Stone fireplace in the FDRoosevelt State Park Registration Office
crisp feel in the air
decorations, breezes, temps
on the cusp of fall
Even the candles remind us that there is a perfect Autumn Day to be lived.
The candles say it, the decorations declare it, the large stone fireplaces sing out, and it all screams fall. Everywhere I looked, there were signs: wildlife scurrying in a cool-temperature kind of way, people milling about with jackets, and food servers arriving at tables with bowls of soup and chicken pot pie.
There’s nothing like the welcoming in-between seasons of spring and fall for those of us who love the bridges from one phase to the next. The cool-not cold, and the warm-not-hot of the outdoor comforts that allow us to be outdoors in the fresh air, taking in the slight changes that are happening all around ~ these are the best times of all.
The decorations are up in places to welcome the change of seasons. We like to sit outdoors with coffee and muffins and have a breakfast picnic on the mountain overlooking the valley at F D Roosevelt State Park. Just birdsong and the occasional group of motorcyclists out enjoying the day. Chicken Pot Pie on the menu at the Country Kitchen at Callaway Gardens in Pine Mountain, Ga.
I finally got my cycle of mammograms to October, the most popular month to get a mammogram! I took a half day, and at first didn’t make the connection – – I wondered why the lobby was more crowded than I’d ever seen it. Then I remembered: it’s Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Everybody’s here for the squeeze.
But I’m completing the whole triathlon. I’m getting bloodwork, having the mammogram, and having a colonoscopy all in the first two weeks of the last quarter of the year.
When I finished my annual screening with close to 30 pounds of pressure on each side top to bottom and sideways (according to the digital readout), I had the strangest urge to go celebrate with a pancake breakfast. Instead, I thought about my recent bloodwork and the results that my sugar should be considered before making any spontaneous breakfast moves. Once I’d removed the gown and gotten my girls repositioned and safely strapped back into their carseats under my shirt for their travels through the day, the mammographer thanked me for coming, giving me a pink cup to help me carry the message.
This coming week, I’ll take the table for the other end and take a nice nap while the nature walk for polyps commences. I’ll try not to dwell on last year’s trip along Route 66, where we stopped in Missouri at the Uranus Fudge Factory. I’ll think instead on the first time I had a colonoscopy and decorated my @$$. And at all costs, I’ll resist the urge to stop for fudge on the way home. (And for the record, I do not want a brown mug from the Colonoscopy Department to match the pink one from the Mammography Department in the picture above).
To all my friends and readers: get your tests done, and try to find a way to make the dreaded medical visits we put off a sparkly checklist accomplishment.
Fitz, Ollie, and Boo Radley take to the trails and paths of state parks
Our three Schnoodles enjoy taking to the trails. In Georgia, the state parks have a program called Tails on Trails, and you can even get a t-shirt for yourself and your pups to identify yourself as a Tailer-on-Trailer.
Our boys may look all nonchalant about it, but don’t let them fool you. They live for this. Boo Radley could not settle himself down for all the things he was trying to take in, and Fitz had to pee on every upturned leaf and then kick dirt and pine straw up in a confetti nature parade behind him as he scratched off. He and Ollie tried to scale a vertical cliff like they were mountain goats or something.
Come with us for a few moments as we walk. The band of brothers will lead the way.
On Sunday, we had our book launch celebration, and we began with……well, what else? Writing! I wrote a 20 Questions Poem, falling short by about 9 questions. Our first 23 minutes includes a writing prompt, and then there is discussion about our books. Enjoy!
How do we celebrate this excitement of our book?
How do we scream and yell loud enough?
How do we jump high enough? Run in place fast enough?
Smile big enough? Laugh loud enough?
How do we let the joy out slowly enough without bursting wide open?
How do we keep our feet on the ground?
How do we remember our names and where we live?
How do we keep our faces from hurting, with these smiles too big
To fit on our faces?
How do we contain all the sugarplums that danced in our heads,
Now here on the pages of our book, our words, our joy, our being?
Barb Edler of Iowa is our host today at http://www.ethicalela.com for the final day of our September Open Write. She encourages us to celebrate our writing group through poetry of any form today. You can read her full prompt here and read the poems of others. On the heels of a celebration of the Labor Day launch of our books Words that Mend and 90 Ways of Community earlier this week, I can’t think of a better way to write today than in thanksgiving and heartfelt gratitude for a group of writers who make a difference in how we live and how we think.
If you don’t have a writing group, I encourage you to find one ~ and you can use this one as a great model for a face to face group in your own corner of the world after spending a few hours looking back at the prompts and the feedback. Get the books, read them, and feel the deep need to fix places you never knew were broken. Too many of us have lost our footing and found ourselves floundering and then discovered the power of writing and what it can do. Today is a day to celebrate the power of the pen and the ways it connects us with others. Anna Roseboro said it best at our celebration: if poetry can do this for us, imagine what it can do for our students. We all need poetry and writing in our lives.
Our host today at http://www.ethicalela.com for the September Open Write is Larin of Oklahoma. She inspires us to write “I Thought You Should Know” poems in any form of our choice. You can read her full prompt here, along with the poems of others.
Special thanks to Two Writing Teachers at Slice of Life
To the Craftsman in Kentucky Who Made the Secretariat
Join us today for our book launch party, too! September 22, 2024 – we are having an Online Publication Party to celebrate this bounteous time in our poetry community. Please join us for a live event on Zoom/YouTube at 12 PM PST/2 PM CST/3PM EST and bring friends with you…we are going to celebrate!
Mirrors
mirrors of life in art
Picasso exhibit in Nashville with my daughter
we sat admiring wondering taking it all in
then my birthday~ she sent blank journals with Picasso art covers fronts and backs
mirrors
mirrors of life these words
conversations with Fran we chatted on writing on family on pens and pencils
then a Ticonderoga Noir Holographic Hexagon flat sections
7:30 a.m. – Today at http://www.ethicalela.com, we are writing poems in our writing community. Join us and read the poems, and maybe write your own. Check back later to see how I’ve spun the prompt for today.
Maureen, our host at www.ethicalela.com, has offered several prompts in celebration of our book launch party tomorrow. I have chosen three to write today, and I share them below. Please join us tomorrow for our book launch. I’ll be wearing light blue for prostate cancer and dark blue for colon cancer to cheer Dad as he begins his treatments in the coming days. Ironically, one of our book covers is light blue, and another is dark blue.
Tomorrow – September 22, 2024 – we are having an Online Publication Party to celebrate this bounteous time in our poetry community. Please join us for a live event on Zoom/YouTube at 12 PM PST/2 PM CST/3PM EST and bring friends with you…we are going to celebrate!Â
Guts (a triolet nod to Fran)
adopting a diet for healthier guts black beans and yogurts and probiotics changing our diets for glandsand but(t)s adopting a diet for healthier guts cheering on polyphenols in nuts guarding our colons from xenobiotics adopting a diet for healthier guts black beans and yogurts and probiotics
Jiu-jitsu Dodoitsu For the Win (a dodoitsu nod to Mo)
I’m shopping today for blues two new cancer-ribbon hues for dad’s diagnosis news this fight he won’t lose
Bonny Blue Naani (a naani nod to Leilya)
a light blue ribbon worn through September on a dark blue shirt we’re cheering Dad’s treatments
Common Threads 