Sand...

I stopped by here, looking for something I needed from a long time ago.


I remember deleting a zillion posts at one point and starting over. I wish I hadn't done that. Silly or not, they were my thoughts at one time.


Now they're gone.


I looked at aaaaaaaaaaaaall the links on the right...sites I used to visit regularly, clinging to the words of the author, excited when there was new content to read, slightly disappointed when there wasn't. Now, many of those sites are defunct.


Kind of like this one.


I kept a regular blog at myfitnesspal.com, mostly about weightloss and health, but sometimes about personal awareness or epiphanies, but I've stopped writing there, too.


I could blame work, but that isn't fair. My job is all kinds of awesome. I got promoted last year and I love the work I'm doing and the people I'm working with.


I realize that I have ZERO creative outlets right now. I am not writing, making poetry, sewing, painting. Nada.


And that means I'm only half-living. And I have no one to blame for that besides myself.


So, if I write it, it's true: Starting now, I am going to get back to it. I'm going to post here regularly and I'm going to start making art again.


That's that.

Where's Waldo?

I love my Mom. And I love that she is not only very intelligent, but she is also really down-to-earth. While she is sometimes overly opinionated, her intentions are always good. She's very liberal, and was a social worker and educator beginning back in the late fifties, early sixties, so she's seen it all. Being very equal rights and civil rights minded is a lovely thing, and I'm grateful that she kept those beliefs in mind as she raised me. Very grateful.

At the same time, just because she sees this painting that reminds her of many of her fundamental beliefs, that does not mean she needs to buy it! Now, please don't get me wrong...there are a LOT of great things about this painting. I don't have the talent required to paint something like it, so I'm not blasting on the talent of artist, Robert West. But still...this image (click it to see a bigger version) of "A Long Hard Journey" makes me ask some questions which made my Mom giggle, even though she didn't want to admit I was right.

1. Where are you planning to hang this picture?
2. Is that George Bush standing next to Abraham Lincoln? Please tell me no. What the heck is he doing there?
3. No Mom, that is not Scout from To Kill a Mockingbird playing with John F. Kennedy, Jr. Look closer...
4. Holy Crap! Is that Puff Daddy over there on the far left, in the red and black sweatshirt?! Where is his entourage?
5. Wait...is that Beyonce? No, I know that's Ella Fitzgerald with the mic - and that's a long extension cord! But I meant the woman with the stripey scarf. Beyonce? What, Ella can't share the mic? Maybe it's Kimora Lee Simmons...
6. Where's Waldo?
7. Someone seriously needs to save Martin Luther King Jr. from that giant eagle. Totally dangerous...potentially bad situation, if you've ever seen The Birds.
8. AND, before the Obama Train gets any closer, please move those coins from the track! They are kind of big and look like they might derail the whole thing!

I fully appreciate the sentiment behind this very creative, very thoughtful painting. I do! And apparently my folks do, too, because Mom is going to frame it and hang it somewhere in their home. Every time I see it, I'm going to think about the long, hard, journey and how truly thankful I am that so many brave, inspired people made that journey. But now, I'm also going to wonder where Waldo is hiding...

This is Very Cool...

I was snooping around the Sharpie site, because, you know...they have a new retractable non-bleed-thru Sharpie, and I wondered where I could buy one. (Apparently not in Ohio yet - the site didn't tell me that, but I've checked in four stores in two cities and no retractable Sharpies...) I love Sharpies, always have, and hoped to snag one soon.

Anyway, within the site, I found the Sharpie Blog and then the Sharpie Squad and all the members of the Squad are cool, but this gentleman's project - making unique lunchbag art for his kid's every single day - really impressed me!

How fun it must be for his kids to see what their dad created for them when they grab their lunch sacks each morning! And I'm sure their friends think they are cool.

My dad, distant as he could be, would sometimes write a note to me on a little strip of paper, about the size of the fortune in a fortune cookie, and put them in my lunch sack. Since I realize now that he struggled to know how to be a father, those little messages mean something completely different to me today than they did when I was a kid: he was trying. (Certainly, he didn't always try - that's for sure - but at times, he did.) They would say things, like, "Have a good day! Love, Dad" or "Good luck on your test!" and you know...it's the little things that make kids, or anyone, for that matter, feel special.

So, grab your Sharpie and do something nice! And thanks to the Lunch Bag Decorating Guy for reminding me about the lunch notes...I hadn't thought of that in a while...

Feeling Creative...

I'm not sure if it's the change of the seasons or what, but I feel like makin' some stuff!

We're having a contest at work...we have an in house quarterly magazine, and each Winter, we do a special art cover. They're accepting paintings and I've decided to try to create something and submit it.

Since it's supposed to be Holiday-ish but not religious, I immediately had this image in my head of my Grandma playing the piano to her second-graders, many years ago. She's playing, and they're standing around the piano, singing.

When I told Steinvic, he was all for it. And when I got home, there were two new canvases waiting for me. (Thank you, Steinvic!) So I need to get busy...maybe tonight.

Meanwhile...

Kanye is a punk for picking on a girl. Not just because she is a female...I mean because she is a girl! A young person. It would be the same if I smacked an ice cream cone out of a little boy's hand - just not cool. Only to make it equal, the boy would have had to have worked for that ice cream cone his whole life AND have me destroy it in front of millions of people. MTV needs to seriously consider refashioning the stage so that freaks can't just stroll up and run their mouths, since it's happened in the past. And Kanye needs to seriously consider shutting the heck up, because no one cares what he has to say.

But frankly, it isn't about picking on young people. It's about messing with people in general.

And that brings me to a question inspired by this recent trend of rudeness... Are we becoming a nation of a-holes? Has blogging and twittering heightened our belief that what we think/have to say should be heard? And that these thoughts will be appreciated and considered? Are we becoming a nation of navel-gazers, who feel that our introspection isn't just worth recording in a blog or journal, but also worth broadcasting to a captive audience?

I mean, I write here. Some people read here. Most people don't. But even if lots of people did, I think I'd still recognize that it was a choice and that my thoughts and views shouldn't be forced on anyone. I don't think I'd wrestle the mic from our front desk lady at work and read my views to our employees every day.

When we were children, society reminded us that interrupting was a sin, that waiting our turn was a good thing, and that picking on people was uncool and could get you a detention, a missed recess or a swat. Is there something in the water that is rinsing good behavior away from our everyday dealings? Just curious...