Saturday 9: Give A Little Love

Saturday 9: Give a Little Love (1988)

Unfamiliar with this week's tune? Hear it here.

In memory of Naomi Judd (1946-2022)

1) In this week's song, the Judds tell us they aren't impressed by diamonds or foreign travel. If you had your choice, would you prefer a $1,500 diamond pendant or a $1,500 voucher from United Airlines?

A. The diamond pendant. I could sell that and get something I really wanted, like a new guitar or a good gaming computer.

2) In the video for this song, the Judds are shown having fun on the beach. Do you have any trips to the beach planned for the upcoming summer months?

A. We have no vacations planned at the moment.

3) Early in their career, this mother-daughter duo performed in clubs venues around San Francisco, where they called themselves The Hillbilly Women. Have you recently been to a bar or restaurant with live music?

A. I haven't eaten in a restaurant since last August (2021). They did not have live music. Prior to that, I hadn't been in a restaurant since maybe November 2019.

4) They moved to Nashville in 1979 in search of greater success. During the three years it took them to score a record contract, Naomi supported the family as a part-time nurse and occasional model. She enjoyed the flexibility so her schedule could accommodate auditions. Do you like having a pre-planned schedule? Or would you rather keep things loose?

A. I like deadlines but how I get to them needs to be unplanned.

5) Wynona sang the Elvis classic "Burning Love" in 2002 Disney movie Lilo and Stitch. What's the most recent Disney movie you've seen?

A. Beauty and the Beast

 

6) In 2011, Wynona wrote her first novel, Restless Heart, about a country singer struggling with the price of fame. Have you ever tried your hand at writing fiction?

A. Yes, but I have not been very successful at it. I had a short story published a long time ago, and I won a couple of writing contests, but that's it.

7) Kid sister Ashley Judd is the only woman in her immediate family to not change her first name. Naomi was born Diana, and Wynona was originally Christina. Do you like your first name?

A. Yes.

 

8) In 1988, the year this song was popular, Sonny Bono went from entertainer to politician when he was elected Mayor of Palm Springs. Have you met the mayor of your town?

A. I don't live in a town, I live in a county, but I know all of the supervisors who run the county, and the county administrator, and I know most of the mayors and council members of the nearby towns.

9) Random question: Were you a member of the Columbia House Record Club?

A. I tried to be. I sent off my nickel or dollar or whatever it was, but I never got anything back for it.

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I encourage you to visit other participants in Saturday 9 posts and leave a comment. Because there are no rules, it is your choice. Saturday 9 players hate rules. We love memes, however.  

Thursday Thirteen #755

Alexa tells me today is "limerick" day. So without further ado -

(I didn't write these.)

1. Limericks I cannot compose,

With noxious smells in my nose.

But this one was easy,

I only felt queasy,

Because I was sniffing my toes.

2. There was a young woman named Bright,

Whose speed was much faster than light.

She set out one day,

In a relative way,

And returned on the previous night.

3. There was an odd fellow named Gus,

When traveling he made such a fuss.

He was banned from the train,

Not allowed on a plane,

And now travels only by bus.

4. There once was a fly on the wall,

I wonder, why didn’t it fall?

Because its feet stuck? Or was it just luck?

Or does gravity miss things so small?

5. There once was a man from Tibet,

Who couldn’t find a cigarette

So he smoked all his socks,

and got chicken-pox,

and had to go to the vet.

6. There was a young woman named Bright,

Whose speed was much faster than light.

She set out one day,

In a relative way,

And returned on the previous night.

7. I need a front door for my hall,

The replacement I bought was too tall.

So I hacked it and chopped it,

And carefully lopped it,

And now the dumb thing is too small.

8. There once was a boy named Dan,

who wanted to fry in a pan.

He tried and he tried,

and eventually died,

that weird little boy named Dan.

9. A newspaperman named Fling,

Could make “copy” from any old thing.

But the copy he wrote,

Of a five-dollar note,

Was so good he now wears so much bling.

10. I know an old owl named Boo,

Every night he yelled Hoo,

Once a kid walked by,

And started to cry,

And yelled I don’t have a clue!

11. I once fell in love with a blonde,

But found that she wasn’t so fond.

Of my pet turtle named Odle,

whom I’d taught how to Yodel,

So she dumped him outside in the pond.

12. I’d rather have Fingers than Toes,

I’d rather have Ears than a Nose.

And as for my Hair,

I’m glad it’s all there,

I’ll be awfully sad, when it goes.

13. There was a Young Lady whose chin

Resembled the point of a pin:

So she had it made sharp,

And purchased a harp,

And played several tunes with her chin. (Edward Lear)

These came from this page. Visit it to read more limericks!

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Thursday Thirteen is played by lots of people; there is a list here if you want to read other Thursday Thirteens and/or play along. I've been playing for a while, and this is my 755th time to do a list of 13 on a Thursday. Or so sayth the Blogger counter, anyway.

The Madness of Crowds

This is going to be mixed up, because I have a lot of mixing up in my head at the moment. I just finished listening to the audio version of The Madness of Crowds, by Louise Penny,* and this, along with the (very loud and frustrating) conversation on Roe v Wade has my head spinning.

So spoilers for the Louise Penny book - you've been warned. As for the rest, well, I like to use the word "fuck" a lot so you've been warned there, too.

In the book, Penny deals with life post-pandemic, but she takes on multiple heady topics, including, kind of, abortion.

The story is about a statistician who has determined that because of the decline in resources, statistics indicate that it should be mandatory to kill off the elderly at a certain age, and to kill off disabled people, including children. Only the healthy (whatever that is) should be allowed to live. 

The inspector is asked to protect the statistician when she has a talk near his home, someone tries to shoot her, someone else is murdered, he has to find the murderer, blah blah.

The underlining themes of this book are troubling and troublesome. We had people in the United States saying that grandmas should take one for the team and just die of Covid. These were Republican members of various state legislatures, if I remember correctly. I find the idea morally reprehensible, although I think if Grandma knows she has uncurable cancer and wants to take an early out, she should have the right to do that. But it shouldn't be forced on her.

This story is about the government forcing early death. That's the statistician's premise.

It gets mixed up even more because the inspector's second in command, Jean-Guy, has, in the previous book All the Devils Are Here, had a second child, one born with Down's Syndrome.

The reader (or listener, in my case), sees Jean-Guy's angst over his child in this latest book. At one point he calls her a burden and he is totally floored by his own words. He can't believe he called his daughter that. He loves his daughter - but.

There is talk about why Jean-Guy and Annie didn't abort early on when they learned the child had Down's Syndrome. He said he and his wife discussed it but decided against it. But, he also admits they weren't prepared for what raising a disabled child means. He questions the decision, but ultimately decides they made the choice appropriate for them, and he loves his daughter (without the "but"). He finds the statistician abhorrent because she would have his child "dismissed" from life.

So here we are with a fictional story that is hitting hard emotionally on all sorts of topics, from ridding the world of the elderly to disabled children and quality of life, and abortion. When is killing good? When is it bad? What constitutes a legitimate killing? Is a fetus a person?

And all around me I see fucking morons who have no idea what they're talking about trying to lay claim to the authority of women's bodies. Until a fetus is out of its mother's body, it's a parasite. It can't exist without the womb.

This is a decision that's nobody's business but the woman's and possibly the man she is involved with, but I have noticed men have simply taken three steps backwards and are out of this conversation, except for the big high-powered white assholes who are making the decisions for the little women anyway.

Over on Facebook, I'm involved in a discussion where two people who were unwanted wish they'd never been born, and being unwanted meant that they had severely crappy childhoods (sexual abuse, verbal abuse, physical abuse, etc.), another who was adopted who thinks we're all saying she shouldn't have been born, when no one is saying that at all, another who survived an ectopic pregnancy thanks to Roe v Wade (I wrote about a similar situation for myself last week), and a lawyer who's chimed in about bodily autonomy and how forcing a woman into pregnancy is similar to slavery.

This is a group of well-educated highly informed women discussing a very emotional and highly complex topic. We are doing it without name-calling, without yelling, without calling one another names, or being overly upset (except for the adoptee, although I think she understands that we're all glad her mother chose to have her and give her up. We're glad she had that choice.). 

And the questions we're really asking are these: if Roe v Wade is abolished, who is going to take care of all of these unwanted children? Who is going to see that the mothers receive appropriate prenatal care? Are we going to revive orphanages? Are we going to throw more money at a foster care system that doesn't work? What about the children with disabilities? Who is going to care for them? The Republicans already are working to undo all the social networks we have in place to keep people from dying of starvation. What are they going to do for these children they want to force women to have?

Are we going to look at the racism that is really behind this? If one traces the issues of abortion and current discussion back to its beginnings, we find the KKK and white nationalism and racism behind it. Nobody cares if there are black babies being aborted. It's the white women they're after here, and everyone knows that. It really is The Handmaid's Tale. 

The poor and minorities are going to be the ones suffering because some powerful white male and his wife want to adopt a sweet little white kid and they can't get one from Ukraine at the moment, because, you know, fucking fascists are over there bombing the place while the fucking fascists here in the US are undermining the Constitution at every turn and have made a mockery out of what once was a legitimate government. (Thanks a lot, GQP.)

In the meantime, we have these anti-human fuckers who really wouldn't care if certain people already living died. They want a war and they want blood. They're ready to shoot me because they think I'm a Democrat (I'm not, really, I'm what a Republican used to be, a very long time ago). They're ready to shoot me because I couldn't have children. They'll shoot me because I'm fat. They'll shoot me because I'm old. They'll shoot me because I used to be a journalist. They'll shoot me because they can because we're too fucking stupid to understand what the Second Amendment of the Constitution really says, because the fucking Supreme Court conveniently overlooked the "well-armed militia" part of the amendment.

I have a niece and a great-niece. Roe v Wade doesn't affect me personally, but it affects young people I care about. I don't want my niece to have to have a child if she should become pregnant before she's ready to raise that baby. I don't want my tiny little great-niece growing up thinking she is a second-class citizen simply because she is a girl. I want her to grow up thinking she's Wonder Woman and she can do whatever the hell she wants with her life (within reason, of course). If she wants to wait until she's 40 years old to have her first child because she wants to build up a law career and be a partner in a law firm, then I want her to be able to do that. I sure don't want her to have to have a child because some asshole convinces her to have sex when she's 14.

Mostly I want people to stop and think, use logic, and take emotions out of the law. Law is about thinking and rationality. Rational people believe murdering the elderly or disabled children is wrong. That isn't a liberal point of view (as someone said in the reviews of Penny's book on Amazon). That's a humanistic point of view. That's a moral point of view.

And as for Roe v Wade, we're not gods, and if women have to give up the right to abortion and their bodily autonomy, then I want a chastity belt slapped around the pelvis of every man on this dying, decaying, morally bankrupt planet, and the keys left on the wall of some female judge who lives 500 miles away. Because without that damn penis, we wouldn't be having this discussion. That's where the problem lies, so let's fix the problem that way, instead of placing it all on the woman.

*Also, I did not like this book as well as the others in the Three Pines series.*

Sunday Stealing

Sunday Stealing

1. Do you like your handwriting?

A. Oh no. My handwriting is horrible. I am the only person who can read it, and sometimes even I can't read it. My mother had beautiful handwriting. Mine is small and cramped.

2. Do you like roller coasters?

A. Not anymore. I didn't mind them when I was younger, but after I turned 30 all of those rides made my body ache.

3. Do you like scary movies?

A. Not really.

4. Do you like shopping?

A. I used to, but it has become more chore than joy since the pandemic.

5. Do you like to talk on the phone?

A. Yes. I prefer that to texting. Texting has its place, but it doesn't replace hearing the sound of a loved one's voice.

6. Do you sleep with the lights on or off?

A. Off, but we have motion lights that turn on if one of us rises in the night.

7. Do you use headphones or earphones?

A. I do not use either. They bother my ears.

8. Do you have tattoos?  Do you want any?

A. I have no tattoos, nor do I want any.

9. Do you wear glasses?

A. Yes.

10. What is your strangest talent?

A. I can roll my tongue.

11. Have you ever been in the hospital?

A. Many times.

12. What color mostly dominates your wardrobe?

A. Blue.

13. What’s your most expensive piece of clothing?

A. Probably my coat.

14. Have you ever had braces?

A. I had braces when I was a tween.

15. Have you ever been on TV?

A. I have, yes.

__________

I encourage you to visit other participants in Sunday Stealing posts and leave a comment. Cheers to all us thieves who love memes, however we come by them.

Saturday 9: Your Mother Should Know

Saturday 9: Your Mother Should Know (1967)

Unfamiliar with this week's tune? Hear it here.

1) This week's featured artists, The Beatles, invite us to get up and dance to a song that was a hit before your mother was born. Do you enjoy the oldies? How old must a song be before you consider it "old?"

A. I consider 1950s songs to be "old" - so older than I am. I listen to 1970s and 1980s music a lot, with some other decades thrown in for good measure.

2) Paul McCartney knew bandmate John Lennon's mom, Julia, and credits her with introducing him to the ukulele. Do you recall any of your childhood friends' mothers with fondness?

A. No.

 

3) Paul's own mother, Mary, tried to instill in her son a sense of pride in his appearance and saw to it he always left the house in a clean, ironed shirt. Paul says that, to this day, when he smells fresh laundry, he thinks of his mum. Is there a scent or sound that reminds you of someone you love who is no longer with us?

A. The smell of green beans cooking in fatback (southern style) always reminds me of my great-aunt. Her house always smelled like that.

4) George Harrison was the only member of the band to have any formal musical training. His mother, Louise, supported her son's musical ambitions and made sure he got guitar lessons. Did you take music classes as a child?

A. I did.

5) Ringo Starr was a sickly and often hospitalized little boy. His mother, Elsie, took a job as a barmaid so she could work at night, leaving her days free during visiting hours. When were you most recently in a hospital? Were you an admitted patient, there for an outpatient procedure, or visiting someone?

A. The last time I was in a hospital was pre-pandemic, November 2019, when my husband had his ankle fused together.

6) Mother Winters always gave our own Crazy Sam peppermint tea to calm her stomach. Do you have any tried-and-true home remedies to share?

A. Vinegar helps with acid reflux.

7) Sam's mother always tips 15% in restaurants. Sam has worked in food service and is more judgmental, tipping between 10% and 25%, depending on the quality of the service. What's your tipping policy?

A. I generally tip 15% percent, regardless. If the service is good, I might tip a bit more.

 

8) Sam's mother still gets the Sunday paper because of the sales fliers. She makes separate lists for each store, picking up grocery and household items where she knows they are on sale. Sam thinks her mother's strategy is a waste of time and gas and prefers one-stop shopping (even better, online one-stop shopping). Are you more like mother or daughter?

A. I still get the Sunday paper but that's because I want to read the news, not the ads. I prefer one-stop shopping (or even better, online).

9) Sam is celebrating Mother's Day with her mother's favorite, Hershey Bars. Would you prefer classic milk chocolate, dark chocolate or chocolate with almonds?

A. Dark chocolate.

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I encourage you to visit other participants in Saturday 9 posts and leave a comment. Because there are no rules, it is your choice. Saturday 9 players hate rules. We love memes, however.  

Musings on Three Pines

In the past year, I found Louise Penny's books about Armand Gamache, Chief Inspector of Homicide for the police force in Quebec.

(There may be spoilers here, so if you haven't read all the books, you may want to stop reading this.)

There are 17 of the books, and I have listened to all but three of them.

I enjoy the books and like the characters.

My one complaint is that several of Penny's characters have head injuries from which they completely recover. (If I have names wrong it's because I listen to the audiobooks so I haven't the names spelled out on a page.)

Gamache is shot in the head and makes a full recovery, aside from a slight tremor in his hand.

Isabelle LaCost, one of his investigators, has a head injury, and makes a full recovery, except for a slight limp that appears to have disappeared, but I'll know more as I finish up book #17.

Stephen somebody, the 93-year-old godfather of Gamache, (he shows up later in the series) is run over by a van and has a head injury. He lies in a coma for most of the book - and makes a full recovery. (This one in particular I found quite difficult. He's 93. Really?)

I know this is fiction, and in a fictional world I suppose anyone can be shot in the head and make a full recovery. I also know that in real life, such things do not happen. If people do recover from a head trauma, they generally are greatly changed, either in personality or in body or both, because recovery can take not weeks, but months and/or years. 

I would very much like for Penny to find another place for a main character to be injured besides in the head. A shot in the knee, perhaps. 

The head injuries and subsequent quick recoveries pull me from the world of the book. My rational mind jumps in and says, "This cannot be." Anything that distracts a reader from the world of the book is something that needs to be reexamined.

That this has happened at least three times (there may be others that I'm not recalling), makes me think that a head wound is this author's go-to injury. And that would be fine, I suppose, if I hadn't lost a friend to a head trauma after she was run over by a truck, if I hadn't watched an older person have a TIA right in front of me during a newspaper interview, if a friend from college hadn't been in a car wreck and then spent years in therapy relearning how to live her life, if someone else I know hadn't had a head injury and then gone berserk and tried to murder his family a long time ago.

But I know these things, and have some experience with head trauma, however slight, and I don't think my knowledge is anything special. However, it's enough to pull me from the story when the head trauma injuries miraculously heal without much time passing.

This is mostly a note for me to remind myself that, if I ever do find my voice for fiction, that I need to be sure not to pull the reader from the world of the book by using an inappropriate prop for authorial purposes, instead of reaching for a harder or more prudent incident that would keep the reader in the story.

Thursday Thirteen

1. Heavy and strange are my thoughts today, Obi Wan. Or is that Gandalf?

2. Spring here was rather dull; we had a cold snap that took out most of the flowering trees and they went straight to leaf status. However, the greenery is a relief over the starkness of winter.

3. Trying to figure out the rest of my life means trouble for my brain. It makes headaches happen.

4. I am old enough to be retired but I don't want to be retired. My doctor says I should not work.

5. The bird feeder needs to be refilled. It will probably be the last time we fill it as we generally don't feed the animals during the summer.

6. I am going today to have a mammogram. Make sure to get those tits looked at, ladies!

7. While I write this, I am listening to a friend complain about her job. Jobs are weird.

8. There's a cardinal at the feeder, so there still must be a little seed there.

9. I need to remove a lot of books from my shelves. I don't know where to donate them since the library stopped taking them.

10. Sometimes it is really hard to come up with thirteen things.

11. I need a new job skill set. Why couldn't I have studied engineering?

12. Or maybe I could have been a computer tech.

13. I am tired of adulting.

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Thursday Thirteen is played by lots of people; there is a list here if you want to read other Thursday Thirteens and/or play along. I've been playing for a while, and this is my 754th time to do a list of 13 on a Thursday. Or so sayth the Blogger counter, anyway.

I'm Alive Because of Roe v Wade

I'm 100 percent certain that if Roe v Wade were not the law of the land in the late 1980s and early 1990s, when I was trying desperately to have a child, I'd be dead.

My endometriosis was severe. Endometriosis is a disorder in which the tissue similar to the inner lining of the uterus (endometrium) grows outside the uterus. This results in pelvic pain and irregular menstrual cycle. The tissue can migrate all over the pelvic area and has even been found in the lungs of some women.

In my case, the first signs were pain. Pain during menstruation. Pain during intercourse. Pain all the time, some months.

Birth control pills helped control the pain so I could function. Otherwise, I would miss an average of two or three days of work a month. Over the counter pain pills didn't help. 

It is hard to hold a job or go to school and deal with that kind of pain. It is hard to have a marriage and have that kind of pain. It's hard to do much of anything with that kind of pain, quite frankly.

Since the use of birth control pills is something that many people believe may be threatened by overturning Roe v Wade, I would not have been able to utilize that outlet to control my health problem.

I married at age 20. I wasn't ready to have a child at the age of 20. We had little money when we married - taxes that first year wiped out our savings, and it took us a while to recover from that blow. (It was called the marriage penalty tax back then. I think they may have done away with that, but I'm not certain.)

The birth control pill was essential not only for birth control but for my pain and problems. We built our house in 1987 and in December of that year, I stopped taking the birth control pill so we could attempt to have a baby.

I was 24 years old.

Almost one month to the day I'd stopped taking birth control pills, I developed a fever and horrible pain in my abdomen. I went to my doctor who sent me off to a gynecologist immediately. He did a sonogram and saw that I had a huge cyst on my right ovary. 

It was the size of a grapefruit, and it had twisted. I had sepsis. And there was a second spot they couldn't identify on the sonogram.

It was possible this second spot was an ectopic pregnancy, (a baby outside of the womb) and without Roe v Wade, the doctor wouldn't have been able to operate. He could only have watched me die.

But because Roe v Wade was the law (and currently still is), the doctor sent me to the hospital, where they performed emergency surgery and saved my life. And while it turned out to be not one but two cysts, technology in 1987 was not what it is today. They couldn't have been sure.

And to be honest, I don't know if any of the treatment I received afterwards to try to help me have a child would be allowed without Roe v Wade. After the removal of the cysts, the doctor put me on a high-powered dose of a drug that stopped my menstrual cycle for months. The idea was to trick my body into a false pregnancy with these pills so as to give my body time to stop creating the endometrial tissue.

But it did not work. As soon as the doctor took me off of those drugs so we could try to have a child again, the cysts returned.

And I had another life-saving surgery because I again had sepsis. The cysts kept twisting and locking in infection. They grew huge. They were the size of grapefruits.

And each time the doctors opened me up and went in, they removed scar tissue and pieces of my ovaries, until finally, in 1992, after having already opened up my abdomen seven times as my husband and I tried to have a child, the doctors performed a hysterectomy. (They left the scar tissue because there was so much of it, but the problems that created is another story.)

I was 29 years old. I would never have a child.

If Roe v Wade had not existed, I would have died before I was 20. The doctors were sure that the birth control pills kept the cysts from coming on sooner, so without them, I'd have had the cysts much earlier, probably before I married. Would they have seen that second spot and decided it could have been an ectopic pregnancy, and let me die?

And if I'd died at 20, what difference would it have made to the world? Is that how people who want these safeguards to women's health removed see the world? What difference does it make if this woman dies, even if the pregnancy is already null and void (ectopic pregnancies generally do not go to term)? Really, is that how they think?

I know Roe v Wade saved my life when I was trying to have a child.

And now I see a future when women who want to have a child but have issues will die. When the treatment they need may be withheld . . . just because.

It is that simple.

And it is that sad.

What kind of bitter, horrible, twisted people wish such a fate on another human being?

Book Writing Question

A very long time ago, a writer friend of mine . . . stopped writing. She'd been a columnist for The Roanoke Times for a very long time, but she wanted to write novels.

She was an excellent writer, and I'd taken a few non-credit classes from her. She was also a cousin, many times removed, but a cousin, nevertheless. I admired her work for the newspaper. I admired her spirit, and her ability to be who she was.

But, she confided to me, she could not write a novel that she thought would sell. She wrote five novels, none of them published. She blamed Hollins College, now Hollins University, the place where we both went to college, she graduating in 1973, me in 1993. Twenty years apart, though we were only 12 years apart in age.

The college had, she decided, beat the writing out of her with the professors' proclamations that one must write literary for it to count. Writing something like, say, a Nancy Drew book wasn't writing. Writing something like Annie Dillard's Pilgrim at Tinker Creek was writing. Everything else was banal, unworthy, and unwelcome. They were still teaching that message, more or less, when I graduated college there, too, so many years later.

But the college has produced its fair share of good, if not great writers. Lee Smith, Jill McCorkle, Dillard, Margaret Wise Brown, and so many more. These authors are listed on the university website. But someone like me, who has published thousands of articles, is not listed there. Nor is my friend who wrote for The Roanoke Times.

So having tried, and in her mind, failing, my friend quit writing. "The world doesn't need another book," she told me, and turned her creativity to making handbags and other sewing and needlework projects.

Yet when she passed away unexpectedly several years ago, her husband noted her writing in her obituary, stating that she had written five novels. He did not mention that they were unpublished. Only that she had indeed made this accomplishment.

And it is an accomplishment, even if the novels only saw the inside the inside of a drawer.

I spoke about this memory to my friend's sister-in-law last year, a woman also a close and much-loved friend, but not a writer. She told me she agreed that the world did not need another book. It did not need, nor want, my book, she said, only months before she too passed away.

Was she trying to comfort me for my own frustration at failed efforts to put forth words that seem to stop where my head and heart cannot find common ground? Was she making a dig at me for even trying? Or simply agreeing with her sister-in-law as we discussed a memory I'd dredged up from the deep well of my mind as we tried to come to terms, her with dying, me with the knowledge that she would soon be gone?

My husband, upon learning of this conversation, said my friend was not really a friend if she told me that. It was not a supportive thing to say, he said. I remain undecided. She was ill, after all. And she was basically agreeing with someone she, too, had admired.

However, I find it a good question. Does the world need another book, when one can go to Amazon to see the world drowning in books, books that will never be read or studied, a book that may or may not make whoever wrote it even $1,000, if anything at all? Books given away for free for publicity's sake, books selling for 99 cents, books that someone spent 10 years writing only to see it on the remainder rack at the Green Valley Book Fair, if it makes it into a hard copy at all?

Does that time spent writing a book matter? Is it worth it? Who determines the value? Who determines the need?

How the hell does anyone answer such questions, especially when they become bound up with the images of dead people I loved?

The Water Bill Dream

Last night I dreamed that I received a bill in the mail for $26,000.00. It was from the water facility in New Castle, where I used to write the newspaper (I freelanced for the paper, but it's not a lie to say I wrote the paper. I did.).

The letter received with the bill showed a contract I'd signed on behalf of the paper (that's how tightly interwoven I was with this freelancing for this newspaper) for water services for the small office.

The company had never paid the bill, and here, more than 20 years later, I was getting it because my name was on the contract.

I panicked. I didn't have money to pay this off. My credit was going to be ruined. This was devastating!

Frantic, I tried to contact the former editor I wrote for. He's retired. I finally found him in a parking lot, and I jumped in his truck and told him I needed to talk to him. He said he didn't want to talk to me. I told him I knew where there were a massive herd of deer and that he should see it. He agreed. (I knew he'd never turn down a chance to see wildlife.) He said we were going to the Northstar (that's a restaurant in Buchanan) to eat breakfast first. Then we came to my house, where there was a herd of about 1,000 deer roaming in front of my house, and I panicked again because they were eating all the grass and the cows were going to starve.

I woke up with my jaw locked shut (happens sometimes) and my heart being over 100 beats per minute.

Now where did that come from?

Sunday Stealing

Sunday Stealing

First Job: Babysitting

First Favorite Politician: Jim Olin, who served the 6th District in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1983 to 1993.

First Record/CD: We had some Disney's children's records, including So Dear to My Heart. My first "grown up" record was, I think, the soundtrack from Grease.

First Sport Played: I never really played sport. Just softball or whatever at recess.

First Concert: The Commodores, although I don't think that's right. I think my parents took me to some country singer's concert before I snuck out to that one.

First Foreign Country Visited: Spain.

First Favorite TV Show: Land of the Giants

First Favorite Actor: Lee Majors

First Favorite Actress: Kate Jackson

First Girlfriend/Boyfriend: James. Almost all of my boyfriends were named James. I was looking for the right "James," I guess.

First Encounter with a Famous Person: That would have been when I met Virginia Governor Douglas Wilder, I believe.

First House/Condo Owned: The one I live in now.

First Film Seen: I don't recall the first. Probably some Disney flick.

First Favorite Radio Station: K-92 FM

First Book I Remember Reading: The Cat in the Hat, by Dr. Suess, when I was about four, followed by a memory of reading Bambi, by Felix Salten, when I was in the second grade. I am sure there were many others in between.

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I encourage you to visit other participants in Sunday Stealing posts and leave a comment. Cheers to all us thieves who love memes, however we come by them.

Saturday 9: As Time Goes By

Saturday 9: As Time Goes By (1958)

Unfamiliar with this week's tune? Hear it here.

1) This song begins with, "You must remember this." Do you often write things down to help you remember?

A. I am one of those people who make lists so I can remember things, and then I lose the lists. I'm trying to do better with this.

 

2) The lyrics tell us that moonlight and love songs are never out of date. Tell us about something else that seems timeless.

A. Stories. People have told stories forever and will continue to tell stories until we've had our last war and destroyed the human race.

3) Originally written in 1931, "As Time Goes By" is best known as the love theme from the 1942 film, Casablanca. According to the American Film Institute, there's only one song from a movie soundtrack that's more expressly identified with the film: "Over the Rainbow" from The Wizard of Oz. What song reminds you of your favorite movie?

A. Into the West, by Annie Lennox, sung at the end of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. It's a beautiful song. I want it played at my funeral.

 

4) This version is from The George Sanders Touch, an LP recorded by an Oscar-winning character actor. There is scant evidence that it sold well. Tell us about something you thought was a good idea at the time, but looking back, would have done differently.

A. Freelancing for the newspaper instead of going on as a salaried reporter.

 

5) This album was really something of a consolation prize for George. He worked with a vocal coach, hoping to win the romantic lead in the film version of South Pacific, but alas, the role went to a younger man. He had fun making this record instead. Have you recently taken lemons and made lemonade? 

A. I made a chicken casserole. This may not sound like an answer to the question, but it is, because we were tired of plain ol' chicken and the casserole was good. So I took plain ol' chicken and made . . . chickenade.

6) He usually played suave but unsympathetic characters. That's why he gave his autobiography the self-aware title, Memoirs of a Professional Cad. What would you call your life story?

A. The Autobiography of Nobody

 

7) The night he won his Oscar, George Sanders accepted the statuette, bowed deeply and then, safely behind the curtain and away from cameras, surprised onlookers by crying. Have you ever cried tears of joy?

A. Not in a long, long time.

 

8) George Sanders wed perennial talk show guest and occasional actress Zsa Zsa Gabor in 1949. Sixteen years after their divorce, he married Zsa Zsa's less famous but also glamorous sister, Magda. After a month, George and Magda thought better of it and had the union annulled. Sam thinks this is one of the oddest romantic tales she's ever stumbled upon while researching Saturday 9. Have you ever known anyone who divorced one sibling and then married another? (Hallmark movies don't count.)

A. I can't think of anyone.

9) Random question: You're in a line of 25 people at the post office. How many of those other 24 are more patient at waiting than you are?

A. Two. I don't mind waiting, generally speaking. But in today's world, I would never go in the post office if there were that many people in there. Too many germs.

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I encourage you to visit other participants in Saturday 9 posts and leave a comment. Because there are no rules, it is your choice. Saturday 9 players hate rules. We love memes, however.  

 

Thursday Thirteen

1. A female cardinal

2. The bird feeder

3. A sparrow

4. Oak trees

5. Sage grass

6. Wooden fence post

7. Metal fence post

8. Fence line

9. Green grass

10. Bull pine

11. Brush pile

12. Chickadee

13. Dove

These are the things I have seen out the window while I was thinking of something to write for today!

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Thursday Thirteen is played by lots of people; there is a list here if you want to read other Thursday Thirteens and/or play along. I've been playing for a while, and this is my 753rd time to do a list of 13 on a Thursday. Or so sayth the Blogger counter, anyway.

Gobble Gobble

 

It's spring turkey season!

Sunday Stealing

Sunday Stealing

15 things that make you smile

A. (1) My husband, (2) my brother, (3) my friends, (4) playing my guitar, (5) reading a good book, (6) hearing a good song, (7) seeing a sunset, (8) watching the moon rise, (9) sitting in the dark looking for shooting stars, (10) watching the deer play in the front yard, (11) an unexpected gift, (12) chocolate, (13) an unexpected visit or phone call, (14) writing something that comes out well, (15) having someone else cook.

14 things that make you frown

A. (1) Seeing the face of the former guy in my news feed, (2) hearing bad news about somebody, (3) losing something, (4) not finding the foods I'm looking for in the grocery store, (5) having to cook dinner AGAIN, (6) missing a show I want to watch, (7) not exercising like I had planned to, (8) missing a note/chord when I'm playing guitar, (9) not writing, (10) my husband tracking in dirt, (11) my current governor, (12) missing a phone call from someone I want to talk to, (13) cold weather in springtime, (14) missing a good shot when I'm taking photographs. 

13 things you see every day

A. (1) My husband, (2) my computer, (3) the Blue Ridge Mountains, (4) deer, (5) the shed, (6) the shower, (7) my medications, (8) my guitars, (9) clocks, (10) my calendar, (11) my phone, (12), my desk, (13) my glass of water.

12 things you have always wanted to try

A. (1) Going to Egypt to see the pyramids, (2) getting my Ph.D., (3) writing a book, (4) taking a cruise, (5) learning pottery, (6) walking around the world, (7) being a geologist, (8) being an archeologist, (9) playing on stage in front of 10,000 people, (10) being an astronaut and going into space, (11) acting, (12) learning to speak so I don't sound so "southern."

11 objects that mean a lot to you

A. (1) My watch, (2) my glasses, (3) my computer, (4) my Kindle, (5) my books, (6) my guitars, (7), my cameras, (8) my work hidden in the filing cabinet, (9) the journals that have my poetry published in them, (10) my blog (is that an object?), (11) my phone.

10 places you have been

A. (1) Myrtle Beach, SC, (2) Charleston, SC, (3) Williamsburg, VA, (4) Virginia Beach, VA, (5) Pocono, PA, (6) New York City, (7) Madrid, Spain, (8) Paris, France, (9) California (multiple cities), (10) Florida (Go Disney!)

9 of your favorite foods

A. (1) Baked Lays Potato Chips, (2) Watermelon, (3) chocolate (though I can't eat it much anymore), (4) eggs, (5) meatloaf, (6), chicken, (7), peas, (8) salad, (9) blueberries.

8 things you would rather be doing

A. (1) sleeping, (2) walking, (3) taking pictures, (4) driving, (5) reading, (6) playing a video game, (7) holding hands with my husband, (8) talking to a friend.

7 things you would take to a deserted island

A. (1) My glasses, (2) a big roll of duct tape, (3) a variety of seeds, (4) a big cook pot, (5) a solar powered radio/battery charger thing, (6) my kindle full of unread books, (7) a sleeping mat.

6 things you wish you never had to do

A. (1) Cook, (2) clean the toilet, (3) take out the trash, (4) work for money, (5) pick up the trash after the bear's been in the garbage, (6) cut down a tree.

5 people that mean the world to you

A. (1) My husband, (2) My brother, (3) My father, (4) my friend, (5) my mother-in-law.

4 of your biggest fears

A. (1) not having enough money in my old age, (2) losing my husband, (3) losing my eyesight, (4) getting pancreatic cancer.

3 words to describe how you feel right now

A. (1) Tired, (2) Lonely, (3) Confused.

2 things you're excited for

A. (1) My husband is eventually going to have a hip replacement so he will be out of pain, if we can ever get the surgery scheduled, (2) getting a haircut.

1 thing you want to say to someone

A. "You are the enemy of this country, you should be in jail, and I don't understand why you're still walking the streets."

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I encourage you to visit other participants in Sunday Stealing posts and leave a comment. Cheers to all us thieves who love memes, however we come by them.

Saturday 9: Dancing in the Moonlight

Saturday 9: Dancing in the Moonlight (1972)

Unfamiliar with this week's tune? Hear it here.

 

1) The lyrics tell us the moon is big and bright. Do you often take the time to watch the sun set or look at the moon?

A. I do. This morning I was out early with the camera trying to get a picture of the sunrise, but to get the picture I wanted I needed to walk out in the wet grass, and I was still in my robe and slippers. So, I settled for a shot of the moon, which was still high in the sky. A children's moon, I call it.

Sunrise. I wanted to get the mountains behind the trees.

Early morning Children's Moon.

2) The lead singer of King Harvest, Dave "Doc" Robinson, tells us that everyone feels "warm and right." How would you describe your mood as you answer these 9 questions?

A. I have been in a bit of a funk for a good while now, but these are decent questions. Saturday 9 always has good questions.

3) He sings that his friends don't bark or bite. What about you? Is your bark worse than your bite?

A. I think so. I haven't bitten anyone in quite a while.

 

4) He believes you cannot be unhappy when you dance. Do you agree?

A. I think you can be unhappy when you dance, but it can also cheer one up a bit.

 

5) King Harvest was not the only name the band used. They once performed as E. Rodney Jones and the Prairie Dogs. If you ever played in a band, tell us what it was called. If you haven't, make up a band name.

A. I played in a band called Almost Famous, and this was in the 1970s, long before there was a movie out with that name. My father also had a band. His was called Music Incorporated. If I were going to have a band now, I think I would call it Blue Magic Music, after my blog.

Me getting down with Almost Famous.

6) Even though this was a major hit, King Harvest's record label, Perception, went bankrupt in 1974. This decade has been hard on many businesses -- especially restaurants -- and many closed their doors due to covid. Tell us about a shop or restaurant that closed recently, and that you miss.

A. I don't have an answer to this. I know we've had businesses close, but I did not frequent them generally, so I don't miss them.

7) This very upbeat song came from pain. While vacationing in St. Croix, songwriter Sherman Kelly was the victim of vicious gang attack and was left for dead. He wrote this song during his long recuperation, and it helped him envision joy. Is there a song that reliably lifts your mood? (Yes, you can say this song. Mr. Kelly is right, it IS joyful!)

A. Uptown Funk, I Can See Clearly Now, and Band on the Run.

 

8) In 1972, when this song topped the charts, Wrangler jeans were America's best-selling blue jeans. Do you often wear denim?

A. I wear old lady denim.

9) Random question: Which of these is completely, 100% UNTRUE of you: Greedy, lazy, or jealous?

A. I don't think those can be completely untrue of anyone. Everyone has some pinch of those qualities of some sort or another. One can be greedy with money, food, possessions, or people one knows. One can be industrious about work but lazy about doing home chores. One can be jealous of another's success, or jealous of another's wealth, and so on and so forth. What matters is not that we experience these emotions, but how we react to them, and whether or not that emotion leads to action, for good or ill.

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I encourage you to visit other participants in Saturday 9 posts and leave a comment. Because there are no rules, it is your choice. Saturday 9 players hate rules. We love memes, however.  

Periwinkle

I ran across this patch of periwinkle* in the hollow of the lower pasture next to the woods. I thought it a strange place to find a flower I normally associated with a house garden but have since learned it is considered an invasive plant now, having "escaped" from old homesteads and gardens and now flourishing freely along highways and forest edges.

It's still a pretty ground cover, but I will leave it at the edge of the woods and not move it up near the house.

*At least, I think it's periwinkle.