I am a throwback, and I am just fine with that...

So, it's the end of July and I am knitting.  I also have an embroidered piece I am working on, a piece of cross stitch and always have some recipe or another going, for dinner or for treats.  And, I realized something curious: each and every "home maker" type thing I do, be it cooking or handcrafts or even 'how' I clean has some association with wonderful memories of special women in my life.  Women who meant everything to me at one time or another. 

Knitting is an easy one.  Growing up, every woman I knew knitted.  My great aunts, their kids, my mother, and the one who first taught me, a neighbour at my parent's house - who actually was more an additional grandmother to me, and mother to mine.  She was always knitting, mittens, sweaters, hats..you name it she knit it.  It was fascinating to me to see this string become something warm and soft and comforting.  And, the fact that she would let me do it too - magical. 

Embroidery and cross stitch was something I learned from a great aunt on the other side of the family.  Her entire house was laden with needlepoint and cross stitched pillows, and she always sat with a hoop in her hands, working on the next pieces.  I learned on a very small piece, and have completed many, even using the skills to decorate my daughter's clothes when she was little.  I still give pieces as baby gifts and wedding presents: including a linen tablecloth and 10 napkins stitched with cherry blossoms for a friend.  There is something both relaxing and structured, leaving time to think when working a project..and there are always pieces in the works. Less so of late, but I have floss and cloth, so there may be a set of bookmarks and other bits coming from my fingertips soon. 

Cleaning was another thing just learned at a knee.  My grandmother always allowed me to follow along and 'help'.  I learned how to use simple things like vinegar and newsprint for shine and coarse salt to lift stains.  I still prefer to wash my floors 3 times, detergent the first, detergent with water the second, and a third water only ( or with some simple scented oil - usually tea tree ) to take up the last of the soap, make it really clean and add a nice scent to the house.  I still can use paste or liquid wax too - and use blutcher's wax on all of the wood here.  

Cooking is where I most notice the connections.  Not only can it be the most obvious example of nurturing and caring FOR someone, I have tons of recipes directly from my Grandmother that I just 'know' and several more copied from her, or on small cards in her hand.  I was just about 2 years old, sitting on the floor of her kitchen as she was kneading bread dough before the final proofing and bake, when she realized that I was reading her recipe book.  Up to that point, since I was always around underfoot, she would read the recipe aloud, pointing to the words, and gathering the ingredients, often allowing me to "help" by mixing.  That day, by the third ingredient, she realized I was reading her molasses cookie recipe, pages away from the bread she was baking.  From that day onward, I was the designated "reader" for the recipes, as I learned to measure, mix and create the wonders that were to be found in her kitchen.  To this day, there are some recipes of hers that I use, and I can actually hear her voice, instructing, guiding, encouraging.  

Not a bad trade off for my time.

The life of an idea ....

*again, taking from the other site, but a universal .. my apologies to those of you who are getting both**

Or, How I choose what to write on.

Read my blog and know one thing, it is very rare that I expand on ideas that I cannot find some way of making them 'relate' to a bigger picture. The best topics are ones where I can bring a different spin on ideas that everyone has some frame of reference on, or can see how I make connections from idea to post to a conclusion.

At any given day, I can toss off ideas into a file that functions as a "seed storage" for the patches in this garden: see the previous post to find the original analogy.

I then work through my emotions about the issues, because writing without passion or emotion is like writing a technical manual: as nitpicky and plodding to do as to read. Once I have settled my feelings about the idea, I then go to the logic. Finding my examples, drawing my conclusions. Even researching for facts and quotes.

All of this happens while I am mentally composing the post, it's look, it's tone, it's need for facts and examples.

Then, I open the "Add A Post" tab, and write. Editing as I go. Adding in quotes and facts as they fit when my writing starts to take shape. And yes, it is rare, exceedingly rare, that I write a post in word, edit and revise, then post. Most of what you read here is written in minutes, despite the hours I may spend researching.

Then, I hit "post" and read the finished product. Make any corrections needed, and then make a copy for my personal archive.

When I choose a topic, I really don't look to add to the "why's" that have no answer. I rarely write on things that I can't find some logical connection between act and intention, or some guidepost that actually gives hints as to why something is happening, or did happen. Perhaps there are patterns that foreshadowed a conclusion I have recently made, or a question that I have thought about yet still haven't reached a real decision and the unease about the "not knowing" the possible reasons why has me sitting at the keyboard.

It's all a process. And, it's my space so I write what moves me. What I can relate to, and bring my own individual sense and spin to.

And while, I am acutely aware that what I choose to focus on for a post may not hit your requirements of "topical" or "important"..it's all apples and pears to me. Because it is ONE of the myriad of seeds I can put in this garden, it just happened to be ready to sprout.

Thoughts on a Garden

**please note .. this is most of a post that I had at the other space, and think it is relevant to all blogs**

A friend of mine in the blogs, once made a comment about blogs being like your garden.  Requiring careful tending and attention to flourish and bear fruit.

I'm taking the seed of the idea one step further. Because it was an idea that spoke to me in a near perfect analogy of the styles one can encounter with a touch of perseverance and patience.

There are those who are purely ornamental, full of flowery nothingness but contributing to the visual.
The grassy plains - solid, nurturing, feeding the need for information and understanding, basic things but so integral to a well-ordered experience. 

Maze gardens, full of twists and turns that make little sense but always bring you back to the writer when they don't lose your interest with the layers of detail. 

Small kitchen gardens - spice and herb and beauty intermingled to give succor, zip and pleasure. 

Landscaped lawn decoration - a tough rigidly planted and limited in scope - they are unique only for the colours that compliment or contrast to the more wildly exotics. 

Wildflower gardens: less a structured garden but a wild profusion of flowers and butterflies. Open and free allowing nettles to grow as openly and honestly as violets.

English gardens, of the stately homes. Multiple layers and thoughts leading from one to another, encompassing all that one sees, ornamental flowers and shrubs, topiaries, mazes and wildly profuse colours and groupings all set to a theme.

Every blogger has a garden, that needs careful tending where comments and readers serve as fertilizer. Each writer here has the ability to build a garden that pleases them, and helps them to randomly or precisely set forth a path. If you look at your self and memories and reactions as the foundation of you - a house as it were, the garden is the space in which you both invite others in and use as a "testing ground" for new ideas, experimental thoughts and reactions, a place to nurture the seeds of growth and thought. Bring them to flower or just discard them when they aren't fitting in the overall scheme of the seeds you are planting for the results you wish to see.

Some days, it does pay for you to look carefully at your garden...

Why here. Why now. Why?

I could just say that I wanted to blog - that's true.  And I could say that the time was right .. also truth.  The realities of the situation go far deeper.  This is not my first ride at the rodeo, at least where blogging is concerned.  I was on a wonderful site for nearly 5 years, until some corporate yo yo noticed just how wonderful a place it was, bought it, and destroyed the things that made it so good.  So I was blog-less for a while, and opted to other interactive forums for an outlet.


After some dithering about with sites, I ended up stumbling upon a sex site, that offered many different things.  But although I read some blogs, I really wasn't partaking of the offerings there.  What I did find there was a group of people that were in my area who were fun, offbeat, and friendly.  The sex, for most, was an individual thing - and the interactions with people they wouldn't otherwise encounter was the best thing.  It was through that site, and chattering in different areas of the country, and even the world that I started to communicate with A.  Everywhere else I refer to him as the Love Muffin, so LM will do.  

Time came that the relationship for the two of us was more important than any life I was recreating up north, with my daughter in University and spending most of her time either at her school or traveling about the world visiting friends and relatives, the house being sold, and well - work is something I can do anywhere .. I moved.  Still is, was and will forever be the best opportunity taken where that site was concerned.  So - here I am in Atlanta, and rediscover the blogs at this sex site.  Because I have always been one who appreciates what someone thinks, how they think, and how they express themselves far more than any other trait.  About 2 years ago - I started a blog there. 

And I learned.  Much.  My writing improved. There was amazing skill and talent exhibited in many of the bloggers there.  There were topics that went from topical to fantasy to simple jokes to highly personal and often tragic revelations.  Heart warming and heart wrenching stories of personal triumph and tragedy.  And interaction.  Most of what I saw was positive: people finding a commonality and bonding with that, answering questions from perspectives of "having been there".  Then, the ugly side of people, or some people, started to show through the butterflies and flowers.  I don't know how many of you are True Blood watchers, but the point where Sookie sees beneath the faerie exterior to the ugly 'what lies beneath' was as shocking for her character as it was for me.

Because, essentially, some of the things I saw happening, things that were cheered on like Romans watching gladiators waiting for the killing blow was so far beyond anything I could comprehend doing to someone, it was as if I was watching some bad telenovela. 
And, it's not because I haven't dealt with the seedy underside of human nature, but to see it so focused and concentrated, and so relentless was shocking.  And caused me to retreat. Because being associated with that sort of behaviour, because you CAN cause people hurt is just not something I was comfortable with. It's not that I avoided it, some I stepped into not knowing all the sides, others I was dragged into ..but knowingly behaving like a spoiled 12 year old girl who is being challenged for the seat at the popular table, when the school owns all the chairs is really not my thing. 

So - that behavior does ebb and flow, pockets of it never cease, but it's easy to avoid pockets.  Sadly though - the miasma of who was worth trust, belief or even a read rather sucked the fun out better than a dyson. So - I set up house here, different, exponentially more functional. No real concerns about some halfwitted reviewer changing words, eliminating words, removing content, or (my personal favourite ) reporting you for abuse since you talk to xyz and they don't like x so you must believe everything x does and you speak for x.  Yes. It does get that childish. 

But it also does show some of the best things. The people that are admirable for the trials they have endured, those who will make you laugh out loud with a new spin on the word idiot, the interaction and play you can have with the responses and comments.  The few good do outweigh the few bad, but like all things - there may be a time where that space isn't comfortable for me to be me anymore.  It's happened to several, people who have moved over to write here - sharing with a select group the spaces where interaction is appreciated and, because of the history at the other space - comfortable. 
I won't let the few overrun what I do anywhere - especially not at the other blogging space ..but I think that is more an apartment where this is feeling more like a home...

Is it ever really this simple?

I read a line today that simply stated, "he didn't love me like I loved him. Now I look for that sort of return always".  I wondered if anyone would actually distill something as complex as love in a relationship down to measuring just how much you are loved in return?

Apparently they do.  And that makes me sad. Perhaps because I really cannot determine just what would lead someone to make all decisions based on the equality of feeling felt, and just how do you really make those sorts of measures.  Is it as simple as just declaring I love you this much, while spreading your arms?

 
What about who says it more? Do you ask? Do you demand? 

Who determines who is more "committed" to the idea of love, and for that matter, do both people actually HAVE the same idea of love? 

On the whole, the entire idea of being equal in love is rather sad, even after thinking on it.  

I'm not saying that unrequited love is something to throw yourself into, but if I were to measure all of my friends, lovers, relationships into a bowl then one by one decide who always returned my effort equally.  Well, let's just say I won't do that. 

Because I know that I will come up short.  And I know that others will too. 

Because love, to me, is not measured it is felt and freely given.  

Imagination

It's less what you see - but what you 'think' you see. Imagination enables you to form pictures in your head, to project expectations of reactions from those you read, even to create bonds. But, without really meeting someone and being in their sphere, are you really able to form a solid opinion of who they are? 


It's been a series of discussions in many places, with opinions varying depending on how people view themselves, how they have experienced others in their interactions, and perhaps most importantly, how honestly they portray themselves in their interactions. 

This forum is limiting in it's 'exposure' of self only to the degree that I allow it to rein in my wild exposures.  But you never really will know me like the one who lives with me daily does, or like my daughter does, or even as people I work with do.  There are pieces that will only be served by your imagination and perceptions of the me I present to you. 


We are all real people - blogging and writing still must have that human element at the keyboard.  Sure, perhaps we are a better version of self - polishing off those rough edges that we aren't willing to show, even changing our persona to fit what we think will gain popularity.  It's all a defense, like maquillage and  airbrushing - trying to present the best sides for first impression. 


But, as I have extreme difficulties with describing me or my goals in a limited set of words that will always hold true no matter what; I also don't think that my 'telling' you with a series of descriptives the who I am is particularly useful or helpful either.  Because it is up to you, the readers, to decide who is or isn't worth your time to read.  It is your interaction that will be unique with any of the writers you encounter, and then it is primarily just that series of interactions on which you should base your initial impressions of any blogger you read.


Of course, as you become more familiar with the writer, you find things ( like in every relationship ) that don't always sit comfortably, or things that you can admire, and sometimes even that there are commonalities that transcend distance, age, experience and even toughies like politics and religion.  Because, after all is said and done - we are all looking to find those connections, to learn, explore and perchance to grow ....

 

And you thought this would be a regular thing ?

Guess again my pretties ..  I suppose the easiest way to explain would be to tell you that I forgot my password.  Which, in the grand scheme of things is truth. 
Because I have about 12 million of them.  And since A is such a techno geek - all of my passwords are "random generation".  It keeps people out of your stuff.  It also keeps you out of your stuff if you, say, forget to mark them down at the last change and then you do something incredibly brilliant and you erase your history - including your keychain that has all of the 12 million passwords stored there.

But - that would be the simple explanation, for my levels of paranoia and my fascination with technology and having alternates and backups for my backups weren't a habit of longstanding. See - I have 2 gmail accounts - one that I use almost excessively for everything, and one that I specifically designated for use with things that I assume will generate spam.  That was a lesson I learned with an old mindspring account when you weren't allowed multiples and most of my stuff went through there.


So - not only do I have 2 gmail accounts - but the lesser used one was the one under which I created this blog.  And, it never dawned on me ( even after trying to access this space with the wrong account - that it was NOT a password issue, it was a blonde moment. 

So - now that I have found this .. I am back.  And will undoubtedly start to move things about - get clearer formatting and deal with all that.


But - for the moment - it's good just to be.