Just Looking

My 5 year old's face was about 3 inches from mine, and I could hear his heavy breathing. "Leave mommy alone," I heard daddy say. "She's sleeping."
"I"m just looking up her nose." was his reply.

Key Lime Pie

What is it that feels more virtuous about taking 2-3 teensy slices of key lime pie, along with the whip creme stuck to the lid, rather than serving up a hearty slice to begin with? I'm skillful at deluding myself when it comes to dessert!

Fortune Cookie Favorites

I reached in my pocket just now, and found a wad of fortunes from a recent meal with friends at the Dragon Buffet. I liked what these had to say, so I thought I'd write them here before tossing them in the can.

The greatest mistake a man can make is to be afraid of making one.

The only man who never makes mistakes is the man who never does anything.

You are a lover of words, someday you should write a book.

Those who wish to sing always find a song.

Writing as Work

I've always wanted to write. I'm always grateful once I've done it. But when I sit down to do it, most of the time, it feels like work. I expect it to flow and it doesn't. I expect inspiration to come, and it won't. What I've put down doesn't seem to amount to much. Yet I want to be disciplined enough to still make myself do it. Less for the end product, and more because I want to grow into the writer I believe myself to be.
As I was reading, "Please Understand Me II: Temperament, Character, Intelligence, it had this to say: "Any skill is acquired by practice, increasing precisely in the degree it is exercised, and diminishing in the degree it is neglected." Writing is a skill, not a mystical experience. To improve in it, I must exercise it. "We improve in doing things we are interested in doing, and have greater interest in things we do well. Interest reinforces skill, skill reinforces interest, and neither seems to be the starting point."(Keirsey 125)
I am hoping that as I work at exercising and applying my writing skills, my skills will increase, and so will my interest in doing the work.
"Neural cells are like muscle cells; if they aren't used they lie dormant and even degenerate."(Keirsey 125)
What do you do, my writing friends, to keep those neural cells firing?

A Local Phenomena?

Maybe the plastic lid and straw keeps this from violating the no open container rule, but who knows?