Day 5 - Holidailies Epiphany #1

I’ve caught myself a couple of times saying, “Just a minute. I’m working on my Holidailies post.”

Or “I’ll be right there as soon as I’ve updated my blog.”

Yes, friends. It is that bad. Put the world on hold, I’m updating my blog.

And then I’ll catch myself several times a day, thinking -- What should I put up tomorrow? What can I say? Do I have a picture?

Just as I was about to note the end of myself as a useful person on earth, it occurred to me –

Why don’t I bring that same energy to my writing?

I’ll be right there as soon as I’ve finished this scene, these script pages, a plot reveal, some juicy dialog, Act 2, a line.

But I don’t. I let everything intrude. I wash clothes. I let the dogs out fifty times. I answer the phone. I look at the dust on the furniture. (Yeah, just look. Let’s not go crazy and do something wild like DUST the place. My career is too important to me.)

Several times, I’ve resolved to write first, everything else second, but what actually happens is I write between everything else.

The Holidailies challenge has shown me how little a bit of energy need be to make something important in a day.

So, here I go, to write first and make everything else wait.

Well, except the dogs. That’d just be silly.

Day 4 - Boys In The Hood

My neighborhood anyway. My yard to be exact.

A little farther down the street -

Day 3 - Women in History - Jeanette Rankin

Jeanette Rankin was the first woman elected to Congress at a time when most women were denied the right to vote. She voted against US entry into both World Wars and protested the Viet Nam War.

Although her anti-war stance was unpopular during her Congressional years, she never backed down.

Ms. Rankin on War

“I want to stand by my country, but I cannot vote for war. I vote no.” 1917

“There can be no compromise with war; it cannot be reformed or controlled; cannot be disciplined into decency or codified into common sense; for war is the slaughter of human beings, temporarily regarded as enemies, on as large a scale as possible.” 1929

Concerning Equal Rights

“Men and women are like right and left hands; it doesn't make sense not to use both.”

“We're half the people; we should be half the Congress.”

“The individual woman is required . . . a thousand times a day to choose either to accept her appointed role and thereby rescue her good disposition out of the wreckage of her self-respect, or else follow an independent line of behavior and rescue her self-respect out of the wreckage of her good disposition.”


About the picture –

This picture is from my photography exhibit, Women at Work, a show I created for Middle School girls. The exhibit was funded by a grant from the Puffin Foundation.

The photograph is a darkroom composite of a frame of the Rankin statue on the second floor of the Montana Capitol building and a formal portrait of Ms. Rankin.

Day 2 - In Which I Wonder, What To Say

Now that I’ve committed to the Holidailies challenge, I’m wondering if I have that much to say.

The noise you just heard was my family falling on the floor laughing. They know the problem isn’t that I don’t have anything to say. The problem is I don’t know when to stop.

For example, when someone asks, “Do these pants make my butt look big?”

If one says, “Do you think it’s the pants?” One has said too much.

If someone asks, “This gravy isn’t too lumpy, is it?”

One should not reply, “Gravy? I thought this was crunchy peanut butter.”

Occasionally, the shoe gets placed on the other foot.

I just joined the local Volunteer Fire Department and am studying to be one of my communities’ EMTs. In a burst of pride, solidarity or dementia, my Loved One gave me a pair of Fireman Boots. Such as these are ordered specially from the Policeman and Fireman Supply Catalog which holds a multitude of items that someone with an active imagination shouldn’t be allowed access to, but I digress.

The Fireman Boots have thick soles for standing a long time on hard surfaces. Rugged lug treads for climbing slippery slopes. High tops to protect fragile ankles. A broad width across the ball of the foot, so one’s toes don’t get squished. In other words, when Dr. Frankenstein bought footwear for the Monster, he shopped in the Fireman’s Supply Catalog.

I said to my Loved One, “These shoes make my feet look enormous.”

And he said, “Are they warm?”

“I can’t even cover them up with my pant leg,” says I.

“And they’re warm,” says he.

Discretion, the better part of valor, also makes for long marriages.

So, I ask you, dear reader, do these boots make my feet look big?
I know they're warm.

Day 1 Holidailies 2006

So, I decided to join in this year because it sounded like fun and all the cool kids were doing it.

If you haven’t heard, Holidailies is a free community writing project. All 2006 participants promise to update their personal web sites every day from December 1 to January 1.

Fifty words or a picture. Post every day. The point? Repetition creates habit. Not that I think posting everday to the blog is a habit worth cultivating, but writing every day is.

But check back about Day 10 when I’m down to a dog story and a cat picture.