Home again

So I return shattered after having my 2 year old grandson for a week, whilst he had chickenpox!(not recommended for grandparents!) and totally spring cleaning my daughters flat, I must be a glutton for punishment.
Needless to say I got little writing done, but I did get a lot of thinking done, which I hope will come to fruition in some way or another.
I will post over the next few days, but Monday will see the beginning of posting deeper and more eclectic thoughts. I will also be posting some of the things written over the Christmas period in Baltimore. So hang in there.

Apologies

I am so sorry to be absent nyet again, but away, looking after grandson with Chickenpox, whilst Mum away having a break. Will post something over weekend whilst Daddy has Tommy.

New York reflections

I have been thinking of my few days in New York over Christmas, and reflecting on my thoughts.
It is a wonderfully elective city, catering for all. My brief journey through Greenwich Village which used to of course be home to writers, musicians and artists is now more of a full gay community, some of the clubs are still there offering wonderful blues, and art galleries survive, but the writing community seems to have vanished. It is such a small land area to have this huge memory of mine, and yearning at one time to go and live there.
China Town, is truly amazing, a complete hotch potch of everything Chinese, markets selling everything, herbalists, and Chinese doctors offering cures for all. Fantastic silk shops, with amazing fabrics, but in all I found it a somewhat depressing and dirty place, I certainly would not of bought food from street vendors or the open front markets.
Central Park, all we ever hear, here is of the dangers of the park, but never any of the real beauty of the place, giving New York a little breathing place at it's heart.
Fifth Avenue, the place to see the beautiful and famous, yes very clean, stores with fantastic window displays, but no price tags! One would not ask. Such an expensive place.
Yet get to the outskirts and suburbs and you see real American poverty, from the slums and tenements to the homeless street people.
I find it hard to understand the disparity, and so would like to see a world which was fair to all, where everyone was housed, and fed, and cared for, that would be my Utopia.

Reflective Sunday

I realize from having total care of Tommy, just two, I am not getting any younger, he is exhausting. It was fine when I was 29 nand had my daughter, I had the energy for anything. However as a Grandma, not in the best of health, I just find my self lacking the energy required. He is fed, watered, played with and loved beyond measure, but I do wonder how older mothers manage?
The beauty of being a grandparent, I believed was having quality time together but then being able to give them back!
Baltimore is under 2 ft of snow, and more forcast for Tuesday, Secret, the boat we live on there is listing to Port with the snow weight, and my man says he will not leave the boat for some days, and will be extremely careful so as not to do any further damage to his shoulder, on which he has surgery this Friday, how I hate not being there for him. Still I know the day will come when I can go and we can be together permenantly, I just wish it would hurry.

One of the strangest sight I have seen.

Driving to pick my daughter and grandson up yesterday, I passed the strangest sight of which I had to do a double take. The strangest hearse was coming towards me. being driven by a pair of matching Harleys, obviously it had been totally customised, and bolted to the two bikes, like a matching pair of horses.
Written on the Hearse in fine lettering - Angel returning to Heaven.
This was followed by some 50 or so Harley bikes and trike, all carrying riders clothed in jeans and black tee shirts.
I learned later by a little sleuth work, that this was the local area chapter, one of the largest in the Southwest, and taking the service, ex Angel minister, aqccepted by the church in 1999, and has brought many Angels into the fold.
What an eclectic and wonderful world we live in.

A very tangled day

Well yes it is still today with just half an hour to go. Today has been one of those days I can do without, my daughter 27 is going through a nasty breakup with her partner, and needed to get away for a couple of days, so Grandma to the rescue. I am staying at her flat looking after Tommy, just two and a delight, but I had forgotten I am no longer in my 20's, and I find him exhausting. On top of that I drove some 150 miles to drop my daughter at friends.
Did we ever get so needy and unable to cope? I remember as a single parent just having to make the best of things and get on with it.
I will attempt to work around Tommy and his schedule, but please bear with me.

Poetry Scene in Baltimore.

This is wonderful, so much larger and more open than ours here. I was invited to read at four different venues and was received very well, it really does do something for ones confidence. Met all kinds of people, many singers and musicians as well as writers.
It was so good to be among like minded people with a passion to write, it kind of made me understand I am not alone, and should just keep on going. I have the feeling that for me being in Baltimore full time is what would work best for me and my writing, it is such a mixed place, with a varied eclectic mix of people and cultures, and is so laid back.
It was so good to hear other writers reading their work, how they had written it and not how we when we read it perceive it to be, there is a vast difference.
So I now have to put my head down and complete Poetry from Baltimore. vol 2, as well as look for a lucrative outlet for my writing.

Christmas in Baltimore, Virginia and New York

Christmas was a strange time for me, the first time in some 35 years I had not had to organise a family traditional Christmas, I left my gifts before I left the country.
Christmas morning dawned cold and bright, phone calls home were made, then the day was ours. Our first stop was for a family breakfast with the family of a friend, the fare traditional grits, eggs, ham and biscuits, with the entire family of 11, they made us so welcome. Then on to wonderful friends made last summer, in Exton, Virginia for Christmas lunch, Ann and Brett and their family again welcomed us as part of the family, real wonderful hospitality, a traditional Christmas lunch followed by Ann's amazingly good cheesecake, it was devine.
Leaving around 7 p.m. for Four days in New York, at my man's apartment lived in by his 21 year old son and two friends.
New York was an amazing time catching up with old friends not seen for some 30 years, wonderful meals at amazing restaurants, the highlight had to be an invitation to Julie and Joey's the day before we left for a dinner of clams on the half shell, steamed clams and followed by Lobsters, much wine was drunk and my mission that day had been to find three or four different kinds of cheesecake to finish the meal with, so we could have a vote of which was best.
Seeing New York at Christmas time was magical, from the huge tree in Times Square with the ice rink, and the decorations in the shops. Christmas in America is much more low key than the hype of here, they have that at Thanksgiving. It was however a wonderful experience.
Driving past Ground Zero, I was amazed that 10 years on, this is not completed yet. My tour of New York that day took in Greenwich Village, China Town, fascinating, then the Dakota Building
where Lennon lived and was shot outside, and the Monument Strawberry Fields in Central Park.
We left the following morning in good time to meet up with more friend for lunch on the way home to Baltimore.
It was a wonderful time made even more special with being with my first love from all those years ago, my first husband, we were reunited only this time last year after a parting of 33 years.

Poetry in Baltimore

This is so much more alive and vibrant in Baltimore than here. I was invited along to a Reading and invited to read a piece of my own work, this in turn led to being invited to three other Readings and to read at each of the, size varied on how many people were reading work, from 2 pieces to 6, it was really good, scary but enjoyable, and my work was received well. I also had the opportunity to go to a Day Workshop, writers and musicians it was a very valuable day. made lots of contacts.
I strongly believe if i am going to get anywhere with my writing it will be based in Baltimore, where I can fraternise with many like minded people, rather than being isolated here. I feel 100% alive there, maybe being on the ocean which is my element, and my man being there, but it somehow just feels right.
I have spent the morning working on Postcards from Baltimore vol 2 (Winter), and so far pleased with where I am at, much more work to do, pulling thm into the shape I want, but I am getting there.
Also thought of a few more ideas for the new book, somehow it feels to be coming together.
O.K. so I must go back to working on Poems.

A new start.

Well it has been a long time, my apologies to all, but since returning from Baltimore I have been ill, with some insidious bug which laid me very low, however I am back at the start of this new month of February. I have much to share with you about this last trip, and the time spent, even if I can work out how to I will post some photographs. It is funny how different a place is in the different seasons, but it still is a wonderful place to be, but then that may be because my man is there.
So from tomorrow there will be daily new posts, sharing some of the writing I did there, and some whilst in bed suffering the bug, also I will share with you the idea for my new book targeted at 7 - 11 year old's, I hope some of you will send me some ideas as I share the plot! Stay well and keep signing in.