Happiness

My life is changing. I have more energy, energy to stay awake during the day. I wake up now and don’t feel groggy when I head downstairs to eat breakfast. I tend to go to bed earlier than I used to, but this is because I’m taking less naps in the afternoon. I’m reading and writing more than I have in the past several years. I’m not afraid or anxious when confronted with a blank white piece of paper. I don’t judge myself before I write; the words flow out of me like water from a faucet.

Two months ago, I started a new medication. And it’s making a world of difference in my life.

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Dedicated: A Rhythm of Love Novel

Porter and Graves are two guys trying to make their way in the indie music industry. Les Graves is the bad boy, a run-around, the sexy lyricist, and secretly head-over-heels for his band mate Evan Porter. Evan’s still coming to terms with his feelings for Les. The two have been a dynamic duo, working their way up from the top trying to make a name for themselves. When a threesome brings about suggestive material, suggesting that the guys were a couple, their manager suggests that the two make the best of the hand they’ve been dealt and pretend to be in a relationship–to help their sales. Their last album wasn’t so hot.

While at the cabin where the two have written their previous albums, Les and Evan must either keep up the charade that they are a couple, or actually air out their inner turmoil about each other. They must also come to terms with what a real relationship could mean for their fans, their music, and for themselves.

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#weekendcoffeeshare (April 26th – 28th)

Grab a cup of Joe and let’s get stared!

This past weekend, I had Friday and Sunday off. I worked on Saturday. I spent my days off reading A Song of Fire and Ice: A Clash of Kings, the second installment in George R.R. Martin’s Game of Thrones series. Things are certainly heating up between the three kings: the King in the North, Rob, Stannis, from Storm’s End, and Joffery at King’s Landing. I still dislike how winy and jerky Theon Greyjoy is–which is putting it mildly. Tyrion, Jon Snow, and Arya are still some of my favorite characters. I’m excited to see what Tyrion is building with the many linked chain he’s making.

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tiny trees flutter in the wind

tiny trees flutter in the wind
bending with the blow of the wind
stretching their creaky limbs
with the older trees

tiny trees look up to the large pines
tiny trees admire their strong branches
“you’ll get there,” sing the pines on the wind’s song
“grow, my children,”
chirp the robins, the orioles, and the grosbeaks
“we’ll roost in you one day soon.”

M.B.B.
4/29/19

Hello, Dolly!

I love going to the theater. As a teenager, I was enamored with the high school version of Les Miserables. I listened to the Broadway version of Les Miserables so many times I had entire songs memorized. My parents and sister put up with playing the tape version for me in the car. I would sit in my room at home and knit scarves and squares to the musical. I was completely obsessed.

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Scardust

Raleigh made a promise to his brother, one that he intends to keep. He also desperately wants to join the group headed to Mars. But when a stranger falls from the sky, landing in the dirt in Texas, Raleigh feels himself being pulled in all directions. Can he still fall in love, or will he have to choose between the mysterious stranger and his promise to his brother?

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The Short Bus: A Journey Beyond Normal

In 2003, Jonathan Mooney, a dyslexic young man, set out on a journey in a short bus for several months. From a very young age, Jon was told that he would be unable to make anything of himself. But, he beat the odds, graduating from Brown University with a degree in English literature, and wrote a book about his experiences growing up learning disabled.

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#weekendcoffeeshare April Edition (12th – 14th, 19th – 21st)

Hello, dear readers!

If we were having coffee, I’d be drinking a breakfast blend. I would also be eating breakfast as well. I’m a cereal kind of gal in the morning. Let’s break down the weekend, shall we?

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The Orphan Master’s Son

The Orphan Master’s Son

Pak Jun Do is an orphan. Living in North Korea, he grows up among other wayward children, dictating where they will work, when they will eat, and so on. His father, the orphan master, keeps him and the other kids alive for as long as he can during the famine in the 90s. As an adult, Jun Do undergoes pain training, a way of withstanding severe pain–such as torture–and learns to fight without special equipment in the tunnels.

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Call Me by Your Name

First love. First awakening. First everything.

When Elio, a young man living in Italy, meets the new arrival to his parent’s home, who open their house to help “young academics revise a manuscript before publication” (p. 4) he hates him. He finds this 24-year-old brash, and standoffish with use of the word, Later! Elio cannot wait for the guy to leave: “Meanwhile, we’d have to put up with him for six long weeks” (p. 4). Despite Elio’s eagerness for this young man to leave, he also finds him alluring.

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Bohemian Rhapsody

Buddy, you’re a boy, make a big noise/playing in the street, gonna be a big man someday

This iconic film makes a tribute to Queen’s humble beginnings: Before the band was a huge hit, before the band was a big deal. Freddie Mercury meets his future band-mates playing to a group of young people in a bar. Upon learning that their lead singer quit–wanting to go to a different group–Freddie offers up, “I write song lyrics.” 

It’s the start of a beautiful group, and a tempestuous friendship.

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On Writing

I’ve loved writing ever since I could form letters. Ever since I knew how to formulate stories through play.

As a child, I loved telling stories with my Beanies, Crazy Bones in the sandbox, and German animals. (I’ve played with so many toys; these are the top three.)

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