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Archive for September, 2012

Sep 30

25 Comments

Deja Vu

I saw him once. A long time ago. A man with curly hair, frozen in stone. He fought a lion that stretched in a back bend.

I stood in my sailor dress, the one I wore in my kindergarten picture, and I watched the man. Imagined him struggle. Strained to hear the roar of the lion across the ripples of the water.

He was different. Not like the others, the naked statues. I pointed to their naughty bits and laughed, even though I knew it was a baby thing to do. Not grown up. Immature.

Samson was raw strength carved in stone. I couldn’t forget him. Of all the statues, he was the one I remembered through my life. Monumental. On a pedestal.

He was still on the pedestal when I saw him again. Thirty-eight years older. Samson still charmed me.

Sep 29

15 Comments

Making Some Happy Feet

Rotary Happy Feet 2012 is a partnership between the Mount Pleasant Lunch Rotary Club and the East Cooper Breakfast Rotary Club. Each year, we partner with our local Target to give school shoes to needy children in our community. We gave away 200 pairs of shoes this morning. Here are some highlights of the event.

Sep 29

sunset, swamp, black mingo swamp, black mingo creek, south carolina
19 Comments

She Sells Sea Shells

Penelope’s last house was a haze of dust. It filmed the corners. Draped the tops of clothes. Seeped into cloth upholstery.

Dust thou art.

Read more

Sep 28

30 Comments

The Backside of My Backside

For almost a week, I’ve been writing posts about weight loss. It’s a topic that is fraught with opinions.

She’s let herself go. 

Wow……can anyone say middle-aged?

Pushing back from the feed trough once in a while *might* be a good idea.

We’ve all done it, at one time or another. Looked at a picture online or in a magazine and been outraged at a celebrity that was something other than perfection. Perhaps we expect a lot of others to fill the simmering, unseen void where we ourselves fall short.

I’m pleased with how I look now, but I wasn’t unhappy with how I looked before. The inside is what counts. My blood pressure is lower. Ditto cholesterol. The heart-attack inducing fat around my middle is gone. Shrunken.

Whatever.

There’s less of me to love, but I hope that means I will live longer. Be nicer. Do something good for someone, somewhere. Use that mileage to make a difference in the world. In the end, I don’t want people to remember me for how I looked.

I want them to remember me for how I lived.

This post is part of the series Don’t Mess With the Dress. If this is your first visit to the series, please click here to go back to the beginning, go here for the second installment, click here for the third installment, go here for the fourth installment, click here for the fifth installment and go here for the sixth installment.

Sep 27

62 Comments

Seeing Red

I still have that sweater, the one I bought from J Crew when I was 19. It’s cable stitched cotton, a mock turtleneck. Forest green, a popular late-80′s color. I think it’s coming around again, though I lacked style and wore it every year from then to now.

With this quest to reward myself for weight loss success, I wanted to break my sordid love affair with J Crew. Kiss a different lover. Add a frock to my closet that was more than something I put in my perpetual shopping cart on the J Crew site.

I always have a cart going. My J Crew user name is continuous sign in. If the three sale items in my current basket are still there by the weekend, it’s a sign I’m supposed to have them.

It’s a sick game I’ve played for as long as they’ve been online.

No surprise I settled on threads from J Crew. A dress from their fall collection. I violated my usual rule and splurged for something full price.

We set the balance aside to go to Helsinki for Thanksgiving. Because experiencing life is ever so much better than wearing it on my backside.

This post is part of the series Don’t Mess With the Dress. If this is your first visit to the series, please click here to go back to the beginning, go here for the second installment, click here for the third installment, go here for the fourth installment and click here for the fifth installment.

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