Colouring outside the lines in White

Today I am referring to a writing exercise that we were given in a course I am currently taking. 

We writers need to stretch our creative muscle each day to feel more comfortable with its strength. We learn to bend it and wind it and make it do odd things. We often think outside of the box and are at times bashful to voice our thoughts except on paper.

I am about to pass on my writing experience to you in another form. 

Make yourself comfortable and glance around your space. Let your eyes stop on any object or image you choose. 

Now for five minutes, do nothing but tell yourself the story of this thing. Enjoy the minutes, recreate how it came into your life, the feeling you had when that photo was taken, smile at the pride in your son’s eyes as he handed you the blue bottle he bought you with his 25 cent allowance, relish the accomplishment of a degree framed in black. 

Be the moment.

Savour it, taste it, treasure it. It is yours to keep.

Read my Simply Utterly White – my description of  the colour White from my writing course here….

Saved between the Pages

I am not one of you, even though I am sitting in this empty chair. I am not homeless or damaged by drugs or alcohol with all my earthly possessions stacked under my table.

I see you sitting across me in this safe house filled with books. Your head is resting on your arms leaning on a dirty table, when was the last time you slept?

I see you sitting across from me holding a heavy paperback, looking, looking at the same page for the last half an hour. You have not turned a page. What do you see?

I see some others, pulling their briefcases and increasing the pace of their steps as they go by. They head straight to the elevators, don't look left or right towards the New & Notables section. Are they staff who work upstairs or have they made themselves so comfortable here that they look like they belong?

It's hard to tell sometimes, who is who and what your business is in this house of words.

The young girls behind the Second Cup counter have ignored the "F" bomb several times while I've been sitting here. They are accustomed to the irate and the irrational, they still smile when I approach for my second cup of coffee while I wait for my next presentation.

I am a writer and I too am looking for a safe place.

What if 11/22/63 didn't happen?

I finished reading 11/22/63 a few weeks and decided that it was time to put fingers to keyboard to share my thoughts.

You might have stayed away from this book because of the Stephen King name and his propensity for scary things that go bump in the night. It was bit of a surprise when I first heard that King was going to tackle this subject. The date of J F Kennedy’s assassination is marked in many of our minds as one of our earliest encounters with tragedy.

Immaculata School (off Decarie in St. Laurent) sent all the students home that day. We watched the news and saw Kennedy’s blood splatter over his wife’s clothing on our black and white televisions over and over. It is an image etched in my memory, even though I didn’t quite grasp the magnitude of the event.

This book however is more about the Time than about the Date. It is about a naive nation, about mystery and hope and love. I won’t spoil the story for you but the walk down memory lane, the references to cars with chrome and fins, candies, clothes and music are on their own worth the cost of the book (paper or digital).

*11/22/63 is the first book I have read on my Kindle. The Kindle was very light weight and has an easy-on-the-eyes screen for reading on the beach or on a plane. I am very fond of it! It was relatively problem free to get used to making notes and highlighting passages for future reference. It is my newest favourite thing since I discovered post-it notes…



                                                         

Click here to check out my new favourite thing, my Kindle!        
      

Disappoint - they will survive

 Making time for yourself in this bustling, noisy world we live in can be challenging. How do we find and commit to "me" time?  Let's face it, we are on/in demand to every family member and 4-legged beast that lives under our roof. We are connected by blood, love, and wireless-ly, there is scarcely a moment of solitude. 

I know of people who set their alarm clocks earlier  in order to get some quiet time, to read, run, swim, write or meditate. Many folks are then catching a shut-eye in their cars over the lunch hour or on the train home at the end of the day. 

We have been raised to be polite and respectful of others and feel horribly guilty to put ourselves first. Why is it easier to disappoint Me rather than You? Honouring yourself takes time and dedication. If we can't find the time and reason to celebrate who we are, why should anyone else? (Click to Tweet)

See Cheryl Richardson's video and article on Let Me Disappoint You.

Spanning the Divide

Bridge in Portland, Ore.

Sometimes you can work alongside and know nothing more than a person’s title. Or by perchance, in a brief few minutes, you can be invited into a window of someone’s CORE.

In conversation with someone new who works in my building, I heard and learned a fascinating story. A refugee from Ethiopia, in 7 years he has brought to Canada, his (now) wife and a handful of family members. He and his wife now have 2 (he said joyously) Canadian children.

He has a degree in the environmental sciences and his wife worked as an engineer. Neither were able to secure similar employment in this land of freedom, they both do work with their hands. He said that he has done 1, 2, or 3 jobs simultaneously to get ahead. “It will not last forever and I am doing this for my children. I am the Bridge.”

"I am the Bridge." (Click to Tweet)

Are you a Bridge? Have you or are you in this very moment, putting aside your own dreams/needs and desires to make it better in the future for someone else?

Ralph Marston’s words are posted at my desk. When I am feeling weary, I read these words to hold me up. Because if we each built a Bridge, how far could we go?