Reception.

I wrote this Wednesday afternoon, but did not want to interrupt "Artistic Thursday", or Lizzy's Birthday, so here it is...

I love receiving packages in the mail. I don't have the whole adult thing going on where packages are concerned. I can't just put them on a table and leave them there for later. I open them with holiday like glee. I throw packing material all over the place and my inner child screams, "WhatDidIGet!".

Today it was a TV antenna I bought for my attic in a sleepless haze. For a change, I was glad I did. I pulled it out of the box and began putting it together with erector set ease. That is until I realized that a nut was missing. Minor setback, that is what electrical tape is for and I'll buy the nut at Nut Depot, eventually. Of course it came 45 mins before I was leaving for the city, so I won't be able to mount it in the attic until this weekend. That does not mean I can't try it out, right?

I grab a piece of coax cable, attach one end to the antenna and the other to the tv. In a fountain like "Zeus hurling a lightning bolt" pose, I hold the antenna in the air as I gently reach over and change the tv from cable to antenna. It starts searching for channels. I'm on the first floor, so I'm not expecting much. Damn, lightning bolts must be lighter than tv antennas because after ten minutes, my arm begins to tire. So now I look like a four year old trying to throw one of those giant styrofoam airplanes. The '0' on the digital channel counter changes to '1' and I'm back on Mt. Olympus. Thirty seconds later, the search was done and the counter hadn't changed. The lone channel was about to come on.
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Telemundo, I don't understand what they're saying, and I don't care. I used to know a little Spanish, now I can't even order food at taco bell. That does not stop me from being mesmerized by their programs. The actors are cheesy, the actresses are hot and they all speak like their tonsils are attached to there inner organs. Last weekend when the kids were over, they were flicking through the cable channels when I yelled, "STOP!". It was Cameleones(I think it means pastry.), or something like that. Emily tried interpreting for the first few seconds, then realized that they talked way to fast. We started trying to guess what they were saying by their body language. You just can't do that with American television. American actors don't look like they're getting tasered every time they talk. They are too stiff.

Even the comedies are funny. Sabados Gigantes(I think it means big balls), never ceases to make me laugh. Funny people, funny scenes, funny show. Maybe Saturday Night Live should have William Shatner host every week and broadcast in Spanish, it couldn't hurt. Anyway I have to get to the train now.

Ariva Durci

In a Daughter's Eyes

Yesterday was Lizzy's Birthday. I got the 2:15p.m. Train out of Hoboken so I could get home by 3p.m. In order to buy what I needed and make Lizzy a cake, unfortunately, as usual NJ Transit had different plans for my time and the train broke down 2 mins. From my station. I arrived at the station at a little after 4:00p.m.. Lizzy's new “thing” is WWE wrestling. I have been known to make spectacular cakes, but with three hours to go and still having to buy supplies, I knew I would have to improvise. My thought was to create a fondant base over a square cake. Use pretzel rods and strawberry shoestring licorice for the ropes and buy some wrestling figures. In the center I would put a WWE logo. To complete the cake.

With a twenty minute drive home and the kids supposedly arriving at 7:00p.m. I pulled into Rite Aid to see what I could find to fit the bill. The only WWE figures they had were huge so the smaller fireman and policeman figures would have to do. Next for the ropes, Rite Aid always has the red shoestring licorice. Not today, looks like I'd have to pull apart sour band candies. OK, one more item on my list, they have to have pretzel rods. Of course not, why break the pattern?   I remembered I bought some safety candles a while back, they would have to do. O.K. So now I figure I better get home and start baking the cake. I get to the register and see WWE wrestling cards. Awesome! If I can't use them on the cake, I'll give them to Lizzy I am so ill prepared to decorate this cake, but my kids know I always make cakes for their birthdays, so I can't let her down.

I got home and pulled the Aldi's confetti cake mix, mixer square cake pan and everything else I needed out and put it on the counter. I whipped together the batter and 30mins. Later, a small square cake and tray of cupcakes came out of the oven. I let them cool and used the square pan as a base for the cake. I actually found blue icing in the cupboard, so the mat was blue. The candles and candy ropes were a pain in the butt. I put the fighters in the center. Something was missing. The cards, I put the cards around the cake pan to cover it and give it a WWE feel.

In just a couple of hours, I baked a cake, cooled it and decorated it. It fell so far short of what I had originally envisioned and could have done had I had the time.  The kids didn't make it over until after eight o'clock, but the look on Elizabeth's face, when she saw the cake, told me that in her eyes, it was better than anything I could have envisioned. Her mouth dropped open and she said, “ A Wrestling Cake. Wow!”. My utter embarrassment at the decorating job faded away as I realized I had created a hero moment.  She hugged me and thanked me. She really had wanted the wrestling cake. The cake was delicious and we quickly enjoyed a piece. I gave her the new camera and her birthday was complete.

Happy Birthday Lizzy.

Artistic Thursday - Star Babies of the Brook

Insomnia.

Lately I've been struggling with insomnia. I'm not sure why, but my mind has started to become alert at night. I've tried meditation, setting alarms to tell me when it's bed time, warm milk, etc.. I've even stopped my nightly pot of tea in hopes that it would have some effect. Nothing seems to work and though it is not hindering my performance yet, I have been sleeping rather late on the weekends.

When I was in corporate America, I was on call 24x7 and call they did. Between commute and working at home, I was only getting about 1.5 hours of sleep a night plus one hour on the train. After years of doing it, I was irritable, tired and stressed out. I even worked some 24 hour + days and on one instance worked 78 hours straight. Don't let anyone tell you different, somewhere after 60 hours, your body decides it wants to start shutting down and your mind starts falling apart. Not the feeling you want to have trapped at an office and not in front of people you work with. I wish I could explain it better, but it is a feeling unlike anything else I have experienced. It is out of body in a bad way.

After I left corporate America, I still woke up all hours of the night startled, swearing I heard the cellphone or pager going off and expecting to have to answer a hardware or software issue.

I've always been able to function with little sleep and worked on a night crew at a supermarket while going to community college. I refuse to take any sleeping aids. I'd rather die of exhaustion then of a side effect and don't trust drug companies that spend more time appeasing their marketing department, than their chemists

Tonight and tomorrow night, I'll be in the city, so I don't think that will help.

When I get back, I'll have to try and get my body into a routine of going to bed earlier and hope it starts working.

Good Night

Life's Not Fair.

While writing the Lizzy's Rebuttal Post I realized I still have unfinished parenting work with her. Emily never even uses the term unfair and when she hears somebody say it, she'll usually turn to me and say, "Guess their parents never taught them life's not fair daddy.". It makes me smile to think I got this through to her, especially with her trying teenage years fastly approaching. I've always said to Emily that if I teach her and Lizzy that life isn't fair, I did a good job as a parent.

I'm spiritual, not religious, but if there is a God, his sense of humor is spectacular. He may be just, but he sure as hell isn't fair. I do talk a lot about karma and truly believe that doing good for others eases your plight in the cosmic all, but it doesn't make anything any more or less fair.

Life has a way of working for or against you and usually at the most unexpected times. Deal with it, move on. You never seem to hear people complain when life does something in their favor.

"I had a good day today, Life's Not Fair!"

Hydration

With the rain we are having today, it is a happy time for me. I am of the water. Some people would say it is related to my astrological sign of Pisces, but I don't believe in astrology and it goes much deeper than that.

Nothing in the world is as great to me as a shower. I am one of those people who will take a shower to go out and play in the mud. Nothing clears my thoughts or refreshes my soul more than the hydration and cleanliness of water penetrating the very pores of my body.

Watching the droplets of rain touch the ground, even the earth seems refreshed, reborn.  The grass that was brown just two days ago is now green. 

water seems to wash away any misfortunes of the day. It's more than just figurative gesture, it is a rebirth of spirit.

Lizzy's Rebuttal

My kids do not read my blog, but I do share with them items I feel appropriate. After posting Lizzy's 10 photographs. She began complaining about the clarity of the photos and that Emily had an unfair equipment advantage. She thought the pictures looked 'soft'. I don't know where she got the term from, but it may have been someone complaining about one of his lenses in justification of upgrading it. I shared the comments that people left and she was thankful.

So now I began to analyze the exif data and caught the little Fuji doing what downfalls most digital cameras on auto. It was raising the iso to insanely high values(800-1600) even in normal lighting conditions. I manually forced the iso to 60 and let the camera compensate. The picture clarity was of course night and day. So The kids and I went back to the brook Friday morning.

When we got home and looked at the pictures, Lizzy proclaimed that she wanted to redo her top 10 and asked if it was OK. I explained to the girls that the point of the exercise was to constantly challenge yourself and replace or rework your top 10. I have to admit, that after seeing the pictures, Lizzy was being limited by her equipment. I'm glad, unbeknown to her, that I got her a camera for her upcoming birthday. Now that the kids are interested in photography, I think I'll speed up the lessons and move more heavily into the manual settings of their cameras.

Look for Lizzy's revised top 10 next week.

Learn From The Past. Live In The Present. Dream Of The Future.

A comment on the past got me thinking. Some people tend to live in their past, others run from it, then there are those, like me, who think of the past as a time where life's experiences are gathered.

Everything we are today is a culmination of our prior selves. We can not change the past, hide from it, nor are we welcome back to live in it. We can look back on it but should never look down or up on it.

The present is such a fleeting thing. It is the time when dreams succeed or fail. It is the result of our choices from the past in the now, while dreaming of the future. We always live and learn in the present. Then the present quickly slips into the past and can be lived no more. Some people somehow hail the present as the who they are. We are only the past expressing itself in the current form.

It makes me think of the title, "The Road Not Taken.", from an often misinterpreted poem. When Frost, the author, was asked about the poem, he explained it was completed for a friend. This friend was going off to war and neither road he chose would be a good one.  The subject of the poem was not wondering what if, he was wondering why. He did not realize his past decisions, prompted the present paths that he could take and ultimately defined his future.

Though we can't live in the future, we can live for it. It is past and present hopes and dreams awaiting the chance to shine. It is the time in which dreams can never die and our present will inevitably lead to.

All of this gets me to my points I wanted to make. 

• To ignore the past is to limit who we are and can become. 
• To live in the past is to waste our present and hinder the dreams of our future. 
• To learn from the past is to move forward, better prepared, into our present and better still for our future.

Artistic Thursday - Table for Two

It's hard to get me to shut up, even when I'm blogging.  I've decided that every Thursday I will give it a break.  Poetry Thursday is not really dead, I have just decided that I'll rename it Artistic Thursday to give the illusion that I've actually made some progress on my blog.  I will post a favorite photo, write a poem, or maybe even a short story now and again(never).  Basically, I'll force my non-artistic ape brain to stop slinging poo for long enough to be creative without the rant and rave attached to it. 

My second choice name for these posts was Procrastinator's Wordless Wednesday, but I didn't think of it until after I started writing this post, besides Artistic Thursday was easier to type.  I've already said too much so here it is.

Table For Two

Kids Photography Project Part 2 - Lizzy's 10

After much deliberation, Lizzy picked her ten best photographs. There was some I actually liked better, but this was her project. It was really fun printing them out on the Picture Station Printer. The kids had a first hand realization that photos look differently on different mediums. As per the project, none of Lizzy's photos were cropped or resized. She shot them on an RCA Small Wonder(A blog on bad choices in itself.) and a Fuji Z33WP. The Fuji is our family camera. We bought this camera on closeout and keep it in the car in case anyone forgets their camera or we find a spot to fire off a few shots. After next week, Lizzy will have her own camera. Here are Lizzy's ten in order...

Snapshots Of The Mind

I was sitting on my back patio working, when I looked up. I was awestruck by the perfect formation of clouds. The foreground was a series of 3d puffs hanging heavy on the sky. The curls and symmetry reminded me of giant, tightly packed cotton balls with their outlines dipped gently in light blue and silvery gray powder, just to highlight the edges. The clouds were covering the entire sky except for a medium sized triangle, where the suns light tried to press through the silver contrast of old photographs.

The next layer of clouds were wisps of spirits hovering across the great expanse watching the earth, you could almost hear them moan as they drifted between the openings of the first layer. These clouds were the spirits Charles Dickens wrote about in A Christmas Carol as Ebenezer peered from his window fearing what was awaiting in the night to come.

The background shown white and slightly fluffy. if not for the distance between them and the foreground, one could easily confuse them as a whiter version of the same. The three distinct layers occupied the space in sheer majesty.

Of course the feeble lens of my camera seemed miles away in my living room just beyond the back door. I paused to put the laptop down but realized by the time I retrieved my camera, the moment would be lost forever.

I did not have the right to shun nature's gift by missing one instant for the chance to get a meager photograph. No lens could have captured the incredible sight and even my eyes struggled to take as much in of the spectacular show as they could comprehend.

Some moments can be remembered and enhanced through photography others are better left as snapshots of the mind.

Karma

I actually learned a lot about Karma from a friend. When I worked in New York City, I would watch him buy sandwiches for and help homeless people on the street. One day, he borrowed a ten from me to give a homeless guy who was sitting behind a hand written sign. I asked him, "Why $10?".  He asked, "Reed, if I forgot to give you the $10 back, would you not be able to eat?".  I said, "No.".  He said "If that guy doesn't get that $10, he won't be able to, that $10 could change his life." I thought about it and realized that little bit to me, meant so much to others.

The other Karma moment I had was when I was going out to lunch with the same friend. There was a young teenage girl on the sidewalk asking for money and food. I gave her a couple bucks and when we got to the deli, I asked my friend, why he had not done the same. He looked at me and said, "Because you are going to buy her lunch.".  I'd seen him do this for multiple people, but before this had never done it myself. I stood at the deli counter not knowing what to order. My friend prompted me to just order something that I would like. I ordered two Turkey Clubs, everyone loves bacon.

When we exited the deli, she was packing up her sign and getting ready to move on. I went up to her and handed her the sandwich. She was much younger than I had realized on the way in. After telling her what it was, she said it was her favorite, hugged me and cried. I'm not going to lie, it kind of freaked me when she did. That was until she backed away and the thankfulness in her eyes touched my heart. I hugged her back and cried. I have issues crying in front of other people, none the less on a city street, but the moment overwhelmed me.

As I turned to make my way back to the office, I realized my friend hadn't even stopped. Back at the office, he didn't say a word about it.

While driving home, I began to tell him about what transpired and he asked, "How did it make you feel?", I said, "I felt connected to humanity.  Why didn't you talk to me about it before?". He said, "Giving is best shared between the giver and receiver.".  I thought, yeah, her, me and the entire city of NY. I slept better that night than I had slept in years.

I tell this personal story to share something between you and I. There are those that assume people who need it can always get help from somewhere else but them. They assume the people who really need help will always get it. They assume people on the streets have made some sort of choice, be it drugs or laziness to live the way they do. I know better. Though there are people like that on the streets, there are others who just need a simple act of kindness.

The people who truly need help are those who are afraid to look into the eyes of a fellow human being and thank them for the opportunity to show compassion towards humanity.

Where the Dear and the Cantaloupe Play.

I am not a vegetarian, nor could I ever be one, but something about fresh fruits and vegetables is amazing. The kids and I picked up a cantaloupe melon at the orchard yesterday. I was pretty sure my kids had never tried a fresh one and they noticed immediately, compared to the store bought variety, the outward appearance was quit different. The fresh cantaloupes in Jersey are larger and paler then their green looking illegitimate cousins. The differences don't end there though.

When we cut open this mammoth, the juice content was clear and the seeds slept loosely in a pulp bed in the center. The orange color was vibrant and inviting. At first spoonful, the kids' and my eyes lit up. It was sweet wonderful goodness. It was like nothing they had tasted before. Nature had provided us with a candy-like snack and we savored every bite longing for more. We struggled with the decision to save half for tomorrow's breakfast and will probably finish the rest off tonight.

My kids tend to be picky eaters but have always liked fruits. I love this time of year when the orchards begin to ripen and the harvest transcends the flavors that we know, to ones that are inexplicably better than we ever expect.

Today the weather is iffy, so we will be making fresh peach cobbler and fresh peach pie. Thankful the whole time that, though most farms in our area have been replaced by strip malls and convenience stores, there are still a few treasures left where children can easily learn the value of hard work and great food.

Saturday At The Orchard

The kids and I had a full day planned but the day we had, looked nothing like the plans we made. Today we were originally going to the Ducky Derby at Allaire State Park and then to the Italian American Festival, in the Township where I grew up. The duck derby, a rubber duck race, was starting at one o'clock and after a lazy morning and late breakfast, we decided not to go. Instead we went to Eastmont Orchards to pick peaches. This has become somewhat of a tradition. We started picking apples there when my eldest was in a stroller and now we go several times a year. We love peach picking season, because we love the peaches. Driving up to the orchard was magical, swirling clouds greeted us and the reddish orange fruit interrupted the green treed landscape.

A pleasant woman who worked at the farm, gave us some bags and the lie of the land. If you've never walked through an orchard, I recommend it. It gives the feeling of the majesty of nature and the ingenuity of man. It is a harmonious place and walking down the many rows of fruit laden trees brings a oneness with nature that I don't usually get, even while hiking. Here nature provides it's life giving gifts and in turn is nourished by man.

We only stayed about an hour. Long gone are the days when the kids wanted to keep picking until the bags were overflowing.  They understand we will be back when we need more.

We stopped at the farm stand on the way out to pick up some potatoes, corn and a cantaloupe melon. As we left, the skies were amazing. We dropped our significant haul off at home and sampled the newly acquired treats.

The festival suffered a similar fate to the duck race and the kids instead asked if we could go shopping for Converse Sneakers. The sales lady at the store and I reminisced about the Converse sneakers of our youth. Emily picked out a multi-colored pair and Lizzy picked up a skull pair.

Tomorrow is a baking day. We will make cobblers and pies

Desperately Trying To Capture Some Memories

Photograph By MRS. LOCKHART C. PAGE

A friend once wrote to me, "When I write, I am desperately trying to capture some memories with my pen.", they were quite proud of the quote and rightfully so.  I think about it often when I sit down to write.  So many of the memories in the minds of men fail to make it to the outside world.  Not that putting them on paper or in this day and age on a hard drive will ensure their longevity, just that it will give them a chance.  I remember talking to my uncle, who is a great photographer, about the pictures that my grandmother, also a great photographer, took.  "When she died", he said, "We burned almost all of the photographs.  When I die, you'll just erase my hard drives.".  It was said in jest, but as so many things said in jest, there was a sad touch of truth to it.

Part of what prompted this writing was my project to scan all of my old SLR photos in order to archive them on my network drives.  A lot of them wouldn't even be worth keeping, if not for the subjects.  The special part of the project came when my mother lent me sixteen of Grandma Page's photos.  She mostly shot in black and white and always developed her own.  On the back of each picture she would stamp, "PLEASE CREDIT Photograph By MRS. LOCKHART C. PAGE".  The magic was not on the back of the pictures though.  Seeing her pictures now, through my adult eyes, I realize why I purchased my first SLR at fourteen.  Why I wanted to get into photography in the first place.  Her photos captured not just the moments; in her photos you didn't see the subject, you knew them, you understood them.  Unfortunately Some genes do not make it down through the generations, so my ability to capture people in life's amazing little moments, through the lens, is barely existent.  I still love nature and macro photography but barring exception I never feel I capture the true essence of people in a moment.

This is where my writing began, If I could not effectively capture faces and emotions from light to paper, I would try to capture them in ink.  That was years ago and unfortunately both disciplines began to whither without the nourishment of time.  Now I realaize time is not something you plan or pay attention to, the more you do, the more things you get done and the slower time will be for you.

So now I've scanned Grandma Page's photos.  She had captured memories with her camera, that out survived her, out survived the fire.  From her has come a son who is a great photographer a grandson who struggles at it and a great granddaughter that just may have the eye needed.  I'm sure this won't be the last post about Grandma Page, she died when I was not even a teenager, but like her photos, her influence has faced and overcome many trials and the memories still survive.
PLEASE CREDIT
Lives By
MRS' LOCKHART C. PAGE

Double Speak

So, I went to my Co-op board meeting. What you notice when you go to these meetings is:

People love to whine.

People love to ask questions, no matter how stupid.

People use key words and phrases when they really mean something else.

People really like to whine

After interpreting some of the doublespeak there, I've decided to put together a list of everyday phrases and what their translations are...

Phrase: I'm not asking for myself, I want to make sure it is clarified for everyone else.

Translation: I'm an obnoxious asshole who has no clue, but I don't want to sound stupid, so I'll make it sound like I know something and need you to educate the masses.

Phrase: Just for the record

Translation: I want to cover my ass with Kevlar underwear.

Phrase: Have a Second

Translation: Can I bother you until your eyes begin to bleed.

Phrase: Got a minute

Translation: Can I bother you until your eyes begin to bleed and you stab your ears with a blunt stick

Phrase: To be honest with you.

Translation: I normally lie my ass off to you, but this time...

Phrase: To the best of my knowledge.

Translation: I'm an idiot and have no knowledge, I'm covered with Kevlar underwear.

Phrase: For as long as I can remember.

Translation: I have the attention span of a flea and don't remember much, so I can remember about 30 seconds, what was I saying?

Phrase: I'm nobody's fool

Translation: I'm so stupid, nobody would even claim me.

From time to time, I'm sure I will do more posts of the wonderful world of doublespeak. I often laugh to myself at the things people say intentionally or otherwise. You know what I mean?

Kids Photography Project Part 1 - Emily's 10

As the kids summer vacation is rapidly winding down, I realize I won't be seeing them as much. It's slightly depressing, as we did not get to go on as many hikes this year and haven't visited many county or state parks due to the extreme heat and humidity. The places we did go, we did enjoy, but they were mostly local and quick jaunts in the less hot mornings and evenings. We will have lots of memories and I will be posting a lot of the kid projects that they did. One of the first and the longest running ones was the photography kid project. The kids had to take pictures wherever they went and pick out their personal top ten.

The top 10 will be printed on the photo printer and put in an album. Emily used my old Sony PAS and Lizzy used one of those HD pocket recorders as well as our family PAS. Maybe she'll get her own camera for her birthday which is coming up. I think the kids did an excellent job and with no cropping or resizing, I realize they listened to my framing advice.  Hell, maybe they can give some advice to me.  To the point of this post. Here are Emily's top 10 in order...

Enhancements

Actual Shot 2004 No PS

Light Crop Bug

Heavily Cropped Bug

After my smoke stack memorial post, a friend asked me how I put the sign in the background behind the horses. Long story short, I didn't. That was a lucky shot, a rare moment in light and time that froze in a way that the eye did not catch until after the shutter released.

With the exception of cropping and resizing, I don't enhance any of the pictures on my blog. I do not have anything against Photoshop or in my case, I like Gimp, it works better for me, but that is personal preference.

It wouldn't have been hard to do with today's software, but I made the decision not to enhance any of the pictures when I started this blog and with the exception of older pre dSlr day pictures, I have stuck to that. It is more of a way for me to get back to the basics and relearn the art I had felt I was losing to the ease of post production.

To me, technology has gotten to the point that picture alteration has become a whole new art and discipline removed from photography. How much change can be made before the picture is no longer what it was? How much before it becomes the realm of light-impossible?

I feel not using enhancement tools in my photos trains my eye to pay attention to the little things like light, color, contrast and shadow.

I still use Gimp for some of my personal photos. Mostly for getting rid of unwanted elements or adding desirable ones. My focus now is to become a better photographer.

I will point out if and when I use enhancements to the photos on my blogs.

Leaving A Home To Start Anew

One the most stressful parts of a divorce is leaving a home that you lived in and worked on with no turning back.  Not all of the stress is bad though.  There is always excitement and fear when venturing forward into the unknown.  One thing I like to tell people who are going through this situation is simple advice.  You know how things were, but you are not sure how they will be, greatness often lives right around the corner from the mediocre life you clung to so dearly.  People can argue that the grass isn't always greener on the other side of the fence.  Those people assume you had grass where you were.  Yes, I am a positive person, but I am also a logical one.  When you start a new chapter in your life, you have to realize there will always be remnants left behind that will impact your heart and your  mind.  Embrace those remnants, those reminders of good times gone by.  Never let them go but never lose yourself in them.  The following are quotes on leaving that I like.  I'm not copping out of writing today, I will post more.  I just know there are people out there, who probably need to read these right now...

Whatever the price, identify it now. What will you have to go through to get where you want to be? There is a price you can pay to be free of the situation once and for all. It may be a fantastic price or a tiny one - but there is a price.
Harry Browne

All changes are more or less tinged with melancholy, for what we are leaving behind is part of ourselves.
Amelia Barr
 
I always liked the story of Noah's Ark and the idea of starting anew by rescuing the things you like and leaving the rest behind.
Zach Braff

I had looked forward so eagerly to leaving the horrible place, yet when my release came and I knew that God's sunlight was to be free for me again, there was a certain pain in leaving.
Nellie Bly

It's interesting to leave a place, interesting even to think about it. Leaving reminds us of what we can part with and what we can't, then offers us something new to look forward to, to dream about.
Richard Ford

The First Taste of Freedom.

Picture of can pull tab from commons.wikimedia

Last time I took my children to the park behind my mother's house, the memories flowed through me at an amazing pace. I lived in that park, almost literally. I grew up in the 70's and early eighties, my mother's house was on the woods, separated from the park by a chain link fence and my step family's house was on the other side of the park by the fire house.

My stepbrother and I, we were explorers. We had conquered the two woods that surrounded
the park as well as the basketball courts, the playground, the paddle ball courts, the tennis courts, the dumpsters and the soccer fields. Looking over the terrain now, much has changed, and not for the better. The park has been redone with lower and 'safer', less fun rides; one woods has thinned out to a series of random trees and the other woods are gone. The paddle ball courts and lion water fountain went to ruin and were torn down. The basketball courts and tennis court are still in tact, but are so much smaller than the ones in my memory's eye.

Getting back to my step brother and me. We used to spend every waking summer moment at the park. I remember many days that we competed to see who could make the largest can pull tab chain. For those of my younger readers, to open soft drink or beer can, we used to have to pull a finger-sized ring attached to a tab, since then, the tabs have been replaced with a pull thingy that punches in a metal disc. We would collect the tabs and bend the metal through the rings to make chains. At the end of the day the longest chain would win. With scratched fingers, we would combine the chains together to form a 'super chain' and our imagination would take over wondering what we could pull with those incredibly long chains. Imagination would always lose to physics and the chains would break under our stress tests.

While finding the tabs, inevitably we would also find loose change that had fallen from some unfortunate soul's pocket. In those days ice cream from the trucks was not as insanely priced as today and for under a dollar, we could get a cool, delectable treat from the Good Humor Man. On days when we only found enough change for one, the debate as to which treat we would share was always longer than the time it took to eat it.

The park was a magical place. It was our first taste of freedom. Back then, our parents did not worry about abductions. If a child got hurt at the park and usually someone did, they would suck it up for fear of not being able to come back to the park the next day. If an injury was severe, another child would call their parents or the police from the pay phone at the edge of the park. We were a community of children learning how to interact with each other, not through the rules of parents, but the common sense a community must have to maintain order. Sharing was a must.  Arguments and fighting occurred on a day to day basis.  Friendships were made and broken as were alliances. Our days would end when the (Street)lights came on or when a distant breeze carried a child's name from a back porch door to our private realm.

Watching my kids walk back to me at the edge of the park, I could have sworn I heard the jingle of bells coming from a Good Humor Truck in the distance. For just a second, I was back, the feeling of freedom was overwhelming. I longed to go on the old tornado slide and submarine ride. My eyes scanned the ground for change and can tabs. I looked up and did not see my step brother, but the faces of my two daughters, looking bored and ready to go.

I wonder if my stepbrother has the same thoughts, when he brings his kids to a park?  Sadly, we lost touch quite some time ago. While the kids were getting into the truck, I grabbed a handful of change out of my toll stash and dropped it on the ground. It's my turn, somebody else's change had paid for so many of my ice creams. I like to think that two brothers playing at the park will find it on a hot summer day of exploration and it will afford them a memory. I know though, in today's world, freedom is not only severely limited for adults, but by them.

Quotes of Kindness

I've been thinking a lot of the kindnesses shown towards me during my lifetime and decided to post some of the quotes that remind me to be kind to others in return.

"So many gods, so many creeds,
So many paths that wind and wind,
While just the art of being kind
Is all the sad world needs."
Ella Wheeler Wilcox

"How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single minute before starting to improve the world."
 Anne Frank

"Forget injuries, never forget kindnesses. "
Confucius

"We make a living by what we get. We make a life by what we give."
Winston Churchill

"The best portion of a good man's life: his little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and love."
William Wordsworth

"Only a life lived for others is worth living."
Albert Einstein

"Help your brother's boat across, and your own will reach the shore."
Hindu Proverb

"You cannot do a kindness too soon, for you never know how soon it will be too late." 
Ralph Waldo Emerson

"Remember there's no such thing as a small act of kindness. Every act creates a ripple with no logical end."
Scott Adams

"I believe that every human mind feels pleasure in doing good to another."
Thomas Jefferson

Robots Take Over the World and are Very Kind Masters.

If anyone believes robots are gentle servants for mankind, they need to buy a Roomba. These seemingly harmless, amazingly helpful, maniacal little hellions will have you trained to serve them within a month. When you first bring one home and open the box, you think cool, I'll never have to vacuum again. That is only because you have not been privy to the cleaning agenda the iRobot Corporation has in store for you.

Day One:

You set up the dock and begin charging the little bugger. An orange light flashes in a soothing, non-threatening way, reassuring you that you did a good job hooking it up, it's charging.

You name it something 'pettish', like Spot, Rover or Robbi.

You move all the wires off your floor.

You clean anything on the floor that the Roomba may try to eat, like cloths, toys, last nights empty bottle.

So far the Roomba has had you do all of the work.
The orange light has now turned to green, hypnotizing you to start up your robotic master.

The Roomba jets around the house bumping and cleaning.
You watch it mesmerized as it cleans EVERYWHERE!  No vacuum had ever gone under the couch no matter how much you bashed the legs with the cleaning head, this thing jets under there with ease.
It pulls the dirt out from under the trim with it's amazing side brushes .
This thing works as hard cleaning as a puppy does messing and when it is done it simply crawls back onto it's base.

You empty the dustbin and WOW, you just vacuumed yesterday, where did all this dirt and dust come from.
You are overwhelmed by the sheer awesomeness of it's cleaning ability. It has shown it's dominance in the vacuuming arena. If it wanted it's intentions known, it would shout, “You Stupid Human, Your cleaning power is no match for me! Now empty my dustbin.”, but instead it beeps a happy tune every time it starts and docks.

Week 1:

You watch it vacuum everyday.

You bet it won't get that one piece of dirt it flew by on the first pass and constantly lose the bet.

You see the amount of dirt and dust this thing pulls up and the way the floor and even the rugs shine. You begin to feel woefully inadequate in the cleaning arena.

Whenever a speck of dirt gets on the floor, the same speck that would have waited days for you to vacuum, the same speck that would have been lost in the sea of dirt left behind from your previous vacuuming, your eyes burn until you remedy the situation by starting up the mechanical monster in the corner.

Week 2:

You stop watching it vacuum and let it go on it's own.

The Roomba effect sets in. This is the effect by which you realize the floor is so damn clean, you must clean the counters, the table, the ottoman, the TV, the pictures, the windows, the washer and dryer, the sink, the curtains, the railings and everything else.
Like cleaning-dominoes, you topple one job after another while the Roomba sleeps with it's gentle green light taunting you.
Now that you've done all of this work, you know there must be dust on the floor, so you start up the Roomba again. When it is done, as you suspected, the dustbin is full.

Week 3:

You surrender to the simple mechanization.
The realization that you would buy a fleet of robots if they could do the cleaning chores for you sets in.
Your mechanical dirt devil, keeps the floor immaculate only running three times a week, you can't keep the counters clean washing them three times a day.

Week 4:

You ignore the Roomba, while it runs, and it always seems to find and bump your feet.

Your ape brain realizes it's been beat and in an act of defiance, you start wiping dust and crumbs from the table, couch and anywhere else directly onto the floor before starting the Roomba each time.

You sweep the stairs so that the Roomba has more dirt to clean.

Week 5 and on:

"The Roomba" has become a religion.
You constantly keep the floors clean of anything that might upset "The Roomba".
You start "The Roomba" whenever it beckons.
You empty the dustbin without thought.
When people come to your house and compliment your floors, you sound like a fanatic preaching to them of "The Roomba's" greatness.

I'm not saying the Roomba is a bad thing (Especially because it's skirting the couch with it's light flashing, watching me write this.), it is just another piece of technology that has invaded our lives.  It's docking, I need to empty the dustbin now.

Today my co-op, tomorrow the world.

Shine On.

It's amazing how words you hear as a child can mature in your ears as they follow you into adulthood.  Whether it be a song lyric, the title of a poem, a saying or, as in this case, a movie line. “So shines a good deed in a weary world.", nine words uttered by Willie Wonka towards the end of the original movie. It was pre-vhs/dvd/tivo/dvr/blu-ray and Willie Wonka could only be seen on network television every Thanksgiving evening. Once a year my family and I would gather in front of the TV and those words would ring in my young ears and my young heart nourishing my growing mind.

These were pearls of wisdom forming in the oyster shell of my life by the gentle irritation of the sands of time. As I got older, I learned that the saying was not written by Roald Dahl but by William Shakespeare and the whole quote was, "How far that little candle throws his beams! So shines a good deed in a weary world.". I was amazed to find out that even in Shakespeare's time, those words rung true.

Wouldn't the world be a better place if this saying weren't true? Would good deeds go unnoticed if the world were not so weary? I'm not sure, but I'd like to think, while Shakespeare wrote these word, he thought and hoped, as I do, that some day a future generation would find out.

I have tried to live my life by these words and so many others that have fermented in my heart and mind. Sometimes I succeed admirably and other times I fail miserably. I know as long as I pass on these timeless pieces of wisdom to my children and those I meet, I will leave the world one step closer to a place where good deeds are but a flicker and the hearts of men extinguish a weary world.

Skull Part Deux

I'm happy to report that Skull, Lizzy's hermit crab, is still alive. She is realizing four weeks later, that responsibility for another creature's well being is not all it is cracked up to be. She no longer gleefully moistens the sponge every so many hours or enjoys putting the food in his little shell bowl. She only plays with him when reminded.  She still loves her hermit crab but his care has changed from fun occurrences to life interrupting instances.

Skull does not seem to mind. He enjoys being left alone to watch our beta swim in his vase just beyond the cage's mesh. At night skull climbs the cage with an odd clatter, only to return to his 'standard' position on the bottom of the cage come morning.

I enjoy having skull around when the kids are here. He reminds me of the so many hamsters and fish I had when I was a kid. The anticipation of a new pet was always so much greater than the long term aspects of maintaining it.

For now Skull enjoys coming over. He is, I'm sure, the first of many pets Lizzy will have in her lifetime. She will be able to look back proudly on Skull, he is surviving nicely, under her care.

Poetry Thursday - Lizzy's Poems

This poetry Thursday belongs to Lizzy. Unfortunately, neither Emily nor Lizzy were very fond of the poetry kids project. Photography and painting were their favorites so far. Going forward, I will need give them more visual oriented projects. Lizzy's two poems:

Petals of Friendship
Underneath a flower
Lies a secret love
The petals are not pink, purple or blue
They are golden just like you

Long Beach Island
LBI the home of the breeze,
LBI the home of the sea
LBI the home of the best arcades
LBI the right place to be.

It's time for another installment of Lizzyisms.

One evening as Emily and I were getting ready to make dinner, Lizzy came into the kitchen and asked, “Is it just me, or am I hungry?”

While lying on my back on the floor, my shirt rolled up past my naval. Lizzy looked down and said, “Your belly button's showing, if you don't pull down your shirt, I'll give you a blueberry.”

The next one happened because I told her she could pick the NextFlix Movie if she found the remote for the player. After one quick search around the room, she lifted the pillow to find nothing but couch beneath and called out to the remote, in as high a pitch as she could muster, “I'll give you your own dressing room if you come out here.”

While watching a movie, Emily commented on an actress's eyes and how blue they were. Lizzy shot back, “That's because they are fake.”

The last one for now. I told Lizzy that she had to clean her room. When I gave her a stern look and asked, “Do you understand me?”, she responded, “I heard you with my own eyes.”