SoCS: Resting is Not the Same as Giving Up and Why I Gave Up on The Rings of Power

Today’s prompt for #JusJoJan and Stream of Consciousness Saturday is: “throw in the towel.” Use the phrase “throw in the towel” somewhere in your post. Enjoy!

To “throw in the towel” means to quit something, maybe give up on something, after having worked on it for a while. Where does this phrase come from? Is it a football term? Don’t those football guys carry towels around? lol. I’m not a big fan of football. Maybe that’s un-American to some folks. Okay, the sport itself is okay I guess, okay. Stop saying okay. But I never really got the huge national extravagant $$$ part of it. But I didn’t really want to go there.

In general, where does one throw the towel? In the laundry basket? If a towel is dirty, then you should throw it in. That brings me back to what I really wanted to write about, and that is that sometimes it’s okay to quit. If something is not healthy, if it’s not working, and you’ve tried to the point of insanity or toxicity, and the fate of the world does not depend on your endeavor, then throw in the towel.

As a side note, resting or taking a break is not the same as quitting. I made a meme for that a while ago.

But sometimes, you just need to throw in the towel. About a week ago, I made the decision to throw in the towel on Amazon Prime which I got for the sole purpose of watching The Rings of Power. This was not an easy decision, because I am a huge fan of The Lord of the Rings (like some people are huge fans of football.) I can watch those movies, and The Hobbit movies over and over again, usually while doing stuff on the computer and stopping to watch when my favorite parts come on, like the parts with the elves.

After much consideration, including the cost of Amazon Prime and that I still want to watch Season 2 of Picard and Star Trek, Strange New Worlds on Paramount which costs less by the way, I decided that The Rings of Power was too dark for me. There were some characters I liked okay, but the orcs seemed a lot scarier, and the series just felt continually heavy. The final decision was the episode (still in season 1) where things happen to horses. I will not go into details (except to say there is fire involved), and I know it’s just a movie and those things didn’t really happen to the horses, but when you love animals and have a good imagination, it can be traumatic. And sometimes horses do get hurt on movie sets. So there. It’s done. There are plenty of other things to watch and books to read, and when the old LOTR and Hobbit movies come on cable, I’ll watch them again.

I had to look up the origin of throwing in the towel. It comes from boxing. The trainer throws in the towel to save his boxer when it is clear he’s not going to win. That way, he can live to fight another day, which brings us back to the idea that it’s okay to take a break and rest a while before going back into the ring of life.

And now, a message from Gandalf.

~~~

To learn more about Stream of Consciousness Saturday,

visit our host, Linda Hill

by clicking HERE.

SoCS: Buttercups!

Today’s Stream of Consciousness prompt is “butter.”

We are not going to write about, wait, who’s we? Me and the cat? She’s not interested in writing. She just wants to cuddle since she hid most of the day yesterday in the bedroom where maybe she was trapped. I don’t know. But I don’t want to write about the first thing that popped into my head, the butter in the refrigerator and object of my cheating in my endeavors to be vegan for lent. I’d rather write about the second thing that popped into my head:

Buttercup!

Photo of buttercups my daughter, Ayla, took in the mountains

Then, I thought of Princess Buttercup in The Princess Bride and found this commentary about how she is not just a typical, helpless, fairy tale princess. She is not in love with the prince. She loves to ride her horse. It made me like her more. I didn’t realize until recently that the same woman who played Princess Buttercup, played Jenny in Forest Gump. Back to the commentary.

Horses and freedom. My horse phase was more than a phase. I actually had my own horse in my twenties. I miss horses. And the beach. But there’s no reason I know of that we can’t go back to the things we love in some way or other – if it’s meant to be, we will find a way. Trust the Timing.

Spring is coming. With buttercups!

That was way more fun that writing about my awful side effects from Moderna 1 and 2. But that is over and done with, and I’m very glad. I survived, and I’m thankful for my strong immune reaction.

Buttercups! Daisies! Roses! Orchids!

Check out the orchids and other flowers blooming in time lapse from Nat Geo! They even have fairy tale like music to go with the images of Princess Bride riding her horse. That’s my stream of consciousness for this Saturday.

But wait!

I forgot all about sharing that commercial where they sing the buttercup song. Can I have three videos in one post? Let’s see! I’m not promoting the product. I just love TV commercials that use old songs like this. I’d totally be singing with her if I was in the store. It doesn’t matter that the lyrics are sorta sad. It’s got a good beat and it’s easy to sing to.

For more on Stream of Consciousness Saturday, like rules and stuff, visit our host, Linda Hill at the link below!

The Friday Reminder and Prompt for #SoCS March 6, 2021 | (lindaghill.com)

Just Say Neigh, Oink, Moo

It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood and Linda Hill has decided to have fun with today’s Stream of Consciousness prompt:

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “on the farm.” Find a word that has a farm animal sound in it, i.e. sMOOth, and use it in your post. Bonus points if you include three or more. Have extra fun!   ___LGH

Hey Linda! Did you know your initials remind me of the word, laugh? Okay, then farm animal. I’ve always loved horses and had one of my own in my early twenties, but I have not been close to a horse in about a year. I’ll be going to Ashton Farm in June for some horse energy! But neigh reminds me of neighborhood.

I like my neighborhood. Some days, I love it. The houses were built in the forties and need some work. Mine needs a lot of work…. but the neighborhood has plenty of old trees and is quiet most of the time. It’s not perfect, we do occasionally get suspicious activity in a house down the street or a dog running loose, but for the most part, it’s great.

I still want to find a house in the mountains some day, too. That’s very much in the dreaming stage. Dreaming about a house, a cottage in the woods. My house is a little urban cottage near the coast. Ahhh. Dreams….. I don’t want a homeowners association fee though and all those rules. Neigh, not for me. Unless the house is otherwise perfect because anything is possible!

Love your neighbor as yourself means don’t forget to love yourself, too. That means I need some freedom to be me and let my yard go a little wild and woodsy. Not manicured. That’s just me. If someone asks you to do something that feels unhealthy or like you would be betraying yourself, then, just say neigh. Not for me. But what might be for me is bonus points if I can find two more words with farm animal sounds.

OINKER. My husband says he’s an oinker. Not that he’s fat, overweight is more PC, (Sorry. It’s SOC) though we’ve both gained a few pounds since we got married. Here’s what he means by oinker:

One

Income

No

Kids

Expecting

Retirement

Did you know that pigs are more intelligent than dogs? I’m tempted to say, that’s why I don’t eat them. But I have to come up with one more animal sound/word. So I’ll go with something easy.

Moon, Moon, I love the moon. Do cows ever howl at the moon? I guess they’d moo at the moon. I bet it’s happened.

While she was jumping

over the moon,

she mooed.

Wouldn’t you?

I don’t eat cows either. I’m never in the mood anymore for burgers. Don’t miss em. Never liked moon pies much. But dark chocolate, that’s calling me. Dark chocolate makes me want to howl at the moon.  Here’s a song about the moon by America. I had not heard it before now and stumbled upon it looking for “Blue Moon.” You never know what you might find.

For more farm animal sounds in the Stream of Consciousness, visit Linda’s post!

https://lindaghill.com/2018/05/11/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-may-12-18/

Here are the rules:

1. Your post must be stream of consciousness writing, meaning no editing, (typos can be fixed) and minimal planning on what you’re going to write.

2. Your post can be as long or as short as you want it to be. One sentence – one thousand words. Fact, fiction, poetry – it doesn’t matter. Just let the words carry you along until you’re ready to stop.

3. There will be a prompt every week. I will post the prompt here on my blog on Friday, along with a reminder for you to join in. The prompt will be one random thing, but it will not be a subject. For instance, I will not say “Write about dogs”; the prompt will be more like, “Make your first sentence a question,” “Begin with the word ‘The’,” or simply a single word to get your started.

4. Ping back! It’s important, so that I and other people can come and read your post! For example, in your post you can write “This post is part of SoCS:” and then copy and paste the URL found in your address bar at the top of this post into yours. Your link will show up in my comments for everyone to see. The most recent pingbacks will be found at the top. NOTE: Pingbacks only work from WordPress sites. If you’re self-hosted or are participating from another host, such as Blogger, please leave a link to your post in the comments below.

5. Read at least one other person’s blog who has linked back their post. Even better, read everyone’s! If you’re the first person to link back, you can check back later, or go to the previous week, by following my category, “Stream of Consciousness Saturday,” which you’ll find right below the “Like” button on my post.

6. Copy and paste the rules (if you’d like to) in your post. The more people who join in, the more new bloggers you’ll meet and the bigger your community will get!

7. As a suggestion, tag your post “SoCS” and/or “#SoCS” for more exposure and more views.

8. Have fun!

Awesome Stories 331

I find this week’s Awesome Stories intriguing. The horse whisperer video took me back to why I’ve always been drawn to horses. When I was in my early twenties, I had a horse of my own for about a year – a tall, grey roan who was a little high strung like I was then. It was a time of confusion for me, so I did not give her the kind of calmness we see in the video, yet there was something about her power that that gave me a touch of stability and focus that I desperately needed at that time.

writing to freedom

This week Awesome Stories brings you the dark side, problems of capitalism, horse whispering, and lessons from the garden.

The Dark Side

One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious. ~ Carl Jung

Mostly I agree with Doc in this post about the pitfalls of calling yourself a lightworker. Much like chasing happiness, we don’t grow the light by chasing it, but by shining it into the dark. Doc makes some good points about our tendency to avoid the dark and challenges, thinking that by focusing on the positive, we are growing the light. Too often we’re running from our pain. I’ve done that for big chunks of my life and it doesn’t work. Yes, we can and should bring our light into the world. Doc doesn’t address how focusing too much on our pain, we can get lost there, and focusing…

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Horses and Dreams

 

I got to thinking that I have not written much about horses here. I used to own a horse when I was in my twenties. Her name was Blue Babe, and we were both high strung at the time. I don’t know why she was high strung, but I was in my twenties, which for me was my messiest time of my life.

Horses have always calmed me and excited me at the same time. Something about their sturdiness, and being in control of something so large and powerful. Though today, I try to have a looser rein when riding.

Yesterday, I went to help out at a summer day camp at Ashton Farm where they have horses. I’ve ridden there when my church group goes once a year. But yesterday, we did not get the horses out because it was too hot. I wondered how I would do being out in close to 90 degree sunshine for most of the day. I arrived at 10 AM (there are advantages to being a volunteer) and stayed until about 2:30 when the kids were getting on the bus.  I helped out with a bee sting and other camper bug bites and wrote names on construction paper ribbons for winners of the long jump, chicken catch, and other camp games.  It was a good day, and I’m glad I was able to hang in there with the kids and the teen and young adult camp counselors.  Still, I think I’d rather go as a day camper and relax, ride the horses, and kayak on the lake.

This small farm is my ideal. If I could live anywhere I wanted, it would be on a farm like this, with horses and dogs and a big farm house with a wrap around porch, where you can see the stars at night.

Maybe it would be in the mountains, or the foothills, where it’s a little cooler.  Maybe I’d have art therapy and meditation groups, and yoga classes.

I would definitely have campfires, and singing, and drumming.

Campfire at God’s Whisper Farm, another dreamy place where I went to a writer’s retreat.

In the meantime, maybe I’ll do some of those things

in my own back yard

of my little urban cottage,

until I get my farm.

Today’s Stream of Consciousness prompt, brought to us by Linda G. Hill is, “rain/rein/reign.”

You can find more SOC stories at Linda’s place:

https://lindaghill.com/2017/06/23/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-june-2417/

The rules for SoCS are:

1. Your post must be stream of consciousness writing, meaning no editing, (typos can be fixed) and minimal planning on what you’re going to write.

2. Your post can be as long or as short as you want it to be. One sentence – one thousand words. Fact, fiction, poetry – it doesn’t matter. Just let the words carry you along until you’re ready to stop.

3. There will be a prompt every week. I will post the prompt here on my blog on Friday, along with a reminder for you to join in. The prompt will be one random thing, but it will not be a subject. For instance, I will not say “Write about dogs”; the prompt will be more like, “Make your first sentence a question,” “Begin with the word ‘The’,” or simply a single word to get your started.

4. Ping back! It’s important, so that I and other people can come and read your post! For example, in your post you can write “This post is part of SoCS:” and then copy and paste the URL found in your address bar at the top of this post into yours. Your link will show up in my comments for everyone to see. The most recent pingbacks will be found at the top. NOTE: Pingbacks only work from WordPress sites. If you’re self-hosted or are participating from another host, such as Blogger, please leave a link to your post in the comments below.

5. Read at least one other person’s blog who has linked back their post. Even better, read everyone’s! If you’re the first person to link back, you can check back later, or go to the previous week, by following my category, “Stream of Consciousness Saturday,” which you’ll find right below the “Like” button on my post.

6. Copy and paste the rules (if you’d like to) in your post. The more people who join in, the more new bloggers you’ll meet and the bigger your community will get!

7. As a suggestion, tag your post “SoCS” and/or “#SoCS” for more exposure and more views.

8. Have fun!