My Dog's Life

Linking with Wordless Wednesday hosted by Kathe

Come join us!

Malcolm and Ruby

"The Art of Seduction" digital artwork by Catrin Welz-Stein

Source

Linking with The Sunday Muse for Muse # 32 

and Imaginary Gardens for The Tuesday Platform.

Come join us!

Forget love — I'd rather fall in chocolate! ~Sandra J. Dykes

Malcolm and Ruby had a wild fling
Malcolm and Ruby had a great thing
When Ruby kissed Malcolm he saw hearts
When Malcolm kissed Ruby she saw stars
It was all pretty rosy until along came Ned
Made poor Malcolm wish he was dead
Cause pretty Ruby saw a future of wealth
Cause all Malcolm had to offer was love and health
After 2 months Ned and Ruby were split
cause only plants can grow when they are planted in shit
Now Ruby wants Malcolm back and she wants him bad
but Malcolm don't want Ruby cause she's a gold diggin' hag
After all the drama Malcolm got wiser
and eventually Ruby met a rich old miser
the moral of the story true love is always free
and their are always plenty of fish in the deep blue sea.

That Lone Rose in that Desolate Land

Courtesy Google Images

Linking with The Sunday Muse for Muse # 31

Hello everyone, I apologize in advance for this one.  Story writing is my weakness and I ventured out of my comfort zone writing this one.

Hope is the lone bloom in the desert. ~Terri Guillemets

Her name was Silencia and the only world she had known was Eldernan.  A planet on the far side of the galaxy.  Many of the occupants had evacuated to other solar systems, but she had remained with her grandfather in his later years.  He had been gone for many months now, but her opportunity to flee had long passed.   The cities were full of shelters for the few that had stayed behind.  There had been 300 different shuttles arranged to get people out, but none of the shuttles had returned.  Fortunately, the storage pods of food and necessities had been enough so far.  The multitude were long gone, and the feared disease that had killed millions on the continent of Gronell had been annihilated by some scientists in that region.   The communication they had with the shuttles had been lost half way through the mission to other home planets, and the engineers and scientists had not been able to regain the connection to them.  Oddly, the climate suffered some strange changes after that time, and the land became unfertile in many areas. After a few years had passed, on days loud with machines doing construction the city, she would venture out to the desolate land of Pralo to find silence and try not to remember all that she had lost.  She would close her eyes and envision a different world.  One full of hope, beauty and life.  She would be wearing her long lost christine dress that was for the annual festivities in the city she grew up in, Rolem.   She would remember the songs and then sing them to what life was willing to listen.  Sometimes there would be a wild bird or rabbit that would cross her path briefly.  Other times, it was a few weeds or a grass hopper clinging to life.  The song was simple, but the melody was beautiful and would stick in your head for days on end.  She would find herself singing it through the streets and back to the shelter she had been at for the last 3 years.  “Reach for a rose…..but do not pick it from where it stands….just touch it’s beauty and then hold the beauty in your hand….reach for a rose….but do not pick it from the place it blooms…..just touch it’s beauty before it is gone all too soon.”  It was a song her mother sang during the days of normal living conditions of Eldernan.    It was like a lullaby, but for Silencia it had become an anthem, and when she sang it, she would reach out her hand to the most beautiful rose she pictured inside her mind.  She felt like she could relate to that lone rose in that desolate land.   If only just one shuttle would return, she thought.  She would gladly let it pick her up and take her away!

Empty Cups Full Hearts

An Angel at my Table by Mariam Escofet  

Photo source


Linking with The Sunday Muse for Muse # 30

We fill our cup with the coffee of the morning

We fill our minds with the thoughts of the moment

We fill our time with the tasks at hand

We fill our plates with the meal of the day

We fill our hearts with the loves of our life.

We collect so many things throughout our lives.  Things that could fill up closets and homes.  Fine china to fill a grand table, and memories to last a lifetime.  May your table be full and your guests be many.

Mighty is the Prayer

Image Source

Linking with The Sunday Muse for Muse # 29


Prayer is glue for broken souls. ~Terri Guillemets

The most powerful

 weight lifting we will ever do,

 is reach toward heaven

 with our troubles in hand

 and give them to God

Amen.

For All the Trees I Never Planted,

"Faith of a Dreamer" by ChieuMua  click here for source 

Linking with The Sunday Muse for Muse # 28

and Imaginary Gardens for The Tuesday Platform

brought to us by the lovely Sanaa 

come join us!

The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit. ~Nelson Henderson

We should not burn a bridge that we never even crossed

Nor should we build something bigger when something better will be lost

But really it is about the act of doing you see life is a leap of faith

We have to sweat a little if we want to make something great

We must get our hands dirty and plant a garden or a tree

Get off that comfortable sofa and truly live what we believe

Making a difference is not just for the other guy

It is a mission that is yours and it is a mission that is mine

For in the name of progress it seems so much has been lost

And we should not build something bigger when something better will be lost.

This is dedicated to all the trees that have been cut down in the name of progress.  What a sad story it truly is.   I have always loved trees and felt they have a magnificent presence all around us.  In fact, the first poem I ever wrote was about a tree when I was 11 years old.  Yes, trees are dear to me, and since we recently celebrated arbor day, it felt fitting to write this.  The sad thing is I have never actually planted a tree with my own bare hands.  I work right inside a botanic garden center.  They gave out little trees for arbor day, and I have one now.  So guess what?  I am going to plant a tree.  Little steps they say.  I am going to get my hands dirty and make beautiful shade for my great great grandchildren.

True Real Estate

Image Source

"My friends are my estate."  Emily Dickinson

One stormy night I sat on the cement floor of a shelter
wearing the only clothes I had with me
not sure what I would go back home to
whether anything would be salvageable
or if I would have a home
a place
 with all my stuff
it seems
I spent years collecting things
lots of things
stuffed in boxes
hung in closets
stored in bags
piled on piles
because
I had
no equity
or investment
in property
no land
to call my own
but I had things
everything you
could think of
I had it.......
.......but it took losing it
to remind me that
my true friends and family
are the things in my life
that matter most.



I do know this much is true.....losing everything you own never compares to losing those we love.  For no matter how bad of a day those days in a shelter would have been, they could never be as bad as days I had known losing those I love in this world.


I dedicate this piece to those who have true real estate in heaven and in our hearts:

Lauren NicoleThackeray
Seth Michael Stewart
Terry Tod Thackeray
Carol Thackeray
William Clyde Odeneal
Hazel Covington Odeneal
Vaude Van Horn
Virginia Katherine Van Horn
Parkes Van Horn
Dorothy Van Horn
Bill Odeneal Sr.
Carrie Lee Meredith
Harry Van Horn
Lou Odeneal
Leah Odeneal
Margaret Boatman
Barbara Van Horn
Katherine Odeneal Marco
James Marco Jr.
Benji Baldridge
Tony Thackeray I
Heather Thackeray
George Thackeray I
Edith Thackeray
George Thackeray II
George Thackeray III
Teddy Thackeray
Tom Thackeray
Little Tom Thackeray
Gail Thackeray
Parks Wayne Van Horn
Lisa Grace Van Horn

Image source

What Is Not In Our Hands

Photo Credit

Linking with Imaginary Gardens for The Tuesday Platform

Come join us!

Oh, my friend, it's not what they take away from you that counts. It's what you do with what you have left. ~Hubert Humphrey

I have held many things in this life.  Some worthy of keeping some worthy of letting go.  The trouble is, I have not always recognized the choice and its importance in the midst of holding on.  

There is a memory I still hold of a fallen baby sparrow that fell out of its nest.  I was merely 6 years old and was fascinated by this frail feathered creature.  I wanted to take care of it and keep it for my own, but like so many lessons I would learn in my life, it was just not mine to keep.

That particular day, we were planning an outing to the Zoo.  Outings were a rare occurrence at our household growing up.  I am not sure if it was just because my mother did not have a driver's license or was slightly agoraphobic like our grandmother, but none the less we stayed home most of the time.

I do not recall every detail, but I remember finding the little bird on the ground and having a special cardboard box to place him in.  When the time came for my father to take me and my brother to the Zoo, I was given a choice.  Did I want to go to the Zoo or did I want to stay home with my mom and the precious little birdie?  Maybe most children would have chosen the Zoo, but not me, I wanted to take care of this wonderful little bird.

Unfortunately, after my father left for the Zoo, I found that staying with the bird was not all I thought it would be.  Sure that the bird would give me some strange disease, my mother made the decision that I could no longer touch it.  So the thrill of staying home with it soon lost its luster.

Looking back on the memory I realize that it probably was not a wise idea for my parents to give me such a choice to begin with.  The bird would have been there when I got back home, and that was the only time I can recall that my father ever took us to the zoo.

Some choices are tricky.  We think we have control over the situation or the outcome, but sometimes simply making the choice at all turns out to be a lesson in just how much we do not have control over the outcome.  Life is full of uncertainty; surprises at every turn. We do not have the luxury of knowing what may surprise us around the next curve, but we do have the freedom and opportunity to learn from the choices we have made in the past. To gain peace over what we can control and what we cannot.  What I have learned is this: we cannot control all that comes our way, like a bird falling from its nest, but we can control how we deal with the outcome, or accept what God truly has placed within our hands.

The Haunting of Her Lips

 Image Source

Linking with The Sunday Muse for the muse # 27

Love, thieves, and fear, make ghosts. ~German Proverb

You are a haunted house my love and I am the ghost that walks your halls 

I have every room memorized but you do not remember me at all

I kissed you once and I kissed you twice more

but before the next you were long gone out the door

you see time stops for only a few things in this world

childbirth/seeing a ghost/ and kissing a girl

I held you close in your red sequin gown

and paraded you on my arm all over town

but what made me fall was that first kiss

and now I am a ghost that you do not know exists.

The Magnificent Magician

Image Source

The Sunday Muse for muse # 26 and with Imaginary Gardens for The Tuesday Platform brought to us by Sanaa
come join us!


We do not err because truth is difficult to see. It is visible at a glance. We err because this is more comfortable. ~Alexander Solzhenitsyn

It is a show I have performed on a big bright stage

 but it has never been magnificent, it has only been a comedy of pain

 Here comes the lady that performs magic tricks

  She makes things appear different with the click of a stick

 No rabbits come out of her big black hat

Only denial and excuses with a big black cat

If you do not look close you will never see

The trouble disappearing act from scene to scene

What once looked bad is now all covered up

With magic gloves under a magic rug

Turns out it only makes for a bigger mess

After the show is over and the rug gets wet

And every performance turns out the same

Turns something medium into a bigger pain

I know cause I did the show many many times

And it always ended the same come rain or shine

My problems magically grew larger right on the stage

And every show I still do that trick just the same

I finally had to take off my magic hat and lay down my stick

For only God can perform a true magnificent magic trick.

Classic enablers can be like a crazed magician or a frenzied maid, trying to fix the world around them and make the problems of those they love disappear.  It is a job that can make for a weary heart and was never what we were meant to do.  I know this because I am one, and I spent many years trying to smooth the rough waters of alcoholism and addiction right at my own front door.  One thing I have learned in the process is this:  the force of dysfunction of a classic enabler can be just as horrific of an addiction as drugs or alcohol abuse can be.  No wisdom of others on the outside looking in could stop me.  It is a struggle that I still wrestle with, but I have learned to see it for what it is, and not let denial cover my eyes with a blind fold like a magician’s ruse.