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Archive for the ‘Musings’ Category

The Vision Board vs The Mirror

Posted in Musings, tagged on August 21, 2010| Leave a Comment »

As part of an exercise in reflection, I read a book about creating a vision board. I introduced the concept to the wonderful group of women who meet with me on those specially designated ‘five’ Monday months. I thank them for their insight.
Each of us was charged with the task of creating our own board using the elements of everyday which support us or give life to ideas.
I started out with the idea of a path which I would follow from a designated point A to B. It would be one which I already walked and had been clear to me since childhood. The idea never took root in my soul. The board remained just a sheet of paper with a few lonely lines. An incomplete concept!
But, my life was not incomplete. It has been full and adventurous and rewarding and challenging. So I let my own board slip into near oblivion over the summer weeks. Each time I stared at the empty cardboard, it stared back at me inviting some concrete proof that what I thought, of my life, was worth recording.
In the meantime, another project, the dream pillows, heart shaped, scented cusions which induce dreams lay dormant. The pillows were completed and stuffed with cotton but the scents needed to call forth unseen dreams lay protected in jars. The squares I used to cut out the pattern were left with an empty heart shaped centre bordered by colourful material. Suddenly, I saw the possibility of my vision board.
Heart shaped windows, into which I could neatly place objects that represented each phase of my life.
The first heart, was of course my conception. The colours of the outer border were a unique mix of everything which could one day comprise a human – yellow, beige, reds, black. Into the centre I placed a matching material with an oval pattern containing almost the same colours. To be sure, I called it the The Chaos at Conception.
Voila! My first heart shaped window was born. Five windows later, I had my life vision board from conception to death as I have seen it and would like it
to end.
A wonderful and challenging exercise has revealed to me a life I can be proud of and the simple visual archetypes and icons used, lend a meaningful but uncomplicated sense of pleasure.

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Inspiration from the past

Posted in Musings, tagged , , , on June 18, 2010| Leave a Comment »

I started writing again because the dream I thought was my destiny did not materialize. I was thrown off course. While standing at the crossroads of indecision, I thought myself lost. Just about the same time, the DVD collection of Beauty and the Beast the TV series came out. That was another dream which finally came true: a full copy of all three seasons. I never thought I would see the whole three seasons again.  I didn’t think anyone cared about the show.  Boy was I wrong!

A chance encounter with an online group got me thinking about a storyline that I would like to write, inspired by my best friend who had passed away. I found Fanfiction or it found me. While writing there, I remembered another twenty year old story of mine which had been inspired by the original series. I pulled it off the shelf, retyped it, edited the writing a bit and then got it published. So, one door closed and another opened. Perhaps feeling lost at the crossroads was just what I needed to step out of the abyss of self pity and get on with life.

There are still dreams about doing what I had planned but as the years pass, I realize it is perhaps better to fulfill my own destiny and not something which feels like destiny but in reality is a self imposed obligationhich serves no one. I can do something similar or do things differently. I learned that teaching and learning doesn’t always have to be in a traditional format.  There are many ways to learn. 

The Dream

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Infidelity and its consequences

Posted in Musings, tagged , , , on June 15, 2010| Leave a Comment »

I have written before,  about music and the joy it brings to life.   When I originally wrote this story back in 1989, I was moved by the words of a song I had heard as a young girl, well before I even understood the meaning of infidelity, ‘Please Help Me I’m Falling’.  

Please Help Me I’m Falling 

It was just a great song to listen to, one of those country ‘hurting songs’ delivered vocally by a master.   Songs then had a full sound, each note had a word that went with it.  Singing along was easy.

Another heart warming song, continued, for years, to run through my head, driving me to dream about the perfect love and how it would manifest in real life.  When I finally decided to tell a story, my dream story, but not my autobiography, I put the two songs together to create what I hoped was a conundrum for even the strongest woman to overcome.  Her challenge would have to contain a past and present which would impact the future.   Her decisions would  also have to challenge her own knowledge of who she was as a person, a woman and wife.

From the perspective of the heroine she is moved by the possibility inherent in the song ‘Loved Walked In’, a Gershwin tune and lyric.  I was grateful to the Alfred Publishing Co for allowing me to use the timeless words.  Set to a moving beat, the version realized by Dinah Washington seemed to tell us what was in the unconscious heart of our heroine as she balances her reality from her dreams.

I hope you will enjoy it and keep in mind its beautiful words as you enjoy the story.

18 Love Walked In

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Gira con me

Posted in Musings, tagged , , , on June 12, 2010| Leave a Comment »

This is the title of a song brought to life by Josh Groban.  It has a beautiful haunting melody which was instrumental in giving me a framework for another story.  Songs play a integral part of my storytelling.  There is something about the ebb and flow of certain music which inspires a kind of frenzied passion for writing.

I had a chance to listen to the song today for the first time in awhile.  It immediately brought back the story to which it was attached.  Clearly, the power of music, is to bring life to mind because it binds memories in our senses.

I long to write another story now.  I am searching for an inspiring theme. 

My favourite performers for providing that kind of link through the power they exhibit in writing or in performing is astounding.  An interesting song which helped me with The Shadow of the Blackbird was a piece sung by k.d. lang, an outstanding and award winning Canadian performer.  She and the author of the song Jane Sibbery, both sang Love is Everything.  k.d. had the power to move me in ways I didn’t understand with her voice and Sibbery could not move me with her voice but her words were remarkable and engaged me in other ways.

Songs must give colour to life, fill in the blanks and empty spaces so that we are made whole when we listen.

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Life changes

Posted in Comments, Musings on June 11, 2010| Leave a Comment »

Just as I have come to wonder about the value of writing, my online stories are on an upswing.  It always amazes me that people enjoy reading what I write.  It isn’t really writing that I do; it is storytelling and I hope to do it as well as I can.  Romance is one genre but there is some excitement in writing about adventure, fantasy and some science fiction.  I grew up in the era of cliff hangers on radio, soap operas, serialized stories.  They are fun!

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Timing

Posted in Musings on June 8, 2010| Leave a Comment »

As I was thinking about this story and the time frame, late 1980’s-90, it is hard to believe that twenty years has gone by.  The timing isn’t as amazing to me as the change in life.  I look at my story characters and realize the names represent friends and colleagues I particularly wanted to remember but more than that, I am struck by change.  Life was so different.    The advent of electronic media has changed the way that people interact with each other.  Social media is so instrumental in the way couples meet.  Chatting on line occupies so much of courtship. 

Is it better that we are not interacting at a physical level during our discourses?  How do we engage our senses enabling us to see and experience emotions?   Can we still read people any more through our senses?

Probably not!

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