Day 3304: Any questions?

Any questions about my images for today?

Any questions about what is the most important way to celebrate today?

If you have any questions, you can ask them in the comments section, below.

Any questions about how grateful I am that you visit this blog?

Day 1841: Today

Today is Martin Luther King Day in the United States.

How to honor Martin Luther King, today?

Two years ago, I wrote about the void left by his death and tried to fill that void with quotes from him.

Today, I want to spend  MLK Day contemplating his dream …

… and what is happening to his dream today.

I’m noticing that two of my recent photos are relevant today.

I think that those who miss the boat on respectfully coexisting with others who are different from them are dinosaurs.  I’ve got to believe they’ll become extinct. Not today, but someday.

Today, as always, I end my post with gratitude. Today, it’s evermore thanks to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and to you.

 

Day 749: Brave enough

Here’s something I’m often brave enough to ask when I’m facilitating a therapy group:

Who is brave enough to get us started?

Who is brave enough to get us started, here and now, dear readers?  I guess it’s  … me!

Are you brave enough to come along?

Right after I published yesterday’s post, which included this photo

… I was brave enough to take a closer look at the face of Penny the Pen, despite my fear of what I might see.

Eeeek!  It seems like Penny — by accompanying me on my adventures since the New Year — has experienced some assault and battery to her face. I’m glad she is brave enough to keep smiling.

Because I’m so sensitive to facial expressions, I wanted to immediately fix Penny’s face yesterday morning. But I wasn’t sure  I was skilled, steady, or brave enough to do so.

I had the equipment.

That’s a permanent marker, so I wasn’t brave enough to use it, at first. However, other non-permanent solutions (like pencils and pens) did not make a mark, at all.

After taking a deep breath, I was brave enough to use that permanent Sharpie to draw in Penny’s eyebrow.

Are you brave enough to look?

I’m brave enough to brag that I did a good-enough job on Penny’s eyebrow.   I haven’t been brave enough, so far, to attempt repairing her eye.

Are you brave enough to vote about what to do about Penny’s eye, in the comments below?  Here are the options I am brave enough to see, at the moment:

1. I become brave enough to draw a new eye for Penny, despite the risks of drawing something that  might look weird, permanently.
2. I become brave enough to let Penny stay as she is now, reframing and re-seeing her expression as a friendly wink.
3. I become brave enough to let somebody else do the repair, who is more skilled and experienced than I.

Right now, I am brave enough to see some parallels there between Penny’s face and my unusual heart (which may need some fixing in the near future, too).

What else do I want to tell you, today, about “Brave Enough”?

Yesterday, I was brave enough to do 7 miles on my brand new, pink elliptical!

  

I watched the movie Muscle Shoals while I was brave enough to log all those mile yesterday. Here are some photos I was brave enough to take, along the way.

That’s the hospital where singer Percy Sledge was brave enough to work and to sing for the patients, before he was brave enough to create his first record —  “When A Man Loves A Woman” —  at  a music studio in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, USA.

Here’s Percy Sledge, bravely singing that song (found here on YouTube) from his heart and soul:

When I was brave enough to reach this distance on my elliptical:

I saw the brave man we are honoring in the USA today.

 

A few miles after seeing Martin Luther King, Jr., I saw another personal hero, who grew up in Muscle Shoals, Alabama.

That’s Helen Keller (who previously appeared in this post, which I wrote last May, when I was being brave enough while recovering from pneumonia).

I am now brave enough to recommend the movie Muscle Shoals to you, without reservation.

Here are some more things I am brave enough to tell you, right now:

1. Last week, I was brave enough to ask someone if I had lost her by expressing some frustration and anger. Her brave answer: “It would be impossible for you to lose me.”
2. In two days, I will be meeting with my long-time and trusted cardiologist, Dr. Deeb Salem. I plan to be brave enough to ask him some questions about possible surgical repairs for my very unusual heart AND brave enough to listen to his answers.
3. I took some photos yesterday of our two cats — Harley and Oscar — who are brave enough to have very different styles, regarding bravery:

That’s Harley, reacting to my being on the elliptical for the first time, running by as quickly as he can. Here’s Oscar, with more obvious bravery:

 

Are you brave enough to stick around for a few more photos I snapped yesterday, at my weekly supermarket shopping with my boyfriend Michael?  Penny stayed home, resting her eye, but I brought along this stand-in

who first appeared in this post I was brave enough to write, last month, after consulting with other cardiologists.

   

Oh, and just one more photo, from this morning:

Oscar and Harley are both brave enough to stick by me here. That helps me feel brave enough, today.

Thanks to Martin Luther King Jr., to Helen Keller, to Percy Sledge and the other incredible musicians and producers who’ve worked together at Muscle Shoals studios, to everyone and everything that helped me be brave enough to write this post, and to all those who are brave enough in their own way, every day — including you, of course.