Choice Words

Watched episodes eight and nine of Downton Abbey, season three. At the end of the episode nine, I let a couple of choice words fly in English and in Bosnian. The 'Fugee said I haven't heard you cursing* in a while.

She was right. I haven't been cursing. Surprise, surprise for someone who got busted for impressive cursing back in the seventh grade. Some friends and I were playing a friendly game of elimination Uno on the fire escape. I had a hand full of cards and someone changed the color allowing someone to win the game. My verbal rampage was heard by the principal and two assistant principals who I hadn't seen standing about 200 feet (or more) away. I thought that my parents were going to kill me once they heard what I had done. The assistant principal along with another teacher harassed me for a while including telling me that they hadn't heard sailors curse like that but they never called my parents and I did not stop to look that gift horse in the mouth...

Went to a birthday party for a woman who celebrated her 65th birthday. I know the woman from my childhood when I used to go to church. If you asked me to say two things about her, I would say that she is kind and one of the best huggers ever. The birthday woman has been having serious health concerns and has not being doing well -- even this week. She thought about not having  the party but said that, in the end, she did want to celebrate life. She went on to say that there's a reason that she's still alive -- even if it's just tell the room full of people that she loves them. Goosebumps!

The birthday woman's statement made me think about something that Joy said when I first started attending her classes. Joy said that there's integrity in living a "normal" life -- being a good sister, mother, going to work etc...


I keep thinking about the obituaries of the Orlando victims and also about talking to the 90-year-old funeral director who started the paperwork for my grandmother's arrangements and she said that everyone should write their own obituary.

Just read Gingerzingi's recent post about social media and it got me to thinking about a book review on Unclutterer about your digital afterlife.

I think about my aunt who died of peripheral artery disease. She did not have a good relationship with her child and she did not want to talk about final wishes, including distribution of assets.

I also think about how nice it was to have closure when writer David Mills suddenly died from a brain aneurysm. He had a blog called Undercover Blackman and left his password for his nephew.

There's a lot of organizing that I need to do...

Luis Daniel Conde went to the same high school in Puerto Rico as Juan Pablo Rivera Velasquez, ran a beauty salon in Kissimmee with him, and on Sunday, they died together in the Pulse nighclub massacre. Lus was 39. His obituary is linked in our bio. #OrlandoUnited #PrayForOrlando #OrlandoStrong #PulseShooting

A photo posted by Orlando Sentinel (@orlandosentinel) on Jun 17, 2016 at 12:07pm PDT

*Being less rattled makes me curse less. Who would have thunk it?

Eight Days Ago

The first thing my eyes fell on when I perused The New York Times on March 30th: David Mills, Television Writer and Producer, Dies at 48.

My gut told me that it was the David Mills that I knew of a.k.a. Undercover Black Man, a blogger that I followed. Yet, it was still hard to comprehend. Mills was someone that I never met. I never verbally spoke to him. Yet, I left comments on his blog that he sometimes responded to. In addition, there were a couple of commenters that I felt I had camaraderie with on his site.

I left a comment on UBM’s blog as did about 160 other folks upon finding out that he had died. I looked on the internet for final arrangements although I had no plans to go. I found some solace in that fact that Mills died literally doing what he loved to do – he was reviewing a scene on the set of Treme, a new HBO show that is set to debut in about a week. I also thought it was fitting that his last post was a video about the making of Treme. And, overall, Mills got a lot accomplished in his 48 years.

Imagine my surprise when I saw that Undercover Black Man’s blog had been updated with the title Blowing UBM’s Cover. Had someone else been writing for UBM all along? I certainly didn’t expect to see another update. I went to see what the update was all about and it was UBM’s nephew, Clifton Porter, giving a wonderful tribute to his uncle. Porter, in charge of his uncle’s estate, had given me what I needed – closure.

I have many journals and books (Can you say storage issue?) and I often think about burning my journals. Yet, I’m reluctant to destroy them. When I first started my fitness journey, I started by writing down what I was eating in a journal. I track what I eat online now but I still keep track of my water and exercise in a journal for some reason. Maybe I need something tangible to hold onto.

Do any of you keep offline journals? Have you thrown any journals away and is your blog password kept alongside other passwords?

And, finally, what are you dreams and are you following them?

I've always liked this quote:

Go confidently in the direction of your dreams! Live the life you've imagined. As you simplify your life, the laws of the universe will be simpler. - Henry David Thoreau

If I were a preacher, I'd start my cadence now. How did he say go? Did he say go tiptoeing? Did he say go timidly? (Hitting hand on imaginary pulpit) Did he say go lukewarm? No, he said go confidently. He said go confidently -- in the direction of your dreams...