Desperation in Ten Minutes

This bit of writing is from a 10 minute writing exercise at Writer's group on Friday. Each of us chose a folded paper with a household object written on it. The challenge was to write from the objects perspective. I did minimal editing - fixing typo's, misspellings. And of course added the quotation and image this evening. 

Can you guess what household object I chose?

Desperation in Ten Minutes

"Oh my heavens! I am so tired of feeling walked on by everyone.  I had great plans when I was readied for sale. All the fabric and yarn that went into my beautiful visage. I was confident that someone with taste would purchase me as a wall hanging. That was not what happened. What happened was a young couple with children. Not children who ran outside to play but toddlers and babies. I know I heard the young moms cooing over their little rugrats. But I wasn’t impressed. Peanut butter, jam, muddy feet, baby drool. And never getting washed, vacuumed and returned to my original beauty. And milk spills! Orange juice! The milk is the worst. Getting sour and turning the whole room nasty and smelly. Did I mention wine? Red wine? And that’s not the children. That’s the parents. After their little darlings were sleeping out comes the wine glasses, or if the church lady is visiting, purple grape juice. Once upon a time I was leafy and green on a lovely white background. Once upon a time I was soft and  plush. Just when I thought I was safe….a new puppy and kitten were let loose. Clawing and scratching, chewing and the worst of all - peeing in the soured milk. How ever can I get my owners to see what they have done to me? I’d cry but I don’t know how. And now this great heavy footed man with a gigantic machine thing that’s not a vacuum has stomped in….Oh no, he’s plugging in a machine….Phew! Finally a steam cleaner!"

“Desperation does not breed empathy or clear thinking.”

~ Joseph Fink, Welcome to Night Vale

Hogwash

Hogwash 

Hadleigh confidently decided that he was really much like the avocado pit he was reading about.
Oh, not a real avocado pit but he had a writing career spanning so many years, with so many great ideas in his head just wating to send forth roots, shoots and grandness, that there did seem a parallel.
‘Good Heavens!’ Hadleigh thought with a start.
‘What if this handsome head looks all pear shaped and green like an avocado with ears!’
Avocado pits, Hadleigh reasoned, were stuffed with food, their embryonic roots and shoots nestled tightly within, just waiting for the right time, temperature and water to sprout and grow into gigantic trees that provided so very much to the ecosystem at large!
Surely, his ideas and beliefs were absolutely as expansive and long lived, weren’t they?
Hadleigh shook his head and decided that this strange parallel between his own brilliance and an avocado pit was probably just a lot of hogwash.

“The greater the artist, the greater the doubt. Perfect confidence 

is granted to the less talented as a consolation prize.”

~ Robert Hughes, [Modernism’s Patriarch (Time Magazine,)]

I See, I Hear, I Believe

When I see the things I see
-my heart feels joy
-my mind is freed
-my spirit believes

When I hear the sounds I hear
- my heart sings along
  - my mind traces melody
  - my spirit soars

When I believe in myself
-my heart is courageous
-my mind is curious
-my spirit is confident.

“Close your eyes and turn your face into the wind.

Feel it sweep along your skin in an invisible ocean of exultation.

Suddenly you know you are alive.”

~ Vera Nazarian, The Perpetual Calendar of Inspiration

The Right to Vote

“On this date in 1919, the Texas Legislature ratified the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, guaranteeing women the right to vote.” June 28, 2010 By Hillary Sorin 

In October 2015, I cast my vote in the Canadian federal election. In Canada women got the federal vote in three stages from 1917 through 1919.

A dual citizen, I again was privileged to cast my vote in a federal election. Today I participated in the U.S. Global Presidential Primary. While I have no expectation that my one vote will sway the results in any specific direction, I am definitely confident in my right to vote.

“Human rights are women’s rights, and women’s rights 

are human rights. Let us not forget that among those rights 

are the right to speak freely - and the right to be heard.”

~ Hillary Rodham Clinton

Confidence ~ 2

Confidence.
We are not born with it ~

Or are we?

Confidence
Not on store shelves for purchase.
Is it learned?

Confidence
A feeling of solid excitement
Does that even make sense?

Confidence
A battle for good enough, fast enough, right enough
Enough is who I am right now.

Confidence
Learning confidence is a real challenge.
A challenge I’m willing to accept.

“It is best to act with confidence, no matter how little right you have to it.”

~ Lillian Hellman

Disappearing Deadlines

There is no way
No way I can get this posted before midnight!
It’s 11:43 pm!!
My last chance for a February 29^th posting for four more years
I’m not leaping into March
I’m sliding into March
And so the beginning is this:
The beginning of four more years 
before I can post on a February 29^th.
And before midnight.

“I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.”

~ Douglas Adams

Dignity: Two Perspectives

I’ve been thinking of two things today. Well, a lot more but, two issues have taken front and centre stage. The Oscars and dignity of burial. Odd pairing! The second, dignity of burial, was the discussion this morning on The 180 with Jim Brown on CBC Radio: “Sprinkling Grandmas’s ashes from your pant leg: is there a right and wrong way to scatter human remains?”

Dignity. How could that be a dignified way to leave this world? But as I thought about it, dignity is not a one size fits all quality. I think of the many memorials, gatherings, or funerals I have attended over the last several decades.  Each was tailored by the generation that raised each person from the beginning throughout their life, long, short or some where in the middle. All of their life experience and finally their wishes. If sending ash surreptitiously down a pant leg, into the soil of a garden or park, is the wish of an individual then isn’t that as dignity conferred.

Then it’s the Oscars. This is the first year I’ve watched the Oscar Awards for many years. It’s the first time in many years I’ve had a television, and been at home to watch. Lots of glitz and glamour. We are entertained, awed and challenged by these movies, seeing only the finished product and maybe staying to watch the credits roll by. This evening I saw many of the faces of those people in the credits. So many more than just the cast of actors. And even then we are not privileged to see all of those that build our entertainment for us. Special make-up artists, cinematographers costume designers, set designers, musical score composers, and so many more - not enough time or space to name them all. More dignity conferred.

“One’s dignity may be assaulted, vandalized and cruelly mocked, 

but it can never be taken away unless it is surrendered.”

~ Michael J. Fox

2015 In Paper

A stack of papers
Files not yet put away
Gathered neatly on desk and table
Over weeks and
Who knows?  Months?
Sorted
Ordered
Tucked away in file folders
Tax files prepared for ‘the tax man’
Old statements….and I mean some are old….
Bound for the shredder.
Another year
From beginning to end
Story in statements, reports and warranties
Everything in its place.

“Nothing good in this world come for free! For everything 

there’s a payment of time or money or soul.”

~ Kellyn Roth, The Dressmaker’s Secret