St. Joseph’s Day, March 19

Good Morning,

Thank you for visiting My News. A few days ago, I celebrated my birthday and St. Joseph’s Day.

My mother’s father, my favorite grandfather, was named Joseph. I adored him and was devastated when he died when I was very young, so it was a birthday gift to learn I could celebrate St. Joseph’s Day on my birthday.

Papa Joseph and I shared secrets because neither of us seemed to measure up to the expectations of the other adults in our family. We often hopped into his truck and drove to the nearby gravel pit. He had a beer, and I got to ride in the sled he gave me.

I’ve decided to name a character in my next story Joseph. My grandfather deserves to be immortalized because he made my early life tolerable. Is there a special person in your life you would like to celebrate?

Free

Good Morning,

Thank you for visiting My News. Today’s news is I’m going to participate in a panel discussion at a poetry festival in St. Augustine, Florida.

A celebration of creative writing and reciting

Friday, April 8, and Saturday, April 9, 2022

Inaugural St. Augustine PoetFest Events

ALL EVENTS ARE FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC

As you know if you know me, I write to right wrongs. This poetry festival is a celebration of writing and reciting that fits my reason for writing. On Saturday, April 9, 2022, I will participate in the panel: Create Change with Poetry. One of my works in progress is designed to provide an option to teen suicide. I’m thrilled to be sitting on a panel moderated by Michael Rothenberg, a co-founder of 100 Thousand Poets for Change.

Crisp-Ellert Art Museum – Stage

48 Sevilla Street

11:00 to 11:50 a.m.

Create Change with Poetry – panel discussion

Michael Rothenberg, founder of 100 Thousand Poets for Change, will lead a panel on changing the world with words.

Moderator: Michael Rothenberg

Panel: Jennifer Wolfe, Chris Bodor, Melody Dimick

Please consider joining us. I’ll be wearing my mask because I still fear COVID. I hope you’ll join us. Thank you for visiting My News.

Thank you for visiting My News. The banned book I ordered arrived. As I’m sure you can guess, I’m not a fan of censorship of books. If we don’t allow people to read, how can they make informed decisions, or critique?

I find the cover to be intriguing. Does the line on the cover, “MY FATHER BLEEDS HISTORY“ capture your attention?

What are your thoughts about banning a graphic novel about the Holocaust? I think the manga-loving characters in my first book, Silent Screams, would enjoy reading it.

I don’t enjoy graphic novels, but many teenagers do. Why stifle them? Do we really plan to rewrite history to suggest we always made the best choices?

Thank you for visiting My News. Please contact me to share your thought.

Inspiration

Good Morning,

Thank you for visiting My News. If you aren’t a follower, I hope you will decide to become one today.

Woohoo! I completed the second draft of my novella last night. This morning, I’m preparing to begin my next work. It’s always daunting to start a new project. I turn to a lake, a river, the clouds, a former classroom, or the ocean for inspiration when I’m seeking a new subject or theme.

This morning, Rick Frishman of Author 101 University, posted a quote on Facebook that he attributed it to Confucius: The man who moves a mountain begins by carrying away small stones.

That quote inspired me to write a poem. Writers are told our characters must grow in our books. The reader expects a change.

Stones were my nemesis as a young girl growing up in the Adirondack area of New York State. I was told the great glacier had dropped them on our land. To plant a garden, we had to pick stones, so they wouldn’t damage the plow or tiller.

Dad would put a hay wagon in the middle of the garden and tell me to fill it with stones. I cried much of the day on stone-picking days. The stones scraped against my fingernails and sent chills through my body all day. As I look back at those days, I wonder why I wasn’t given gloves.

There wasn’t any quitting. When Dad gave me a job, it had to be completed. Slowly, stone-by-stone, I filled the wagon as directed. I hope I built character as I picked those stones and completed my task. I know it resulted in gardens full of fresh vegetables.

I never think of stones without thinking of Robert Frost’s poems “Mending Wall” and wondering if he was given the task of picking stones and hated it as much as I did. He said, “Something there is that doesn’t love a wall.”

One thing is for sure. In New England, stone walls bound borders, and as much as I hated picking stones, I love the stone walls that are part of the New England charm. However, like Frost, I hate that we build boundaries that wall us in and others out.

There’s a poem in picking stones, and I plan to write it stone-by-stone or word-by-word in the next few weeks.

Thank God it’s Friday. Thank you for visiting My News, and thank you, Rick Frishman, for posting inspiration quotes.

Censorship

Good Afternoon,

Thank you for visiting My News. Censorship has reared its ugly head again, but did it backfire? I think so.

When Tennessee removed the Pulitzer-Prize winning graphic novel about the Holocaust from the shelves of public schools, sales surged. In fact, I’ve ordered and paid for a copy of Maus, but shipment has been delayed. I wanted to read and critique the book. I’ll have to wait.

What I can criticize is censorship by the state. The First Amendment Freedom of Speech should not be denied. If students don’t learn to be critical readers, our society is in trouble.

The question is, did Tennessee do author, Art Spiegelman a favor? Sales have skyrocketed. People know the name of his book. Writers and students are rushing to purchase copies. Perhaps, he’s laughing all the way to the bank while people are rushing to purchase copies of naked mice. Oh, wait. Aren’t all mice, except Mickey and Minnie unclothed?

Just musing. Should our leaders do a little more thinking?

Thank you for visiting My News.

It’s Martin Luther King Jr. Day and National Bootlegging Day

Good Frosty Morning,

Thank you for visiting My News.

Enjoy the holiday, preferably avoiding huge crowds and parades. Martin Luther King Jr’s family has asked those wanting to honor him to do so by fighting for voting rights. I applaud them. I think he would have too. Our right to vote is one of our most precious rights. It is also a serious responsibility. We must support legislation to protect it if we want to live in a democracy.

I celebrate Dr. King’s peaceful protests and powerful speeches. As a Communication 101 instructor at the State University of New York at Plattsburgh, my students and I analyzed his “I Have a Dream” speech. This powerful speech is my favorite speech. By studying his references to religion, repetition, parallelism, and rhythm speakers can learn how to capture and hold the attention of an audience.

Today is also National Bootlegger’s Day. I’ve been fascinated by Prohibition my entire life because my family was impacted by a bootlegger. During Prohibition, a major route from New York City to Canada passed by my family’s home. My dad’s sister was hit and killed by a bootlegger. The accident created a rift in my family that was never mended. I do not celebrate bootleggers or any other smugglers. Instead, I salute Reverend Martin Luther King Jr.

Thank you for reading My News.

It’s Kiss a Ginger Day

Thank you for visiting My News. I’m excited because it’s National Kiss a Ginger Day. Why?

I consider people with red hair, freckles, and green eyes to be ideal friends and relatives. It’s a family thing. Most of my mother’s aunts had red hair. My first cousins on Mom’s side of the family often smiled and laughed when we got together. They had red hair and freckles.

Comedian Lucille Ball entertained me when I was young. “The Ransom of Red Chief” is one of my favorite short stories. Ron Weasley served as a great sidekick for Harry Potter.

When I wrote my Silent Series, it seemed fitting that the sweet girl nicknamed Squirrel would have bushy red hair and be an animal lover. I’ve never met an unfriendly Ginger.

Do you have a special Ginger girl in your life? Is she worthy of a kiss ?

Thank you for visiting My News.

Yesterday, Barry Dimick and I traveled to St. Petersburg, Florida to visit the Museum of Fine Arts’ “Pieced & Patterned” exhibit.

Serendipitously, we learned the James Museum was featuring Andy Warhol‘s Western art. As we are wont to do, we walked to the museum to see this unique perspective.

The most fascinating aspect of the exhibit for me was this poster and the information on the card that accompanied it. This is quite the contrast to Warhol’s tomato soup can images I studied in college and far more interesting. It is aLeo a perfect example of art imitating life.

I’d love to hear about a time a chance encounter changed your viewpoint. Thank you for visiting My News.

My Favorite Things

Thank you for visiting My News.

Although I’m not rich like Oprah, I have favorite things, including book chats, quilting, my husband’s photography, the color purple, the blues and greens found in oceans, polka dots, playing Pickleball and pinochle, writing poetry to right wrongs, the #Me Too Movement, and birds–especially flying geese. Yes, I’ve been called a bird. So be it.

My work in progress incorporates many of these favorites. I’m in the step of revising my quilters’s sampler of poems. Although I’m petrified of contracting COVID, I must leave the house we are renovating to complete research for my book. SOON. I hate doing research during a pandemic as much as I hated ice skating when I was a child living in the cold Adirondack Mountain Region of New York.

What are your favorite things? What has COVID forced you to do that you hate?

Happy New Year! Thank you for visiting My News. By the way, the quilt in this post was one a former student posted on Facebook.

Reading to Lift Your Spirits

Thank you for visiting My News. Although I’m usually a Pollyanna, Mother’s death, COVID, and being isolated from family and friends have dampened my spirits this year, making it difficult for me to write, read, cook, play Pickleball with my husband, or quilt. In other words, I’ve lost passion for most of what makes me happy.

Luckily, I have a wonderful husband and great friends. Linda Kraus, the Vice-President of the Florida Writers Foundation and a friend I miss meeting for lunch, came to my rescue with a hilarious book. Linda sent the laugh-out-loud Your Guide To Not Getting Murdered in a Quaint English Village by Maureen Johnson and Jay Cooper to me and recommended I read it to lift my spirits.

I read, thoroughly enjoyed, and highly recommend this tongue-in-cheek book purported to be a self-help book for travelers to England. Your Guide To Not Getting Murdered in a Quaint English Village can easily be read in a sitting. Read it early in the day, and you’ll smile for hours.

After reading, merely page through Jay Cooper’s creative illustrations to double your fun. Then do as Linda did, and give a copy to a friend. I have found that paying it forward lifts my spirits, and this book is a perfect choice to pay it forward. Friends give friends books.

Happy Boxing Day to my Canadian friends. Happy Kwanzaa to those who celebrate the principles of unity, creativity, faith, and giving gifts. I hope you’ll consider giving a book as a gift.