Every day, for the past eight years, I’ve been telling people what’s on my mind through this blog.
Today, Georgia is on my mind, because of the two races for control of the U.S. Senate and because of this:
There exists a recording of somebody with sedition on his mind calling the Georgia Secretary of State, but because I don’t want to go out of my mind listening to somebody who is out of his mind, I’d rather listen to “Georgia on my Mind” performed by writer Hoagy Carmichael.
What’s on my mind also includes a broken filling in my tooth, which I’m letting my dentist know about now because he reads this blog every day. Hello, Dr. Del Castillo! It’s on my mind to call your office today.
I share what’s on my mind by capturing images like these:
What’s on your mind, here and now?
Gratitude is always on my mind, so thanks to all who help me share what’s on my mind every day, including you!
Yesterday, I witnessed somebody telling a writer that their story did not answer the “Why should I care?” test. Why should I care about that? Well, sometimes I wonder why my loyal and lovely readers should care about the personal words and photos I share in this blog.
Why should you care if I went to the dentist yesterday and got a new dental crown that was created, before my eyes, in a 3-D printer? Why should you care if Michael and I took Oscar to the vet and he got a clean bill of health? Why should you care if Harley escaped going to the vet by scratching Michael, hissing, growling, and making it impossible for us to corral him in time to make the appointment? In other words, why should you care about what I care about?
Why should you care about how I recorded some of yesterday’s moments?
Why should any of us care about allowing cats and people to communicate their stories in an authentic, personal, and full-bodied way?
Why should anybody care about this video I took of the creation of my new dental crown?
Why should I care about the comments you make on this blog? There are SO many reasons I care. I can only hope I convey that caring in every post and every answer, every day.
Yesterday, on a special day, I noticed “Special Operations” on a parked police motorcycle.
I thought, “I’m going to be interviewed for a special podcast tonight about my special heart and several special operations, including open heart surgery.” As I was taking that special photo for today’s “Special Operations” blog post, I heard somebody speaking to me and that turned out to be special operations officer Hicks:
I explained to Officer Hicks, “I took that photo because I’ve had many special operations on my heart.” He said something special, like “Those special operations must have gone well because you look pretty good considering you’ve had all those special operations.” He also said he didn’t think he was handsome enough to be in a blog, which I thought was especially modest.
Officer Hicks and many other special operations officers were in Boston yesterday, in preparation for the special Boston 4th of July celebration today. Minutes after I photographed special operations officer Hicks, I noticed something special on my car.
I thought, “What?!?! It’s true that I just spent a long time getting a special teeth cleaning and also talking to my special dentist Dr. Del Castillo, who is doing so well after having the special operation of a double lung transplant, but I don’t think that took over two hours!” I looked more closely and saw this special reason for that ticket:
Since when do they give out special tickets for being over 1 ft from the curb, especially since only the back of my car barely met that special criteria?
I know that special operations officer Hicks is not somebody who gives out tickets and — in case he thinks that I’m looking for special treatment — I already did an online special operation last night to pay it.
Do you see any special operations in my other special photos from yesterday?
As you can see from those photos, I did a special operation of pre-medicating before my dental cleaning and did a special operation when I got home — trying out a new cat carrier on Oscar, our cat-in-a-bag.
After my special boyfriend Michael and I walked around our special neighborhood last night (and saw some unexpectedly special fireworks and a special beach bonfire), we danced to this special 4th of July song:
Now, I’m going to request that you do the special operation of making a comment, below.
Happy July 4th to everybody who performs the special operation of reading this blog, including YOU!
It took me several special operations to upload my photos today. I hope you don’t have to perform any special operations to see them!
Look at me, writing a second blog post titled “Look at me!” almost exactly two thousand and two hundred days after the first one. (Who’s counting? Look at me!)
Look at me, sharing what I drew in a therapy group yesterday, when the topic chosen by the group was “children.”
Look at me, seeing my wonderful dentist for the first time since his double lung transplant eight months ago.
For the first few years of this blog, I didn’t let anybody look at me!
Look at me, sharing all my other photos from yesterday.
Look at Harley, letting me look at him without running away.
Look at me, warning you not to watch that unless you lower the sound before you get to the dubbed rapping. Here‘s 7-year-old Mir Money‘s actual performance on the show:
Look at Howard Stern hugging Mir Money after he made him cry.
If you look at the good comments in yesterday’s post, you might notice that some good people had some trouble discerning whether that post had good news.
The news in today’s post is that I can relate to that confusion. When I look at the news these days, I often ask myself and others, “Is this good news?”
It’s probably not news that I’m going to share many new photos and relate them to today’s topic. I ask you, good readers, is this good news?
Is this good news that my son Aaron took so many photos of camera-shy Michael? I guess it depends on your perspective and on who you are.
Yesterday, in the home office of a major medical institution in Boston, a therapy group discussed the topic of “home.” This hit home for me, because soon I’ll be changing my current home for a different one.
I asked the group to write, draw, or otherwise express thoughts and feelings about home. Here’s what I did:
From my home this morning, I’d like to share this music about home.
As I look at my list of “What Makes a Home a Home?” from the comfort of my home, I see that I wrote “pictures.” Here are more pictures from yesterday.
I also wrote that “People make the home” and listed gratitude on “What makes a home a home?” Many thanks to the people in my therapy groups, to my bass-playing dentist Dr. Del Castillo, to my friend Deb, to Simon & Garfunkel, to all the other people who help make this my blogging home, and to you — of course! — for visiting me in my home, here and now.
In honor of the 50th anniversary of the release in the USA of the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper, here’s another Home song: