Day 1266: Something You Like

Something I like to think is that reading my blog is something you like.

Is seeing this photo something you like?

Something I like is singing in front of people to the best of my ability without fear. Something you might like is that I absolutely did that, yesterday, at The Voice tryouts in New York City.

I didn’t get a red card for a callback and getting a callback is something I like. However, here’s something  I like almost as much: I let go of disappointment immediately, because

1. I knew I sang great,
2. I can’t control what The Voice is looking for,
3. My increasing confidence is going to help me sing more in public, and
4. There are so many other somethings in my life that I like.

Is there something you like in my other photos from yesterday?

 

 

 

 

Something I like is singing  my tryout song “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” a capella, like these guys (here on YouTube, if you like):

Is Acapella Soul something you like?  What about leaving comments?

One more thing I like: sharing some things I like with you, every day.

 

Day 1219: Tone

Try to imagine my tone of voice as I say any of the following statements:

Every year, I wait for the arrival of spring.

Spring is my favorite time of year.

I LOVE walking outside in sunny weather, feasting my eyes on the flowering trees and all the other brilliant colors of spring.

For years, I’ve done all I can do to take a week off from work in spring to enjoy the blossoming colors after the long Boston winter.

Last year, the local weather in May was predictably beautiful, but I had heart-related surgery during my week off, so I couldn’t really enjoy it.

Two years ago, I had pneumonia during April and May.

This year, I need to travel to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, at the end of May to consult with a cardiologist.

I was afraid that trip to the Mayo Clinic might prevent my taking off a week earlier in May to enjoy Boston’s spring weather.

However,  I was able to take two weeks off from work in May this year.

It was gloriously sunny on the first day of my May-stay-cation

Since then, it has been rainy and cold.

I just looked at the forecast for the rest of the week AND THERE IS NO SUN OR WARMTH IN THE FORECAST.

What is the tone of this post, so far?

Yesterday, while it was rainy and cold, I met up with my friend Tony, whom I often  affectionally call “Tone.”

Tony and have known each other for forty years!!!!!!! We’ve experienced many tones of life, along the way.

I say this with no tone of irony, sarcasm, or fear of being contradicted by him: Tone and I are BFFs (Best Friends Forever, Tony, in case you don’t know what that means).

I remember writing something to Tony, years ago, that began like so:

Tony! Toni! Tone!

Here‘s the band Tony! Toni! Toné! performing a relevant song:

It never rains in Southern California, but I’m here in rainy Boston, now, which gives me the opportunity to practice all the beautiful tones of forgiveness, patience, acceptance, and appreciation of what is, in every moment.

What tones do you see in the other photos I took yesterday?

Here’s the tone of my current thinking: What will be the tone of the comments I receive for today’s blog?

Many thanks to all the Tones that contributed to this post and to you — of course! — no matter what tones surround you.

Day 1042: Happiness

In yesterday’s blog post — which I was happy to present to you — we found out that thesaurus.com believes that happiness is the opposite of intensity.

Fairness, clarity, completeness, and closure are elements of happiness for me, so let’s see if thesaurus.com thinks “intensity” is an antonym of happiness.

It does not. Instead,  it lists these:

depression, despair, discouragement, displeasure, dissatisfaction, gloom, melancholy, misery, pain, sadness, trouble, unhappiness, upset, woe, worry

Does what thesaurus.com does —  or does not do —  get in the way of my happiness today?

It does not.

What might get in the way of my happiness today?

• When I was leaving the parking  garage of the movie theater where Michael, Aaron, and I saw Bridge of Spies last night, I scraped some happy yellow paint off the side mirror of my car, which has been providing me with lots of happiness.
• That’s all I can think of, in the moment.

To me, that is  happiness — waking up in the morning thinking of only one minor, fixable barrier to happiness.

I’m sure if I spent more time, right now, thinking about past experiences of or future possibilities for

depression, despair, discouragement, displeasure, dissatisfaction, gloom, melancholy, misery, pain, sadness, trouble, unhappiness, upset, woe, worry

… I could come up with lots more.

Instead, I’m going to share the music I was singing out loud yesterday and images I captured, with happiness.

                  

In my previous blog post quoting Pharrell William’s “Happy,” I wondered what he meant by a “room without a roof.”

Now I know.

What might contribute to your happiness today?

As always, it gives me happiness to express my thanks to all who help me create my posts and to all who read them (including you!).

Day 1003: Not a choice

After all these months of my blogging once a day, it’s not a choice whether I’m going to create a post. It IS a choice what I’m going to write about.

It’s not a choice that I sometimes have trouble realizing what my choices are and then deciding what to choose. It is a choice that I tolerate that discomfort and eventually choose.

“Not a choice” was a lyric I heard yesterday, as I made the choice to listen to “Loving You” from Stephen Sondheim’s musical Passion. It’s not a choice for me — at this point in my life — to love Stephen Sondheim’s musical choices. It was a choice, though, which version of that beautiful song to share with you all, today.

I just made the choice of showing you that version by Donna Murphy, from the original cast of Passion.

I’m also making the choice of including this quote, from the first comment on that video of “Loving You” on YouTube:

Today we celebrate Broadway from the 80’s and a few shows from the 90’s. “Passion” ran for 280 performances, making it the shortest-running musical ever to win the Tony award for Best Musical! There is a fine line between obsession and passion. Obsession connotes the feeling that the person is emotionally and mentally ill. Passion, conversely, is supposedly the healthy emotion which two people reciprocally feel for one another.

What might you choose to say about what David’s Broadway Station chose to write there?

This is what I choose to write, here and now. It’s not a choice for me to be:

• a little obsessive about making my blog posts — and other things in my life — “good enough” to meet my own standards,
• passionate about this blog, my work, and the people I love,
• living in Boston, Massachusetts, despite my feelings about the weather here, because my son is a senior in high school and I get all my medical care in Boston for some complex health issues, and
• going to see my Primary Care Physician, Dr. Laura Snydman, today, after a morning at work facilitating a therapy group.

Actually, most of those things ARE a choice. And I’m making the choice, right now, of making that choice point in this post.

It’s not a choice (or is it?)  that I’m going to include some photos here. It is a choice how I present them.

Hmmm.  My Apple devices have been making some unexpected choices, lately, regarding how they choose to share photos between them.  These kinds of unexpected choices  resulted in my blogging from my iPhone for several months earlier this year. I REALLY don’t want to make that choice of typing on that friggin’ phone keyboard any time soon, so let’s see if there’s another choice for me, now, to access yesterday’s photos quickly and easily.

It’s not a choice that I tried to prepare adequately for this last night — those choices are in the past.   Is it a choice how much anxiety, concern, worry, disappointment, or frustration I might feel about this unexpected blogging wrinkle, in the moment?

I’m making the choice to breathe, right now, and let go of any investment in how this post is going to turn out, photographically and otherwise.

I am now choosing to replicate the steps I took, last night, to make photos from yesterday accessible to this blog when I’m on my laptop. Therefore, I am making the choice to save this draft and restart my computer.

Drat! My photos from yesterday are NOT there when I choose “Add Media” and “Upload Files.” I don’t know why WordPress, my iPhone, and/or my laptop are choosing to limit my choices this morning. And I don’t have the choice to figure out that unexpected problem, if I choose to be at work on time this morning.

Actually, one photo from yesterday is available, for unknown reasons, so I shall choose that one:

That’s a photo I took during a therapy group yesterday, when we were all making choices about what topics to discuss.

I am also making the choice to include the first few photos from my choice of available photos, this morning:

You have a choice, as always,  to make whatever comment you choose about my post.

Choice thanks to all who helped me create this post this morning and to you — of course! — for making the choice of visiting here, today.

Day 776: Just Ask

If you have any questions or if you need anything, just ask. What have you got to lose?

Sometimes I hesitate to just ask, out of fear of a negative reaction. However, not asking means I will get no response, at all.  If I ask, at least I have a chance of getting something in return!

Yesterday morning, I just asked the universe for good enough weather, so my very-soon-to-be-17-year-old son Aaron and I could fly out to Los Angeles, California.

Here’s the first answer I saw:

That looks promising, doesn’t it?  However, the weather, as expected, deteriorated as we approached our flight time of 5:20 PM.

When Aaron and I were at Boston’s Logan airport yesterday, waiting to see if our plane would escape through Winter Storm Neptune to take us to sunny California, we saw this:

Of course, I couldn’t resist. So I walked up to the counter, acknowledged the invitation in the sign and just asked: “Will you be in my blog?”

Juan (on the right) didn’t just ask or say anything, but I took this photo anyway:

Juan just asked that I take a better photo of him, so I did:

Rico just asked me the name of my blog, and we agreed that he was more judgmental than Juan.

Then, Rico and Juan  just asked me: “What was your question?” And I repeated what I had just asked, “Will you be in my blog?”

The answer, if you didn’t already guess, was “yes.”

Then, I got some things I did not just ask for, including:

• a flight delay, because of ice on the wings,
• a return of my dreaded fevers, during the entire flight to California, and
• Aaron and I missing our only chance, this trip,  to see the weekly midnight show of comedian Ron Lynch (appearing, if you just ask, in previous blog posts including here, here, and here).

Here and now, I am also getting much more than I would ever think to just ask for, including

• my friend Krystal and her husband Jim’s generous and kind welcome to their lovely home in Santa Monica,
• dinner with Ron Lynch on Monday, and
• a return to a normal temperature, for me.

You might just ask me to show you some pictures of Santa Monica, but instead, I’ll just ask you to look at these photos I took before we left Boston:

 

     

If  you have any questions about those pictures — or anything else — in this post, just ask.

Many thanks to Aaron, Krystal, Jim, Juan, Rico, Ron, our cats, my boyfriend Michael (who I just asked to be my Valentine yesterday), to anybody anywhere who has had the courage to just ask, and to you — of course! — for just asking to read this post, today.

Day 593: A spot of bother

Whenever I start something different — a trip, a job change, anything new at all — I often start out with some disappointment.

I’m not sure why I get bothered by change, that way. Maybe I’m …

• anxious,
• stressed out,
• cranky
• expecting too much,  or
• fearful that any change might be a mistake, making things worse.

These days, at least,  I know enough to EXPECT this  reaction from myself. So, I’m ready for a spot of bother, when I’m starting something new, and I recover from it, more quickly.

Today, my 16-year-old son and I flew from Boston USA to Edinburgh, Scotland (via Philadelphia PA) for a six-day stay at the Fringe Festival.

Sure enough, when we got to our hotel, I felt that old, familiar disappointment.  I think I was bothered, because it wasn’t the familiar place we stayed in, last year. Now, that change was deliberate; we WANTED something new.  I knew to expect difference, going in. Nevertheless, when we made our way to our new hotel, I felt a strong sense of nostalgia, for our experience last year.

Well, the hotel last year DID have an AMAZING view, of Edinburgh Castle.

You can’t beat that, can you?

Today, after my son and I  found out that our hotel room wasn’t ready, we walked around Edinburgh, trying to experience the old and the new, including lots of people attending the Fringe Festival.  I did take some photos but — I’ll warn you —  they’re not that great.  I was jet lagged and my son gets cranky, sometimes, when I stop to take pictures.

However, maybe some of these images are good enough, for now.

That’s a photo I took from the new tram system in Edinburgh, which brought us from the airport to our hotel.

Oooops! I just got a message, on my laptop, saying that I was about to exceed my data transfer limit for my internet access in the hotel

Yikes!  I’d better find out what I can do about that.

I may very well  be disappointed about internet access here, especially if I compare that data transfer limit to every other hotel I’ve blogged from, since January 1, 2013.

It’s a good thing I committed to posting only one photo a day here, from Edinburgh.

Here’s the photo I definitely wanted to show you, today:

 

 

Hmmm. I’m not sure if that image is even showing up here. If you can’t see it, it’s a photo I took on the plane, of the book I’m reading.

“A Spot of Bother,” by Mark Haddon.

So far, I LOVE it.

Thanks to Mark Haddon, to my son, to the good people of Edinburgh, to those who are on the fringe, to people who do their best to let go of disappointment and unhelpful comparisons, to friends old and new,  and to you — of course! — for taking the bother to be here, today.