Shhhh...

Hey, keep your voice down, I don't want to attract any attention.

Forgive me Father, it's been - how long? 5 months since I blogged. Wow, time just zips the hell on by, when you're out of the house and knee-deep in La Vita Loca. Or more accurately, La Vita Broka. But as nice as huge piles of cash would look, lying around the house, I can't complain.

Life IS good.
The guys are doing well in school, making friends and good grades.
The Gorilla-man (aka, the hub) and I are solid. Getting ready to celebrate 18 years this month. How the hell that happened? Beats me - I'm just working for the weekend, you know?

I'm also almost 30 pounds slimmer and a lot stronger than I was back in May.
When I joined the gym in mid-May, I could barely reach down to tie my shoes, I got winded walking a block, and I felt like I was suffocating everytime I lay down to sleep. Now, I'm busting ass for an hour and a half at the gym 4 times a week - getting the heartrate up and lifting weights, and I feel better than I've ever felt before.

Bea has been right there as well, though she goes at night and I go during the day (except for Saturday and Sunday, when we go together). I think she's lost about the same - I know we both have funhouse mirror perspectives about ourselves, but I can tell she's gotten trimmer, more compact. We are just getting better and better all the time, and by this next spring, we are going to be a pair of buff bitches. "Yeah, that's the ticket!"

I've thought about coming back in and writing - I like writing, and when I do it consistently, I can see how much better I get at it. But the hours of time spent socializing with other bloggers, while interesting, insightful, fun even, it's time away from my real life. When my eldest son told me last spring, "Wow Mom, you sure spend a lot of time on the computer blogging. You must really like it," I had the wake-up call. Because there is nothing more important to me than making sure my kids feel like they have my full attention when they need it, and honestly? Being in the blogger groove was making that mission statement a bald lie.

I miss you guys, no, I really do. I want to find a way to continue blogging, but not compromise the job I do as a mom and a wife, and a friend. I can't guarantee I'll be here every week, or that I'll be on top of reading your posts as soon as they publish, but I will be there, albeit late (So what else is new, right?!)

A Few Things You Might Not Know

Bennie Waddell has twice described me as an iced tea sipping, firefly catching, laid back good ole Southern girl. While this is very flattering, in truth, I am none of those things. I feel compelled to 'fess up to you, so you don't get the wrong idea about me, though, in truth, you might like the fiction better.

• I am not a Southerner, though I have lived in the south for almost 40 years. I think that's what's called a "Damn Yankee" - the ones who don't leave. As much as I love the South, there is a part of me that will always yearn for the Great Lakes. Okay, two parts of me: my heart and my stomach.


• There are many things about the South I love and embrace - Barbeque, hush puppies, shrimp and grits, biscuits, okra (if it's done right), the way a little snow stops the whole world - but iced tea is NOT one of them. Neither are Brunswick Stew, collard greens, sausage gravy, NASCAR, or Pepsi as a breakfast beverage.


• Beverages of choice for me are (in order of importance on a daily basis): coffee, water, Coca Cola, seltzer, Dr. Pepper, orange juice, Newcastle, Red Drinks, margaritas.


• I would SO kick my kids' asses if they caught any kind of wildlife, including fireflies. We have a No Intervention policy here concerning the fauna.


• I am not a particularly laid back individual - actually, I'm kind of a monkey on the edge, but I play calm and cool really well, don't I? (In related content, I have been quoted as saying, "I'm a HAPPY person, DAMMIT!")

So while I just love Bennie for thinking I'm a groovy hippie Southern girl, I have to admit - I'm just not that cool. But I did stay in a Holiday Inn Express once - does that count for anything?

The Writing's On The Wall

Or rather, on the page. The REAL page.
I'm breaking with my own non-conformist ways to go with the crowd on the handwriting post. I know, it's so unlike me, but I really thought it was clever, kind of cool, and hard to resist.
I saw this first at:
Chani's

Flutter's

Jennifer's

Brian's
And now you get to see what the handwriting of a lunatic - pardon - eccentrically creative individual looks like. It might be easier to read some of the others!

See now, that was on lined graph paper - anybody can stay fairly even and nice looking. But here you have the chicken scratchings I do when I'm on a roll and writing at a more normal pace. It's hard for even me to read! (Addendum: I just noticed that you can see the picture I was doodling on the back of this page. I think there's a calendar on there too. what can I say - I think this was written in carpoop, which is V boring! But it's kind of trippy to look at up close. Go ahead - you know you want to!)
It's sad, isn't it? That such a sweet little child could grow up to have the handwriting of a killer. Or maybe a doctor? Or maybe, just plain ole scribbling?

Painting With Words

Travelogues are easy...too easy.

It's like following along the lines in a coloring book. Sure, you get to decide what color to make everything, but the image has already been decided for you. I'm usually the one who takes the pictures , so the creativity is still there in a travelogue, but the artist, the poet in me, notices the lack of impasto to my words. The lack of tenebroso, the wallpaper smoothness with which I present a pretty slice of life to you.

It's a hell of a lot messier in real life. The everyday passions and woes leave splatters and splashes of red anger, and slate blue sadness; sunny yellow children's kisses and grey streaks of self doubt leave their marks upon the walls of my mind.

I'm not much of a housekeeper because I kind of like the clutter of life around me. Still, I'm hesitant to ask you in, afraid you'll see the mess and think less of me, despite my disclaimers of, "Please excuse; it's usually not like this", because, honestly? It usually is.

If you don't mind mental messes, please come in. I'll make a pot of coffee and we'll talk, while we fill our minds and mouths with tarty-sweet cobbler ideas.

Blog Interrupted

Its been a little over four months since I began this blog, in the hopes it would spark some creativity and help me hone my writing. I have to say, that for the most part, it has been more stifling to my creativity than nurturing. I find myself not saying what I want to say, because I might not get the all-important traffic, and that bothers me. I also find it keeps me from getting to the easel as often, and that is a really bad thing, in my opinion, as I don't need any extra reasons to procrastinate.

I look around the blogosphere and see a vast range of quality in the blogs I have come across. It isn't for me to criticize what makes someone else happy or fufilled, but I wonder sometimes at the wisdom of offering up one's life to such an inconsistent yardstick for measurement. According to the blog-ruler, I don't measure up at all, which actually is somewhat comforting, but the question remains: To blog or not to blog. To get caught up in the artificial popularity contest that appears to be the impetus to having a sucessful blog, or to simply step away from it and get back to real life.

I've read blog after blog wherein the writers confess to us that they cannot control their children, cannot relate to their husband, cannot feel in synch with their life, and it occurs to me that there is a giant elephant in the blogosphere no one wants to address, and that is the addictive potential of computers and the internet. Of course no one in blogland is going to go unplugged, and their kids are going to be plugged in as well (I believe that's called enablement), and if anyone dares to raise the questions of "how soon should a child be plugged in", or "how much is too much" they're going to receive a raft of ugly verbage. It does seem to me that a disproportionate number of bloggers have kids with ADHD or autistic-related issues, and rarely do I read about these parents considering the benefit of making lifestyle changes, like unplugging those kids from TV and computers, or giving up junk food, or setting a bedtime and sticking with it; all of which could reap just as much benefit as slapping them on a drug, just so Mom can get back to her virtual world.

Ugly words? Only if you're in denial. What is ugly about wanting parents to grow up and take on the job they said they wanted? Parenting is a full-time job, so if you're only doing it part-time, who's picking up the slack for you? If what you're doing isn't working, shouldn't you WANT to try something new? Does anyone really appreciate a martyr who isn't ever pro-active about making change/making things happen?

These are some of the questions that come to my mind, as I surf the blogosphere, and ask myself, "why am I here?" If I am here to speak my mind, and not pander to some sorority for acceptance, then I have to say what I think; not what I think you might want to hear.

What Blogging Looked Like A Hundred Years Ago

This is one of the ways I spend my spare time.
I have collected every single article written by Sarah Agnes Darling, and am currently in the process of transcribing them.
Why?
Because, dry as they are, they provide a glimpse into the life of my family, and their extended relatives, some of whom I never knew were related until I started collecting this stuff.
There are articles like this for every little town in that area, none of which have been indexed or put into a searchable format. If you want them, you have to go through all the microfilm and photo-copy the pages you need. That's why its taken me 4 years to get it all (Thanks Mom!) (She's faster than I am at getting them, though it still takes her years to read a census page, but I am grateful, nonetheless.)

It occurred to me today, as I was working on the year 1911, that this is the precursor to blogs. They were written mostly by women and had to do with their kids, life around them, and the social scene, such as it was. OK, so they didn't have all the bells, whistles, and gadgets we have to spruce up a page; some of them, like Ag, are downright terse, but take a look - its uncannily like a blog page in content.

A Couple of Early Bloggers? Nah, but we can pretend they are! (Elizabeth Snyder and daughter?)

Kaneville, January 13th, 1908
(Reported by Sarah Agnes Darling)

We are having beautiful winter weather for this time of year.
Mr. and Mrs. J.V. Toy, of Oil City, spent Sunday with the latter’s parents, Mr. and Mrs. Ross Gahring.
Mr. and Mrs. Ernest Gahring will soon move to this place and live in the house Mrs. Sara Moyer recently vacated.
Mrs. Maud Kirkwood, Donald McKissick, and Baby Harper are on the sick list. Charles McKissick and J.E. Cunningham were quite ill during the past week, but are both able to be around again
Mrs. Catherine Thompson spent last Friday afternoon with Mrs. Jacob Toy.
Floyd Darling entertained five of his young friends on Friday evening. The games were Donkey and Flinch.
Carl Kirkwood, Ethel and Lester Toy have the chickenpox.
Miss Becca Cherry called on Mrs. S.A. Darling Saturday afternoon.

Kaneville, January 21st, 1908
(Reported by Sarah Agnes Darling)

Rev. Swanson, of Diamond, held services in the U.B. church on Sunday morning at 11 o’clock.
Mrs. S.A. Moyar and Mrs. A.J. Kirkwood spent last Sunday here and attended preaching at Cherrytree on Sunday evening.
Mrs. William Toy and Mrs. S.A. Darling spent Sunday at Dempseytown with Mr. and Mrs. William Hill.
Mr. and Mrs. Frank Neely were called to Breedtown on Friday by the death of the latter’s father, Edward Hancox.
About seventeen friends spent a very pleasant time on Monday evening at the home of Mrs. William Toy. They were gathered to celebrate the 16th anniversary of John A. Toy’s birthday. At 11 o’clock a dainty lunch was served and the games were Pedro and Flinch.

Kaneville, January 28th, 1908
(Reported by Sarah Agnes Darling)

Quite a number around here are sick with the grippe.
About sixty-five members and visitors attended the Kaneville Aid Society meeting at Mrs. Mary Kirkwood’s last Thursday. The money taken in amounted to 8.50. The Aid Society will take dinner with Mrs. Susan Thompson on Feb. 6th. All are cordially invited to attend.
Mrs. Barbara Long, of Oil City, spent Sunday with her sister, Mrs. William Toy.
Mrs. S.A. Darling and son, Floyd, spent Sunday in Rouseville with Mr. and Mrs. William Darling and Grandma Darling. Grandma is 89 years old and quite lively for her age.
Mr. and Mrs. Harry Hunter, of Rouseville, spent a day recently with the latter’s parents, Mr. and Mrs. J.F. Neely.
Mrs. Sara Cunningham and Miss May Kirkwood spent Saturday with Mrs. Jennie Cunningham, of Oil City.