Word Paintings - What they Mean to Me

I came up with the term "Word Paintings" to describe the vivid recollection of memories or descriptive writing that I sometimes like to do. I haven't created a "Word Painting" in some time now. I will pick the habit back up soon...

Dreamer

Alternative speech for Toastmasters tomorrow

Last time I spoke, I spoke about finding my voice. I described to you the difficulties I have faced, and my hereditary family silence. Today I will speak to you about dreams.

I have always been a dreamer. My father came home with a diary once from a trip that he had taken, he said he bought it in China town.

It was beautiful, it had a shiny green cover embossed with different symbols and the paper was patterned with catfish and boats.

What I held in my hands was to me a glimpse into another world and I dreamed of parasols and china dolls as though someone had transported me into another world.

I was not content with dreams though, I turned many of my dreams into reality.

By brother Daniel, just 18 months younger than I was my traveling companion in the land of dreams.  We sailed the high seas out in the snake-pit on a section of bush pushed down by some planks.

We built our own carnival, with bean bag toss, pinball machine and rides in sleeping bags down the stairs.

It's a good thing my parents never really knew what we got up to.

We built a boat out of 2x4's and plywood, which never got to the river, but it did serve as the platform to our rope swing.

As an adult I have fallen into the void at times, where no dreams can surface, that is when I have been facing my reality and fighting for a place in the world. I've been fighting the demon foe called poverty, and burnished the sword of determination to finish school.

A tiny sliver of a dream surfaced after I was done though, a little bit of a leftover dream from my scheme of a grand and beautiful house. A place to record music, a place to sing, a place of literature, a place to dream.

So when I found myself in the position of needing a new home. I put my feelers out and had my real estate agent send me links to affordable places. Suddenly, in the middle of Year End turmoil a link to a condo with 2,200 sq ft. came through.

I pulled it up and as I flipped through the photos my heart sang. A tiny backyard for a garden, a room for each of my kids and 3 bathrooms, a large living room and family room and then, the bonus room. I knew what that would be for.

I went that night to see the place, and it was exactly as I had hoped. I walked through each room until I found the bonus room and there it was, the large walk in closet, there I would build a voiceover booth. In the rest of the room a dance studio for my son.

Why, you might ask would I want such a thing? Dear friends I don't know, I could tell you my youngest brother is a sound engineer and was very happy I built this booth.

But that was not the reason, not really, the reason is that it is a part of a dream and I need to have a place to dream.

Thank you

SG

As I Began to Love Myself – Self Love Poem by Charlie Chaplin

As I began to love myself I found that anguish and emotional suffering
are only warning signs that I was living against my own truth. Today, I know, this is “AUTHENTICITY”.

As I began to love myself I understood how much it can offend somebody
As I try to force my desires on this person, even though I knew the time
was not right and the person was not ready for it, and even though this
person was me. Today I call it “RESPECT”.

As I began to love myself I stopped craving for a different life, and I could see that everything that surrounded me was inviting me to grow. Today I call it “MATURITY”.

As I began to love myself I understood that at any circumstance, I am in the right place at the right time, and everything happens at the exactly right moment. So I could be calm. Today I call it “SELF-CONFIDENCE”.

As I began to love myself I quit steeling my own time, and I stopped designing huge projects for the future. Today, I only do what brings me joy and happiness, things I love to do and that make my heart cheer, and I do them in my own way and in my own rhythm. Today I call it “SIMPLICITY”.

As I began to love myself I freed myself of anything that is no good for
my health – food, people, things, situations, and everything that drew
me down and away from myself. At first I called this attitude a healthy egoism. Today I know it is “LOVE OF ONESELF”.

As I began to love myself I quit trying to always be right, and ever since I was wrong less of the time. Today I discovered that is “MODESTY”.

As I began to love myself I refused to go on living in the past and worry
about the future. Now, I only live for the moment, where EVERYTHING is happening. Today I live each day, day by day, and I call it “FULFILLMENT”.

As I began to love myself I recognized that my mind can disturb me
and it can make me sick. But As I connected it to my heart, my
mind became a valuable ally. Today I call this connection “WISDOM OF THE HEART”.

We no longer need to fear arguments, confrontations or any kind of problems
with ourselves or others. Even stars collide, and out of their crashing
new worlds are born.Today I know THAT IS “LIFE”!

The Scenes to the Play of Life

Some thoughts I've gathered going through my week:

Life is like a play and different people are in different scenes

When we are little we play the role of baby, then child, then teenager, as we pass into adulthood we play the role of young adult, adult, middle aged and old aged.

The young have difficulty understanding the roles of adulthood and in some ways adults forget how to play the roles of the young.

Life has always been hard, I'm not saying that in a fatalistic or pessimistic way but it is a statement of fact.

I remember clearly hoping for the next stage in life thinking that I would escape the uncertainty, loneliness and difficulties of the stage that I was in. To a certain extent I now look back at the seemingly carefree days of my youth and longing for simpler times (when I wasn't in charge of making sure everything was OK).

The characters in my play when I was little included my grandparents, my parents, my brothers and sister, my cousins, aunts and uncles, the kids at school and the kids in the neighborhood. In the auxiliary scenes were people in my church, my teachers, principal etc.

I had a certain world view, my days were spent at school, at church and at home. I had difficulty making friends because I am a deep thinker and most of the time it was hard to convey my thoughts to others. I liked to play with dolls, do my hair and make-up, a lot of the same things as other girls but I have never been able to just think of shallow things. In the back of my mind were the stacks of books that I wanted to read, the things I wanted to influence and change (in my family), and the projects I wanted to take on in my own fantasy world. I wanted to have fun, I had a lot of fun, but it was usually me coming up with wild schemes and plans, I was always thinking of something new to do. It was hard for me to relate to other kids, other girls especially. I was a Tom Boy I suppose though that terminology seems to have changed. I can't say that I felt like a boy so I will stick with Tom Boy.

I was lonely, in my own world trying to learn about everything, I broke out of that world when my cousins would come over and when my brother and I would play video games. There again I would play video games and even got addicted to them but I felt some amount of shame for wasting my time so I found myself turning away from them.

My desire to fit in led me to make stupid decisions. Like going along with my "friend" who went shop lifting. Luckily I got caught and had to talk to a judge and that ended my shoplifting career. What was not so lucky for me was that I wanted to have a boyfriend, that desire led me to become a young mother.

And the scenes of my life changed.

As a young mother I was still a teenager so I still felt the desire to play and do fun things. This led me to put up a swimming pool outside of the window in our kitchen and climbing through with my kids. I still liked to watch Pokemon and play the game. I was jealous of my cousins who could still go out on dates and I really just lost touch with them because they couldn't relate to me and we couldn't do a lot of teenage things together.

The player in my life were still the same but with the added dynamic of a husband (who was still a teenage boy) and babies who needed me to be a mother.

I had a great desire to be the kind of mother they deserved, and I desired to go to school in order to be a good example for them.

Fast forward to my life now. My children are all growing up, my youngest is 10, I've been divorced from my first husband now for 6 years and separated/divorced from my second for 6 months. I don't know how this stage of life is supposed to work, I get the whole going to work and providing for my children aspect but I no longer go to church so that whole community of people and set beliefs is no longer there. I made breakfast for my children this Easter morning, and gave them small Easter presents but they will have to wait to do their Easter Egg hunt at my parents. Then that is getting awkward, unless my nieces are there the only one who is still technically a child is my youngest girl at 10. This developing stage of my life is me, without the support of a husband, without that consistency... and it's weird. Who do I let into the scenes of my life's play now? I don't exactly want to be in a relationship right now, I don't think I've found the right person, I don't know if I will ever find the right person. The person who I thought was right, turned out to think I was the wrong person and left... and that has been really hard for me. I gave my heart, my hopes and dreams to someone and the relationship that we had... and now it's gone.

That is the play of my life right now, the scenes don't make a lot of sense to me. I don't really know how to play this part, but I will figure it out.

SG

Projects!

This is the speech I am preparing for Toastmasters. I am going to give it this Thursday.

I love projects! Ever since I was a little girl I was always up to something (some would say "up to no good").

Have you ever built a Rube Goldberg machine? I think they are so much fun to design and build, so time consuming but so satisfying.

I created a gumball machine out of cardboard and car tracks, I was a bit obsessed with gumball machines when I was little.

My brother and I created a magic box out of a refrigerator box, we stacked a smaller box on top and put in a "trap" door, so cool!

I created a pulley system between my window and my friends in the neighboring window, so that we could pass things back and forth in a basket. It was so much fun!

I hated to wake up in the morning so I built a pulley system out of thumb tacks and string so that I could turn the light off after my mom had turned it on.

Sadly the boat my brother and I created out of 2x4's and plywood couldn't even be moved let alone float on the river (as we hoped) but it did become the platform for our rope swing later on.

There has always been something energizing about coming up with new things to do. My youngest brother and I recently started to record some things together, he is in the audio engineering program at UVU and I just think it would be awesome to record music and voice-over's, so we make a good team.

Last fall, when I found myself in a situation of needing to get a new home, I kept my eye out for one with a bit of extra space.

We were in the middle of the Year End crunch time at work when a link came through from my realtor to a Condo in Orem that I could afford with 2,200 sq ft., so I pull it up and start glancing through the pictures.

First of all I was attracted to the small piece of land behind the condo, space for a garden! Then I came across the picture of the 'bonus room' and I was convinced that this was the place for me!

So I call up my realtor, he gets me an appointment to see the place that night, I get there and walk through it and the whole time my little checklist of things that I want in a home are being marked off… the only thing I didn't like was the set up of the kitchen and the flooring in the upstairs rooms.

The 'bonus room' was exactly what I was looking for, I could see the potential for a recording space right away. Plus the rest of the space would be perfect for a little dance studio for my son, he dances Break Dance and Hip-Hop.

So I put in an offer, it was accepted and I ended up with my very first condo!

Then it came time to get everything, I was a fanatic for a while there, researching and gathering all of the pieces together.

Now that my space has been created, and I can explore this new opportunity to learn how to speak.

On to my next project, I don't know what it will be yet, but I know it will be fun!

Comfort Zone

I keep trying to write today and keep getting stuck.

I finally got caught up at work! Hallelujah! I had to put in some extra hours but it was worth it knowing that tomorrow with the new COA coming by (whatever a COA is... controller I think) I will not be behind and can focus on going to lunch and listening to him say stuff... without worry.

Each day that I am at work I wonder how the grownups in my life ever had time for a life and how I never noticed if they didn't? 

It's so draining to do the same type of work, every single day and yet I am treading water I know I am. I've been treading water for years waiting for the right time to make a move. 

There's too much of impatience in the world though and I have been basically doing the same thing every day, yet I have been learning each day and the role has changed with the years a little at a time. I've had to step out of my comfort zone, a little bit here and there and I have grown so much. It's sometimes hard to believe that I was still unsure of how to properly send and email when I first started, I was that ignorant of the workforce. There have been many times when I have felt that I should be doing better work but then this job has become a security blanket of sorts through the difficulties of my life over the past couple of years.

I have stepped out of my comfort zones but I will crawl right back in if I'm not careful. Like giving speeches for Toastmasters at Adobe... I'm supposed to be writing the next one but I am stuck, I just don't know what the best thing to speak on is so I've got many different speeches started. I want to talk about how I get crazy projects going but there are so many and they are of different varieties. Sometimes I make things sometimes I create things. Sometimes I gather and sometimes I discard. I have bits and pieces of stories written as well. I should pull them all together and make a book of random, disjointed thoughts... think it would sell? Haha

~SG

Getting The Frustration Out

I don't know if you've ever been accused of something that you didn't do and couldn't prove that you didn't do it, I have been, it's dead awful and frustrating.

Here's the deal. I have a strong conscience, I always have, I've never been able to go long without wanting to make things right, fessing up to my mistakes. I hate to have made mistakes, it makes me feel so ashamed and I don't like that feeling, but I do own up to them.

In fact I once inadvertently took home the fork of my friend after a dinner party, then brought it to work intending to give it back to her, time passed and I kept forgetting to give her her fork back. Until one night when we all planned to go out to dinner with our friend (and former manager) who was visiting from San Jose. I suddenly remembered the fork and when my friend came to my desk I gave it back to her, so embarrassed. We all had a good chuckle over it because it was a silly thing to feel guilty about.

So I have a self identity of someone who is generally honest. I value relationships, superficial people drive me nuts so I tend to form deep relationships with a few people. I don't have a lot of time and so this can be a difficult task. So when I invest time into a relationship I really don't like to lose it. Unfortunately I've usually invested in men who I felt a connection with. Opening up, revealing my past mistakes, forming a bond... and then when those relationships ended I was left with gaping holes in my heart.

Looking back I was infatuated with my last husband, we discussed things a bit but he didn't really reveal much about his feelings or his family's life. He talked a lot about fun things he did with his friends. We did things together and for me to get out of the house to go to concerts, visit friends and do things with family, go hiking, go geo-cashing, go snowboarding... and to get out the paints and paint. I loved that, I just loved it. I was so stressed out from school and I just don't know what it was but he calmed me down and I don't know how but I he could make me laugh until my sides hurt and keep laughing. He started to fill in for the kids Dad and didn't say things off the cuff like their Dad used to, he always seemed to think things through. He was my heart, I loved him so much. We had nicknames for each other, he was my best friend.

Then he grew cold. He decided that I had cheated on him and nothing I said, nothing I did could change his mind. I pleaded with him the first time he left but he "just knew I cheated on him" and he wanted me to confess. The empty futility of that tears at my heart. I had nothing to confess, I have nothing to confess. When I decided to get into a relationship with him I had cut ties with every other interested guy. I closed the door on friendships with other men. The biggest fault that I can lay on myself is not being able to stop my ex-husband from interfering in my life. I tried, I was so cold to him, I only talked to him about our kids and somehow he took advantage of that. BUT I wasn't in love with him and didn't want to be with him. My second biggest fault was being too damn busy to give my husband the attention he deserved, in that I just didn't have an alternative but to drop out of school.

I did all I could to prove that I didn't cheat, I took a lie detector test (which was humiliating) and was cleared as telling the truth. 

BUT he had made up his mind and that was that. 

Now I look back and I know that there was nothing I could do. He had grown cold, distant and he wouldn't forgive me for being human. He didn't seem to care when I was bleeding internally from Ulcerative Colitis, he seemed put out that he had to drive me to the doctors when I had spent the night clearing out my intestines for a test, he seemed mad at me when I was sick, unconcerned when I had a bad reaction to cashews, didn't care or worry for me when I was anemic. By the time I was going through these difficult things he had decided that I had cheated on him so he withheld his compassion. He was a big jerk! Damn it. I didn't know why he had flipped the switch from caring to indifferent.

AND I don't need that in my life.

It's just that I had started to dream of this steady life, this bright future, this happy home and I lost that. I now have this home, this new life and new dreams. I have this dual nature where I am moving forward but I am tired of my heart breaking. I recognize the impermanence of life, of relationships and it seems the impermanence of love. Part of me is so sad that I feel cynical towards the idea of finding lasting love. I guess I'm jealous of those who have found someone who will stick it out with them, who have stayed and figured out how to make it work. How to make it fresh again, and who have someone to comfortably be themselves with. I dislike disingenuous people.

Well I've worn myself out, time to eat a banana and get to bed.

SG

Some old thoughts about religion on a Wiki that my friend and I put together several years ago

Thoughts:

Why are humans so compelled to religion? Why do we feel good when hearing about others religious experiences?

Case in point - I attended sacrament meeting today. First was a talk by a lady obsessed with family history and recording personal histories (I can see the validity of this to a point, but it can become an all consuming obsession). It was interesting to hear stories of her pioneer ancestors though I couldn't help but wonder the whole time how human beings get caught up in a psychological battle with themselves about what they believe. About how comforting it is to be a part of a movement, a group that seems to have things all worked out and how it is harder to face the void and meaninglessness of life and persevere making your life's meaning be what you want it to be. I was flipping through facebook on my phone while contemplating this. Then her husband got up to speak. He told of the extreme circumstances that he faced. His wife left him and took his two younger boys. He was left with his older son who developed a serious disease. He was in a car accident. He lost his job. His hair was falling out due to the stress. He turned towards God and while on taking pictures at his brothers temple wedding a woman who came out of the temple radiating happiness came up to him and told him that she felt impressed to tell him that God loved him. I've gotta tell you this story made me tear up. I've been there. I've been so poor that looking for spare change in the house would be pointless since we had scoured it many times. I've been harassed by debt collectors at 5 AM while my husband worked in a different state. I had to get on my knees and ask for guidance and I've found it. I've had encounters with people who seemed like angels to me since they appeared at my lowest states. AND it's hard to turn from believing in that to not believing because there is that something inside that wants to believe. BUT it feels the same way as believing in Santa Clause and the Tooth Fairy did as a kid. AND a lot more evidence (or lack there of) points to the religion as a fraud... but what a fraud it is.