Random Thoughts

Well, it is Purim.  This is a fact I discovered on my Yahoo home page.  Purim is number 8 at the moment in Yahoo's category called "Trending Now."  Number 1 is Chile Earthquake.  Number 2 is Tsunami.  Purim is a Jewish festival, having to do with the Biblical book of Esther.  That is my first random thought.

The second random thought is that nowadays I have to watch my typing more than what I used to.  In days gone by, my fingers knew if they had made a typographical error.  Nowadays I have to use my eyes.  Why this is, I do not know.  I began to notice this new deficiency after Scooter died.  What the one has to do with the other, I cannot guess.

The third is that I have "1 Friend Online" ... and by that I mean on Multiply.  If I were to flip over to my MySpace page I would likely find a friend or two online there also.  And on Facebook it would not surprise me to find quite a few still online at this late hour (the time being 1:05 a.m. Eastern Standard).

Hmmm, I need a 4th Random Thought.  This is not randomly thought about - I am constantly aware of this fact - I do not communicate so very well verbally anymore.  I can often not think of a thing to say to anybody.  My random thoughts are so empty (if empty is, indeed, the proper word) that I am at a loss for much beyond hello.  This phenomena is also since my Scooter died.

Nevertheless: most people do not notice, because I have always been relatively quiet, socially.  And furthermore, I am a relatively high-functioning airhead.  At the moment my verbosity is being enhanced by 2 or 3 ounces of Mogen David Concord Wine (Kosher, alcohol 11% by volume ... oh my, I am such a lush!)  Said wine is intended to put me to sleep, and make me quit thinking about Scott's funeral bill. And yet the thing that I had to write myself a note about, so that I will not FORGET is to tell the funeral home (either voluntarily, or only if they call again ... depending on which thing I later decide would be most appropriate) that SOMEBODY killed Scott with a motor vehicle and that when the police figure out WHO, their auto insurance should pay Scott's final expenses.  (Did you know it costs over $4,000 to drive a hearse 50 miles to pick up a body and then deliver it to a donated grave?)  The funeral was supposed to be billed to Scott's estate.  I am not the executor of Scott's estate.  I was Scott's estranged adoptive mother at the time of his death.  And I am a compliant person.  The medical examiner told me I had to tell them what to do with Scott's body.  My pastor worked something out with a local funeral home.  Scott's ex-girlfriend was going to handle his estate.  She absconded or something.  Sigh.  If you want to know the truth, I was expecting a living prodigal son to come home and say, "Mom! I've missed you!"  Death was never my honest expectation.  Sigh.

Random thought 5: youngest son told me tonight to give $33 from him to church for his tithe this week.  So I went to mybank.com to transfer $33 from his account to mine, and dang if mybank didn't insist this time that I fill out their "enhanced security questions."

And that is something I have ALWAYS been incompetent at doing.  Online security questions always want to know your favorite this or that.  I have never, to my knowledge, had favorite this or thats!  So first I have to try to figure out what a reasonable answer would be, and then I have to worry forever that I will not remember what my answer was.  So of course I have to write down my answers.  And then, of course, I will need to remember where I put the list of answers.  For which if I were truly to act in character I would make a file entitled "Answers to Security Questions," which, of course, defeats the purpose of security questions.

And I feel inept, when really I am not inept in the slightest; yet I wonder if anybody else on earth finds answering simple security questions challenging.

I recall at a job once-upon-a-time, my boss wanted to hand out plastic bracelets to put your office key on.  She came to me, not telling me her true purpose, but only said, "Rani, what is your favorite color?"  (Holy crap!!!! I DON'T KNOW!)  "Favorite color for WHAT?" I said.

Back when security questions amounted to "What is your mother's maiden name," I was challenged even by that question.  My mother's father died when she was 3.  So she has gone by 2 last names, both of which I know about.  And I have answered that question 2 different ways over the years.

And as to what color was my first car (this year's security question number 2 of 3) well, it had an exotic name (which I can remember, even 30 years after the fact) and of course it has a generic color name.  I gave the generic color name as my reply to the bank's security question.  Will I be sure to remember that someday (say in 2525) when my bank doubts my true identity?  Probably not.  I will have to answer, "Uh, it is either 'exotic-name' or 'plain vanilla name.' "

The only security question I knew the definitive answer to was "In what year did you meet your significant other?"  At last! A question that requires knowledge of a FACT, not an opinion!  I KNEW the answer to that one!  (But then, so does everybody else who actually knows me, I think.  Well, hopefully, those who would wish to steal my airheaded identity are people who do NOT know me.)

I should probably rephrase the airheaded descriptor.  People do not generally consider me airheaded.  On a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being airhead and 10 being geek, I am probably scored by those who know me as 11.

What I am, according to my husband, is, well, literal.  (Is that a fault?  I try to say what I mean, and I anticipate others doing so as well.  Except for when I am trying to tease somewhat, because people like to tease somewhat, and even I can do so once a month or so.  Well maybe it is only 4 times a year.  But hey! I can make people laugh with my wee jokes.  4 times a year, anyway.)

Random thought #6:  The Mogen David is working!  I think that I shall go to sleep if I try again now.

Random thought #7:  With only 2 friends online, it is not likely I will get much feedback from my random thoughts tonight.  Oh well.  It is Purim.  There's an awful lot of grace in Purim, even though Esther never mentions God.  Funny how that works, eh?  Oh, BTW, the photo attached to this blog is Scooter, in his teens.  When he was still my son.  He left home to go to his homecoming dance when he was a junior in high school, and never did come home until he died, at the age of 31.  Prodigals, beware.

Too gone for too long

Guess I've been too gone for too long (as some song in my memory goes). So: cobwebs, begone! Two, at least, of my Multiply friends have missed me. I turned off the email updates months ago ... so I never had a clue when anyone tried to visit here. One of 'em tracked me down on MySpace (which I wasn't particularly using either, but still had email updates from).

I have been online.  NOT writing, NOT even reading, hardly.

Ever hear of SuperPoke Pets? It's a game. You can play it from MySpace and from Facebook. It is mindless. It uses creative energy. It keeps you going when you just don't feel like thinking. Then I quit doing that, even. I did use Facebook ... lots of people I know in real life on there. Not that I was particularly open with them. Nope. You do not tell the people who really know you how hurt you are inside. At least I refuse to. Heck, I try mostly to get by without telling myself!  Too bad I'm so clever I can always read my mind!

See, I'm not much of a screamer. But the foregone year or two really deserves a primal scream.

It's a wonder to me that I wrote so much from October of '07 until whenever it was that I quit writing.  And having quit, I don't quite know how to start again.  But here's another private blog.

Hopefully eventually I will write for my public again. Hopefully someday I will be the friend I think I wish I had.

If Anyone's Looking for Me ...

I'm just on a reading binge.

It happens from time to time.

I don't feel like writing.  I feel like READING!  And I am having a blast.  Please don't anybody get your feelings hurt.  I still ask God to bless all my Multiply friends every night when I say my prayers.  That means YOU!

And I'll come back and play as soon as I get my fill of these books.

Your friend, Rani

My Multiply Wish List

I wish my Multiply In Box would be a little more programmable!  I want to read every one of my contact's blogs.  I do not want to miss the ones that are posted on a day or so that I'm not online.  But I don't want my In Box to be constantly full of comments that have been added to blogs.  Seems to me that Yahoo360 was easier to manage.  And so is MySpace, for that matter.  I can "subscribe" to the blogs I don't want to miss.  Does anybody have any tips?  Am I doing something amiss here with my settings?

Note to Self

Read replies you missed tonite on the blogs of Teri and Zee.  Too tired to read them now, and InBox will have buried them by tomorrow, no doubt.

 

Connectedness

Many of you have recently read my blog entitled "All Over the Place".  I should have been careful what I wished for.  The other day, I got an email from a friend I know "in real life" asking me to connect to her on facebook.  So I set up a profile there real quick this morning.  Now, as today has progressed, my little facebook inbox is full of people I "know in real life" trying to connect to me.

And that scares the heck out of me.

Because in "real life" I am shy as can be and quiet as can be and un-noticeable as can be.  And hardly ever does anybody know what I am thinking.  Except maybe in a classroom type setting.  I will raise my hand and point out a relevant fact, and then discussion will ensue, but I do not dominate that discussion.  I just connect the dots, and the group moves along, and they don't really even notice that I sort of directed them.  And that is comfortable for me.

Blogging and making friends on line has gotten to be really comfortable for me, too.  In a way, most of my Multiply friends "know" me better than most of my "real-life" friends do.

But what will I do if my real life friends read my blogs and expect me to be as articulate in person as I can be in writing?  I'll be a FAILURE, that's what!

Groups of people who all know each other and all know me ... well that is UN comfortable for me.  Because, well, groups always want you to SAY something.  And you have to be quick, and witty and I'm ... well ... SLOW.  I think too dang deeply.  I need to process and connect all the dots.  I need to listen.

Sigh.

Well, I've got a facebook page now, and I suppose I gotta update the little blurb every day "Rani Kaye is ... (you're supposed to fill in the blank)."  My 50+ year-old "real-life" friends are filling in those dang blanks!!!!  Who knew?

Maybe in 2009 I'll become as comfortable with verbal communication as I am with blogging and commenting.  When I was on Yahoo 360, I never ever ever commented ... I just read blogs.  It wasn't until the Yahoo mass-exodus began that I quit lurking and contacted the people whose blogs I read so that I could come over here and not lose the writers I loved to read.  Then one of those friends taught me to comment.  (Okay, so I AM an idiot.  I had to be taught to comment.)  Now I do it all the time.  Maybe someday I will even learn how to do it in real life.

... I'm not leaving Multiply, though, that's for sure.  I'll just practice a little with facebook, and then maybe invite my facebook friends over here to see what a "real" blog site is like.  Grin.

All Over the Place

The people I admire the most on Multiply are so "out there."  Each of you is different from me, and yet each of you hold an attraction to my soul.

It's a blog I read tonight that made me sad.  This one: http://lindao6.multiply.com/journal/item/523/We_Need_Each_Other._._._

Because we ought to be connected, I want to be connected, I imagine myself connected, maybe I am connected, but I don't FEEL connected.

And some of you feel smothered by your connectedness.

And I'm a great listener, advice-giver, someone who knows how to find "the quiet center."  And yet, there is not a soul that I would trust with mine.  Not really.  ...

That was a great blog on Linda's page, and I really like what I know of Linda, and I wanted to leave a comment.  But I was too dang sad.  Because my roots don't seem to intertwine, although I try to tangle them.  They've just been chopped too many times!

My parents moved us around every time I got my bearings when I was growing up.

The first man I married was never contented with a blasted thing in life, and he kept changing everything constantly.  On top of which, he rather wanted to be a hermit.

Church connections are supposed to be good ones, but to really be connected at a particular congregation (any of them) you're supposed to bad-mouth the ones that aren't your kind.  I worship, and have raised my youngest son, where the liturgy and the sermons do me the most good.  And he's connected there, having gone to parochial school there "all his life," but I don't really fit.

I'm a church secretary at a different kind of church.  I don't want to worship there.  They don't meet my deepest needs as "my own" church does.  But they are "inclusive" almost to a fault, and I need that.

The friends I've chosen on Multiply (and those who've chosen me) are extremely diverse, from down-home Baptist to Catholic to Pagan or Agnostic ... and I guess that if truth be told, I am a little bit of all those things myself.  (I'm a Lutheran, if you want to know -- Missouri Synod -- with a few unfortunate Baptist and Jewish tendencies, and the occasional respectful irreverence and willingness to dance at the winter solstice.)

Some of my friends are way more sensual than I'd ever care to be.  Some are searching for meaning in life, some are just trying to hold their grip, and some think they've got it all figured out.  Some could care less.

The friends here that I admire most are those who have an opinion -- their own point of view.  Whether they bitch about their mother-in-law, or gripe about bad weather, or try to make everything funny, or just tool around posting glitter graphics, or try to capture the most exquisite moment in words or photography.  Whether they flaunt their intelligence, or only their silliness.

I am a little bit like all of you ... and nothing like any of you.  And I do not share myself completely with anyone but God.  So if He does not exist, then apparently I do not share myself completely with anyone but myself.

"My own counsel will I keep." -- Yoda, from one of the Star Wars movies.

But damn, I sure do wish I really felt as connected, rooted, and intertwined, as my head believes we all are.  Because in my thought life, with my reason, from my world-view, I am convinced of the truth of the blog that set me tip-toeing through melancholy tonight.  I honestly think that, believe it or not, even when we don't speak the same language, we are ALL connected, in the eternal sense of things.

There.  That's as close to revealing as I am able to be.  For what it's worth.

The sky is NOT falling

Listen up, kids.  I have suffered under self-proclaimed prophets.  I have lived through a number of losses of various sorts.  I fed a family of five, plus 2 dogs, on $30 a week in the late 1980s.  I have been promoted beyond my wildest dreams, then had the whole office closed in a corporate restructuring.  I have gone from well-paid management to learning how to make donuts at minimum wage, and then back up again to corporate accountant, and then laid off by a whole new company.  I have built my own house with my family, and then lost both the house and the family in a divorce.  There's more, and I ain't gonna tell you.  But the sky is NOT falling.

I am not a pollyanna.  I am realistic.  People can survive without a lot of things.  A LOT of things.  Some things matter a lot.  And some things just don't really matter much at all, even though they take up a lot of time and energy.

If you have a particular gripe with religion, or even with God himself -- get over it.  You've probably bought a line of bull.  Prayer is a GOOD thing.  You should try it.  You don't like the way it's gone for you before, or you don't like the way some people who have preached to you in the past have done their preaching or their teaching or whatever -- get over it.  You WOULD be better at coping with all this latest nonsense on earth if you knew it was okay for you to talk to God as if you mattered to him.

Give it a try.

I've got other practical advice I'd be willing to hand out free for nothing.  But the thing you need to know most is what I just told you.  God made you.  God does care how it goes for you.  Have a word with him, even if you start out by yelling.

Writer's Forum Find Your Muse #8 'Secret Rendezvous'

A Shared Secret

My literary career began before I could read or write, and I suppose that Mother Goose may be partly to blame since I learned of rhyme and rhythm from the sing-song-y verses Mama read to me at bedtime.

It's the wanting to REMEMBER, though, that birthed the writer in my soul.  More specifically, it's the COMPENSATING for FORGETTING.

And it is as simple as this:  I often heard songs, I often heard poems, I often heard stories that I loved.  I loved to hear a well-told tale.  I loved to hear a lovely song.  I loved to repeat a well-turned phrase.

The stories my Mama read to me, she read over and over again; and I could remember every word.

The songs my grandpa taught me, he sang with me over and over again; and I could remember every word.

But there were OTHER songs.  There were OTHER stories.  I would hear them once.  I would want to tell them.  I could not remember the words.

I would try to sing a song I had heard.  (This was generally for my own amusement.  At that point I was a toddler, and for the time being, an "only" child.)  I would recall a phrase or two, but not the whole.  So I would think.  I would try to remember. I would wonder what comes next. "Now what word sounds like sky?" I would say to myself. 

Then I would sing, and just PRETEND my new verses were how the true song went. 

I needed to memorize my made-up verses as I went along, though.  So I would do two lines, and get them to rhyme, and then repeat them again and again before making up the next two.  Repetition like that is how my grandpa always taught new songs to me.

Sometimes I would remember almost nothing of the "real" song, and I mustneeds make up MANY verses, in order to go with all the notes.  It seems I could naturally remember the tune and how long the song should be, even if I heard it only once, but I couldn't memorize the words fast enough to keep them forever.  And I mustneeds keep them forever.  That I cannot tell you why, because I do not know.  I have simply always wanted words to be kept forever.

When I got older and went to school, I loved to share songs; but at first I continued to pretend these all were songs I'd learned somewhere.  I ashamedly hid the truth that I had "written" them myself.  At that young age, I somehow felt it was wrong of me to selfishly make up words just so I could teach myself to sing the pretty songs.

Eventually, however, when I was nine, a teacher found me out.  I had escalated my criminal behavior to include teaching my songs to a girlfriend whose daddy played guitar, and this little girl had a charming voice.  Her daddy had her sing for people, and she liked to do that. 

Our teacher played piano, and our whole class sang at the beginning of every school day.  My little entertainer girl friend volunteered to sing my songs in front of the class and dragged me up front with her to sing along.  I could carry a tune, and she could sing like an angel.  Our teacher loved music, and she encouraged us to perform this way every time my girlfriend said that she and Rani had a new song.

Without my knowledge, that teacher started writing down some of my words, and she gave typed-up copies of my "poems" (as she called them) to my mama at parent-teacher conferences. 

When my mama showed those "poems" to me, I was stunned to discover that it pleased my parent and my teacher that I was doing this dishonest thing of making up my own little stories and rhymes.

Well needless to say, my temperament being such as it was, I was all about pleasing the parent and the teacher; and heck, by that time I could make a rhyme out of anything, any time it struck my fancy to do so.

So that's my story
Each word is true
And I have remembered it here for you.

My girlfriend's name was Mary Lewis.  Her voice sounded just like Mary of "Peter, Paul and..."  I just this moment remembered her name.  The school was Malcolm, the town was Sault Ste. Marie.  Mary, if you're out there, write to me.  You moved away before I did, and I never knew what became of you.  I wonder if you knew that I was "making up" the songs.  I do not think I told you.

Betty's Birthday

I am not pleased with you for dying when you did, Betty; and I know that you were not pleased with me when off you went;  HOWEVER: I have a magnet on my refrigerator that you gave me, and it says "Forever Friends" ,  so I intend to hold you to that promise.

Happy birthday to you in Heaven, Betty.  And as to whatever you didn't like about how my life went on when yours didn't: Get over it.

I damn well would have been there if you would have told me, and you know it!

Now.  Shall I pour the coffee, or is it your turn?

Been strolling through the neighborhood

Got up early this morning, after staying here late last night moving my blogs over from 360 and MySpace.  Have spent the past hour-and-a-half strolling through the neighborhood, and trying to remember to say hi everyplace I go ... but I'm not very gregarious in real life (kinda shy) so remembering to comment is a newly-learned skill for me.

I have a recipe to post before the kids get up, but I wanted to say hi to y'all.  I LIKE it here on Multiply!  I LOVE the way the My Multiply page shows me all my friends' friends and what y'all are up to!  Makes me feel so connected and so welcome!

Well, gotta type out that recipe.  Got one grandson here for an overnight, and even HE loved eating this yesterday!  Youngest son, of course, is almost 17, and eats EVERYTHING!

We ARE all connected, and I think it's less than 8 degrees...

Current mood: contemplative

Those of us who make friends online feel quite connected to our penpals. We congregate around our particular interests on the web ... "birds of a feather flock together," as the old saying goes.

I, too, have some forums that I frequent ... and my penpals mean a lot to me.

I just read an article from our local tv news rss feed about a Virginia Tech student who was well known at an online forum for our Detroit Tigers and West Michigan Whitecaps. I don't frequent that forum, not being into sports myself, but I understand.

If you wonder whether our online connections are "real" -- take a look at this link:

http://www.wzzm13.com/news/news_article.aspx?storyid=74050

Doing Good

"There is gold, and an abundance of jewels;

But the lips of knowledge are a more precious thing."

-- Proverbs 20:15 NASB

I got a holiday card just after New Years Day from a dear friend.  Her gift to me, to her family, and to her other friends this year was that she donated a cow to Heifer International.  From the back of her holiday card, I quote:

"The mission of Heifer International is to work with communities to end hunger and poverty and care for the earth.  Since 1944, Heifer has helped more than 7 million families in more than 125 countries move toward greater self-reliance through the gift of livestock and training in environmentally sound agriculture.  The impact of each initial gift is multiplied as recipients agree to 'pass on the gift' by giving one or more of their animal's offspring, or the equivalent, to another in need."

Heifer International's web address is: www.heifer.org

I can only imagine what a difference this gift might make on earth. I am so honored to have such a friend. 

Friends, if you have the power in your hand to do some good somewhere today ... just do it.

Friendship

"Of what help is anyone who can only be approached with the right words?" -- Elizabeth Bibesco

"If the first law of friendship is that it has to be cultivated, the second law is to be indulgent when the first law has been neglected." -- Voltaire