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 |   Reflections and ruminations from a modern day Alice - Life is Wonderland |
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Reflections and ruminations from a modern day Alice - Life is Wonderland  Welcome to the place were I chronicle my own falls down dark holes and adventures chasing white rabbits! Come on In, Take a Bite, You Never Know What You May Find... "Curiouser and curiouser." Alice in Wonderland    |
| Soundtrack of my Life Challenge Feb 8th - In Your Eyes, Peter Gabriel If there is any song in my varied and eclectic music library that I could deem, "my favorite", it would be this one. This version, where Gabriel showcases a variety of international vocal and instrumental talents is the best of the best. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJmrWE1J5Hw In my humble opinion, this may be one of the most perfectly constructed songs ever. Gabriel's vocals and lyrics combined with the African influence of Youssou N'Dour, make this a profound and epic love song of global proportions. And yes, I realize it was used in "Say Anything" in a devotional declaration of love...with good reason. It is this version that moves me the most though...it's hard to compete with steel drums and Gabriel's infectious vocals and the rhythm nd pulse of the African performers. Easily ranks at the very top of my list! |
| Soundtrack of Your Life Challenge Feb. 7th Bittersweet Symphony - the Verve I am late here but this challenge is right up my alley given that music has been the balm on my ragged, COVID-fatigued soul. If I had to pick the quintessential song that would be the milestone marker of my life overall it would hands-down have to be Bittersweet Symphony by the Verve. It is a meandering and haunting examination of the whole of the human experience. Life is a symphony, a cacophony of emotions and experiences that rolls on and on with flashes of brilliance and beauty but also grief and rage and loss. Aside from the swelling chords and violins, there is a lovely strain to the singer's voice. I love that lyrics reflect that battle with destiny and the healing power of music. It is, in my opinion, one of the greatest songs about the human condition. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1lyu1KKwC74 |
| "Blog City ~ Every Blogger's Paradise" DAY 2366-- January 25, 2021 Prompt: “Loneliness is for me a source of healing that makes my life worth living. Talking is often a torment to me, and I need several days of silence to recover the futility of words,” said Carl Jung With us writers being word-people in mind, what are your thoughts on the subject? Word-people is a new phrase for me...I'm not sure I'd have thought to describe myself that way. I will say that prior to the pandemic, I did feel somewhat like Jung with regard to loneliness. I've always relished the time alone from others. I think as a writer and avid reader, I've always been comforted by those solitary pursuits. I think though, these many months of forced isolation have caused me to see loneliness in a new light. I have developed a keen appreciation for time spent with others, for social connections as a way to foster a full life. I have felt the absence of my friends and family and it has magnified the feelings of fear and anxiety, of being overwhelmed by the sheer strangeness of a world on fire. |
| When she was born our daughter had the same ice blue eyes as my father and not my husband’s dominant dark brown pools as we had expected. Then, as if in act of defiance of both our genetic codes, her eyes suddenly changed to green. My daughter’s eyes are a color not shared by any known ancestors on either side. They are a beautiful and complex shade of green, unique unto her. They are dynamic and prone to variations within the spectrum. In summer, set off against her sun-ripened caramel skin, her eyes can appear light, almost Jade green. At other times, and in cooler seasons and moods, her eyes darken to a more olive shade with a ring of deep emerald circling the iris. I like to call them her “sea-change eyes” because they are always shifting like the ribbons of color in the changing tides. At almost 11, she has started to recognize that her eyes are one of her defining features and, I believe it brings her a small measure of pride that their origin remains a family mystery. Lately, she has taken to lengthening her long, soot dark lashes with the clear mascara she got for Christmas. It is the first hint that she is exploring her blooming maturity. It is a small flirtation with vanity for a child that has shunned anything remotely “girlie” since starting elementary school. New Year’s Eve, to add some fun to an otherwise boring, home-bound celebration, I let her use some of my makeup. I was surprised at the subtle way she adorned her face. She used it minimally, employing only the most neutral shades and slight shimmers in my palettes. It was a bittersweet glimpse into the not too distance future, watching her tilted forward on her toes at the bathroom mirror applying eyeliner with delicate, careful fingers, then rolling back on her heels to assess her work. Despite her initial interest and enthusiasm, the eyeliner, lip gloss and fancy clothes did not make it even full hour. She had quickly retreated upstairs to wash her face and change. She came back down dressed in her standard fare of leggings and a sweatshirt; her face scrubbed clean – save for those dark lashes. I was relieved to have that fresh face back, happy that her curiously was short-lived. I tell her all the time that she will never need make-up. She will never have need to artificially enhance her beautiful features with cosmetics. At almost 11 she is all legs and straight angles like her father had been as a teenager, but her budding curves and graceful carriage keep the gawkiness at bay. She has struggled with some bad skin and did her time battling with bangs but overall seems to be embracing all the new physical changes with relative ease. The changes are coming fast now, and it is hard to ignore the pang in my heart when I see the young woman so clearly in her silhouette. Her athleticism continues to surprise me. She is interested trying most all sports. She felt the sting of COVID most when it robbed her of soccer season this past Fall. She missed the practices and drills, the comradery of being on a team. These days, she spends her free time outside kicking the soccer ball or attempting to master her skateboard. She’s happy when she can coerce us into walks or bike rides. The winter weather and shortened days have limited the time at the barn but on those rare days when the sun cuts into the chill, she bounds around – scrambling over the gates to visit all the furry residents. She has shown an interest in photography and architecture and making art, in all its forms, remains one of her mainstay hobbies. She enjoys decorating her room with sunflowers and LED lights but will leave discarded clothes strewn about the space until it looks like her closet exploded. She snacks almost constantly but has developed a willingness to try new foods and has expanded her menu considerably over the last year. In many ways she is a normal, nearly-preteen during what has been a very unusual time. The pandemic has robbed her of so many things, as it has for so many. As we prepare to celebrate her first birthday in this time of COVID, I am forced to acknowledge that for the first time, loneliness has become part of her landscape. As an only child she has felt the isolation more acutely because there are no siblings to pass quarantined hours with. Sleepovers with friends have all but disappeared and even outside playdates have become a casualty of colder temperatures and the rising positivity rate. Then today, a few days before her birthday, another blow coming with the news her school is moving to all-remote until Feb 1st. While not unexpected, she radiated disappointment on learning that her two days of in-school instruction were going away – effectively stripping the last shred of normalcy from her life. She does not complain but somehow her resignation is far worse. Her loneness is palatable, and I am often riddled with pain over it. I see it in her slumping shoulders and the way some mornings she gazes out the car window, silently watching the world slip past. As much as I loathe her obsession with screens, I can’t bear to take the games and phone calls away from her. They are at present, her only connection to friends and family. I tell myself that it is temporary, that soon she will have reasons enough to abandon the blue glow of the iPad, to lace up cleats, to run and play with friends in the real world. This is certainly a difficult time to be almost 11, straddling the world between child and teenager. For now, I can only tell her it will get better. I tell her that for now, we must hunker down and deal…but it will get better. It will all come back, the sleepovers, the parties, the sports…. the full and vibrant life she’s known. I can see the serious contemplation in those amazing sea change eyes and then she flashes me that Mona Lisa smile and I know my resilient daughter believes it to be true. |
| "Blog City ~ Every Blogger's Paradise" DAY 2248--September 28, 2020 Prompt: Now that we have only a couple of days to the "October NaNoWriMo Prep Challenge" [13+] by (362) , are you going to write a novel this year? With or without doing the NaNo, what is your best approach to write a novel: vignettes, outlines, character developing or what? If you are a NaNo rebel, what is in your book-writing future, then? If you are not ready to write a novel yet, what do you think of the NaNo program? Every year I tell myself that I will sign up for NaNo and work on my novel. Every year. This year however is has provided me with the only legitimate excuse I've ever had for not doing so. The pandemic, and subsequent fall out, has derailed most of my plans for 2020 and sidelines all the best ones for 2021 sadly. I, along with much of the nation, have had to adapt to a new normal that has included remote learning. Here in the northeast, our restrictions remain pretty tight and most schools are doing a hybrid model for school. It requires me to be creative with my work schedule and far more hands on when it comes to my daughter's education. That translates into far less time for me to pursue anything I might have planned for myself including, but not limited to, NaNo. I've always viewed NaNo as a viable and necessary piece on my journey to novel publication. It encourages me to develop commitment and discipline, two elements I am lacking in my writing practice. This year however, it seems like it would add additional demands to a daily routine that already has me feeling stressed and too thinly spread. Perhaps next year? Maybe by the fall of 2021, I will be able to regroup and make a new plan...one can only hope. "Blogging Circle of Friends " Day 2873: September 28, 2020 Prompt: Use these words: mountain - clover - stone The stone was cool in my palm, it's surface worn down and smooth by my worrying fingertips. I rubbed my thumb over the word carved into the back, feeling the rough outline of the letters H.O.P.E. I released the stone and it dropped down into my bag. I heard the faint clink as it made contact with something hard in the bowels of my backpack. I shouldered the pack and turned to gaze out across the Somes Sound to Cadillac mountain, rising through the morning fog like a sleeping leviathan rising from the deep. In an hour the early autumn sun would burn the fog away and the landscape would reveal itself as a picturesque kaleidoscope of colors; deep reds, golds and oranges punctuated by stubborn pockets of emerald pines and fur trees. By that time, I would be gone, driving south, away from the colors and the comfort of my coastal New England town. My hand strayed to the silver-plated clover on the chain around my next, another talisman, and a closed my hand around it. Hope and luck would be my faithful traveling companions on this one way trip. I prayed they would be enough. |
| "Blogging Circle of Friends " DAY 2861 September 16, 2020 "We understand how dangerous a mask can be. We all become what we pretend to be". – Patrick Rothfuss Your thoughts? In my part of the world, masks have become more a political statement unfortunately. The decision to wear one or not wear one seems to be closely aligned with one's political leanings rather than an concern for health or well-being. You can go into an establishment and see folks with masks, and then others who are proudly, somewhat defiantly shopping bare-faced. Most places have signs on the door refusing entry to anyone not wearing a mask but it is not uncommon to see patrons testing the limits or simply refusing to comply. The instance that mask wearing somehow violates their personal freedoms is an all too common refrain. This week Connecticut introduced new fines for anyone not in compliance with the state mandate for wearing masks indoors and outside when social distancing can not be maintained. Its a $100 fine for individuals that can and will be enforced. I am curious to see how this takes affect and what impact it will have on the current situation. "Blog City ~ Every Blogger's Paradise" Day 2236 Sept. 16, 2020 Prompt Prompt: What life lessons have books taught you? I've largely been drawn to books that help me escape life. It is hard to think of a book that might have taught me any life lessons for this reason. If I had to pick one it would clearly be Alice in Wonderland. I frequently find myself thinking about "madness" and "often give myself very good advice but I seldom ever follow it". I have always related to Alice, how she was always at odds with the world around her - struggled to find reason when the unreasonable seemed to reign. I appreciated her curiosity and could understand how it could lead you down paths into dark woods.I have always been prone to wander and often found myself turned around in strange places, surrounded by an even stranger cast of characters in my life. |
| "Blogging Circle of Friends " Day 2859: September 14, 2020 Prompt: Write about moving. We've moved into our new home just going on three years ago now. It took about an full year for us to fully and completely be settled. We moved from an very urban area. Our old home was a 1930's era colonial off the main street about 5 or 6 mins from the downtown area of a small city. The drive to our new place takes us past open fields of farm land before turning into our neighborhood of wide streets and wooded lots. The new property has many mature trees and a yard with a natural flow. The quiet has taken some getting used too. The soundtrack seemed to be missing the hum of traffic and the occasional emergency siren. I have come to love our quiet, residential street with neighbors we wave to on walks, the visits from wild turkey and deer and all of the birds. Moving sucks no matter how you manage it but we definitely made the right decision, a truth that became all the more apparent after two months of quarantine. I would have lost my mind in our old place. The back deck became a refuge for me during that time. I delighted in watching the birds, discovering that we had an army of yellow finches that swooped down from the trees and ravaged the feeders. It was so calming, in the midst of all the chaos of a world turned upside down over night. I appreciated their bustle and drama as we secluded ourselves from much of the world outside. I don't know how we would have managed at the old place, with our tiny yard and the proximity of the looming apartment houses with their haunting turnover of new faces. I am so grateful we made the move when we did. It had been daunting and scary. It had been exhausting and had taxed us to our limits but today, I can say it had all been for the very best. "Blog City ~ Every Blogger's Paradise" DAY 2234--September 14, 2020 Prompt: Ray Bradbury advises in Zen in the Art of Writing, “You must stay drunk on writing so reality cannot destroy you.” If reality is so bad and destructive, which I agree that it can be at times, why are we seeking it under the guise of believable factor in the books we read and the movies we watch? What is your opinion on the matter? I used to think I wrote to escape life. I would get caught up in a piece and forget whatever real drama was waiting outside the door for me. My early pieces were departures from my reality. As I began to write more seriously, I found more and more of myself in my stories. I found myself echoing my life. Writing became the way I processed things that happened to me. It was my way of cleaning house, mentally. I believe people seek out authenticity in movies and novels some times because maybe it helps with their own self-reflection in much the same way. Maybe watching something play out in the hands and hearts of other characters is a way of processing our own emotions and reactions. I tend to get the most feedback over the non-fictional pieces I publish more often then any other genre I write in. I can't tell you how many times I've been told a reader could "totally relate" to something I'd written. I think all of us are looking for common connections in life. |
| "Blog City ~ Every Blogger's Paradise" DAY 2238-- September 8, 2020 Prompt: Eleanor Roosevelt said, “Do one thing every day that scares you.” As best stories sometimes come out of their authors’ fears, what do you say for writing about one thing that scares you every day? For example, what scares you today? I feel like nearly every day since becoming a mother, my life dictates that I automatically do at least one thing every day that scares me. Motherhood is one terrifying-as-fuck journey some days for real. I find myself fairly well-rooted in the fear that I am screwing up , even on the days when I grudgingly award myself an A- for parenting at the close of a particularly productive trip around the sun. As my daughter rapidly approaches puberty, some days I am completely overwhelmed by those fears. We get sidelined by epic shouting matches as she seems compelled to argue with me over the most mundane things. It seems we are destined to never agree on a wide spectrum of topics from, "what shirt goes best with those leggings", or "why chicken nuggets are still chicken" to "why one particular Hamilton cover is in fact, not Sia but some other artist". Sadly, these are all very real examples drawn from actual arguments. I blame our most irrational debates on burgeoning hormones and on my patience and sanity, both of which have been severely compromised in the wake of COVID. I try not to to think about the fact that she's not even a preteen yet. The truth is that real emotional fireworks haven't started yet and that thought fills me with a numb horror some days. I wonder how we will make it through these coming years, she and I. The anxiety overwhelms me at times and I have to take step back. I have to slow down. I have to acknowledge that we have amazing moments still too. For as much as we may battle, she will still randomly take my hand in the grocery store, unconsciously slipping her delicate fingers through mine. She still prefers to sleep in between us most nights and we one of us will always wake with her lithe body snuggled up against our back or her small face pressed against our neck. As much as she loves time with her friends, she seems content to settle back into time with us after returning from play dates and sleepovers. The graceful and forgiving truth is that,as often as I have seen the budding adolescent in her these past weeks and months, I have also had glimpses of the loving, dependent child she still is in her heart and it gives me a beautiful respite from the fear. "Blogging Circle of Friends " Day 2853: September 8, 2020 Prompt: It wasn't until I was older that I understood... It wasn't until I was older that I understood that having expectations of others would be the greatest deterrent to my own happiness. The truth in life is that most people in your will not care about whatever battles you may be facing, what dreams you wish for or what goals you achieve. That has been a hard learned lesson and one I seem bound and determined to keep forgetting. Lately it seems, I'm dealt one reminder or another as to how little I, or anything I may think or feel, matters to the people who would claim to love and care about it. It sounds like I am whining...I'm honestly not. I'm most angry at myself. You see, I am the person who feels compelled to pick up every call, to respond to every text. I "need" to be there, to invest in everyone else - sometimes at my own expense. I am the one condoning the way others make me their second and third choice. There is something inside me that doesn't believe I deserve more sometimes. I thought we got wiser with age but that doesn't seem to be true in my case. I have to keep relearning the same lessons. I have to keep reminding myself not to expect more from other people. I have to remind myself not to be grateful when someone makes me an afterthought. |
| Sometimes I dream about running away with all the fever of sex addict living out their most erotic fantasy. True story. I think that because I would never actually do it, my escape plan has all the vivid color and cinematic prowess of an epic motion picture. Over the years, I’ve honed the fantasy so by now, it is richly woven tale of reinvention set against the backdrop of the great, wide expanse of the American west. I dream about trading all the ivy league-soaked promises of the East coast to roam amongst the dusty ranches and shadows of great sequoia like a roving tumbleweed. I dream about trading in the confines of an air-conditioned office for big skies, open fields and distance mountain peaks. I dream about becoming a better, leaner version of myself, freed from all my lofty ambitions to live a life in appreciation of sunbaked earth and weathered cowboy boots. Mostly though, I dream of a life free from wanting, wanting to be more than my experiences, wanting to be more than just what most people expect, wanting to be more than I expect from myself. Somedays the fantasy of living a life untethered, mentally trumps the one where I’m constantly feeling like the girl waving her arms and screaming into the wind just to be seen and heard. I’ve been waving and screaming my entire life. It’s exhausting. |
| Blog City DAY 2136 May 22, 2020 Some people love chaos, others crave order. Is it the implicit coldness in order that you need or is it the random warmth that gives you a rush in the unknown ? What pattern works for you? I have always been a person who craves order over chaos. I like planning for what is coming and having a plan B if I'm unsure of a certain outcome. I don't like surprises as a rule. I feel the most centered when I know things are in order in my house and in my life. If I want drama or chaos, I can live that through my writing, and often, I've used that as a kind of escape or an exploration. I get the appeal of the great, wide open...sometimes the thought of running away, taking a chance on the unknown has been tempting. I believe I am a creature best served by order ultimately. I don't mind pressure, or taking calculated risks but chaos isn't my style. Blogging Circle of Friends DAY 2744 May 22, 2020 "The full range of human experience from joy, love, and lust to greed, betrayal, and despair can be expressed in any activity." Do you agree or disagree? What activity best expresses all of them? I think art, in all its forms, is the most powerful medium available to us for expressing the full range of human emotion. I consider writers as artists as well, I believe they craft with words over paint or clay. |
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