These leaf cutouts are so wonderful that they defy description. Click on link below to see 30 of them:
https://www.boredpanda.com/japanese-artist-cute-leaf-cutouts-lito-leafart/
Incredible Leaf Cutouts
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Tag Archives: reblog.
Americas Doing Worst in COVID-19 Pandemic, Making Up 55 Percent of Global Deaths
Why I am Voting for Biden, by Duffy Exon
A friend in Wyoming who happens to be the significant other of one of my best longtime friends wrote this explanation of why he is voting for Biden. It comes as close to the reason why I am doing the same as anything else I’ve read, so I wanted to share it with you:
Why I am Voting for Biden, by Duffy Exon
After reading a copy and paste declaration on the page of one of my few remaining trumpkin friends, I thought about it for a few minutes. It’s a pity the GOP didn’t use it for a Party platform, because it spells out the ideals of the Party much more eloquently than the “whatever the orange guy says”, that is apparently the platform this year. It inspired me, as a matter of fact, to examine and write my own.
I’m voting for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. They weren’t my first choice, but I believe that they’ll get the United States closer to what we like to think we are as a nation and as a people.
I may be a starry eyed fool, but I believe in all those things that we say when we pledge allegiance to the flag. I believe that we are one nation, not warring tribes of self-centered John Galts, one nation that includes everyone who wants act together to build the United States for the common good of all our citizens. I believe that we are under G*d, however you choose to define Him/Her/It, even if you don’t wish to define or believe. (It’s kinda in the Bill of Rights). I believe that the government shouldn’t really have a say in how or what you worship.
I believe that “Liberty and Justice for all”, stuff too. Not more liberty and justice for me because I’m an old white man who lives in Wyoming. Liberty and justice for ALL, even if you live in a housing project or in a storm drain or under an overpass. That means my vote ought to count just as much as my cousin’s vote in California. It means getting rid of things we did to make slaveholders feel good in the eighteenth century. Yeah, I know. “Tyranny by the majority”… is that really better than tyranny by the minority?
I’m voting for Joe Biden because of the Supreme Court. I want Supreme Court Justices that are scholars of the Constitution, not ideologues that think that money = speech, and corporations are people. I want people on that bench who remember who John Marshall was, and what he did for the concept of checks and balances. I want a woman’s health decisions to be between her, her physician and her clergy, if she chooses to have one present, not someone from the Department of Health Services. If you want rights for children, that needs to include rights for those who have made it out of the birth canal. Like not being locked in a cage because your parents dared to dream of a better life for you.
The Second Amendment is now settled law, thanks to Heller and McDonald. That’s fine by me. It’s not wise to mess with Stere Decisis. You know, like Rowe v. Wade?
I believe that everyone who puts on the uniform of this nation, military or civilian law enforcement officers, need to be fully protected and fairly compensated. We spend a trillion dollars a year on the military. A living wage is not too much to ask for those who protect us. We should not be looking the other way when our adversaries place bounties on the heads of our soldiers.
The police need to be police, not mental health professionals, educators, or substance abuse councilors. They need high standards of training and they need to be compensated accordingly. We need to stop expecting them to cover our parenting mistakes.
And further, I believe that everyone has rights, given by G*d, and that includes affordable healthcare. Yeah, I know that it costs money. It’s money that we pay as insurance premiums, fees for services or taxes. There really is no such thing as a free lunch.
I am the great grandchild of immigrants. I haven’t forgotten that. If you’re here, you are either the descendant of slaves, First Nations People or immigrants too. Don’t forget it and try to slam the gate behind you. Let’s get a workable process for those that wish to come here and be one of us.
Finally, I’m voting for Biden because I’m sick of people that want to mess up the world our Creator gave us for money or for fun, then run away. If you make a mess, clean it up. My mom taught me. I taught my kids. They’re teaching theirs. I don’t know why it didn’t soak in to BP Arco, Rio Tinto or Chevron Texaco.
That’s why. You can feel free to disagree with me, and we can even discuss it politely if you like. You might change my mind, but you’ll have to be civil and support your arguments.
Hard Drive
The year is 2100, and my computer’s dusty hard drive has just resurfaced at an antique store. This is a note to the curious buyer explaining what he or she will find inside.
Hard Drive
If you long for mystery,
poems, facts and history,
long perambulations
and wild exaggerations,
recipes and letters and
episodes of Homeland,
Elementary, Sherlock, Friends,
a blogging site that never ends,
Emails, Youtube, Facebook notes,
starts of novels, copied quotes,
OkCupid pictures of
possibilities for love,
notes from nice guys, threats from creeps,
notes from guys who play for keeps,
friends who only write when drunk,
chain e-mails, jokes and other junk,
two hundred drafts of my third book,
(each one different, have a look),
kids stories and their illustrations,
the Christmas plans of my relations,
photographs of my whole life—
its happiness and pain and strife—
some successes but also follies:
fireworks, insects, gardens, dollies,
travel snaps and friendly faces,
rooms at home or foreign places,
birds and children, beaches, skies,
the camera lens is true and wise
and not as given to fraud and lies
as writings filtered through the eyes
of one who feels the joys or pains
of what she witnesses, then refrains
from trying to change her reader’s mind
to accord with the type or kind
of thoughts she carries deep inside:
pride’s cutting edge, love’s waning tide—
then read this hard drive if you dare,
but if you fear a life laid bare,
I have one word for you. Beware.
Found Poem
I was looking for another poem that I wrote but have never published or put on my blog. I couldn’t find it but instead found this poem that I wrote four years ago. Seems as though it would qualify for this prompt!! It’s actually a true story. When I was at the beach a few years ago, I had a house right on the beach and it got so I never knew who I would find on my porch when I woke up in the morning.
Found Poem
One and two and three and four.
Four little music makers pounding on my door.
One beats a rhythm, one toots a horn––
wild and sweet––sort of forlorn.
One hums a tune behind his teeth––
a sort of descant underneath
the melody on the steel guitar.
The gulls reel in from near and far
to add their screams to the refrain,
then fan their wings, silent again.
Four musicians at my gate.
I wait for their music to abate.
Then I go and let them in
to add my music to the din.
I sing my lyrics fast and slow
first soft then loud, my lyrics go
up and over the drums and horn–
out into the sandy morn.
Over the rocks and out to sea,
setting all our music free.
When the drummer leaves my porch,
he leaves just three to loft the torch.
Too soon the horn, too, fades away
but the hummer’s here to stay,
and the steel guitar swells out to fill
the morning air until until
the morning fades into full sun
and our melody comes done.
Soon guitar and singer fade,
their morning share of music made,
and I fold my songs away.
I’ll bring them out some other day.
With music left behind I wind
only words around my mind.
They weave their spell with me along.
I lose myself in their noisy throng.
Wander aimless, round and round,
in getting lost, this poem is found.
For Fandango’s Dog Days of August Challenge: Something you Found.
lifelessons - a blog by Judy Dykstra-Brown 