Everyday Canvas

August 14, 2021

For "Blog City ~ Every Blogger's Paradise" 

Prompt: How do you feel about the rising increase of people recognized as gender fluid. (gender fluid-denoting or relating to a person who does not identify themselves as having a fixed gender.) Do you think this is a passing trend or the wave of our future?

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I don’t know, and I can’t really tell the future. How would we have known all this, say when we were living in the early sixties or even fifties?

My general stance in life is “live and let live” and “to each his/her/its own.” What I oppose to is the attempt by some radical parents aiming at a physical change in very young children just because they express a desire to belong to a different gender.

Little kids say anything. It doesn’t mean they have made a conscious decision. Heck, one of my kids, when four years of age, used to say, “I’m going to marry my mom. No one’s better.” What should I do? Plan a wedding?

We all need to have a serious head on our shoulders before we act on any false impression. Easy to say, right?

For: "Space Blog" 

Prompt: From innerlight ’s "5-8-09 2021" 

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Although this poem’s content seemingly depends on a romantic music box and rings, in essence it is really a sad one, as if a eulogy to someone departed or maybe to something that could but did not happen.

Rather than blabbing on this beautiful poem any longer, I’d like to say something in general on works like this. Given their profound emotional impact, it may make a person wonder why we like to read and write such works especially during our lowest points.

From one point of view, it may be that such works actually put us in a better mood after writing or reading them because we feel validated, as if such works validate our pain. Then, once we feel validated, we can put our problems into perspective and use them as prompts of empathy for others in real life.

When my husband and I, as a young couple, watched a very popular movie during early 1970’s--The Love Story (Erich Segal) with Ali Mac Graw and Ryan O’Neill as actors—we were incensed that they made such a sad movie and wondered why anyone would exploit the melancholy of such a tragedy and make people unhappy.

That was then, though, and we couldn’t relate to that sadness fully. But it is now, and my husband’s gone, and I can definitely relate to such a sadness. Now, I can see the point in such works. Now, they act as if soothing balms for those of us who can relate to them. Now, I know.