Brain research is clear – our thoughts trigger the neurochemical flood of emotion. Think negatively and you will feel anxious or fearful. Think positively and you’ll be flooded with the neurochemistry for happiness, contentment or love.
I admit I’m obsessive about steering clear of people who are sick. I’ve been “known” to remove my groceries off the counter and go to another check-out if I see a clerk sniffing or coughing. With fibromyalgia everything lasts longer and is more severe so I go to great lengths to avoid people who even appear to be sick.
My husband caught a cold 2 weeks ago and I’ve assiduously washed everything down – counters, door knobs, light switches and my husband – with disinfectant.
Turns out I was disinfecting the wrong person.
I woke up yesterday with a scratchy throat, a headache and feeling even less chipper than I usually feel in the morning.
“But at 90 . . . she is exercising caution as she recovers from a heavy cold which she’s had for at least 12 days, (12 DAYS!!!! ) and which is bound to have left her feeling pretty miserable. (tell me about it).”
“She hasn’t yet had an opportunity to go outside and explore her 20,000 acre private Norfolk estate. (So true, so true)”
LONG LIVE THE QUEEN . . . and me too!
P.S. Wash your hands after reading this post – I’m contagious . . .
Besides being soft and cuddly a mission of mine is to bring poetry to the masses, of which you are some. And I am here to bring you the truth . . . even though it might hurt.
Santa was frantic at the North Pole
Finances in the red, he was in the hole
Mrs Claus couldn’t afford sugar
For her cookies sublime
Dear old hubby didn’t have a dime
North Pole employment had exploded
and Santa’s credit had eroded
He’d spent his last cent on black Friday deals
and turkey with the trimmings for thanksgiving meals
The night before Christmas he no longer had clout
When all the elves threatened a walk-out
Elf-union held all the chips
As evidenced by the grin on all the elf lips
For every elf in all the land
Had won a pay deal without tipping their hand:
Double pay all December
a free thanksgiving meal in November
Finally fringe benefits for elves was real
For Santa and the Mrs, there was no appeal
Santa had bitten his nails to the quick
Both right and left eyes developed a tic
All Santa could do was self medicate
So he stuffed his mouth from the cookie plate
And downed all the rum from a hot toddy cup
his blood pressure sky-high, went up and up
His big fat belly shook like a bowl full of lead
While visions of bankruptcy danced in his head
So all you children and adults too
Have compassion and learn to make due
STOP asking for presents and things you don’t need
Sharon Bonin Pratt is a writer, an artist and a dear friend. I think she also is psychic. I’ve been not feeling great and the subject of her last post was just what I needed. AND it’s dedicated to ME!!!! What an honor!
Shari inspired me to look for a smile (SEE THE VIDEO).
“Who can laugh without relaxing? Isn’t that why some of us (not me of course, and certainly not you, but other unnamed folks) pee their pants when laughing raucously? Losing all control is not a bad thing, even if you must change your whitie-dities, because when you’re having that much fun – who cares about all the rest? Oh, and it’s contagious! In a good way, not like the flu, but like having enough cup cakes for everyone in the world. So now I not only feel good inside my own world weary bod – I feel good because everyone around me also feels good. Motto for today: Spread cheer – laugh out loud.”
You may know it as stream-of-consciousness, non-stop writing, free writing – all the same names for what amounts to writing with no thought to spelling punctuation, whether it makes sense or not. Just write. I call it brain-dump.
It’s a writing technique used for warm-up, breaking into writer’s block or uncovering unconscious process. In the journal class today we were given the prompt “We do not write in order to be understood, we write in order to understand” (C.Day Lewis).
I typed out my journal page (I hope you appreciate the lengths I go to for you my readers!) to show you an unedited glimpse into what a sample of free-writing looks like.
But first!!! here’s the ditty that came out of my free-write:
My tiny trains of thought
chugging uphill
Hopefully if I run out of steam
I will stay on track
I think I can I think I can I think I can.
Actual journal page. (The flower is from the napkin I had for cookie refreshments)
“Who on earth really understands us we are understood by others only in reference to how the other perceives their own world thru their own lens which always clouded just like the mist that clouds the sky this morning I’m obscured obscured and I obscure how I see what I see through a clouded lens of my feelings and perceiving the cloud it’s hard to know what is real and what not obscured vision filter it thru a mist as if I see with the brightness I don’t know my reference my experience no one can ever know They think they know I think I know yet my senses are bound up in my brain scattering thoughts confused thinking between the past and present in the obscurity of the future I meant to write obscurity of the present, interesting slip of the pen in the scattering of thinking on paper no one knows what this means I don’t know what this means how am I suppose to know how am I suppose to understand what can’t be understood it’s safe to say no matter what I write no one will understand NOT EVEN ME how can we pretend to know much less pretend to understand always curious wanting to understand wanting to know it’s as if a long train pulled by a locomotive is coming can’t see the end if I’m at the beginning can’t see the beginning if I’m at the end and in the middle of it all are cars filled with the unknown going up a hill like the Little Engine that Could try to reach the top of the knowing to see other to the other side where it’s just a glide, just a downhill run where the brakes need to be applied not the foot on the throttle if a train has a throttle I think I can I think I can I think I can”.
“Ye are all leaves of one tree and the fruits of one branch.”Baha’i
As I “count up” to my 70th birthday” I think more and more about choice & inevitability, and the wonder of the unknown. When I received these pictures from my friend Sharon they struck me as reflecting the human condition . . . mine included.
“Thou Shalt Not Whine”is a hand embroidered sign in my office that was given to me by my good friend Sharon.
I do try to live up to that motto but today I am whiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiining. I have a headache, my body aches all over, my feet are burning, my brain is fogged and the only energy I had was depleted by the effort it took me to get in bed and take a nap*. Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa! Woe is me! Oh! woe is me!
“I’m not lissssssstening”
Like all (or many) of us living with chronic conditions the key is life-style management to keep the symptoms at a low simmer instead of a rolling boil. In the last several decades I’ve perfected life-style management:
judy’s Life-Style Management
Overdo it quick
take advantage of the lull
then crash, moan and groan.
Whimper quietly
when no one is listening
It’s free therapy
Did whining make me feel better? Nope. But it’s nice to know that even if I’m not feeling well
my inner child is alive and kicking.
*You don’t have to wash your hands after reading this post. I’m not contagious. It’s just fibromyalgia letting me know who’s in charge.
My motto: Never, ever give up on healthy eating when it comes to chocolate!
Brownie mix and pumpkin . . . well you’ll have to read my first attempt 3 ingredients to Eat Healthier and lose cravings . . . not so delectable. So back to Google and trying cake mix instead of brownie mix. I also used an ORGANIC brand of pumpkin but the “batter” was so stiff I couldn’t stir it. So I plopped in an ORGANIC egg . . . and of course, flax-seed to make it a COMPLETE health food.
Dogs are incredibly likeable creatures
with many commendable features.
They sniff and they lick
and rarely get sick
whether named Freddie or Duffy or Peaches.
Rats! George Clooney is off the market! I rarely write about celebrities but Clooney is an exception. I was in love with him before he was famous. He played detective James Falconer on the TV show Sisters in 1993. I didn’t have a clue who he was. I only watched the show to see him.
“. . . for the ducks that do have orange feet, well, it’s all about attracting the ladies. Chicks dig orange.”
“Bright orange coloring suggests that a male duck, also known as a drake, is getting all his vitamins, particularly carotenoids, such as beta-carotene and vitamin A, antioxidants that can be beneficial to the immune system. “This indicates that his behaviors and genes are good enough for him to recognize and eat the right food, or that his immune system is strong enough to produce bright orange legs,” Omland says. “The female sees this as a very attractive trait to pass on to her offspring.”‘
“Omland’s work only looked at drakes’ bills, but he thinks there’s enough circumstantial evidence to say that ducks check out each other’s feet, too. “Blue-footed boobies have, obviously, very blue feet, and it’s very well documented that they use their feet in courtship and that females do care about the coloration of males’ feet,” Omland says. “Perhaps mallards, like the boobies, have a foot fetish.”‘
Good thing I’m not trying to make a living as a farmer. So far the cauliflower is bitter, the broccoli is tough, the apples are tasty but a bit mushy, the 6 berries died on the vine and word is still out on the 4 tomatoes which are green. Stay posted for my next CROP.
Everyone knows that EXpirations – like sneezes – spread germs.
Here’s an example of how INspirations are contagious.
Max and I just got back from our morning prayer walk. I was singing to God while Max, well, Max was sniffing to the max.
A huge raven swooped by, landing just ahead on a light post. It was sleek, shiny black and started calling loudly for other ravens to join him. I wondered if that raven was the patriarch or just some young whippersnapper with a rousing call to action.
I wondered how you tell the age of a bird. No tell-tail (sorry couldn’t resist) age spots or wrinkles.
My mind flashed on a brilliant comment about God that Ramesh Sood had made – something about wrinkles – which I couldn’t precisely remember but I remember thinking, “How brilliant” at the time I read it.
When we got home I was inspired to re-read his comment and poem.
“What an inspiring post this… yes, I have often prayed..May God never let my thoughts get wrinkled…May I continue to exude youthful energy and exuberance…And Judy, if one has to go by Photos on your page here..you don’t look 67..touch wood…let me try:”
A song waits to be written And to be Sung It’s so happy and joyous To always stay young
Doesn’t matter if body belies Let mind think fresh thoughts Let heart with happier ones clung
A song waits to be written And to be sung
Be cheery always, have fun Talk to Moon, stars and flowers Taste the rising sun on your tongue A song that waited to be written I know you have just sung
Hey, stay happy and stay young..
“Judy this song didn’t exist just ten minutes back.. . . .that’s the power of inspiration.” Ramesh Sood, (author of Elephant & Ant, coming soon to a computer near you). A Little More Than Ordinary..
Been working on some preliminary doodle-sketches for Ramesh’s Poem about the Love Affair Between an Elephant and an Ant.
Ramesh is so creative (and wonderfully quirky) to have dreamt up a relationship between such disparate souls! But his charming haiku and poem about this unlikely pair captured my attention and my heart.
Here’s a sample of the poetry prelude to Elephant and ANT to whet your taste for more!
Elephant & Antby Ramesh SoodA little More than Ordinary . . .Prelude: Before AntBefore marrying his AntPreliminary Sketch of Rattie!Our dear hero ElephantHad fallen for a Female RatOh, don’t ask how could be thatShocked to see the monolithRattie thought it really fitto talk before taking the bait. So happily she agreed for a date
What’s your vote? Should Elph be Green, Blue, Orange or . . . .?
Maureen
