On Dating.......

When I ask a man how OLD he is,,,I am NOT referring to DOG YEARS...

Here's a good "Toby Story"....
I was in the supermarket about an hour ago in yoga pants and a turquoise top and flip flops...
So I'm feeling the PINEAPPLES,,lol...and this guy in a beautiful suit, very tan...walks over and says, "That's a GORGEOUS COLOR on you"...
(kind of elegantly actually)
and I, being the self deprecating yet arrogant woman that I am, said
"Jeeez, you should see me when I REALLY look good!"
And he said,"Let's try and make that happen.."...
And I literally RAN AWAY, leaving him agape...
WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME ?????
I'm so ridiculously aloof to men.....
Thoughts ?

On "Getting Away"....

How far away must one travel in order to REALLY be 'AWAY' ?
Can we simply lock our LOCAL, bedroom door
and sequester ourselves for a long weekend without phone or laptop ?
Would that qualify as "Getting Away" ?
Or..
Must we really LEAVE ?
Board a plane...fly to an 'un-charted' location ?
Is that really FURTHER ? Really ??
More REMOTE somehow ?
Are we AWAY, at times, EVEN while we are still HERE ?
What exactly IS "GETTING AWAY" ?

On Fathers...

The FIRST TORAH commandment to a Father is:

"Teach your child to SWIM..."

Curious, right ?
Why would such a seemingly abstract tenant be the FIRST ?
Well.....
It's not so abstract really...
The message is quite clear...

in other words:

Teach your child to SURVIVE...

Teach your child to CHOOSE LIFE...

Teach your child to LIVE...

An INGENIOUS, LIFE-AFFIRMING message really.......

"Teach your child to swim.."

Is it Possible ??

Do you think that it's REALLY possible to "take care" of oneself TOTALLY...
while aggressively taking care of someone else ?
Does one side suffer ?
Can we give 100% to 2 entities at once ?
According to my "humble" calculations, we each have in our "handbag" of resources...
only 100% in entirety...
Based on this premise, it would be virtually IMPOSSIBLE to GIVE 200%...
Right ?

Have "Hashtags" Replaced Search Engines ?

Things are moving VERY, VERY quickly....
The worlds of technology and communications seem to have melded into
ONE BIG ELECTRIC, THINK TANK...
You buy a computer on Wednesday, and by Friday, it's OBSOLETE...
You hear tidbits and snippets of conversations, and you'd SWEAR you were in a foreign country...
Because you don't UNDERSTAND ONE WORD of what they're saying...
And so...
from where I sit,
there are TWO choices here...
You can
 1) Become obsolete yourself, while clinging to your old ways,
 hoping against hopes that you will NOT be left ALONE...
or
2) Get off your stubborn ass, and JUMP IN, FEET FIRST...
Sink or Swim !!
And BELIEVE ME, my friends.,,,,
If THEY can do it, so can YOU....

So it's that time of year...

when things tend to end..at least for the season...
The Cycles of life continue.....
The Seasons...
Ecclesiastes' words come to mind...
Schools gives the kids a good, long break...
Schedules relax...
The days get hot and the sun stays up there in the sky for LONG periods of time...
Thursdays end the work week...
Generally, there is a kind of collective "sigh of relief" which one can almost hear in the quiet of the long days...
And way up in the sky...
high above all of this GENERAL, HUMAN LAPSE in activity,
 there floats an ethereal blanket of "whimsy"...
GOLD in color....a soft gold...
almost like a HALO really...
An AURA of GOLD stretches its silky, smoky haze across the entire SEASON somehow...
And one gets the distinct feeling that this AURA
 holds within it a collection of MEMORIES,,,of IMAGES...
of CONCEPTS....of CREATION somehow..
Let's call it a "Creative Sanctuary"....
And this place...this "ethereal cacophony of wonder and light"..
Well...
It actually SWAYS back and forth softly...rhythmically...
It LIVES...it breathes...
Are you getting the picture ?