My First Award!

I hopped over to see Julianne at http://midlifejobhunter.blogspot.com/ yesterday for my daily visit, and was surprised to find that she was giving me an award! It took me a minute to realize that she was talking about me, but when I did I let out a huge 'woohoo'! Here's what the award is about :

The Super Comment Award/You Don't Say Award is given to bloggers who leave comments worth discussing on other blogger’s posts. It may also be because those comments are great in quantity, great in substance, or just great in general. An award that recognizes great commenters is a brilliant idea. And that's the idea behind this You Don't Say Award. Getting awards is always an honor but an award that recognizes those bloggers who consistently comment is a high honor indeed. The You Don't Say Award "... is for beautiful people who practice blogging etiquette by visiting or visiting back, and leaving comments. Their observations are apt and helpful and it's a pleasure to have them comment on your posts..."

I had never read a blog until six months ago, when I found out that my husband's niece, Wendy at http://wisdomofthemoon.blogspot.com/, had one, and I started reading it. In the blink of an eye I had jumped in with both feet and started my own blog, not even bothering to read anything but the most basic instructions. (See my first blog ...)

Pretty soon I was reading blogs that had all these intriguing names over on the side, so I started visiting them, and then had to go thru their lists, and so on and so on. But you know how it all starts, don't you! Before I knew it, I was totally hooked on reading all those intriguing titles ... and also realizing that maybe I was in over my head, that maybe I shouldn't have jumped in with both feet without looking before I leapt! The talent, the ideas, the opinions, the examples of our commonalities and our differences -it's awesome and overwhelming at the same time, and I wasn't sure if I measured up against it all, if I had enough stories, knowledge, or writing skills to interest anyone but myself.

AsI plugged along with my own postings, I began to log in with that thrill of anticipation to see if someone had left a comment, and was hyper-excited if I found one! Niece Wendy was one of the first, and in addition to commenting on my post, she gave me hints and suggestions - like "leave a thoughtful comment". So that's what I always try to do - leave a comment as if I'm talking face to face with that person. And, in turn, I began to anticipate someone else's thoughtful comment, and a lovely cycle began.

I'd like to pass this Super Comment/You Don't Say award, to my niece, Wendy at Wisdom of the Moon, for giving me so many thoughtful comments. (And maybe she'll be soooo appreciative she will explain the link/backlink thingie in a less complicated way than the directions given on blogger.) I'd actually like to give it to everyone on my current blog list, so feel free to copy and paste it to your blog if you want to!

I don't have that many readers/commenters right now, but the ones I do have are so appreciated, and I'm looking forward to many years of meeting more and more of you, and you can be sure that I will return the favor.

And look how cute that panda is and how he brightens my space!

Musical Monday-Ten Years After

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LFpfureaCVs

I haven't done a Musical Monday for a while, because - well, because I don't think most readers really listen to it. Which is fine! But in honor of the 40th anniversary of Woodstock, I'm adding Alvin Lee and Ten Years After to my jukebox. And, as an afterthought, I'm also putting on the youtube video.

With all the hoopla of the 40th anniversary, I've been thinking back to that period in my life, 1969. I was 21 years old and in the first year of my first marriage. I had just started smoking pot recreationally at this point, but we were most definitely not hippies! Not even hippy wannabes! He was in college and then the army, and I was an office worker. We were listening to the Beatles, Bob Dylan, and ... hmmm. I really don't remember right off the top of my head. He was mostly into the Rolling Stones, and I was probably listening to John Denver type music.

I didn't go to Woodstock, and it wasn't really on my radar until I watched the 1970 documentary so many times that one could have had false memories of having been there. Actually, I don't think I even watched it until early into my second marriage in 1973. (I sometimes get things mixed up with the two husbands in that time period.)

Back in the day, when we were young and stupid, we did the occasional dabbling in drugs, mostly pot and very rarely acid or mushrooms. (I know, I know, I shouldn't really admit that, but it was what it was. And yes, I know that's probably why I get my husbands mixed up in that time period.) So most times when we watched the movie or listened to the album, we were high on something. The music and the viewing of the performances themselves was just riveting and exciting, and opened up a whole new musical world for me. (Remember, this was pre-MTV!)

Everyone has their Woodstock favorites, and mine (at the time) were Joe Cocker, Janis Joplin, Richie Havens, Country Joe and The Fish, and Santana (with that drummer, hair flying and drumsticks moving so fast you couldn't keep track of them!).

If you've seen the movie (and I'm sure there are some, especially if you're younger, who haven't), you may remember that the Ten Years After's song, 'I'm Going Home', went on forever (9min25sec). Alvin Lee was hypnotic, and the beat ... the beat itself, high or not, if you close your eyes you will instantly be inside the beat, you'll be the beat. I have a particular memory of sitting in a room of one of my houses and being high, and all of a sudden I saw a ball of fire jumping from speaker to speaker to the beat. Seriously, people, it was the most awesome musical thing that I've ever experienced!

What's so funny about this story is that if you met me today, you'd see that I'm a white bread person. I'm a soft rock/country/oldies person. I don't do things out of the box, I don't do things to rock the boat, I don't do things illegal or things to damage my reputation, integrity, or health. But at that period of my life, like most that age, I was still looking for who I was, was experimenting with music/looks/ideas. And I was trying to 'fit in' and 'be cool'.

And to this day, 40 years later, we still talk about Woodstock and our own experiences surrounding it, even if it was only owning the movie and sound track album! We're still talking about how it was a defining period in our individual and collective lives. Even my second husband and I (David, the 35 years and counting husband) still talk about it as if we we're in our middle twenties and listening to it for the first time (well, actually, he still is listening to it in one form or another!). The only one I truly followed after the initial Woodstock period was Joe Cocker, and the father/daughter dance at Melody's wedding was his 'You Are So Beautiful to Me'.

Anyway, in a few weeks the remembrances of Woodstock will have died down, and we'll be back to the age of the aging baby boomers, the generation that brought about possibly the biggest change in musical history ever, reliving their youth every 20/30/40/50 years thru the resurrection of a movie and a time that won't fade until the last of us is gone.

If you're of the age that you remember Woodstock, did it influence you in any way, or was it just a blip on the news to you? Who or what was your favorite artist or music?

Wednesday's Wander to the Wayside: Chattanooga Nature Center

Last weekend, my daughter and her family and my husband and I had a daycation at the Chattanooga Nature Center. We only live thirty minutes away, so it was an enjoyable afternoon that didn't involve a lot of driving! It wasn't a big whoop like Yellowstone or Disneyland, but we enjoyed it, and the boys (three and six) had a great time as this was their first canoe trip. I won't bore you with a lot of narration, most of it is pretty self explanatory, and only the names have changed from anyone else's photos of their daycation. I will say this ... it was hotter than hell, but that's life in Georgia and Tennessee these days!

Friday's Favorites: A Tale of Two Clocks

Back in the 1970s, my husband's stepmother brought me a clock kit and asked if I had the time to embroider it for her. Being a stay at home mom, I gladly accepted the challenge and spent the next several months working on it. I hated passing it on to her after all that work, but was very proud of myself because (a) I had embroidered only a few things previous to this project and hadn't been at all sure that I was up to the task, and (b) I'm notorious for starting projects and never finishing them.

Also, back in the late 70's, I started a new job, the first since my daughter was born. It had been a while since I'd had my 'own' money, and made a vow to myself that I would buy a cuckoo clock out of one of my first paychecks. My grandparents had had one in their apartment when I was a young girl (that later was sold at a yard sale), and I had always wanted one. Serendipitously (seriously, I'm not kidding), a cuckoo clock salesman came by our office one day (what are the chances of that happening!), and I picked one out of a catalogue, ordered it, and waited excitedly for it's arrival. When I finally got it home and on the wall, I was like that little girl again, spinning the hands around and around until the little cuckoo came out on the hour and half hour.

The cuckoo clock adorned our wall for about a decade, until we had a litter of kittens that became fascinated with the weights ... and pulled the whole thing off the wall. It required a trip to the clock repair shop to get the weights untangled (do you know how hard it is to find a cuckoo clock repairman?), but it was just never the same again. On our next move, to a house with a shortage of display walls, the clock remained in the box. I was determined, though, to get it repaired and up after the grandkids were born, because I wanted it to be one of those things that they would remember from their childhood, and that I would pass on to one of them. Which would beg the question ... which kid?

As it turned out, it was a moot point ... the box with the cuckoo clock disappeared with our last move in 2005. Despite the fact that I had looked in every box and nook and cranny, the clock was nowhere to be found. I had all but given up, and figured it had gone the way of the box of purses that had also disappeared in the move - that mysterious black hole of all things lost.

Now comes the cool part of the tale of two clocks. This last January, my husband's stepmother gave me the embroidered clock! Finally, a clock to pass on to one of the grandkids, made all the more special because I had made it with my own two hands. Let's get it up on the wall before they're grown and could care less about mawmaw's clock!

A few weeks after I received the embroidered clock, I found the box of purses in my office closet ... it had been there all along (three years!), and I had somehow managed to miss it.

It was only a week or two later and ... you guessed it ... the box with the cuckoo clock appeared. Out of nowhere. In a spot where we had looked a million times before. In a spot where I had told my husband that it surely had to be, in that box, and he swore that he had looked there.

So now I have TWO HEIRLOOM CLOCKS, and TWO GRANDSONS! You tell me, is that serendipitous?

And now I have to find a cuckoo clock repairman, and figure out which clock to put on which wall.

Wednesday's Wander to the Wayside: Cottage Treasures

It's been several years since I had a "girlie" day, but was fortunate to have one recently with my daughter Melody and her sister-in-law Gail. We went to a tea room/gift shop called Cottage Treasures, and it was a delightful luncheon. It's a house that's been converted into four rooms - The Rose Room, The Teacup Room, The Hydrangea Room, and the Mother's Room - in addition to the display rooms, all of which were small and cozy. Lots of lace, linen and antiques, good smells and good food, and rooms full of treasures old and new. Melody and I are involved mostly with little boy interests these days, so getting to do such a girlie thing was a special treat.

This isn't much different than a lot of tea rooms, but had some really cute items and nicely displayed. If you'll enlarge some of the photos, you'll be able to read the signs, which I myself plan to duplicate for my own home or as gifts! Unfortunately, I wasn't thinking blog and didn't get a photo of the picket fence surrounded cottage outside, nor will you see a photo of me - I'm rarely in photos as I'm always the one taking the pictures.

As an after thought, I'd like to mention why this was such a treat for me (other than the obvious reason of having a girlie day with my daughter). I'm a stay-at-home wife/grandmother, rarely go out other than groceries, family events, etc., and as a result have not made a network of friends since we moved here three and a half years ago. Don't exactly know why my life has been this way, but it is what it is and pretty much always has been this way. I'm basically just not a social person!

We're not church-goers, and I don't work (except for the occasional babysitting or housecleaning job) because we originally moved here to be near our daughter and for me to sit the boys while she worked. Now she's a stay-at-home mom who helps out with the office part of the furniture repair business that my husband is involved in, and, though I sit the boys quite often during the week, for the most part I'm on my own.

There are very few people here who know me or who I know, certainly no one who I'd call to say "hey, how about we get dressed up and go check out that new coffee shop", or "hey, how's about we go grab some Mexican and a marguerita?" I used to be able to do that with my cousin, Nancy, but she's now three hours away.

So, when I do get invited to go out, it's both a "woohoo!" moment and a "crap, I have to socialize and make conversation and what the hell will I wear?" moment. I actually fit in better with younger women like my daughter and Gail, and rarely meet women my own age - even the women in our neighborhood are busy working mothers with young children. Where are the women in the 55 or older stage, anyway? According to the blogs I read, they're either still working and getting ready to retire, or have retired and are traveling with their mate (or by themselves - hi, Lila!), or are involved with their church, so I guess it's no wonder that I never meet them!

Well, I guess this last part is a blog for another day! I'm just rambling ... thanks for stopping by!