moratorium on the news media,

It is my wish to be able to declare a moratorium on the news media, both liberal and conservative, from now until after the Nov. 12 election. The media is running our country according to each of their bias. We need time to think, to absorb, to observe, to cogitate, to look at everything and everyone from both sides. We need quiet time in which to make a decision. I don't want to hear "what the media thinks."

I am writing the below because there are several people on my Facebook page that are contemplating migrating to Australia.  


I think it highly ironic that I was just reading about my Irish ancestors who came to America in about 1749 because of problems in Ireland. And, of course, there are my English ancestors who came in 1620-35 because of problems in England. Seems kind of silly to keep on picking up our tails and running, doesn't it? Invariably the place we choose to run to eventually will become a place we choose to run from.

SOAPBOX SATURDAY! A new series by B. E. MacKie

Our  Road needs to be cleaned up...there are candy wrappers and trash everywhere, especially outside of here going toward the highway. Nasty people.

Googlemail is changing its format, and it's not senior citizen friendly. There are more of us than there are of YOU! It wasn't broken; why do you have to FIX it so we can't read it!? I think once you get to be 70, younger people just look at you and think you're going to die soon, so why be accommodating toward you at all. Well, I've got news for you busters....some of us live to be 100...that's thirty more years.

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    Brownie Mackie Andy Rooney worked up until a month before he died at 92. Now that's class!

Passtimes of My Youth..1948 to 1954

My mother took me to Dallas to the Starlight Operettas in the bandshell, an outdoor theater on the State Fair Grounds.  I saw so many old operettas;  The Student Prince, Naughty Marietta, Bittersweet, Brigadoon.  Ilona Massey choked when a bug flew in her mouth during Bittersweet.  Then later, the shows were moved indoors, and we continued to go, but it wasn't nearly as much fun.  Beyond that, in our small town, we walked uptown to movies.  We went to the pool or the lake to swim in the summers.  We spent long lazy days doing nothing...just chumbing around...talking on the phone....talking over the fence...talking with an ice cream cone in one hand...going to airport and looking at the planes.  Parking at the train tracks to watch the trains go by.    For lack of anything else to do we went crawdadding and/or fishing.  We had picnics in the park.  Rode our bicycles all over town.  Had slumber parties. Walked the railroad tracks.   Called grocery stores to ask if they had "Sir Walter Raleigh" in a can and when they said "yes" we said, "Well you better let him out before he suffocates!" There was a poor man in the phone book whose initials were B. O.   We called him incessantly to ask him if he used deodorant.

We played tennis (not well) at the college campus courts and roller skated on same when school wasn't in session.  Baseball and basketball were played on sandlots at the schools.   We had parties at the roller rink.  We went to church camp in the summer and short sheeted our friends.  We had hay rides and wiener roasts.  We had formal dances, tacky dances, and dances at the Huddle, which was the youth center.  I was a wallflower.  We had a minor league baseball team (what they called a farm team), and Monty Stratton, one legged baseball player, was on that team.  We used to turn out for all the baseball games when Monty was playing.

Radio was BIG.  Young Widow Brown, Jack Benny, The Shadow, Fibber McGee & Molly, The Inkspots......"I don't want to set the world on fire.....:-)  I just want to start....a flame in your heart."
Cream of Wheat is so good to eat...yes, we have it every day.......we sing this song as we go along...and it makes you shout hooray!  It's good for growing babies and grownups, too, to eat.  For all your family's breakfast you can't beat Cream of Wheat."

 READING THE WAITING ROOM

Spent all day in M. D. Anderson in Houston in scan and diagnostic unit yesterday.  Young people; old people; middle-aged people.  Poor people; middle-class people; wealthy people. The big C....the great equalizer. 

Poignant, heart rending, joyful, tear jerking, laugh provoking.

I saw such tender reactions from a 30 something husband toward his wife, who was obviously very ill,  it made me cry.  A 50 something lady who'd started out six years ago with stage 4 cancer and had her thyroid, both breasts and two other organs removed and was still chuggin' along.    A family of about nine people from at least three generations supported their matriarch of the family with such humor and love it made me happy, because she was happy.  And then there was the omigosh coincidental moment when we started talking to a couple and found out that the husband had the same kind of cancer Jim has (only 2500 diagnosed in the US yearly) and that it had been found the same way Jim's had (an intestinal blockage)....and that they lived in the same town my daddy grew up in....Groesbeck, TX.   :-)....and that they knew all the Ellises (my maiden name was Ellis).  I took a book and didn't read one page.  :-)  Instead I read the waiting room.  

WAXING PHILOSOPHICAL

As I see the end of my life looming in front of my eyes, I think about what I want my children and their children  to know that I know and can pass down.  With every ending there's a new beginning. And it's a continuous flow. 

I wish for all of you a quieter time;  a simpler time;  understanding and cooperation with all kinds of people....find the beauty in each person that you meet;  freedom from keeping up with the Joneses;  the courage to be yourself;  the patience to explore and research and learn until it becomes addictive and pleasureable;  that you learn all you can about this world before you leave it;  the ability to know the difference between trash and treasure in all walks of life;  freedom of thought so profound it makes you rise above temptations that are bad for you;   freedom from unfortunate memories;  the ability to forgive;  the ability to rise above it all.  

Life is not a three act play with a beginning, rising action, a climax, falling action, denouement, , and an end.  

Life  ends right in the middle of things;  life ends when you least expect it;  life.......ends.     

I THINK I'M NUMB

It's hard to feel anything but fear since Jim became sick.  I know at our age, it's common, and the doctors don't seem to understand how young we still feel, so they kind of dismiss our true feelings that we WANT HIM WELL!  And they're not very cooperative.  He's the best thing that ever happened to me; dear God, don't take him away from me yet.  Please.

I love him so much.