TToT: Do Or Die – Mercy! #10Thankful

“Writing and reading to me is synonymous with existing.”
–Gertrude Stein

What a difference a week can make.

Last week was the perfect autumn weather and this week all I keep hearing about is snow.

Last weekend the Toronto Blue Jays were not expected to be in the game for much longer and this week they still have a chance.

TEN THINGS OF THANKFUL

I seem to remember something about a book of rules for the TToT and there’s one of those for baseball, not that I understand it, but more about that later.

It was a difficult week, in some respects, but only because I am finally putting myself out there, my writing and myself, and receiving feedback. This translates into criticism and that can be difficult to take sometimes. Doesn’t mean it isn’t worth it.

Ten Things of Thankful:

For my immune system.

Mine works for me. Okay, so I may be singing a different tune come the middle of winter, but at the moment I think all’s well.

I have been around several sick friends and family in the past month and I just assumed I would catch their colds, etc.

I haven’t. I have a lower immune system, as a transplant recipient, and it can seem to permit multiple colds each winter, every year, but it is unpredictable. I can’t predict when or if I’m going to get a cold.

I am visiting a friend in Toronto tomorrow and her niece is there recovering from a bone marrow transplant. As long as I don’t jinx myself and come down with something in the next twenty-four hours, I will be happy and thankful. Not to mention, my immune system hasn’t decided to completely attack my father’s kidney, in nearly twenty years, so that’s something to be grateful for.

For a delicious cup of coffee, some relaxing Lorde inspired tunes, and a couple of hours at the salon.

Portishead

The coffee and the half hour I sat there, listening to music playing and the hustle and bustle of my cousin’s salon, while my hair had foils in it and waiting for the dye to do its thing made for a most relaxing break.

For the chance to feel like I was dressed up and with somewhere to go for the evening.

For the deliciousness that is movie popcorn.

Who’s with me?

For a totally eye-opening documentary experience.

“Our voices are our most powerful weapons.”

I went to see He Named Me Malala and I found it to be every bit as inspiring and moving and sweet and real as I thought it would be.

This film needed to be made and it needs to be seen around the world. It makes me cry, but it forces me to be thankful.

For the game that kept Toronto in the running, for the first time in over twenty years.

It was a real rush to know that we had little chance, at that point, but that I never lost faith. It ended up being one for the record books, and I don’t pretend to understand all the little ins and outs of the game and its rules, but I know the tension and the energy felt, sitting there watching.

We were losing two games in a five game series. Nobody thought we would go on to win the next three, but I believed.

What is it about rooting for one’s sports team that can cause such strong feelings and stress?

For my white cane.

October 15th was White Cane Day or White Cane Safety Day. I feel like a lot of these days are more US based, a lot of the times, but it doesn’t really matter where or what day.

I will admit that I have had my battles with the white cane. I have truthfully felt embarrassed about it, like a little brother or sister, always tagging along, but being forced by a parent to let them join in the fun.

Yeah, I’m working on getting over my issues because without it, I would be in more danger and would have been left without the means to get somewhere, anywhere, unable to see my surroundings well enough. I can’t deny the importance it has played and must play to me in future.

For my first Internet radio show interview.

Traveling With the Speed of Sight

I think I’ll stick with writing my blog, but it never hurts to try something new.

For you never knows’.

I did not expect a lot of people to listen to that interview, honestly, but all it takes is one.

One of the writer/editor friends I’ve made online and on Facebook just happened to be listening and immediately messaged me after the interview ended.

I admire her and her work so much and her online publication is at the top of my list of places I am determined to see my writing on.

Full Grown People

For the good and the bad that comes from putting myself out there.

Sure, this week I received some hard to hear criticism, but I also received some personal invites to submit my writing and to do more guest posts.

This, to me, would be considered a week of triumphs.

The Canadian federal election tomorrow could be the change we need, but there is a bit of a clash of events happening.

Elections Canada vs Jays Fans On October 19

Oh, don’t we Canadians have problems in our country?

😉

At least we’re aware of the issues that are important to us and as long as we know our priorities, right?

Mercy Mercy Me

I’ve been inspired, again this week, to not be silent, in whatever way that might be.

I love the female voices I’m hearing lately: both young and old.

Do I look scared to you?

You tell em Hazel!

“There’s a moment when you have to choose whether to be silent or to stand up.”
–Malala Yousafzai

In My Mind’s Eye, #SoCS

Sometimes, when I get to the end of the week, I am so excited for Friday. I can’t wait to log onto Linda’s website, to find out what the prompt is for the week.

STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS SATURDAY

Then, as Friday makes way for Saturday, well I become hesitant. I start wondering what I should write and if I could possibly have anything to say, using the letters or word she has chosen.

That’s not the point though. If I wait and then, Saturday comes, I get writing and the words begin to flow.

***

You know that well-known belief that people who are blind can hear better than everyone else?

Well, I listen hard and voices and music are some of my favourite things, so I hope I always hear them both.

I have a keen sense of smell. Just ask my family.

I have an excellent set of taste buds, if I do say so myself. Again, ask those closest to me and they will tell you I can drive them crazy with these talents.

🙂

I use all this and touch to navigate my world, all because I can hardly see.

But yet…I believe I am a sighted person, even still.

This may sound strange. Please, allow me to elaborate.

I used to see so much more and I miss it, along with forgetting just what it was like, as the years pass me by.

In my mind I can see.

My mind threatens to burst, sometimes, from the strain of all that I see with my mind’s eye. As the memories fade, I cling to them all the more tightly, as my mind’s eye begins its work.

The seeing eye is alive and well in there.

There’s fire and a roving eye up there, but I’m not evil like that guy.

Yeah, I’m trying really hard not to imagine The Great Eye.

🙂

Not exactly appropriate for what I’m getting at here, if you are following me anyway.

It’s just that the phrase “in my mind’s eye” says just one eye and then I naturally go to Lord of the Rings because, well, I just do. Can’t help myself really.

Anyway, back to what I was saying…this is stream of consciousness writing, after all.

I get headaches and I sometimes like to tell myself the story, to at least frame that in a somewhat positive light, if headaches can be light at all, by saying I started getting them in the immediate years that followed my original vision loss.

This is true.

This goes for so many things: letters and cursive writing, colours, the faces of my family, the ever-disappearing television screen, even the numbers on an alarm clock or my old dialysis machine. I used to see those in the dark, but now I picture them in the darkness of my mind.

Those things are aided by my memory and so I have an easier time re-picturing them in my mind.

It’s the things I have not seen and will never really see that cause the pain in my head, my mind clattering and thudding up against my skull in desperation.

In my mind, I’m staring at a computer screen, like I did those first times, when the Internet was new.

I am seeing, in my mind’s eye, the faces of my sweet niece and nephews, of which I will never get a fully defined idea of that sweetness in their little faces.

In my mind, I am picturing every beautiful thing in nature and on the travels I have gone on and hope to go on. I can’t complain. Since having all the vision I did have, at one time, this allows me to have a little help in guessing what things might look like, giving my mind less of a workout, but it’s still a challenge.

I see the long lost words on the page.

But back to reality, and the voices on my phone and laptop keep speaking to me, as my mind runs on and on and on. My mind’s eye is where I really want to be.

I now must see more and more of the things I used to see with my eyes, with my mind’s eye. I try and my head aches, because I just can’t stop seeing all the loveliness of the world in that space between my ears.

I wish I could stop, not care, not bother to even try. I wish I could sleep at night, without hundreds of images flashing through in there, like one of those programs that provides a slideshow of photographs, like the one on my mom’s computer.

I can’t stop. I can’t rest. This slideshow runs through, again and again, ceaselessly, but in some strange and painful way, I don’t want it any other way. I can’t make it stop, but deep down, I guess I never want it to.

Thanks, Linda, for this weekly writing prompt:

http://lindaghill.com/2015/08/21/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-august-2215/

I am thankful for the opportunity to have an open-ended window of pure creative writing time, which is different and separate from everything else I do with my blog.

SoCS: Dear Grandma

***

Dear Grandma,

I started this blog with an entry on my birthday and in that entry I talked about your diaries.

They are still upstairs, in the perfect chest I found for them, protection against any possible damage.

You wrote in those every night, for so many years. I tried to follow your example, many times, but always lost interest. I guess I didn’t believe I had enough to say.

I don’t feel that way anymore Grandma. In fact, it’s become quite a problem now, now that I have too much to say and I can’t stop myself.

I think what you had to say, all written by hand up in those books, I think that was all important stuff and I wish I could see to read it myself.

I remember how you used to read from your diaries, to me, at your kitchen table sometimes.

You sometimes even stumbled and had trouble reading your own writing, from so many years gone by.

You loved your ritual of writing in your diary at night. I loved that about you.

Now I don’t know if you would think it quite so good an idea, if you were still here, if you knew I wrote my blog for so many to see.

You were from a different time and you didn’t understand the Internet. From the few conversations we had about it, you didn’t seem all that impressed.

I have good reason to believe you would understand though, if you knew what it means to me to have a journal, a blog, a diary.

You knew I couldn’t write by hand anymore.

I would show you my blog, but you wouldn’t buy a computer, so I would have to print out my blogs for you to read.

I know you’d want me to. You’d ask when I saw you, if I had any more journals written since we saw each other last, because you loved reading my words.

I miss the unconditional love and acceptance you gave, that pure pride I heard in your voice when, on those rare occasions, I showed you something I’d written.

I write with you in mind, all the time, Grandma.

I want to keep a journal, a record of all the thoughts and all the experiences I’ve had since you’ve been gone, that I wish I could share with you.

I dedicate today’s stream of consciousness Saturday post to you.

Love,
Your granddaughter.

***

This was my post for this week’s SoCS, with today’s prompt, “Jour”, from:

http://lindaghill.com/2015/04/10/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-april-1115/

I didn’t feel very French today.

🙂

I thought of journal and immediately thought of my grandmother’s diaries, the ones that are my most treasured belongings, since she died ten years ago.

To Any Loyal Readers: Goodbye Summer

I can’t say I saw that there would be a time when I would not post on a weekly or more than a weekly basis here.

Okay, maybe I could and did worry I would eventually run out of things to say and therefore would stop posting. A few months down the line or maybe years. Well, I made it past the six month mark and I am proud to say I have not yet run out of things to write about. On the contrary actually. If anything, I have too much to say and find it overwhelming at times. It isn’t always so easy to get all the ideas constantly swirling around inside my head down on this blog.

It is the end of summer, unofficially, with the long weekend and Labour Day just ahead. I can’t say I am sorry to see this particular summer go, but may find I am left to eat my words when another lengthy frigid winter like last years) settles in.

I am posting just once this week, smack-dab in the middle and only to let you all know I am still here and that I truly appreciate the more than eighty followers to this blog I have accumulated. I am taking a vacation, a week’s break. I wanted to take a few days to ponder the question of moving forward and adding to the wonderful thing I’ve got going here already.

I am trying to decide if it is always important to take a chance and make what you want your reality or if sometimes the point is to decide when to make a move and when it is the right time for a change and when to just wait. I am not always the most patient of people.

In this case, I have been blogging for months now and I needed this time to hone in on what I really wanted to write about, what I was most passionate about. I do enjoy writing about all sorts of things, from fiction and memoir to reviews and interviews, but I have a dream of having my own travel blog.

I came up with the name The Insightful Wanderer (thanks to a helpful suggestion from a friend), only after my first thought which was The Sightless Wanderer. I agree my friend’s suggestion is better. I just wanted to come up with something that could subtly hint at my particular viewpoint and from what angle I would approach travel writing from, but without being super obvious about it.

Step One: come up with a name. Check.

Step Two: Start a site and claim the name. (This is the one I am stuck on.

Should I rush into this when I haven’t even figured out the third and final step in my three-step process?

Step Three: Travel so I actually have something to put on my site.

Now, I have traveled enough in the past that I think I have plenty of past stories in me, enough to post for a good while. I would write about travel, whether it was local (in Ontario) or far off. I have been reaching out to several travel writers/bloggers in recent weeks and am determined to learn about what other people’s experiences have been with exploring this planet. I want to know how they do it and what they have seen of the world. Travel changes many people’s lives and perspectives.

I simply did not want to start posting a lot of these particular interviews on my current blog, even with my Travel Tuesday feature. I thought maybe now was the time to move forward and perhaps I could make it happen.

In the world of online and on the Internet it is hard to make a name for yourself and to find your voice. I want to make my mark in this world by seeing it up-close. I don’t want to just hear about it and read about it. Pictures do me no good and I feel like travel may be my only way to make the most of life while I can.

I do realize that if I do not include a photographic element to my travel blog that I will be behind almost everyone else, and I am still working that out.

Also, I admire the women who travel solo and I wish I could be one of them, because at the moment I don’t exactly have a lot of options. However, being a woman who just happens to be visually impaired also makes it all the more tricky to see my dream come to fruition. These are the sorts of things I haven’t yet worked out and of which make me nervous to jump off the cliff, so-to-speak.

On the other hand, how do you know when things like these aren’t just excuses not to make what you want happen?

I don’t want to take on more than I can handle and I am glad I have you all and this blog. The idea of having to build back up an audience and an online presence is daunting to me, seeing as this one I’ve got here wasn’t a walk in the park and super easy for me. I had help and I go on habit and routine. I do not have a master web designer on hand and at my beckon call. Money is not plentiful and this makes paying for help on a site and for the actual cost of travel rather tricky, but I will scrip and save where I can and save up if I know I will travel again one of these days.

I just want to be able to print off some business cards with the name Insightful Wanderer on them and to make a real and honest go at this dream of mine.

🙂

Only time will tell and probably not in one week will I find my answers to all these questions.

One step at a time. Follow my new travel blog (on Facebook only, for now)

Here,

and I am open to any or all suggestions or feedback on this matter.

What advice do you have on making your dreams a reality or on travel? Where have you travelled and what might you write about if you had a reason to, such as a travel blog?

Thanks for listening and stay tuned for more excellent posts here in the weeks to come.

Note: I’ve got some wonderful interviews with interesting people ahead, a couple reviews of some movies and shows to share, and a new weekly feature, every Monday for the foreseeable future, which will start on September 1st.

Hope everyone enjoys the last long weekend of the summer and thanks for reading.