Author Archives: lifelessons

Unknown's avatar

About lifelessons

My blog, which started out to be about overcoming grief, quickly grew into a blog about celebrating life. I post daily: poems, photographs, essays or stories. I've lived in countries all around the globe but have finally come to rest in Mexico, where I've lived since 2001. My books may be found on Amazon in Kindle and print format, my art in local Ajijic galleries. Hope to see you at my blog.

Won by Wit

Won by Wit

South sea island cruises do not stir up my lust.
I fear that all my passions have succumbed to mold and dust.
All that iron will to love has come to naught but rust.
To date, there is no counter urge that says, “My dear, you must!”
It never was my temperament to plot and scheme and plan
complicated maneuvers to try to catch a man,
but still I found that now and then one drifted into view
that caused me to examine my attitudes anew.

Perhaps my behavior included one or two
of the tiniest maneuvers by which I hoped to woo.
It may be that in passing, I allowed the slightest brush
of my arm and his arm and blamed it on the crush
of bodies in the elevator, even though the fact
is that the elevator was not so tightly packed.
Nonetheless, my hints were subtle, for I rarely pined
for a lustful body over a brilliant mind.

So if you want to woo me, do it over books.
For me a silver tongue will always win out over looks.
Write with wit and logic, original and kind.
Fan my imagination. Seduce my wild mind.
My upper arms are flabby, but my mind is sharp and taut.
To woo me, try to judge me not for all that I am not.
The only one to win me would be one of my own kind.
The only nuptials I seek are marriages of mind.

 

Prompts today are south seas, brush, lust, temperament and date.

Stage 1 of Coming of Age in Mexico

Stage 1 of Coming of Age in Mexico: Yoli’s First Communion

Please click on the photos to enlarge them and to read captions.

 

Although I arrived ten minutes before Yoli’s first communion service began, Yolanda ( her mother and my housekeeper/friend of 18 years) and family must have arrived very early for they were in the second row of the church. Not willing to walk that long aisle and find there was no room left in their pew, I sat near the back, a choice I was grateful for once the incense dispersal started. Luckily, I was in an area between two open doors, so ventilation was better than it would have been trapped in the front where most of the action with the censer  was taking place. Nonetheless, I interrupted the mood with a few sneezes. The elderly lady next to me was shocked to discover I wasn’t a Catholic. Other than that, the service went smoothly except for the mother in front of me, who kept laying her daughter’s candle on the top of the pew in front of her. All three times, it was mistakenly knocked off to the floor when the woman sitting in that pew sat down again after rising for some part of the ritual. After the hour-long service, I took Yoli and her family out to Viva Mexico for lunch. Since the family of Juan Pablo’s girlfriend had three boys doing their first communion as well, they were invited to come along so our table grew from ten to eighteen, counting Luz Maria, age 6 months, whose mother Alejandra I counseled at a summer camp for children at these very tables five years ago. In case you are curious,  HERE are photos from that camp. Alejandra is the graceful dancer in Levis and camp T-shirt, second from the right. Time passes too quickly.The next time I show photos of Yoli in a long white dress and veil, she’ll probably be a bride!! Hopefully ten years or more from now.

More than Half of Your Body is Not Human! Fascinating.

Screen Shot 2020-01-11 at 6.41.23 PM.png

Click on the link below to see what the major part of your body is composed of!!!

https://www.bbc.com/news/health-43674270?SThisFB&fbclid=IwAR2VSMKl-lQsjvSyQ-XyK0lmOIYyagVKY-Kp_GycyJyApFvuKMj1x9Ndh8c

 

The Scheme

Photo on 7-4-14 at 12.20 AM

The Scheme

By the seat of my pants I’ll accomplish my scheme
which some may consider to be too extreme.
Avoiding the bridge, I’ll have forded the stream
in the dark of the night to the moon’s guiding beam.
As I find the right path, if only by chance,
small rivulets will stream down from my pants—
evidence that will dry up in the day
with the breeze’s collusion and each dawning ray
of the sun as it shrugs off the night’s blinding hand.
Permit me to hope that by then all I’ve planned
will be finished and done. I’ll have reached the far ridge,
crossed down to the road and fled over the bridge.

Extreme measures are sometimes all that can be done
to enact revenge. In the end, I’ll have won.
The news will corroborate all of my acts.
They’ll furnish the details, establish the facts.
My crime will go down in the annals as one
that everyone’s heard of but to this day none
will have heard who accomplished it. No one will know
that I orchestrated that fabulous show.
How can I be sure you won’t let it be known
that I did the act and I did it alone?
This vengeful act that I so aptly hid?
You’ll know I did something, but not what I did!!!

Prompt words today are hope, permit, scheme, corroborate and pants.

Poinsettia: FOTD Jan 11, 2020

IMG_4761

For Cee’s FOTD

CNN Hero of the Year for 2019: Freweini Mebrahtu

https://edition.cnn.com/videos/world/2019/05/02/cnnheroes-mebrahtu-mixed.cnn

 

Fitting In

pierrick-van-troost-5UnLTVKQVlc-unsplash

Image by Pierrick Van Troost on Unsplash. Used by permission

Fitting In

He held his campaign kick-off in a colossal yurt,
clad in plaid Bermuda shorts and a rubber shirt.
His children were unruly, but his wife was slim and perky.
She dispensed campaign buttons that were colorful and quirky.
On them he wore colossal shoes, big pants and a red nose,
but she explained the reason for his eccentric clothes.
Why he wore the clownish clothes and the painted face
was to even out the odds for the senate race.
He wanted to fit in, he said, with others in the Senate
and look like all the other clowns who were sadly in it.
He won out by a landslide—an open and shut case—
proving once again that any fool can win a race.

Prompt words for today are shut, rubber, campaign, quirk and shirt.

Bougainvillea: FOTD Jan 9, 2020

IMG_8049

For Cee’s FOTD

Moving Water

 

For Cee’s B&W Challenge: Moving Water

At Play

 

 

Click on photos to enlarge

 

For the Photo a Week Challenge: Play.