Category: Just For Fun!

I am currently working on my second book in a series of four or five books. The first book in the series is set in the 1980’s and the second one is set in the 1890’s. Yes, you read that correctly, the second book goes back almost 100 years! I love historical books! As I mentioned in a post a few weeks ago, Gone With the Wind is my favorite book. But I have so many others that I have enjoyed as well. Traveling back in time gives us a glimpse of that world. While I love to read it…it’s a bear to write about!!! Believe it or not, I didn’t live 100 years ago and it takes A LOT of research to get a feel for a different time and place.

All that leads me to my thoughts for today. Yes, our dress is very different, we have various modes of transportation that we didn’t use in the past, and we communicate in a whole unique way that we did not over 100 years ago. We still have phones, we may occasionally write a letter and we visit family and friends.

The communication part is what has been popping into my head the past few days. Can you imagine someone from the 1800’s or earlier see us put a small, rectangular-shaped object to our ear and actually ‘talk’ into it? We probably would have been burned at the stake for witchcraft! Think of all the new ‘words’ or phrases we have now that we didn’t have even when I was growing up. Transport yourself 100 years ago and the person you were talking to would say, “Excuse me?” (They wouldn’t have said, “what” or “huh” 100 years ago!) “BTW, I’ll TTYL, pick-up some moo-joo at the store. TYVM! SYL!” (Okay, maybe they would have said, “HUH?!)

I can understand texting the above phrases. (I don’t text unless I absolutely have to, so I may have those, phrases, words, whatever you call them…wrong.) But seriously, are we so busy that we can’t say, “Dairy Queen” or “International House of Pancakes”, instead of “DQ” or “IHOP”? When I was a young girl, we went to the International House of Pancakes many times on a Saturday morning and it didn’t cause us great distress to say all those words. It didn’t take a lot of time out of our morning to ask the question, “May we go to the International House of Pancakes for breakfast this morning?”

I must admit, many of the abbreviations are pretty cute. “IHOP” has a nice jingle to it. My mother would ask my father if we could go to the “DQ” long before it became that, trying to make it a surprise for us. We did figure it out pretty quickly. Mainly because children are fairly smart when it comes to ice-cream or treats in any form. “BOGO” still causes me to stop and think about what they are talking about. It comes in a snap when I’m at Payless looking at shoes, though!

So, the next time you board a plane, think of what someone from the 1800’s and earlier would have thought about that. This is a post for another day, but I’m fairly certain they would have thought we were…crazy!!! “All those people get into that silver bullet and it goes up into the sky, even where the clouds are and then it comes down in another state or country?! NTYVM!!! (For those of you that aren’t as techno-savvy as I am, that would be: No Thank You Very Much!!!

Well, it is two in the morning. What are you usually doing? The correct answer to that should be…sleeping. If you are a woman over fifty…probably not!

I have never been a great sleeper. I would wake with each little sound in the house. If I wasn’t in my own warm, comfy bed, sleep probably wasn’t going to happen. For a short period of time, my brother and I had a paper route. We delivered papers every week night, and then very early on Saturday mornings. On Friday night, I went to bed dreading the next morning. I woke every couple of hours, hoping it wasn’t time to get up, listening to the barking dogs and wondering which one was loose and waiting to chase me on my bike.

Of course, teenage years in school were awful. I loved school, but if a special event was happening the next day or a test…sleep was the last priority. Not good when you have finals for a string of days!

Then came babies. I could never understand how I could be so exhausted but catch every little hiccough, sneeze or coo from down the hall! Really? Anyone that is a mother knows that pretty much comes with the territory…and it doesn’t end when they marry and have children of their own. I can hear my oldest sneeze from a mile away in the middle of the night!

So when I turned fifty, I thought, “No big deal, I’ve got this, I haven’t slept for years. This won’t be any different.” Wrong! Now it’s a whole different kind of sleepless nights with no rhyme or reason. Sometimes I’m agitated and I sleep wonderfully and other times I’m awake the entire night. I may go to sleep really well and then wake up a few hours later, tapping my toes against the sheet for another few hours.

And now…my dear husband tells me I’m snoring when I’m sleeping! What?! Maybe that’s a blessing. Just maybe I’m finally, actually sleeping when my eyes are closed and going into that deep sleep you’re supposed to have for good health. You know the one…where you lose weight, your eyes are sparkling and you have all sorts of energy?

I don’t think so. The picture in my mirror still looks the same and my running shoes have an inch of dust on them. Oh, I don’t own a pair of running shoes!

Usually when I write an article or post, I title it after I have written it. In the writing world, I don’t know if this is correct, but it works for me. When the ‘story’ is completed, even I know what it’s about! Because believe me, it doesn’t always end the way I thought it would. When I write, the conclusion of a book is sometimes just as much of a surprise to me as to my readers.

The above title was easy. In light of all that has gone ‘wrong’ in our world of late…and by that I mean the entire world we live in and the very small corner of this earth I reside on, I wanted something to smile about. You get tired of all the garbage being dumped on you and you just want to think happy thoughts. Sometimes this needs to be a conscience decision in our lives. We have to ask ourselves, “Am I going to let this ruin my day, my life, or am I going to choose to take a different path?”

Today, I want to think about what makes me smile. I love it when I check out Facebook and people have posted really funny items. I want to smile, I want to laugh out loud and feel that release of just…good. Nothing on my mind, nothing worrying me, nothing I have to do…just good…for a few moments. Here are a few for you to smile about as well:

Family pictures always make me smile, as I’m sure they do for you. Some examples of my favorites:

Our little Diva!

Our cat when she was a kitten. She loved this little ‘chair’.

Our three youngest and their friends in Branson.

House projects well done ALWAYS make me smile and give me a sense of great accomplishment. Our son helped me with this stone terrace we put in a few years ago. He was probably too young to be working on such a thing, but he was a huge help and I so enjoy that terrace to this day! Thank you, Nate-Nate!

Then there are the pictures that just have great memories. You look at them and smile because so many happy thoughts come your way. You’re put back into that instant…and it’s wonderful! These are some of mine:

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What makes you smile? Take a moment to go through some old pictures…remember that fantastic day. Watch a funny movie and really laugh. Spend a few hours with a cherished friend. Or hug a child/grandchild…that ALWAYS makes me smile. Have a joyous day!

My absolute favorite characters from any book or movie are Rhett Butler and Scarlett O’Hara. I first read ‘Gone With the Wind’ when I was a young child, but I watched the movie first. I don’t remember the reason, but the movie was showing at our little theater in the town I grew up in and my mother took my brother and I to see it because she had enjoyed it so much.( I think my father said he had slept through most of it the first time he watched it! My husband did the same after I coerced him into watching it with me!)

The movie made a HUGE impact on me. The Civil War was and still is my favorite era. I loved the clothes they wore, the houses they lived in. Yes, I know not everyone lived on a plantation, but in my dreams I would. The concept of slavery and the difficult political situation was lost on me as a nine-year old and all I could think of was the romantic part of the movie. I wanted to meet a ‘Rhett Butler’ someday and be swept away.

At some point, I happened to be in an old book store in that same little town. Wouldn’t you know, they had a very old copy of ‘Gone With the Wind’ and I snatched it up with my paper route money. I read that book in its entirety and loved it! I learned much about the battles that were fought and gained a bit more clearer thinking of the Civil War and what it entailed. Of course I read it several more times over the years, loving the worn gray/blue cover and yellowed pages. It had a smell all its own. I’m afraid that copy ended up in a flood we had in our basement many years ago, because it went missing shortly after that. I still miss it!

I remember thinking as a child that the title for the book was exceptional. That era; the clothing, the mannerisms, the plantations were all truly gone after the Civil War ended. That time period didn’t return. The south was crippled. Again, this post is not to get involved into the issues of slavery…many horrendous things happened during that time period. The south could not continue as it was and probably for the better. But I will always love and enjoy the sweeping grandeur of the movie, the actors, the colors that were so vibrant.

When I think of writing, and great Authors, I think of Margaret Mitchell. Just a housewife, plucking out a great story on her typewriter. That doesn’t come along too often.

The above picture hangs above my desk where I write… for inspiration. This picture means a lot to me because it was a puzzle my husband purchased last Christmas with MANY pieces. Our family spent the first part of the New Year of 2015 putting it together. So not only does the picture mean a lot to me, the memories I will always have assembling it are very special as well!

This was our past five days…Branson, Missouri. My husband and I were very thankful to get away for a while. One of the days was spent driving around the country side. I grew up in Colorado and my husband lived in upstate New York until his mid-twenties. So neither of us were strangers to mountain roads. But it has been a LONG time! Needless to say, after several hours of driving around the back roads north, west, and east of Branson…we were a little jittery. Black-topped roads, twisting among the autumn foliage, no shoulder to speak of and local people driving with confidence, made for an exhausting day. I haven’t been car sick for a few years, so I had the wonderful experience of that again…even sitting in the front seat.

The beauty of the views was extraordinary! Climbing the steep grade, cresting the top with hills covered with the remains of color. Deep valleys below, water shimmering in the distance. You could just picture a small cabin, nestled against the hillside, puffs of smoke from the chimney floating lazily in the cool breeze.

Of course my mind had to drift back to the early years in the Ozarks. Before there were paved roads to make the travel easy. Back to the days when a small cabin was home to a very large family. Water was pumped from a well or carried from a mountain stream. Food for eating was planted on the steep hillside when no flat area was available. Chickens roamed freely, pecking bugs from the ground. The colors of each season greeted you in the morning and at night, the whispering wind sang you a sweet melody.

I didn’t grow up in the Ozarks and I haven’t lived there. But I can imagine all the above and it gave me a sense of homesickness as we were driving through all that beauty. A loss for what once was. The lives of the people that experienced that time period, were difficult, I’m sure. No modern conveniences like stores or doctors nearby. No running water or electricity.

What they did have, was family, friends, and time. Time to appreciate the seasons, time to plant crops, time to sit on the porch and listen to the night sounds. In our world today of ‘hurry, rush, don’t be late’, there isn’t much time for the simple pleasures anymore. The Ozark people of long ago just lived their lives, doing what needed to be done to survive. We do the same in our world today, but it seems so much more complicated. Am I envious of that long-ago world? Yes, in a lot of ways. If a person from that time were dropped in our world of today, they would probably think I was crazy to say that. Then they would return to their porch or hillside and look over the rolling mountains…and sigh with relief.

Just some thoughts to share on a Thursday afternoon.

 Have you ever meandered along a meadow brook like the one pictured here? The trees would clasp their branches over your head, sheltering you from the noon day sun. You could rest beside the slow-moving water, your back against the trunk of an arching tree. Maybe take off your shoes and dip a toe in the cool water before ‘going all the way’ and standing barefoot, the clear water rippling against your ankles. You could lean your head back and close your eyes, listening to the gentle gurgle of the stream, the birds singing in the shade of the trees. A breeze would whisper through the green corridor and you could sigh with contentment and peace.

Or maybe you’ve hiked along a mountain trail, climbing over the occasional rocks until the rush of water grew louder in the trees. You pressed on, following the sound until you brushed past the edge of the woods and stood at the brink of all that roaring water tumbling over the smooth rocks. You could breathe deeply of the wet earth and pine trees in the spring sunshine. All that water would beckon you to cool your tired feet. A boulder beside the stream would be your chair as you slid your toes into the frigid, sharp depths. Tiny stabs against your skin as you adjusted to the spring flow.

What about the night air, crickets chirping to one another? Fireflies flicker in the dark trees, tiny lanterns spaced in the meadow. The silvery light of the moon stretches across the navy surface of the water, pulling your gaze to the heavens above. What sweet peace fills your soul as you revel in all that has been created. These are the treasured moments. The ones that come far and too few between. Remember to enjoy them this summer, either alone or with those that are special to you. I know I will be looking for some!

For some reason I’ve been in a beach mood the past few weeks. I don’t know why. I’ve always loved water. The sound of a mountain river, flowing over smooth rocks or a meadow brook, gurgling gently in the heat of a summer day. Tall grasses growing to the water, tiny fish gathered along the edges. Lakes, pristine and clear, reflections of autumn on the surface. But the ocean really pulls me in. (Not literally of course, that would be dangerous!) I could stand on a beach, watching the waves roll in and pull the sand out for hours. Closing my eyes and hearing the rush of the waves puts me in a peaceful state of mind.

Water calms my soul. The picture I posted here really speaks to me on so many levels. I’ve also used it for my Facebook cover picture. The picture is maybe a little idealistic, more a painting really, but it makes me want to walk right into that scene. Smell the flowers blooming in the evening air, making it pungent with perfume. The little ‘ribbons’ of water would lead me to the ocean’s edge and I could stand there until dawn.

So yes, I’ve been in an ocean state of mind lately. Living in Kansas is about the furthest away I can be. Thank goodness for our local lake!

So look at the picture, really ‘step’ into it. What does it make you think of, hear and smell? Just a little bit of peace in a hectic day. I pray your day is wonderful!

Cover Girl make-up was all the rage? I’m thinking of the late ’70’s. All the girls at school were wearing it. During that time there was a commercial running. I want to say the model was blonde and tossing her hair. (Aren’t blondes always tossing their hair? I have few in my house.) This little picture made me think of that and it made me smile. I wanted to share it with you and make you smile too. Thank you to my children for showing me the picture! Have a great day!