Tag Archives: Journals

Letter to Loved Ones (Just in Case)

“My life has not always been easy, but it’s always been worth the effort. I’ve not always possessed what I’ve wanted, but I always received what I needed, and most days it was simply the love of friends and family, and the ability to live comfortably in my own skin.” — from Dispatch from the Hideout: Letter to Loved Ones

For those who know me personally and/or read my blog or social media posts, I’m open and share freely about my personal life, some say I overshare. I write about my lived experience, often the mundane moments of everyday life, and sometimes I wax philosophically or poetically about our shared universal human experience. In essence, I’m an open book, and you choose whether to pick it up and read, or not! Continue reading

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Life Is Good. I’m Grateful. Thanks, H.P.!

For my Door County LGBTQ+ writer’s group, Write On, the prompt this month was ‘Thank You.’ At first, it didn’t seem inspiring, until I realized that thank you and gratitude are cut from the same whole cloth. As a person in recovery from substances and behaviors that no longer serve me, gratitude is an acknowledgement of the commitment and work that was required of me, and a thank you for the support I received from others, including a belief in a power greater than myself. Continue reading

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Dispatch from the Hideout: Letter to Loved Ones

“Either write something worth reading, or do something worth writing.” Benjamin Franklin

“The goal isn’t to live forever, it’s to create something that will.”  —  Chuck Pahlaniuk

First some background. As my Mixed Metaphors, Oh My! readers know, I’m a writer and blogger. Friends and family, from firsthand experience, are also aware I’m a storyteller. I’m 70-years-old, yet consider myself young at heart and continue to be a student of life. I’m a work in progress, and perfectly flawed. I live alone and on the continuum of introvert/extrovert, I fall in between. I’m an ambivert.

I’ve been socially distancing and sheltering-in-place to some degree since my previous job ended at the end of February and has continued due to the coronavirus pandemic. Since May, I began working part-time at a job as an LGBTQ+ AODA Advocate that is more an avocation than vocation. I’m grateful. Continue reading

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

A Solitary Life: Living Independently

“What matters in life is not what happens to you but what you remember and how you remember it.” ― Gabriel García Márquez

“Memory is the diary that we all carry about with us.” — Oscar Wilde

Today is the 4th of July, the Independence Day Holiday. Yesterday, I began reflecting on the meaning of the day, which celebrates the independence of a nation following a revolution and the freedom of its people from an oppressive government. Of dire concern — we are living through what may be judged as another oppressive government — our own — as our elected leaders dismantle democracy and favor the corporate aristocracy and dominant white culture. We are not truly free and independent until we are all free and equal under the law. Continue reading

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

To-Do List Confessions, Or How I’m a Little Bit OCD

“The only thing more important than your to-do list is your to-be list. The only thing more important than your to-be list is to be.” ― Alan Cohen

“Sometimes our stop-doing list needs to be bigger than our to-do list.” ― Patti Digh

Today as I write, it’s the Fourth of July Holiday, which for my part-time work schedule means it’s the beginning of a four-day weekend ― and an opportunity to power-load my weekly to-do list to capacity. I’m not an electrical engineer, yet it sounds like I run the risk of blowing a circuit, and some days it feels that way. Continue reading

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

The Pleasures (and Lessons) of a Staycation

“A vacation that is spent at one’s home enjoying all that home and one’s home environs have to offer.”— Urban Dictionary

“You don’t have to go far to travel.” Me

It’s that time of year again when September arrives and I extend the Labor Day holiday by taking my annual Staycation. While students return to school after their families unpack from vacation and pack those back-to-school backpacks full of brand new school supplies, I take a break from my day-to-day work routines and make my “to-do only if I want to lists.”   Continue reading

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Journal/Journey

“What matters in life is not what happens to you but what you remember and how you remember it.” ― Gabriel García Márquez

Years before I started writing for others, I wrote poetry and journaled for myself. Sometimes I would share a poem with the person who inspired it yet seldom a journal entry. Journaling by its very nature is a private act, a conversation with oneself, often a daily record of happenings, experiences and observations. Sometimes our loved ones or curious friends or colleagues surreptitiously read our journals. Much is written about the consequences of reading someone’s journal without the author’s permission.

Continue reading

Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,