A Contemplative Life

My Tears of Joy Quilt under which I was sitting this morning, feeling grateful for having sewn it.    I'm currently reading aloud Can't Be Done Alone: The Hawk Book Five . Two chapters in, I came across a couple of paragraphs that made me cry. Below sits the chapter in whole, but I've made those paragraphs bold, because as I read them, I realized some truths about our lives on this planet that don't seem to change, especially when set alongside mathematician Emmy Noether , who left Germany in 1933 after the Nazi government dismissed Jews from university positions, or Edith Eger , a Hungarian/American psychologist and Holocaust survivor. When dictators or those wishing to be dictators frame this or that segment of society as unworthy, they are hoping to instill intrinsic hatred to a degree so their followers will assume no one deserves love and respect. As Eger put it, guards at the concentration camps where she was imprisoned were 'brainwashed', their youths as...

August 2012 as though I knew one day I'd need a photo aligning to what was then being written. With the release of Splitting the Sky just days away, I'm deeply involved in the final edits. I've been reading each chapter aloud, and one remains. After that I'll reread today's assignment, then tomorrow I'm not doing ANYTHING writing related, LOL! Need a break before I publish this novel on Monday. Why read a novel out loud? In part to better relate authentic dialogue. In part to root out nefarious typos hoping to remain hidden. In part to.... Make sure that this story, originally written in 2012 then unearthed last November, is all I want it to be before it goes live. Ages ago, like around the time StS was written, I read aloud my books before releasing them. I got out of that habit, not sure when, maybe when I was publishing The Hawk on its initial go-round. Anyway, it's been quite enjoyable reading aloud, and not altogether quietly. I do lower my voice aro...