Category Archives: Random Thoughts

Those random things that happen in a day and end up here.

Summer sighs…

31 Wednesday Jul 2019

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shallow focus photo of brown spider

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I watch a spider hanging from a branch of my avocado tree, following the movement of her body as she spins to repair the web torn when I slid the pot away from the window.  She swings toward a leaf and misses, eases up the filament, swings again. Misses again. “I’m sorry,” I whisper but she doesn’t respond. What would I have her do, shake one leg in outrage? I turn away from her efforts wondering how many times I’ve been the giant in the fairytale, wondering how many small worlds I’ve sent into oblivion, either by accident or design.

 

selective focus photography of house finch perched on bird feeder

Photo by Brett Sayles on Pexels.com

Sparrows are stopping by for afternoon tea and I take out more water for them. They wait to eat more seed until I distance myself and don’t notice when I sit on the porch bench to watch. I take pleasure in the way they use their wings to push each other away from the seeds, feeling better about the human members of our household who wriggle on our couch vying both for position and popcorn during a movie.

 

animal antenna arthropod background

Photo by Miguel Á. Padriñán on Pexels.com

 

I heard a cricket last night, here early for who knows why. I wondered where it was hiding. The evening air was hot and still. The fountain splashed music and a bird swooped over the yard toward sparrow apartment nests behind the ivy leaves. In spite of the car engines and a blast of The Stones from down the street, I could hear the cricket for just a bit, a little sigh at the passing of time.

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Waiting on the cusp–or maybe it’s cups…

16 Saturday Mar 2019

Posted by in Metaphors, Random Thoughts

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eye of the storm image from outer space

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Having survived the bomb cyclone, I’m peering out the windows of my house in search of spring. Or in search of something.

January went walkabout on the veldt, its hiding places unknown. We had to send adjustment officers to drag it back. Short February lasted at least three icy months, its  breath evoking a heightened sense of something in the shadows, lending a gothic tinge to the seemingly endless span.

 

full frame shot of snowflakes

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Now the sun shines, but not yet on everything.  And we’ve been told to watch for an appearance by the Worm Super Moon on the twentieth. How appropriate. (No insult to worms intended. I am a founding member of the Worm Rescue Squad.)

Times lurches forward in fits and starts, with some certainties: newly minted tax forms, long may they fold. More investigation reports. More candidates. More waiting.

Leave it to a poet for a sum-up:

“But the sunshine aye shall light the sky,/As round and round we run;/And the truth shall ever come uppermost,/And justice shall be done.”

Eternal Justice, Stanza 4

Charles Mackay (1814–1889)

Hope he’s right.

 

 

Neither Here nor There…

28 Friday Dec 2018

Posted by in Life, Metaphors, Random Thoughts

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blurred-background-branches-close-up-788751The days between Christmas and the New Year hold ghosts of past events and restless shadows of what’s to come. Fun’s to be had and still-on-vacation kids are quick to grab at it. Nostalgia gathers in corners, hovering in case memories and distance-pangs evoke tears.

Duty waits in hallways, tinging the air with a faint scent of reckoning: tucking away the excesses of the holidays; finding dreaded proof for life narratives…taxes. Holiday lights sparkle enough to weaken such seriousness, but cannot banish it.

Winter settles in, at least here in Colorado. Wind attacks leaves left like confetti, gathers cold behind clouds and aims it toward naked trees and hatless heads. New light arriving with the solstice hasn’t yet the strength to pull at time.

Soon…soon the short, sharp months of the early year will streak into lives grown lazy with celebration. Measures to be taken, notions to harden into resolutions. Scales to be polished, treadmills eyed.

And a slow missive will be dropped into the year-mail to make its way through days and weeks. A warm breath will hint of promises to come, a smile will be glimpsed as light lengthens.

We’ll wait for Spring.

 

 

Losing my mind? No, just my phone…

04 Wednesday Apr 2018

Posted by in Life, Random Thoughts

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A funny thing happened on the way to walking my dog: I lost my phone. I can still almost feel its weight in my jeans pocket, have looked everywhere inside the house and out, and it’s definitely gone. That little contraption of metal and plastic that holds more info about me and my life than should reasonably be carried around has escaped into the world.

Well, shit.

I’m not even one of those souls who constantly carries a phone with me. Can’t count the times I’ve left it on the table and then needed it while I’m out and about. But slowly, over the years, I’ve become dependent on the thing, have gotten sophisticated enough to connect to some apps, have begun to feel the migration of brain cells to pocket or bag.

And now it’s gone.      pexels-photo-209660.jpeg

I called the company, suspended the line, ordered another phone, knowing full well that when it arrives, I’ll be bitching about the set-up hassle. And I’ll go back to carrying the thing around, fitfully, and missing the pictures I took with the old one. Feeling stupid for not protecting my property. Hoping no villains have absconded with bytes and bits of my info for their nefarious ends.

Maybe I’ll use the event as a plot device in the latest book. Maybe I’ll come up with a clever bit of business that’ll make the whole experience worth while.

Not bloody likely.

I’ll go through the drill, replace info and leave some hidden. And this time I’ll buy one of those signal finders that locates the errant phone. And I’ll try not to take the technology for granted.

Right.

And November has never felt so long…

21 Monday Nov 2016

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I’m baaaaaaack. I’ve been nursing my psychic wounds (my candidate lost) along with the respiratory virus that will not let go. I almost feel compelled to write a horror movie screenplay to destroy the thing, but haven’t had the energy. And now we’re near Thanksgiving and the swoop into The Holidays.

Good news: I corrected the galley proofs for Wisdom Court Book 3, All in Bad Time. The cover’s been set and we’re getting close to liftoff. Of course I’ll let you know when. I’m excited and hope you readers out there are, too.

Life goes on, my mom always said, and Scarlett O’Hara chimed in with “Tomorrow is another day.” I hope all of you are well and busy with creative projects. I’m planning to continue posting more often since I developed a taste for it during the Halloween marathon. Here’s to a wonderful Thanksgiving for us all. 998584-195

Another Lick and a Promise…

11 Wednesday May 2016

Posted by in Hope, Random Thoughts, Wisdom Court, Writing

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Seedling of narcissus spring flowers growing from ground

Seedling of narcissus spring flowers growing from ground

I’ve been revising like a fool, hoping the revisions aren’t foolish. Thus have Twitter & Facebook lacked for much attention, and I haven’t blogged in a good, long while. So, here’s to spring, my dears, with all the tumult and drama our Colorado springs usually have. Here’s to venturing out to plant seeds and seedlings, even though we know the likelihood of hail and destruction for a few more weeks. Here’s to doing good work and getting enough sleep and finishing the tale.
I’ll be back soon with more reflections about life, liberty, and putting words on the page. Send me good vibes, please, so I’ll see my way clear to the end of the story.

A moment of geese

04 Monday Apr 2016

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This morning I returned from the drive to school and got out of the car. A choir of sparrows and chickadees was rehearsing in a nearby tree, nearly drowning out the city-sounds filling my corner of Capitol Hill. Cars grumbled and a truck roared; a motorcycle spewed a raspberry at the skateboarders dodging potholes. A saw whined from a construction site down the street.

A flick of motion overhead caught my eye. Three gray geese skimmed the roofs across the alley as they headed south. Silent, swift, gone before I could do more than let out a breath of appreciation. Their wings sliced through cacophony with synchronized grace, leaving behind the discord.

Three Greylag Geese coming in for landing over a field in formation

I wanted to be like those geese: fast, focused, fully engaged in flight. Following where ideas led, turning aside for no interruption, stopping for nothing. For a moment that yearning cut as sharply through me as their wings had cut through the noise.

And then the day went on.

 

Summertime, and the livin’ is wishful

01 Wednesday Jul 2015

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a reflection of sky is in the quiet river

a reflection of sky by mycola

Wish I were riding an inner tube, straw hat on my head, jug of lemonade attached to the tube with a string. I’d have a book resting on my belly and the water would rock me like a cradle. The sun would go behind a bank of clouds  and the current would turn me toward the weeping willows bending over the river. Would I see an owl peering from a thick old stump? Eyelids heavy, I’d check it out later.

Honeysuckle and flowering elm would perfume the air and my thoughts would thicken like custard. With closed eyes I’d see the deep purple of meditation and hear the droning of bees gathering pollen from the Bouncing Bettys.

Would a fish swish by my foot? I’d wiggle my toes in the cool water and swish it back. A mourning dove would grieve from a tall cottonwood and I’d wonder what secret sorrow moved her to weep.

And then I’d sleep the thick, caramel-rich sleep of a childhood nap. I’d drift through it, serene in the summer day, content to rest and do nothing.

I wish.