Grateful

 

Every morning as soon as I wake up, I say, “Thank you God for this day.” I sometimes think, “I don’t know what I’m gonna do with it, buts thanks.

I’m grateful for my son. He’s all grown up now and as long as he’s in my life, there’s a tremendous amount of gratitude for his existence.

There’s extreme gratitude for my house. Having a roof over my head, water, heat and sunlight coming through the windows means a lot to me.

My family, friends, teachers, and acquaintances; I have gratitude for all of them because they all add a touch of happiness to my life.

I’m grateful for my health. I’ve heard people say when you have your health, you have everything.

Having enough money makes me feel grateful. Being able to pay my bills, buy groceries and have a tv to watch gives me a basic feeling of comfort.

I would be remiss if I didn’t say I was grateful for my bathroom. After all, it’s the first room I use when I get up in the morning. Thoughts like using an outhouse in the freezing cold of winter or digging a hole deep in the woods ran through my mind which gave me tons of bathroom gratitude.

Gratitude is so important because it makes you think more positively about the things you have in your life.

Ellen G.

Winter Withered Away

 

I woke up to steam hissing in the radiator

Old Man Winter was still trying to be a Dictator Narrator: “Your time has passed old man, make room for spring and stop being so steadfast!”

Old Man Winter: “I am alive and vibrant my Blizzard days may be over, but I am still not ready for a hostile takeover!”

Narrator: “End your annoying meteorological blight!”

Old man winter:” I can still deliver flurries to blur your sight!”

Narrator:” Spring is in the wings, and her beauty grows daily while you increasingly turn gray and scaly!”

Winter knew that he was done and would not win the day, so he stood there and reluctantly withered away.

Jim- March 26’

Writing Assignment: "Grateful"

 

What I am grateful for: 

 

My health, my mind, my freedom, my kids, and grandson.  

My cat, my home. 

Reading, writing, art, and music.  

Safety, lessons learned from joy and hardship.  

Wisdom and waking up to the gift of another day

Georgia

Writing Assignment: Regarding Favorite Authors

 

Steven Pressfield 

Steven Pressfield is a remarkable author that has inspired me for many years. He writes as if he is speaking to me about my inner struggles in consistently producing creative work. His book “The War of Art” describes an artist's inner resistance, doubt, fear and procrastination that stand in the way of making art. Any art. His writing is direct, wise, and encouraging and reminds me and all artists to have courage, discipline, and persistence. He writes clearly and in an ordinary, understanable, language. Steven Pressfield has not only inspired me but countless other artists to believe in their work and to never give up.  

Georgia

Long and Short

 

I read many long and not so long novels, usually just once. However, there are certain children’s books that I have read and love to read over and over again. My four all-time favorites are Pierre, a Cautionary Tale by Maurice Sendak, If You Give a Mouse a Cookie by Laura Numeroff, Oh Were They Ever Happy by Peter Spier and The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs by Jon Scieszka.

In the story of Pierre, all the little boy will say is, “I don’t care” to everything and everyone. When a lion says he will eat Pierre up in one gulp and Pierre answers that he doesn’t care, the lion eats him whole.

In the end, Pierre figures out he’s better off saying he cares which produces a happy ending. This story influenced my family so much that if anybody said, “I don’t care,” the rest of the family would rename that person Pierre.

If You Give a Mouse a Cookie is a humorous and entertaining book about a mouse who requests a cookie and then makes more requests, one after the other as soon as the first one is granted. Boy, I would love that to happen to me one day in the life of….

Oh Were They Ever Happy is a book about parents that go out and leave their three children and their dog at home. The children want to help around the house while their parents are gone so they find a bunch of paint cans and brushes and decide to paint both the inside and outside of the house, including the dog. Needless to say, when the parents get home, they show their reaction to being helped. When the kids were done painting, everything looked bright and colorful. I wish I could have done this to my house and the dog when I was a child.

This fractured fairy tale, The True Story of the Three Little Pigs, is hysterical after reading the original The Three Little Pigs. Wolf claims he was framed and he had a bad head cold that made him sneeze so hard, it blew the first two houses down. The book presents Wolf as a very misunderstood character. In the end, Wolf is in jail claiming he’s innocent and all he wanted from Granny was a cup of sugar.

Many of us can recall that at some time in our lives, we have known a “Wolf”, whether it be a family member a neighbor, or a co-worker.

I do enjoy the novels I read just once but I really love to read children’s books over and over again.

Ellen G

A Restorative Sanctuary

 

My father introduced me to the works of Arthur Conan Doyle when I was about eight years old. He suggested The Red Headed League and I was enthralled. Since then I have sat in the corner of that famous flat in front of the two broad windows at 221B Baker St. waiting for the next desperate character to appear on the carpet and sit by the fireside between Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson to relate their bizarre tale of woe with the hope that the world's premier consulting detective can solve their mystery and bring them peace and a satisfying resolution. I am there in spirit and invisible to the residents of that abode, hanging on every word to see what will happen next.

Or I might instead file into the cozy home of Bilbo Baggins lost in a long line of dwarves bearded and hooded in his home, tunneled with great skill into the side of a hill, in the Shire, as the great dwarf Thorin Oakenshield and his band of kin disturb the comfortable retiring lifestyle of one Bilbo Baggins, at this unexpected party and interview him to determine if he has the mettle to steal treasure and pair wits with a Dragon as intelligent as it is merciless.

A wild ride with Toad bouncing up and down on the back seat of his new hot- rod can be joyful as well as thrilling, unseen by the amphibian road-hog, risking life and limb for a thrill. Or witness an exchange between Friday and Robinson Caruso as they try to communicate with each other for the first time.

The magic of the written word masterfully wielded by a writer that we can identify with can take us away from our mundane tribulations or current circumstances whisking us away to a fantasy world or into the past or future or even to an alien planet in our own time to escape a problem , or dream about our circumstances from a refreshing new and novel perspective restored between the pages of a good book.

Jim - March 2026

Parade Excitement

 

Teenagers! Teenagers! My girlfriend Cindy and I are both fourteen years old which means it is the first year we can go to The Thanksgiving Day Parade without our parents. They actually gave us permission to go without them. Cindy and I know how to travel the trains to Manhattan so we were all set to go.

The train took an hour, but we talked with each other so much during the ride, it seemed like we were at 34th Street in fifteen minutes. We were so excited, we practically flew up the subway stairs. When we reached the street, our eyes were filled with all the parade sights. The floats were the most fascinating part of the parade and there were so many of them. We saw marching bands, the baton twirlers, and all the spectators lined up against the sidewalks to catch a glimpse. The Thanksgiving Day Parade definitely did not disappoint.

Cindy and I were down in the dumps when the parade was over, and it was time to take the train back home. The train was packed with parade goers. My friend and I had to sit across from this vagrant, older man who had taken his shoe and sock off. Maybe his foot hurt a lot from standing at the parade. In the meantime, Cindy was holding some very long, wispy peacock feathers.

When she saw the old man’s bare foot, she bent over laughing hysterically causing the feathers to reach the old man’s foot. The old man didn’t think it was funny because the feathers were now tickling his foot. The old man started yelling at us. We got scared so we moved to another spot in the train. Once we were safe, we laughed and laughed so hard, our stomachs hurt.

Being at The Thanksgiving Day Parade was amazing but the man’s foot being tickled by the peacock feathers stands out as the most memorable and is still talked and laughed about to this day.

Ellen

Halloween Parade

 

Many years ago, I took my children to the Greenwich Village Halloween Parade. We didn’t march in it because the crowds were overwhelming, and I felt it was too dangerous. We stood for hours, trying to stay near the front, but the pushing and jostling became too much. 

We did, however, witness the most incredible horror costumes imaginable—zombies, vampires, werewolves, dead celebrities, dragons, witches, skeletons, ghosts, and ghouls. Spooky music drifted through the streets, mixing with the hum of excited voices. Food vendors lined the sidewalks with hot pretzels, roasted nuts, and sweet treats, while souvenir stands sold glowing necklaces, masks, and plastic pumpkins to mark the night.

Georgia

Reading

 

I remember being about six years old, sitting beside an unnamed adult who held a copy of Babar by Jean de Brunhoff. They read the story aloud, and I was thrilled listening to the words and looking at the pictures. At some point I grabbed the book and stared at the lines of print myself. That was when I realized I could not read. My little brain was stunned. I felt frustrated, I wanted to read the book on my own. 

Not long after, I found a copy of Madeline by Ludwig Bemelmans. I held it with hope, but the words did not make sense. I kept looking at the pictures and tried to make sense of them.  

Time passed, and I went to grade school. Slowly, patiently, the letters began to make sense. Sounds formed into words, words into sentences, and sentences into entire worlds. Reading finally came to me.  

Georgia

A Valentine Card for My Grandson

 

Happy Valentine’s Day, my sweet boy.
Be kind, be brave, and remember how deeply you are loved.

 

Georgia

Words on a Kite

 

Paper and string I may be,  

With tiny bones blown by gusts. 

The blue open sky knows my name,  

Even my shadow lets go.

Georgia

The Golden Cat

 

I dreamed a golden cat rang my doorbell with its tail. 

He was carrying a small sun and walked past me in a hurry as I opened the door.  

The cat said, “Is dinner ready,” though I had never agreed to cook dinner for a golden cat.  

It sat on my couch, turned into a loaf of bread, then back into a cat, offended that I noticed. 

Melted butter was dripping off the wall, and we gathered it into pink and green bowls.  

The cat yawned, swallowed the clock, and everything felt finished and perfectly wrong. 

Wrong is good sometimes.

Georgia

Pelicans and Cormorants

 

In a small community along the Florida coast, there lived a large population of Pelicans along with a large number of Cormorants.  Both are water birds and although they get along, they don’t really pay attention to each other.  Pelicans are large, brown and have large beaks with throat pouches that can hold up to three gallons of water.  Cormorants are medium sized, have dark brown colored bodies and long necks.

One thing these two birds have in common is building their nests on the ground not far from the coast land. The ground is not as safe and secure as other locations to build nests. Unfortunately, they will learn this firsthand when a severe windstorm passes through the coastline one afternoon.

A mother Cormorant had built her nest on the ground but didn’t realize it was too close to the water.  When the windstorm arrived, it blew the nest with four eggs into the water.

Mother Cormorant started squawking and shrieking in her loudest distress calls.  All the Pelicans and Cormorants saw the nest floating away and they were frantic.

Suddenly, one of the bigger Pelicans flew off in the direction of the nest.  He caught up to it, swooped down with his large beak, and scooped the nest with eggs into his large throat pouch.  It fit with ease!  The Pelican flew back to the Mother Cormorant and placed the nest gently at her feet, not one egg missing.

“Thank you, thank you so much! You saved my babies and you didn’t have to do that!  What empathy you have!  Until eternity, whenever I dive for my fish, I will share them with you.  You will never go hungry,” said Mother CormorantIn a small community along the Florida coast, there lived a large population of Pelicans along with a large number of Cormorants.  Both are water birds and although they get along, they don’t really pay attention to each other.  Pelicans are large, brown and have large beaks with throat pouches that can hold up to three gallons of water.  Cormorants are medium sized, have dark brown colored bodies and long necks.

One thing these two birds have in common is building their nests on the ground not far from the coast land. The ground is not as safe and secure as other locations to build nests. Unfortunately, they will learn this firsthand when a severe windstorm passes through the coastline one afternoon.

A mother Cormorant had built her nest on the ground but didn’t realize it was too close to the water.  When the windstorm arrived, it blew the nest with four eggs into the water.

Mother Cormorant started squawking and shrieking in her loudest distress calls.  All the Pelicans and Cormorants saw the nest floating away and they were frantic.

Suddenly, one of the bigger Pelicans flew off in the direction of the nest.  He caught up to it, swooped down with his large beak, and scooped the nest with eggs into his large throat pouch.  It fit with ease!  The Pelican flew back to the Mother Cormorant and placed the nest gently at her feet, not one egg missing.

“Thank you, thank you so much! You saved my babies and you didn’t have to do that!  What empathy you have!  Until eternity, whenever I dive for my fish, I will share them with you.  You will never go hungry,” said Mother Cormorant.

Ellen G

The Hero of Northern Boulevard

 Idling at a traffic light, on the barren expanse of Northern Boulevard. 

Motion suspended, thoughts suspended, a checkered ball suspended –  

No, rising, sailing, arcing joyfully 

High above the pavement, the stoplight, the chain link fence  

That sequestered an adjacent schoolyard teeming with children 

Who swirled in serpentine games. 

 

The soccer ball sunk silently into the maelstrom. 

My eyes retraced path to the narrow median where its flight began. 

Poised, triumphantly was a small round man 

Grey knit cap adorned his head, 

Atop an explosion of granite-hued beard 

That seemed to crumble in the radiance of his grin. 

 

He waved. In that moment,  

He was Yogi Berra on the pitcher’s mound. 

A war hero atop a festooned float. 

The light changed to green. 

He disappeared into his car and was swept out of sight 

In the freshly flowing traffic. 

Shelia

Birds

 

Today we had a rare, heavy snowstorm—something we don’t often get in my area. 

I feed the local birds with bits of bread, creating what I think of as Bird TV for my cat. This morning felt different. Early on, I set the bread out on the windowsill as usual and wondered if any birds would brave the storm at all. 

Normally, the big, plump pigeons and turtle doves arrive first, devouring nearly everything and knocking enough crumbs down for the smaller birds below. But during the swirling snow, none of them appeared. 

Instead, the little birds came—sparrows and starlings—battling the wind and stinging snowflakes as they pecked determinedly at the bread. Watching them struggle on, I found myself seeing them differently. Those small birds are braver than I ever gave them credit for—certainly braver than the big ones. 

Georgia