Hello to you . How are you today? It’s a sunny start to the day. It feels so nice! I am doing ok today. I’m thinking about Halloween. I bought a couple small bags of Snickers to pass out and am thinking about wearing my steampunk hat and goggles! I am having to break through my grief. Halloween was our favorite holiday.
I did this last May
Who am now? So much of my identity was plural! It was Kyle and Jackie not just Jackie. I am having to find out who I am now. Yesterday I deleted my Tinder (dating app) account because I realized I have no business being there. Like I talked about in my previous blog. I am walking around carrying a bag full of holes!
“Gradually, carefully God unravels the mystery that is a life. Be it mother, sister, friend or wife. Previously curtained paths do a slight reveal. A joy is found that no one can steal.”
Hello . How are you? It’s an overcast day. The sun is playing peek-a-boo with roaming clouds. Link is here. I am so grateful for him and his company !
“Where are you twin star in all this cosmic dust?”
My little drum
For some reason I’m having trouble writing today. My life is in a sort of stasis right now. Everything is in place but isn’t moving. I feel like God is testing my resolve! I am having to be patient!
“I have to remember there are many pieces to move for a single moment! “
Good morning – least that’s what it is here. How are you? I’m sitting here with a cold cup of coffee thinking about the word that came to me on the morning walk. It was patience.
“Adopt the pace of nature; her secret is patience. “ Ralph Waldo Emerson
Patience has never been one of my strong suites! Especially when it comes to waiting for God. I will talk to God about something and more times than not expect an answer right away and that’s just not how things work . There are so many pieces that have to move to answer a prayer! Like for instance what I have been talking about with starting a meetup group in my town. Even if I pay the money to start the group there is no guarantee people will just magically appear! It could take months or even more before even one person signs up. How much patience do I have? I’m not sure if people in my town even know Meetup exists! Will anyone here want to play a drum?
All I can do is try!
Will anyone join me ?
“Little drummer girl blowing in the wind, where does this journey end when it has yet to begin? Take your drum and play a beat trust in God new souls to meet. The lonely days will soon pass away for just how long only you can say. Be patient drummer girl your on the path to new days. You will soon be shoulder to shoulder where everybody plays .”
Hello! How are you today? I didn’t want to get out of bed this morning. It’s real windy here. The clouds are playing with the leaves. It’s really quite magical to watch.
“When someone tells you to “find your niche,” they mean you should find the very specific activity or position that sets you apart and in which you can find success or fulfillment. … Much less commonly, niche can be used as a verb meaning to place something in this kind of niche.”
When I asked what I should write about this word came to mind. Lately I’ve been watching a lot of YouTube videos on how to make things . What I’ve noticed is when a particular video gets a lot of views there will be a bunch of other people who come behind trying to do the exact same thing. You see this in our economy too. It’s not enough that Crayola makes chalk and writing instruments. A bunch of other companies have to make them too and usually on the cheap.
“To each there is a message and a messenger.”
My niche has always been drawing and writing. Both over saturated worlds. I have been doing these things ever since I was like 4 of 5 years old when I would write short stories for my classmates. I used to spend hours drawing portraits and writing poems. Sadly in many ways I have regressed in my niche. I’m not as good as I should be by this stage of my life. I think it’s because I have never done what I do for a living. Nothing or no one has pushed me to be better.
I think we are all looking for our niche. Where do I belong? How do I fit into this complex puzzle of existence? Some people actually find it and lead fulfilled lives and others of us keep puttering along trying to find it. I believe a lot of people never find their niche or find it but haven’t the ways and means to break through and be seen. There are some who are seen and can’t handle what breaking through entails. There is a loss of self. There is a loss of the purity of why the niche began in the first place. From my own personal experience, money can taint a niche.
I am hoping, God willing, that I always will have my mental and physical faculties to be able to write and draw. Even if I reach just one other person I’ve accomplished something. It is validation enough that my particular flavor of niche is worth something. You will laugh but some days the only person reached is my own self! “What the hell is she going on about today?!!”
Hello to you. How are you ? It’s Thursday already! Didn’t this week go fast? I got out and walked but only made it around once. My knees aren’t being nice to me lately. I also miss having someone to walk with!
So I was having a talk with a friend yesterday who suffers from OCD. It can be quite crippling. He gets stuck in his thoughts and exhausts himself. I suggested to him that when he had these ruminating thoughts he think or say STOP and at that moment put another thought in its place. Kind of like stopping a train on the tracks. When I do this for myself I will insert a thought like, “I don’t want to think about that right now,” “That is not helpful.” It’s kind of like making a new train route in the brain. It’s an attempt to redirect my thoughts.
Each day I have to use the advice I gave my friend . As a bipolar everything is a delicate balance in my life. Living alone I have time to ruminate a lot and a lot of times it’s not helpful stuff I’m ruminating on. When I do this it’s oftentimes very visceral. I feel what I am ruminating about and it makes me feel like gears are slipping in my brain.
With this kind of stuff going on and living alone I find myself turning to God more. I get frustrated though because sometimes it feels like God isn’t there. I know it’s not true but it’s just a feeling. I don’t know if it’s the Covid-19 or what but I have been feeling my mortality so much lately. The world feels fragile, like we are on borrowed time. How is it some people just go through life like there is nothing to worry about ?
Sometimes the gears in my brain feel like they slip
Hello there ! How are you doing today ? I’m doing pretty good . I’m writing later today because I spent some time with my aunt and uncle this morning! We had blueberry pancakes ! They had gone to watch the balloons go up at 5 am and there was news that a new member of our family had arrived – Cove 8 lbs 1 oz! Baby girl !
Wouldn’t it be wonderful if everyone was welcomed to this world with so much joy ?! If everyone who felt estranged from their family and friends found out everyone was so pleased that they had arrived. This is the promise of new life —- hope! It’s kind of like finding out that someone was praying for you and you didn’t know it . Being loved and cared about even if you don’t directly see it . We are never entirely alone . When we get here there are so many souls, many we don’t directly know, praising our arrival . Welcome Cove!
Doodle for today welcoming Cove and balloons that took to the sky today
Hello to you ! How are you doing today ? I hope your doing well . It’s another beautiful day here. I wish the skies would clear up but we will take what we can get .
This morning my mind turns towards thinking about appreciation. It’s so easy to take a person, place and or thing for granted. We can live life just expecting they will always be there and we are learning on many levels that is is a mistake. There is one thing that is certain about existence and that is change! Impermanence is the name of the game of life .
It’s important to show appreciation, to express gratitude while there is still yet time to do it . It doesn’t have to be a grand gesture either! Sometimes it’s just saying the words is all someone is waiting to hear .
Hello again! I did another one of my strange drawings. I honestly just out the pen to paper and this is what comes forth. It doesn’t always make sense .
What comes to mind looking at my doodle is duality of worlds . It’s something I learned when I was lead to exploring the value of words in numeric form. There are different realities in the light and shadow of our existence and in between is our destiny . I guess that’s what all the center stuff in the drawing is about. How do we get to our destiny ? There seems to be an unseen plan! A word that comes to mind is “the weavers.” The weavers are constantly at work shaping our worlds — constantly shaping us.
Hello to you. How are you doing today? Link and I have started to get in the patterns of the sun. When it’s dark you go so sleep. So here I am at the keyboard, artificial sunshine of coffee and computer screen on! This is a process that will only last a short period of time and then I’ll have to figure out what to do next lol. It’s better than laying in bed like I was doing, fretting about a bunch of stuff I can’t control!
Such is life these days right? What to do with myself to keep busy but stay at home. I’m sure if I were to peruse the internet right now I’d find all kinds of advice on what I could be doing. I can turn on the news on any station and if it’s not covoid19 hysteria it’s other bored people, famous and not, showing us what they are doing to not be bored at home. Finding stuff do and being alone didn’t use to be a problem for me. What happened is choice of whether to immerse or not immerse myself in the world has been pretty much removed. If I go out into the world to do something, it’s getting groceries, an appointment or something pretty important I need to do.
Yesterday I shared some of my art supplies with our neighbor children. We have a couple of Mom’s in the neighborhood with young children and it’s so challenging right now for them to keep the young one’s entertained.
The old standbys have always been drawing, writing and right now working on another corner to corner afghan. I’ve even considered working on an edited version of a book I’ve already e-published, The Gospel According to Sam (https://www.amazon.com/Gospel-According-Sam-Jackie-Wygant-ebook/dp/B00533VOTU) all proceeds going to charity. The only part of me that seems to really be working right now is the writing. I sit down to draw and unlike years past, it’s just a blank page or trying to record what is in front of me.
6 May 2020 drawing I did last night of Link out in the backyard.
There are only so many words, so many drawings, paintings and creative ways to put together the same meals before you start to repeat yourself or others. The other thing is I’m trying to downsize and reduce the amount of that stuff I want around the house. Thank goodness for digital writing but even that isn’t without pitfalls…..you need a reliable way to store the media if you care to retrieve it later. I had a hard drive I was using. It got dropped one too many times and now the data is is locked in there unless I can get someone with some skills to break them out! I am having to learn to be a more transitory person and it’s hard.
So I have found myself asking, what does the God of my understanding want me doing right now?! I want to be useful and help somehow so is my even sharing this today doing that? Do my words here help alleviate boredom and the same things for someone other than myself?
It’s kind of like life in the extremes of weather be it extreme cold or extreme heat. In either one, I have learned to hunker down and keep busy but sometimes my lesser natures take over and I gain weight. Eating becoming an activity. Thankfully here the weather has been nice so when I get really restless I put on my walking shoes and take Link out or go just by myself. Walking does help!
Today I decided to look at the phrase staying busy. I’m going to put all the values I’ve come up on my “travels” with gematria. Sometimes to see the order in which I have found different number values is like a weird sentence lol:
“staying busy” in the English Ordinal system equals 162 – a taking, train, insane, riches, torah, shift, poop, behaves, noise, hearing germs, right, under, humane, doubt, Queen, disease, favor, plasma, choices, under, right, audience, a miracle, polar.
“one six two” in the English Ordinal system equals 144 – a mask, brain, clock, handle, hope, faith, cut, space, bored, talk.
“one four four” in the English Ordinal system equals 154 – a love, sun, play, French, voice, eyes, chemical, health, acting, spar, breath, Bavaria, butch, pods, bodies, Gabriel, Mama bear, foodie, gnome, eyes
“one five four” in the English Ordinal system equals 136 – a halo, child, hair, bite, heard, hug, have, asp, agree, chips
“one three six” in the English Ordinal system equals 142 – a self, new, gift, balanced, rain, run, war, raw, rare, bitch, female, rebel, Odin, sub, tail
“one four two” in the English Ordinal system equals 152 – a blonde, earth, seeds, caring, speak, what, thaw, hobby, disable, heart, Pope, kept, raise, create, spice, birds, devil, dog, pee, crop, ship, going, hobby, ashes, a glaze, thaw
“one five two” in the English Ordinal system equals 134 – a cold, chance, free, hate, breed, heat
Now all of this said, I am not trying to invite drama into my life. What I wish to invite into my life is a positive, loving way I can be of service to God as I understand them.
The last thing I want to be is a waste of space. So I am going to trust that gradually, as I can handle it, God will show me great ways to be of service in this uncertain time. May be in some way, I’m already doing it just blogging here? May be somebody, that’s not me, will see my message here and get some relief from their personal struggles and be able to pass that light on to someone near or far in their own life? That’s my hope!
The Beatitudes from the Bible. I am not a religious person, but very spiritual. Parts of the Bible like this are comforting I think.
Hello to you. How are you doing today? Hopefully you are doing well.
Something that comes to mind this morning is the phrase uncomfortable silence. As I write, I’ve got an alternative station I found that I like, 103.7 fm on as background noise. I’m getting to be one of those kind of people that has to have the sound on in my world. That thing called comfortable silence is uncomfortable for me and it never used to be.
This radio used to belong to my brother-in-law Todd – still useful!
My mother-in-law used to follow ratings for television shows. I seem to remember her talking about CSI was one that always had high ratings. What was behind that a certain demographic, usually older Americans, put the show on as background noise even if they weren’t watching it. I though that was funny at the time until this situation of having to stay home alone more! I’m becoming one of those people!
So today I give thanks for local programming and the radio stations that keep the world interesting for me. Right now I don’t have access to streaming services without paying for it. I’m trying Amazon Prime video and took a look at Patrick Melrose yesterday. I couldn’t get through the first episode. It was hard to see Benedict Cumberbatch being such a convincing addict. I much prefer seeing him as Sherlock Holmes (minus the addict part) and Dr. Strange! There are some other interesting shows to check out whilst I work on my afghan.
I find myself going a bit stir crazy staying in the house so I’ll meander out for a walk. This isn’t such a bad thing as I gained some weight during my hospital stay. I’m starting to remember why one can lose your mind a bit being trapped in the house. In the past, it was just because of extremes of weather. I can remember being in a shelter in Mississippi during a hurricane and how tough that was. I was in a shelter with a bunch of other people and it was dark and even smelly at times. We ate peanut butter and crackers in the dark. As tough as that was, there was an end in sight. With this virus and containment, there doesn’t seem to be a definitive end. I understand better why there are protesters in different placing demanding things get opened back up. We are social creatures and are made to do stuff besides staying at home.
I wonder if this is the plants way of healing itself? For all the bad things that have happened and tragedy, good things have been happening for the planet. The biggest thing is a reduction in air pollution! I wonder how can we keep that going once life starts to resume it’s course?
To be 