It’s always nice to start the day with laughter. A good article poking fun at the state of the Bushite, some welcome news on the eco-front, a brilliant cartoon lampooning some human idiocy. Of course, then there’s that bit of joy with coffee, watching the early morning sky. This sets up breakfast, when, if the eggs turn and hub’s yolks don’t break, the happiness there is its own reward as he daintily dips the end of his sausage into the yellow.
Category: off the cuff
Sipping Coffee
I sat sipping coffee as a manuscript was going through an evaluation process. I also half-listened to a conversation happening over my shoulder…about that editorial process — young women sissy-whispering about who that might be with that manuscript box loaded with postage and whose manuscript was being evaluated.
Pages were sifted and shifted by the editor, notes checked, references made, and an occasional comment jotted. With each new development, the surreptitious audience got a little louder…and louder…and louder…until, finally, the editor looked over at them, frowned, and asked them exactly what it was they found so stimulating that they felt it necessary to make themselves a nuisance.
I expected the brazen young ladies to slink down out of sight, or at least turn their heads and muffle it. To my surprise, they scooted their chairs nearer and started to ask questions, chattering on and on about how they were writing books and…well, you know, pouring their details out as if pitching an agent. They didn’t even pause long enough upon asking something to give space enough for an answer to happen in between their incessant, burbling chatter.
ADD I wondered? Too much sugar? (Both were drinking sweetened beverages.) Or was it just too much self-infatuation?
If you want answers, you’ve got to listen and, then, hear.
Some People Are Exciting; Some Art Not.
I’ve been dealing, one on one and many on one, with people my whole life. Some, I always enjoy engaging; others, well, two minutes into becoming acquainted with them, and I’m yawning already.
Self-infatuation and a penchant for caring more about the surface than about the depths, along with shallow thinking are the main culprits that bring me the “yawn reflex.” Give me someone who isn’t seeking flattery and adulation, give me someone who doesn’t give a damn about what color lipstick they put on this morning…or even if they are wearing any, give me someone whose entire mental repertoire consists of more than parroting the latest ad, fad, and fatuous flatulence as fed them from the boob tube, church, government, or the gossip queens, and, maybe, just maybe, I’ll not dismiss them out of hand.
I like someone who can think for themselves. (The churches, governments and the mega-corps do not.)
I like anyone who doesn’t swallow, hook, line, and stinker, the “truths” convenient for getting along and going along with status quo.
I like anyone who knows how to substantiate their position, and who, if they discover that maybe their position might be wrong, can admit it and take another look.
I like anyone who challenges opinion and accepted circumstance.
Polly Parrot, Missy Aren’t I Pretty, and Mister Dodges Anything Which Pins Him Down is not for me.
I might argue with you, and we might disagree, but that’s how we learn and grow and explore perspectives, isn’t it? If I lend an ear, if I speak, and, if you, in turn, respond and listen, too, isn’t that the highest honor you and I can pay each other?
Yes.
My life at the moment…
Well, the good news is that my eyes are getting better…as long as I don’t look at a computer screen too much, and especially if I don’t read work that uses movable type…which means stay away from blogs, online newspapers, most forums…. If it is static type, it doesn’t bother me, go figure. So that’s the good and bad of it.
Gripes: Writers. Too much to go into at the moment. My decision? I’m cutting them loose. They can make it or break it on their own. I don’t need the abuse. I don’t need the headaches. I don’t need the financial drain.
More gripes: Sandpoint, Idaho. Oh, can we see the mayor sign the green bill? And then what? Cut more big trees down to make way for yet more development — non-green development.
And last but not least: Petulant men and women whose only goal in life is to get their way — men and women driven only by selfish desire.
The Power to Help.
I have two ants safely harbored in a peanut butter jar, a piece of screen keeping them inside. They came here inside my husband’s lunchbox from the construction site. Of course, they didn’t come on purpose. They weren’t particularly interested in visiting places far, far away. They were after goodies and got hijacked by the lid being closed and zippered shut. So home they came…surviving what had to be a very dangerous and uncomfortable trip, jostled between empty lunch containers, locked inside a plastic and nylon environment in 100 degree heat.
So hubs opens lunch box to dump his containers into the sink and does the old, “Ants! Oh, great.”
Now, I have a “thing” about ants. It’s the one creature…en masse…which will send me screaming off in a frothing panic. (I was bitten by red ants when I was a child and have never quite recovered from the experience.) But I also have a “thing” about life and its being precious. I have a “thing” which demands me respect all life…and non-life. And, me, a human, has the power to help. And that’s what it comes down to, doesn’t it? If I have the power to help, doesn’t that obligate me to help where I can, when I can? I think so. Caring matters. If one doesn’t care, if things don’t matter, what’s the point?
So back to the story.
So, lid open, one of the two ants trapped inside started perambulating around in a bit of a frenzy. One got outside the box and disappeared. The other was just doing laps inside.
I see all manner of containers, but everything is plastic or styrofoam — death to insects put inside because they are saturated with things like pesticides or made using formaldehyde. (Nice to think that our food comes in these things, right?) Quickly, I grab the clean, empty, glass peanut butter jar, wondering where the “outside” ant went off to, and how I would be able to find her to get her safely inside the jar for the return trip home tomorrow. Ah! There she is! I manage to get her to walk inside the jar. Now for the other one. She’s not so easy, but, with the help of a piece of paper towel, she’s induced to take a ride inside safety.
Screen lid anchored in place, and they are ready to roll, no longer “lost ants,” but simply on an adventure and ready for the return trip home.
I used my power to help.
BELATED ANT UPDATE:
Yes, they made it safely back to their ant homes. Hubs was very conscientious about getting them back to exactly where he ate lunch the day before. And he watched them as they made tracks out of the jar and onto “familiar ground.” They immediately ran into more ants, did the “feeler thing,” as he called it, then made tracks, following other ants headed to a “known ant home.”
I really like the construction crew. They are very conscientious. All of them. And that’s as it should be since the two owners, Hubs and partner, are both eco-minded. If the crew wasn’t, I guess they wouldn’t be crew very long, right?
Oh, and, I failed to mention, I put a bit of water on aforementioned paper towel the morning of transport back home, and both ants made quite an elaborate show of drinking. Those were some thirsty ants. They must have snacked on some of hubby’s favorite Triscuits!