'MASKS' - by Shel Silverstein

She had blue skin,
And so did he.
He kept it hid
And so did she.
They searched for blue
Their whole life through,
Then passed right by -
And never knew.

EMS

'I feel that if you have to embellish the things that you've done when you tell stories, it.........it takes the genuineness out of the experience' he said as he leaned casually on the opened refrigerator door. He nodded his head once more, turned towards the opened fridge again and took out a piece of pizza that was loosely sealed in a ziplock bag. He was not talking to me, so I kept walking and entered the next room where the TV was on the History Chanel. The volume was down, but the scene was pretty descriptive: two young boys around 7 or 8 years old were standing holding onto pillars. It looked like ancient Greece or Rome. Two women came up and tore the backs of the little boys' tunics down the center and laid their backs bare. A man stood up behind them, holding a bull-whip in each hand - his long dark tresses looking like Fabio as he cracked each whip. He began whipping the boys as they clung to the pillars, and suddenly the little '-...............volume..............+' thing came onto the tv. Someone was turning up the volume. The narrator said something about how this is the training of the young men who were to grow up to be a part of the 300 who faced the entire Persian Army. 'They were taught not to cry' the narrator said, and then I looked around and the younger one of the 2 had turned up the volume and then left the room. I diverted my attention to my studies. The One with the pizza came in, turned the volume down again, and slapped a green-camouflage paperback textbook on the coffee table in front of me. 'THERE!' he said with a smile, 'that is my military medic book...basically the same info, just not as much.' He was my EMS instructor, and was also in the national guard as a medic. 'Well,' I said, 'at least it has real pictures! Not the drawings that we have in ours.' I said as I flipped through the pages. 'I wish we had actual photographs instead of drawings. I feel like they dumb it down'. 'I guess that is one thing to appreciate about that book' he said, and took a huge bite of pizza - his 3rd piece in 3 hrs. The publisher is AAOS, the same as my EMS textbook, and my first exposure to this system. I believe that they feel they have to dumb most of the clips down for us as civilians. But, if we are going to be working with this stuff, why not just show us how it is going to be, rather than drawing in sterile lines with pink ink for skin color? Our instructors are not afraid to show us exactly what we will be going through with graphic pictures of some of their calls. But the drawings and sterile lines are almost as confusing to me as how women can keep their long tresses while in the military, and the men have to shave their heads (?). I really don't get it? Long hair will get into anyone's way, and I thought that was one of the main reasons why men are required to shave their heads? No one, thus far, has been able to give me a valid answer. When I ask guys about it, they either just smile at me, or they add something to the effect of, 'Women are easier on the eyes with long hair'. The same thing happened here, and I believe that I 'set' my jaw. Conversation ended.
I am now an EMT-IV and love the job. In the fall, I will be going back to get my medic at Southeastern Institute...Lord willing. I have not yet felt that I should not take this course of action, but sometimes I am not aware of it until the very end - when I am actually listening.

Je Vois

Today is my first day of EMT-IV summer classes. I have not yet been to class, but I sit here waiting to go. Hello Future! I've always wondered what you would look like. You are different from what I had imagined, but my imagination could only go so far and could only imagine what I had already experienced. I often wondered if you would even come. Oh yes, I will admit that I wondered, sometimes fiercely. I still wonder what others of your relatives I will meet, or if I will meet them. But I am learning to wait for you with temperance, while riding Life in The Present. I will keep watching as Future slowly and steadily morphs into Present, and then Past. May I treat you with respect, and may you grant me Wisdom.

Lilly-Bug

I let her back inside and she made a few sounds to let me know that she is hungry...nay, starving! I ignore her because it is not yet time to eat, and she flops herself dejectedly onto the floor next to her food dish. She looks at it longingly and pitifully stretches out her paws to reach for it....her last hope gone as Life slowly seeps out of her being - she barely reaches it with the tip of her paw. WHOA!! What is that!??!?! Her tail flicks into the air and she catches the motion with the corner of her eye......POOF! she is now chasing her tail! Food dish forgotten, and her tail is now her prey. An ant crawls aimlessly across the floor, unaware that danger lurks only a few feet away (miles to the little ant). POUNCE! She laps up the ant in one swoop, and it is now no more. She gallops over to the window and looks out. There is that mangy little fox who cries every night outside the window. 'WAAAOOOOWW! WAAAAOOOW!!' he screams every night around 2am. If you have never heard a fox scream for its lost love at 2am, it is an eerie cry. It is like a ghost, paler than most foxes, and flits from garden to garden, and bounds off of fallen trees, turning corners and looking in nooks and crannies - it's shadow frightening it into the middle of the yard...some invisible force cracks its whip and the frightened little crying fox scurries away and through the fence. She watches the fox as he stands on a log just outside the window - sniffing the air with his face in the wind. She is curious about the fox, but perhaps she would not like to meet him after all. She is shy anyway....

Hatchling's adventures

I have been doing projects lately - mostly wood-working.

This is my bed...my loft bed that Harry and I made. I now have a futon mattress that fits perfectly inside. I know that my room is a mess...I am working on this as well. Apparently it does not take first priority...as maybe it should.

This is a candle idea that I got from a gift that someone gave to me. I am going to make more. It is a flat rock that I have drilled a hole into and put a wick. Then I glued the lid of a jar to the rock. The idea is to bury the jar in the garden, and have a candle in the rock. Illusions....
Finally, my carving project. This is a tea rack that I am making for Anne and myself. She adores owls, and I like Sycamore trees. So, I bought some poplar wood (very soft wood) and carved the word TEA on one side, and then an owl sitting on a Sycamore tree branch. Since the shot was taken, I have since added another branch, and carved some leaves and flowers into the plank that has TEA written on it. How can you tell if it is a Sycamore tree? (you may well ask). If you look at a Sycamore tree, the bark that is near the base is small and jotty. As the bark goes up to the top of the tree, there is that beautiful distinctive smooth White bark where the other bark has peeled off. I was able to attempt to recreate this effect on the board with the help from Harry's wood carving tools. They are not perfect, but I am hoping to sharpen my skills here

The House By The Side Of The Road

Anne gave this poem to me, and I fell in love with it immediately ::smiles::

'There are hermit souls that live withdrawn
In peace of their self-content;
There are souls, like stars, that dwell apart,
In a fellowless firmament;
There are pioneer souls that blaze their paths
Where highways never ran;
But let me live by the side of the road
And be a friend to man.

Let me live in a house by the side of the road
Where the race of men go by -
The men who are good and the men who are bad,
As good and as bad as I.
I would not sit in the scorner's seat,
Or hurl the cynic's ban;
Let me live in a house by the side of the road
And be a friend to man...'

~Sam Walter Foss