Hand-Me-Downs

Saturday, November 30, 2019

After some quiet days hanging out with the critters and watching whatever appealed on TV, I needed to turn some feelings into action. But processing many feelings is confusing and I wondered where to start. Well, the recent loss of my big sister has been significant. I considered writing about her, my feelings of connection and loss, and whatever else might also boil around about family. How does one start to write about all that?

My considerate neighbors, in a card for me, included the gift of a handwritten poem:

That’s it, I’ll write poetry! But how to write poems correctly? After all the best poems follow standard forms. Could I learn from a book? (That was item one this morning from Amazon.)

Then I got to wondering what keeps me sitting through a long and rather boring art course on the internet. It teaches drawing with colored pencils, seemingly an easy way to “just get going”. But episodes increasingly are complex. What might I draw? Could easier help come from an art book? (That was item two this morning from Amazon.)

Since this all seemed related to my big sister, I’d let such thoughts settle and wait for the new books.

I turned to the morning newspapers. An article in the Washington Post by an eminent sociologist caught my attention (a link to the story will follow). She asserts that societies weren’t originally designed for people living as long as we do, and so societies need changing. Humans have increasing needs but diminishing resources and these are forcing “a major redesign of life”. What she brings to forefront is much that’s begun to roil in our collective brains. (Item three this morning was her new book from Amazon.)

I’ve loved old musical movies, as did my big sister, but she was bunches-up, watching, rewatching, and memorizing movies. For nearly every musical, she could cite music, lyrics, dance steps, acrobatics, and everything about actors and athletes. Today, the WaPost reviewed a new book, “The Movie Musical” by Jeanine Basinger. Oh, why not. (Item four this morning from Amazon.)

My interests, while always alive, are casual in areas like writing, drawing, sociology, and movie musicals. Periodically, during spurts of increased interest, I’ve gone ahead and pursued or ignored urges to learn more. Today’s high interests, while associated to my big sister, extend even beyond her–to our mother, who also loved movies, music, dance, and books.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/we-need-a-major-redesign-of-life/2019/11/29/a63daab2-1086-11ea-9cd7-a1becbc82f5e_story.html?fbclid=IwAR3ZD67VZntVfqmAqlG7uHOEqA66scqRhrRaM0aS1MDzW75OhYPMA1a_xic

Dear Friends: Rediscovering myself as an inheritor of tradition, and as an individual. Diana