Week 2: Favorite Childhood Memories

I was pleasantly surprised that I was able to find quite a few happy childhood memories! 

(insert wavy, psychedelic, Austin Powers inspired, digitally enhanced time travel transition here)

I remember having backyard camp outs in the summer... All my friends at the time were the kids of my parents friends, and we'd sleep in sleeping bags in the tent in the backyard, roast marshmallows over the grill, and eat powdered sugar donuts for breakfast.

This was the little playground near our campiste.

I remember camping trips as a family, stopping at the IGA on the way to the campground, it was a great old fashioned place and no camping trip was complete without a stop there.

Mini version - just right for little hands!

I remember Saturday mornings, where my parents slept in and we got to get our own breakfast, which was specially set up the night before.  They would leave bowls and spoons set at the table and our favorite cereal boxes waiting for us. There were little pitchers of milk in the fridge with just the right amount of milk for our little hands to carefully carry to the table and pour ourselves. I always felt quite grown up those mornings!

I remember sitting in my room, entertaining myself for hours with my record player and records and books and crayons. Captain Jane was my favorite record, and years and years later, when I actually found the book that went with the record, I could hear the record playing in my mind as I read and couldn't help but smile.

I remember escaping into the world of books, from the time I was in grade school until now. Books have always been an escape for me... as I joined Francie Nolan in Brooklyn while reading from atop a perch in my favorite tree... Ramona as she skipped along Klickitat street in her musical shoes... Kristy and her babysitters club full of big ideas...
 
I remember fun babysitters we had, who were practically family... visiting my favorite Aunt where she always had animal crackers and tootsie rolls for us...
going to the sledding hill at the park... building forts out of couch cushions and blankets...  reading Calvin and Hobbes on the back porch with my neighbor... roller skating in the basement... playing on the swings for hours on end... picking raspberries from the neighbors garden...snuggling with my favorite blanket on the couch in front of the fireplace...

I like ending on a positive note, so I'll just wrap it up there...

Week 1: What Is Beauty?

Beauty.... I'm not sure I have my own definition, yet, so I dug up a few quotes to help me explore the topic...

Winter Sky January 2011

A woman whose smile is open and whose expression is glad has a kind of beauty no matter what she wears.  
-- Anne Roiphe

Morning Dew July 2009

Beauty is worse than wine, it intoxicates both the holder and beholder.  
-- Aldous Huxley

SnowDrops December 2010

Because beauty isn't enough, there must be something more.  
-- Eva Herzigova

Trumpet July 2009

Everything has its beauty, but not everyone sees it. 
-- Confucius

Sunset July 2011

Beauty is not in the face; beauty is a light in the heart. 
-- Kahlil Gibran

Inner Beauty July 2009

Beauty is how you feel inside, and it reflects in your eyes. It is not something physical. 
--Sophia Loren

And one of my personal favorites...

Sunrise October 2011

People are like stained-glass windows. They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in their true beauty is revealed only if there is a light from within. 
--Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

Pink in the Pool August 2009

I struggle with finding beauty in myself, but can easily find beauty in those and the world around me.

New Year's Day Sunset January 2011

New Years Sunshine January 2011

If they say

that what we recognize in others

is something

we have in ourselves, 

maybe 

there is still hope 

for me to find 

beauty within, 

since it is so easy 

to find it elsewhere...

© October 2011 MGD

An attempt at making sense of things...

Well, this blog is a new adventure.  I've often thought about blogging, and have actually started a blog already.  It hasn't been launched cause it isn't perfect enough yet.  I know, I know, perfect only exists in the dictionary.  And in a tiny, dark, dusty corner of my brain.  But hopefully it won't be in my brain for long.

Anyway.  This blog is a project.  A self-discovery project of sorts.  Or a self-expression project.  Or a way of making sense of the jumbled chaos in my brain.  Or.  Maybe it's still undetermined what this is going to be.  And that's ok.  This project just is.  And right now, that's good enough.

So... off to the keyboard I go...