Nancy LaRonda Johnson's Blog, page 14

Indie-Fever Review of The Ice Cream Vendor's Song

This review is part of the Indie-Fever
2013 Reading Challenge
When I was young, riding in the car with my mom and peering out the window, or looking out the window of the BART train, I often wondered what the lives were like of the people in the many cars and houses we passed by. The flash fiction story collection in Laura McHale Holland's The Ice Cream Vendor's Song gives you a glimpse into quite a few people's possible lives. It is an interesting and memorable book of flash fiction.
Although I wouldn't call many of the stories complete, some are, and all have something worthy about them.
Here’s an incomplete list of what I thought about some of these stories:
The best:                             Golden SandalsMost descriptive:             Endless NightMost disappointing:        The Neighborly ThingMost mystifying:              Long GoneMost effective                   Something OrdinaryFunniest dialog:                I Don’t SupposeThe darkest:                       Thanks, I GuessThe sweetest:                     The Ice Cream Vendor’s Song
I won this eBook from a LibraryThing Members Giveaway. You may purchase the eBook for $2.99 or in print for $8.95 at Amazon.com. 
Check out the author's webpage and blog here.

Tuesday's Journal Past Blast - Messy Art

This is the second weekly installment of Tuesday’s Journal Past Blast, and I've decided to open it up as a blog hop. Feel invited to join the blog hop with the linky below, copy the above button and pin it to your blog, and post old journal entries. We'll share, laugh, cry, and just remember the past from our old journals.

This journal post is from sometime in 1990 or 1991. I actually do remember writing this, but don’t know if I realized how very hilarious it is. 


Out of a Mess Comes Art
If each piece in my room represented a stroke of an artist’s brush, maybe then, instead of a junked-up, messy room, I would have created the masterpiece of the 20th century. I would have won that special artist’s prize and recognition before anyone else. My innermost private self would be copied in every rich person’s living room above the mantle of the fire place. And as they’d make love on the bear rug, they’d look up above the mantle at my garbage bag with trash spilling out, inside-out pants strewn about the floor, along with paper, shoes, books, and think of how talented that young Black woman artist is.

This journal, old as it is, has lost it's
cover, but still holds the truths of
many secrets.

Introducing My Amazing Mother on Her Day...

This is dedicated to my mother, Clara Victoria Butler-Chock. 
Clara, AKA Kattie (pronounced Katie), is a faithful woman of God whose determination and drive have allowed her to reach her goals: travel the world, attain a college degree, raise six children, much of it on her own, and be the CEO of her own business for nearly 30 years. (Oh, she raised a grand daughter, so she raised seven kids.)
Moms and her six kids.
Ask her what her goals in life are now, she'll have definite answers for you:
~ To attain her Master's Degree in psychology, this while battling health issues at the age of seventy. And guess what? She is currently a masters of psychology student at Argosy University in Alameda. 
My proud mom.~ To write her memoir. I've read some of her stories, and she has a great talent for pulling you into her life and giving you a taste of the characters she has encountered.
~ To travel, travel, travel. I mean, she's already been to Japan, Canada, Mexico, Australia, Virgin Islands and several of the States, including Hawaii. Of course, she wants to do lots more, like see more of the States, particularly the southern states, and go to Puerto Rico, Spain and Hong Kong.
~ And to spend time with her millions of grand and great grand kids.
Mom in the center, and her grand and great grandkids.
There are more now, but this is the last picture of them together.Yes, my mom has a full, balanced life, and she's always up for a party:


Halloween 2011
Princess Mulan Miss Pocahontas,
at a costume party  New Year's Eve 2012











She has family and friends that are always ready to show her some love:




And just remember, however, that no matter what, she remains her same outgoing yet strange self:
If you catch her talking to
a stuffed animal, make her stop.
My mom and stepdad, Joe




She is my amazing mother who, although divorced my dad, has been remarried for almost 25 years and is working hard to keep it going... 









while dreaming of herself from years gone by: The original family
Kattie in all her glory! (Leave it to me and my brother
Anthony to mark it up with our "cursive" writing.)
Yes, us two here, me and my brother, with my beautiful mom.
Happy Mother's Day Mom!
LaRonda

The Vair Thriller: Save-a-Word Saturday

The word lovers and prompt writers blog hop. Here's how it goes:

1. Create a lovely blog post that links back to The Feather and The Rose blog - our host.

2. Pick an old word you want to save from extinction to feature in your blog post. It really must be an old word, not just a big one. We are trying to save lovely archaisms, not ugly giants (for example, "Dihydrogen Monoxide" is not an acceptable choice). Luciferous Logolepsy is a great database of lovely words if you're having trouble coming up with something on your own.
3. Provide a definition of your word. Use your word in a sentence (or even a short paragraph) vaguely related to the theme we have chosen this week. You may also add visual or musical interpretations of your word or your sentence. In fact, add anything that moves your creative spirit.
4. Add your post to the linky list below (sometimes I add it later in the day). Then hop to as many other blogs as you can in search of as many wonderful words as possible!
5. Use as many of the words as you can on the people in your life. Do leave us a note or add something to your own post to let us all know what wonderful old word you whipped out to befuddle your friends and relations.
Today's theme is: scorpions
My word today is: vair: (noun) fur, typically bluish-gray in color, obtained from a variety of squirrel, used in the 13th and 14th centuries as a trimming or lining for garments.
And here's my writing for this word:

At the precise moment when the scorpion came out of its hole, Tryer saw the handler reaching for the woman wearing the vair earmuffs. Tryer quickly lifted the scorpion by its tail, its body and legs jerking about in a hapless attempt to sting her. With fluid motions, Tryer flung the scorpion and it landed on the handler's neck, the stinger attaching to the handler's strained neck vein.
The intense pain of the sting distracted the handler enough for Tryer to pull the vair earmuffs off the woman and sprint away to the exit spot. Right before making her way through the exit, Tryer used an exacto knife to dislodge from the muffs the hidden vials containing the microbes. Tryer looked up when she saw a shadow fall over her.

Getting Back to Normal Celebrating

Being that it's another Friday, you should know by now that it's time to Celebrate the Small Things accomplished this past week in a blog hop hosted by VikLit's Writing Blog.

Things I'm thankful for this week:

* I think I've finally recouped from the A to Z Challenge, and will get back to visiting more people in this blog hop.

* Beginning to work with a publicist starting today and hoping for some great exposure. Pray for me!

* I've also been working more on Salted With Fire, my short book on flash fiction and poetry.

* Saw Iron Man 3 in IMAX 3D. Very good and humorous movie. :)

I'll be coming around to see what you're celebrating!

Coming Out From The Past - A Writer's Old Journaling

The S post of the A to Z Challenge (this one) got me thinking about the past a lot – the post where I spoke about how an old friend and I were caught shoplifting in our youth. 
I did go to her old house and was surprised to learn that her parents still live there. My friend wasn’t there, but one of her sisters was. It turns out that my friend lives just a block away from my mom, she works at a high school in Hayward, the city I live, and her other sister works as a probation officer like I do. How things go is just funny to me! I mean, I hadn’t seen her in about 30 years.
I left my phone and email with the mom, but of course I ended up writing the wrong number! But she did email me and I sent her the right number. I’m looking forward to catching up with her.
Well, this got me the idea to go over some old journals and to post some things here. Some journal entries are VERY personal, not to mention show me in a vulnerable light. But, it seemed like an interesting idea. Here goes.
This is something I wrote years ago that I don’t even remember writing. (I’m sure there are at least a few journal entries I won’t remember having written!) It’s not dated, but the entry before that was on 12/6/97. Unfortunately, nothing after that was dated, so it’s hard to say if this was also written in 1997 or not. Since this journal entry was about writing, I thought it would make for a great start to this weekly theme. Hopefully soon I'll come up with a label and badge for these Tuesday posts.
When A Writer Creates
It’s the act of creating, like drawing and even doing jigsaw puzzles. It’s seeing how something is created from nothing or from jumbled things. The act of putting letters, words, sentences, paragraphs on paper is a beautiful experience to me. And then seeing, reading, what comes out of it… if it’s something good, it’s magnificent. If it’s bad, it’s still something to be at least a little proud of, even if a little ashamed of also.
It’s a great feeling to realize you’re the only one who’ve thought to write this story, character, this trouble. Although I hate when people say this, you feel almost godlike. You’ve created a world, people, lives, interactions, love, hate, murder, just simple pleasures like enjoying how vanilla ice cream melts in your mouth. You made that person who enjoyed that. You’ve created someone who dies a horrid death… yet no one has been hurt.
Maybe from the outcome, someone’s been moved, touched, made to understand something that nothing else in life has made him understand. Writing can give someone a reason to get up in the morning when they just have to find out, What happens next…?
It’s a way of creating that pits your wits against your experiences, which results in as great a creation or feeling of love as rearing a beloved child. It seems almost out of your control how it finally turns out.
This writing came from this journal. I liked sketch books because they didn't have lines and writing was more free flowing. I didn't have much in this journal, only a few entries, which is why it's hard to be sure when the above writing was written.

I Was Thinking.... Save-a-Word Saturday

The word lovers and prompt writers blog hop. Here's how it goes:

1. Create a lovely blog post that links back to The Feather and The Rose blog - our host.

2. Pick an old word you want to save from extinction to feature in your blog post. It really must be an old word, not just a big one. We are trying to save lovely archaisms, not ugly giants (for example, "Dihydrogen Monoxide" is not an acceptable choice). Luciferous Logolepsy is a great database of lovely words if you're having trouble coming up with something on your own.
3. Provide a definition of your word. Use your word in a sentence (or even a short paragraph) vaguely related to the theme we have chosen this week. You may also add visual or musical interpretations of your word or your sentence. In fact, add anything that moves your creative spirit.
4. Add your post to the linky list below (sometimes I add it later in the day). Then hop to as many other blogs as you can in search of as many wonderful words as possible!
5. Use as many of the words as you can on the people in your life. Do leave us a note or add something to your own post to let us all know what wonderful old word you whipped out to befuddle your friends and relations.
Today's theme is: earlobes
My word today is: Ratiocinate: From 1635-45Verb - to reason; the process of reasoning
And here's my writing for this word:

Mom said I have to clean behind my ears and inside my ears. “Mom! I’m washing my earlobes too even though you didn’t tell me to! Can I get extra ice cream?”

 

Am I Just Waking Up?! Celebrating the Small Things + A to Z Reflections

I guess I’d better wake up (as if I’d ever gotten enough sleep!) and get back into the grove of posting again. I tell you, after the A to Z Challenge, it was great to not even have to turn on the computer after getting home from work the last couple of nights, which was why I’d missed IWSG on Wednesday.
[pic from wikipics.net]        
But, I didn’t want to miss VikLit’s Celebrate the Small Things blog hop today, so I’m up and ready to get going.
This past week, I’m thankful for:

1. The A to Z Challenge was a blast. It was my first time doing it, and it was worth the hours each day spent posting and reading others’ blog posts. 2. This most amazingly wonderful weather we’ve been having. 3. Claritin for helping through worsening seasonal allergies.4. That God is my God, patient and faithful to me through all my faults and self-doubts. 




Since I didn’t follow instructions on the A to Z Challenge Reflections link very well, I’ll copy my (late) reflections on each new post for a while.
This was a wonderful Challenge – definitely challenging and growth promoting. I feel my writing developed a great deal doing these posts, and my confidence in writing on the fly has been boosted. I can endure stress!
I liked not having a theme. There were some wonderful themes out there, but where I’m at now, not having a theme worked best for me. You could say my theme was my blog – Christian and other fiction, poetry and ideas – except I didn’t have any poetry. But I put out some flash fiction, some ideas, controversial and otherwise, and it was a wonderful experience.
I do wish I was able to visit more blogs, and wish all of the blogs I did visit returned visits, which some unfortunately didn’t. Overall, this was an experience I will look forward to doing again… and again… and again, if I am able!

ZZZzzzz.....

The A to Z Challenge is over now. I am off to sleep, but I have left you a couple of videos and some photos which I hope will allow you to relax and ease into a deep sleep as well. 
God bless. It has been a wonderful journey. 
ZZZZzzzzz.......







[These photos were taken by me while on vacation in Hawaii (I think), Mexico, Greece, the Panama Canal cruise, and Treasure Island in the SF Bay. Except the clouds picture, which I call "God's Hands" was taken by my mother's friend from her backyard.]

Yearnings

Many dreams come, developments are reached and goals are attained because of initial yearnings for things not yet at hand. 
If so much good come from yearnings, why is it that they seem to have negative connotations? People often say we should be happy with what we have, which could mean that yearning for what we don't have focuses selfish attention on ourselves. In that sense, yearnings are like discarded branches and twigs strewn about on the shores of who we are - the ignoble parts of our character. I know I often have an inner sense of guilt for wanting what I don't have when I have been blessed with so much already.
I think that guilty feeling, however, does not come from God, as God wants to show his children favor with many blessings. If we don't acknowledge the yearnings we have, there is a great chance that we will unwittingly not accept blessings from God who supplies the fulfillment of our yearnings.
I do yearn, and these yearnings bring me feelings of melancholy, hope, loneliness, joy, fear and expectation. The negative feelings in this list, I'm realizing, come from not acknowledging that many yearnings are good in God's eyes. Indeed, wishing for more than I have is not sinful. I would not be who I am today if I did not yearn to write a book, to help care for my family, to travel, to further my education, to speak another language and to please God.
Starting now, I will allow myself to have yearnings, free from feelings of guilt. I will accept God's desire to bless me by bringing these yearnings to completion. Only then will those seemingly discarded and ignoble branches and twigs become part of the beautiful landscape that will be my final portrait.
My vacation at the coast in Mendocino County, CA

Please visit these other A to Z Challenge blogs:
Elaine AM Smith
Devin Dahl