Category Archives: Life

by | April 11, 2011 · 9:45 am

rejoice always: a practical application


so. auto accident a few weeks ago, increasingly bi-polar auto air conditioner (thank God for power windows – but it’s in the 80s most days now and not a lot of breeze), and this morning, the big one: my car wouldn’t start. wouldn’t even turn over. the remote unlocked the doors, my kiddo and i got in the car, i inserted the key into the ignition, turned it and…nothing. nada. zip. zero reaction. nobody home. brain dead.

well, okay, there WAS a slight reaction: my gas gauge registered and the mileage appeared on the dash screen. great. at least i know how much gas i have left and how many miles till i reach 100,000.

i had to rouse the parents for a ride, ’cause my brother had already left for his 24 hour shift at the station, and my kiddo starts the reading and math portions of FCAT today. first thing. at least he had a good, healthy breakfast. yep, he was late. but i was smart and called the school to let them know we were having car trouble, but he’d be there. go me.

drove back by the house on my way to work to be sure i’d locked the car. because i thought i’d hit the remote, but not 100 percent sure of that. my sad little car was still unlocked. i pressed the “lock” on the remote, expecting to hear the click of doors securing. nothing. zilch. pressed it again, just to be sure. nothing doing. sighed, opened the driver door to press the power locks. also dead. what?! for the first time in the six years i’ve owned that hunk of metal (it’s entire life off the lot), i had to manually lock all the doors on my car.

i think this is more than just needing a new battery. electrical problem? if so, it’s going right back to the body shop that repaired the car after my accident. i’ve had it back less than a week and since nothing unusual has happened in that time, must be something they did/didn’t do.

so. working on the “rejoice always” and “in everything give thanks” (even when you don’t want to & fail to see the good in a given situation) theories, i rejoiced and gave thanks this morning over my dead car. and who knows, i might have avoided another accident or something much worse by not being able to drive my own car and leave the house at that time. God knows what he’s doing; i guess it’s not important that he tell me. so i’m trying to exercise my tiny kernel of faith and just TRUST him…not always an easy thing to do, ’cause i’ve got this control issue…

i also tried to find the silver lining, and what do you know, there is one: i get to drive my mom’s still-like-new fully air conditioned ford hybrid suv that drives like a dream and has power everything. at least for today. : – )

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Filed under Blogging, Humor, Life, Motherhood, Musings, Real Life, Sarcasm, Thankful

by | March 16, 2011 · 12:45 pm

can we expand the menu, please!?


So an old friend contacted me out of the blue recently, several years after leaving me the emotional equivalent of a beached whale, flopping out of my element, gasping for air, frantic that I’d not find sanctuary before I expired. (Okay, it wasn’t quite that dramatic). This “friend” had been something more at the time, and then the drama started. Not quick enough – or smart enough – to hightail it, I ended up being badly burned. Emotionally speaking.

Anyway. Apparently, he’s desperate to talk to someone. – Or so he says. Manipulative much? – And clearly, I’m the current favorite. I know of at least one other person he’s used as “confessor.” Why not call that other person? Or better yet, call God. Let Him deal with the baggage. I haven’t decided yet whether I’m going to give him another chance as a friend. Maybe at arm’s length. He pretty much burned the bridge for anything else and would have to perform AMAZING feats of daring do to get back into my good graces enough to rank above friendship status again.

What I want to know is why I seem to be a magnet for damaged guys. Not one of those little, dull magnets that everything falls off of within a day or two. No. I’m talking about one of those huge, good-as-new, shiny magnets. The kind you have to place inside a superconductor box inside freezing cold temps to break its hold on metal objects. One guy was abused as a child – actually, more than one of them was, but I digress – another suffered a baseball bat beating by friends of a psycho ex-girlfriend, another discovered his weakness for “recreational” drugs and had his stomach pumped at least once. And let’s not forget the spoiled, spiteful young man who was an early object of my affections. I regret to say that I allowed him to systematically tear my self-image & esteem to shreds. All of them in their own way drained me to the point of depression. I guess we’re all a little damaged in some way, but it’d be nice to once in a while attract the attentions of a guy who’s risen from the ashes of abuse or psycho girlfriends or whatever else he’s been addicted to and allowed it to make him stronger as a man, rather than continually riding the ferris wheel of self-pity, recidivism and emotional unavailability.

Here’s my order: I’ll take one tall, relatively slender, firmly heterosexual caucasian (ethnicity is negotiable for the right man) male please, heavy on the positive work ethics, a generous helping of morality, a little of the bad boy/devil-may-care personality, a bountiful helping of self-respect and respect for others. He must also be intelligent and have at least a level of common sense comparable to mine (why would I want a man who I can easily manipulate and out-conversate??). A college degree in something useful would be nice. Ambition, a well-paying steady job; likes to travel (outside the USA as well as in), not more than 7 years younger or 10- 15 years older than me. And yes, must be of the same faith as me. There are a few more…um…intimate details, but as this is a family friendly blog, those particular details will be revealed only to the applicant(s) in question. : – )

Am I asking for too much, do you think? I know they’re out there somewhere. I’ve met them. Unfortunately, most of them are married! I don’t want perfection, but a girl’s gotta have SOME standards.

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Filed under Friendship, Humor, Life, Musings, Random, Real Life, Relationships, Sarcasm, Stuff, Writing

by | February 7, 2011 · 9:21 pm

Images of Wilkes-Barre


My first Residency at Wilkes University in January 2009, was pretty intense. Classes all day and homework assignments every night, to be turned in the next morning. One of our assignments was to walk around the town of Wilkes-Barre, consider the blight and beauty of the town, then write about it. The genre that would express our vision – fiction, non-fiction, poetry, drama or screenplay – was assigned based on small groups – 4 or 5 students to a group. For this exercise, my group had to write a poem. This is the poem I composed while walking the beautiful and blighted streets of Wilkes-Barre.

In my travels
I walk the streets
of a quaint old mining town
that has seen better years.

Architecture at once blighted and beautiful;
buildings formerly stately and proud
give silent witness to attention once paid;
lives once lived, now forsaken.

History lives on, rich and present;
ghosts of a time maybe long forgotten
bright colors weathered and worn.
Walking down the streets, you imagine and sense.

A six-sided star – embedded high in the window
of a house of faith existing
in the midst of the bleakness and gloom –
seems to speak of hope for redemption.

Though barren and worn, some pride remains;
though tired efforts to restore fall short,
still, deserted gables stare with hopeful eyes
peering down at us, following our passage.

Silent voices screaming in my ears,
“Wait! Come and stay with me.
Gaze out of my windowpane and
keep company with me.”

“My inhabitants are all gone away
I’ve been abandoned for far too long.
Dust coats my casements
my covers are tatters and rags.”

The pleading voices fade as we swiftly pass
more pressing matters fill our thoughts;
no time to waste
on ancient and deserted lives.

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Filed under Life, Musings, Poetry, Writing