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 |  My blog for the blog challenge |
| Ahem, ahem, ahem ... cough cough cough ... mememememememe ... Okay, I'm ready to write now. |
| Day 2 Prompt for the "30-Day Blogging Challenge" : WILDCARD MONDAY!! March comes in like a lion, and goes out like a lamb (or vice/versa). What are you most looking forward to this spring? Spring is what I'm most looking forward to. Fair weather. Warmer days. Planting a garden. Digging in the dirt. Blue skies. More sun. Our winter has been drab, gray, and cold weather-wise. Our winter has been filled with hospital visits, loss of income, worry, depression, surgeries, emergencies, and drama. We've done what we could to overcome it all, but it never lasts for long. We made sure to take our son on a special trip for his 21st birthday in the middle of everything else, and while it was great fun, the euphoria wore off way too fast. At least when I have a garden to dig in, I can zone out and take my mind off everything for awhile. It's my Zen spot. My cousin races cars to find his Zen ... I dig in the vegetable garden. Spring is the perfect time for digging in the garden. |
| 30DBC Prompt: The Sunday News: Pick a random article from the headlines and talk about it. Share your opinions and feelings about it. Encourage a conversation. http://www.cbsnews.com/news/almanac-remembering-the-very-first-selfie/ The world's first selfie was taken in 1839 by photographer Robert Cornelius. I like strange news, odd facts, and dates in history, especially when they are relevant to today's society. This one touched me because I love photography, but notably photographers are some of the least photographed people because they are usually behind the camera lens. I'm absolute rubbish taking selfies on my phone but I am the family photographer so most of our vacation photos lack images of me anywhere. Lol. I wonder if Robert had any idea that centuries later people would do daily what he did but in a much easier way. Could he have imagined instant photos, cell phones, and the craze of photographing oneself in every possible situation? I think we really have to pause when we see images like this and realize that selfies are not a modern invention. We can't blame modern technology or even modern thinking for them and must realize that people are human and have always been human and will always continue to be human ... Some people hate history, but I think it makes us more humane when we see the intimate things people did and thought back in time. We realize that there is more to the world than what we see and think now and that everything came from somewhere. There really is nothing new in this world! |
| Prompt: June 9, 2014 I can. I will. End of Story. I can do almost anything I decided I'm going to do. Playing a tuba is not on that list, however, thankfully, because I can NOT play a tuba. I can feed my family on what I raise in my backyard almost exclusively. I can write well. I will the gods to bequeath me a million dollars all at one time. Oh, but that's probably not the "right" kind of will. I will my worldly goods to my husband, who won't have a clue what to do with them. Wait, is that the right kind of will? Maybe, I will lose weight this year and become healthier for it. End of Story. |
| June 5, 2014 Prompt: I grew up listening to my mother tell stories about how this moment in history changed the world as she knew it; http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/bobby-kennedy-is-assassinated She felt much of what was good in our country died when Bobby Kennedy was shot. Is there a moment in history where you felt the same way, or did your parents (grandparents) share their thoughts on pivotal historic events? My grandfather always talked about the Japanese bombing Pearl Harbor. It certainly influenced how he saw the world and what he taught us about it. He was a very bigoted man. (It's strange to say that because he was very affectionate and loving towards us.) So I won't repeat what he told us to do or think. My dad, on the other hand, always talked about the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl because his family, his parents, his grandparents, his uncles and aunts were all impacted by it. Most of them lost their farms, their entire life savings, their homes, their cars, their entire way of life. It changed who they were on such a monumental scale and to this day impacts the decisions they make in their lives. |
| June 4, 2014 30DBC Prompt: Do you think playing violent video games and watching violent movies makes people more violent in real life? Were you allowed to partake in these activities as a child? If you have children, did/do you let them have violent media? I think obsessing over violence causes people to become more violent in any form. But having been a foster parent to some seriously messed up kids who came from violent homes and who were exposed to violence very early in life on an ongoing basis, I have to say that in the case of children, violence will begat violence. Children will do what they see, no matter what they think, no matter how rational they can be in thinking through other options. Logic and emotion are two different things. A child can think through a situation long before they are emotionally ready to deal with it. But in a situation where emotions run high, they will not think logically about what to do. They will react emotionally. If that emotional response is linked to violence, they will be violent. Although I, as a child, saw many violent cartoons, I knew that they were cartoons. They weren't real. Movies and a lot of the realistic video games that are out there now blur the lines for a child who doesn't have a strong grasp on reality or who isn't emotionally ready to deal with what they see. My kids watched things that could be considered violent, I suppose. Mulan is violent is some ways and my kids loved it. But again it was a cartoon. They weren't allowed to watch violent tv or movies otherwise though until they were teens. And they were never allowed to play realistic shooting video games or war video games. All that said, I think most children come out of the womb with some level of violent tendencies. They have to be taught how to behave differently. They have to be shown the correct way to interact with another human being. They have to learn how to deal with their emotions. |
| Prompt: June 3. 2014 Spring Fever I'm not sure that I get spring fever so much as I get "vacation fever". Spring comes and I am so busy with life on the farm. We have so many baby animals to care for and the garden to plant and rain to manage and compost to move and heat to cope with ... that by the end of the day exhaustion sets in. After weeks of it, I get the urge to run away. Run far far away. Perhaps that's the same thing. |
| "30-Day Blogging Challenge" Are there any unwritten rules for blogging? Is there anything that's off-limits? Are there lines you won't cross, or is there anything that makes you shudder and gives you pause when someone else's entry crosses your line of what you think is appropriate? Unwritten rules for blogging you ask? Yes, there is at least one. Do not give out too much personal information about private matters. I do not need to know about your bodily functions, fights with your spouse, sexual partners habits, or intimate thoughts you harbor. I will not share mine if you don't make me share yours. Anything off-limits? See above. Plus, bashing anything whether its religion, politics, race, nationality, gender, age, etc ... I don't think it belongs in a blog. Lines and shuddering? I shudder frequently. And I'm sure I probably make others shudder as well. I'm not so good at respecting lines drawn arbitrarily ... or even sometimes my own lines. I think people are people and they say what they say and do what they do and if it offends me or you or anyone else then that's our problem, not theirs. People should be free to think and feel what they want. If you feel the need to expound on things I don't agree with or find disgusting, I will excuse myself as all grown ups are free to do.  Probably my biggest abuse of line crossing comes when people make arbitrary rules for things. I've never been good with that. My dad used to say he could beat me to death and it wouldn't make a bit of difference if I didn't see the point. (They couldn't put me in a time out. I just sat there and told myself stories. Surprise.) People give me pause all the time, every day of my life. Old people, young people, middle age people. But in the end I figure we're all just human walking along our own paths in our time. We'll all end up in the same place some day anyway, so what happens here and now we might as well make the best of. Pauses are just that point where you get to take a big deep breath before you laugh you head off. Right? |
| APRIL 10, 2014 We all have our own idea of what a perfect world would look like. What does your perfect world look like? What part of your real life wouldn't be part of your perfect world. Is there anything you currently enjoy that can't be part of your perfect world? I'm not sure that I do have an idea of what a perfect world would look like. I did when I was younger. I would have torn down every structure that wasn't designed and a beautiful piece of art. Now I tend to find beauty where ever I look. Some time ago I heard or read or came up with this: Promote what you love instead of bashing what you hate. I wrote a blog entry about it the other day that you can find here:http://wingedwriting.wordpress.com/2014/04/07/promote-what-you-love/ I really do believe that when you focus on the things you love you see beauty everywhere you look. Perfection becomes a standard that means nothing because everything is perfect in its own way. So do I think hate or violence or greed should exist in a perfect world? Yes, I do. When I was young, twenty-three, I was a victim in a car bombing in which another person died in my arms. It was horrific. It was an event that changed my life. It tore my soul in half. I couldn't understand how a God of love could possibly allow things like terrorism to exist in our world. It was pure senseless violence and hatred. Evil to the bone. It took me twenty years plus to come to terms with it. And when I did I finally realized that the beauty in it was not that God had allowed evil to exist, but that God had protected me. It was very personal. We don't tend to think about terrorism as being personal. It seems so epic in scale, mass bombings, mass death, mass torture ... but when you're a victim of it, when you're in the middle of it, it isn't epic at all. It's personal. It's private. I would never wish violence or fear or evil on any other human on the face of this planet. Not even those who inflict the violence. But having been through that experience, my view on what was important in life changed. Perfection disappeared. Changing the world in a grand way vanished. Being a great artist no longer mattered. To me, people matter. Lives matter. So any day that I can wrap my arms around my husband and kids and tell them I love them, is a perfect day. |
Monkeying Around, the video http://video.nationalgeographic.com/video/kids/animals-pets-kids/mammals-kids/ch... I'm taking my inspiration for my blog writing on this topic from this video. I could, as the video says, use this footage to make some scientific point and spend an hour or two writing about "monkey around". BUT it's my month off from blogging on here sooooooo, I'm just going to have some fun. (to the tune of Side-by-Side) "Well we ain't got a barrel of monkeys, Maybe we're ragged and funky, But we'll carry right on Writing our blog on Writing dot com." |
| March 31 needs a Prompt There's an extra day this month, and it needs something challenging. What world famous monument was celebrated as completed today (March 31) one hundred and twenty-five years ago? Give us your opinion or thoughts about monuments or what a 30DBC monument would look like. Well that wasn't too much of a challenge given the ease of using the internet. I just searched for monuments completed on March 31. How many could there be, right? And the winner is: The Eiffel Tower built by Gustave Eiffel. Construction began in 1887 and was completed two years later. Most Parisians thought it would ruin the city but instead it has become one of the most beloved icons for tourists and the people of France alike. Other than being a tourist attraction and landmark, it was used during WWI as a giant radio signal jamming device. And in the TV show "The Highlander" it was used as a giant lightening rod to fry a computer disc with sensitive information stored on it. Lol. When it was completed in 1889 it was twice as tall as the Washington Monument which was considered the tallest building in the world at the time. It was originally built for the World Exhibition of 1889 and not meant to be a permanent structure, much like The Crystal Palace which was built in Hyde Park London for the 1851 Great Exhibition. While The Crystal Palace was moved to another location after the fair and subsequently succumbed to a fire, the Eiffel Tower has remained in its original location and become loved by all. A monument for 30DBC? Location, location, location ... and purpose. Most monuments commemorate great achievements or stand in memory of heroic people. Decisions would have to be made by all those involved, votes counted, work commissioned, and then another committee formed to raise funds. Sounds like a lot of work. I did complete my 30DBC without missing any days but I'll be glad to have my month of April back to my regular writing routine. I write everyday anyway so for me it was more a matter of challenging myself to keep up with the prompts. Will I be back for May? We'll see when I get through with April. I may not be able to as I have a couple of writing conferences that month which will eat up my time and days and limit my internet access but I may come back in another form instead. ha ha he he he |
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