Month: January 2021

Can I Trust You? Can You Trust Me?

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The Importance of Trust in Teamwork | by Gráinne Logue | Buckets Blog

What character trait do you value most highly in another person? Courage? Self-control? Compassion? For me, the answer is honesty. As a child of divorce, I recall being endlessly grilled by one parent or the other: Is your dad hiding money so he doesn’t have to pay child support? Is your mom leaving you home alone while she works?

My life was a balancing act–I had to keep my parents in balance so they wouldn’t destroy each other! Now don’t get all Department of Children and Family Services on me! I’m talking about the havoc one misspoken word can wreak, catapulting a parent into a hurricane funnel, while a child runs for cover!

Perhaps you’ve been there? Managing your parents, when they should be managing you? Trying so hard to be the perfect child that honesty summersaults out the window.

I was newly married and in my twenties when my mother passed away. I asked my father, “Was all that stuff you told me about mom true?” He shrugged. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

It was then that I decided to break the rules and tell the truth like my life depended on it. Wait, my life does depend on it. If you’ve got ADD, you better admit it so people will understand why you pose endless questions. If you sing, dance, write, and play piano, you better tell the truth so you can shine your soul instead of squeezing your talents into a Tupperware bowl because some people are jealous of your talents. And if you want to help the world thrive, you better be honest so you can connect with others who share your goals.

Dirty little secret about honesty? It takes commitment. Like phoning a friend back when you say you will. Like promptly responding to texts and emails when you’ve promised to do so. For those of you who mouth the words, then leave the sender hanging because it’s a bummer to respond, shame on you.

Honesty can be inconvenient, it requires commitment. I changed. So can you! From now on, let us each commit to one another, following through on our promises, no matter if it is only a text or email.

Honesty. The only policy.

THIS AUTHOR’S HOPES AND DREAMS FOR HER SEEDLING

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The Mechanics of Cosmic Consciousness Blossoming: Yellow Seed Wavespell, Kin 144-156 - TimeWaves

In this time of new beginnings, when Democracy has reclaimed its Mojo after wrestling with Goliath, when scientists, in the time it takes to grow a baby in its mother’s womb, delivered unto us a miraculous COVID-19 vaccine predicted to save the lives of hundreds of thousands, when President Joe Biden, a man whom Lindsay Graham called “as good a man as God ever created,” pledged to become America’s “Uniter in Chief” and Vice President Kamala Harris won the trifecta of becoming our nation’s first black Asian woman to assume that post, who am I, a mere writer, to ask for anything more?

Asking for more is human nature. Anyone who knows me will tell you I’m a pretty grateful gal. Every morning I spring out of bed and praise the Lord for allowing me to live another day. For granting me a clear bill of health; despite Osteoporosis, my fingers are still nimble enough to type my manuscripts, hour after hour, without uttering a single grimace of pain. Emotional pain from the wrong word or phrase doesn’t count!

These nimble fingers are rounding the track on completing the last pages of yet one more edit of Up Close & Personal. If you’ve been keeping up with my blog posts, you know that Up Close & Personal, a new series I’m writing about a retired Chicago news reporter who gets kidnapped by a young man claiming to be the son she put up for adoption thirty-four years ago, is in its seedling stage, awaiting a literary agent/publisher who will water that seedling with the utmost of care until one day it will blossom in all its glory!

I believe that my friend Austin is such a planter. Austin is both an author and a small publisher. So far, he’s told me Up Close & Personal is not yet ready for planting. He’s been kind enough to tell me what nutrients I need to feed my seedling so it grows big and strong. My gut tells me Austin really is interested in planting my seedling, he just wants to make sure it’s sturdy enough to withstand the weather. So I’m going to do all I can to position my ask so it receives the right answer! All I need to do is grow my seedling into a strong sapling that can be replanted.

Wish me luck….

How An Attempted Coup Impacted My Heart!

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Bay Area Reporter :: Guest Opinion: Trump's attempted coup requires a bold response — from all of us

Is this what we’ve come to? The last shards of American civility shattered as insurrectionists stormed into our House of Democracy with minimal capitol police presence to stop their assault?

My neighbor, a native from Brazil, mentioned she came home to see her husband holding a hand to his mouth as he watched the news. She glanced at the TV screen. “Oh! Another coup. Which country this time?” Then she saw the American flag.

I remember walking down an empty street the day after the 2016 election and spotting an 8 of Spades from a deck of playing cards. As it was a strange item to come upon, I Googled the card’s meaning: Temptation, misfortune, danger, upsets, chaos.

That prediction has come true over the last four years, with immigrant children wrung from their parents’ arms, half the nation calling the pandemic a scientist-sponsored hoax, Black Lives Matter protestors and rioters facing a massive military show of force, and most recently, the president of the United Stated refusing to accept the confirmed vote count that will soon boot him from office.

But the final affront to our nation occurred on January 6, 2021, a day to go down in infamy, as President Donald Trump stood in front of thousands of his followers, inciting them to storm the capitol and disrupt the electoral college vote. Terrorized members of Congress wearing medical masks and gas masks, barricading themselves in their offices.

Once inside the chambers, however, the mob looked more like tourists, taking pictures of papers scattered on the floor, broken desks. One guy making off with a lectern. Another plopping into House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s chair and grinning for a portrait. Others posed for pictures beneath a painting of the Civil War.

As we’ve seen during this administration, two polar opposite realities.

Even more shocking than what we already saw was watching insurrectionists being calmly escorted outside by the capitol police, one capitol police officer even taking selfies with the mob. Fifty arrests in total provided a stark contrast to the 316 Black Lives Matter predominantly peaceful demonstrators who were tear-gassed and thrown to the ground in Minneapolis on June 1, 2020 after police killed George Floyd.

Fortunately, Mitch McConnell, Nancy Pelosi, and Chuck Schumer, for perhaps the first time in this administration, came together to form a plan. Refusing to allow domestic terrorists to rule the day, Congress reconvened to count those electoral votes, and Joe Biden will duly be sworn in as president, Kamala Harris as vice president, of the United States on January 20, 2021.

I was talking with a friend about the aftermath of the attempted coup, re: many legislators and company CFOs calling for Trump’s impeachment. We grimaced at a Facebook post that said: Twitter has permanently removed President Trump’s account for incendiary posts, and that’s the guy you want to press the nuclear bomb button?”

My friend then posed a question that will funnel through my brain for a long time to come: “How can we deprogram half the nation who are just following their cult leader?” My response is this. We still live in America. No matter how abhorrent to us are the beliefs of others, America can not become another Communist China, throwing people into mass detention camps to reprogram them using forced ideological and behavioral re-education.

There must be a better way to dissolve people’s fears and distrust, creating a society where justice will reign. As Joe Biden has said, “We must restore the soul of America.” I pray that the incoming president of the United States of America will do just that.