KICKING THE TIRES OF MONDAY AUGUST 22, 2021

A 2021 Resolution Shot to H–!

The resolution was to post every day without fail as this was my personal record tracking my use of imagination as a means of tracking the third semester of my allotted “four score and ten.” Sigh! I couldn’t manage to string words into a sentence. Once upon a time, somewhere someone stated forcefully “there is no such thing as writer’s block.”

It’s true. I certainly can’t claim writer’s block. I lacked the stamina for noodling through half-baked ideas and pushing limp words into sentences until one morphs into a paragraph.

For seventy-four years, I asked myself “if I don’t write up to my standards, should I write at all?” If one can’t write deathless prose, what is the point of writing at all? Personally speaking, the point of “getting my hands dirty” putting  words on paper is that I learn to appreciate good writing. I have certainly stumbled across some great writing that will never appear on the curriculum of a university English. Except for mine of course.

There are books that I read three times for the story then five more times to analyze and admire how the author constructs sentences, or establishes a mood or arcs a small  recurring event through the story until it explodes as the turning point of the novel.

Here’s a thought. What fun it might be teaching my own English class, using my own favorite books as a curriculum.

Think about it!

KICKING THE TIRES OF MAY 21

Photograph of purple flowers
Road side moment

Shifting Perceptions

What seems to be, is, to those to whom it seems to be . . . .”

William Blake

Those words that gave me food for thought this morning. A mind-twister bout seeing what we assume we will see. If we change our assumptions about what we see when we look, will we see differently? I really evaluate my assumptions when it comes to my nearest relative. I see her tinted with my negative feelings about her and my feeling set point is one of exasperated duty that feels more unpleasant than feeling love. Furthermore, I have no desire to feel more appreciative of her. However, I do choose to want feel appreciation for her: that requires changing my assumptions about her, or maybe my assumptions about myself.