 For Authors: April 01, 2020 Issue [#10104] |
This week: Observations: Incredible Shrinking House Edited by: Fyn  
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There is no way that writers can be tamed and rendered civilized or even cured. The only solution known to science is to provide the patient with an isolation room, where he can endure the acute stages in private and where food can be poked in to him with a stick. ~~Robert A. Heinlein
Then stirs the feeling infinite, so felt In solitude, where we are least alone. ~~Lord Byron
Language... has created the word 'loneliness' to express the pain of being alone. And it has created the word 'solitude' to express the glory of being alone. ~~Paul Tillich
I look up and see a rainbow, you look up and see a cloud; solitude to me is heaven, but your heaven's in a crowd - for everybody hears a different drummer ~ From the musical 'Walden' |
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You know that old saying about guests and fish after three weeks? Love my granddaughter, her other half and the two great-grands (5 and almost 2) who are staying put with us while awaiting the closing of their new house. We have a small 1960s vintage three-bedroom ranch. It has been cold and rainy for the past week. The walls are closing in, as the several baby gates chop up the small space into teensy ones. Our house is not childproof. It is barely US proof! I'm not used to doors being closed or lights being left on or tripping over kid toys in the middle of the night. We are trying to mesh their schedules, (We are morning folks; they are NOT!) but their routines, the kids and us (oh and the pooch) are all over the place! Meal times? Us meals, kid meals, their meals. Funny how folks each eat SUCH different things. The concept of all eating at the same time doesn't seem to work well because it is like three sets of food. And dishes And pans. ET CETERA!
Luckily everyone gets along, the grands really are great littles and there's tons to do trying to keep the house intact. Hubby recently took down and transported twenty tall trees which he and her other half have been splitting and stacking. Last count, we figure thirty-some full cords of wood.
We are all awaiting those first unemployment checks to hit the bank even though food shopping has become an as needed excursion versus the date night hubby and I usually enjoy. I've discovered our tiny (original 60s) fridge is in no way big enough for feeding six people. Our pantry is bursting at the seams, the closets are way, WAY too small for the additional bodies' clothing, especially as they were already full to begin with. The living room looks like a daycare exploded and the only place to hide is in my office.
Today, however, she decided to 'reorganize' it. She did an amazing job and I love the new configuration! I even have a nook! Given the amount of time I spend locked in here (TOO MUCH a non-kid zone) it is a wondrous thing!
AND it gave us a great idea. As long as we are all squished in here, why not rearrange other rooms too! It was fun and keeps everyone busy and not just flopped on couches watching TV. We've even found ways to get the littles involved sorting and playing with things that are kid-safe and non-breakable! Pantry is on the docket for tomorrow! (Looks at the ceiling helplessly!)
Used to be my hubby took the pooch for a walk every night at dusk. It has become a family excursion these days as it gets us all out of the house at a time no one else seems to be out on the walking trail. We are goofy and sing as we traipse along and the littles love it! Anything that gets us away from 'kid-tv' which seems to be on nonstop. My brain is turning to mush!
Emma is five and loves playing dress-up. Yesterday we shoved all the living room furniture up against the walls and played the waltzes from "Beauty and the Beast' and the songs from 'The King and I' and the kids (even the older ones (!)) learned how to waltz and polka wearing old gowns and top hats! She also 'sorted' out all of my colored pencils for me. I have probably 300 colored pencils of varying kinds. She sharpened every one with the electric sharpener and then put them ALL in order on the dining room table BY COLOR. She learned there are close to
twenty-five greens and at least that many blues. We had an eight-foot rainbow when she was finished!
Each time the walls seem to shrink another five or six feet, we come up with something to shove them back out again. Hubby said we can introduce the kids to his drums. (THAT will be time for a long, long, LONG walk!)
All of this is because while Emma and I were sorting books today, (she LOVES sorting!) she said we should write a book about things to do when you can't go anywhere and are stuck in the house. She's now keeping a list of things to add to the book. She said she hopes the 'stay at home' order goes on for a long, long time. I agreed, because, luckily, her idea of a long, long time and mine are blissfully different!
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Melisscious  writes: Wow! The title drew me in but that's a great topic! I never thought about including something like a funeral or death into a story. I'm all about including death into real life because as Slug says: "I probably think about death more often than some of y'all think about sex".
Full disclosure I'm one of those people who will attend ANYTHING for food. Probably an excecution, truth be told, if there was sushi. Sorry, sashimi.
I also loved the humour in this piece! Doesn't hurt to always have a little levity when dealing with such heavy topics.
My grandad used to say "put me in a cardboard box and bury me in a ditch". He also said, "I will always love my children, but I hate the people they've grown up to become".
I'm game to attend a few family funerals just to laugh, verify the death and sh*t on a grave while I have a smoke. But I'm not the nicest viper from my generation nest.
Happy scribing!
hbk16 says: Writing stories should translate real-life and death is part of life.
An author sometimes writes about death and funerals and this lets him creates other new characters and develop further the story.
It is here revealed in this news letter. Thank you for sharing!
Paul  adds: Thank you for sharing that with us, I appreciate the thoughts. I’m 77 and have been going through exactly what you talk about since my wife of 45 years died in 2015. I’ve done the will and now I’m trying to get to each of 6 kids, 17 grand kids and 5 great grand kids so we can say our good-byes and enjoy what we have left. Saying goodbye and thank you is very important. I have a new partner and we look out for each other. We’ll be together until things change again.
Quick-Quill  comments: I attended the funeral of an elderly friend and indeed it was a gathering of friends and family that started out over 60 years ago in Los Angeles. As we looked at each other and laughed at how we'd changed. Some we see all the time, others every few years at the funeral of one of our group. As I looked at those in the gathering, I could see the wife of the deceased being next to join her husband, but there were others. Close in age or in poor health. All those years have passed. Birth, childhood, marriage, children, grandchildren and now in these autumn to winter years, I hope the passing will be as sweet.
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