somepinkflowers

minor inconveniences

"What it comes down to is the small things," Tim explained as we ran and puffed our way along the 15 mile route.

Catching his breath, Tim goes on, "After much suffering in silence and even angry words, it is the minor inconveniences that does us in every time."

Tim, his wife, Jan and I were training for a half*marathon race.

About 20 people in our running group all start out together early on Saturday mornings but it was us three who seem to fall into the same pace after about mile 3 .

We were neither in The Slow Group or in The Fast Group which has often been the story of my life.

Tim, Jan and I were in The Steady As She Goes Group but we always finished the race. No matter what.

Tim was a Life Coach and flew to different cities giving presentations to groups at corporate conventions. Helping people work smoothly together in spite of their differences. Building esprit de corps.

Tim was a motivator extraordinaire.
I'll say...

Whilst we moved steadily across the miles I would pick Tim's brain as it was there for the picking.

Plus, as you well know by now, I am filled with questions. Always.

What makes some move on?
What causes folks to quit their job?
Why do married people throw in the towel?
What signal tells our brain we have simply had enough?
Why do we hit the road after being in the same place for so long?

I find Longevity to be an interesting topic on many levels.

If one cannot hang in there with satisfaction, one cannot hang in there for any great distance.

In road races.
In life. And so on...

"It is the minor inconveniences that occur over and over again , day after day, that will be the end of any relationship," Tim explained.

"If every day your husband uses the scissors and does not put them back, if you ask him kindly to please put back the scissors and he does not, because after all it is such a small thing, if day after day you have to go find the scissors, eventually you just get Fed Up."

"Hunting for scissors is such a minor inconvenience.
But you get the idea. Scissors is just an example."

That day after this run I stopped at the store and bought scissors.
All kinds of scissors.

Scissors for the kitchen, for the bathrooms, for every room in the house. Years later, to this very day, I see my scissors in every room waiting.

Quiet little symbols to remind me to Pay Attention To The Small Things.

Not to cut things in two, these scissors standing at the ready, but to keep things together.

full*moon~itis

Does this ever happen to you?

You are sleeping away just fine having The Best Travel Dreams Ever and then, suddenly, without any warning what-s0-ever------>You wake up wide~eyed, sit~plum~straight~up~in~bed awake?

With me it can mean only one thing---->
The full moon is out there in the dark sky messing with my circadian rhythms.

I reached over to check the time, to see if I should just go ahead and get on up, and then I knocked my sweet little alarm off its home base and it takes a tumble...

Sweet little alarm falls onto the rather large & cumbersome stack of books which I keep beside my bed for emergency night-time reading. This opens up the back and the wee battery rolls  W A Y  under my bed.

I don't care how old I get I am NeVeR going to reach under my bed in the dark of night.

If I turn the light on now I know I will never get back to sleep...

Finally, finally the sun creeps on up and here I am.
Worn out. From doing nothing. I could have been reading.

I could have been playing Angry Birds or Words With Friends.

How long have I been awake?
Why, I have no idea.
I am completely thrown into a time~warp loop!

That moon!

 

haiku my heart and spadoman is home!

welcome, spadoman!
warm Round Circle of healing,
prayers flutter on in...

~~~for more haiku my heart--
and today honors one of our own--
please do pop in here~~~

hope everlasting for a poison ivy free summer

I am ever hopeful about this year being The One.
For the past 6 summers I have managed to host an infectious tribe of poison ivy and this year I am being Oh So Careful.

By hosting poison ivy  I do not mean that I have beds of it growing in my yard by design and purpose. Although, one spring a poison ivy plant popped up inside a flower pot of petunias growing on my front porch! Clear as day.

"One, two, three, don't touch me," the plant sang to beat  the band.

As if...

I never mean to host poison ivy in my yard, on my porch. No. I do not. I mean every summer for the past 6, I have hosted the rash of it. On my person.

I am a good scout so I do know what poison ivy looks like. I can readily identify it when I see it growing. In bushy form or climbing up a tree, I know it for what it is.

T. R. O. U. B. L. E.

In the early spring when little green bumps start to push out new growth on the stalks of my red bud tree, I take it as a sign.

I start woods roaming. I cannot help myself.

I woods roam. I woods plunder. I woods collect. I do.

I break off small stems of budding shrubs and bushes and bring them on home.

I plop them in a bottle filled with water and keep my eyes peeled.
I cannot wait to see what will happen.

Sometimes bright green leaves erupt. Alone or in groups.
Sometimes fragile blossoms push their way into the world.

Seriously, I will take anything. I am thrilled.

Most often I know the name of the treasure I have catching the morning sun on my window sill. 

Now and then I am completely stymied. I am clueless to the proper name even though I much appreciate the proper beauty.

I have a neighbor who weed-whacks down the spiderwort growing in the island in the middle of the road in front of my home.

"Weeds!" he shouts over his gas~powered motor while he whacks away! "Weeds! Weeds! Weeds!"

I look hard and close and all I see are lovely clusters of deep blue~purple flowers holding the morning dew. I cannot see weeds for the life of me.

"Leave mine alone," I shout as I run out the door in my night~gown, my breakfast cup of Earl Grey splashing down on my bare feet.

"Leave my spiderwarts alone!"

"Weeds!" he shouts, thinking he is saving the world from unwanted invasion.

"Flowers!" I shout back, knowing I am saving nature for future generations.

So you can see how it goes.
I am the crazy lady who goes early morning walking and brings back budding sticks and moss covered twigs and seed pods and so on and such.

Sometimes, unbeknown to me, I brush up against some thing in my haste and accidentally bring back a little rash.

Sometimes I find the loveliest little blossoms and I have no idea what they are.

Some days I take the unnamed ones to the library and Reference looks them up or a library visiter knows exactly what I have plucked from natures back pocket.

"That is from a china~berry tree!" someone will explain to me, simple as can be.

So this bunch of flowers you see above sitting on the window sill in my napping room was unnamed. Not red bud. Not poison ivy. But what?

Producing amazing results for several days I finally started calling her Sarah, as in," I must go water Sarah."

No one any where could identify Sarah and her cluster of pale flowerettes.

So last Saturday I just gave up.
I woke up Saturday morning and just plum gave up on Sarah's real name.

As long as I did not bring home a useless rash, did anything else matter?

Saturday mid~morning I hustled on over to the farmer's market for fresh produce.  My heart was set on leeks, white-white on one end and dark green on the other.

I parked my jeep, grabbed my bag and boogied on down the shady row. I was not distracted by the bread lady or the crab~cake man. I focused on my leek~seeking mission.

I boogied on past a man selling blueberry plants.
Blueberry plants in full blossom.

I stopped short...

"Sarah!" I shouted with joyful recognition.
"Sarah! Is that you?"

they are coming at me left and right

I am surrounded by miracles. They are every where I look and when I stop to think about them it just about knocks me over.

"How can one person be so lucky?" I sometimes wonder.

I am talking about Miracles here. Not just the kind that involves modern day appliances. I am talking about Truly Amazing Things.

For the longest time I simple did not think about my good fortune. I had a different point of view about things. Sometimes I thought, "Why me?"

One day I got it into my head that I should run. You know, be a jogger. This was about 100 years ago and not many people were running outside of PE class. Not unless they were trying to get away with something or away from somebody. That kind of running.

Anyway, I was out walking one day here in Florida, which I have loved to do since Day 1, and it came into my head to run to the next tree.

And so I did. And then I ran to the next one. And so on.

I ran and ran and ran and ran. At first I wore sneakers because Back in the Day that was all there was for girls to wear. {{ See, I TOLD you it was about 100 years ago...}}

Then I switched to men's running shoes which never fit properly and only came in ugly colors but what was a girl to do?

When I wanted to run I just high-tailed it right out the front door. Zoom. I was gone down the street without a thought of anything else. I would run for hours. Zoom. Zoom. Zoom.

While running around town I bumped into other people who felt like running, too. We were all wearing the same ugly running shoes no matter what our gender happened to be. The same t-shirts and shorts, too, practically.

Even though we were all different ages we started running together. We ran in the mornings and after work and on the week-ends. We ran here and there and we thought we were so cool in our ugly shoes. We KNEW we were cool but mostly we just wanted to run.

Then things slowly started changing in the world as it is apt to do. Everyone started running, it seemed. {{ I like to think I helped start it all--the running craze--and who is to say I did not? }}

Finally women's running shoes were born and I really took off running. It made all the difference in the world. Zoom. Zoom. Zoom.

I quickly entered running races. 5K, 10K, 15K. Well, you get the picture. If three people wanted to get together and race anywhere on the east coast, I would be one of them.

And sometimes I won or came in 2nd or 3rd...in my age group...for women. I got little trophies and ribbons and life was sweet. I met TONS of other runners and we ran and ate doughnuts and TONS carbs and weighed next to nothing. We were thin, lean running machines. We ran all over this state.

Then a terrible bad thing happened. I hurt my knee running a long race. A little bit hurt. Then I hurt it Big Time and had to stop running. It liked to kill me. You just do not understand. But it did.

A couple of years ago I was all set to go to Spain and a few months before the trip my knee gave out on me. Just plum forgot how to work properly. I could not even walk down stairs with out saying this--->^&*%  or this--->#$%  due to the tremendous pain.

I lived in denial for as long as could. But you know me. I am ever hopeful. Finally I had surgery to fix things. A doctor made three little holes in my knee and I did not feel a thing. He went in there with T-tiny tools and fixed the problem. Just like that!

Six weeks later I was here and here and here. Like nothing had ever even happened.

It was a Miracle.  Truly. Nothing less.

A few months later I lost an adult tooth and had this HUGE gap in my mouth. I mean it echoed in there and nothing could be done about it. I could not chew properly and entire meals would get lost in the space where my tooth once was. It was just awful. I had to forget about eating corn.

Well, you know what happened...A doctor put a stainless steal screw in my jaw and I did not feel a thing. He went in there with a fake tooth and fixed the problem. Just like that and I am eating whatever I want.

You could not even tell which tooth I did not grow. Like nothing had ever even happened.

It was a Miracle.  Truly. Nothing less.

And you know what happened just last month with my eye. A hole fixed by a healing gas bubble. A gas bubble as big as the moon in my eye, it seemed at first, a full moon taking up all the space my eye had to give. And now that bubble is the size of sweet little English pea...floating around getting smaller and smaller still. I will most likely miss my bubble when it shrinks away into nothingness.

I had the surgery and I did not feel a thing. I can read now with my once wonky eye. Like nothing had ever even happened.

It was a Miracle.  Truly. Nothing less.

"That somepinkflowers must be falling apart over there," you must be thinking but I am not. I feel strong and healthy and most everyday I want to high-tail it right out the front door. 

I am surrounded by Miracles. They are every where I look and when I stop to think about them it just about knocks me over.

I bet you have a few Miracles of your own standing nearby, looking over your shoulder, whispering in your ear, "Remember me?".

I hope you do because Miracles can give you such strong faith in the future. Or a least they do over here at my house.

"How can one person be so lucky?" I sometimes wonder and then I jump on my bicycle and zoom around my neighborhood. Zoom. Zoom. Zoom.

*******************************************

Thursday night news--->Yikees!  Someone over here goes in for Total Knee Replacement surgery tomorrow morning and it is not me or this one. {{ He is counting on his own Miracle, BTW. We are all ever hopeful.}}

*******************************************

Saturday morning news update---->Yikees! times 10! The new knee {{ our most recent Miracle }} is in place and lime jello {{ a food miracle really if you stop to think about it  }} has been consumed in a celebratory fashion! Thanks ever-so for all your positive vibes and heartfelt prayers.

Yippee! for Miracles and for miracles...all around!

open letter to the poison ivy living in my yard.

Dear Positively~Annoying~Poison~Ivy~Family,

Hellllu, there! How you doing? Fine I hope.

Fine enough to pack your bags and move the heck out of Dodge, if you get my drift.

Who invited you into this neck of the woods anyway? I do not see you paying any property tax or pushing out any fragrant blossoms for my benefit.

You with your Leaves of 3, don't touch me!

I have tried my best to stay out of your way. God knows I have tried.

I have left you alone down there by the creek with these digging guys and these slithering ones but no you have to spread out...and move on...surrounding my sweet camp~site of a home here.

Give you an inch and you take a yard.

Mine.

Things have gotten so bad I have to watch Every Little Green Growing Thing I touch.

If it were not for these beauties blooming in mid~winter and these ones blooming up a storm right now {and pictured here in this open letter}, I might never even venture outside except to jump on an airplane or head off to the beach.

Why can't you give off some sort of special vibrating glow or maybe a soft buzzing sound when I come near?

"Warning,  somepinkflowers!You are getting warmer, warmer....STOP!" you might say in your most pleasing, polite voice.

That might give me a chance.

That might give me fair warning to avoid your death~ray sap which drives me plum crazy...

Sometimes I see you, sometimes I do not, but always and without fail, if you touch me it ends up costing me a fortune in $$$.

Do you have any idea how much this costs? Or this?

Good grief, not to mention my much needed rest as I scratch all the night long.

And there was that time I had to go to the doctor and get an Rx for this.

Man! You have no idea how bad~trippy that stuff makes me feel.

Or do you?

Look, evil and itchy ones, just tell me A Single Useful Thing about you. Just. One.

I so strongly believe in peaceful coexistence. I do. But the day you sprang up in a potted plant on my front porch was the last straw.

Now I will have to bring in The Big Guns.

You want aggression?

I'll give you aggresion...

I know I look all mild and gentle like a wee flower, but you haven't seen anything yet, buster brown.

The jig is up and I am giving you One Last Warning.

Hit the road, Jack.

Clearly you were not paying attention last summer when I personally relocated 10 tons of these guys with my own gloved hand .

Threw them way across the creek one by one, I did.  That was that...

Let that be a warning to you, Positively~Annoying~Poison~Ivy~Family.

I am no longer Ms. Nice~Nature~Chick when it comes to you anymore.

If there is one thing I know how to do in this world, besides getting out of town, it is getting rid of pests in my garden.

There is room enough for only one of us and you, innocent~looking weed, have got to go.

Have a nice life somewhere else, Poison Ivy Family. Please.

I remain,

Scratching all the while,

somepinkflowers

then add one dog and stir

Before you get all mushy and think I finally acquired a dog, I did not.

I do not own a puppy but several own me part-time.

I am in the palm of the paws of several.

Growing up we had one dog, a half-breed terrier I think someone left by our back door, which is how all the pets arrived at my childhood home. {Well, not counting the goldfish won at the fair but that is another story.}

"Here, take this!" was how I saw it then, a gift, a dog, a cat plopped down from The Universe.

Maybe it was more a gift from God, "Here, you need this."

Most evenings I walk my neighborhood with the dog walkers. They have adopted poor-little-dogless-me and as one neighbor has two little fluffy-pups the mathematics of it all works out fine.

Sometimes I am the official pepper-spray holder as we have the occasional free-roaming rogue. Especially during hunting season one might find a working-class stray wandering lost and confused looking for a misplaced deer or turkey.

Normally these strangers listen to my voice of reason as I calmly explain, "Run! Fast as you can the other way, Lost Boy! I do not even know how to work this pepper-spray-stuff. Please get out of Carson City. Pronto."

This normally works as none of  our dogs look or smell like deer or turkey. Things turn out OK.

A temporary lost traveler wants to go home to his own kennel and kibble. These hunter-types are often misunderstood. They are simple souls and are plum worn out when they reach our hood. Two times now we have matched them back up to owner.

Just so you will know: I have never actually had to USE the pepper-spray even though I stand at the ready.

We walk prepared and trusting with our dogs into the dusk. If an owl hoots, we pick up the wee ones and tuck them under an arm.

When one of my peeps is feeling puny or has a project working I step up and volunteer for the official dog-walker position.  I might take Katie and give her one good loop around so she can do Her Business.

Katie always knows something is up. She is no fool.

She knows me but I am not The Momma. Katie drags her heels every step of the way until we get to the half-way mark. Smart cookie that she is, Katie takes off like a bat out of hell when she is on her way to her own place. When we get to the home-stretch, it is Katie by a mile.

How could Katie know she is half done? How does she know that at the very point she is now heading back to the one she loves the best?

See that is what I love about dogs. They so know stuff we do not know.

They look up at you with those old-world eyes and say everything you want to hear without even moving a muscle. Sometimes they smell and drool and we love them anyway.

On your worse day, your dog loves you.

I keep thinking I wanna a dog, gotta get a puppy, wanna do it now, dog, dog, dog....

But not yet.  I want to go here first and then here soon and so on. {Plus my pup needs to be an Inside Dog because we have these down near the creek.}

The day after I no longer have a working-away-from-the-house-career I am going to let The Universe bring me a gift.

I do not even care what breed he happens to be. I just want him to be loving like this one. OK, yes, and a cutey~pie like this one over here or, maybe a simple noble dog, like this one.

Well, will you look at this one!

I feel confident that the right dog will find me at the best time. I am sending out waves of love to The Universe to be on guard for the perfect one. I do not want to miss a thing so I will be ready.

In the mean time, back here at the ranch,  I curl up with old  Spike-the-cat, old Spike-the-inside-cat, and we are happy. He knows my ways and is busy trying to teach me how to slow down. I have never once seen him multitask.

Spike has me in the palm of his paw. He is just what I need.

and somewhiteflowers, too

Yesterday I had to have Emergency Dental Surgery. 

I know.

It sounds just terrible but it really was not as I was given some very interesting Alice~in~Wonderland drugs to take before, during and after.

Not that the pills made me larger or smaller because they did not. I did not fall down into a rabbit hole or have tea with a mad hatter. Nothing quite so obvious as that.

Just a simple, every~day, unobtrusive paradigm shift.

And haven't we all had those?

What the pills did do was make me extremely unconcerned about some minutia and then unbelievably fascinating with others.

{{Well, maybe you know all about this kind of thing and I would not be at all surprised if you did. Nor judgmental. Not me. Things happen.}}

About one hour before the appointment I took one little pill. Nothing to look at really. A sneeze could blow it out of your hand into the next county. It was that insignificant.

Now, I do not mean to push drug~usage onto anyone. I do not even drink colas or teas that contain caffeine. If I even LOOK at too much dark chocolate I am buzzing off the wall, awake all night with wild heart~beating.

So do not get me wrong here. I was never the Wild Hippie Girl who swallowed This and That.

No, I was the Flower Child who baked my own bread, made my own jam and worked in the food coop in exchange for organic cashews and fresh Zellwood corn.

Body=temple kind of thingy.

About 10 minutes after I swallowed the pill I noticed the white azaleas sitting on my kitchen table as I slowly ambled past on my way out the door.

I really, really Noticed Them.

They were simply Glowing. Turning this way and that, posing, they begged me to take a few snaps.

And so I did.

And then a few more.

I was completely mesmerized. At that very moment all the planets in the world combed their hair and smiled at me.

We had such a bond working here. Those white flowers, the planets and me.

The sun, coming in through my window, was singing to me in honey tones of goodness. The flowers were practically purrring in the warm sunshine. Their petals velvet with never~ending softness.

Why in the world should I have Emergency Dental Surgery when the entire world was so bright and promising right there by my kitchen window?

Why? Why, indeed?

If I placed my head down on the pine table the energy magnified by the water, which sweetly nourished my flowers, would certainly heal my wayward tooth. Clearly this was my ticket to perfect teeth, healthy gums and unimagined riches.

A rest in the sun watched over by somewhiteflowers.

Clearly my ticket to everything.

But that was yesterday.

If my driver had not been waiting I might still be at the kitchen table with my addictive camera, my enticing white azaleas and my drug~induced visions of bay~window nirvana.

Today I sit easy and upright with pulsating Frankensteinian stitches above molar #3.

I remember nothing of the actual Emergency Dental Surgery procedure. Thank goodness.

I sit here at the table gentle swallowing Dannon All Natural, No Artificial Anything strawberry yogurt. A few of the browning azalea petals fall gently down to rest on Pine Table Street.

The temperature dropped 15 degrees on this the first day of Spring here in Florida. The wind outside my window is whipping itself into an oak~pollen froth.

Where is my singing sun? Where?

how i know it is a new year

They are back.

I knew it would happen. As the moon follows the sun, as January's self~promise follows December's self~indulgence, nature continues its cycle. And they are back.

The New Year's Resolution~ites have returned and have hit my gym.

It comes as no surprise. The same thing happens every year.

When I arrive at the gym and cannot find a place to park my dusty, white Jeeplet, then I know it must be January.

The Resolution~ites are back in number, puddling around each weight machine, clogging up the Ab Area.

Here they are, the Resolution~ites in three flavors, smiling with grand expectations for a healthy and skinny new year.

Bless them all.

The first flavor with high hopes are the new college students back from winter break. When they arrived originally in September they headed over to the beach for volley~ball, surfing, beach biking, sun~soaking~up kinds of things.

Not so much in January. In January it is off to the gym. To my gym.

They are easy to spot, these young ones. They are the Resolution~ites with the bright and shiny faces. Wrinkle~free, bright and shiny faces.

The hard~chested guys want to get pumped up before Spring Break; the cutie~pie girls want to watch the guys get pumped up. Or maybe it is the other way around. Most likely it is a bit of both.

As soon as Spring strolls in wearing flip~flops, these young ones will be outta here.

I do not mind this flavor of Resolution~ites. They are fun to watch flirting back and forth and as long as they do not sit too long on this I am happy to share my gym.

The second flavor of Resolution~ites are the older ones, the Snow Birds, who come down here from up north to escape the ice and snow and high cost of heating a home.

And who among us can blame them? These ones have outgrown their fondness for snowman building and find more pleasure in beach walking and shell gathering.

Their lives are made simpler and safer by lack of slippery sidewalks and icy front stoops.

"Thank God for sunny Florida," I hear them thinking. "Thank God."

These Snow Birds Resolution~ites bothered me for the longest time due to their increasing numbers. Even during these rough economic times Snow Birds are one species you will not find placed on any endangered list. On they come. Many of them roll south in one of these but most of the ones at my gym stay here at one of these on the beach.

My gym is like a country club to these older ones. A social gathering place for mid~day before an early lunch and nap, before coffee at Barnes & Noble. Who knows what's up?

They seem to be the shuffle~board set but who is to say what goes on during carefree afternoons when you have no windows to wash or gardens to weed.

Who is to say? 

Last year a friend of mine from over here  said I should be happy the Snow Birds were adding $$$ to the local economy.

Sometimes my friends can be so wise.

This past week I met a few Snow Birds and they seem normal enough. My eyes have been opened wide enough so now I view them with mild frustration appreciation.

I am quite fond of actual birds after all and when I travel I may be looked upon as a bit of a Tourist myself, which is rather like a Snow Bird, don't you think?

Where ever we go, there we are.

One of the nicest things about  the Snow Bird Resolution~ites is that they are here for only three months at a pop and then they are gone. They fly away home, happy, short~time visitors  who leave wanting more and so will be back next year.

I do not mind this flavor or Resolution~ites, either. They are fun to watch visiting back and forth and as long as they do not walk too long on this, I am happy to share my gym.

The third flavor of Resolution~ites are the locals who want to lose weight or turn over a new leaf. They look familiar but seem out of place. I know the face but not the body so exposed.

My banker in shorts, my dentist with his pecs showing, my librarian in her bike pants.

Oh, wait... That last one would be me...Never mind...

These are the ones I want to make it, the locals of my town.  They are not going to graduate and move away. They are not going to pack up and go back home after three months. This is IT for my local friends. This is where they live and will grow old. Here with me.

I want these local Resolution~ites to have stick~with~it~ness. I want them to be healthy and strong forever. I do not want them to give up before their contract with the gym runs out.

This seems to happen with alarming regularity.

Even if I do not know the person, I want them to keep plugging away.  I want only the best for my local peeps. It isn't easy to start a new workout regime and I try to be encouraging.

I want them to be at my gym every day of the week cranking out crunches, stepping high on this. Everyday taking this class or that one. Every chance they get I want them in my gym.

I do not mind this flavor or Resolution~ites at all. They are fun to watch, testing each machine and as long as they do not climb too long on this, I am happy to share my gym.

Except...

...I don't want them ALL at the gym when I go, during MY time.

That sounds so mean, doesn't it? I do not mean to be mean. I always try to share nicely.

I want working out to be the dollop of fun on the top of my potato of a day.

I want my parking space ready and waiting for me. When I walk in the gym door I want to glide from one weight machine to the next without long lines...waiting... Everything perfect and carefree.

I don't want to pop into the ladies room and find all the stalls full. That kind of situation.

Lucky for me if things get too crowded at the gym, I can find the simplest inspiration to exercise some other place.

I am surrounded by subtle hints pushing me toward healthiness and tasty suggestions nudging me on to happiness. 

All around me I see the possibility of a healthy and happy new year. For myself and for you.  Everywhere I turn.

pardon me but i seem to have misplaced my october

I know I had it right here. I am talking about my October which has gone missing.

Just a few moments ago I was sitting here dreaming about going here.

Time was on my side.

I was still pumped with artistic energy from this adventure and looking forward to visiting friends at this party.

It was end days of summer and I had such plans for autumnal activities.

I distinctly remember that I had my October in my pocket as I dreamed of cooler days.

I distinctly remember walking out of here thinking how great the sun felt on my sandled toes and my bare arms. I was full of grand expectation for biking riding here and day dreaming here.

Florida in October translates to days less humid and to nights with outdoor concerts.

First one thing and then another happened to my dear dad. You can well imagine how dealing with such unwanted things can plum drink up a person's time.

Sip, sip. Gone, gone. Here and then not here. Hours, days, weeks ---->missing.

Hey. I am not complaining, just explaining how Life can look at a person's pen-marked calendar, toss her head back mockingly and  exclaim in a sassy manner, "You're doing what? When? Nah... I don't think so. "

Most things are turning out OK as my family adjusts to new, and hopefully temporary, challenges. We were extremely fortunate to have caring and knowledgeable health providers taking care of my dad as he moved from the hospital to a half-way home for the elderly ill.

Extremely fortunate.

When I sign myself into my father's rehab center/nursing home I see names I recognize from my past. It is like a class reunion for me over there at the nursing home.

I should not be surprised as this is my hometown and my high school friends naturally have parents my dad's age. We lucky ones with parents still on earth are facing similar issues.

When I visit my dad, I grab an opportunity to chat with a friend visiting her mom. Our parents are on the same wing. We discuss home health care options and Medicare coverage.

When I was in high school I never saw this coming.

Personally I am doing OK. I do my best to be floating in the Now.

I try to flow downstream with the confidence that what I need is waiting for me there just around the bend in the creek.

I  gently float and bob along hoping not to get swallowed under by some unexpected current.

I float and bob, float and bob.

I try to ensconce myself in thoughtful prayers and silent meditations. I do my darnest not to Google every single medical term I hear over there at the nursing home.

I only computer research the terms I can spell.

During this float and bob time I have taken great solace from those who have offered encouraging words and sent heart-felt prayers my way.

Calls, cards and e-messages zoomed through the sky to be at my side, to keep me company as I float and bob along.

{{ Thanks ever~so for thinking of me and my family. I just cannot say this enough----> Thank you. }}

About my dad. He has charmed every nurse and aide on staff. I can hardly stand it.

"Your father is so cute!" they praise. I can only imagine what he might have said or done as he walks up and down the halls like the energizer~bunny chasing after his memory, holding on to some young nurse's arm.

"Let's go home,"  he says loudly when we stroll, holding my hand as we pass the nurses station, looking around. "Where is your mother?"

Weeks ago we lied and told him this was the Health Care Hotel. He thinks the whole family is staying in different rooms. My sister tucks him into bed every night and he wonders why we are not all in the same room.

"Where is your mother?" he asks her.

"In the next room," my sister lies.

The women in my family have become the best liars in town.

In the morning we start all over because my dad forgets. My mom drives across town from home and sits with my father at breakfast, trying to get him to eat.

"I'm really not very hungry," he explains politely before he is off to physical therapy where he does things to make him stronger. His arms and legs are too thin but he carries on.

"Just tell me what I am suppose to do," he says.

So we do.

When I visit we do things. I bring a bag of tricks to fill the time. I say this is to entertain my dad but mostly I just cannot sit and do nothing.

This is the part where I have honestly learned to float and bob, I think.

Every chance I get I play this with my dad. An unexpected gift from a friend a year ago and now I am playing it with my father. I call out the words in Spanish. My dad acts like he understands. La sirena. La rosa.

On a good day my dad can play four cards. We play until every colorful picture is covered with a round, yellow plastic disc. Every time  we play it is the first time for my dad. Then we pick a card and try to draw it on notebook paper, coloring and shading it with colored pencils.

Some days we take old magazines  and brighten up the pages with magic markers.

Talk about being in the Now.

I have misplaced my October and a sizable chunk of my November but I think things are going to be OK.  What is a missing month or two, really? I am over here looking forward to the time when my dad will be home again.

We hope it is soon.

My entire family has been floating and bobbing along for such a long time we have become water~logged and are feeling a bit sinky at times.

Mostly we want to just sit in the sun like turtles on a log.

As nice as it is, we have grown weary of the Health Care Hotel. Days, entire weeks can go missing here.

I am just warning you.

a new normal starring julia roberts

Last night I dreamed about Julia Roberts. It is no wonder, really, what with everything that has been happening lately. Honestly, I feel great knowing that I was asleep long enough to even have a dream.

I was sleeping at home in my own bed which is cause enough for a joyous celebration. Not every one in my family can make this claim.

My daddy is still in the hospital.

You know how much I love traveling but sleeping sitting up in a hospital~chair does not compare with sleeping here  or here.

Not that I am complaining.

I figured out the trick to hospital~chair sleeping is to pretend you are on an airplane. The hospital~chair cranks back only so far--just like in an airplane!--but the great part is there is no one else in front leaning their head back into my little space.

In the hospital late at night the lights are dimmed, bells ding and dong, there is the occasional intercom message, and someone nearby is snoring. It reminds me of a 10 hour international flight.

Wearing my wrinkled day~clothes and socks  I pad to the restroom in the middle of the night.  I don't have to wake anyone else up as I slip out of my seat. That is one of the nicest things about hospital~chair sleeping. I am in a row of one.

The bad part is that I do not wake up here.

After the emergency of  the situation my family settled into a routine, a new normal.

My sweet mother has been Nurse Nancy on the morning shift most days and I have no idea from where she finds the strength. My loving sister has been working on her nursing badge every evening between 6 and 11 after her regular day job. I thank God 10,000 times for my sister.

Me? I travel over there and fill in mid-days and afternoons mostly. No two days are quite the same as the weeks melt into each other. We try to find some laughter in our over-lapping shift rotations.

The television, sitting high on its wire perch on the wall, keeps us all company. The stations are limited but we click between the presidential election news, the cooking channel and the movie channel, thankful for the diversion from the mundane.

We have seen the presidential and the vice~presidential debates several times, every sentence dissected, discussed, and translated. We have watched numerous chiefs slice sausages, chop onions, crack eggs and whisk batter. 

We have watched Pretty Woman more times than I can even tell you.

The first time I watched Pretty Woman almost 20 years ago I thought it was so cute. A modern day Cinderella, of sorts. Happy endings were  Buy One, Get One Free in those carefree days.

Folks get so wrapped up in the hopefulness of Pretty Woman that they almost forget Julia Roberts is a hooker.  Julia is so southern girl sweet you feel that hooking must not be that bad.

Right from the start everyone knows Julia is going to get her man. This knowledge makes us all smile with happiness. We are so clever to see the writing on the wall. True love will win over odds.

I certainly never thought that one day my father and I would sit together watching a movie which featured  a hooker. I certainly never thought I would be sitting in a hospital~chair while my daddy was in the bed tethered to an IV while we watched a movie which featured a hooker.

I did not see that coming.

It just goes to show how you can never figure out life ahead of time, which I  suppose is just as well.

One day this past week the movie channel played Pretty Woman back-to-back, just in case you missed it the first time. I thought this was extremely thoughtful on the movie channel's part. Rather like Buy One, Get One Free.

Plus, I guess most people never get enough of Julia Roberts.

On this particular day my  nursing shift started in the middle of the first movie showing. Somewhere between the 137th time my dad asked, "When am I going home?" and the 219th time he asked, "Where is your mother?" I realized I had, at one time, owned those very same city shorts that Julia was wearing. Somewhere back in 1990 Julia and I must have shopped at the same store. Maybe it was The Limited.

At least I never, ever had her Really Big Hair.

My dad does not care what we watch as he is busy trying to cheat on the crossword puzzle. He uses the newspaper from Tuesday to find the answers for the Monday puzzle if he gets stumped.

I am thrilled that he has the presence of mind to even try to cheat. Sometimes I try to help him out here and there.

38 across-------->8 letter word for Jerry Garcia fan.

My dad never would have gotten that one on his own. When he discovered my answer fit the spaces he was so proud!

"Deadhead?" he asked. "Deadhead? Is that right? Are you sure? Well, OK."

When my mom wandered in from the hospital cafe with a small box of cheerios, she smiled to see what we were watching.

"Oh, this is my favorite part!" my mom cooed. "I looooove how Julia tells the shop~girl 'Big mistake. Big. Huge.'"

So there we sat, eating cereal and watching Julia Roberts kissing on Richard Gere. My mom and my dad and me in the hospital.

Three days later I walk in and there they are, my parents watching Pretty Woman again.
I have such luck!

The movie had just started.

My dad was sitting up in the hospital~chair looking all the world like a first~class world~traveler, blanket tucked across his bony, cold knees, ready to fly right out of this place, to fly right on home.

My mom was sipping on some Nestea.

I crawled into my daddy's hospital bed. I powered up the head part until I could see Julia's toothy grin and we all settled in to watch the happy ending.

Then, wouldn't you know it,  last night I dreamed Julia Roberts was my daddy's nurse. It is no wonder, really. Even in my sleep, ever hopeful, I am looking for the happy ending.

some how you would think you would know

Maybe this has happened to you but I hope not. I most certainly hope it never happens to you.

Let us say that you are at work and your loving sister calls on the telephone and says, "somepinkflowers, we are all at the hospital now."

Your heart races as you wonder------> Who? Mother? Daddy? Who? Which?

You would much rather it be you.

Then you and your racing heart race to the hospital with racing breath and racing prayers. Every thing racing, RACING but in slow motion.

Like when you fall from a bicycle or out of a tree. Moving quickly but slowly at the same time. Tumbling but racing and trying to hold things together, you move.

Trying to keep your hands on the wheel at 10 and 2, trying to keep the faith in your heart, you move on and on.

So that is what happened to me last week. And this is where my family has been.

My daddy  had to have emergency surgery. And it was more than was expected.

The doctors and nurses have been stellar. A marriage of professionalism and compassion.

Were it not for my dad's constant but unwelcome companion we would have rested easier. All of us.

"When am I going home?" my dad asks every minute he is awake.

"Where is your mother?" he asks when my mom goes home to rest.

If we had a penny for every time my dad has asked these two questions, there would be no national debt, no bail~out needed for anyone in the whole wide world.

There would be pennies raining from heaven for all God's children, I am here to tell you.

"When am I going home?" my dad asks as he tries to remove the IV from his arm.

"Where is your mother?" he asks as he tries to get up out of the bed to go find her.

Still, in between all the commotion and the questions, things are moving along better this week. We are not out of the woods yet, but we are on the correct, tear-littered path.

Oh and thank God for comic relief, is what I say! Thank God for loving family and understanding friends. Thank God for all the good stuff that comes at you from nowhere, too, and most of all, thank God for God.

Thanks ever~so and I most certainly hope this never, ever happens to you.
{But if it does, let folks know so they can be there for you. You might be surprised.}

pink artists, pink hats and somepink me

Every day is a leap of faith really. I am so happy when I wake up and find a new beginning.

Morning time around here is like the first day of school. All the crayons are sharp and new and ready to glide.

I cannot wait to jump out of bed and get started.

Some people find it very annoying that I am so perky without even trying. Sometimes I have to put a lid on it.

"somepinkflowers," they ask me mornings at The Library, "are you certain you have had no coffee, no caffeine today?"

"I am positive," I answer as I scurry to the book~drop to gather up the over~night deposits. I make an attempt to s-l-o-w down. I try not to be too bright~eyed and bushy~haired.

The truth is I am fortunate and I know it. Everything is not Perfect over here, what with the price of gas and bread and all. I worry too much about some things.

But you know me. I do not want to miss a thing.

There is so much I long to do. So many places that call my name.

Then there is this----->I am sensitive and cry at the drop of a broken promise. My heart breaks every time I see an old person's hands, ropey with blue veins, covered in paper dry skin. 

A baby's grin leaves me breathless.

When I see the good that folks do for others, the efforts some make for people they do not even know. This makes my heart fill up and over~flow with positive thoughts for the entire world.

I get a such natural high when I see people taking time to make a difference.

From my back yard I can see Pink Artists everywhere raising awareness and money for breast cancer research.

I am so proud and pleased that artists I know are taking part in such a noble and hopeful cause. When I think of the numbers who have been touched by breast cancer it makes my head spin.

Every day is a leap of faith really. I wake up feeling healthy and strong but You Never Know.

I send out thoughts and prayers of thankfulness for myself and those I love. Some times I meditate and send positive vibes out to people I don't even know, like the homeless woman who meanders up and down US1 in bedroom slippers. She never smiles and just keep walking.

She will not accept even one dime from anyone but this Wandering One  is getting prayers whether she wants them or not.

She travels the world in her own way.
Maybe my prayers are more for me than her.

Today I thank the Pink Artists for touching my tender heart with their gracious acts. The time and energy spent for others could stop a train. So why can it not stop cancer? Why, indeed?

I also thank Vallen for making and sending me a magic pink hat. I lift this gift to the sky in gratitude for my too soft heart that breaks a bit every single solitary day. I lift my hat in gratitude for the new beginning that is mine each morning.

Every day is a leap of faith really. And for mine, I thank God, thank goodness.

earth hour every hour starting with the SUN

Are you like this? ----> In the morning I cannot wait to get up.

I want to see what has happened over night and see what shape the day is taking due to the weather. I like to gaze out my bedroom window overlooking the small ravine in my backyard. If the sun is shining I can see the water sparkling and moving on down the narrow creek next to the cypress tree. Green things are growing all over the place down there.

If the sun is not shining I feel a bit cheated before I have even brushed my teeth.

I am sorry but I do.

Growing up in Florida for me meant long stays at the beach. Rising early to watch the sun come up out of the sea, I would walk on the beach with my dad. We would look for shells and they were everywhere then. You could hardly take a step without crushing them which would break my heart.

Some vacations were spent at my cousin's beach house. I could not wait to get up in the morning and be on the beach, in the sun, in the water. Even then I did not want to miss a thing.

If the day was rainy I felt a bit cheated even before I had my breakfast .

I am sorry but I did.

On rainy days us boredom-fearing kids did fun things like this and this. Looking back now, I do not know why I did not love the rainy days more.

During hurricane days when kept home from school my mom bought my sister and I this and this so we would not be frightened of the raging storm. I am here to say there is nothing better than coloring by candlelight when the electricity goes out.

Now that my life here in this planet is about half done, I have become so much wiser about the weather. Oh, sure, you have heard me grump and complain right here about no snow, about no leaves changing colors but that is because I do not want to miss a thing.

I want to see it all.

I could not wait to getup this morning to see if my favorite flowers had popped open in the night. I could not wait to get up to play work with my beads, making order out of chaos, taking little bits of color to make one whole wearable thing.

I could not wait to get up and see how my new, improved knee was bending.

If you are just back from Timbuktu and did not see the sky-writing over north-east Florida, did not read this, well, I had the simplest knee surgery ever on Tuesday morning. Even then I had to be the first one in there at 6 AM.

I wanted to be in and out and on with things.

And so I was.

It felt so good when the surgery was over. Plus, I do not remember a thing thanks to the angels that make forget-it-all drugs. Certifiable witnesses say I asked for this straight away the moment I came to.

That sounds like me. Doesn't it?

Asking for pizza when all the while what I really wanted was Italy!

On Wednesday when the surgery drugs wore off I switched to prescription drugs which stole away my time along with the pain. I camped out on the couch and went to sleep watching this and woke up watching this and it ACTUALLY MADE SENSE TO ME. [So, sorry, dear Jane, but it really, really did!]

Thursday was the big day for stitched out. Three little holes are not much else to see on one big, fat, puffy knee. The doctor put a clear rubber bandage on the entire knee surface. I could look through and see the incisions, wee things looking as if they were drawn on with one of these.

Then he wrote on the bandage, upside down for me to  read: SUN.
Right side up it looked more like this: UNS.

He is a doctor after all and his writing was...well, you know...

The rubber-cement looking bandage has to stay on until Sunday so things will heal properly, nice and dry. I should not remove it until Sunday. I shall not. [We will see.]

But SUN reminded me of Elsa and her sun and her moon and her stars. It reminded me that her baby girl still needs prayers, as does Constance's mom, as does the world at war and so many other things.

All God's chil'ren need prayers.

Tonight we have Earth Hour when all the lights will be turned off from 8 to 9 PM to remind us of our energy dependence, to remind us to conserve, to remind us to be mindful of things we have taken for granted for so long.

I do not know what I will do after I turn all the lights off at 8. I might just sit and color by candle light like during those halcyon hurricane days.

I cannot help but wonder, like you, I am sure, if one hour is so beneficial, why don't we do it every week? Why don't we turn off the lights for an hour every week? Because we wouldn't?

Oh, I guess I can...

This morning when I woke up I could not wait to do all the things I have planned for today. Limping somewhat through my Saturday I know I will never have time to do all the things I want to do today even if I was able to run.

But that is OK. As you can see here, I made it around my yard where things are starting to spring up.

Tomorrow when I wake up, rain or shine, I can look forward to the pleasure of removing my SUN bandage from my knee. Even now as I type this my finger nail scratches around the bandage worrying with a loose edge.

Ohhh...the pleasure of an itch, scratched.

Monday morning it will be something else.
More things to see and do.

In the morning I cannot wait to get up and greet the SUN or the rain even.
Are you like this?

my personal worst

When walking through a darken room you should take the utmost care or you might trip on one of these. If you do trip and land on your right knee it might look like this the next day.

Still, that might not be too bad if you just camp out like this for a few days. Kick back and read this and then you might be OK. Maybe.

Whatever you do, if your knee feels a bit wonky after four days, do not go here and do not get on this. OK, if you do, only do it for 1000 meters or so. Do not try to beat your personal best time. Do not go for another 1000 meters and then another 1000 meters.

Listen.
Just because you can do something does not mean you should. That is all I am saying. Learn to take it easy. Learn to sit back and chill and watch movies like this.

What happens if you  do go to the gym and go a bit over board? Well, you might need one of these. And maybe one of these, too. You might find out you have torn this. When you do this, make no mistake, it feels like this.  There is very little you can do about it except to schedule this.

Man.
I have learned my lesson. The next time I trip and take a tumble, I am staying here and eating vast amounts of these, which is pretty much all I am good for until I have this next week and can start this, which will take place here.
Go figure.

In the mean time, I will be hanging out eating these from here where they have graphic designers to make sweet, juicy art like in the sweet, juicy ad above.

When all this is over I might just go back to this. But you know me, I don't want to miss a thing. We will see.

thank you, thank you so much

Mr. Handson walked into the stacks  while I was attempting to bring order out of ciaos in the James Patterson section. Knee deep in the prolific writer's works,  I was a trapped audience. I worked here and could not slip out the back door. I provided new ears for Mr. Handson's exhaustive, yet amusing, tales. I didn't mind at all. This was the library after all, I had to take what I could get. What ever walked in the front door.

"I lost my cheek in the Korean War," Mr. Handson explained. Looking at his face, I could see both cheeks, present and accounted for, so I was confused. Which one was missing? Maybe Mr. Handson was  referring to a cheek he used for sitting.

"Oh, they replaced it with pig skin in China," Mr. Handson went on, touching his left cheek tenderly, or was it his right? I cannot remember now.

" I was never the same," Mr. Handson went on, not the least bit winsome or sad or anything like that.

"Oh, dear," I replied "That must have been very unsettling for you!"

And so began our library relationship.

Mr. Handson had it in his heart to build an airplane in his back yard. I located book after book on airplane building. Tons of build-an-airplane-in-your-backyard books. Finally I sat him down at a public computer to download his final plans.

I taught Mr. Handson how to click, double click, drag and google. Took my entire lunch time plus more.

Then I left him alone. Before I made it back to the check-out counter bells and whistles sounded from Mr. Handson's  PC. Bells and whistles. Sounded like maybe the president or the pope was coming through. Then a yellow and red banner flashed angrily at the top  the screen: WARNING! WARNING! CLASSIFIED MATERIAL! CLASSIFIED MATERIAL!

Then an official looking FBI badge came onto the screen.

Man. I though the police were going to come running in. I had only left Mr. Handson alone for about 5 seconds.

"somepinkflowers, you put Mr. Handson on the computer?" each librarian asked me in turn when they showed up to check out the commotion, everyone of them rushing. "Mr. Handson? On a computer?? Mr. Handson???"

In February Mr. Handson brought me a gift. Hand-made. He was so proud. It was a small, table-top easel complete with adjustable and sliding this and that for holding a canvas.

I thought he had been working on his airplane.

"I made this for you, somepinkflowers," Mr. Handson said, pushing the wooden treasure into my hands. "It did not cost me a thing. I was going to put a drawer in the bottom but that would have made it too heavy for you to carry."

He would not let me give him any money, or even trade a drawing, as that would mean, if the easel became broken, then 'he would be obliged to fix it.'

I think this is going to be one of those pay it forward things. We shall see.

I have been so fortunate lately.

French Paul, one of my library volunteers, gave me a bottle of his homemade limoncello. We share a love for hiking in the Cinque Terre and like to outdo each other on the dangerousness of each leg of the public footpath overlooking the Mediterranean Sea.

"The famous Via del'Amore, between Riomaggiore and Manarole is easiest to walk but take care with  your heart, somepinkflowers," warns French Paul, wading through his accent as if it were limoncello itself, thick from the freezer.

Truth is, I left part of my heart in Vernazza under a bright yellow umbrella in a seaside piazza. Who knew anchovy pizza could taste so yummy? I ate the whole thing.

I put the new copy of the Sam Cook CD on Tom's request list at the library. So then Tom made me a mix for my Bose wave. That is how these things happen.

Creative Debbie awarded me with this last month because I made her day. That is such a nice thing to say, I think. Her roundy-headed art folks always make my day, too.

And nature photographer extraordinaire Janson honored me this way. I am embarrassed but honored by such thoughts of kindness, such demonstrations of appreciation. When people do things like this I am proud to be human.

No matter how hard you try, you cannot get away from the generosity of people who want to share.

You have to just let them.

Last month while biting down on a piece of dark chocolate-covered nuts I cracked a crown. Valentine candy cracked my old tooth. That crown had been in my mouth for years. We were old friends. That piece of dentistry had been preformed before my nephew was born and now he has a teenage daughter. Time sure can pass by, dentally speaking.

Plus, I nearly swallowed the hunk of enamel.

"Happy Valentine's Day to me! " I thought, savoring the chocolate still. A new crown would be, what, $1000? Airplane fare to Athen is what that is. Counting the taxi to the airport on this end.

Ha!

Little did I know.

Like cleaning one little spot on the wall in your living room can force you to paint your entire house and then buy new carpet, things tend to escalate. One thing leads to another. A tooth implant cannot be done until there is strong bone. All God's chil'ren gotta have strong bones.

I am sitting here now with a bone graft in my jaw. Bone from some person I don't even know.

I want to thank this person for his/her bone but I don't know how. The bone-donor is no longer around to enjoy Valentine chocolates, limoncello or anchovy pizzas. The bone-donor can no longer enjoy the feel of an honest and heart-felt 'thank you so much.'

So I am thanking everybody else.

I am thanking Jenny for sending me the beads and charms you see up there in the three green dishes. She found out I was into beading and sent those my way. I have been making bits of jewelry like they were Johnny Depp dripping with bobs and trinkets.

I am thanking Steph for the copy of Mondays with Maxine  she sent my way. Pulled from her blog, Steph's book is about nature's  marriage to hope.  A gigantic pumpkin named Maxine grows a personality along with her bulk. I KNEW it would make a great book and I so love when I can say, "I told you so!" about something that turns out cool.

I am thanking Glenn for the ship-on-a-bottle painting he did for me in honor of my favorite beach. I am his library go-to person when he needs reference photos for his sign business. Last week we were all about photos of shrimp. Before that it was locomotives. I just never know.

I am thanking my sister for the silver hoop bracelet and the little  herb pots from here. My cat and I both  love the the little pots filled with rosemary, basil and more. I am thanking Janet for the  magazines on beading. I am thanking Carol for the flat of pink petunias which I will be planting tomorrow.

I am thanking Debbie, Janson, Paul, Tom, and Mr. Hanson. Thank you all for thinking of me and sharing.

No offense, Mr. Hanson, but I am glad my bone graft did not come from a pig. Your cheek turned out fine but I don't eat pork and would rather not be wearing  any either.

I think I am the same, Mr. Handson, even with this otherness inside me taking root.

Maybe I am more thankful these days for people who share.
Thank you, thank you all so much.

prayers of light and health for sophia

Sending sweet Sophia prayers of of good health...

Sending waves of strength to her loving, hopeful family...

Shine on, Sophia, strong and true and bloom again spring fresh and whole.

christmas left-overs

'Look out here she comes, she's coming!
Look out there she goes, she's gone.'

While I am not positive who wrote that lyric--Guy Clark or, maybe, Johnny Cash--I do know the 'she' in the song is a fast moving train 'screaming through Texas.'

Not exactly  Christmas carol material but around here western songs wear their own holy wings.

Like the train in the song, Christmas approached and never once slowed down for me. I stood beside the tracks with child-like apprehension and witnessed the entire holiday pass me by in a flash. 

The little red caboose of Christmas lights twinkled on and off and out of sight. Whoa, buddy! Gone.

I started a new job right after Halloween and my discretionary time  crawled out the east window most days as I headed off west to work.  Almost January and, for the life of me, I cannot remember what my discretionary time even looks like any more.

I think maybe she is wearing a Florida tan, which I am not.

Now it comes back to me again, what it feels like to be a Normal Working Person. Trying to squeeze in trips to the gym and a much needed haircut I managed my own 2-step-shuffle to Attempt Every Christmas Activity Known to Womankind...and then some. Many plans were left on the high shelf in the Christmas closet.

In case you did not know, grocery shopping late at night has its own rewards. Perfectly good flowers are marked down, along with bakery bread, around 9:45 pm. A conscientious  night-time shopper can get a good deal while others sleep.

Who knew?

After 5 days on my new job I came down with the-cough-that-would-not-leave which zapped me of Christmas-cookie-making strength. Coughing and baking...well, don't even go there.

I could find not one single cookie recipe calling for NyQuil Cough Suppressant. Not one.

One night I did, however, dream of crushing up Halls Defense Vitamin C Drops to use as sprinkles for cupcakes. These supplement drops come in assorted citrus flavors, after all, and, thus, seemed to me to be cupcake worthy.

Please note: I never actually tried using the Halls Defense Vitamin C Drops but if you do, please let me know how that works for you.

Anyway, I did managed to learn how to sing Joy to The World and many of my other favorites while secretly sucking on Ricola Lemon Mint Herb Throat Drops. I am pretty sure no one could tell.

I feel rather confident that any holy figures hovering over me would see my pure heart and understand. I wasn't like I was eating chocolate in church. This was not recreational use of candy.

You know, it was like when an adult gives a small child a Peppermint Life Saver for sitting still in church.

Well, that did always worked with me.

So Christmas came and went and here we go.

You know what happens next. A new year will be stopping by and frankly I am doing nothing special for it except to sit back and say, "Hi, there! Come on in. Have a warm cup of Earl Grey or some Limoncello from the freezer. Here, try one of these Halls Defense Vitamin C Drops!"

I am nothing if not polite.

I had plans to redecorate my bathroom while I was off from work these next few days. I wanted to paint the walls a brighter color and to buy more fluffy towels, the works.

But I am learning.

I cleaned everything to sparkling, set up a few pristine candles and opened up a fancy-shmancy box of newly-gifted soaps which have no medicinal fragrance what-so-ever. Thank, God.

Took me about 10 minutes to redecorate the entire bathroom and I never coughed once.

My favorite redecorating idea was this: I moved the bathroom scales into the garage, right near where I keep my walking shoes and my  Good Vibrations Huffy Beach Bike. Works for me.
 

Look out world!
Here I go, I'm going...

christmas calories

When you walk in the Christmas Parade and throw out candy to kids of all ages, you can eat one piece yourself every two blocks and not gain any noticeable weight what-so-ever.

In case you were wondering.

tagged by a mermaid

I have been hanging out here at home a bit under the weather. I have not felt like my usually spunky self due to:

1. a dry, scratchy throat;
2. a cotton-candy feeling in my noggin;
3. an out-of-sorts, overly-pink from too much blowing, nose;
4. and an achy body vacillating between chills and fever.

All in all, not a pretty sight but other than that, I feel OK. I do, however, think it is strange that even my hair can hurt. Who knew?

Mostly I have missed doing tons of fun stuff while staying in bed feeling stuffy.

I was tagged by a mermaid a few days ago for a meme. I have been tagged before to share things about myself but have never played along as:

1. my life seems rather plain and only-just-slightly-above-ordinary to me;
2. so who would want to read about it?
3. Plus, you have to come up with a certain amount of things to list
4. and I am not so good at that.

But when I read Shin's meme I liked learning more about her which was kind of cool. Her list helped to flesh her out more into an live person, no longer just a blogger there on the computer screen. 

Finally, I said to myself,  "somepinkflowers, just do it this one time and have some fun with it. Not likely you are going to get up out of bed and go to the zoo today. Go with the flow, missy. Get those feet out of bed, why don't cha?"

If you aren't into this kind of meme thing just skip over this one. Who is going to know anyway? I might have subliminal goodies hidden in here but probably not. Although, I might:

1. mention your blog here;
2. or here
3. or here
4. or maybe here or not at all.

That is the thing with me. You never know. And, I AM on OTC drugs. Whoopee.

I was also tagged by Trisha to do The List 4 Things tag so I am combining all these tags into one because:

1. I like to do things my own way;
2. I lost Tricia's The List 4 Things instructions;
3. I have always like the number 4;
4. and, I just learned how to do the automatic indent and number button here on the Typepad edit post page.

As you can see, it actually takes very little to entertain me.

Here are 4 jobs I have had:

1. I painted cells for an animation company. Now I think they do it on a computer but a few years ago, no, it was done by hand. I had to paint the backside of the acetate sheets of cartoon characters. This got old extremely fast as I was only allowed to paint the white and the yellow areas. Other people painted the other colors.  If I had been in charge of the pink areas, or even the blue areas, I might still be working there.
2. I did photo research for a Greek textbook company. I was in charge of locating photographs to use inside the textbooks and also had to obtain reproduction rights for the legal use there of. I worked closely with the Library of Congress and the New York Public Library. If the staff meetings had not been held mostly in Greek, which I do not speak, I might still be there.
3. I measured food for the state school lunch program. I traveled to different schools and  weighed each item placed on the tray of school lunches before the trays were served to the children. I had to put on little plastic gloves and pick up the food in my hand and weigh it on this cute little food scale. Then I marked the weight on a form. No matter what happened, I would not have done this job for very long as I also had to, at the end of each lunch period, put on those little gloves and weigh what WAS LEFT ON THE TRAY after the kids were finished eating.
4. I managed a video lab where I spent most of the day rewinding videos. If  I had enjoyed this job more, I might now be working at Blockbuster Video.

I learned that easy things can quickly become boring.

OK, these were not true career choices for me but a sampling of a few things I did to put myself through graduate school. Graduate students have no pride what-so-ever. Amen.

Here are my 4 REAL careers thus far:

1. Elementary school teacher;
2. Designer for a state water management agency;
3. Public relations coordinator for Barnes & Noble;
4. and Library Assistant.

It would seem that working my way through graduate school might be more entertaining than actually working my way through real life. Who is to say?

The 4 tall things I  like to climb:

1. up to the second level of the Eiffel Tower;
2. the mountain trails around Vernassa;
3. the top of  St. Pete's Basilica;
4. the hills on the Marin County side overlooking the Golden Gate Bridge.

I also like to climb trees if the chances look good that I can make my way down again. This has not always been the case.

I have also been thinking of doing this.

My 4 favorite shades of nail polish.

1. Boris & Natasha OPI Nail Color;
2. Wine With Everything by Revlon;
3. Extrovert by Lancome;
4. and Maybelline's Crimson 170 Express Finish.

If you think I have the kind of life where I can sit around polishing my fingernails everyday, you are on the wrong blog, missy. I buy nail polish because I like to collect jars of pigment sometimes, if I like the names. 

You might say, I am a kind of Boris & Natasha, wine with everything, extrovert, crimson express finish kind of person.

Here are 4 places I go to play on the internet:

1. Rive Gauche;
2. for Colour Lovers;
3. the Scribbler;
4. and Dream Land.

I know. You think I don't have enough to do in my life. Well, maybe I just like inexpensive entertainment.

Here are 4 things I like to see in writing:

1. a sly similie;
2. a juicy mixed metaphor;
3. a sentence SLAMMED with onomatopoeia;
4. and air abounding with atomic alliteration.

Oh, yeah. The photos.

When I met up with Ladybug Circus this past August in Portland, she took me to Cargo where all these shots were taken. I loved that day because:

1. I made a new friend
2. who likes to talk and adores colorful places like me.
3. Also, I found a new city to call my own
4. while having a grand adventure.

You cannot ask for more out of a vacation.

So this is my meme. I won't tag anyone else:

1. but sometime,
2. when you are feeling less that your best and still want to blog post,
3. go back and think about what makes you YOU.
4. Have a bit of fun
5. then go back to bed
6. and take some medicine.
7. Maybe go to sleep
8. and, if you are lucky, your cat will curl up behind your knees
9. and you will feel somewhat better.
10. That is what I am hoping for myself.