Sunday stuff...

Oh my gosh! So true...from today's New York Times:

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We Now Conclude Our Broadcast Day

Recalling the Imperfect Radio and TV Reception of the Past

By DANA JENNINGSDEC. 19, 2014

Inside

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Remember when you had to wait for the TV to warm up before you could watch it? Credit Getty Images

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Also from today's New York Times:

Many years ago, when I was an innocent lamb making my first appearance on a right-wing radio talk show, the host asked, “If you don’t believe in God, what’s to stop you from committing murder?” I blurted out, “It’s never actually occurred to me to murder anyone.”

Even though I believe in God, it's long irked me that some people think atheists aren't moral people. If anything, a person not believing in God (and therefore possible eternal damnation in Hell) and still doing the right thing means she's doing the right thing for the right reason, not because of some fear of punishment:

read more here:  http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/21/books/review/living-the-secular-life-by-phil-zuckerman.html

Okay, so I am addicted to Google Play Books and discovered a book by Havelock Ellis that has some rather interesting insights on sex. 

I don’t know to how to quote what I found intriguing without sounding rather crude (the book is surprisingly graphic for the late 19th century). In less crude terms, I’ll say what I think Ellis is saying and that is this: sex may seem highly biological and messy (he uses “evacuation” instead of the much more common modern term that also starts with “e”) but it has to be more if it comes with such a high intensity of emotion.

I can't believe how many times I've been experiencing something in my own life and then pick up a book that I have just started reading  and it's like the passage was meant for me to see:

The relation of love to pain is one of the most difficult problems...why is it that love inflicts, and even seeks to inflict, pain? Why is it that love suffers pain and even seeks to suffer it?

Picking up the book to read more of the "Love and Pain" chapter from one of this books I find myself more fascinated with the non-personal related aspects of it all and get sucked into the leaning and human interest parts. Reading and learning has so often been able to pull me out of myself and realize how universal alienation can be.

I am so glad I still have more Kayla Bashe stories to read. She is an amazing author and I love the way her characters care about each other and touch readers' hearts.

Graveyard Sparrow offers intriguing mystery, but it is the love that blossoms between Katriona and Anthea that pulls you into the story, head over heels. Whether they are about loneliness or love, so many of the passages get it just right:

--It was hard enough to interact with people in the first place. But when you weren't sure what they wanted to share and what they were hiding, interaction became nearly impossible.

--She thought she wanted Anthea around for the rest of her life. If she holds onto me any longer, people will think we’re betrothed, Anthea thought.

Also a huge plus is that Graveyard Sparrow takes place during the Regency era and, for all its dark side, has a charm and character well-suited to its time. This is a must-read for anyone who likes their romance chaste and their plots compelling. :)

Except for reading Elle for the book reviews, most of my adult life I have shied away from fashion magazines, not because of the fashion itself (though I know nothing about nor care for it that much) but because of the sex articles.

The degree to which some details are shared doesn't offend me (to each her own, right?) so much as it makes me feel completely inadequate and unadultlike. Sometimes, I feel as clueless as I did as a pre-teen.

Growing up, I used to think it was cute that my mom had to spell out words like "bra" and "sex," until, looking back now, I realized I knew little about either because they were two words that dare not ever speak their full name in our house.

I stopped believing in the stork around the same time I stopped believing in Santa, but still I had no clue about sex (no clue!) until middle school. I guess I thought babies popped up from flowers like in an Anne Geddes photo shoot or that two adults (as the narrator in Paul Zindel's Pigman imagines about his parents) bumped into each other accidentally in the bedroom and (bam!) a baby would soon be on its way into the world.

Just when it seemed it was time for my parents to finally explain, to finally explain it for real, "family life" (that was what they called it in the early 80s in my middle school) came along and 7th grade health class turned the silliest possible rumors about sex (you don't even want to know what some of the kids were saying) into sterile, sometimes uncomfortable, biological truths.

I had read a forbidden copy of Forever before middle school, but I honestly didn't get what the two characters did together. I thought it sounded funny more than anything else. It seemed about as romantic as a science experiment with rabbits gone horribly wrong.

My parents meant well, I'm sure, as they were both shy and sheltering when it came to that other "s" word. But I doubt they would have been able to get away with that approach these days. It seems like the age kids find out about sex (though hopefully aren't actually having it) gets younger every year.

My mother would still never dare talk about sex, or "s-e-x," with me now and not just because there's nothing to talk about and I would be mortified to, even if there were. Just as she doesn't seem to truly believe (much less accept) I'm gay, no matter that it's been almost twenty five years since I tried to come out, she seems to believe if you don't talk about something, it doesn't exist.

Maybe I've picked up some of that along the way because instead of reading the articles with interest, I kind of snap through the pages fast until it feels safe again to look at the magazine. How adult is that?

I'd like to say upfront that I have never been that fond of poetry, which is odd for someone who likes music a lot. Maybe it comes from too many years of having to read it against my will in school or maybe I was exposed to too much of the dark side of it...I'm not sure. I do know I love Emily Dickinson, but that's about it.  My poetry expertise is seriously lacking.

 

Even so, I like _My Strength_ because it's sincere, often sweet and very much for anyone needing to find inner strength wherever they can. Sincerity and sweetness can go a long way for someone who truly needs both in their lives during trying times. All the proper poetry technique in the world means nothing to me if there is no heart to it and Debra George's poetry definitely has lots of heart.

 

My three favorites from this collection are "Anger" ("This will be the last that /Anger causes me dismay/Just keep in mind that /anytime you go to that dark place"), "Crazy" (Captured in the middle/ nothing's funny yet you giggle/ Feeling out of place but you/ still try to act civil) and "Disgust" (But you’re in another place, /and they take that as being rude.)* There is an honesty to them, an easy to relate to quality about the whole collection that I like a lot.

 

The author herself writes in the beginning: "I wrote this for all of those who encounter emotional challenges in their everyday life. We are all human and experience a spiral of different feelings." One of my favorite passages is from "Yearning: "...just the feeling alone is the entity that carries you."

 

_My Strength_ is meant for those of us who get exactly what she's saying. I'll keep this on my Kindle app because of that. After all, one reason many of us read is because it gives us great comfort to know we're not alone in our thoughts, even the most isolating or odd ones....

 

*Just a side note: I put the breaks in as they appeared in the Kindle edition on the

iPhone app.

Bread, specifically David Gates, is exactly what I need right now. I love his gentle voice (that goes so well with his kind face) and I need a good cry and if a person can't cry over songs like "If" and "Lost Without Your Love," then what songs can you cry over? I swear...if actresses need help getting ready for a scene where they have to sob, they should just listen to David Gates.

 

I found this article on him very interesting, especially since its focus is on "Diary" and why it's such a rare kind of song for pop:

 

“Diary” actually surged as high as #15 in 1972. Maybe the one thing that Gates overlooked when assessing the song is that is the lure of a great twist ending. It’s the kind of a thing that’s a little easier to pull off in a movie when there are a couple of hours to set the surprise up. It’s a much tougher task in a song, but Gates pulls it off while still delivering a resonant story of unrequited love.

 

http://www.americansongwriter.com/2013/09/bread-diary/

 

The lyrics to "Diary":

 

I found her diary underneath a tree
And started reading about me
The words she'd written took me by surprise
You'd never read them in her eyes

They said that she had found
The love she'd waited for
Wouldn't you know it?
She wouldn't show it

When she confronted with the writing there
Simply pretended not to care
I passed it off as just in keeping with
Her total disconcerting air

And though she tried to hide
The love that she denied
Wouldn't you know it?
She wouldn't show it

And as I go through my life
I will give to her my wife
All the sweet things, I can find

I found her diary underneath a tree
And started reading about me
The words began to stick and tears to flow
Her meaning now was clear to see

The love she'd waited for
Was someone else not me
Wouldn't you know it?
She wouldn't show it

And as I go through my life
I will wish for her his wife
All the sweet things she can find
All the sweet things they can find

It seems perfectly fitting that someone who writes and sings as David Gates does has remained married to his high school sweetheart since 1958. As the article above points out:

 In one of the noblest gestures under extreme duress in pop music history, somehow this guy musters up the strength to give this couple his blessings: “And as I go through my life/I will wish for her his wife/All the sweet things they can find/All the sweet things they can find.”

I think that's why I like the song so much...because it captures true love, which is wanting the person you care about to be happy, whether she feels the same for you or not.
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