Going Back

Let's go back to where the air is clear, the sky so blue, the sand so soft and warm, the house so grown up, where the friendship is the best! Let's get captured once again!

Drippity drip drip...droppity drop drop

Drippity drip drip......droppity drop drop........

Pull the covers back over you head and listen
to the drops and drips – let them lull you back to slumber.

Curl up in your favorite chair with a book or glossy
pretty magazine and let your eyes go heavy with
the light

Eat toast and jam, drink something hot, and feel
the warmth in your core

Let your furry family wrap their warmth around
you and feel small heart beats...

Drippity drip drip ..... droppity drop drop

Collections

Why does the mere fact of collecting things into boxes give so many of us a thrill? Is it the fact that we are organizing the stuff, junk, crap, treasure, heirlooms, etc? Or is it simply that we have the things in a compact spot for our eyes only? And why does the act of collecting this stuff, junk, crap, treasure, heirloom give us pleasure? My father collected junk, my grandfather collected junk, my Aunt Sally collected junk – I think I come by it along the branch of the proverbial apple tree. Of course, my collections are special. Magazines with beautiful, glossy pictures of rooms and gardens for which I could never live a life long enough or many enough to duplicate for myself. But definitely the nesting fantasies I feel when I look at these pages give me that sense of pleasure that I cannot describe. I collect shells and wine corks – shells because I can physically pick up and bring home with me a piece of the beach, any beach, where I feel so connected. Wine corks – for the silliness of it. I will NEVER make a trivet or craft from them – I just like to see them all in a basket. It’s amazing.

My china cabinet is full of collected stuff, junk, crap, treasure and heirloom as well. And when I open the door, it smells of pepper from when it used to sit in my grandmother’s house filled with her treasures. That smell brings a smile to my face every time I open the cabinet door – I think of my grandmother and her snow white hair, twinkley eye and Scottish brogue.

My attic is filled with plastic bins of collected stuff, junk, crap, treasure and heirloom too. An odd assortment of holiday decor, but most treasured are the things from my daughter’s childhood. I will never throw away that picture with the macaroni tree or the hand print made of pudding (bugs are long gone from both). Her collection of plastic horses that made up her world for so much of her childhood and fostered her imagination that has formed her into a fabulously talented, thinking young woman. Yes people, I attribute that collection to all of that!

Unfortunately for my daughter, friends and family, these collections of stuff, junk, crap, treasure and heirloom will stay with me until the end of my days. And when all of you go through it some day and laugh, cry and get angry, please remember all the collected stuff, junk, crap, treasure and heirloom all of you have in your nooks and crannies. But most especially, think of me and know the small pleasures my collections gave to me.

Be My Guest

If I could have a guest room like this, I would have a guest every weekend! Or I would be my own guest. I could have a nice cup of tea, a stack of magazines, some Diana Krall on the MP3 player and I would/could live in this little house!

Sniffing for words

I am suffering from writers block again.....this is worse than having the flu or a bad cold! I feel so disconnected when I am not writing. Help....is there an inhaler for writers block? If not, there should be.

Change and birthdays

I have been feeling quite nostalgic the past few days, more than likely due to my birthday cycling around again for this year. I miss my family and friends who are gone and for whom my birthday was important to besides myself. Most of all, I miss my mom on my birthday. I always felt that special connection and she was the first person who would call me on my birthday every year, no matter where I was or what she was doing. I think the connection to my mom on my birthday is a connection I will never have with anyone else in my life and one that is the most important in my life. I hope my own daughter feels the same way - I am pretty sure she does. I feel as though the older I get, the happier I get. I am glad I am where I am today. I have decided to make some major changes in my life - mainly to go along with my major changes in the past few months. I am on a roll....may as well roll with it. This is random writing - all over the place. That's okay though. I don't write for others, I write for myself.

Happy

I haven't been in this space in quite awhile...I have been trying to calm my life down, get back into a rythmn and figure out how to do it all in a week. I love love love my job and pinch myself every day to remind myself that it is real. I still get queasy when I read about unemployment in S.C. and how at a moment's notice, your life can change and you can be thrown into a washing machine drum of unemployment, rejection, panic, and helplessness. I see people who are smart, dedicated, ethical, loyal that are now trying to portray themselves to an employer who only knows them as one of 200+ applicants for a job that may not even be the best fit, but it would pay a salary so they can provide for the family. I am just a little panicky right now writing this because I remember how one person can change your life without you ever having control over the event at all.
I am so very happy and excited to be working with a group of people so dedicated to the good of my city and have met some awesome people on this new journey. I feel so confident, and so needed, and so very fortunate. I need to constantly remind myself I am worthy of the assignment, I am capable of the job, I am now doing more than just a job - I am living a whole new life wherein I can make a difference for years to come and bring this wonderful, spectaculoar city front and center to anyone who would contemplate moving here and being a part of us. You just cannot even imagine how wonderful this city is until you see it also behind the scenes and you look back and say, yes, this is why this city is so damn wonderful!