Because Someone Has Faith in Me

Because someone has faith in me

I cannot fail though all the way

Winds up the hills.

My staff in hand and cheerily,

I can but fare me forth each day

With right good will.

Because someone has faith in me

I need to keep my heart quite true,

My own faith strong,

My vision clear, that I may see

Undaunted by what meets my view,

And sing a song.

God help me sing the song, I pray,

God keep me clean and strong to go,

Clear-eyed to see

The untrod, upward-winding way,

For fail I cannot; One I know

Has faith in me.

Be Patient with Me

Be patient with me

As I am just learning how to

Feel love,

And sometimes I still get frightened

Understand how I feel

And how new this is to me,

Because I realize how very much

I love you.

Love is such a strange feeling

To have,

And sometimes I’m not sure if

I can deal with it.

I know it will take a while for me

To open up

And completely trust you

But I know it will happen

Because I want it to,

So, please,

Be patient with me.

A poem about me from a former acquaintance.

During my dating days, I was acquainted briefly with a really nice young man who wrote me a sonnet.  I kept it in a box and typed it up one day.  It was special to me because I felt it described our adventures to a T.  And so I post it here to remember days of old.

One day a girl – she came over

I felt like I’d found a four leaf clover.

We walked through parks with streams and trees

Skipping, jumping, very at ease.

We hunt and fish at our own leisure

Scaling and skinning, gutting for pleasure.

Also, when in my turck we do ride

I sit on the passenger side.

Hither and yonder, driving she goes

Clutching and shifting, dodging potholes.

I do not mind when she comes over

She is my own personal chauffer.

Thinking of her, I get melancholy

Her voice is a song – her eyes like a puppy’s.

So bright, so brown, tranquil they’re seeming.

But then look again, and you’d swear they were scheming.

She’s a girl, a woman, a companion worth mention

A give of laughs & smiles, not tension

Now it’s time that I be proposing

The eventual cause of this closing.

Before I do – I thought I’d mention, uh,

This girl, her name, it is Cynthia

-by Kenneth Harvey

Laugh Out Loud Books to read

Janet Evanovich

Karyn Bonsak

John Grogan

David Rakoff

Carl Hiassen

Laurie Notaro

Fannie Flagg

Laura Numeroff

Can You Keep a Secret? - Sophie Kinsella

Confessions of a Shopaholic – Sophie Kinsella

Shopaholic Ties the Knot – Sophie Kinsella

A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole

Mamma Makes Up Her Mind:  And Other Dangers of Southern Living - Bailey White

Being Dead is No Excuse - Gayden Metcalfe & Charlotte Hays

Skinny Dip:  The Series – Carl Hiaasen

We Thought You Would be Prettier:  True Tales of the Dorkiest Girl Alive – Laurie Notaro

The Idiot Girl’s Action Adventure Club:  True Tales from a Magnificent and Clumsy Life – Laurie Notaro

Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Café - Fannie Flagg

A Girl named Zippy – Haven Kimmel

She Got Up Off The Couch – Haven Kimmel

Little Altars Everywhere – Rebecca Wells

What Looks Like Crazy on an Ordinary Day – Pearl Cleage

Dress your family in Corduroy & Denim – David Sedaris

Me Talk Pretty One Day – David Sedaris

The Egg and I – Betty MacDonald

Mennonite in a Little Black Dress:  A Memoir of Going Home – Rhoda Janzen

Hypocrite in a Pouffy White Dress:  Tales of Growing Up Groovy and Clueless – Susan Jane Gilman

Like a Lampshade in a Whorehouse:  My Life in Comedy – Phyllis Diller

The sex lives of cannibals – J. Maarten Troost

Fraud – David Rakoff

Planning and Frustrated

I hate trying to make plans.  I dream.  I make lists.  But to actually put something fun down on a calendar is just unrealistic.  Why?  Because my dreams/lists/plans don't ever come to fruition.

I'm frustrated.  I have wanted to do something for the past two years but every time I mention it to someone, I get shot down.

See, about 10 years ago, my dad retired from his job as a Process Operator.  He was divorced and all of the kids were grown and/or married.  He had nothing to hold him down at home.  No job to go to on a daily basis.  So, he retired after 35 years on the job and hit the Appalachian Trail within a week o his retirement party.

I'm a homemaker, stay at home mom, domestic engineer, whatever you want to call it.  I love my job but it is monotonous.  My youngest two daughters are now tweens and growing up too fast.  I have a desire to hit the AT also.  I don't want to wait another 10 years to do so.

So, I have put my adventure start date on the calendar.  Wrote it in and drew a big red circle around it.

With my dad's assistance, over the next 6 months, my girls and I will embark on Trail Training.  Starting out on flat terrain with just our hiking shoes.  We'll add inclines and backpacks about 6 weeks before our departure date.