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My Yard Is For Freedom

Aug19

Who cares about political affiliations except for those who think the Civil War is still being fought? Actually, that ordeal is and was a total embarrassment; a Country declaring war against itself with winners none. That chapter is thankfully gone, but in its place was

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supposed to be born the beginnings of a brand new liberty and freedom. What happened to that freedom? Hard for me to tell and I live on the prairie where the wind whispers free and unemcumbered. It is for this reason, peace of mind, that I am taking a Facebook break. I am a writer, a northern, Republican, Catholic, American writer, and I know what real freedom tastes and feels like and cannot and will not settle for less.

If you are looking for me, this is where I will be; although, I will continue to share with FB but I imagine my posts will be DOA on arrival. Love to my friends and family, and you will be hearing from me.

 

The Joys of Being a B-Book Author

May28

120px-Rippl_Young_Girl_Dressed_in_YellowWhat is a B-Book Author? If you write e-Books, you know. It one of the two million e-Book authors that are stuck in the bottom tier, with more arriving daily. Make no mistake, there are many e-Books  deserving of the bottom tier; faulty grammar and syntax, scammers, and  pamphlets that  claim to be books but are not, but what about e-Books that are well written but cannot move because they are being crushed into oblivion? It’s a real dilemma, but such is life.

Of course, I and many others  would love to be in the A-Class, but I am not and probably never will be. But here’s the thing. I am retired, have three sources of income, and I live on the prairie where there is nowhere to go and nothing to do. It’s not like I have anything more pressing to do than write B-Books, so in a sense, I guess it’s a hobby.  Here’s the other thing. In the course of creating B-Books, I learned to write, really write. I use punctuation correctly, write with clear concise wording, and keep my paragraphs tight.

I guess, it’s all about perspective, and I would rather be a B-Book Author than never have written anything in my life.  It’s sort of like leaving footprints behind, and that’s not such a bad thing.

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http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0185HGFR6

 

Prince: A Case Study In Safety Zones

May3

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Sociology is the study of social behaviors in a society that defines the social norm. Sometimes referred to as Social Studies, I tend to think it’s not currently part of the school curriculum, but has been replaced with sensitivity training, political correctness, the importance of one’s self, and the preservation of  personal safety zones. Simply put, it’s not about acceptable social behavior anymore but about personal entitlements.

A concrete illustration of this was the college students whining on television because someone wrote ‘Trump’ on the sidewalk in chalk, which according to them, violated their peace of mind and the sanctity of their personal safety zones. It is unclear what will happen to those poor disillusioned babes after leaving the shelter of academia, because there are no safety zones in society other than the ones you create for yourself.

Recently the world lost a very talented performer who apparently was gravely ill for quite some time, and suffering intense pain for a variety of reasons. By all accounts, he was surrounded by a circle of staffers and relatives to tend his every need. Therefore, it seems rather strange he died alone on an elevator floor and no one knew until the next day. How can it be that not one person in that circle seemed motivated enough to get him safely to his private quarters, or better yet, take him to the hospital?

Those college students crying about a name written on the sidewalk need pay heed to this lesson because when they stumble and fall, they cannot count on a safety zone to protect them. Inevitably, a whole barrage of people will storm their tent with hands out demanding personal entitlements.

Is this what we have come to as a society; walking over dead bodies to find the mother lode?

Is Purple Rain Real?

Apr24

A man gave a television interview where he was talking about ‘chemtrail flu’ which is a conspiracy theory concerning high flying planes dropping toxic chemicals that cause flu like symptoms and possible death.   He also maintained two days after Merle Haggard made the same public statement he died suddenly from respiratory complications.

This man was many things including a dazzling performer, and I’m wondering if he knew something the rest of us don’t because it seems rather bizarre that a 57 year old man can walk upright into his house on a Wednesday night, but on Thursday morning someone makes a 911 call saying there is a man down in the elevator but cannot tell the operator who the man is or the address he is calling from.

That man was Prince. Home alone and dead in an elevator. Autopsied the next day followed by cremation, and a private ceremony with the ashes being held in an undisclosed location. What really happened in a two day period that made an icon vanish? Could it be that Prince found that purple rain he sang about?

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Prince Nelson Rogers (1958-2016)

Photo: Wikimedia Commons, from Madame Tussaud’s House of Wax, Amsterdam

Yikes! There’s a Woman in the Closet

Apr20

In the year 1857, women didn’t have careers, but were expected to marry, partake in the mandatory semi-annual baby birthing, and bake bread. If they had not achieved those milestones by a certain age, they were considered spinsters. The life of a spinster was the life of an outcast.

Thus was the life of Emily Dickinson who was most likely suffering from a social disorder, and begin dressing only in white, and talking to visitors through closed doors so she didn’t have to speak to them face to face. During the last fifteen years of her life few neighbors saw outside of the house, and when they did she was dressed entirely in white. Consequently, she became ‘the woman in white’; the recluse of Amherst, Massachusetts.

After speaking of ‘a great darkness coming’, she fainted while baking bread.  After a two year’s illness, she died but not before extracting a promise from her sister, Lavinia, also a spinster, to burn her papers, and was laid to rest in the family plot.

That would have been the end of the story of the strange lady in white except Lavinia after burning her sister’s personal correspondence found a locked trunk in Emily’s closet, and the 1800 poems of Emily Dickinson were pulled from the closet. Lavinia spent the duration of her life getting Emily’s poems published, and they have been in continual publication since that time. In 1899, Lavinia died at age sixty-six.

Black-white_photograph_of_Emily_DickinsonIt’s a strange story, one sister writing in the closet, and the other sister sheltering her strange ways. It does raise the question of what would Lavinia have done had she known about the closet horde when she made the promise? Thankfully, she didn’t find the trunk for two years, and realized its value; a story to be told.

It seems to me, this tale presents a great moral to women everywhere; ‘Get out of that closet, and go where you heart takes you.’

photos: U.S. Creative Commons (Wikimedia Commons)

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Emily Dickinson (1830-1886)