Wednesday Weirdness!

"Where's your will to be weird? " ~ Jim Morrison

"Some are born weird, some achieve it, others have weirdness thrust upon them."
~ Dick Francis

“We are all a little weird and life's a little weird, and when we find someone whose

weirdness is compatible with ours, we join up with them and fall in mutual weirdness

and call it love.”~ Santiz

This will be my first try at Wednesday Weirdness. I had checked out the sight and thought about trying it many times but today decided to actually just dive right in and do this after one of My co-workers said to me... " Patsy, you are so delightfully weird!!!".. I took it as a compliment and immediately decided that I would try the Wednesday Weirdness questions for today and maybe make it a regular part of my blog. Please be sure and let me know how you..( the ones who read my blog)... like this new thing! If Y'all hate it I'll toss it. The way it works is that someone else makes up the questions and we bloggers answer them on our blogs. I have been told that the questions vary and that sometimes they might even be a little bit racy! WOW! I might have to skip some of the really racy ones. I wouldn't want y'all to see me blush! Besides my Mama and my kids read this. They would be mortified if I answered some of those questions for all the world to see. Also this first time I am going to choose questions from several different weeks to answer. After all this is my first weird Wednesday! Here goes my first weird Wednesday questions!

1:) What is the most annoying commercial on the air right now? I Hate the smiling Bob ~enzyte commercial. I hate the fact that they use a Figure (Santa) who appeals to children to sell a sexual enhancement drug. I will turn the channel and not watch it. There are actually a few that I hate but I think I hate smiling Bob the worst. I know it airs late and most children are in bed but still... I hate it!

2:) How long do you think could you disappear for until someone would notice your absence and start looking for you? I actually tried that once a long, long time ago. It is part of what convinced me to marry my beloved Dave! I was dating someone else. Dave and I were neighbors and very good friends.. he was my best friend I just didn't know that then!.. He was doing his very best to become everything I ever needed in a man and hoping to be my next husband... I had been having a lot of issues with my health and it seemed that my life was falling apart again. I was lonely all the time except when I was with Dave and our slew of children... I was in a relationship that I knew was going no where at all and yet I didn't want to hurt any one.... I was sick and tired~ of being sick and tired! I decided to vanish for a week or so. I loaded up my two youngest children and away we went to a State Park about one and a Half hours away. I stayed the first week.. having pre-arranged with Dave to call him at my house every night so he could let me know if anyone was looking for me. My Parents I had told where I would be.. I even borrowed their cooking tent. Not a living soul looked for me. I decided to stay another week.. After all. I apparently wasn't needed at home! The Guy I was dating came by once and asked Dave if he had seen me that week... Dave didn't lie when he said no, since I had by then been gone longer than a week.. Just after daylight on the ninth day I heard horns blowing and children laughing. I came out of my tiny dome tent to see Dave and his two children along with another couple, who were our friends, pulling into my campsite. Dave said he couldn't stand it any longer. He had convinced the other couple to come along to help convince me to come back home. Being that I had already paid for the whole week, we had a great group vacation and only a few weeks later Dave and I got married. I don't think I could be gone for more than a few minutes now though before Dave would call my cell phone and ask~ " Hey Baby where you at?"

3:) If you could have the ability to solve problems quickly and easily or the ability to know without doubt every time a person told a lie, which ability would you want and why? First I want to say that I am pretty good at reading between the lines. A lot of people who have told me lies about things would be surprised to know that I knew they were telling me a lie even as they stood in front of me with a smile on their lips and made up a ball faced lie for no good reason. I hate a person who will lie to me. Daddy used to say that anyone who would lie ~ would steal; and vice versa. He also hated liars and thieves! My thing is, and I used to tell this to the young people who would come in and out of my life through my kids.. If I ask you something that you feel the need to lie to me about.. please don't lie.. Just look me in the eye and say.. " Miss Patsy, I would rather not say!" I will accept that as warning that it is none of my business and and move on to another topic... I wouldn't want to cause you to lie. I do know people though who just love to lie. At least that's the way it appears. They will lie about insignificant things. If I ever catch someone in a lie.. I never quite trust what they say again.
~ I would rather have the ability to solve problems quickly and easily. I can right now think of quite a few things I would fix if I could. A few for myself but mostly for other people in my life. So many people have problems that seem to be new to our world. No jobs~ everywhere people trying to find work. Violence and anger in families. Brothers and sisters who don't speak even if they pass each other on the street. Parents and children who haven't spoken in years. I really worry a lot about the problems our children and Grand-children will face. ~ Yea I'd take the problem solving ability any time..... after all.. if a person feels the need so strongly to tell me a lie.. maybe I shouldn't have asked the question.. and if I had the problem solving ability.. I could maybe even fix his little lie telling problem... (smile!)

I only chose three questions for my first try at Wednesday Weirdness. I tried to pick out questions that maybe you would find interesting... If you would like to visit their sight I have included a link for you. Please check them out for yourself. Maybe you will see a question there that you would like for me to answer. Maybe you have a question of you own that you would like for me to answer. If you do then feel free to send it along to me..
Have a wonderful Wednesday!
Patsy


http://wednesdayweird.blogspot.com/

Today is Tell a Story Day!

"It takes a thousand voices to tell a single story." ~ Native American Proverb

"There have been great societies that did not use the wheel, but there have been no societies that did not tell stories." ~ Ursula K. LeGuin

"Stories live in your blood and bones, follow the seasons and light candles on the darkest night -every storyteller knows she or he is also a teacher..." ~ Patti Davis

Today is tell a story day. Everyone who knows me well, knows I love to tell stories. I will admit that every once in a great; great; while I will even add the teeny tiniest bit of fiction to a boring story to make it tell a little bit better. Never making up a lie but some stories just have to have a little bit of dressing I think.. For instance, The last time I flew I was searched over and over for what seemed like a hundred times..... ~ I was actually searched only three times! But being that they took a flip flop and my bra every time; it surely seemed like a hundred times and you have to admit that the first telling sounds better.... Today I am sharing with you a story that I wrote a while ago when I was sent some very detailed instructions by a friend. I was to write a story, at least two of the characters had to have names from the Bible but this could not be a Bible story. It also had to either be about the future or the past, and it had to be about re-incarnation. It also had to have a cat in the story. Not too much to ask for is it?? Only a very few people have ever heard this story before today and yet it is one of my favorites that I have written.

Please enjoy my story for today. Today; if you get the chance; tell a story to a child or maybe ask an elderly person to share a story with you. The elderly have so many wonderful stories to tell and not nearly enough youngsters with time to listen. Storytelling is fast becoming a lost art in this new world of cell phones and the Internet. I hope I will always have a story to tell and a willing ear to listen! Have a great day!
Patsy


A Bad Day to Be a Barber


Delilah was a barber. Not a beautician, not a massage therapist, not a tattoo inker. But a Barber! She hated it when people came into her shop here in the green zone and asked for any of the other services. She had her red and white flag flying outside. Didn't that tell them that "Delilah's Den" was a barber shop? "Let today be a good one!" she said to herself as she turned the knob to enter her shop, "A good day to be a barber!"

She had discovered her career quiet by accident when she was four years old and had found scissors in her Mother's work basket. She had cut her brother, Paul's hair and it had been so skillfully done that her path had been decided by her Dada right then. Delilah loved cutting hair. She hadn't counted but she was almost sure she had cut at least a million heads.

"We're open again." she told her big, bronze colored cat. "You have to let me use the chair for a while."
" Yea Whatever." Cringle replied, leaping from the chair to lie along the window sill in the sunlight. Delilah laughed at him. " Be nice Cringle!" she told him " Not all cats have it so good!"

Delilah went about her morning cutting and trimming hair for the many men who came in and out of the shop. Tossing a mouse here and there to Cringle when she found them lurking in the beards of the old ones. Laughing at the same old jokes she had been hearing for years. Listening to the sad stories of love and hate that the men would share as they waited for their turn in her chair.

It was as if she were an equal with them. She liked that feeling. Delilah liked feeling equal with the men. She wondered how much longer she would hold that joy, a joy unknown by most women in the green zone.

Delilah's Mother had warned her that Dada was looking for a mate to match her with. She hoped to put him off just a little bit longer. She had hoped to marry for love like her parents had. She knew that love was rarely found any more but still she hoped. Her brothers had both been matched by the old ones. Paul to a lovely young girl from the red zone who had been traded for food; and Noah to a ship builders daughter who had wound up here, an orphan, when the family's ship had crashed. They had been traveling to the red zone from the blue zone far away. It was possible that Ruth had left family behind in the blue zone, but that wouldn't matter here. Since she had no cat to look after her she had been declared an orphan and had been mated just as soon as the old ones could find a single male who would take her as his mate. Even though her brothers had both been matched by the old ones, they seemed happy. Their wives were grateful to be counted as wives and not as orphans. Both families were expecting their second sons this year; their first sons now several months old.

Delilah knew Dada would make sure the old ones made a good match for her as well but she wanted to hold off just a little longer. She was only twenty seven ages this year. She still had a little time. A little time to find love.

Cringle lay in the warm sunlight and worried about his lady. He knew she would never be happy matched with any man without love. He dreaded that day for them both.
"Delilah?", Cringle asked, When I have to become a house cat, will you still allow me to talk?"
" OH Please Cringle!" Delilah muttered, " could I or any mate they might match me with stop you?"
"Probably not!" he answered rolling away with a swish of his long tail and swirl of worry hanging over him. Cringle had been around. He knew that most house cats were silenced unless they were sent by their mam to carry a message to her mate. Most men wouldn't allow their wives to continue her special relationship with her cat once she had been mated to him. Why even Dada had silenced Mother's cat for a full month last year after it had repeated to Mother some words it had over-heard him say. " Let him try!" Cringle muttered to himself, turning his eyes to the street; watching the men and the occasional cat carrying a message hurrying by. "Just let him try!"

Delilah picked up her sweeping stick as Cringle closed his eyes for a nap. She always cleaned the shop during lunch time. No men would visit the shop for those two hours. The single men were somewhere seeking a mate and the mated men would be in their own huts, mating or resting and having a cup of tea with their lady. Sweeping floors and dusting counters, she was unaware of the vision she gave to the watcher across the way. The silvery hanging orbs that the customers used to look at themselves captured her beauty and tossed it back to the watcher. Her hair hung in raven waves to pool softly around her slim hips. Her green eyes flashed as she talked and laughed with her beast.

"I'll silence that soon enough." Sampson said to himself. " No cat will hold such a high spot in my mates heart." Sampson was spoiled. The son of a rich man and his lady, Sampson had always been given what ever his heart or body desired. Today he had decided that he desired the beautiful barber. He had decided that he would have her for himself. " Very soon..." he promised himself. " Very soon you will belong to me. I will pour my body into yours. I will pour my life into you. Very soon You will do as I say!"

Delilah pulled the brush again through the long thick hair hanging over the stranger's shoulder. His locks hung almost as long as hers and not a mouse to be found. Something very strange was going on here. Delilah knew this was no ordinary man. He had come striding into the shop demanding a brushing as soon as she had re-opened. He had slammed through the front door disturbing Cringle and causing him to roar. Delilah couldn't remember the last time she had heard the big cat roar. Even now he was eyeing the stranger with Hatred. Something seemed almost familiar about this stranger, she felt that she knew him deep with-in her soul. Delilah joined him in a delightful shiver as his eyes met hers reflected from the orb hanging before his face.

"A trim stranger?" she asked seeking a truth in his eyes. " or just a brushing?"
"I'll have a trim." he agreed " But silence that beast!" he added with an authority not yet his
"or I will!"
"I would know your name stranger" she said as she reached for her bearding knife I would know your true name."
"I am Sampson." ha said, realizing too late that he was out numbered by the lady and her beast.
"I am Sampson of Nazarii" he repeated as her bearding knife sliced his throat; his life blood flowing hotly across his belly and down; forming a scarlet puddle at Delilah's feet.


"Pull her up Gabe!" Sampson said, sucking in the sweet breath of life that had been restored to him as soon as he had reached this place. "Pull her up before a customer finds her there."
"The boss won't like it" Gabriel said "Why do you always have to bother the cat."
" You know she has to finish this life," Michael added from the shadowy corner of the room.
"Why?" Sampson insisted. " She Killed me again. We may as well go ahead and start over right now. Sooner or later she will get it right." he added, " I know she will. Give her one more try."

"You win Sampson" Michael said flicking Sampson straight away into the arms of a new Mother, "You Win."
"The boss is not going to like it" Gabriel repeated , worried that he would be blamed. "he's going to be angry!" he added with a shudder " I hate it when he's angry."
"He won't be angry" Michael replied hopefully. "just pull them up and send them after him. I'll go talk to the boss."

"Hey Michael?" Gabriel asked ; his hand hovering over thew two heart stones blinking as one in the life orb. " They almost had it this time didn't they? It's him that needs to change isn't it? Will they get it right this time?"
"I hope so!" Michael said as he reached the door. " What are you going to tell her when she gets here?"

"I think," said Gabriel with a chuckle and a lop-sided grin, That I shall say it was a bad day to be a barber!"


written by: Patricia Sawyer
2-7-2008

Pig in the Blanket Day!

"When fate hands you a lemon, make lemonade."
- Dale Carnegie, 1888 - 1955

"There is something wrong when you wait in line thirty minutes to get a hamburger that was cooked for ninety seconds an hour ago."
- Lewis Grizzard, 1946 - 1994

"I was 32 when I started cooking; up until then, I just ate."
- Julia Child, 1912 - 2004

"Please understand the reason why Chinese vegetables taste so good. It is simple. The Chinese do not cook them, they just threaten them!"
- Jeff Smith, The Frugal Gourmet Cooks with Wine, 1986

Today is pig in the blanket day. A day you can really sink your teeth into. First of all let me say that I don't know who decides what day is what or who names all the days. Some are silly to me. Some are very interesting even though it might be a day no one ever thought of celebrating before. I get an e-mail every morning telling me what day it is. After all I would hate for Bologna sandwich day to have passed me by with-out me knowing it now wouldn't I? I keep thinking that one of these early mornings I'll come in here and sit down to an e-mail that says "Hey Stupid~ Today is just another day.. Get a life and quit thinking every day is important!" So far that hasn't happened. So far, for the last few years, every day has been something or other day. So far each day has had either an important historical or maybe just a sentimental reason to be important.

When I opened my early morning " Today IS" e-mail this morning I was surprised and excited to see that today is Pig in the blanket day. I love to search and google and even image search every day to fully check out each days meaning. For any of you who are about to do that now.. let me give you fair warning... anything that comes up about a real pig.. delete that, don't even go look! It's scary! A pig in the blanket has very little to do with a real pig and it's only connection to a blanket is that Blanket means cover or covering. A pig in the blanket is a hot dog or sausage wrapped or covered in something and cooked.

First you should choose your pig. Some p[people do like sausages for their pigs. I personally prefer wieners. I like the cheap kind myself because I am going to need lots of them. Especially if one of the kids finds out I'm making them. I also want my pigs plump. You never hear of anyone butchering a skinny hog. So first thing on the ingredient list is fat cheap hot dogs and lots of them.

Next comes the blanket. The choices for covering your hot dogs is quiet a long list. Some people use those corn bread twists things that come in a can like biscuits. That's too much like a corn dog to me. If I want a corn dog I want it to come from the fair and be just out the grease hot when I get it... No corn meal in my blanket please. I ate what was called a pig in a blanket recently. It was a hot dog wrapped in a can biscuit then baked till the biscuit was done. They were served with chili and ketchup and mustard. They weren't bad.. The biscuit was to me a little over done, but all in all they were not too bad. Just like a hot dog in fact. I think if I wanted a hot dog; I'd just cook hot dogs.

I love pig in the blankets. My Husband loves them and my kids and Grandson love them too. I have loved them for years and tears and years. My Mama cooked the very first ones I ever ate a long long time ago when I was just a child. The recipe is simple. The ingredients are simple. The combination results in a great quick supper.

The shopping lists is short, fat cheap hot dogs . I usually get three of the eight packs. They reheat well so Dave can take any leftovers of these to work. Next on the list is bacon. Yes Bacon! My blanket is pig. get enough bacon so that each wiener can have it's own slice. Again I choose the low price bacon. The last ingredient is cheese. You can use the sliced cheese in a pinch or if you like it then you can use it without a pinch! I like block cheese for these. I usually even spring for Craft sharp cheddar for these. Sometimes I will do half of them with cheddar and half with Pepper jack. They are great either way. You will also need some plain wooden toothpicks.

To begin with you will want to split each hot dog down the middle but cut carefully so that you don't cut all the way through the skin on one side. You will need a sharp knife for this. This split is where we will be putting the cheese in just a minute. I have known people to put Ketchup and mustard here but I don't. I always use cheese. Once I have split all of my hot dogs, I usually do all the other steps to each pig in the blanket one at the time till I am done.

Now I put a tiny thin strip of my cheese into the split and then wrap each wiener in it's slice of bacon. I usually slice the cheese ahead and tuck it into the wiener tucking the first end of the bacon under the end of the strip of cheese. Next I wind the wiener in it's bacon blanket and when I get to the other end I stick a toothpick through the bacon and into the hot dog. I will say that the wrapping them in bacon takes the longest. I always marvel at the fact that mama used to make enough of these for ten of us. Even more when they had foster children there. I guess she must have liked us a lot to stand and make that many pig in the blankets. We all loved them we were all good eaters!

Once all your pigs are split, stuffed, wrapped, it's time to cook them. Lay them all on a flat baking pan. you will want some sides on the pan because bacon gives off grease. We don't want any oven fires on pig in the blanket day. I cook mine in the oven; on about 400 degrees. There are done when the bacon is done and the cheese is melted. I usually have a salad with my pigs or maybe if Mason is here I'll make macaroni and cheese as well.

All this talk about pigs in a blanket has made me hungry. I will be having some pig in the blankets with ketchup and a vegetable salad. I will think about Mama's Cooking while I eat too many of them. I will enjoy every bite I take.

Does some food take you back to your childhood. Does it take you back to a time when life was still simple? Back to a time when you still colored outside of the lines? Enjoy your food. Try new things. Maybe you will try a pig in the blanket. Maybe you will remember a food that you loved as a child and try it again. Have a memory supper. Have a great day!
Patsy

Happy Earth Day!

"Let us a little permit nature to take her own way; she better understands her own affairs than we." ~Michel Eyquem de Montaigne

"Be such a man, and live such a life, that if every man were such as you, and every life a life like yours, this earth would be God's Paradise." ~Phillips Brooks

"We have probed the earth, excavated it, burned it, ripped things from it, buried things in it.... That does not fit my definition of a good tenant. If we were here on a month-to-month basis, we would have been evicted long ago." ~ Rose Elizabeth Bird

"The Earth has a skin and that skin has diseases, one of those diseases is man."
~Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

"Nature is a labyrinth in which the very haste you move with will make you lose your way."
~Francis Bacon

"Never does nature say one thing and wisdom another." ~ Juvenal

Today is Earth Day! I was Ten years old in April of 1970 when Earth Day first Began. I was in the forth grade. Our home-room teacher, Mrs Christopher talked to us that day about not being litter bugs and about how we should save all of our cola bottles and return them to the store where we could at that time get a refund. Most of us were already saving cola bottles and always on the look out for a stray bottle besides. As ten year olds Bottles meant money to us and money meant candy. Soda bottles then were glass... As for the littering, Daddy made us clean up behind ourselves and others when we went camping so we were well aware about not littering. Not too much else was said to us in school about Earth day. I did hear Uncle Neal talking about it at Mr. Floyd's little store. Uncle Neal was all for it. He said it was people who were working to save the earth. Mr. Floyd thought it was a bunch of Hippies demonstrating over something silly. He said the Hippies just needed another reason to demonstrate. He couldn't see where there was a need for spending all that money on what happened to trash. Daddy didn't say what he thought either way. He just paid for our stuff and we headed on back home. There were eight of us children. We didn't throw away very much. We grew or raised most of what we ate. I remember Mama saving bread sacks and Daddy later filling them with fish for the freezer. Those same fish would be served in the brown paper bag we brought the few groceries we bought home in. Even the cloth chicken feed sacks were used to make us dresses or warm quilts. I guess you could say we were living green even though we didn't know it at the time... I guess I didn't think much about all the other aspects of being a good tenant on earth until I was much older.

I have never been a litter bug. I hate trash on the roadside and I really hate seeing it on my own dirt road. I know everyone who lives on this road.. I hope I don't see one of them tossing their trash into the woods across the road. What will be even worse is when I discover who is throwing the fast food bags up into my field of young pines. Y'all know I am going to be mad and most likely will be thought of as~ the crazy lady who lives in the first house~ from the time I catch them till I die. I won't mind the reputation if it stops them.

In the last few years I have thought more and more about the Earth and how we, as humans have poisoned her. I hate the idea of burying trash in our ground. I try every day to not put something in the land fill. I shred all paper and use it as mulch or worm bedding. I Save all aluminum to be recycled. I save all egg cartons and ask others to save theirs for me too. I put my own eggs from my chickens back into them. One of my friends gets two dozen eggs from me each week. She brings her two empty cartons back every Saturday and gets two full ones. I know it doesn't sound like much; but most egg cartons are Styrofoam and it takes a long long time for them to break down. Some people say that I'm a nut and that what I don't throw away someone else will and that the little I DO doesn't really help. I like to think that even the tiny bits I do will help and if I can get others to also do little things; then overall maybe we can make a difference.

I save all cardboard boxes~ Macaroni, cereal, and many other foods come in paper boxes~ I tear them up into small pieces. They then go into the worm bin where the worms will eat them. I know not everyone grows their own worms but you could flatten them out and put them into the paper bins at your recycle center. You could also use them for wrapping gifts. The box often gets torn into so fast that no one will care if their new socks were wrapped in a cracker box.

I save the trays produce comes in. They make great paint pallets for young children to use when doing crafts. The deeper ones can be used for sorting small items or for organizers. I wash them in hot soapy water and then use them when I peel vegetables or fruits. I also never throw any peelings away. I have chickens that love them. I have used the trays to start seedlings for my gardens. Poke a few holes in the bottom and fill with potting soil and add the seeds. You could even allow a small flowering plant to live the entire summer in a three inch deep produce tray!

I save all glass jars and bottles too. I pack my home grown peppers into vinegar in the tall thin bottles and pass them on to friends and neighbors. The small jars become nut and bolt and screw organizers out in the barn for the gazillion different tiny things I find in Dave's pockets. Who knew there were so many different nuts, bolts, screws, washers and on and on? Olive and pickle jars can be made into banks for change or even a candy jar. Fill them with tiny candies for guessing games at parties. I try to look at jars when I buy to get any I can that can be used for canning vegetables later. There aren't many things that come in a jar that a standard lid will fit. Maybe the companies should be encouraged to package things in jars that we could re-use?

I must admit I haven't actually found a good use for tin cans yet. I have a whole bunch of them saved up. I have heard of people flattening them and using them as roofs for bird houses. I have been eyeing a basket full in my laundry room and thinking that with a coat of paint and some heavy string they would make a sort of wind chime. I was thinking of slipping them one inside the other and with knots keeping them from sliding down and a bell at the end I bet they would be pretty. I already use them to give away small plants and to water chickens or birds who are separated from the flock and only needs a small water container. I have seen a tin man made from an assortment of cans and a tin funnel and hope to have one of those standing in my own garden soon!

Earth day has come a long way from when it was first envisioned by Senator Gaylord Nelson, a Democrat from Wisconsin; in the early 1960s. Nelson worried that important environmental issues were not being addressed by the politicians of that time. He organized a nationwide grassroots demonstration in the spring of 1970, to promote conservation involvement and awareness. Support for and interest in the activity was Huge and the 1970 demonstration became the first official Earth Day. The first Earth Day helped inspire the United States Environmental Protection Agency and the passage of the Clean Air, Clean Water, and Endangered Species acts. Each year, April 22 marks the celebration of Earth Day, which is now observed around the world by over 500 million of people in 180 countries. Many schools celebrate Earth day with special programs and celebrations. It is considered the third most activity inspiring holiday; Christmas and Halloween being the first two. There are even communities where Earth day is also a "car- free" or "car-pool only" day.

What special things will you do today to celebrate Earth day? Will you do your best to recycle something today? Maybe you can re-use something that you were thinking of throwing away? Maybe those clothes you were going to place into the trash could be delivered to a center that helps victims of fire or disaster? Maybe the toys your children have out grown can be given to s shelter for the homeless or the abused? Isn't there even the tiniest thing you could do? I think if you think about it you will see that there are many things you could do to help the Earth be a better place for our children and grand- children. Keep litter until you are at home to throw it away. Try to cut back on the use of plastics. Landfills are filling up fast and many of them will never be "clean" land again. Throw away less. Use less water. Make a compost pile for leaves..

If we each do a little it adds up to a lot! Have a great Earth Day!
Patsy

Short and Sweet!

" Life is short, and it's up to you to make it sweet!"~ Sarah Louise Delany

“Strange how a teapot Can represent at the same time The comforts of solitude And the pleasures of company”~ Zen Haiku quote

Today I am going to be very short and I hope very sweet! This has been a very busy week. It's a long and complicated story all of it's on. Suffice it to say that I have been hunting a job. I had no idea or maybe I had forgotten just how much work there is to finding a job. Maybe instead I'll just ask everyone I know for a dollar? I really wonder how many people would give me a dollar? While dropping the e-cards on other blogs sometimes I see little things that say Buy me a beer or sometimes it says coffee.. Sometimes it says donate. I personally don't want donations.. I want dollars! What would happen if I said everyone please mail me a dollar bill? Maybe one day I'll try that. Years ago there was a chain letter thing going around where you mailed a couple of people a dollar bill and sent a gazillion copies of the letter and eventually you were supposed to get a load of dollars in the mail. I tried it.. I carefully typed the letter over and moved all the names up one space just as I was supposed to.. I had copies made of the letter and bought all those stamps.. I sent out how ever many dollars I was supposed to and what do you think I got back? I bet you guessed nothing huh? Well, I got a letter back from some woman that said I was a crook and she was turning me in to the police in her state for sending out chain letters. I also got three envelopes that contained dollar bills. So basically I went in the hole for the stamps and the copies and the envelopes and I probably still have a record in some state as a chain mail sender. All that for a measly three bucks... I did see on the news last year where a woman asked on-line for money to pay her credit card debt and she got a lot more money that she even owed. If enough people promise me a dollar I'll even rent a post office box to accept all those gazillion dollar bills. Then I can quit looking for a job and get back to the things I love best like chickens and writing and planting flowers and playing in the dirt... But in the mean time, since I never like to fool myself, I think I will keep the interview I have planned for tomorrow morning.

Please enjoy these few Haiku!
Patsy

Good Morning Spring

peach tree blossoms
in the over-grown back yard~
a rooster crows

By: Patricia Sawyer
4-8-2009


Fishing Allure

wiggling ripples
lure a bass to shore~
Daddy whistles

By: Patricia Sawyer
4-8-2009


Irony

a fat hog wallows
in the sun warmed morning
Grandma fries bacon

By: Patricia Sawyer
4-8-2009

Happy Easter!

"Easter says you can put truth in a grave, but it won't stay there."
~Clarence W. Hall

" 'Twas Easter-Sunday. The full-blossomed trees
Filled all the air with fragrance and with joy."
~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow


Yesterday was good Friday I wanted to plant something yesterday. I didn't care what, It could have been anything. I would have settled for any flower or food plant at all. Needless to say yesterday got busy with one thing and another and Good Friday almost slipped by without me planting anything at all. But just before dark yesterday I was outside and thinking about how Daddy always planted on good Friday. Dave had put me off all day saying that his friend said the moon was haloed and that would mean more cold weather. I was sitting there in the almost darkness and to tell the truth I was a little bit angry with my own self. I asked myself why I had even discussed planting with a city boy. I knew I had married a city boy and he knew nothing about planting. Finally I had talked myself into a regular tizzy. I was mad because I hadn't planted anything and I was mad because just suppose I had tossed my good planting and growing luck to the wind. Everybody knows you are supposed to Plant on Good Friday! Well everybody but Dave and his friend.. I was about to bet myself that they were both city boys when suddenly I remembered the 6 pack of flowers that Dave bought for me a few weeks ago;
I hurried into the greenhouse room and grabbed them; next I ran back outside and grabbed a small pot. I filled the pot with soil and praying for a good growing season this year and asking God to bless me with both food and beauty again this year I stuck two of the small flowers into the tiny container. I noticed today while Dave and I were planting and filling planting boxes and planting and working our butts off; that the two plants I planted yesterday were putting on new blooms. Looking around I also noticed other plants putting on new growth and everything appeared to be doing just fine even though I still wasn't exactly satisfied about the whole not planting on good Friday thing. Even so tomorrow will be Easter ~ the promise of a new beginning. The promise of miracles!

A few weeks ago Camella sent me a word list and asked me to write a poem for her to use to invite my Family members to Mama's house tomorrow for an old timey Easter egg hunt and picnic. We used to all pile in on her and Daddy for lunch and spend the afternoon hiding and hunting eggs. This will be the first time we have done this in a long long time. This year it will be the Great-Grands who will be wearing the Easter clothes and searching for the eggs. I will be on the porch, with the old folks, rocking in a chair, enjoying the little children's laughter and thinking about Easters gone past! I hope everyone has a wonderful Easter!
Patsy

"frilly, eggs, Azaleas, baskets, chocolate, bunny, hunt, spring, bonnet, Sunday, grass, duck, church,"
~ Camella

Easter Morning ( a vignette)

I:
Frilly dresses ironed
by Mama's hand.
Starched with a sprinkle
from the giant Pepsi bottle.
Four New spring Bonnets.
Four new Bow ties.


II:
Hen's eggs carefully dyed.
Daddy chose the best
Peeking and poking into each
and every nest.
One a duck egg.
Daddy called it a prize.

III:
Oh a special Sunday.
The day Jesus arose.
Every Church pew Filled.
Families together dressed
in their very; very best.

IV:
Ham and Mama's Potato salad.
Both Grandmas joining us
at the overflowing table.
Using our best Manners
we try to hurry.
We are ready for the hunt.

V:
The Azaleas burst forth
with bright blooms and
secret spots holding eggs
of lemon yellow and sea foam green.
Little feet Running with excitement;
baskets bulging with glittery grass;
Chocolate bunnies and jelly beans.

VI:
Collapsing with Laughter
we count and count.
Hidden too good
a few eggs will be
an opossums supper.
Long after we are fast asleep.

written By: Patricia Sawyer
3-4-2009

Flowers

"People from a planet without flowers would think we must be mad with joy the whole time to have such things about us."
- Iris Murdoch

"The mind I love must have wild places, a tangled orchard where dark damsons drop in the heavy grass, an overgrown little wood, the chance of a snake or two, a pool that nobody's fathomed the depth of, and paths threaded with flowers planted by the mind."
- Katherine Mansfield

"Flowers always make people better, happier, and more helpful; they are sunshine, food, and medicine to the soul."
- Luther Burbank

"Why always, 'not yet'? Do flowers in spring say, 'not yet'?"
- George Norman Douglas

"Wildflowers don't care where they grow."
- Dolly Parton


On this day in 1513, Ponce de Leon discovered Florida. The name ~ Florida~ means "full of flowers" in Spanish. April 8th that year was Easter, which in Spanish is "Pascua Florida" or the "Flowering of Passover." Although we have had several cold nights with breezy cold days it is once again Easter time and the first flowers of Spring are blooming. I have red, white and pink azalea's bursting forth with bright blooms. I have what we call Bridal wreath blooming out by the ditch and just this morning I saw a clump of the tiny white bells I call Easter bells blooming beneath the sticks of a Hydrangea. The beautiful red birds were out in force today each trying his hardest to steal a bite of corn or even laying mash from the clucking hens. Their bright feathers just reminded me even more of the Easter Sundays past. I always wanted a red Easter dress. Grandma Morris was dead set against it. She said ; "You let that child have a red dress and she will become a fast woman!" I was eight. I didn't want to become a fast woman. I was still hoping to become a boy so I could shoot and fish with the men. I didn't expect I'd get a red dress after her declaration But I hoped and prayed they wouldn't make me wear something that looked like a powder puff. Was I ever surprised when I got a beautiful Navy blue dress with a long body and - an almost ruffle like- skirt with tiny pleats at the bottom. It also had a pretty, white jacket and a RED neck tie. Grandma Morris made it. I always wanted to ask her why she made it with Red, but I wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth. Besides. I knew if I asked She would make me set on the steps to think about the answer. I loved that dress.

When we got to Sunday school that morning all the girls were wrapped in layers of pink and pale yellow or lavender fluff and lace. I was so glad I didn't look like a powder puff. I remember a few of the girls said how much they liked my dress. One girl cried all through class because her tiny white Bonnet was so tight that her head hurt. Mama had brushed my hair till she had all the tangles out ( even those that would hide under my neck when she sent me to brush it myself!) and had put red barrettes in my hair one on each side. I didn't look like a pale flower blossom.
If I was a flower that year I was surely a wild flower.

I love flowers. I try my best to plant at least one new flower each year. I will plant a few that only last for one year but I really rather plant something that will grow and come back each year and hopefully will one day be able to be divided with a friend. I also plant a lot of seeds every year including wild flowers.

I was all set to plant a few things last week.. Something, although I don't quiet know what caused me to decide to wait. I only planted collard plans and dipper gourd seeds out near the chicken pens. I had other plants but decide to wait to plant them this week. I am glad I did since we had frost on the ground this morning. I will be planting seeds of many kinds Friday. It's supposed to bring good crops to plant on Good Friday. You can depend on it though that I will also be planting flowers.. For even though the body has to have food to survive, Flowers feed the eye with beauty and the heart with gladness. The world seems to be a little short on those lately.
Today I will share a little poem that I hope you enjoy. Please do your part to add beauty to our world. You can grow a single flower in a tin can sitting on your front step and add a little spot of color to the life of you and your neighbor. Leave the label on the can.. Get a gallon can even.. A gallon ketchup can with a patio tomato growing in it would be a great conversation starter.. If you can't grow a flower then at least notice the ones you come in contact with daily. Enjoy their beauty. Breath deeply of their wonderful scent. Have a great day!
Patsy


Easter Flowers

I:
Sitting carefully on the
tiny wooden Church chairs
each of you appear to be
a pale and delicate blossom.
Or a stiff and straight stem.

II:
Eggs in bright colors
nestle in the new green leaves.
Neon pink and lemon yellow blooms
their hiding places beneath the trees.
One Lavender with lime dots.

III:
Pony tails tied with colorful ribbons
Ball caps Bouncing as you run from place to place.
So excited as you spot one egg.
Never seeing the three resting on the watering can.
Old sand buckets find a new use today.

IV:
The tousled heads rest
atop snowy pillows.
Sunday school frills hung away.
Bright Eggs hidden and found.
Ball caps hung; Pony tails down.

V:
The Flowers of my Easter
Lay sleeping; peaceful and free
with the smears of egg yolk
and chocolate bunnies
across their rosy cherub cheeks.

written By: Patricia Sawyer
4-8-2009

Sometimes I feel a little Dark!

"Make it a rule of life never to regret and never to look back. Regret is an appalling waste of energy; you can't build on it; it's only for wallowing in." ~ Katherine Mansfield

"It is better to look ahead and prepare than to look back and regret."
~ Jackie Joyner-Kersee

"Never regret yesterday. Life is in you today, and you make your tomorrow."
~ L. Ron Hubbard

"Look at your past. Your past has determined where you are at this moment. What you do today will determine where you are tomorrow. Are you moving forward or standing still?" ~ Unknown


Each of us have gone through some dark times in our lives. I personally have at times wondered if I would ever see good times again. I have to tell you that even though we may go through dark times or what seems like very hard times; we will always come through them somehow and there is always a brighter day for us somewhere near. I think sometimes we have to look around at things other people are suffering through to appreciate our own "hard times"! Most days when I see what others are dealing with I feel very blessed not to have to contend with those particular troubles.

I have had a past that was often filled with issues. We moved a lot. Money was a rarity. I cried tears enough to drown an elephant. Trust was broken and lives fell apart. I survived and though I walked through some dark days I soon found a new Path into a new light! I regret nothing of my life. For even in those dark moments I was learning and growing. I am who I am today because of the tears I shed back then!

These two poems were written during very dark days of my life. I am sure that everyone knows we all have those dark days. It is how we come through those darkest of days that shapes the person we will become. If you feel that the world is a dreary place right now look around you.. somewhere there is a person who will allow you to see that their are others with worse problems.
Don't stand still! Move forward ~ even if an inch feels like a mile! I try to look for a blessing of some kind even if it is small every day. I am blessed in many ways but just as a sample ~ I have a roof over my head and food to eat.... I am wearing clothes and am warm... I have family... I am sane. ~ ( well I think I am sane - If I am not same I don't know it yet and so am still blessed!)
Have a great day!
Patsy





Stolen Emotions

What wickedness have you wrought?

A shadow of betrayal drowns us

as my perceptions shudder.

Once we drank of paradise;

Innocent and glad hearted.

But your heart perished...

A feverish vision of lies.

emotions follow pain,

pain follows memories

Love dissolved.

in a storm of bitterness

I condemn you.

By: Patricia Sawyer

1992

Torn Apart

The cloak of night falls

without a sound,

Cold and alone are we.

the understanding for which you pine

flares once, then dies.

swallowed by your obscessions

All hope must end.

Your heart desires no more.

how could YOU not understand?

Our dark emotions surround us,

crying....

Save us from ourselves.

By: Patricia Sawyer

1992