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 |  Daily Doings |
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This begins on April 11, 2005. I have no idea what is going to happen. Today is June 28, and I still don't know what is happening here. It's a combination of personal and not-so-personal. Some say I just put it all out there. Others comment that it is LOL. Read and hopefully enjoy! Thanks to Writerchic for the Awardicon on WDC's 5th Birthday. |
| I have a short story that I am thinking seriously about making into a novel. I am also aware that there is a theory going around that the novel is dead, or at least on its way out, and short stories will be in, mainly because of the speed of the byte and the speed of technology and the speed of this and that, and we just no longer have the patience to sit and read an entire novel. I wonder how true this is, and how I can check on the accuracy of this trend. I fellow-WDC writer wrote to me that he was desparately looking for a group of very serious writers with whom he could have such discussions, as well as discussions about his writing, about which he is very serious. And I can tell you that when he sends me an email about something I have written his comments are so incredibly persccptive as to almost take my breath away. What do you think? Is the novel going the way of other 20th century and before oddities, or will it remain to grace living rooms and dinner tables for some time yet? What short stories are read except for The New Yorker? Another constant question that comes up is what constitutes serious writing? Dostoyevsky? Woodward and Bernstein? Maureen Dowd? The writer of "Peanuts" whose name escapes me at the moment? How about "The Rolling Stones"? How can a piece of writing be not serious unless it is some silly note passed among school children, and even then it is serious to the children passing the notes, and some of those notes have serious consequences? I, personally, cannot take the self-help books seriously, or the ones that talk of angels speaking to us and caring for us, but that does not mean that other do not. I take most satire seriously -- Tom Robbins, Elmore Leonard, Carl Hiaasen. Up until recently I belonged to a group of women who would read a certain book, selected by agreement, and two weeks later we would meet at someone's home or a restaurant, and discuss the book. We read over a hundred books in that group, and I cannot recall anyone not taking one book seriously. Am I using the word serious here the same as I would the word "good"? I'm not sure. I am only sure that some novels are better than others, that Stephen King sells better than Gabriel Garcia Marquez, that Anne Rice sells better than Flannery O'Connor and I do not understand why. |
| I think for the first time I am a winner in a contest. Of course I haven't entered many until recently, but this was Best of Forms Contest. I won first place in two categories, second in two categories, and Best Overall. I was so happy and so encouraged! And really happy that a short story "Falling in Between" won first in short stories. I am really working on writing short stories in addtion to poems, and so far, so good. Gee, I won something! WOW! I have laryngitis that won't go away. It was getting under control until my friend Cathy called about Midnight and we talked for two hours. She's the one whose mother was unconscious on the floor, and EMS saved her. The mother was on the ventilator for about a week, but she now has a simple oxygen tube and will probably come home this week, A two hour phone call, however, is not good for laryngitis. I want to thank all of you who have been so encouraging lately when I've been about ready to switch writing communities. Tor, Al, Sky, and others. You know who you are. There are a lot of serious writers here (I cannot be the only one) and we are here to help each other and to learn from each other's insights. That's what's important. There are going to be bad apples anywhere, and they get weeded out with time. Right? Right! Now I shall write this on a blackboard one hundred times.  I think I'll go look for more contests to enter. I can't talk so I might as well work! Is it the weekend yet? |
| I have noticed several trends this evening, having spent most of the evening on writing.com for the first time in a while. I will probably get thrown out of all groups I belong to, asked to leave all material I have written and be banned to some other nondescript site, but I have to say what's on my mind. I note a growing lack of serious writing. Or, a greater amount of frivolity. This may be not be verifiable by facts, and I hope it isn't, for I for one consider myself a serious writer, and a serious person. I have fun, but mostly I take things pretty seriously. Especially when people go through my port and rate but don't review and rate at a low low number; this has happened to serveal people I know. I hope these kinds of indcidents take a downward turn. There a number of "cliques" on this site, as there are whenever any large number of people are together, but it seems to me that this is growing also. I have ever personally felt shunned or shut out of anything by anyone, but I know that it goes on. Am I being paranoid? I have also noticed a frequent recent mention of bi-polar, or manic-depression, or depression, as though these were not real illnesses, as though it were an epidemic of some sort and only on this site, and people suffering from these problems should be in a separate category. Should they be behind closed doors, in castle basements or perhaps towers, snake pits? Need I list AGAIN the names of the many artists who have been in this condition? Again, am I the only one noticing this? If that what I get for surfing around recent work? Help! |
| This afternoon I was doing some reading and listening to something that came over the web, and it all had to do with happiness. Not necessarily how to achieve it, or get it, but more like be it. Say you decide if you had a new Accura you would be happy. So you work hard, save your money, and eventually you buy your new Accura. It is exciting and you have fun motoring about for a few weeks. Then slowly it becomes less and less happy-making. You think you would be happy, for example, if only your child would recover from his terrible birth defect, and over the months and maybe even years, the doctors and hospitals and prayers, and so on, seem to be working and your child improves greatly and actually grows up to a nomal adulthood. Is this happiness? Or, is happiness something that comes from within? Is it a state of mind, an energy, a heart that is there despite outside circumstances? Is it due to DNA? On the opposite side. suicides run in families. So does mental illness. This seems to support the happiness/melancholy theory that the outlook is in the DNA somehow. Some intense psychics and spiritualists believe that with intense concentration, focus and work DNA can be changed. I do not know too many details of this particular view, but I do know that it is being developed and practiced. I do not know anything about it's success rate. If this were possible, however, and one was prone, say to depression, or melancholy, one could change the particular particles of DNA that imply such a condition, and the melancholy would turn into a happier disposition. Is this possible? Others believe that happiness is possible only with an intense faith in a High Power, God, Allah, etc. If this faith in present, even the darkest tragedy will be accepted, maybe not with joy, but not with a nervous breakdown either. The stress and pace of contemporary life, especially in the United States and most of Western Europe, is so high that many people are "stressed out" and thus do not really have time for happiness. Unless you define happiness as being a state of constant motion and stress that produces consumer goods and products, or in another word, money. I personally have known people from junkies to judges, and many in between and I have had a difficult time deciding the criteria for happiness. Is it where you find it? Is it the state of being in love? Is it having a loving family with many children and grandchildren all of whom have healthy lives and careers of their own? Is it different for everybody? Or, is the glass half empty or half full? After coming through a near death experience, white lights or not, a great percentage of people say they appreciate life much more, that they see each day as an adventure, for some of us here on WDC each day is a new story. We are glad to be alive. You never know what you have until you lose it, is another way of saying this. Is happiness an innate state of being, an outlook. an attitude, or is it a state of mind that is dependent on external events, others' comments and lives, praise or scorn? The theologians that I have scanned through today seem to agree that happiness has to be with being close to God, or at least feeling close to God, a oneness with God and all things in His/Her world. Off hand, this seems to be to be very close to being peaceful, to a life of prayer and meditation, or a life lived for others such as Mother Theresa's was. and yet, surely Ted Turner is a happy man, Laura Bush a happy woman, and I am sure I could think of many other well know celebrities. Bill Gates. They are people who have "made a difference." Is that what it takes? I don't think that is all that it takes, or the Cubans down the street who cut sugar cane and pick strawberries would not be happy people. It's all very curious to me. I have no answer. Do you? |
| I'm getting very sporadic about this blog, but it'sll just have to be so until things settle down. Now I have laryngitis so I can't talk, and I can write constantly. Pretty good deal if you ask me! Who snuck that Awardicon in there? I didn't see that until just now? I can't begin to guess. I'll have to look in the "My Awardicons" section. Memorial Day was memorable, at the time. I remember I had a terribly busy week and day, mostly seeing friends and going places. This is the last weekend before the Tourist Season starts officially (I didn't know it ended), and so I did go out and about. Didn't make it to Busch Gardens though, which is the one place I want to go. What's the big deal about Deep Throat? Just because he was supposedly a secret? I'll skip the Linda Lovelace jokes. But I don't see why it's such a hugh revelation. And front line news. The TV talks about hurricanes all the time. Today is the first day of the hurricane season. They will not stop. It is a big marketing ploy. But there are also many houses not repaired from last year's four hurricanes in a row in September. This is a crazy state to live in. CNN has been on 25 years now says Ted Turner, proudly. I think it's on the way out. I think Network news is, pretty much. I can't listen to it 24 hours a day. Only when some- thing important happens. I can't stand to watch TV at all these days. Am too used to the computer. It's faster, less full of chatter, and you can stream in music. Heaven! I think I haven't written in this blog because there isn't much to write. I'm sick, it's raining, etc. Just like any other household. Maybe later I'll get worked up about somthing. Like Laura Bush running for President in 2008. It's possible. Ciao |
| Today's subject has two parts; I don't think they are related to each other but I'll try to draw a thread from one to the other. The first subject is the *&%$# Media. Not only did they do a terrible job on the Newsweek story, and have not mentioned a word since, but, as most of you know, I live in florida. Today, Friday, May 27, is the end of a week that has been filled, and I mean filled, with Hurricane Hype. The season is officially June 1 to November 1. Now I believe there will be hurricanes, and I believe we may have more this year than last, or we may have less than last. I do not believe I should have to hear about, relive, and memorize the history of hurricanes in Florida starting in mid-May. I also do not believe they can forecast this far ahead. I swear the grocery stores and Walmart and Home Deport support this hype. The grocery stores really make out if there is the most remote threat of a storm, let alone a hurricane. I can't believe Winn-Dixie is going out of business. It must be similar to the cold war scare when people were building underground bunkers (is that a contradiction), especially in the midwest. That'd be pretty silly here, since we're at sea level. Anyway, the media is having a field day. Maybe it's a slow news week. The second topic I want to talk about is this epidemic among children age say 11 to 20, called "slashing" or "cutting". There seems to be no intention of suicide, but it is a process of self-mutilation. A very scholarly friend was telling me that it is similar to the facial and body markings of what some consider "primitive" tribes, and even to such modern day identification marks as tatooing, which is another thing that has taken off in America like it was a new fast food chain. I had not heard about it at all until I became an active member of Writing.com, so I can't accuse the media of exploiting this (although I hear Oprah did a show on it not too long ago). I heard about it here, on this site, from people who were doing it and trying to quit, from people who had done it and had stopped, from all kinds of people that felt guilty and/or ill. I don't get it, but there are lots of things I "don't get"! That's not the problem. The problem is: is anything being done about these children on a community basis to offer them sympathy, safety, aid,etc.? Do any of you know, and for those of you in countries other than the United States, do you have this problem in your country? There are so many contests ending this weekend, that I wish you all of you who may have entered any of them great luck! I doubt much if you have Memorial Day in the U.K., Sveden, or Australia, but happy weekend and happy contests just the same! Ciao. |
| It's been a while since I had a minute to sit down and chat. A close friend of mine's mother (whose name is Lois) was incoherent on the floor when she got home Friday night' Cathy (my friend) called me. I took one look, knew she was breathing, but that's all, and called 911. They said if we had waited ten more minutes she would have been Code Blue. As it is she is in the hospital on the ventilator. She's not brain dead by any means, her heart is strong, they don't know what happened (the doctors don't know), and she is "stable". It was all very traumatic for both Cathy and for me. We can't find a Living Will, and after the Terry Schiavo case, the hospitals demand a new Living Will each time you come in. I said "She came in unconscious. How could she sign a new Living Will?" The nurse just shook her head and said "All I know is those are the rules." Ah, America I love you. Constant prayers are needed here for Lois. As well as good doctors. Lois is mad at me for calling 911. Figure that one out. I can't. I finally entered several contests (The Story Master threatens me, and I behave). They all end on the 30th of May, and we'll see. I'm proud of myself for entering. One of them, Best of Forms Contest has eight separate entries so I sat me down and did some work. Laura Bush is looking good there in the Middle East. I wonder who her make up person is. and her physical trainer. I should look so good, and I think she's older than I am. Some people got it, and some don't I guess. I used to have it, but it went away. Maybe it'll boomerang and I'll wake up tall and thin and get those looks that people give when someone with presence (that's one word for it) enters the room. O dream on, you fool, I tell myself. At least it relieves the pain of the moment. There are really some good writers on this site! I found several while looking around for people to review for the {Good Deeds...Go Noticed contest. I guess it's a contest. I'm not sure. It's more like a lottery, I think. They draw random numbers, and then that's who wins, if I understand this correctly. I probably don't. I can't even understand why Newsweek magazine should not be held accountable for reporting abuses in Guantanamo. What do I know? I'm going to put duct tape on my mouth. Not on my fingers though . You lucky folk!!Later. |
| I am definitely getting feisty. My dictionary says (1) being touchy and quarrelsome (2) being frisky and exhuberent; having or showinng a lively aggressiveness; syn. spunky. Well, well. I've spent a great deal of my life, not quite a wallflower, but I've often been called "a long, tall glass of water" and "one spiritied filly". There gave been some not so complimentary descriptions too, but those I forget about. But not feisty. Usually nice. But I'm getting more feisty. I write letters everywhere...not randomly at all, but frequently and with great purpose. Senators, congresspeople, Hillary, The White House, etc. NEWSWEEK put me over the edge. I was getting emails from people in Ohio and New York who have known me a hundred years and they'd say things like "Pamela (oops--,my real name revealed), get ahold of yourself." Or"For God's sake, get a grip. Things like this happen all the time." Etcetera etcetera. Then a St. Augustine buddy of mine called and I said "Hello," and he bypassedv all the usual social pleasantries and blurted "I'm not buying another Newsweek ever again!" I said I wasn't either and I was not going to read it in the doctor's office anymore either -- that'll show 'em! -- and "Sorry doen't cut it!" I don't quite know what I want them to do but I do know that "We regret that we ran the article and our sympathies go out to the families of the deceased" does not make up for what happened. The White House is concerned about America's image. How could that suddenly happen? Why didn't they think of that when they went into Iraq? I'm still nuts over this, and of course it will all settle down in a day or two because Washington will make sure something else happens so we'll forget about it (Newsweek). That is the kind of crap they do. I'd say shit but I've learned the computer changes it. The WDC computer changed my blog rating and a rating on something else in my port. That's the least of my worries. I am going to spend the next two weeks working on contest entries. I am excited about this. I will not be stopped until I get on a winning or at least learnng streak. I also want Microsoft Certification. Does anyone know if I can get a scholarship for this? They want 4 grand. Can't Bill Gates have a scholarships? Really, I've good grades and agood record at NYU. I didn't quit. I didn't get asked to quit. I didn't get thrown out. There is no reason why Mr.Gates would not want me on this team. I just don't have an extra 4 grand around. Why are computers and tech toys so expensive? They're getting less, but the new stuff isn't. I'm thinking of getting a part time job. Anything except baby sitting. There's a great new (to me anyway) group on here for Sensitive People. We share ways to get out of things, like talking on the phone, going to the store and running into people we know who want to stop and talk and tell you everything they have been doing for the last year, day by day. I don't want to talk. Sometimes if people call me, people I know well, I'll say I can't talk now, I just can't talk. They know. They understand. Most are writers, readers, students, film makers, artists. etc. In Florida my little group is not like that. I'm definitely in the wrong' place. At the right time if I'd kept my house but I didn't, so...that was that. It's the wrong time. Because I was stupid about the real estate I owned. Is this the week of the Writing.com Convention? Seems like so few people are around. If it's not, when is it? I have been extremely busy all day, and have accomplished more than I anticipated. Even threw out an entire stack of magazines, so my activities included house cleaning. Doesn't happen often. But mostly on the PC and in my "relationships" lots of energy expended but inner rewards gained. In other words, I know what it feels like to put in a good day's work. It's quarter of ll and I think I started about a quarter of 8. No naps. One coffee break, and at lunch at my desk. it's wonderful to be motivated. I wish that would happen all the time. Why doesn't it? Or, asked the other day, what brings it about? Surely not Tom Robbins and the motivational speakers. Maybe I've become bi-polar. Everyone else is. Maybe I am still succumbing to peer pressure. My peers are all over the world, if I count the people on WDC. Which I do. Some of you are my dearest friends. More dear than people I see constantly. Why is life inside the computer less real than life in a restaurnat or in someone's home or walking on the street? Is it? How can you tell if you are dreaming or in an altered state or a parallel universe? Really, how do people know these things? Someone sent me a book entitled Hyperspace by Michio Kaku. The subtitle is "A scientific Odyssey Through Parallel Universes, Time Warps, and the l0th Dimension". I have been trying to read it but I get sidetracked by novels. Expecially Love in the Driest Season" by Neely Tucker about how he and his family arrived in Zimbabwe in l997 or 98 to help with the orphans there. It is really touching. I cry after about five pages and have to stop. But, I really recommend the book. I recommend both of them especially if you are interested in what science thinks these days, but I think I read in the NYTimes that there are now 11 dimensions. See the wonderful and unusual information you get from reading this blog? Ciao. Angels on your pillows. (If I find the origin of that I'll let you know, or if anyone knows the origin of that lovely saying, please let me know. Okay? Ciao. This time I mean it. Bon nuit. Buenos noches. |
| I work up bright and early (6:30 a.m.), hear the birds a-twittering happily while the sun is barely visible beyond the trees in my "yard." Then I hear that "Newsweek" reported falsely the story of burning the Qu'ran or flushing it down the toilet at Guantanamo. I'd swear I heard it was burning first.Now I realize it was the American flag that was burnt in Afghanistan. (How does one go about flushing a book town the toilet? Page by page?) People lost their lives over this. Can't we shut the media down? They cause an awful lot of trouble with their bullshit and misinformation. STOP THEM NOW!! The hell with free speech. If you can't yell fire in a crowded theater you should not be able yell "QU'ran flushing" in a weekly magazine. What's next from those people? I used to like them. I can't imagine that I used to like them. I never liked politicians much but I didn't mind the press. Now I think they are buffoons. Especially the reporters on the major channels. This is the final straw! You know those Bose headphones that block out all noise? You can buy them for a few thousand dollars. I'm getting a pair and blocking out the world. I'm throwing my TV out. The one problem is is that we are supposed to have many more hurricanes this year than last, and one needs to know where and when they are likely to hit. Maybe I could get this information from NPR. Yesterday was awful. A neighbor's daughter called me and asked for my help because her mother couldn't swallow or breathe. I went to see what I could see. I called 911. By the time these 5 EMS people come (1 minute, 10 seconds, I timed it) she was breathing, swallowing water, joking with the EMS folks,and her vitals were fine. I've been had, I thought. Oh well, better safe than sorry. I found it all very unnerving (would I have felt better if she had something major wrong and had to be hospitalized immediately? Oh God...there's no way out of this morally, ethically, sanely, or insanely), and it all took up hours to get the household (hers, not mine) calmed down again. I was exhausted and had to go to sleep for three hours. All because she did not have to be zoomed off to the ER! Something is wrong with me. Back to "Newsweek". If the government controls the media, as a lot of people seem to think, why would the government let that get that fake flushing "Qu'ran" passed the edit desk? Just to get everyone upset? I have a friend who several years ago took his short gun (they're very legal in these parts) and BAM! right through the TV. His wife would never let him get another one, and they were welded at the hip so no divorce was even mentionable. He's just TV-less and much happier for it. Why can't I just turn it off and go on a nature walk or something? A canoe ride at dawn in the Intercoastal? Did you all get a notice about entering contests, and how you should do it more often? I found one in my mailbox. I enter contests all the time. Was this a mass mailing or was it just to certain people? In the South they say y'all for you all. I usually point out that Yawl is the name of a certain type of boat but they look at me like I went to school or something. They pronounce it just like yawl. It's one word in the South. Of course soon the Confederate Jasine will start to bloom, and the magnolias, and the honeysuckle, and the air will stop smelling of freshly poured tar froma all the construction, and maybe I'll feel better. Maybe. More later...it's shaping up to be a busy day. |
| Who first said that cleanliness is next to Godliness? Martin Luther? Germans are supposed to be so immaculate in their housekeeping habits. Is this true? Is heaven immaculate and how does anyone know that? I loathe cleaning and I always have. I like things clean, but hate doing the work, and only have had a very few years where I could afford to hire someone and then I felt guilty for exploiting: the whole American thing of guilt for this, guilt for that, slaves, Indians, Viet Nam, Watergate, Monica, and now this nut job in Iraq. Maybe it was Emerson or one of those early Transcendentalists that started this rumor. That has led to manicured yards in expensive, lavish housing developments and neighborhoods. On another matter, why do people on Writing.com leave a low rating with no explanation, and vanish without a word, or a clue as to their identity. It is not fair. I've had it happen frequently, and it happened again today. Should I just ignore the star rating system altogether, or suggest that they devise a clever way of ending this unpleasant practice. I have set almost everyhing on "Registered Authors or Higher" in order to avoid the visitors and ones who are just in for the free month, but other than that Grrrr. It's 80 degrees here now, daily, and sharks about in local waters. The birds are crazed and chirp constantly. I'm going on a boatride at sunset tomorrow to see the owls and egrets getting ready for the night. It really is pretty, and I should not be so sarcastic. I had a dove nest in a hanging plant when I lived at the beach. I was amazed those newly hatched babes could fly in six or seven days. We get an awful lot of butterflies. Rare ones too. I still don't have a digital camera. Jesus, I am such a wreck. How did this happen? I'm reading three books at once, keeping up with emails and groups, reviewing what I can, and letting cleanliness and Godliness go their separate ways for now. I'm determined to win Lexi's poetry contest this time. That's been my focus. If there is one. Except my constant headaches. Why are American women known the world over for two things. One is promiscuity and the other is bitching. Is this true and fair? I've heard it over and over and over, until I am convinced of it myself. Even Jon Stewart made a reference to it recently. Does everybody think this is true? Especially people who live outside the United States. I know we are held in low esteem right now, but why single out the women since Dubya started Iraq? Well, there is Condi... How can they put John Paul II on the fast track to Sainthood when Mother Theresa died first? That doesn't seem fair. I think they are having trouble getting the Of course, there is also a rumor that EWTN is owned or at least is heavily benefactored by the same guy who owns Dominoes Pizza, and he lives in Dallas. Can anyone confirm or deny these things? Do they make any difference? John Paul II named more than 500 saints himself. More than any other pope in history. This is a very confusing to me. Gay marriage goesn't have a change. Now they have appointed the Archbishop of San Francisco as the first American to do to the Vatican. Does anyone care about this except me? Ciao |
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