Lately, I’ve found myself telling my teen “When I was your age…” or “Back in my day…” and I’m no longer shocked that the words come out of my mouth like I used to. I’m… More
just as beautiful
Taking a little break from poetry today to read one of my short stories about love, inspired by a real-life event and a young man I fell in love with so long ago. I hope you like it.
one step at a time
what do you dream of
when you close your eyes?
do you see a future filled with possibilities
or do you see a past littered with lies—
the ones you told yourself
when you thought no one was looking
the ones that shaped the way you saw the world
making you believe you didn’t deserve anything?
where did things change for you?
when did they fall apart?
was it when they said you couldn’t do anything right
or was it when he broke your heart?
was it the day they promised you the world
but never came back?
will you believe me if i tell you
that you can get yourself back on track
to a place where possibilities are endless
where hope and joy spring from deep within
one step at a time, one win at a time,
all we have to do is believe… and begin.
out of my depth
i’m tired of always being the strong one
some days i just need to let my shields down
just for a time so i can exhale again
maybe then i can remember when
you used to keep me safe from harm
until that night you left before the dawn
after telling me you’d be there when i’d wake
only you weren’t and so here i wait
being the strong one all by myself
out of control, out of my depth
losing count of the days since you left
with my heart in your hand, my soul is bereft
all i have left is the memory of you
your voice, your words pulling me through
every line perfectly crafted, well thought out
filled with love and kindness, without a doubt
reminding me to be strong, because there’s no other way
to make it through each challenging day
and face the world with my head held high
wondering no more the reasons why
you had to leave the way you did
until the day you return to me, your dreams fulfilled
your hand on my heart again, feeling each heartbeat
let me close my eyes now, time to go back to sleep
Beauty, Undone
You are very beautiful to me,
even with the imperfections that you see.
The too-wide eyes, that loping smile,
the way you wear your hair, your very own style.
Don’t listen to what others tell you,
nor pay attention to what they say you should do,
that each line upon your skin a mark of future correction.
Don’t they know that underneath it all, you’re perfection?
A nip here, a tuck there –
beauty at a price, everywhere,
but beneath all that is just decay.
Is that really the game you want to play?
So smile that smile and be brave
Become that peaceful soul you crave.
For you’re perfect just the way you are,
beautiful beneath every wrinkle, every scar
Dry your eyes, stop wishing to become
like everyone else, empty as a deafening drum.
Stop changing yourself to fit into what you think is true,
strive to be at peace with your soul – just…just be you
And as you look at yourself – so beautiful, so free,
unencumbered by what the world defines as pretty,
though acceptance can be the most difficult thing, it can be done.
It’s a hard road, I know – it’s why I’m still undone.
Laissez-Faire
Over coffee and an omelet, we talk about current events
eventually ending with a realization so inevitable
that we’ll never ever be ready for what’s to come
any efforts we start today would be negligible
for things happening now have been going on for a long time
we’ve just been too distracted by other things
like the phones and devices always in our hands
and their funny memes with no deep meanings
beyond taking our attention from more important events around us
simmering yet hidden behind the perfect smiles
on our social media feeds from morning till night
keeping us all constantly—purposefully—occupied.
What Books Do I Want to Read, You Ask?
Are you ready for this conversation?
Just kidding. No one is. Heck, I’m not. So instead of listing the thousands of books I want to read, I’ll list the first five books because that’s more doable (and I know you don’t have all day).
- You Are a Badass: How to Stop Doubting Your Greatness and Start Living an Awesome Life by Jen Sincero – This is a reread for me, or rather a first-time READ because I listened to the audiobook the first time and can’t remember a thing. I’m more of a reader when it comes to remembering things. Plus I can highlight passages and that makes all the difference.
- Hate You Later: A Lit Lovers Enemies to Lovers Romantic Comedy by Ciara Blume – I met Ciara Blume last year at my first Orange Country Romance Writers meeting and loved her fun energy immediately. Her cover for Hate Your Later also won the cover contest and it definitely stood out. Hate You Later is the first book in her Lit Lovers series.
- Daily Creative: Find Your Inspiration to Spark Creative Energy and Fight Burnout by Todd Henry – I bought this around the middle of last year and didn’t quite get to start on the right foot so I figured for 2024, I could start it on January 1 and continue all the way to December 31. Each day has a post and a question about creativity and I journal my answers.
- Make Your Art No Matter What: Moving Beyond Creative Hurdles by Beth Pickens – Described as the Artist’s Way for the 21st Century, I picked up this book from our local bookstore Page Against the Machine. After being in burnout for the last three years, I’ve finally come out of it and hope to have the tools to keep my creative fire burning no matter what as I move forward.
- The Echo of Old Books by Barbara Davis – Covers with piles and piles of books drew me to this book like a moth to a flame the moment I saw it. I didn’t even read the description before I bought it but it’s about a rare book dealer who discovers a pair of beautifully bound volumes that appear to have never been published and tell of two sides of a tragic romance.
What about you? What books are you looking forward to reading?
Oh To Read All Day
If I could do nothing but read all the wonderful books,
I’d consider it a day well spent
even better when I learn something new
I don’t even have to pay rent
to learn how to change my own oil or replace a flat tire
if ever I’m on the road alone
sew me a pair of PJs of every hue
as I sit on the Iron Throne
I can lose myself in different worlds and times, even space
all from reading an interesting book
picked from library shelves or from home
and all I have to do is look.
Sequoias
I yearn to stand between ancient sequoias one day,
be reminded of how minuscule we humans really are
though we think we’re not.
I want to breathe the forest’s clean air into my lungs
witness nature’s glory with my own eyes, grateful
not everything can be bought.
For such is our responsibility to keep nature’s beauty alive
as the world rushes fast into its electronic future, devoid
of conscience or forethought.
“Keep close to Nature’s heart… and break clear away, once in a while, and climb a mountain or spend a week in the woods. Wash your spirit clean.” – John Muir
Name an attraction or town close to home that you still haven’t got around to visiting.
I Might As Well Have Fun
Last night, I stopped writing my current WIP at nine and went to bed, not to sleep but to do one thing for “fun.”
I cleaned my TikTok FYP feed to limit everything I watch related to #booktok. And while I was at it, dialing it down even more by limiting it to contemporary romance. Apparently, it helps the algorithm when it’s time for me to post something related to my books. Someone once said it takes her only five minutes every night to curate her FYP, and I thought, five minutes? I’ve got five minutes.
I’m doing this for fun, remember? Five minutes will go by in a blink of an eye!
One hour later, I was still scrolling endlessly until everything I was seeing was romance-related which left me pretty stressed because it meant I could no longer see my favorite exercise, recipes, and gardening accounts, or tell Steve Burns from Blue’s Clues (@heyoutthereitsme) about my day while tearing up. But it’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make right now as I remind myself, I’m doing this for fun.
The other four things I do for fun:
2. Reading – more like going through my massive TBR, both digital and physical books, which is one of my goals for 2024)
3. Knitting – while NOT buying any new yarn because I have 2 bins of them under the bed. This is a hard one, btw. I want new yarn!
4. Taking walks around my neighborhood and checking out the cool shops as well as the little free libraries I find along the way
5. Blogging – I’ve missed blogging and for 2024, I’ve told myself to start again. I may not be able to stick to a daily schedule but I plan on posting at least once a week. Maybe a poem, maybe an answer to a Daily Prompt, maybe a Wordless Wednesday post. Who knows?
It’s all for fun!
List five things you do for fun.
Clutter on Display
Years ago, I projected my iPad onto a screen for a class on advanced massage techniques and suddenly there was a gasp in the room followed by chuckles.
Weird, I thought. I hadn’t yet pulled up the anatomy app.
“You need to open your emails,” someone said and that’s when I saw it.
This was before Apple decided that maybe showing one’s unopened emails was best not displayed above the envelope icon. But back then, it was right there on the screen for all to see.
I had 192,698 unopened emails.
Yikes! Talk about clutter.
Well, fast forward almost fifteen years and there are still about the same number of unopened emails across all my accounts (actually, half) but thankfully, it doesn’t show up on my phone display anymore.
Whew.
Otherwise, I’d really need to declutter… right?
Keep Going
Sometimes we just need that extra nudge to remind us we’re doing okay and that all we need to do is keep going. So moving into 2024, that’ll be my billboard.
No beating myself up for not doing “better” than I’d hoped. I did my best and that’s that.
Just keep going.
Be kind to myself and others. Keep at my personal and professional goals, whatever they may be, or at least the day’s to-do list. Make sure everyone’s fed and so is my spirit with a bit of meditation sometime during the day or night—and exercise (which means walking the dog or letting her out to do her business because running that pet vac is more work than necessary).
Do one creative thing per day. Keep writing while silencing the critical voice inside of me as I draft because she really can be a pain.
It’s definitely better than the alternative.
Not Enough
I used to complain about not having enough time to do all the things I wanted to do in the day.
For example, today, I want to dive into day 3 of Daily Creative: A Practical Guide for Staying Prolific, Brilliant, and Healthy by Todd Henry and write my thoughts in my new journal. But I haven’t done it yet and it’s already past noon as I write this. Instead, I walked the dog twice and watched an educational segment on writing blurbs while knitting a cowl before discovering I made a mistake about seven repetitions back as the yarn broke.
Unfortunately, time isn’t the only thing I find myself complaining about these days. It’s having the energy to do everything on my daily list as well. By the time I get to the most important thing on my list, I’m knackered and ready for bed.
But I guess it’s simply part of getting older.
We simply run out of time and energy—unfortunately, both at the same time.
My Imperfect Present
I try not to think of the past the way I used to. No point in rehashing all the mistakes and the regrets you can’t do anything about so many years later.
But if there’s one day in the past that I can’t stop thinking about, it’s April 16, 2023, the day I had to let my 17-year-old Truffles go, the day I held her for the last time as she slept forever. Pet Sematary, I totally get you now…
I think about the things I could have done to prolong her life, like paying for that $1000 scan that would have told the doctor to increase her heart meds even though she no longer looked as happy as she used to, not since we had to move out of the house that was her home for 17 years and being almost blind and deaf, the new place just wasn’t home anymore.
I think about how feisty she was, and how ladylike, too, with her slender paws, expressive eyes, and sweet demeanor. I think about how she’d sit right next to me every day as I wrote my stories before reminding me a few hours in that it was time to get up and go for a walk.
Then I remember how she slept for most of the day during those last days, how her back legs were stiff, and how she’d look at me like she were tired and she was holding on only for me to get through whatever it was we were all going through as a family then.
Then as if knowing we’d be alright, she let go.
We have a new dog now but she’s hubby’s dog more, and that’s just the way I prefer it. Because sometimes there just isn’t any more room in your heart for another soul dog, no matter what all the social media posts say.
Sometimes there’s just room for one… and that’s fine with me.
2006 – 2023
Daily writing prompt
Do you spend more time thinking about the future or the past? Why?
Telephones, Tape Recorders, and Other Knick Knacks
I was sick with the flu the past week and as I commandeered the couch for myself the whole time, it hit me that I could be watching something on the telly while feeling not so hot. So I watched a few movies like Uncle Buck, Home Alone 2, National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, and other movies I can’t quite remember now (probably part of the flu thing).
What I do remember is how the sight of corded telephones, intercoms, baby blue eye shadow, and poufed-up hair thanks to AquaNet made me long for the old days.
That the “old days” I’m talking about happens to be the late 80s had me do some math and realize with horror that that was thirty-three years ago!
Holy Moly, but when did I get so old so fast?
But before anybody answers that question, don’t you miss those days when no one knew what trouble you got yourself into? When hanging out with friends meant really hanging out with them, chatting together, laughing together… not sitting in the same area for hours with each person looking down at their phones the entire time?
I know I do (or at least, while I’m recovering from the flu).
I miss the innocence that came with it, although at the same time, looking back at what I know now, the mature part of me wouldn’t really want to return to that time either because that innocence cost us big time, and we and the generations that follow are experiencing its consequences now.
But that’s nostalgia for you. As comfy as it feels at the moment, it should be fleeting and temporary.
Then you snap yourself right out of it and move on.
Morrighan's Muse 