At the Closing of the Year

If I cannot bring you comfort
Then at least I bring you hope

~ Wendy and Lisa ~

Music

I think music in itself is healing. It's an explosive expression of humanity. It's something we are all touched by. No matter what culture we're from, everyone loves music.

~ Billy Joel ~

Sunday's Kat Kwote

For those days when you'd like to throw most of humanity down the drain...

For Me, Too!

For me, the compelling question is the psychological state of his supporters. They are unable or unwilling to make a connection between the challenges faced by any president and the knowledge and behavior of Donald Trump. In a democracy, that is disastrous.

~ Howard Gardner ~

Poetry Friday

Remembering the stable where for once in our lives
Everything became a You and nothing was an It.

~ W. H. Auden from "Christmas Oratio" ~

Letters to Santa

P.S. Please do not forget the poor.

~ Mary McGann ~

Time Machines

We all have our time machines. Some take us back, they're called memories. Some take us forward, they're called dreams.

~ Jeremy Irons ~

Mason Jar

Yesterday I went outside
With my momma's mason jar
Caught a lovely Butterfly

~ Weezer ~

Sunday's Kat Kwote

[Note: Sainsbury's is a large supermarket chain in the U. K.]

Morning

To him whose elastic and vigorous thought keeps pace with the sun, the day is a perpetual morning. It matters not what the clocks say or the attitudes and labors of men. Morning is when I am awake and there is a dawn in me.

~ Henry David Thoreau ~
Postcard courtesy The NY Public Library Digital Collections.

Poetry Friday

Artists are not cheerleaders, and we're not the heads of tourism boards. We expose and discuss what is problematic, what is contradictory, what is hurtful and what is silenced in the culture we're in.

~ Junot Diaz ~



Photo © Nina Subin, courtesy JunotDiaz.com.

Birds!

Everyone likes birds. What wild creature is more accessible to our eyes and ears, as close to us and everyone in the world, as universal as a bird?

~ David Attenborough ~

Creativity

You can't use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have.

~ Maya Angelou ~

Two Sides of the Same Coin

Life is never all one thing. It bounces around. Certainly, my own life has. Look at Woody Allen's funny movies--all the humor comes out of sad stuff. Sometimes you have to laugh, no matter what life deals you.

~ Tim O'Brien ~

An Easy Trick to Learn!

Obviously, you would give your life for your children, or give them the last biscuit on the plate. But to me, the trick in life is to take that sense of generosity between kin, make it apply to the extended family and to your neighbour, your village and beyond.

~ Tom Stoppard ~

Sunday's Kat Kwote

~ The Monkey's Frolic by Anonymous ~
Published in 1843.

Simply Put

There are two doors. Behind Door Number One is a completely sealed room, with a regular, gasoline-fueled car. Behind Door Number Two is an identical, completely sealed room, with an electric car. Both engines are running full blast.

I want you to pick a door to open, and enter the room and shut the door behind you. You have to stay in the room you choose for one hour. You cannot turn off the engine. You do not get a gas mask.

I’m guessing you chose the Door Number Two, with the electric car, right? Door number one is a fatal choice--who would ever want to breathe those fumes?

~ Arnold Schwarzenegger ~

Poetry Friday

Just read poetry, love it to pieces,
and enjoy it to the fullest.

~ Lee Bennett Hopkins ~




Photo by Charles Egita, courtesy Harper Collins.

Puzzles

You know, people call mystery novels or thrillers "puzzles." I never understood that, because when I buy a puzzle, I already know what it is. It's on the box. And even if I don't, if it's a 5,000-piece puzzle of the "Mona Lisa," it's not like I put the last piece in and go, "I had no idea it's the 'Mona Lisa'!"

~ Harlan Coben ~

Art

Art is not a handicraft, it is the transmission of feeling the artist has experienced.

~ Leo Tolstoy ~








Painting by Ilya Repin (1901), courtesy Wikipedia.

Always Have, Always Will

Knitters use knitting to value-add to the world.

~ Stephanie Pearl-McPhee ~

Need a Sweater?

Does anyone not know who this character is?

Sunday's Kat Kwote

But sometimes at dusk when we're driving home
And come on the cats by surprise,
I feel a shiver go down my back
Facing their burning eyes.

~ Elizabeth Coatsworth from "The Two Cats" ~

Photo by Rikki's Refuge.

Interesting Observation

In a sense the world dies every time a writer dies, because, if he is any good, he has been a wet nurse to humanity during his entire existence and has held earth close around him, like the little obstetrical toad that goes about with a cluster of eggs attached to his legs.

~ E. B. White ~

Poetry Friday

Humility

Poems arrive ready to begin.
    Poets are only the transportation.

~ Mary Oliver ~

Celebrities Love Their Cheese Logs

Nothing says holidays, like a cheese log.

~ Ellen DeGeneres ~

So Don't Do It

Crying is really bad for your vocal cords.

~ Adele ~

Be of Good Cheer

Let us be of good cheer, however, remembering that the misfortunes hardest to bear are those which never come.

~ James Russell Lowell ~