finding a life.....

We're musical junkies at our house. That is, we will watch musicals over and over, and sometimes interject parts of dialog or lyrics into our day to day conversations.

One of the musicals that my daughter loved and watched over and over and over was The Sound of Music. There is a line where Mother Superior is talking to Maria and telling her that the walls of the convent can't be used to hide behind, that she has to find her life.

It occurred to me recently that in a way that is what I am doing once again.

We spend a lot of our lives looking to some future event. When we are very small we look forward to going to school. When we are teenagers we look forward to driving and graduating from high school. Then we progress to looking forward to getting married, having children, building a career. When our children are growing up, we go through the stages again: sending them to school, having them graduate from high school and college, then getting them married.

We are at that stage in our lives. We are no longer part of any corporate job. Our daughter has graduated from college and will be married in August.

So....now what?

I saw an article in the paper yesterday about a 96 year old man that has just had his novel printed. He's working on the sequel and has a third book in the planning. He talked about writing to fill the time.

A couple of weeks ago I clipped an article about a woman that ending up writing her novel when she was injured and was confined to bed for a lengthy period of time.

I'm considering papering the wall around my computer desk.

The articles whisper to me "don't give up"....

the internal critic says "who do you think YOU are?"

its an dialog that sometimes keeps me awake at night........

So, I guess I need to find my life.....

music, music, music

my daughter sent me the most wonderful email ..... a whole page of links to YouTube music clips....wonderful things:

Josh Groban doing musical theatre (Anthem from Chess, Soundheim's Not While I'm Around, and The Music of the Night from the Phantom of the Opera)

Mandy Patakin doing pieces from Evita

Brian Stokes Mitchell and Audra McDonald doing a piece from Ragtime

I love it! More, I want More!!

I'm the only one in my family that has never had any kind of musical training....but I love it just the same.....bring on the bucket with the lead lid (required for carrying a tune, you know), and I'll warble along with just about any kind of musical theatre.....

(ok, I confess, I did teach myself to play the piano....I wanted to play Moonlight Sonata, and at one point, I actually could -- probably not exactly the way it should be played, but I loved the fact that I had mastered the notes in the right sequence all the way through....practice, practice, practice!! Its sort of like wanting to run before you can crawl, which probably really describes my approach to a lot of things!!)

I'll be humming all day.......

what's wrong with us?

In our area this week it was revealed that a group of junior high school kids (boys and girls) used their cell phones to take nude pictures of themselves and share them around.

Today the news reported that all of them may be charged with crimes that will require them to register as sex offenders for the rest of their lives.

HELLO!!! What's wrong with this picture?

Lets see: we expose them to sexual content their whole lives, they see the girl on American Idol "strut her stuff" and get publicity for it, they see Britney Spears walk around half naked (or more) and get rich. Then when they try to mimic what they see, the "justice" (??) system is going to punish them and ruin their lives with the sex offender thing.

Now, don't get me wrong, I think this whole thing was a bad idea, but the folks that need punishing is the parents!

Why does a 12 or 13 year old need a cell phone with a camera? Why are they being allowed to idolize Britney? Why are they being allowed to watch American Idol and Survivor and Anne Nichole's TV show? Why doesn't anyone thing they need to PARENT anymore?

Let's take each and every one of the mothers and fathers of those kids and think of some appropriate punishment for them, and someone help those kids sort out what was wrong with this whole idea.

observations.....

on Sunday mornings if I wake up early enough I listen to Mass from Notre Dame. This morning in the half hour before that, I listened to a very interesting program.

The encouraging part of the whole half hour was this: depression is a medical issue: it does not mean you don't have enough faith or that you are stupid or that you are morally weak or that you can "snap out of it" by force of will (that is like saying you can "snap out of" having high blood pressure)

Somehow there was some real comfort in that.....

...wishing.....

a while back I was invited to complete an application for a writing course, and since filling it in didn't cost me anything but a bit of brain exercise (a good thing!) I did it.....

now I'm almost wishing I hadn't because I got a letter yesterday inviting me to sign up because they liked what they saw....

trouble is, there is no way that I can afford to do this even on their tuition time payment arrangement.....

guess this shall be logged under the "better to have loved and lost" catagory.....{sigh}

8 weeks after the storm.....

(after the first of the 6 storms, actually) we FINALLY see some effort by the city to clear our street.

Notice this is a road grader....or perhaps a road "grater" since they took so long to get to us that there were long sections where the folks on the block had already dug the stuff out.


So this is the little pile they made and then cleared away.

Because it took them so long and the storm drain was blocked by ice, the ice and the chemicals everyone had used on their sidewalks just sat on the concrete for the better part of the last 8 weeks. I noticed this morning that there a several large patches on the sidewalk and the driveway where the concrete is now flaking away because of the chemicals and the freeze/thaw cycle.

Oh yes, and this morning its snowing again.....{sigh!}

...on being afraid.....

Marty (click here to see) was writing the other day about the things she is afraid of, which set me to thinking about it too......

So I have decided to write some of those thoughts down.....

1. Heights --- don't ask me to go to the edge of anything above the ground (maybe it has something to do with being afraid of falling too)

2. That my body will outlive my mind --- I hate the idea of being a babbling diapered burden

3. That something will happen and I'll end up a bag lady on the street, living out of a shopping cart

I've been thinking about trying to put a lot of the hidden fears and thoughts into a character for a story, but I'm wondering how I can do that and not set off a storm of trouble with (or for) the people around me.....I begin to understand why some writers feel the need for a pen name.

confessions.....

I like driving down a residental street in a strange town in the dark.

I look at the lights in the windows and wonder about the people who live there. Are they happy? Are they loved (and do they know it)? Are they lonely? What do they dream about....laugh about....fight about?

I've realized lately that I grew up in a sort of bubble. When people my age talk about things that were part of their commonly shared experience, I have no idea what they are talking about. I get to just nod and smile and silently feel like the stupidest person on earth.

Its not that I don't remember things....I remember plenty, way back to when I was only 2. Some of those really early memories are just pictures in my head, but I do remember.

So, here are just some of those things I mean that people talk about:

1. going to the movies with friends
2. playing on the playground of the school other than at recess
3. going to summer camp
4. going to a dance
5. reading from a required reading list
6. take a lunch from home to school
7. picking on someone on the playground (I was the someone they picked on)
8. learn to dance
9. participate in some kind of sports
10. take music lessons

When my daughter was growing up, I did everything I could to make sure she didn't miss out on any of the things the other kids got to do (safely and within reason, that is)....in a way, I got to experience a lot of things for the first time as an observer to her life.

I'm sure I made my own mistakes along the way with that, but at least I tried. I've joked that being the mother of an attractive daughter is an interesting role....you're mostly invisible.....its a role I'm well suited to

Self discovery at my age is painful. This sort of self guided mental health therapy is interesting to say the least. I've discovered that I'm good at teaching (or being in charge of something) and I'm okay with being the "worker bee" behind the scenes, but I have no idea how to do the social thing in between.

So now I'm trying to deal with my own "night terrors" of a sort.....the DH wants to go and do square dancing. He says it will be good exercise. He says it will be a way to meet new people. He says it will be fun.

I'm making him set it up, I'm having enough issues trying not to run screaming....I'm sure I will be a total klutz...I have no idea how to dress...and what do I say to these smiling, dancing people who have some common connection. Never mind, I'm sure they won't talk to me anyway except to correct my errors.

pondering and reflecting........

I've been cleaning out old files the last couple of weeks, its something I just tend to do in the "dark days of winter" in January as I do taxes. Probably this is something left over from spending 30 years in corporate accounting offices.

Yesterday, as I was cleaning out one file and putting documents through the shredder, I ran across a letter dated February 4, 2001, that the last corporate boss I had wrote commending the work I had done to get the department through a rather ugly year end.

At the time I'm sure I just was thinking about getting the work done, and it feels rather odd six years later (on the same date no less!) to reflect and remember. As I handed the letter to DH to read, my comment was "someone used to value what I did".

Sort of bitter sweet in terms of the fact that I think I've been "phased out" of the accounting work that I'd been doing for a local company. Of course for them its all about economics....they have a "friend" that will do it cheaper than what I charge....hmmmm, I wonder if the "you get what you pay for" logic will apply here....ah well.

It just seems to be human nature to look back and regret....hence the ever present list of online questions always seems to include "if you could change one thing in your life what would it be"......a hard question to answer for those that believe that every choice made impacts every other choice given.

Whittier was right when he said: "the saddest words of tongue or pen, are these four words, what might have been"

Meantime, the Denver paper yesterday put out its annual "Call for Entries" to write a for a column that appears weekly in the Sunday opinion section. They want 2 sample columns of 600 to 700 words and a cover letter. I sent in essays last year and was turned down, so now I'm pondering on doing it again. (If I'm collecting rejection slips, at least I'm sending stuff in!!) What I need, tho', is a couple of ideas to write about that I can get excited about. Deadline is Tuesday, Feb 20, so I have a little time, but not a lot.

So, anybody got any ideas?

wearing 3 shoes....who knew?

Ok, I guess I was wrong.

There was yet another shoe to be dropped after the last post.

Monday I had to put 2 new tires on the van and have it aligned before it was safe to take it on the road.

DANG! Just when I thought 3 was the magic number....(here we're making the sign to ward off the evil eye, hoping this new event isn't the beginning of a new 3 some!)

This time I was ticked off enough about the cause of the problem that I fired off a hot letter to the dealership about the total incompetence of who ever did the vehicle inspection before we bought the van (unless, of course, they just lied to us about that happening).

Seems this month we can't catch a break {sigh}

Looking for a window...(the other shoe has dropped)

Ever notice how "bad" things come in threes?

Maybe I'm just nuts (ok, we'll discuss that another day), but it seems that bad things always happen in clumps.

I've now had my 3 in the last week, and I can say, I'm glad the clump is over now we can get on to recovering.

Item 1

Last week we went out to go some where, and the van wouldn't start. Nope, battery dead as a doornail (what DOES that phrase mean?), and this was the 4th time we had found this condition. And since I had already used up all of my alloted AAA calls, I had no choice, I called the dealership and told them that we had "the issue" AGAIN!

Much to their credit, they sent one of their techs with a booster box and got me started, then I took the van to them to figure it out.

Over the few months we have had the van I have gotten to know a lot about it. Through some miracle, the folks that owned it before us had left a receipt in the glove box that had a phone number on it. I got bold, I called the guy and asked him if they had ever had this issue with the van. He said yes, so I questioned him further about the DVD player that had been installed in the van. He had put that in the weekend he bought the van, so he couldn't answer my next question which was -- did you have the problem before the DVD player went in.

So, my thought was that the folks that installed the DVD player (Circuit City) had installed it with the electrical connection ahead of the starter so it was always on and draining the battery.

Well, after 24 hours and a lot of testing, the dealership found the problem ... guess what ... I was right.

So, the wiring for the DVD player has been REMOVED!, and I got to write a check for $311 to the dealership. (At least now the problem is fixed!)

Item 2

Then we had the furnace issue. Waking up to a COLD (even by our standards) house and getting to spend just under $200 to have the ignitor unit replaced on Monday.

At that point I knew there would be something else ... its that clump of 3!

Item 3
The other shoe dropped yesterday. (that's another phrase I'd like to know the origin of)

Since August I've been doing bank recons and account analysis for a small business locally to help them try to get onto a corporate basis from just being a small "mom & pop". The guy has been paying me at the rate I had originally asked him for, and I was making enough to cover the increase in payments going out for the van and my health insurance.

Yesterday when I delivered the December recon, he told me that they had some friend of theirs that was a Quick Books guru working on the inventory and other things, and for now at least he doesn't have anything else for me to do for them.

NUTS!

So, there we are...now I need to find some way to make up that difference......

We believe that when a door closes somewhere a window opens.....so, I'm looking for a window

Slaying the Dragon....

I've done it again.....submitted something for publication.

Two things actually -- one is a sheet of paper dolls that I just finished, and the other is an article about a teddy bear's make over.

These both went to an online magazine. I was emboldened by receiving a notice from the self same Ezine that an article I had submitted back in December is going to be used in the upcoming issue......WHOOOPPPEEE!!

I don't get paid for these other than the free publicity about my work to a much larger audience than I can reach any other way, so its pretty good!

As soon as the issue comes out, I'll post links here.

Now, I just need to keep at another writing project I'm working on.....

Letters from home......

I have a dear friend in California that sends out an email about once a week to a long list of folks that I am blessed to be a part of.

Usually she writes it and sends it out (actually her daughter does the computer part) on Sunday afternoon, and I get to start my week by reading what I consider to be "news from home".

Even at this point, I have still lived more years in California than anywhere else, so it really does feel like home.

I should also add that this charming lady is an accomplished artist, so she notices things an artist would notice and shares them with us all.

This week's letter included the following: "The hills to the East have a green tinge to them." ...and... "The hummingbird (or another one) has returned. She is sitting in last year's refurbished nest on two eggs"

Oh, to have the hills in any direction from us have a green tinge! I am well and totally sick of winter, as we cleaned another 5 inches out of the driveway yesterday for a total of about 8 inches for this weekend's storm. (and I see in the long range forecast another storm for NEXT weekend --- please! say it isn't so!)

I love reading her letters and hate reading her letters....wondering how many days this week I'll feel homesick......Bless you June, for helping me remember that spring will come -- eventually!

Do I seem like an atheist to you?

Recently someone said to me "I sometimes think you are an atheist, its like you don't believe in anything".

Now this is troubling.

And since there was no specific example of what I had said or done that was cited to give me some opportunity for explanation, I'm now left wondering what it was I did -- or didn't do -- that gave someone that impression.

I will admit to having had doubts. Its not that I don't believe that God exists, or that He knows what's going on down here. But I can say that I've never had that "flash of lightening" feeling that people talk about. I guess that's reserved for folks that are already WAY ahead of me on this level.

So to a large extent I guess I feel like I'm sort of stumbling along, trying most of the time to be a good person tho' I'm not always, to give back to folks with less than I have.

I'd like to have that "I'm sure of it all" feeling that some folks say they have, but I guess I've taken too many detours along the way.

Administrivia and trouble makers

I'm beginning to wonder if there is an active brain cell left among the administrative employees in this area.

Example #1:

Early in December, the DH was given a form by his doctor to get a handicap placard for the car. When we started filling in our part of the form, we discovered that the doctor's office had not had her sign the form, so it had to go back to her office to be signed.

After the form came back to us, we didn't get over to the DMV because of the 3 storms back to back.

Well, yesterday seemed like an opportune time, so off we went to the DMV, form in hand to accomplish the deed. But NOOOOOOO, there was a number missing! So I called the doctor's office, from the DMV and asked for them to give me the doctor's medical license number (required on the form by the State), and was told by the administrative employee that she could give me that information over the phone because it was "private information" --- HUH!? Then she told me she'd have to check with the office manager and call me back.

She finally did call back, an hour and a half later, after we had given up waiting and returned home.

So today the form is in the mail box waiting for the post man to carry it back to the DMV. I hope we've finally got it right.

Example #2:
This morning we got a phone call from the office of the specialist that the DH is supposed to see tomorrow asking us if we had the referal paperwork. WHAT?

Here's the deal here: when we first called (back in early December) to make an appointment we were told they needed the referal. I contacted the primary care doctor and asked them to take care of that for us (its SUPPOSED to be their job). About 2 weeks ago, the specialist's office called and said they had the referal and we made an appointment.

Ok, whose wires are crossed here?

On second thought, maybe it isn't all administrative employees, maybe it just the medical ones -- what do we expect from a system so seriously broken?!

And my second "rant" for today has to do with troublemakers.

Why is it some people are just not satisfied unless they are stirring up past history and flinging accusations?

Having just had an encounter with this issue, I am mightily tempted to reply point by point with both barrels (preferably of a shot gun full of rock salt!)

And of course that response makes me unhappy with feeling that way, having been told as a child that someone always has to be the "bigger person" in a disagreement, and that it should be me (why me always?)....

But sometimes it seems a little righteous indignation and a setting of the record straight might go a really long way to putting a halt to this kind of assault in the future.

Maybe I'll get to have my say someday.....

tax screaming

I've spent a good deal of time the last 2 days working on taxes.

First we organize all the little pieces of paper into piles of what they are: medical, business, contributions, sales tax, income

Then its on to the spread sheets -- I should note here that effective Jan 1, 2007, I am converting all my business stuff into QuickBooks, so there will be less of this next time, but there will still be medical

And then there is the reviewing to be sure I didn't duplicate anything

and the downloading of forms from the IRS.gov site where I can take just the pieces I need (including from the instructions) but even so, I have a hefty stack of paper to wade through

I may run screaming from the room!!! (how did I do this at work for all those years without being certifiable --- oh, yeah, now my secret is out!!)

how did I write that?

yesterday, as we're driving off to the store to pick up a few things, the DH says to me "why don't you see if there is some place that you could submit a short story"

hmmmmm, well, uuuuhhhhh .... here's the issue my friends: when I was in high school (yes, low, nearly 40 years ago) I wrote short stories, and plays and poetry and newspaper articles. Thing is, I just wrote whatever was floating around in my head (or the assigned topic in the case of a newspaper article). I never took a class then, or in college, that gave me any really idea of how to create a believable character, or structure a plot, or whatever.....I just "did it"

so, do I still have a story or two to write? well, maybe, but I have no idea anymore how to start.

Can I blog? Well, yes, it appears so, since I have 3 of these running and I seem to be able to write a recipe and a few paragraphs about its source, or keep up a running commentary on the other art work I'm creating, but I don't seem to have the faintest idea of how to start a story.

is it possible to write a story without knowing at the beginning how it will end? how is it that the idea for that civil war era novel is still floating around, but I have no clue how to start (ok, I have done a brief character description for ONE character, but I don't seem to know those other people)

and so I'm puzzling about this....how is it you can "forget" how to do this, or was it simply that when I was 17 I didn't even think about the structure, I read a lot and I wrote a lot......

having read several of Julia Cameron's books, I know that if you're going to write, you have to do it every day, and I'm managing to do that by blogging (I don't miss a lot of days), but that is not giving me any real direction....NUTS!

hmmmmmm, perhaps having some direction is the problem......

and so I consider this rambling a sort of "asking the higher power" as Cameron puts it, and thinking that perhaps someone in blogland will run across this and drop me an idea or two.....

On being thankful to live in this century

In doing family history, I've also read some other source material about the experience of living on the plains in the 1800s.

For the past 3 days, we've had clouds, snow, and almost constant wind.

Imagine living in those conditions out in the middle of the plains, no neighbors for miles, no electricity, no internet, no cable --- nothing but a little cabin, a fireplace and the sound of the wind howling around (or through) the cabin.

No wonder those women looked so dour in those pictures. How did they keep from going literally crazy in those conditions?

They obviously were made of very sturdy stuff -- I'm not sure I would measure up.....here's to our great grandmothers --- what great ladies they were!

A wonderful Christmas was had by all......

As I write this, I'm sitting in a pool of lovely full spectrum light from the new lamp my DH got for me. After having "burned up" two smaller lamps that were full spectrum bulbs but used a transformer in the power set up, I had hinted broadly that a more efficient lighting system was probably a good idea. TA DA! I now have wonderful light to work under!!

He had quite a story to tell about one of the other presents he got for me too, and it goes like this.

Not long ago on Mason Dixon Knitting, there was a lengthy review of a Rowenta iron. Now the iron I've been using is about my daughter's age, and has seen me through many projects, but after reading the review of the Rowenta, I went on at length about its virtues, especially since it was clear that an heirloom quality quilt for our daughter's wedding was in our future.

So, the ever faithful DH set out on his quest to make it happen. Off he went to the store where he picked out a very nice model of the Rowenta, one with a very "pointy" sole plate which will be great for all that quilt work!

He goes to the check out, and is his usual thing, he was telling the clerk how this is a present for his wife for Christmas. Well, he nearly couldn't get it out the door until he made a long explanation about how thrilled I'd be to get it for the quilting. She simply didn't think an iron was a good Christmas gift! What a hoot!! BTW -- I am thrilled!! Can't wait to get started on the next quilt project and get to use it.

Today's picture should probably be labeled "Queen Elphie". She's pretty much taken this chair as her personal "throne". At the time I took this picture Christmas morning (before we tore into the presents as you can see from behind her), she was keeping our daughter's dog from getting into "her" chair.

I hope all of you had a great Christmas too!

Snow pictures and household projects

The snow and the wind made lovely scuplture! This is our back yard, where the wind blew the snow around into a kind of "half pipe".....it really looks amazing......I'm wondering if there's some way to capture this look with beads.....something to think about

The picture below is an icicle hanging from the blue spruce tree in our front yard.....the storm decorated the tree for Christmas!

And these would be the latest knitting adventure. Both knit from the same pattern, but in one the texture runs vertically and the other it is horizontal.

These are covers for my "Swiffer" which I love using because it picks up the dog hair so well, but I'm not thrilled with the "use the cover once and throw it away" issue.....

The reason I knit these two different directions was to do a semi scientific test.....which pattern picks up the most stuff before it must be changed? After a test use to figure it out, I will be making a few more of these.....in the most efficient pattern of course!