Pardon My Flosculation...Again

I really like words. Seriously, I use them all the time! Reading, writing, quotidian colloquy. But I have recently heard some disturbing news. I mean, I guess deep down inside I always knew, but until my worst fears were confirmed by an outside source, I held out hope that it wasn't true. There are words on the brink of expiration. The threshold of existence. Near their demise. Falling, quickly and abruptly, into obsolescence!

Words that once served a purpose and held their places proudly and alphabetically in lexicons across the world, are now being tossed aside like relics of a bygone generation. Deemed antiquated, outdated, useless and ineffective they are being removed from dictionaries to make room for new words like woot, edamame and subprime. I get it. Really, I do. I understand the necessity of it. I mean, the only reason language exists is to serve the community that uses it. It allows us to freely exchange thoughts, feelings and ideas. If a word no longer performs this function, it will drop out of our vernacular naturally. It just seems so harsh, you know, to take them out of the dictionary after all they have done for us. Toiling away year after year until suddenly, when they are no longer needed, being torn from the very pages where they waited so faithfully for some amateur philologist to find them. And, as usual, I digress a bit.

The point is that someone even more passionate about words than I, has taken up the cause. Launched a formal protest even, and issued a call to action! For those of us so inclined, we can adopt one of these vanishing words and try to resuscitate it. How fun is that!? So, please help Savethewords.

I narrowed my choices to thural, coquinate, fallaciloquence, flosculation and ictuate, finally choosing to assimilate flosculation into my vocabulary. As part of my pledge to do so, I publicly take the oath of adoption: "I hereby promise to use this word, in conversation and correspondence, as frequently as possible, to the best of my ability." Ah...one down!

And A happy, happy AlphabeThursday to you...Mrs. Matlock just loves her some words...

Quote of the Day: "Language artfully used can make you happy to be alive."

--Ben Yagoda author (from If You Catch An Adjective, Kill It)

Coming Out Of The Closet...How Charming!

I have been inspired, as have others, by Jen's willingness to come out of the closet. Yep, that is right. She totally did it. She exposed all of us for the frauds that we are. Sitting at our computers day after day, blogging about the good the bad and the ugly, but somehow skirting around the actual ugly stuff. Oh, sure, sometimes we discuss the hard things in life and even whine or complain now and again, but somehow we do it in a way that assures all of our readers that even in hardship there is never a dirty dish in the sink.

Well for a few brave souls that has ended. We are comin' clean. I must admit, I lead a pretty charmed life. I have a seriously Hunky Hubby who cleans up after himself (ahem, and me) and four pretty danged well behaved and intelligent kidlets who rarely give me trouble. I have a comfortable home and even some free time to do with as I please during most days. I like sharing that life with others, but I do nip and tuck! You know, a little face lift for my life. But today it is time for, dunt, dunt, dunt, duh...Reality Check!

So yesterday started pretty good. Got the kids fed and ready for school. Packed pretty danged healthy lunches and dropped them off ON TIME to there various destinations. I headed out to teach my yoga class. It was a nice class and I met a few new folks. I dashed home to take a shower, and then catch up on some chores while I let my hair dry in time for my visiting teachers to come by for a visit. So far it is sounding pretty good huh? Except you may not know that I am a curly girl. My hair that is, and this actually is a real issue when dealing with time constraints (other curly girls, back me up here.) It is a whole process. Last month my visiting teachers saw me while it was still in the drying stage...humorous! Anyone unfortunate enough to ring my doorbell between 10 and noon on any given day will get a real laugh I tell ya. (Ok, see that was another little cover up. I should have said 10 and 2!) So, I wanted it to be done drying this time before they came for a visit. It was close enough and they did not have to hold their chuckles while visiting with this...

It was then time to pick up youngest kid from school. It was a lovely day, so I walked. She had invited a guest to come visit her ballet class that day and was very excited. At the last minute the friend could not go and the little one had a melt down. A little late for ballet, I left the 12 year old to fend for himself right as he walked in the door from school and called the two older kids to remind them to get themselves to the dentist straight from the high school. My good intention was to meet them at the dentist and then zip home to fix supper and visit with the one I had left behind. Never happened.

Ballerina did not want me to leave the building so I stayed for the 2 hour class and watched. This story is getting way too long, so I am going to cut to the chase. I never made it to the dentist to hear that one kid had a cavity and they BOTH need their wisdom teeth out. The fifteen year old had to make his own dinner and find a ride to his Civil Air Patrol meeting. The 17 year old had to make her own dinner and then get off to a school thing. 12 year old is still alone. I picked up Sonic (which is quite possibly the most disgusting thing I could imagine feeding my children) on the drive home and the three of us ate it at the kitchen counter. Did I mention Hunky Hubby was out of town on business? We finished up homework just in time for me to retrieve 15 year old from his meeting and returned home just minutes after HH pulled in from the airport. This would not be so bad if the day before had not been equally as odd. Other two kids at the dentist, HH gone, and microwavable macaroni and cheese for dinner. I was also going to show you the cleanest of my kids' rooms and couple of closets, but it seems pointless now. I think we all get the idea.

Our lives are not perfect. Which is ok. Mine is a still charmed life. Less than perfect and sometimes hectic, occasionally sprinkled with quick fixes and messes that take a while to get to. Most days run more smoothly than the past couple have. It was a crazy week. But my man is back home, the children will get a decent meal tonight and we will head back to the dentist next week to fix the cavity. Oh! and I know two teens who are getting wisdom teeth extraction for Christmas... Charming!

Quote of the Day: "It may be that your sole purpose in life is simply to serve as a warning to others."--Unknown

The Theory Of Evolution

Oh oh oh I love me some Mrs. Matlock's homework assignments. (I always was a good student.)

I would like to discuss the theory of evolution today. No not that theory...if that theory were true mothers would have three hands by now and ACTUAL eyes in the backs of their noggins. No, this is the theory of the evolving...me. Little old me. I am Leslie. Wife. Daughter. Sister. Mother. Mormon. Recycler. Writer. Friend. Woman. Gardner. Lover. I am a loudmouthed, stubborn, opinionated know-it-all, but a passionate, empathetic, friendly naturegirl. I could go on, but for everyone's sake, I will not. I am above all, a work in progress. I am evolving. I have likewise evolved. I think most importantly I am becoming more ME. Everyday more comfortable with who I am. Letting go of pretenses; both externally and internally. Allowing myself to get to know the real me.

It takes time and effort to let emerge the person we are at birth before life and hurt and fear gradually sneak in and temporarily rob us of our true selves. Temporarily. We are divine. Yet mortality has a funny way of snatching that knowledge right out from under us...oh around, you know...jr high. Pick, pick, pick, little pieces of our divine nature are plucked off and we have to patch and mend and cover up our perceived inadequacies for years until we are once again able to see our real selves. Once again able to BE ourselves.

I am not perfect. There are things that I do not like about myself. But I do not feel as much need to cover them up anymore. Instead I try to work to change the things that I do not like. To soften my temper, to be more open to change, to be more forgiving and honest with myself and others. We often change and mold and bend ourselves to meet others' expectations or to conform to something or someone we think we ought to be. Mostly to someone we think others want us to be. But there comes a point in our lives, at least I feel it has come in my life, when we are ready. Ready to come back to the real us. Strip away the layers of cover up and be open and honest with the world. ever changing. Forming new relationships, evolving in our current relationships. Finding new passions, resurrecting old ones. Making ourselves over for the better. Putting our real face and our best foot forward. Moving into being who we were really meant to be. It is exciting. It is evolution!

Quote of the day: "Be yourself, everyone else is already taken."

--Oscar Wilde friggin' genius

Heeeelp! Seriously, SOS!

Ok, so within the last month or so someone, some blogger, someone we all read, posted a recipe for chili. It looked really yummy and I wanted to try it. I remember that it had some odd sounding ingredients for chili...cocoa or cinnamon, or maybe both. Anyway, I did not write it down, and now I cannot find it! Someone help! If you remember whose blog it was, or if it was you... Fess up! I want that recipe before our chili cookoff this weekend. That is all.

Notes From A Bohemian Cottage

Happy AlphabeThursday! Today my D is for Decorating. I am not good at decorating. I have good taste, don't get me wrong, of course I have good taste. I just do not know how to put it all together. Also, my taste is very...um...shall we say...eclectic. It is my mom's fault.

Growing up we always had a strange assemblage of furnishings and decor. A mixture of family pieces, antiques and odds and ends. A combination my mom's diverse flair for decorating and a lack of financing. Bookshelves in every nook and cranny, including the hallway! Nothing matched. I hated it. I just wanted everything to match. One year we bought a whole living room set, straight off the showroom floor. Overstuffed sectional sofa with matching (yes matching) end tables, coffee table and lamps. It was the one and only time I remember having a whole room in our house that...ya, you guessed it...matched. We moved shortly thereafter and that living room set was quickly pieced out, servicing new rooms and odd corners of the new house. We never matched again.

I knew that when I grew up and had a home of my own I would drive straight to the nearest furniture store, find my favorite grouping, wrap it up and take it home. Each room of my house would look just like a showroom. Sofas purposefully flanked by matching end tables. Headboards purposefully flanked by matching end tables, with matching dresser against the opposite wall. Everything. would. be. perfect. But as it turns out. I hate it. I hate matching furniture. Oh, do not get me wrong. It looks amazing at the store. It even looks amazing in my friends' homes. But it isn't me. Come on! Who was I kidding, my clothes never even match!

So here I sit, in my little bohemian cottage, full of hand-me-downs, thrift store finds and odds and ends. Bookshelves in every corner and a dining table in the middle of the living room.No real antiques because I am way cheaper than my mom. Nothing matches. Well except one sofa table and one end table that I bought together for our first home. They are in different rooms. I became my mother. Good thing. She lives in a wonderful space that really suits her. That is it I guess. Our space, our homes, our rooms must authentically reflect who we are. I was trying to make my outside into something that did not jive with my inside. I do not know why yet, perhaps just to rebel against my upbringing. I will have to explore that. But finally I have begun to make peace with my insides and am becoming more comfortable with showing that to the world. So, letting my inner bohemian shine through is a step toward living more authentically I guess. Well, that is all I have to say on the matter. For now anyway.

Quote of the Day: "I would be most content if my children grew up to be the kind of people who think decorating consists mostly of building enough bookshelves.

--Anna Quindlen author

Let's Go To The Hop, Oh Baby!

I have actually blogged about blogging. On more than one occasion. Seems rather redundant, superfluous even. Haha...I crack myself up! Anywho, here is a little excerpt, extract, part, section, piece, portion, snippet, clip, bit, sample of one of those posts. But don't worry. There is a reason behind it.

I have seen some remarkable things over the year since my somewhat trepidatious entrance into the blogosphere. I have "met" some amazing people, reconnected with old friends and drawn closer to family. I have seen babies born, and couples wed (not necessarily in that order)...birthdays celebrated and anniversaries marked...rejoiced with some friends and cried with others. Am I alone in my sentiment, sickeningly saccharine as it may be? Do any of you have experiences with this medium that have touched, inspired, angered or fed you? I want answers I tell ya! So here is where the favor comes in. I want to know who you are. Am I getting to read all the bloggers' blogs who hit my blog? So, if you read this...leave a comment. If you have an experience, share it. If not, just say hi so I can go check out your blog! If I already know who you are...leave a comment anyway so I don't look like a big dork standing in the corner all by myself waiting for someone to ask me to dance."

I like the blogging medium. I have met even MORE cool people in the year since I wrote that little bit. I love the accidental blog hop that leads me to find people who enjoy the same quirky things that I do. Or people who look at things and do things and think things that are completely opposite of me!

I love the sneak peek into the daily (even if mundane) lives of friends and family. My friends and family are spread literally from border to border and from sea to shining sea. We have, however, this place to converge, to rally, to reunite, to associate, to mingle, to share, to connect and reconnect. So, while there may not always be a lot to say, keep saying it. Real people, real lives. Ordinary and humdrum at times. Remarkable and Amazing at others. Blogging is journalism, poetry, prose, expression, conversation, news and stories. It is whatever you want it to be. So, I say...Blog On! And today. I say also...Blog HOP! Let's meet some new folks, make new friends and hop, hop, hop...