Author Archives: lifelessons

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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.

Sunset, Feb 13, 2018

I said I wouldn’t, but I did. More sunsets. Plus a capture of a pleasant blog setup after the dinner guests have gone.  Nice to have some quiet time out on the deck with Annie. She didn’t cotton to it unless she was on my lap. Her first time out of the house since we got here. It was housecleaning/ sheet and towel washing day, so the porch was completely covered with washing in front. I thought it was good planning to have a dinner party because the housecleaner would have just been here, but forgot that linens would be hung out to dry. Oh well. Gave us privacy.

Click on photos to enlarge.

White Lily: Flower of the Day, Feb 13, 2018

 

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Good flowers make good neighbors.  Thanks, Daniel, for providing this one.

For Cee’s Flower Prompt.

Internet Infraction

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Internet Infraction: Bogged Down in Blog

The only way I’d ever stop
is flagged down by a cyber cop
who says my blogging cannot last
if I continue to go so fast.
He’d give a lecture and a ticket
and then he’d actually stick it
across my screen with strict instruction
to cease this method of destruction.

If life had meant us to go on line
hour after hour––eight or nine
hours or more day after day,
with always one more thing to say,
why would it give us legs to go
and feet to walk on, heel to toe?

Day after day, it’s grown obscene––
my eyes plastered upon my screen,
my fingers stiff with my attention
over what I might next mention––
fingers drumming, tapping, bending
all the while sending sending––
typing out, first fast then slow
my life as a reality show.

Until I wonder if I log
its details daily on my blog
because I want to recall life––
its joys and sorrows, pleasures, strife––
or do I only move about
to give  something to write about???

My friends all say this can’t go on.
I’m growing flaccid, weak and wan.
I need some exercise and sun––
some movies, dancing or other fun
aside from snapping pictures of
each bougainvillea or mourning dove.

Life’s meant to live, not to record.
It should be shouted, screamed or roared––
not typed out softly on the keys
of a laptop spread out on my knees!
The truth of this I’ve clearly seen
now that this sticker obscures my screen.
“Do not remove” it clearly reads,
“Go live your life! Go do some deeds!”

I’ll put on sneakers. Do some laps.
I’ll exercise ‘til I collapse,
then do more laps around the pool
‘til I’m an exercising fool.
I’ll call twelve friends up on the phone.
I’ll never ever be alone.
I’ll live my life until its end
without a single blogging friend!

My dedication will never lapse;
and yet, how temptingly it gaps—
that sticker, unstuck at its edge
so easy now to pick and wedge
my fingernail beneath and tug,
to drop its shreds upon the rug
and free my screen of its obstruction––
this taboo not of my construction.

To push the button, light up the screen––
to see its colors from red to green.
Black words on white, Cee’s daily flower––
no longer do I pine and cower.
I peck the keys, upload some pics––
once more getting my daily fix.
The truth of modern life leaks in.
To blog is not a major sin!
I’ll give up blogging, become a rover
precisely when Hell freezes over!!!

 

Another reblog from three years ago, when with firmest resolve I decided to cut down on blogging and get a life. So, how did that work for me? The prompt word today is lecture.

Sunset Serenade

I put my new guitar to good use by loaning it out.  These four strummed out the sun and to my great delight, their repertoire included “Snowin’ on Raton,” by Townes Van Zandt—my request as it is one of my all-time favorite songs.

The sunset was once again outstanding.  This time I made no alterations to any of the photos other than some slight sharpenings and a few croppings of the musicians.

This was a very good day, starting with meeting Patricia for coffee and to discuss possibly setting up a group home where friends could join us for support during our codger years, then home to write, a nap in the hammock, a few gin games with Tess, an hour swim and exercise in the ocean, chats with the sunset advisory board and convincing the musicians in the crowd to give us a few tunes. My harmony was working, as were my percussive additions via various objects rapped against other objects.

More talk with Patricia and Daniel concerning constructing a beach bar out of the thousands of cobalt Corralejo bottles Daniel has collected over the years thanks to the nightly sunset tequila consultations on the beach in front of his home/business. Plans are being made as I type this..or will be soon.  Patricia is in charge of nagging.

Following are way too many photos of the sunset and musical accompaniment.  If you see which I should cut, I will take it under advisement. I have already trimmed down to fewer than half of what I took.

 

You know you can enlarge these by clicking on them, right?

Slice of Life (Heliconia) Flower of the Day, Feb 12, 2018

IMG_7630Detail of Heliconia  jdb photo 2018

The Holy Apewoman of Mexico

This post made years ago at the very beginning of my blog answers today’s prompt of “conjure” perfectly, so here it is again after a small edit:

The Holy Apewoman of Mexico

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 My dialogue takes place between my 7 year old self and my 70 year old self who, ironically, is writing this in Mexico.


Childhood Dreams

7
The mysteries
of Grandma’s barn
and basement—
whole lost worlds there.
Our own attic—a door held down
by a gravity never challenged.

I wanted to see
the hanging gardens of Babylon,
Mexico and Africa—
all these places from books,
their pieces jumbled together
like puzzle pieces
in the deep recesses of my closet,
scattered,
but ready for assembly
some day
when I would
make my future memories
happen.

70
I crouch with myself at seven—
sharing imagined dangers
in deep closets,
trying to conjure the world.
So many small town stories
overlooked
while I dreamed of living
in those fairy tale places
of Bible stories
that stood on a shelf
sandwiched between
the Bobbsey Twins
and Tarzan.

Some of us spend our lives
trying to be like books,
then spend our old age
trying to remember childhood,
mainly remembering
childhood’s dreams.

*

The prompt word today is conjure.

La Manzanilla Sunset, Feb 11, 2018

Beat this sky, if you can!!  One of the best of countless fabulous sunsets in La Manzanilla.
(Click on photos to enlarge.)

                                              Sunset Rating Society of La Manzanilla, Beach Bar Chapter.

Vendor Bender

Rapidly, the handmade Mexican handicrafts sold by beach vendors are being replaced by cheaply-made Chinese duplicates. I refuse to be a party to this destruction of native craftsmen and artists, so this year for the first time, I have not bought. Today, however, when this hawker walked by my porch, barely bothering to pitch his wares, I called out to him. I’d been to the Michoacan village that was devoted to creating the craft he was selling, and what can I say? I bought two–one for me, and one for my friend Marjorie Pauline, who actually only had to borrow 200 pesos. What was it that made me break my resolve?

Vendor Bender

What bought I on the beach today, What could I not resist?
What souvenir of  painted clay, what bauble for my wrist?
Though I have sworn no more to buy, why have I changed my mind?
Have I found a memento of a more novel kind?

The vendor started to walk by. I had to yell “How much?”
And within a minute, he had me in his clutch.
The price was right and  he possessed the perfect pitch to sell.
He serenaded me and oh,  he did it very well.

It mattered not that I had two others of its kind
waiting for me in my home, for  it was such a find!
I bought one, and my friend did, too. She knew not how to play it.
But I was complicit.  I did nothing to allay it.

I have no yachts or penthouses.  I have no fancy cars.
But although I rarely play, I now have three guitars!!!

 

Click on photos to enlarge.

You can read about the remarkable village where these guitars are made HERE.

More Tropical: Flower of the Day, Feb 11, 2017

Decided I’d get a bit more mileage out of my tropical coconut arrangement.  Here is the flip side of the bouquet:

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For Cee’s flower prompt.

Mnemonic Phonics

 

 

 

Mnemonic Phonics

Babies use clues amniotic
to deal with stimuli chaotic,
but later, memory gets thick.
In short,  it’s anything but quick.

Age slows us down and trims our wick,
fogs our recall,  slows our pick.
So I resort to many a trick
to give my mind a little kick.

This loss of memory’s demonic
and leads to fits most histrionic,
so I depend on clues mnemonic
for memory that’s supersonic:

(Can you guess what the below mnemonic devices help me to remember?)

Neither leisured foreigner
seized or forfeited the weird heights.

Every good boy does fine.
Good boys do fine always.

My very excellent mother just spewed up nine plums.

How about you?  What mnemonic devices do you use?

 

The prompt word is mnemonic.