15 Tuesday Oct 2019
Posted in Random Thoughts
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October ferments
cider spiced from fat full days,
edged with keen endings.
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Give welcome to the Harvest Moon.
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23 Monday Sep 2019
Posted in Life, Random Thoughts
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Got me a jumbled brain from too many notions and a lack of laying’ things out on the page. Picked up a just-folks twang watching’ the first couple episodes of Country Music on PBS. Ken Burns has got himself a bunch of music my mama and daddy loved to listen to back in the day, and there’s some nice background as to how that music came to be. From Jimmie Rodgers to Patsy Cline, Roy Acuff and his Foggy Mountain Boys to Mother Maybelle Carter, sprinkled with Hank Williams, the Maddox Brothers and Rose, and lots in between, I’ve been remembering the music and early days of television when we’d watch Grand Ole Opry. Funny thing is, I didn’t like a lot of the music then, even as a kid being kind of embarrassed at the almost-sobs in some of the voices, and the gut-punch emotion of often spare lyrics. I was getting into rock and roll, and that was more my speed. Now I see I didn’t have enough wear and tear on my tires to appreciate the hard times behind those songs. My treads are plenty low in spots now, and in those songs I can hear pain being made into art…sometimes with a twang.
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One of my favorite authors, Stephen King, has a real talent for evoking the flavor of my childhood. The granddaughter and I, having seen It a couple of years ago, went to see the sequel, It Chapter Two last week. Everybody and his balloon has reviewed the movie, so I won’t, but I will comment about the format we saw it in, 4DX, something previously unknown to me. To quote Wikipedia: 4DX is a motion picture technology owned and developed by South Korean company CJ 4DPLEX, a part of the CJ Group. 4DX allows a motion picture presentation to be augmented with environmental effects such as seat motion, wind, rain, lights, and scents along with the standard video and audio. That meant every time there was an action scene, our seats shook or air puffed against our hair or drops of liquid hit our faces (or glasses). Was it blood? Dunno. By the time we got to the big ending, we were shaking around in our seats and I was trying to forget that one of the aspects of my childhood had been motion sickness. No, not quite that bad, but it was distracting. I loved the book It because of the pathos underlying it, and the emotional horror that made the children who they were. The bells and whistles of 4DX made me think of all the summer movies touted to be a hell of a ride! It’ll take me a while to see this movie again and then it’ll definitely be in 2D.
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Mornings are getting cooler and crisper, and leaves are beginning to turn. Autumn is here and I’m excited. We’ve already had two good signs: a full moon on Friday the 13th. The creative juices increase in direct proportion to amount of falling leaves. Can’t remember where I saw this scientific info, but I’ll footnote it next time. Here’s to new projects, new goals. May your efforts be rewarded.
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31 Wednesday Jul 2019
Posted in Random Thoughts, Uncategorized
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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.
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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.
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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.
16 Saturday Mar 2019
Posted in Metaphors, Random Thoughts
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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.
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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.
28 Friday Dec 2018
Posted in Life, Metaphors, Random Thoughts
The 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.
01 Saturday Dec 2018
Posted in Random Thoughts
Even in the cold, a whiff of anticipation scents the air.
01 Thursday Nov 2018
Posted in Random Thoughts
Here we go again, trying to get back to regular posting. What’re the odds? During this most fraught month of the year, pretty good. Not today, for I’ve used up my brain cells sorting through the papers on my desk. But isn’t that a good sign? Yeah.
So, for now, an image and a promise.
Watch this space.
04 Wednesday Apr 2018
Posted in Life, Random Thoughts
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. 
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.
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. 
11 Wednesday May 2016
Posted in Hope, Random Thoughts, Wisdom Court, Writing
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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.
