30 Days of Spring: Capture the Beginning, Day 1

Capture the Beginning

Um, how do I say this?  I'm totally and blatantly ripping off this idea from a friend.  

Sorry, friend. I hope you understand. 

She has found a program to encourage her to open her eyes and look around and photograph what she sees.  Being a less-than-awesome-photographer, but a complete photographer-wannabe, I'm following her blog and her prompts and I'm going to try to open my eyes to the world around me, too.  

Join in or follow along - the more the merrier!

I didn't really want to use my opening photo as my selection for "Capture the Beginning" because there is so much more to the story of the baby birds in the nest.  But it's the best photo I got for the prompt.  

Mama bird has been sitting on this nest for a week or so. It's right along our walkway and I have been trying like crazy to get a good photo of her with my phone.  She glares at me when I walk by her.  I thought it would be an awesome shot! 

So today I take my 'real' camera out to capture her sitting on her nest incubating the beginning of her new family. But she was missing and this is what I got.

Mama's Out to Lunch

I figured she'd be back so I wandered around the house looking for more photo-ops expecting to catch her glare when I returned.  Instead of her glare, I got her babies!  I loved the surprise!  

So what else did I spy in my yard?  Let's take a peek!

Notice the Little Things

 A weed is only a weed when it's a flower blooming where you don't want it. 

Dandelions, the Flower of Childhood

When Alyssa was two or three she was with her Grandmother for the day.  Grandpa was going out to "kill the dandelions."  My sweet little girl just could not believe her ears.  Appalled she took matters into her own hands and ran outside and picked as many pretty dandelions as her pudgy little hands could hold. 

Open to the Sun

 I love that my tulips completely worship the sun.  They are so open they look like they are about done blooming, but tonight this pretty flower will be closed up tight waiting for another day of sunshine.

I am the Sun!

My daffodils on the other hand, just bloom strong and steady, being sunshine when there is none.

Let's play!

Please!?!

Fine!

Lastly is my faithful companion with her ever present Frisbee. She is such a sweetie, but don't be fooled by those sad eyes... it's just her ploy to get me to play.  She's pretty cunning!

The Long Island Medium

I think it's about time I follow up to my post of going to see the Long Island Medium, Theresa Caputo. 

It was an interesting and fun night spent out with my friend.  We had dinner at a new (to us) restaurant that was amazing and just made it to the theater in time for the lights to flash their warning that it was time to be seated. 

We paid well to have "good" seats near the front of the theater.  That was unnecessary as Theresa spent her time wandering around to the back of the theater.  Camera men follow her and project her and the audience onto a screen in the front of the theater.  No need to pay for 'good' seats!

So the question remains, is she real or fraudulent?  

Personally, I don't really care.  She brought hope and healing to a lot of people that night, and if it's real or not, I think that is what is important. 

As for me, I'm still on the fence.  There were one or two people that she just didn't quite connect with. One in particular that she kept going back to as if she was going to make it work. And there were others who she said things to that were quite convincing.  

I did hope that she would speak to me.  But I don't have the kind of pain that those she spoke to carried.  I wonder if I would feel more convinced if she had spoken to me?  

Here's something that I find curious, though.  And to be honest, it pushes me toward the "believing" side.  They say children are very open to "supernatural phenomenon."  I'm only using that phrase for lack of a better word at the moment.  When I was young, I think I was a little more aware of the unseen or unknown or what is to come.  The best example that I easily recall is of my pre-school years or early school years.  I was completely aware of when I was going to win something.  I can clearly recall being on a cake walk at the school carnival and "knowing" that I was going to win.  It wasn't a hope to win, it was truly knowing.  It was a feeling inside my body.  It used to be frequent and now is less so, but it was very real.  Interesting to me, that very same feeling invaded my body for the entire show.  I was almost certain I would be called on.

I know that falls a little short of my explanation of knowing vs hoping, but here's the deal.  Whoever, or whatever tells me I am going to win something, do something or find something, was there that night.  That's what I was feeling.  There were a lot of people with great expectations in that theater and many needed to hear what they heard. My need was not so great as theirs and my visit wasn't verbalized, but my "people" were there.  Of that I am certain. 

Skeptically hopeful?

Tomorrow I am going to an event at the Aronoff Center featuring Theresa Caputo.  

You've either just rolled your eyes or you are saying "Theresa who?"

Theresa Caputo aka "The Long Island Medium." 

Okay, you can roll your eyes now if you didn't already. It's okay, I won't be offended.

I'm trying to go with no expectations.  Seriously.  In a theater full of people why should I even be hopeful that I might be the one to receive a message or a "hug" from my loved ones who have passed?  And I imagine you are asking yourself right now, "Does she really believe in this stuff?"

My answer is, I don't know. 

My father has been dead for 54 years.  Growing up I always felt him with me.  Although I knew he'd never walk me down the aisle or hold my babies, I always believed he was here and part of my life that he'd have shared had he lived.  

I don't know.  But in admitting I don't know I think the answer is I do believe, or at least I believe it's possible. Theresa Caputo isn't the only medium I've been fascinated by.  I wished for a long time that I could meet John Edwards, too.  This isn't something new for me.

In the past few years I've lost so many people that were important and close to me.  My best friend, my mother, my father-in-law and most recently my mother-in-law.  I expect nothing personal to come from tomorrow's show.  But I am hoping for more. 

It's Been A Long Long Time

It's been quite some time since I've sat on the deck of the Badonkadonk Cafe and pondered life.  I miss the Cafe - I can picture my deck having a swing on which I sit in the cool breeze and look out over the valley from my mountainside.  Other times my deck is actually on the water and the tide is working its way out.  I can hear gulls arguing, mixed in with the gentle sound of the waves.  The air smells so different than when my cafe is in the mountains.  Salty, sticky with summer heat.  

I have no purpose to sit and swing on my deck tonight, other than to encourage myself to return and practice my skills of writing.  And pondering.  Ha!  Perhaps with this brief start I will find my way back sooner rather than later.  It seems to me that quite a lot has happened since I wrote last, but at the same time, I have difficulty pulling it all to the forefront of my mind and putting the words down "on paper."

So I'll breathe in a little more of the sticky salt air and enjoy the sun on my face and arms.  Then, without much adieu I'll slip back into reality and wrap my sweater a bit tighter around myself as protection from the winter storm that drops snow all around outside my home.  

Badonkadonk Cafe - I have missed you.

Found Treasure!

I occasionally go back to MySpace and recover some of my old blogs... ones that I find personal attachment to after this much time has passed.  This in particular requires saving for all posterity.  It was a class project of Krissy's (May, 2007) and I simply adore it!


Kris-ology (the science/study of ME!)

Krissy | Myspace Video

A Rant

I am sorry to continue to Rant and Rave but I can't get beyond *that "man's"*  assault on women, calling a woman who's fighting for contraceptives to fall within the range of her health insurance coverage a slut. Not to mention those contraceptives are also widely used for other medical reasons than birth control. (The Hoya).

*He* says he doesn't want to pay for this "slut" to have sex. 

Guess what.  I don't want to pay for that neanderthal to overeat, smoke, and sit around on his fat ass all day.  He's been hospitalized for chest pains in the past.  Is there any doubt he's on blood pressure medication, and a plethora of other meds?  Who paid for his hospital stay?  Who pays for his medications?  If it's the same insurance program that should be paying for contraception, then I say I don't want to pay for that neanderthal to overeat, smoke & sit around on his fat ass all day. Take away his meds!

*He* doesn't need the medications, he's can just adjust his eating habits, give up his stinky cigars and get some exercise.  I don't want to pay for his anti-health whorey lifestyle. 

The best reason of all for "Obama-care" (and I say that like it's a good thing!)

We've Reached that Age Where....

Recently I was told of the death of a past friend of mine.  She was 56.  According to the obituary it was a sudden and unexpected death, probably a heart attack. 

Wow.

How can that be?  I remember a straight laced, clean cut girl who made most of her own clothes. A heart attack at age 56?  I'm in shock. 

But once I get beyond that (I haven't really) I start thinking about the girl I knew.  We were friends in grade school and into high school.  She lived in a very nice house on a lake with a dock and a ski boat as her back yard & toys.  Her family vacationed on Lake Chelan for a week or more each summer and one year I was invited to come along. 

You know that sunburn you are always being warned about?  The one of your youth that will come back as cancer later in your life?  Mine came from that week in Chelan.  I remember sleeping on the grass under the stars and waking up damp with dew.  I recall a week of wearing a long white T covering my blistering back.  I remember the frigid water that comes off a glacier to make that lake. 

I remember hanging out with this girl and having fun.  But then something changed.  She became the girl we ganged up on. 

She was the one we stopped asking to hang out with us.  We avoided her in school and after school.  We started dating and going to parties and didn't include her.  It was our Riding in Cars with Boys time of life and she wasn't invited.  We whispered about her and never looked back. 

And now she's dead at a very young age. A husband and daughter survive her.  My memories survive of her. And more than that...

Guilt. 

She obviously moved on and lived her life despite the angst I feel I caused in her teen years.  Perhaps I give myself too much credit.  But whether my actions actually impacted her or not, I've never forgotten.  It's been more than 35 years since I've seen her and I still remember. 

How does one go about redemption for our sins of the past?  Who knew that a kinder, gentler me in my youth would have made such a difference to me now?  I wish I could change the past.  I can't.  I can only pledge more kindness in my present and future.  I pledge it in her honor and her memory.