Starrise

I sit before the fire,
watching
stars come out of hiding.

Am I hiding?
Is it time for me to shine?

Somehow, I think it may be.

Kids and Apple Branches

Today my 7-year-old said, "I LOVE yardwork." However, I think I've found the difference between hauling branches when you're 7 and when you're almost 30 years older. The 7-year-old sees it as an opprotunity to pick the blossoms off the branches to sell to Grandma for a nickel.

I see it as work. A necessary evil.

It truly is all in how you look at it.

Words of Power ...

I sit in awe of the power of language. As Martin Heidegger says, "Language is the House of Being," and I can't agree with him more. Children come into their own through their mastery of language. When they can talk to you and communicate what they need / want / feel / think, they have the power of affect the world around them in ways they hadn't been able to before. They can get juice when they would have received milk. They can ask for cheese instead of crackers. They can tell you that they need a kiss or a hug or that they miss their Daddy when he's at work, then you can e-mail Daddy, he can call, and then they can talk and come away feeling loved.

Language shapes the world you live in. Writers create new worlds, then readers sometimes appropriate that world and integrate it into their own. One clear example of this comes from my fifth grade year. I was reading Lloyd Alexander, and one line in the novel I was reading (I no longer remember the name of the title or the main character) has stuck with me for over 25 years. That line (paraphrased): "I've heard of women's work and men's work, but I've never heard the work complain about who did it."

The message to me: you can do any damn thing you want to, and who cares if a man is supposed to be doing it. What a world-changer.

This is why I write. I want to create a world around me that is a world where everyone, myself included, respects the individuality of those around them. People are NOT a number, they are thinking, feeling, speaking beings, each with their own particular world-view. The world of the misogynist is as valid as the feminist, and both deserve acknowledgement. No, this does NOT mean that you have to agree with what they say. You just have to respect their right to say it and move on. However, you don't have to listen.

One of the great things about using language actively is that you can both affect change and be changed as you communicate with others. You can show the world your house of being and possibly offer them a new pillow or curtain to put in their own house. Your words may even be akin to a gallon of paint, and color the way they see the world.

Powerful stuff, isn't it.

It's Dandelion Season

Yep. It’s that wonderful time of year where young boys and girls pick yellow flowers and give them to the adults they love, who then fill cups and glasses with water to keep the lovely yellow blooms bright and fresh until tomorrow’s bouquet.

There’s nothing quite like the smile and the hug you get with the yellow flowers, though. It’s a child’s way of saying, "You're special. Thank you." It's also a way for them to cop a hug, and I'm all for that.

When does a dandelion become a weed? The greens are tasty and nutritious. The flowers are bright and cheery--and once the seeds pop up, it's a lot of fun to blow them hither and yon. But yet, as adults, we strive to kill the very flowers that we adored as children. My son sees a sea of yellow blossoms as a chance to pick flowers to give to somebody special. My husband sees that same yellow-polka-dotted patch as another item on the to-do list: must spread the weed-killer.

Maybe we'd all be better off if we skipped the weed-killer and picked the flowers ourselves. After all, it's not every day you can test to see if you like butter simply by rubbing a flower against your arm--and as this test proves, EVERYBODY likes butter.

WELCOME

This is a brand-new blog, created by me, Ali. What will I post? I have no idea. However, neither do you, so if you're interested, stop in, grab a cuppa, and stay a while. Who knows, we might even find something interesting to talk about.