Monday, October 28, 2019

I Dreamt I was in a Hallmark Movie

Well, it finally happened.

Yesterday, I was exhausted after a long weekend of camping. I fell asleep on the sofa during a Hallmark movie...one of my Christmas favorites about a veteran. Actually, I had just watched the end of my other favorite about a veteran played by Michael Shanks (from Stargate fame) who falls in love with a war widow and buys her husband's old motorcycle with his re-enlistment money. But I digress.

This second movie stars two of my all time favorite Hallmark actors. This time, it is a woman Marine who was a dog handler who got out of the Marines when they reassigned her dog to someone else. Search and Rescue...that's what her job was. Anyway, her car breaks down in this sweet little fantastic town somewhere in Illinois where it snows a lot. I mean, it is just about Christmas and there is snow everywhere on the green leaves that they carefully try to avoid in each outdoor shot. It's Canada, everybody knows that, but you try to show one license plate and that sets the scene. So, it snows a lot in Illinois in December, right around Christmas, and the whole town is Christmas-mad. I mean, every possible space is decorated with greenery and balls and bells and ribbons and trees and candy canes and hot chocolate stands...and a merry-go-round because it is the big town wide celebration week.

Well, that was that movie.

The one I was in was probably the same place, only with fewer decorations, but the guy...oh, he was there for me.

So, I went through the being lost part and the him finding me and offering to take me in because there were no hotels in the small Illinois town, but not into his house because he has a reputation to uphold, but he's a super nice Hallmark kinda guy.
There I am. Stuck in Nowheresville. The townspeople think I'm safe and treat me well and this nice guy is interested in me.


Now...wait. It's not the me I am now! Of course not. It's the me of me in my prime.

I keep thinking I have to leave, there is something vague I need to see to, but I can't because it's one of those movies. So, I stay and probably fall in love with the guy, even though his face is rather narrow and he's slim and gorgeous and dresses well.

Just when he kisses me and asks me to marry him, I wake up.

That was a relief, actually.
I do not need any further complications in my life.

But I do need to purchase a card for a wedding on Friday. 
It will probably be a Hallmark.

Friday, October 11, 2019

Haunting

It doesn't have to be a ghost to haunt you.

It can be good, or bad, memories that visit your mind at inopportune moments. 

This week, I have been plagued by ghosts...things conjured from my memory that have long been thought dead. I remembered some stuff that crept out of the depths from my childhood. I wanted to talk to someone about these thoughts, but there was no one who would either remember or give a rat's ass about what I was thinking.

That's the trouble with odd memories. Good or bad, sometimes they are just your own and therein lies the problem. You might be able to unload them if there was someone to share the pain or joy. But, no. They lie in wait for you to shut your eyes and hope for sleep without dreams, or nightmares.

That's when these memories spring up and spill over you.

Most of the time--they hurt.

Saturday, October 5, 2019

Why people keep going

Lost causes.

After doing something to find something--a cure, a treasure, an answer, a hope--and getting nowhere--(how many dashes are okay?) what makes people continue?

Einstein said something about doing something over and over the same way and not getting what you want is idiocy. That's paraphrased, to be sure, and I am not even sure it was Einstein who said it, but, well, it makes sense.

Finding the Loch Ness Monster, for instance. I've seen four different programs on television this week, four different groups of people, scouring the lake for signs of this huge prehistoric animal and finding nothing.  Thousands of dollars down the drain, searching for a legend. They find nothing, yet they keep going back to Scotland with hope.

The treasure of Oak Island...another search. Yes, they try different holes, different methods, star charts, high tech satellite photographs, you name it, they've tried it to find treasure. It's been about ten years of this particular team, the Laginas, who have poured money into this venture. So far, they've found a few coins and a lead cross and a crossbow bolt, a couple of semi-precious jewels...but not this huge treasure. The treasure of the Templars and maybe precious first editions of Shakespeare's works...maybe buried somewhere on a small island off the coast of Nova Scotia. Okay, they drill and dig and use every conceivable scientific and geologic method to search for wonders beyond price. 

They've got nothing much so far but a fun television show.

Yet they go on and on, searching, hoping, digging, making television shows. This is 21st century stuff. It has happened all throughout history. Columbus. Ponce deLeon. Name any explorer, any alchemist, anyone who hoped to discover something, anything, that would stop that itch they have to keep going.

Sometimes, an individual does find something of value. Schleimann found Troy. Salk found a cure for polio. There is a huge list of successes, but probably an even bigger list of failures.

Yet, they go on. They keep trolling Loch Ness. The Laginas keep digging on Oak Island. They don't give up.

There may be something more than grace in continuing. But there may be grace also in realizing that the quest is over and giving up.

I am not telling anyone to give up searching, to stop hoping to find a cure, a treasure, a reality (UFOs and Bigfoot), but there has to come a time when either the questions are all answered, or you just plain throw in the towel.

One day, that one day when the decision is made, or the treasure is located, or the monster comes up and bites you on the butt, well, I guess there is always the chance that it may happen, so, okay, you have to keep on trying.

Albert, even you had to keep on going. Scientists and mathematicians and explorers are still trying to prove your ideas. 

Never give up, never surrender!