ColorColor

My sister got me this
book for Christmas and
I had to smile.  I had
almost gotten her one!

At Onward, as you may can tell, we love bright colors.  When I was growing up during the pre Internet era I used to take magic markers and draw different shapes and just liked to see how different colors looked up against each other.

I posted a few pictures I colored on Facebook and two of my friends said they found it relaxing. I find it relaxing as well.  It gives me something to do while I think about things.  Often I have fallen asleep while coloring which is a great thing for a nocturnal person who needs to go to sleep earlier!  Other times while I have been coloring I have thought of solutions to daily problems. 


I don't prefer coloring waves though as it feels too chaotic.  I prefer to color landscapes or floral and  fauna.  But coloring  reminds me of doing ceramics; picking the colors and painting them on the green ware and waiting to see how it comes out.  It also reminds me of doing arts and crafts like cross stitching, or making hook rugs, except that coloring is easier.  Everyone can color!

The big child tells me that Books A Million has an extensive section at their stores just for adult coloring books. Of course you may also find them at stores such as Walgreens and Walmart.  Right now the prices for adult coloring books runs from ten to fourteen dollars.  However, a co-worker advised me she had found adult coloring books priced as low as four dollars at certain types of dollar discount stores.

The other night I was feeling a little down, but then I realized I had colored myself a bouquet! Which a certain little RN I know showed me the coloring book she had bought for herself.  She didn't have time to finish anything much but she did say it was being used in hospitals as an activity.  One of my co-workers who is an author had been coloring in down time at work and she said she liked coloring so much she had made trips around town buying up coloring books.  So it is official that the adult coloring craze has caught on... but then who wouldn't like to color instead of doing  more adult things like work, eh?!

How is the adult coloring craze going for you and yours?

OFF THE TOP OF MY HEAD: The Four Seasons by Laurel Corona

This is one of the books I enjoyed last summer. It is a historical novel set in Venice during the 18th century when music ruled.  Two sisters were left as babies at an orphanage that also happened to be a music academy.  In between the routines of life in an impersonal institution one of the girls learned how to sing with exceptional talent.  The other sister, after almost malingering from lack of life choices, was able to persevere and become a violin virtuoso as well as inspiration for the famous composer Vivaldi.  Operas were sung, choirs performed, small boys were even castrated in hopes their voices would retain their heavenly soprano sound into adulthood.  People who sang and preformed on stage were much acclaimed and admired even as celebrities are admired today.

The society in 18th century Venice was full of moral contrasts.  Some women were required or expected to be virgins their whole life to the point of being cloistered while a married lady who was wealthy was allowed to have another lover besides her husband as long as it was discreet. It was essentially open marriages.  The sister with the singing talent was swept off to marriage by a handsome, wealthy good guy.  After all she was as well known in 18th century Venice as our modern day celebrities are on television now.  The more introverted sister, that played  the violin,  had to live her life as a cloistered virgin locked away in the music academy. Priests, like the composer Vivaldi, were often living openly with their housekeepers being their unofficial significant others.  It was a rumor Vivaldi lived with a woman that way but there is no actual evidence to prove he ever actually broke his priestly vows of celibacy.

The title of the book, The Four Seasons, is making reference to the work of music Vivaldi composed by that name that is well known.  The novel starts out as interesting historical fiction. The subject of feminism is introduced after the married, wealthy sister becomes in charge of the family finances. The author did make it clear that a woman being in charge of the family finances was an unusual occurrence in 18th century Venice. The other theme that is woven through out the novel is the power of making choices.  The author emphasized  that even a poor orphan who has to be a cloistered virgin her whole life still has personal choices to make that can impact her life for better or for worse. So that was the actual theme to the novel for me: Even the least of us have big or small choices everyday that can make our life that day better or worse.  The title of the book, The Four Seasons, may also refer to the four seasons of life and how each season may be different.  The novel was written by Laurel Corona who is a professor of English and Humanities and lives in California.

Sunday Stealing: Would You Rather Meme, Part 2

Back with these revealing
hypothetical questions from
www.sundaystealing.blogspot.com
originally featured on WTT: THE BLOG
This weeks questions stolen from
SIGN UP GENIUS

Would you rather go to a movie or dinner alone? Supper

Would you rather say everything on your mind or never speak again?  "...Therefore be wise as serpents but harmless as doves."__Matthew 10:16
There would be no way to say everything on your mind or never speak again.




Would you rather make a phone call or send a text? They both have their place.
Would you rather read an awesome book or watch a good movie? I like both but I could live without movies.
Would you rather be the most popular person at work or the smartest? I am not a follow the crowd type person. The world is bigger then being the most popular person.
Would you rather put a stop to war or end world hunger?
Who knows the right answer for that one?
Would you rather spend the night at a luxury hotel or a scenic camping site?  I already live in Kentucky and have all the scenery I want, so I would pick the luxury hotel for a change of scenery.
Would you rather explore space or the ocean?  Looking forward to the day I can go straight up in a space shuttle from Kentucky, straight down to Hong Kong to work for the day, then back to Kentucky.
Would you rather go deep sea diving or bungee jumping?  I can watch those on TV.

Would you rather be a kid your whole life or an adult your whole life? Life ain't PETER PAN,
Would you rather eat a meal of cow tongue or octopus?  Whichever one is fried or has gravy on it or is on a biscuit.
Would you rather have x-ray vision or magnified hearing? Hearing
Would you rather work in a group or work alone? I do my best work alone.

And how about yourself? What would you rather do?
Happy Sunday and have a great week :)










 

OFF THE TOP OF MY HEAD: My Blue Suede Shoes

Such a great book! The stories are so well written they kept my attention for the better part of a day and a half!  I have read so many books in my life that it is rare for a book to do that for me now.

MY BLUE SUEDE SHOES  is a book of four novellas woven together by the common theme of domestic violence. The wild card in each story is a pair of blue suede shoes which is also a common theme helping to tie the stories together as well.

All the authors of these stories as well as the fictional characters happen to be African American but the ethnicity of all the characters could be changed to any ethnicity without the truth of the stories meanings being lost.  BREAKIN' IT DOWN  by Desiree Cooper details what a successful celebrity who was abused as a child does to her own daughter. BROTHERLY LOVE written by Tracy-Price-Thompson tells a tale of family cycles of incest.  In BREAKIN' DISHES TaRessa Stovall weaves the double looped story of a husband beater and a cheating husband. THE WRONG SIDE OF MR. RIGHT is an interesting tale of the fine line between being a traditional, submissive wife or an abused one. None of the blue suede shoes are the same in any of the stories.  They are merely an instrument used to bring hope or make the protagonist stop and think or rebel against their individual situations.

Practical life applications:

1.  If a partner hits you, then they are not the one for you.
2.  Everyone, no matter how successful they are presently, has insecurities and baggage left over from childhood.
3.  No amount of money or prestige is worth putting up with mental and/or physical abuse.
4.  There are ways out of situations like that if you look for them.

Interestingly enough I had to find some shoes for work around the time I was thinking of this post:

 

I did not even realize until after I had gotten home from shopping that I had bought myself a pair of blue suede shoes. I thought I had merely bought them for comfort!

 

5.  What are some circumstances we might need our own set of blue suede shoes for or our own hope for?  How about yourself? What do you need your own set of blue suede shoes or hope for?

 

picture credits to ONWARD

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sunday Stealing (The I meme)

The I Meme was stolen from
the blog THE ARCHIVES, The
I Meme is all about me, me, me,
me. Which these memes do help
you learn about yourself so think
of it as self therapy.

I am...am sometimes like a small child fighting sleep.  I am not ready for the day to be over. 
I want to focus, focus, focus to be more efficient.
I have...a very active imagination that the good Lord gave me, yet I have been around enough that I have too much clarity about what is really going on.
I wish that my family mostly lived in one town, instead of being scattered over many little towns and a couple of states.  I sometimes would cry when I watched the Braverman family on Parenthood because our family is no longer like that.   Blame it on the economy, the rain, whatever...

I hate it ....when I spend my little money on fast food or a meal  out and then the meal is not  up to par or the employees throw it out there like they really don't care what happens to it.. Maybe there is an undue amount of grease dripping off the burger, or the bun is hard (literally), or the onion rings are hard and crunchy stale (literally), the fries have too much salt or pepper on them for anyone to be able to enjoy it etc. These are all things that have happened to me this year in the town I stay in.  Other towns close by seem to take more pride and do a better job in their fast food work.
So that's my rant ;).
 I feel...that truly in the town I stay in that people do not often take pride in their work or are apathetic about it.

I fear..the world is so much more impersonal now with everybody taking care of their own things with their own technology. People walk looking down at their phones or talking on their phones while wearing headphones. People are at the store on their phones.  Social media accounts take a lot of personal interaction out of the day, and people are sort of like this meme....everything is all I,I,I, I. and me, me, me , me. ( Do I sound like Destiny's Child, repeating everything?)

I wonder...If Barrack Obama is looking forward to the time he won't have to be president anymore.  If maybe he is thinking..."Yes! Just a little while longer till all this pressure is gone and I can have an enjoyable day again."  I am not a particular fan of him but I feel the American public has bucked him every chance they have and have not let him make one move without waves of opposition. (So okay I had another rant.)

I regret...a few things...but mostly whatever I  did was what I wanted to do at that time.
I love people again after having made a conscious choice again to love them.  They may not like or love me but I have decided to love them, even as Our Lord loves us anyway while we are far from perfect also..

I never liked the social side of school....but I realize now I really like learning.
I ache....Yes I do ache being of a certain age, (lol)
I always...pray everyday but rarely before a meal  as I pray enough all day that I don't need a meal to remind me to pray.
I usually ....read several hours a day in one form or another, books, magazines, online.
I am not...good at math and I feel that has limited my education.
I sometimes...lose track of time when I am thinking about things.
I cry...at times to relieve stress.
I am not always..I am hardly ever a follow the crowd type person.
I dance...only in play.  No one danced in the culture I grew up in so we just didn't learn how.
I am confused...at times because my mind wanders and I might not be paying attention to what is going on.
I need...(and we are back to this) to focus more.
I should...try and get more with the program. Whatever it is for that day.

And there I have it...a couple years worth of therapy consolidated in one Sunday Stealing meme.
And you thought I was dumb.

if  you would like to participate in your own Sunday Stealing therapy or to just chill out go to www.sundaystealing.blogspot.com

 

 

 

BLOGGING ON

Doing my research on blogging the past few years I came across so many abandoned blogs!  A blogger can go along giving the appearance of doing relatively well in their blogging endeavors only to suddenly never make a blog post again.  I wonder sometimes if that will happen to me.  That I may post one day on Onward and then never get around to making another post.


The reasons it appears to me people quit posting on their blog are many and varied. I am listing the gist of what I have noticed below:
-- It takes more time then people anticipated to blog.  Even the simplest of posts can take hours.
--To be a blogger may be to "wear your heart on your sleeve."  Some may feel they have inadvertently revealed too much personal information.
--Sometimes the subject the person was blogging about has ended.  If it was a blog about their experience during pregnancy or childbirth, adoption etc. and the goal has been achieved.
--There is so much information and social media to read now that even ones acquaintances or relatives may not read the blogs.
--It can be easier to micro blog on other forms of social media such as Facebook and twitter. 
--Negativity and drama draws in more readers then being positive or neutral but many blog folks don't want to go there.


For myself, I didn't blog much last year.  The area where I live, I don't personally know any bloggers. Many people are not even sure what a blog is or have never even heard of it.  My other excuses are that I was busy, my grandmother was in hospice for several months and passed away, and so on. But, I have made a decision to keep on blogging, to press forward, to continue. And "I'll be blogging you long time."
:)

Sunday Stealing: THE NOSY MEME

Chilling with Sunday Stealing
This weeks subject is:
THE NOSY MEME
from FYEAH SURVEYS

So if you asked me, which you didn't, all these memes are nosy! Edgar Allen Poe just never had to deal with this.  The first questions are: average hours or sleep, last thing I googled, one place that makes me happy, how many blankets I sleep under, what are you wearing right now?

My answer is: REALLY?
The next questions are:  favorite fictional character, last book I read, last movie watched in the cinema, dream vacation, dream wedding, dream pet, dream job, how old would you be if you didn't know how old you were. 
So, my answers are: Amber, in the book FOREVER AMBER; recently I read the book THE WITNESS, last cinema movie BLADES OF GLORY, the dream vacation is Ireland, no dream wedding, no dream pet, 36.

 Final Questions:  which is worse, failing or never trying; if life is short why do we do so many things we don't like and like so many things we don't do.

Well...never trying would be worse then failing because even failing can lead to good things that you might not have had if you never tried. 
And...the reason we do so many things we don't like is because of necessity, peer pressure, and boredom.
The reason we may like so many things we don't do is because imagination is often more enjoyable then reality and work at something.

A random thought:  This candy bouquet that is nothing more then a cheap vase, some ribbon, and a few candy bars, is sold for twenty-five dollars.  A good example of a upgrade per the way it is presented.

 So, "How was your weekend?"


to participate in sunday stealing go to www.sundaystealing.blogspot.com