagg in hoops, who undeniably shows a streak of Phenom. 

Busy day

 Sunset in Ptld.  It isn’t always pretty, but it’s always pretty early.

     Old ladies may resist activity, but we certainly need it more than ever.  So yesterday was hair styling day. Thank you again ma belle M, for blonding me yet once more; and trimming my bushy black eyebrows that I can’t see but everyone else can; and couldn’t you please find a way to trim the wrinkles?  I never guessed they would be so…wrinkly.  (Plastic surgeons need not apply.)

      We drove the three blocks to Whole Paycheck afterward, and darling Red patiently waited in the car while I shopped especially for Christmas treats, tea candles, and supper.  I found my favorite Sumo oranges and tea lights, but nothing attractive enough to shout “extra Kid Gift,” settling on a chocolate bar.  Supper was the big, expensive boondoggle.  That’s happened before, but I came back in the name of “make it work.”  They offered fewer, drier choices on the Hot Bar, and I made poor choices, “eating  with my eyes” from slim pickings.  Time is a factor, I’m sure:  what’s fresh and tasty at noon is dead on arrival at 5:00 and cremated by reheating at home.  Lesson learned?  We’ll see.  The dream of convenient supper prep lives on.

      C and N came over to play in the evening, so a good time was had by all.  

    

Deflated, but sparkle anyway

 

Fun neighborhood Christmas display.  Especially at night.

   Well, he did ask.  So I described my teaching career in more detail than probably needed for this on-line group.  He responded, “So we have an Adherent-of-Legominism.”  I burst into guffaws.  “I knew there was a reason I liked you!  You just gave meaning to my whole career as an art teacher!”  (To see the joke, you may need to consult Beelzebub’s Tales chapter XXX Art,  p. 455 & others.)

    I must admit I also took it as a compliment, one of three or four I’ve received recently.  I appreciate them.  They boost my spirits.  And they remind me of my taste, like sugar, for flattery.  Vanity, thy name is Sandy!

Silence is golden

 Lunar eclipse, 3-14-25, by IW. My grandson.

     And leave it at that.  No need to talk when you’re talked out.

Will Santa stop here?

 Now, that’s a treehouse!

   No signs of life, so maybe the Man in Red will stop in for a quick break or to drop off my flopped gift of Crispy Chickpeas to the squirrels.  

   He did stop here!  See post January 7.

Everything old is new again

 

     It’s cold here.  It wasn’t there, in April, 2013, so it bears revisiting after shoveling snow three times yesterday.  That’s me and Fran, set on our asses for a climb up to the place of high sacrifice in Petra, and nomad camels parked at the “watering hole” in Wadi Rum.

My neighbor’s light display

    Can’t describe how much I enjoy this display and garden every holiday.  The pic in no way does it justice with its moving pictures and varied colors.  I tease when I say, do they own an LED factory? Because I just can’t guess how such a fabulous show is assembled.  Thank you!

Good night, sweet prince(s)

A, as sweet as in infancy

    Nothing much to say. Sleepytime is coming on.  Spoke to his dad on phone so we two also said hello tonight, too.  I guess I’m still amazed at how a special needs person can hold onto your heart so tightly for a lifetime. Good night, sweet dreams to all the boys.

Righteous Dickens?

In AZ museum

     I have two things to recommend.  First the HBO(?) series “Righteous Gemstones,” now completed so you can binge watch the whole five year story arc.  It presents a hilarious arch satire of modern religion.  Some people don’t like it, of course, not because they are offended or religious, others who are religious and offended.  I can hear in my head my deceased friend, NS, saying, “Heck with’em if they can’t take a joke.”

   Secondly, an aging movie, “The Man Who Invented Christmas,” is moving and seasonal these days.  It shows Charles Dickens’ struggle to write “A Christmas Carol.”  I have always loved Dickens and this special story of redemption. 

     Yesterday at the bookstore I bought a new facsimile copy in order, I expect, to read at the spiritualist church class meeting tonight, at least, that is, “Stave One, Marley’s Ghost.”  Christmas ghosts seem more than a bit appropriate to me for my spiritualist friends.  Hope they agree, or we will just have to fall into a walking meditation!

     This is irrelevant, but it just occurred to me: Dickens is slang for the devil, i’nit?

DJ or SC? Bless the givers

DJ consistently makes bird seed cakes

   No wonder we love our brother so dearly.  This is just one example of how he cares for his “tribe,” which includes birds, squirrels, and deer.  I was complaining about the nasty cold and dark of this time during our weekly phone conversation a few days ago.  

   “I really wonder how deer and birds and wild critters survive winter.  I look for their possible hidey-holes on our neighborhood walks, but I don’t see much.” 

    “They tuck into trees or bushes, then they come out to eat when they are hungry.” 

    “But it’s SO cold.”  

    “That’s why we feed them.”

  

     Good quality food, stuff they like… peanut butter, raspberries.  I’ve watched.   Is he a Santa?

Dreadnought. And Love

  

M and R

   Such a great word…dreadnought, succinctly loaded either with the best advice, or descriptive of unwavering character. Could it more accurately apply to personality or essence?  That bears pondering, especially about its source. Dreadnought need not contain implications of hard heartedness or self-centeredness, though some folk might assume that.  No more descriptors about it from me, though they flit like joyful raptors through my brain.  You can play with them if you wish, but, take care:  you may, like me, end this word/idea game by admitting,  “I fancy being a dreadnought,” or perhaps just to be perceived as one.  (Now, if this isn’t personality dabbling in imagination, I’ ve never observed myself before!)

   Meant to talk about the loving nature of dogs (and other two brained beings) with this pic of my dear friend playing with my dear dog.  Gurdjieff said something to the effect of, love a dog and you learn to love.  In this cold weather, Red and I have taken trips to the big box stores and mall six times in two weeks, for exercise and certainly to their profit…cha-Ching!  I usually avoid such shopping which was once upon a time a major form of entertainment.  It got boring, somehow, as well as expensive…even wasteful?  So what’s love got to do with it, Tina?

    First, my willingness to take my little bowwow there often shows me I love. Ugly little secret, I have doubted my ability to love many times in my 78 years.  But I have no doubt that I love this dog, so when I feel or tell people I love them, I know I mean it.

   Second, scores of people have greeted and petted Red (and me as his person) in these trips.  He gives them a moment to feel and show love.  Does he love it?  Mostly, but I think he gets tired. Yet GIG would agree: dogs keep on giving.  

Talked out

 

Light in the park.

                           So my brain feels empty.  Isn’t that amazing.  Ever happen to you?

Eric’s Christmas Tree.  Told him send the pic, only one I’m likely to “have” this year.

Plant in spring, harvest…

 

My son said, “We plant Max seeds in spring, then they bloom in September. 

      Phone calls with discontented people can drag you (me) from neutral or happy to heavy in half an hour or less.  Wash rinse repeat…their complaints remain the same.  No way to convince suffering people to lay down their misery.  Now how do I lay it down? 

   Start with body sensing and self observation, then ask myself EJ’s questions from the “Tales?”

  What could be "unbecoming" in "satisfying" "this impulse ... now called 'pleasure'"?   How can you recognize this in yourself, and how in others?  In which sense can this judgement "unbecoming" be made with "impartiality"?

   Then respond: I suspect my ego takes pleasure in playing “Lady Bountiful” with financial aids that I offer and that I stir the pot by listening to the dissatisfaction of one party’s views of cheating by the other. Also by trying to fix psychological roots beyond my ken, maybe with a threat:  So King Solomon says cut the baby in half, nobody will get anything.  Also, am I not taking sly pleasure in that unintended role of judge who writes THE narrative in my mind for the present and future events of this relationship?  After all, I have raised the issue twice after it was initiated by the “plaintiff.”  But now I am ready to say no more about it  to anyone, including myself.  That seems impartial, if I manage to do it without feelings of dread.  

    Money truly is the root of evil.  And pending death does not slow that down. 

    Beelzebub does famously advise on the last page of his Tales to his grandson:

“The sole means now for the saving of the beings of the planet Earth would be to implant again into their presences a new organ, an organ like Kundabuffer, but this time of such properties that every one of these unfortunates during the process of existence should constantly sense and be cognizant of the inevitability of his own death as well as of the death of everyone upon whom his eyes or attention rests. “Only such a sensation and such a cognizance can now destroy the egoism completely crystallized in them that has swallowed up the whole of their Essence and also that tendency to hate others which flows from it—the tendency, namely, which engenders all those mutual relationships existing there, which serve as the chief cause of all their abnormalities unbecoming to three-brained beings and maleficent for them themselves and for the whole of the Universe.”

Time to serve supper, gotta run

 

   I keep going back-and-forth on the lights opinion:  They did not look so spectacular to me yesterday as they have in past years. Still can’t help loving them  Though Red obviously likes the snow better. 

    OSU lost the big game and Conference championship to Indiana last night in a late game, which was exciting enough to keep me up till 11 PM. Of course I’m sorry our home team lost, but can’t say I’m sorry Indiana won… What does that tell you?  I do like the Hoosier quarterback, and will look forward to watching his career in the future.  

   Ta ta for now. I’m hungry and the soup smells done.  

I take it back: GREAT city lights, WBK

 Not exactly wonderful, but jolly enough in person. And proves my point today.

   Which is that I often speak with unwarranted authority from presumption.  My judgment of our town Christmas lights is the example.  Yesterday’s comments were based on daytime, unlit viewing.  I saw them after (frigid) dark last night and will say now, “Best Ever!”  The colored strands were apparently moved to the park and also to augment some side streets in very effective contrasting concentrations of green, blue, red.  Well done, city maintenance workers!

    Perhaps relatedly, I’m seeing fewer individual neighborhood displays so far, including in my own house.  If I neglected to say it before, lights are my favorite Christmas tradition.

Snow squall me

 

   Yes, I do edit my photos, but some things just don’t look much better:)  I never was a fashionista;  I do like the snowflakes in the picture in the pic. And my blue glasses.  Color is my jam, so I happily report that I put up multicolored Christmas LEDs in the back room last night. So cheery.  Strangely, I’ve lost track of my pre-lit tree and other ornaments, so little newbies and fresh greens—wreaths, maybe a centerpiece—this year. Don’t think I failed to notice, Town Public Works, that you have replaced most of the colored lamp post lights on Main Street with white this year. I have boasted several years about my town’s Christmas lights, but the change to me is not for the better. It’s not “elegant,” as the debate used to declare. At best we might call it “more illuminating,” like a porch or store light.  It is color that brings the cheer in the cold, dark entree to winter.

Last year in the park

  

LLB Freeport a few years ago.  Then they switched to white lights.  

This is one of my all time favorite pictures.

Full moon tonight

 

   Can you tell this is a cut crystal sphere hanging in front of a full moon?  Super full moon, actually, October 6.  Pause and see what effects it has on you.  Might help account for my “communications issues.”  Must always bear in mind some friction improves things, even though uncomfortable.

Breakfast, she titled it

Barbara P’s picture, from Brother’s home, Colorado, in October 

   I lifted this image from a video B sent me after I mentioned in webinar the red tailed hawk I photographed in the park a couple of days ago.  The bird’s catch adds much emotional weight to the image.   Not exactly “Breakfast at Tiffany’s :)”  I am honored. We have a shared experience with observing these birds.

Do not go gentle into that good night.

Rage, rage against  the dying of the  light.

DYLAN THOMAS

              I just spoke by phone with my dying sister eight hundred miles.  Very unhappy.

Beauty, at least its memory, remains.