Sweet Feet

A  L  O  H  A !

 

Click on these photos for engorgement

" Forget not

 that the earth delights

 to feel your bare feet

 and the winds

 long to play 

with your hair.  "

Khalil Gibran

" Keep your eyes

 on the stars, 

and your feet

on the ground.  "

Theodore Roosevelt

 

" Heaven is under our feet 

as well as over our heads.  "

Henry David Thoreau

"  I have spread my dreams

 under your feet; 

Tread softly 

because you tread

 on my dreams.  "

William Butler Yeats

" Ah, the patter of little feet

 around the house. 

There's nothing 

like having a 

midget 

for a butler.  "

W. C. Fields

 > < } } (°>

Today I'm enjoying

the fact that I am not

limping anymore.

What happened

is not important.

It was minor,

and on the mend..

It's amazing

how the body knows

the ways to favor injuries

without thought

on our part.

As the injury mends,

the limp changes

along with it.

Today I am

remembering how to walk

without a limp;

A limp,

or a flinch,

 can become

a habit

you know.

What other stories

does my body tell?

Do my shoulders still

hunch

with a shame,

or fear,

or reticence

that my mind

long since

 let go of ?

" Life is very sweet

just walking down the street-

not all of us

can use our feet. "

Just for today

let's celebrate

overlooked, common

miracles

such as walking,

breathing,

a companion,

solitude.

" You have brains in your head. 

You have feet in your shoes. 

You can steer yourself

 in any direction 

you choose. 

You're on your own, 

and you know

 what you know. 

And you are the guy 

who'll decide where to go.  "

Dr. Seuss

Leave YOUR footprints

in Comments !

                   Warmly, cloudia

Summer's Genius

A  L  O  H  A !

 Afternoon  Retreat from Brightness

 “It takes a lot of time

 to be a genius.
You have to sit around 

so much,
doing nothing,
 really doing 

nothing.”

Gertrude Stein

 Intimate Duet

“A genius is someone 

who takes a complex thing

 and makes it look simple.

 An academic 

does the opposite. ”

Robert Fanney

Sky  Crown

" There is a huge amount

 of freedom

 that comes to you 

when you take 

nothing personally. "

Don Miguel Ruiz

 > < } } (°>

Thank YOU

                   Warmly, cloudia

Juneteenth

  A  L  O  H  A    FRIENDS !

Click on the photos

 " My grandfather always said 

that living is like

 licking honey 

off a thorn. "

Louis Adamic

" A memory

 is what is left 

when something happens 

and does not completely 

un-happen.  "

Edward de Bono

" Memory is a child 

walking along a seashore.  

You never can tell

 what small pebble

 it will pick up and store away

 among its treasured things.  "

Pierce Harris

 " Every man's memory

 is his private literature.  "

Aldous Huxley

" God gave us memories

 that we might have roses 

in December.  "

J.M. Barrie

 And

there are memories

that it is our

duty

to remember 

Happy Juneteenth!

On June 19th, 1865
US Army Major General 
Gordon Granger
landed at Galveston, Texas
bringing the news
that the US Civil War
was over,
and that slaves
were now free-

two and on half years
AFTER
President Lincoln's
Emancipation Proclamation.

January 1, 1863

Texas was far away,
but with the arrival
of the General's troops
freedom had at last 
come! 
(Surrender had been signed
in April of 1865)



In a similar vein:

From:

 Dwight D. Eisenhower

 Memorial Commission, 

Washington, DC

HERE " On April 4, 1945, elements of  the United States Army captured the Ohrdruf concentration camp  outside the town of Gotha  in south central Germany. . . . . . . .. Bodies were piled  throughout the camp.   There was evidence everywhere  of systematic butchery.  Many of the mounds of  dead bodies were still smoldering  from failed attempts  by the departing SS guards  to burn them.  The stench was horrible.. . .   General Eisenhower  immediately arranged to meet  Generals Bradley and Patton at Ohrdruf  on the morning of April 12th.  By that time, Buchenwald itself  had been captured.  Consequently, Ike decided to  extend the group’s visit to include a tour  of the Buchenwald  extermination camp  the next day.  Eisenhower also ordered  every American soldier in the area  who was not on the front lines  to visit Ohrdruf and Buchenwald.  He wanted them to see   for themselves  what they were fighting  against. . . .  Later on Ike wrote to Mamie,  “I never dreamed that such cruelty,  bestiality, and savagery  could really exist in this world.” . . . .  [And he had just fought a savage war! Cloudia] He cabled General Marshall  encouraging him to bring  Congressmen and journalists  with him.. . . . General Eisenhower understood  that many people  would be unable to comprehend  the full scope of this horror.  He also understood  that any human deeds  that were so utterly evil  might eventually be challenged  or even denied  as being literally  unbelievable.  For these reasons  he ordered  that all the civilian news media  and military combat camera units  be required to visit the camps  and record their observations  in print, pictures and film.  As he explained to General Marshall,  “I made the visit deliberately,  in order to be in a position to give  first-hand evidence of these things  if ever, in the future,  there develops a tendency to charge  these allegations   merely to  ‘propaganda.’”  His prediction proved correct.   When some groups, even today,  attempt to deny  that the Holocaust ever happened  they must confront  the massive official record,  including both written evidence  and thousands of pictures,  that Eisenhower ordered to be assembled. . . .  " © Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial Commission, Washington, DC, 2004    >  <  }  }  ( ° >
Thanks for swimming these wine-dark seas of memory with me. Let us enjoy our Summer all the more to honor the people - fragile, people just like ourselves- who overcame literal darkness. Let us promise ourselves to be more like them. Today's Germans & Texans bear no responsibiltiy for the past even as they  live history's lingering effects,  those regrettable, and those  ennobling.                       Warmly,  cloudia

The New Song

A  L  O  H  A !

 " Every year,

by burning fossil fuels,

we release

a million years

of photosynthesis. "

Daniel  Nocera

 " More energy from sunlight 

strikes the earth in 1 hr 

 than all of the energy 

currently consumed on the planet 

in 1 year. "

 United Nations Development Program

(2003)

World Energy Assessment Report: 

Energy and the Challenge of Sustainability

 

 " A hunch

 is creativity trying

 to tell you

 something.  "

Frank Capra

 

“Genius is nothing more

 nor less

 than childhood

 recaptured at will.” 

  Charles Baudelaire

 “Genius

 is the recovery

 of childhood 

at will.” 

  Arthur Rimbaud

[/]

 

THE NEW SONG
w.s. merwin


For some time I thought there was time
and that there would always be time
for what I had a mind to do
and what I could imagine
going back to and finding it
as I had found it the first time
but by this time I do not know
what I thought when I thought back then
                                                -

there is no time yet it grows less

there is the sound of rain at night

arriving unknown in the leaves

once without before or after

then I hear the thrush waking 

at daybreak singing the new song.

Thank YOU! 

                    Warmly, cloudia

Bless the Fathers

A  L  O  H  A !

 Click on the Photos

" I cannot think

 of any need in childhood

 as strong as the need 

for a father's protection."

 

  Sigmund Freud

" Sometimes the poorest man

 leaves his children

 the richest inheritance.  "

Ruth E. Renkel

" Dad, 

your guiding hand 

on my shoulder 

will remain with me 

forever.  "

Anonymous

 Look around.

This moment,

These people,

This place-

THIS is treasure!

I hope you enjoy it

                         Warmly, cloudia

Fantast:

 A visionary or dreamer. 

A L O H A !

 

“The self requires a story.” 

 Andre Gide

Bobby's mother had three children.
One's name was April. 

The others name was June.

What was the third child's name?

Answer:

BOBBY !

 “History shows us

 that the people who end up

 changing the world –
the great political, social, 

scientific, technological, artistic, 

even sports revolutionaries –
are always nuts, 

until they are right, 

and then they are geniuses.” 

John Eliot

 <>[}:{]<> 

Have a good day,

fellow genius-nuts !

                Warmly,  cloudia

                                                                       the birthday girl