The dictionary uses evocative terms to define and describe the unique properties of Gold (chemical symbol Au): durable, malleable, resistant to corrosion. It is a precious metal, connoting beauty and elegance as well as great value.
These definitions may be applied to a 50-year marriage: durable, malleable, resistant to corrosion. Likewise, the long-lived marriage is precious, signifying beauty and elegance in addition to great value. Continue reading “Striking Gold”
Hello to the New Year 2018. May each day in this new year be filled with God’s blessings for you and your loved ones.
Goodbye to 2017. Was it a good year for you? Or a bad one? Either way, it’s done and we have a whole new year on the horizon.
Time for making a fresh start, beginning tomorrow. Make the most of every opportunity! See you in 2018.
Southern Living has long been one of my favorite magazines, one of the few print magazines to which I steadfastly subscribe. While leafing through a recent issue newly retrieved from my mailbox, one full-page ad (pictured below) caught my eye. Now you might assume the radiant, air-brushed smile is what drew my attention … but no.
Maybe it was the fragrance ? If you’ve thumbed through a print magazine lately, you may have noticed an uptick in scent strip promos for perfume and cologne products. Scent strips can be helpful. They provide fragrance samples so you won’t plunk down a substantial sum just to learn the scent is awful. But the multiple competing scents in a magazine’s single issue might easily lead to sensory overload!
So, no, it wasn’t the toothy expression nor the unexpectedly subtle fragrance, both of which are skillfully designed to generate interest and drive sales. Surprisingly, the text drew me in!
Take a closer look at the tag line: Life is beautiful. The Fragrance of Happiness.
With a simple search, I learned there were other tag-lines attached to Lancôme’s La vie est belle advertising. The overall theme of Life is beautiful extends naturally from the French phrase. One tag-line declared Life is beautiful. Live It Your Way. Another: Life is beautiful. Choose Your Own Path to Happiness.
Notwithstanding its variations, Lancôme appears to have settled on The Fragrance of Happiness as its primary tag-line. Continue reading “The Fragrance of Life”
You may be geared like me. No matter what the rest of the week brings my way, Saturdays are usually a day of ambition for me. All the tasks still on my list (because I failed to complete them during the week) get shuffled into Saturday!
Of course that means I have to get an early start on the day, so I rarely take the opportunity to sleep in. Given that “Your” (or technically “UR“) lies smack dab in the middle of Saturday, it seems logical to conclude it’s your day, right? A day to do the things you want to do. Continue reading “Sat-Your-Day”
Ever since we first viewed the 2007 film Bella, I’ve paid attention to Eduardo Verástegui and the projects with which he’s been involved. Bella tells the story of an international soccer star (José played by Verástegui) whose life takes a sharp turn that abruptly ends the man’s career. As the movie begins, he’s working as a cook in a restaurant.
Lest I ruin the pleasure you’d have in watching this film, I won’t provide more details. It is well worth viewing. The movie earned multiple awards and honors, and though it didn’t fare well in reviews from Rotten Tomatoes, audiences liked it well enough to reward the film with RT’s Golden Tomato award. Continue reading “Not A Sour Note”
Back in February, I posted about a day when I made a specific appointment to prune the raspberry bushes in my garden. I mentioned my reluctance to perform the task because I believed the productive plants might – given my notoriously purple thumb – take offense at being pruned and simply refuse to produce another crop! About two weeks ago, I took a hopeful gander at the raised-bed garden. I’m afraid it wasn’t good news.
While I can’t confirm that said canes have actually given up the ghost, I’m beginning to worry. While the usual complement of weeds have begun to flourish (and propagate without any assistance), if there are new canes sprouting, I have not spied them. I will go out tomorrow and confirm. Granted, the temperatures may be fooling them into thinking it’s still late winter! Continue reading “Raising Canes . . . Maybe”
With ABC’s Dianne Sawyer conducting a two-hour interview scheduled to air tomorrow night, stories and pictures of Olympic athlete Bruce Jenner are everywhere online as well as on the front pages of various tabloids. Jenner reached the pinnacle of success, snagging two Gold Medals in the grueling decathlon. Esquire described him as “the greatest athlete of his time.”
The picture above shows the young athlete I remember admiring, proudly holding one of his medals. I can’t deny my amazement that this man – and he is a man, no matter what extent his body is or will be mutilated – could be the same individual the news outlets are now covering.
Forty years separated from his last Gold Medal achievement, the recent picture below makes me think of a tortured and lost child, someone so despondent he’s chosen an extraordinary (some would say irrational) path in hopes it will bring him some measure of peace. I look at this second picture and it breaks my heart. How does an individual arrive at this point of utter desperation?
Yes, life can be a meat-grinder … even for someone who is perceived to have success, all the perks of a fine life and seemingly not a care in the world. With three marriages and three divorces, Jenner fathered six children but did not (apparently) find the transformative experiences of family suited his neediness.
For as long as I can remember, music has been an integral part of my life. Two other posts in this space (here and here) offer some background. Because I’m also a product of the 1960s, there’s a certain genre of music that shaped my life just as it shaped the lives of most in my baby-boomer generation.
One of the things I love about YouTube is the availability of so many tunes from the 60s era. Somewhere in storage, we have an ancient record player/changer as well as a stack of long-play albums that we probably haven’t played in at least twenty years … probably longer! We’re unlikely to ever play the albums again (assuming the record player actually still worked) but disposing of the records won’t happen either. (Feel sorry for our heirs!) Continue reading “Back To The 60s Again”
On Tuesday, my post referred to a poem (Spring) written by Pulitzer Prize recipient (1923), poet Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892-1950). According to some literary sources, her sonnets are among the best of the early twentieth century. One particular poem I’ve loved many a year is not a true sonnet but still a top-notch and memorable composition in my opinion. It’s pictured below.
From the moment I first read this poem, Vincent’s ecstasy and amazement showcased in this poem made a connection with me. (I think I might have been in high school at the time.) This poem stands in stark contrast to Spring. Whereas Spring gives a contrary and cynical view of Nature, the rapture and pure pleasure expressed in God’s World supplies Vincent’s surprising yang to the yin that infuses Spring. So enraptured is Vincent in God’s World, she suggests her passion would necessarily overflow if something as simple as a bird call sounded on her ears.
