Friday, August 26, 2011

LOOK ALIKES?






Just can't believe how much beautiful KF reminds me of photos of me at or near her age. She's much prettier and photogenic. She's a precious and interesting little girl. I think she might be brilliant.

Today she enjoyed a double-dip, side-by-side watermelon ice cream cone. YUM!

Sunday, August 21, 2011

CATASTROPHE THEORY AND FAITH


Alone for awhile this morning, an email from my friend BB got me thinking and then writing about matters of faith and my spiritual journey. That led to the Menlo Park Presbyterian Church website, and a John Ortberg message on Forgiveness from his recent series, Who was This Guy?. I know that this is one subject I'll always need to pursue. Forgiveness is a grace I need to practice over and over again.

For a lot of the past few weeks I've been strung-out with fears, anxiety, and my default catastrofying. (Spellcheck doesn't like that word, but it's real. Very real. I've been there too many times. And, psychologists have written much on catastrophe theory as social response.) I know when I'm doing it, or at least eventually own it, but it's so real when I'm in the middle.

I'm over it now. My perspective is clearer; I just have to make sure I don't go too far in the other direction. For me, that would be grandiosity--such a feeling of well-being that all things are possible, and affordable, doable, and brilliant.

Anyway, my conversation with BB led me to some very favorite verses:

Jeremiah 29:11-13
New International Version (NIV)
11 For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you Hope and a future.
12 Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you.
13 You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.






Tuesday, August 16, 2011

SAILING TO CAPRI



Just included this book in my First Paragraph's blog reviews, and am determined to capture Elizabeth Adler's fine collection of quotes she uses to preface each section of Sailing to Capri and think this blog is the best place for that documentation. Food for thought.

No man is ever rich enough to buy back his past. 
OSCAR WILDE

The truth is rarely pure, and never simple.
OSCAR WILDE
The Importance of Being Earnest

Many a woman has a past, but I am told that she has at least a dozen and that they all fit.
OSCAR WILDE
Lady Windermere's Fan

The Book of Life begins with a man and a woman in a garden. It ends with Revelations.
OSCAR WILDE
A Woman of No Importance

All love, all liking, all delight
Lies drowned with us in endless night.
ROBERT MERRICK

Life is a foreign language: All men mispronounce it.
CHRISTOPHER MORLEY

We seldom confide in those who are better than ourselves.
ALBERT CAMUS

A man cannot be too careful in the choice of his enemies.
OSCAR WILDE
The Picture of Dorian Gray

We owe respect to the living; to the dead we only owe the truth.
VOLTAIRE

Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes.
OSCAR WILDE
Lady Windermere's Fan

The good ended happily, and the bad unhappily. That is what fiction means.
OSCAR WILDE
The Importance of Being Earnest

Monday, August 15, 2011

INDOLENCE





INDOLENCE:
faineance, faineancy, heaviness, idleness, inactivity, inertia, inertness, languidness, languor, laziness, lethargy, shirking, skiving
British slang: slacking, sloth, sluggishness, torpidity, torpor
English Collins Dictionary - English Definition and Thesaurus


Ran into this word in a recent novel and wondered if it captures that certain state of being I fall into when my world is at rest, I am at rest. Maybe. Can't even get my mind around faineance and faineancy--think they refer to a state of being faint...


Some of these synonyms I like; some insult what I consider to be an O.K. state of being for some periods of time...  I like idleness (not as a habit, but sometimes desired), inertness (the body and soul need a good laid-back time every so often), languidness (a high-class or elegant word that captures my take on indolence), languor (who wouldn't enjoy a dreamlike state once in awhile?), and torpidity/torpor (don't I wish these guys were in my vocabulary. Think I'll toss them out a bit in the next few days and see what reaction I get!)