When you get to be of a certain age, you find yourself wanting to reach out to people who have been important to you in your life, only to find out some are so very worth it, but some are so very not worth it at all. #1linerWeds #InspirationalQuote
Sponsored by Linda Hill
Thanks, Linda!
The United States has just been through a very divisive Presidential election. It seems the entire country is polarized. Friends have argued with friends and, in fact, friendships and even family relationships have been lost over the election. What we need at this Thanksgiving holiday season is to think about the meaning of the first real Thanksgiving in our country.
In 1621, the Plymouth colonists and the Wampanoag Native Americans shared an autumn harvest feast that they called a thanksgiving for the successful harvest. There were also other successful harvest feasts. All were full of the wonderful,
aromatic food from the fall harvests. The key was that the English colonists and the Native Americans shared the food in peace.
It couldn’t have been easy for either group. The English colonists were running from the tyranny of an English King. The Native Americans must have felt like their homeland was being invaded. But, they put aside their differences and shared the bounty of the fall harvest. The American people, many of whom are so galvanized on one side of the political spectrum or the other that they hardly talk to their family and friends who have different opinions, need to consider the actions of these two very different groups on that Thanksgiving so long ago.
On this first Thanksgiving, the story is that the Native Americans came bearing deer for venison. The feast also probably included duck or goose instead of turkey. They were close to the sea so lobster, clams or mussels may have been on the menu. Squash, carrots, and peas may have been the vegetables. The only corn in November would have been dried corn. Nuts like walnuts and chestnuts may have been available. If there were any sweets, it would have been only pumpkin as the colonists sugar supplies had run low during the trip from England.
They had an excellent Thanksgiviing dinner though different from what we traditionally have now. But they had it together, these two very diverse groups with different opinions and goals. I hope they can be an example for the rest of us this Thanksgiving. #amwriting #amblogging #writing #Thanksgiving #dailyprompt
Good morning! Come right in. I’m glad to see all of you this cold Kentucky morning! Please, take a cup of the beverage of your choice. Several types of coffee and tea. I probably don’t have as much to choose from as usual as I’ve had a terribly busy week, but I hope you’ll find something you’ll like. Bring your cup into my writing studio so we can talk!
If we were having coffee this morning, I would tell you that it has been kind of a scary week here in the Ohio Valley from a weather perspective. We, like many of you, are experiencing a drought that just started this fall. It is so dry. We did get about 15 minutes of hard rain last night; obviously not enough to do anything but dampen the ground. We live in the forest with deciduous tress surrounding us. The leaves have been falling for weeks and we have been trying to keep them cleared away. A few weeks ago, wildfires started in my state and they are now close to me. Finally, the temperatures have dropped to normal and the winds have died down. We are hoping for rain.
If we were having coffee this morning, I would tell you that I have some exciting news. News that is, at least, potentially exciting! I may have a new job. At least I am hoping it will work out. I wear two hats in my professional life. I am a writer and sell my writing. I’m working on a novel and write non-fiction articles on a variety of topics. My second hat is that of business consultant. In my previous life, I was a college professor for 27 years and did some consulting in the finance area for many of those years. My new job, if it works out, is as a finance consultant.
I know those two professions sound like they could not possibly be simpatico. I have a variety of interests so when I retired from teaching, I was able to pursue my love of literature and writing. I, however, still have my finance knowledge and am able to consult with and help big and small business. I am often consulting for someone somewhere even though I am also writing.
Those of us in the U.S. have had a Presidential election. I know the world was watching that election. Obviously, many Americans were happy with the outcome and many were not. Political science has always been of great interest to me so I am watching the aftermath of the election carefully. For me, it is a rather frightening time in the U.S. I don’t remember such a time during my adulthood. I’m hoping for cool heads and good advisers.
In America, one of our favorite holidays is coming up this coming Thursday and that is Thanksgiving. For many people in America, we find that is our favorite holiday. Families gather but it’s not a commercial holiday like Christmas. I find myself missing the big family gatherings that I attended as a child and young adult. Those gatherings don’t happen for me anymore as most of my close family are gone. I have a quiet Thanksgiving now. I surely miss the gathering of my family at my grandfather’s farm deep in the heart of Appalachia. Mostly, I miss my family.
Happy Thanksgiving to everyone in the U.S. To my international friends, have a wonderful week! #amwriting #amblogging #writing #Thanksgiving #politics #weekendcoffeeshare
This post sponsored by parttimemonsterblog.com
Thanks, Diana!
It was a tough summer and fall, from May all the way through November, for Maria. She found the love of her life, only to lose him in the most painful way possible. It may not have been a conventional relationship. It may not have even been a relationship that should have been. But it did happen. It was wonderful, loving, exciting, and she was with him again. She didn’t need anything else. He seemed happy. She was happy.
He was her love and he had been for many years. He also had bipolar disorder. Maria had been with him during episodes of mania before. Many times, in fact. She knew the symptoms. Instead of manic, he seemed lonely. Anxious for company and for someone to talk to. Needy for attention. He was drinking, but he was usually drinking when she saw him. He didn’t seem to be drinking more than usual. There were no particular red flags that he was having a manic episode. He didn’t talk non-stop as he sometimes did during a manic episode. He wasn’t any more sexually insatiable than usual. They were both always that way to some extent when they were together. It was part of who they were as a couple. They tended to get addicted to each other. Maria thought it was because they both had rather addictive personalities about many things.
They had wonderful times together and then it was over. A wet, cold blanket was thrown over the whole thing. He was gone and she was alone. She worried about him as she didn’t know the details of what had happened.
Then she found out and she was horrified. Since when did an affair mean that you were having a bipolar episode and slapped on lithium? A strong, dangerous drug. A drug designed to make you forget, to flatten your mood, to keep you from feeling anything at all. Doctors don’t even know exactly how lithium works in bipolar patients. But, they do know the side effects. It causes forgetfulness, a feeling of being in slow motion, a feeling of dizziness, weight gain, interaction with certain heart medications. It’s hard on the kidneys, thyroid, and heart. These side effects are only the tip of the iceberg.
Maria couldn’t believe it when she found out what they had done to him. She felt responsible. Lithium? He had heart issues. He wouldn’t live long on lithium. She had known him for over 30 years. He was so fun-loving and had a beautiful spirit. They were trying to kill that spirit in order to control him. It was clear to Maria exactly what was happening to her love.
After weeks of thinking about this, Maria realized there was nothing she could do. If there was, she would do it. He was lost to her in the world of control and the world of mind-bending drugs. A world she didn’t understand. She had to hope that his family, maybe his children, or friends would recognize what was happening and save him.
Maria knew that she would always grieve for him. He had never known what was important in life and he was paying the price for that. She would have loved him to the moon and back for the rest of his life. She would have taken care of him. She had felt like that for many years but he’d never recognized it until recently. Then, he rejected it for money and travel. Maria had no way to fight those things. Then, the bottom dropped out and boom……lithium. If he was ever able to get off the lithium, there were always the seductresses of money and travel. Those he could never escape. She felt sorry for him. Maria finally realized that the person she had to save was herself. #amwriting #amblogging #writing #romance
This was her first concert in several years. Long ago, she had lost her will to play. She played a number of instruments. Cello, harp, piano, violin. Tonight, a small group was here to listen to her play cello. She was playing The Swan by Saint-Saens. She had not played it in concert since the last time she had been with him.
That was long ago. It was all behind her. She seldom thought of him anymore. That’s why she could play again.
They were all filing in now. Wait! Who just walked through the door?
*Post sponsored by Friday Fictioneers.
Thanks, Rochelle!
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There was so much between us during that year. No one, but us, will ever know. He left from this very dock. He went to the mainland from this spot. The night before, he told me not to worry, that he would never be out of my life. I trust him. It doesn’t matter what anyone says. Just because someone has a relationship with someone else doesn’t mean they are sick. How cruel could that be? How silly does that sound? That only means they are trying to keep us apart.
It seems like I’m waiting wherever I am. Work. School. Home. I know he will figure it out. I know he’ll come back for me.
So I’ll wait. Right here on this dilapidated dock where he can find me. #amwriting #amblogging #writing #romance #flashfiction #fiction
*This post sponsored by FFfAW.
Thanks, Priceless Joy!
Hurry to the grocery before all the cranberries are sold out! You need to pick up some bags of cranberries so you can make this delicious Cranberry Salad for your Thanksgiving dinner. This was my mother’s recipe. It’s delicious and she always made it for Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter:
Prepare Cranberry/Orange Relish:
12 oz whole cranberries (frozen)
1 orange including rind
Put the cranberries and orange in a food processor. Chop them up to relish consistency. Add 1/2 cup of sugar or equal amount of artificial sweetener. Stir.
Melt cherry jello (large box) in 1 cup hot water. Use 8X8 or 9X9 pyrex or glass dish. Cool on countertop. Don’t let it set up completely. Add relish (above). Add 1 small can crushed pineapple plus juice and 1/2 cup cold water. Add 1/2 cup chopped celery. 1/2 cup of chopped walnuts are optional. Stir everything together.
Refrigerate until it gels. Serve cold. This recipe is easily doubled.
Enjoy! #recipes
They weren’t young anymore. She still had lofty goals for both her personal and professional life. He…..well…..not so much. Rebecca was never content. She may have been 64 years old but she worked as hard as she did when she was 34. Patrick was retired and he did a little work but was more interested in traveling and having fun. Rebecca liked those thing too, but she needed time to work at her writing. Her personal life with Patrick was of crucial importance to her. First on her list. She also had a full life outside of Patrick. Patrick had a life outside their relationship as well. It made things difficult.
When they were together, none of those things mattered very much. They took advantage of every moment as there weren’t many moments. No one seemed to understand that what they had together didn’t threaten anyone else. It was their’s and their’s alone. Some mysterious something they had never been able to find with anyone else. God knows they had tried. Rebecca alone had spent her life trying to find what she had with Patrick with other men. It never worked. It was never there. It was very frustrating.
Rebecca thought to herself, looking at Patrick across the room, that she guessed this is what love was. That mysterious something that you had with one person and didn’t have with anyone else. When she looked at him, she knew. She had always known, that he was the one, the love of her life. But it had never worked out between them. They had been in each other’s ives in some way, even if only off and on, for 35 years. In all those years, either she was married, he was married, or they both were married. Yet, they wanted to be together. How could that be?
Patrick was on the phone as Rebecca was thinking about this. She was watching him, with great love in her heart. Sometimes, she wished fervently that she didn’t feel like this. That she could just walk away. She had tried. Over and over, down through the years, she had tried. She always missed him so much, she went back again and again. How could she not go back to the love of her life?
It may sound foolish to say that, at 64 years old, Rebecca was still searching, still going back to the love of her life. Rebecca had never felt her age. She was young at heart and been fortunate to keep her physical health. She didn’t feel much different than the day she had met Patrick all those years ago. Looking at him, she remembered that day clearly. She had walked into his office and fallen in love. What a day that was!
Patrick was a few years older than Rebecca and was struggling with some health problems. Rebecca wondered if, for Patrick’s sake, it really was time to walk away. If Patrica had still been married to the mother of his children, the answer would have been yes. She was a good person. But a woman had broken up Patrick’s marriage a number of years ago. She was a controlling, manipulative woman who thought she knew what was best for Patrick and did not much care for Patrick’s input into the matter. Patrick seemed frightened of her for some reason and that was never good. There was something wrong there with that marriage and Rebecca wa worried for Patrick’s sake. This woman seemed to feel the need to judge and criticize Patrick as a method of control. Rebecca was quite concerned. How could she abandon Patrick under those circumstances?
Patrick ended his phone call, walked over to her, and put his arms around her. She felt so warm and safe in his arms. She always had though they saw each other so infrequently. They didn’t feel the need for conversation at that moment. They just felt the need for each other. They dissolved into each other and neither of them had any concept of time until two hours had passed. Patrick made her feel totally fulfilled in every way. Any thoughts of giving him up flew out of her head as she lay beside him. #amwriting #amblogging #writing #romance
*Excerpt from the upcoming novel The Lost Romance
Before I begin this blog post, I want to put in a disclaimer. When I started this blog, I had no intention of talking much about either politics or business. Business is my professional field and I wanted to get away from it. Politics is too volatile. But, I’ve had a lot of questions about the effect of a Trump Presidency on certain segments of the economy and on our lives that I feel compelled to answer them to the best of my ability. I’m going to try to be non-partisan, but (full disclosure), I was not and am not a Trump supporter. I will still try to be non-partisan. If I sound like a teacher, let me apologize in advance. I am a teacher :)……it’s hard not to sound like one!
The Trump transition team has made it known that they intend to repeal or, at least significantly change, a piece of legislation called the Dodd-Frank bill. They also intend to repeal the Volcker Rule. Let me explain what that means to me, you, and the man on the street.
The Dodd-Frank bill is a very complex (and long) piece of legislation that was enacted after the economic and banking collapse that happened at the end of 2007 and the beginning of 2008 and the recession that resulted. Large banks were the primary cause of this collapse. The general consensus is that the large banks invested in too many subprime (risky) mortgages in order to beef up their income by charging high interest rates. They also invested in speculative securities for the same reason. In other words, these banks took advantage of their customers and took risks with their customers’ money. Banks in the U.S. have never before been allowed to do that. The banks essentially got caught and the economy almost failed because of it.
The Dodd-Frank bill was enacted to protect customers of large banks in the future. Some say that it goes too far and restricts the ability of both individuals and corporations from borrowing money. I have not read the bill so I cannot address that. What I do know is that banks do, indeed, need some checks and balances so what happened in 2007 and 2008 will not happen again. Apparently, Mr. Trump intends to repeal this legislation.
We used to have legislation called the Glass-Steagall Act which prevented banks from engaging in investing. That legislation was unfortunately repealed in the late 1990s. Glass-Steagall would have prevented banks from making these speculative investments and loans.
The Trump transition team has said they also intend to repeal what is called the Volcker rule. Mr. Volcker was once Chair of the Federal Reserve. A regulation was passed in his name preventing banks from making investments that could endanger their customer accounts by exposing them to too much risk.
The positive side of repealing Dodd-Frank and Volcker is that it would be easier for consumers to obtain mortgages. It would also be easier for businesses and large corporations to borrow money and make investments, including risky investments. #amwriting #amblogging #writing #DoddFrank #VolckerRule
Please! Come on in to my writing studio and join me for coffee, tea, or hot chocolate! It’s cold this morning – in the 30s. It has finally gotten cold here in the Ohio Valley. I think most of us here are welcoming a bit of normal weather for this time of year. I always welcome some cold in this age of global warming. It kills the bugs that would plague us in the spring. We will have a hard freeze tonight, I suspect.
If we were having coffee, I would tell you that I have my normal selections of coffee and tea to offer you, including chicory coffee and green teas. I also have, as something new for you, matcha green tea which I received as a gift this week. I would love to share it with you. Are you familiar with matcha? Matcha is a specially grown tea. It is grown in the shade for just three weeks and then ground into a fine powder. It is sort of a Zen thing as it supposedly calms the mind. But, the interesting thing about matcha is that it has unparalleled health benefits. One cute is equal to 10 cups of regular green tea. It is packed with antioxidants and nutrients. Check it out! Please let me make you a cup!
If we were having coffee, I would tell you that it has been an interesting and disturbing week in the United States because of our Presidential election. It was a contentious election and campaign. Many people are very happy with the outcome. My hope is that they knew exactly what they were voting for in terms of policy. Almost as many people were very disturbed at the outcome of the election. Those of us who are fearful of what could happen have to keep an eye of things and organize into groups that can lobby for our positions, such as women’s rights. I think we all realize that the international community thinks the U.S. has lost its collective mind and I’m not sure they are wrong. I find myself in a wait and see mode. I will try to keep all of you up-to-date here and with my blog postings, though I won’t post about politics very often.
If you are wondering about Americans leaving the country and relocating, I would say that many feel like I do – they will take a wait and see attitude. No one wants to abandon America. It depends on how untenable things become…..if they do. If we see any signs of the rise of Fascism at all, we will leave the country in droves, I am confident. Not all of us necessarily to Canada. There are other countries that would be attractive. Younger people would stay and fight but older people…..it would be hard for us to do that.
If we were having coffee, I would tell you that Veteran’s Day was also this week. So many Americans had family members who fought in one war or another, from World War I through World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, Desert Storm, and all the Iraqi/Afghanistan conflicts. I think Veterans’ Day meant something to all of us.
If we were having coffee, I would tell you that I find myself thinking about Eastern Kentucky today. They voted, almost exclusively, for a man who has threatened to take away services they depend on, such as Medicaid. He also promised to bring back coal mining, a promise that there is no way he can keep because that industry is dying.
If we were having coffee, I would tell you that I’ve spent the week writing. I’ve written many posts for this blog but I have also spent time working on my novel. For those of you also working on a novel, I have found an excellent novel writing program. If you are going to write a novel of around 80,000 words or so, the file on Microsoft Word just gets too big and difficult. It becomes too unwieldy to move scenes around. There is a program for those using a Windows-based computer called yWriter that helps you keep everything in order. For Apple computer users, the best novel writing program is Scrivner. You can download both off the Internet. I’m currently learning how to use yWriter. If you are using yWriter, get in touch and we will figure it out together!
To all the American writers. Regarding the Trump administration. Remember that we can write…..and write and write and write. There is power in the pen if we see this administration going off the rails.
I hope all of you have had a good week! Back to writing. Please come for coffee/tea/hot chocolate next week! #amwriting #amblogging #writing #coalmining #EasternKentucky #realDonaldTrump
*This blog post is sponsored by parttimemonsterblog.com
Thanks, Diana!
The Write Scribe 