@MOM I love you and miss you. Say Hi to Dad & send instructions for apple pie crust soon Pls xx❥x Robin

                                              Virgina Wendell circa mid-1930's

All the hoopla about the Oprah tweet debut and the CNN versus A.Kutcher, race with its, follow or not to follow, debate on twitter this week got me thinking about my own following proclivities.  I realized that the folks I want follow and to hang with are the ones that I want to connect with on a personal level.  Same goes for the people I follow -- I look forward to the tweets about their lives, their blogs and the other useful information they have gleaned from others.  I only follow folks that are marketing products if it’s something I want - like books or travel or food related sites and information.  I want real stuff and real folks not free laptop guys and mega-marketing gurus pitching how-to info-manuals cluttering up either my twittersphere or my offline life.  

I got to wondering.  Who would be my Ultimate Follow?  If there was one person, living or dead, that I could follow -- (and who would follow me back and engage in conversation with me) Who would it be?

No, contest, it would be my Mom.  She died suddenly of a heart attack in 1985 and I didn’t have a chance to say goodbye. We have a lot to catch up on.  I’d like to go through all the family photo’s with her and ask questions about her mom and dad and her childhood in Chicago. She always wanted to write - I bet she likes my blog and is proud of my sisters books on the Ravenna neighborhood (where we grew up), and Frederick and Nelson, where my dad worked for over 30 years.  Most of all I really need her exact technique for making pie dough.  I have never been able to replicate the, melt in your mouth, crust on her apple pie. 

How about you -- Who would you choose?  Why?

©Robin Wendell 2009

A Beagle on the Roof, Aloof

                                                

Twitterer @ inkgypsy  website has graciously offered to be my ‘First-Peep’ Twittomancy subject.  The everyone ‘tweet’ on her Twitter.com homepage that she picked, at random, (with eyes closed) was-- “I am the Cookie Monster Disguised as Snoopy.”

I immediately had a vision of a rather subdued Cookie Monster inside a dog house with a triumphant Snoopy sitting on top with a happy cookie crumb grin on his face.  I took a look at Snoopy - Wikipedia and found these references: 

“Schulz once said that the best idea he ever had in the strip was to move Snoopy from inside his doghouse to the rooftop. Preceding that, there was a gradual evolution of the character, from something like an actual dog to an anthropomorphic character, more like typical cartoon animals.”

Also:

“Oddly enough, the first time a beagle is mentioned in the strip (December 5, 1960), Snoopy denied being one. As Snoopy dozed, Charlie Brown paraphrased Gertrude Stein: "Beagles on the grass, alas." To this, Snoopy replied, "I ain't no stupid beagle!" (Years later, Snoopy would paraphrase the Stein expression himself: "Birds in the grass, alas;. Beagle on the Roof, Aloof")”

In the comic strip Charley Brown, Snoopy was the ultimate observer of life.  Charlie, Lucy and all the others were very caught up in the drama of their life stories.  Snoopy, on the other hand, watched the continuing show with a certain amount of detachment. He had a wry eye that looked at each unfolding event or object with curiosity and an open mind.  

As a current life situation lesson this picture of a triumphant dog sitting above the fray with a happy life-loving smile on his face says it all. Cookie Monsters are funny but one minded creatures. They want cookies NOW and damn the torpedoes. This is the human condition, we all want what we want when we want it and we want it now.  The trouble is that unless the Cookie Monster part of us is overlooked by the Snoopy part there is no discrimination in our consumption of just about everything.  This leads to a somnolent and sated soul-life, not to mention many extra inches on the old waistline. 

As Joseph Campbell  said, “Life eats life” -- this is a given while we live in space and time.  While Indiscriminate munching is normal but wasteful, the careful consumption or sharing of the proper nutrients for the present moment can nourish your whole life. 

What is needed is to get out of the dog house of need and leap up the roof of abundance to look around to see what’s out there to give or get. Sometimes the morsel is for you, sometimes it is for someone else. Sometimes these tidbits land in your face like a big cream pie and sometimes they come quietly and sit on you shoulder like a little chocolate truffle bird. It’s all waiting in the big refrigerator of life as the unlimited provisions for a banquet of love. 

So here’s to you Inkgypsy - an Eagle Beagle with many wily eyed possibilities before you. I can see you now, your neck scarf is waving in the breeze as you sit on your roof and watch for the next morsel to fly by. You are, at last - A Beagle on the Roof, Aloof"

In memory of "Barney" Woof,Woof. Rest in Peace <3 p="">

*Author Ann Wendell - Picture is birthday cake made for my sister Ann Wendell sometime in the 1960’s

©Robin Wendell 2009

A Tranquility Bird in my Brew

A Tranquility Bird in my Brew

I woke up this morning on my first month twittering anniversary to find 200 plus folks in my teensy followers box on my twitter account. http://twitter.com/paradisekitten  Wowser. I feel so lucky to be followed by and follow such interesting and informative folks.  I have to admit that I started my account on a lark, being of the opinion that social networking sites were probably self-involved twaddle. Now, a month down the twitersphere universe, I have changed my tune.

I’ve bopped around the net and read some critics of twitter.  “What are you doing?”, BIG YAWN, right?  Who, la de da, cares right?  Well it’s not quite as simple as that. 

There is an old swing song that goes, “It’s not what you do, it’s the way that you do it, That’s what gets results.”  Sure there are a lot of less than thrilling folks on twitter but that’s life; the great news is that is not like they are seated next to you all the way to Chicago. It’s possible to choose your travel-mates. I personally find an occasional food item or personal epiphany-tweet fun but if hearing about breakfasts or the cute little golden hairs folks have found on their toes is not your cup of tea you can just change seats.  

Social Networking curmudgeons rant on about how twitter is not “real life”.  Well, I agree that clicking on a tiny-URL ROSE, TwitPic - Share photos on twitter  is not the same thing as going outside and sticking your head in a bush. In fact -- in some ways it’s better.  Outside it’s grey and wet.  My bushes have no roses and if I stick my head in one I will (1 get soaked, and (2 come out looking like I got caught in a kitty cuisinart. Twitter is not a replacement for real life but sometimes -- less is more.

Another thing I have noticed during my fledgling tweet flights is that the brevity of the venue condenses the personalities of people like heat reduces a sauce on the stove.  Their joys, foibles, rants, loves, and woes are boiled down to an essence.  Interested, curious, helpful, intelligent, loving, joyful, ruminating, investigating, creative and fun - those are the people I hang with.  Ranters abound everywhere, but a twitter advantage is that while, with a page to rant you can be an expert or philosopher, in 140 characters it comes off as a big baby twissy fit.  On the other hand, goodness and joy reduces down to light -- small but still very bright and illuminating.

All in all, I’m happy I joined and will continue to frolic word-wise in my twitter box. I’ll leave you with one of my favorite Marcilo Ficino Ficino Quotes:

What Is Necessary For Composure In Life And For Tranquility Of The Soul

(last three paragraphs)

“O my Friends, live your lives happily, Far from narrowness, Live happy. It was the happiness of heaven that created you; and with a kind of laughter, that is with a dilating, a movement, a splendor, it declared you, as if it were rollicking.  The happiness of heaven will protect you.  So live everyday happy in the present.  For worry in the present steals the present away from you and steals the future too.  Curiosity about the future quickly turns it into the past.  Therefore, I implore you, again and again, live Happy!

The fates allow it, as long as you live without care.  But, to live without care, do not allow one single care.  Never worry about anything!  Be extremely diligent in escaping from cares!  For all it takes is one care for the heart of miserable mortals to burn with all cares.  Neglect, therefore your diligence, and love, in fact, your negligence, and even in this it is fitting to be negligent, I mean to the extent it is allowed us.  

I am telling you all this, my friends, not as a priest, but as a doctor.  For without this one thing -- the life of all medicines, as it were, -- all medicines used for the benefit of life would die."

16 September 1489  in the field at Careggi

© Robin Wendell 2009

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