Lost Blog

Friday, December 26, 2008

The case of the lost blog. Where the blazes does the last blog you just spent thirty minutes of your precious time writing go when you bleeping press the wrong key? What happens when you can hear the computer chewing your words, chomping sentences and licking its lips? Argh!!! No amount of back arrow clicking can recover the lost blog. It was breakfast for a hungry cyberspace monster; and so you have no choice but to begin again…start over…argh!!!

The possibility exists that what was written previously was dribble anyway, and no one cared a lick about what was said. Amen.

The truth is I’ve been remiss in my Good Days and No Days and for those unable to get out-of-bed because of my failure to advise – I apologize.

Once the Scorpio Moon went off into the deep bowels of the Cosmos she left behind about six hours of what-the-heck-is-happening-to-me-garbage. This was precisely between 12:30am-6:15am on Wednesday morning. Whatever occured during that time frame seemed important and serious, however, the Scorpio Moon is known for its bathroom humor and dirty tricks, so no worries,believe it or not, she was just kidding.

The Sagittarius Moon took over, thank you very much, and continues until 6:30pm, Friday evening. There is sure to be some over spending, over eating, over doing and over joying with this jolly moon. Hope your Christmas was all of that and more. The Capricorn New Moon joins us for the weekend beginning 7pm Friday night. New Moons are excellent for starting over.

So there, that’s the answer…I had to begin again with this blog and this one makes so much more sense than the last one. But hey, if you are lost in cyberspace and find any MIA blogs please let me know…

Have the best darn day everyday.

Linda

Blog the Longest Day

Saturday, December 20, 2008

I look out my window and the world is transformed. Everywhere, as far as my eyes can see, is white. The heaviness of an intense storm still hangs in the air. Almost like the boxer who has returned to his corner for a pep talk and water. The snow will come again and again. The reasons why you love and hate the North East of the United States is clear. You talk about leaving, about packing up and going South, but you don’t. The serenity of moments like this morning are too precious to miss. They will stay with you until you start to shovel and then you will remember why you should have left last year.

The Winter Solstice is upon us. The longest day of the year when the sun is farthest from the Equator in the north causing the longest day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere. The effect is that the sun “stands still” in its apparent northward motion. This celestial event occurs with the sun in Capricorn, the beginning of winter, the Winter Solstice and after this time the days begin to grow longer again. Take note that the sign of Capricorn is very potent in the coming years. Talk of conservation directly relates to the sign of conserving. Capricorn seeks to be wise and at times frugal. This control gives Capricorn the ability to invest with wisdom, go-green and lead a comfortable existence. Although budget conscious, this sign likes the good things of this world and is the true material girl (boy).

Saturday, the 20th, the moon is in Libra bestowing on us a very Good Day. Libra asks us to work in tandem with others, to compromise, and to be diplomatic. If you find your self on the fence, or stuck in the middle, please make peace with your situation and you will find the solution. Libra remains until about noon on Sunday when she vacates for the remainder of the afternoon, returning in the sign of Scorpio after 6:30pm. Perhaps last minute stuff would best not be accomplished during that warp of time. Purchases may need to be returned or will not be used as intended. Better to have Santa leave a note in his or her stocking or hang a heart on the tree with beautiful words of love. Remember that Scorpio takes no prisoners. You can not get away with anything. The Scorpio Moon discloses the most secret of information. Keep yourself squeaky clean!!!

Have the best day everyday.

Linda

Blog Winter

It is winter, the Solstice will herald the official arrival on December 21st. Outside my window there is evidence of this coming event, a fine layer of snow covers the ground, the wind has a deep chill and the dog goes out and comes in without being called. For some the weather is not a factor on the longest day of the year, perhaps where you are the temperature will remain mild…lucky you. I was reminded, once again, that plans can change on-the-turn-of-a-dime. That’s the same lesson twice in as many weeks. Perhaps the universe is telling me something…I’ve promised myself that I will slow down, beginning today,reducing my speed will allow me to see what is around me, to listen better and to appreciate the small stuff. The Aries Moon will be reflecting on us until 4:30pm. So the day until then is a Good one. The week will get off to a fast start and the suggestion is to watch tempers around you. Short fuse people can explode. The Taurus Moon joins us for about two days beginning early on Tuesday morning. Tuesday and Wednesday are very Good Days. These are the days that you can ask for what you need. You are deserving and should be successful. You may be tempted to milk the Good Day Moon on Wednesday past 5:30pm and you might be safe to do so. However the moon changes hats and goes off radar until early in the morning on Thursday so do not put too much expectation into those final Taurus Moon hours. There will be a Full Moon in Gemini on Friday which will insure God Days for Thursday and Friday morning. After 1pm and for the next twelve hours the moon will say No Day. Keep the No Day rules for the balance of Friday. The television show ‘Extreme Makeover” takes people out of their home, on vacation and then home again to a completely new house. Not a TV watcher I spent a few hours watching in awe what this show accomplishes. In the spirit of giving at this time of year and all year round we can all practice some kind of generosity. Reduce the scale of what TV manages and go out as an individual and make a difference. Have the best day everyday. Linda

Blog a Lesson

Travel Days on a No Day are best approached with an open mind. On Monday, December first the Moon in Capricorn was off the cosmic radar screen from about 10:45am until the next day at 1:45am when she reappeared dressed in her exceptionally weird Aquarius garb. I chose Monday to return from a long weekend with family and knew in advance that my timing was smack in the middle of that No Day. I mentally deferred to the energy and calmly experienced delay after delay, terminal, tarmac, holding patterns and the like. Three amazing experiences happened to me as I moved from scene to scene: one was that my traveling companion was my oldest daughter, we were locked into this travel madness together and we were spending more time together than either of us could remember. That was a good thing. The regional jet that flew us from North Carolina to JFK broke all air time speed records trying to beat out the air traffic controllers at Kennedy. The third thing was circling Long Island and Manhattan (because we were early) the view outside our cabin window was the crescent moon with her diamond earrings of Venus and Jupiter. Never doubt with this combo that love is all around and that you are loved in a big way. If we are in deep economic trouble it is because the symbolism of these two planets has been misused. Living large is one and love me, love thyself is the other.

In this downward turn of financial events please keep in mind that this is a cleansing period and we need to be supportive of each other until the cycle ends. If you are more fortunate than your neighbor…please share your good fortune. This is the lesson to be learned.

Have the best day every day.

Linda

Blog a New Moon

No Day…Good Weekend

Well so much for a plan…when you have a plan God laughs. I’ve been without a computer for five days not because of technical problems but because I ventured out for a few hours with a plan and life grabbed me and threw me into a nightmare. I watch the sky and track the No’s and Good Days but that does not give me magic powers to see what will happen in my own backyard. Enough said, except to remind you all that life is very fragile, hug the people you love tell them every day that you love them.

Wednesday is soon to be a No Day packed with changes of plan and God knows what else. Go with the flow. New Moon is on Thursday in Sagittarius and we love that new moon because it allows us to begin again. From just after midnight on Thursday morning until about 8pm on Friday use that moon to be generous and thankful. The Capricorn Moon shows up on Saturday but not until about 1pm. You can make lists in the morning and if you are shopping on Black Friday do it in the daylight, rest up when the moon goes off radar.

The balance of the Holiday weekend is the Capricorn Moon which has us all counting our pennies and trimming costs. Budgets will prevail, go green-go lean.

Have the best day every day. Remember: Hug someone you love.

Linda

Blog Memory Lane

I had  not been back to my Alma Mater in forty years.  But here I was driving down once familiar streets, craning my neck at buildings renovated and reinvented that housed me, fed me and schooled me many years ago.  This return visit was not by chance, but by invite.  I was to be a guest speaker to a group of communication majors.  Me.  The girl who graduated with a degree in science was returning as an author of literary fiction. 

 

Strange how life has its way with you; how a barely eighteen year old with the dream of being a journalist finds herself taking Anatomy and Physiology, Physics and Biology. The dreams I left behind remained dormant waiting to energize again when the timing was different, better; when life said it was okay to be what I always wanted to be.

 

I stood before a group of students recounting my journey from graduation using the metaphor of shoes.  With lines taken from Forrest Gump in the film of the same name I weaved my way through the maze of days, months and years.

 

“Mamma always says you can tell a lot about a person by their shoes, where they are going and where they have been.  I bet if I try real hard I can remember my first pair of shoes.”  Forrest Gump

 

Perhaps some of the students listening never saw the movie.  Too bad.  Despite its length there were some memorable lines, chunks of wisdom like the one above that might serve as a guide in the future. My shoe metaphor allowed me to travel through the decades since I’d last walked that campus and each different pair put me in another mind set, on another journey.

 

I told the young men and women listening, to nurture the friendships they will make while in college and to live their lives with passion.  I told them also to believe in their dreams and to do whatever it is that ignites the fire inside.  Let that flame burn hot, I said, for a life without passion is no life, why it live any other way.

 

For the record, my next pair of shoes might be flip-flops; I want to see where they will take me.

 

Blog what you say, see, hear, and feel.

Linda and One Writer’s Passion

Blog Another Season

 

There is a woodpecker rat-tatting on the south wall of my house.  The sound reminds me of other autumns, other late mornings when October’s leaves fill my driveway full of yellow, orange and rust.  My writing space has been winterized.  I am now in the loft just above the wood stove.  For the next four to six months this is where you can find me most often; under the window over The Elm.

 

Today the dog is outside, oblivious to the knocking of our feathered friend.  If I knew Morse Code I am sure that bird is tapping a message; something profound.

Something to do with the shift of my writing space, which has also created an alteration of purpose, because with so many months devoted to book promotion I feel that my writer’s compass is off.  There is a strong pull to let go and let what I’ve done find its way and give myself permission to do this without penalties attached.

 

I keep a calendar on my kitchen counter.  Every day there is a painting or print from museums around the world.  Today there is a black and white print of The Large Cat by Cornelis Visscher (1629-1662).   This feline is over three hundred years old, drawn by a man who died at thirty-three.  I wondered what he would think if he knew I had my morning cup-of-tea looking at his large cat.  I wondered too just what becomes of all we do and all we have created, centuries from now.  Perhaps my tapping woodpecker had the answer or maybe Mark Twain did when he said: “If you would have your work last forever, and by forever I mean fifty years, it must neither overtly preach nor overtly teach, but it must covertly preach and covertly teach.”

 

Blog what you hear, see, think and feel…

 

Linda Merlino

Blog One Word

There is one word, a four-letter word that binds us to life. That word is hope. Without hope there is no reason to be, no reason to survive or to carry on. Hope is our glue, our daily dose of spiritual vitamin that prevents the breakdown of spirit and the onset of despair.

We must remember how fragile hope can be, how the maintaining of this four-letter word requires the love and support of family. Holding on to the thread of hope when you are faced with the possibility of your own demise is a challenge. Cancer shuts off the music in our lives, it takes up residence uninvited. Cancer moves in and spreads itself out. The treatment of this disease takes over. One day you could get up and go about your ordinary life and the next day you are tagged for chemotherapy, mastectomy, and/or radiology by a staff of nurses and doctors trying to give you every chance to survive.

Emotionally, hope can become elusive almost transparent. You could lose hope at any turn and then what? What would you do? Hudson Catalina is faced with that question and struggles with her own loss of hope. The decent into darkness that is represented by my book’s title has been the subject of several questions. Since hope is also part of having faith then its presence in each of our lives needs to be acknowledged and given its own chance to survive. Cancer crosses boundaries of culture, religion and genetics. It does not discriminate; it is not racist, anti-Semitic or bound by rules and convention.

Cancer laughs in the face hope, but there is no stronger medicine, no elixir or potion. In the end, if we keep hope alive, if we hold on through the darkest of days when there is light again, whether it is the beacon of God’s lantern, or the light in our kitchen, with hope and love we are victorious.

Please stop by Belly of the Whale’s Virtual Book Tour which is dedicated to Breast Cancer Awareness. Here are some of the upcoming stops, welcome aboard.
October 7-The Library at the End of the Universe
October 8-Café of Dreams
October 9-The Merits of the Case
October 10-Café of Dreams
October 13-Scribe Vibe
October 14-Literarily
Blog what you see, hear, think and feel.
Linda

Blog a Virtual Question

Blog a Virtual Question

 

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month and Belly of the Whale is on Virtual Tour for the month trying to help fight-the-fight.  There will be reviews, posts, interviews and a podcast for anyone wishing to come aboard. 

 

I was asked many questions but one I’d like to share is included here: “What is the most important thing in your life right now?”

 

The most important thing in my life is my family.  Family has been, always will be and is the most significant part of my life.  My dreams and aspirations have been realized because even on the darkest of days I keep them at my center, close to my heart.

 

Remember to stay healthy and aware: Hope begins with Us.  Please stop by the Tour over the next few days and say hello:

October 1 – The Book Czar

October 3 – Zensanity

Blog what you think, see, hear and feel…

Linda Merlino, author, Belly of the Whale

 

 

 

 

Blog Real Life

Nothing in fiction can top real life and I confess that I prefer fiction to memoir and biography.  The sprinkling of imagination like spices on a gourmet dish can turn boring history into explosive fiction.  Reality as the back drop for fiction needs to go outside the boundaries of hum-drum.

 

Belly of the Whale is the fictional account of twenty-four hours in the life of a young woman with breast cancer; a disease whose reality is lived everyday by so many people.  If you look at statistics the numbers are staggering.  Age forty, that mid-life crisis birthday, is when having mammograms should begin.  Breast cancer occurs at any age, but more often as women get older.  Your chances of not ever having cancer are slim, very slim.  For most; it will happen.

 

Breast cancer is the nightmare turned real in the ordinary life of my character, Hudson Catalina.  Bringing the quality of emotion that I felt was needed to depict a situation so grave and where all hope was lost began with the intention not to focus on the cancer but instead on what happens at an over-the-top level; when one person’s life is broadsided by bad news on a beautiful day.

 

Given previous experience and the fears that follow, how does someone cope with this type of diagnosis?  How does the woman in my story maintain her ability to keep hope alive? Extensive research produced one common thread, family.  The love, kindness and patience of a spouse, boyfriend, life companion, children, siblings, and friends are crucial to quality of life.  Caregivers can have the opportunity to be the best they have ever been, the best husband, the best daughter, or the best brother.

 

Many people have been touched by cancer, as victim and as witness.  Others have been touched by tragedy and by loss.  What kind and how each are defined does not matter.  There is darkness in every life.  The challenge: can we come out on the other side spirit intact?  We can because hope belongs to everyone.  Without hope, there is nothing.

 

Blog what you hear,see, think and feel.

Linda Merlino, author of Belly of the Whale