Blogapalooza 2016 - Day 7: I'd Love to Learn ...

     I'm sure everyone has their list of things they'd like to learn how to do and a while back I wrote down mine.  Unfortunately I don't have the confidence or the money to take advantage of any local opportunities to fulfill these right now, but hopefully some day!

• Learn how to do a handstand (I can do a cartwheel so I'm halfway there!)
• Learn to pick a lock
• Learn calligraphy
• Learn Russian
• Learn Sign Language
• Learn Hebrew
• Master 5 makeup tutorials
• Learn 5 dance routines from YouTube/Disney
• Get CERT trained
• Learn to make 5 types of bread
• Figure out how to make Greek Lemon Chicken soup with orzo like New Seasons  (I want to be able to eat it all the time, but without the nasty celery!)
• Learn a complete song on the piano, both hands!  (I'm good at read and playing with my right hand, but getting my left in at the same time is tough.  Rhythm is not my strong suit so I have a hard time keeping track of the timing for both parts.)
• Learn to play the guitar  (So many musicians seem to use guitars as their composing instrument and it is ever so much more portable than a piano so I think it would be a good skill to have.)
• Learn archery (longbow and compact)
• Take horseback riding lessons so I’m more comfortable around horses
• Learn how to load, unload, and shoot a gun
• Take a self defense course
• Restart piano lessons  (I know I am better at something when I am accountable to someone else so this would help with my goal of learning a full song.)
• Learn to swim confidently  (I love the water but am also terrified of it.  "Oh the shame of the polar bear who fears the water. No wonder we are shunned by our fellow bear. Woe is us." - Muk and Luk from Balto.)
• Take swing dancing lessons

     What are some things you'd like to learn?

Day 31 - Whispered dreams

August 31 - They're talking in whispers

     They are a handsome couple as they sweep the floor to a waltz and none of those watching would deny it, though they may protect in the same breath that the pair was very odd indeed.  Why a man such as he would deign to dance with a lass such as she, well, they simply could not supposed.  Wasn't the look in his eye that of love?  Well!  They wouldn't dare assume!  He, after all, was a terribly rich and private person, who knew what one such as he thought.  He certainly wasn't the kind to display such feelings.

     Is it Elizabeth and Darcy?  Belle and Mr. Gold?  Anne and Wentworth?  I have no idea.  I have been on such an Austen/Pride and Prejudice kick lately.  ^_^  No matter who is dancing, all the ladies are in floofy dresses and the men are in suits and cravats and are terribly dashing!  And those whispering are doing so behind fans.  
     I got lost wandering the web looking at pictures of those pairings (even though I already had the Darcys), which is why this post is a little late.  :)  I used the 'newer' Wentworth rather than Cirian Hinds because Cirian looked ridiculous in all the pictures I could find of him.

Day 31 - Dreaming Your Ship

     How much of my work is autobiographical?  Well ... most of my main characters are auburn, have younger siblings, age as I do ... physically they do resemble me but that is about where it ends, which is part of the point Ms. A makes by quoting John Cheever.  "As you dream your ship, you perhaps know the boat, but you're going toward a coast that's quite strange, you're wearing strange clothes, the language you don't understand, but the woman on your left is your wife."
     Most authors include some aspect of their life in their work I imagine, some more transparently than others.

Day 25 - Searching, Impossible, Failing

August 25 - In search of impossible light (after Larissa Szporluk)

Music - Interlude VII from Fresh Aire IV by Mannheim Steamroller; The Impossible Dream from Stage Heroes by Colm Wilkinson


Striving
Hand outstretched
Grasping
Searching
Trying
Hoping
In vain
The struggle
To find it
To reach it
That impossible light
That unreachable star
That unreachable dream

What kind of crazy awesome name is Szporluk?  Wow.  I need a pseudonym that is half as awesome.

Day 25 - Failing Better

"No marks on paper can ever measure up to the word's music in the mind, to the purity of the image before its ambush by language."  - Mary Gordon
"What we need to do is think of all our failed drafts simply as steps toward the final one, the one that works."  - Barbara Abercrombie

You have no idea how many times I have bewailed and bemoaned the fact that we don't have telepathic abilities.  Star Trek, you are cruel for introducing me to the idea/possibility.  The images I see in my head and scenes I write have so much more depth and flavor and character and emotion than what I am capable of conveying on paper.  Sometimes I can rewrite or edit in some of what I miss the first time but there comes a point where there are too many words and they begin to obscure the image I am trying to paint/clarify.  See, right there.  We don't have a word to convey the thought/feeling/emotion I am going for so I resort to slashes.  Some day, my friends, I can only hope, some day we will have the ability to convey ourselves perfectly.

I was feeling like this was a little 'blah' so I am glad to be able to include pictures!  And on an unrelated note, I think Barbara is a weird name.  Bar Bar A

Day 12 - Long way of patience

August 12 - Write about taking the long way around

I took the long way around to the car from the library yesterday.  Normally I take the the handy new cut out but there was a cyclist fixing their shoe with their dog.  It was hot and the dog seemed friendly but I decided to give it room.  So I changed course like a pond skimmer, all angles, sharp turns, and quick movements.  I felt bad for possibly implying that the dog wasn't nice and the people/man behind me probably thought I was afraid of dogs but it's OK.  I took the long way around.

Day 12 - Patience

Writing takes time; dreaming, remembering, thinking, imagining, silence, solitude, and wasting time.
There is no fast and easy way around it.

Day 7 - Dreaming and Jumping

August 7 - "In my dream I was the first to arrive" (after Thomas Smith)

I don't necessarily like being the first to arrive because then I'm not sure I'm in the right spot, but I definitely like being one of the first.  Then I can help with any last minute set-up or prep; I know where everything is before people show up; I can familiarize myself with the location before there is a crowd; and I can slowly greet people/acclimate to the noise as people trickle in rather than jumping into a crowded, noisy, potentially unfamiliar local.

Day 7 - Jumping Off

OK, they can finish talking about the risk taking or inappropriate side of writing any day now.
I do like the idea of randomly bursting into song in the middle of class though.