Consortium of Seven

   My mom and stepdad, Roger. Larry, Jean, and me. Thanksgiving The 80's might be my least favorite decade. Revisiting them, I notice a reluctance to fully enter my memory. I think it's because, in the eighties, I was in the part of my "story" where I was truly lost in the world. Uncomfortable with myself, not sure what to do. Not everyone suffers a kind of chameleon-like existence, as I did - where you are acutely and confusedly aware that you comprise several different selves out there in the world, searching for...definition? A place to fit? Satisfaction, perhaps? I wasted time and energy feeling bad about that for most of the decade, in fact. But like most of the actual "growth" involved in growing up, it sorts itself out without your "doing" anything. Over time I had a few conversations with young people who described themselves in that same way, and I suddenly could be helpful, helping them see that it is just "a way" of b

Sometimes… I need the company of art. So said my pre-teen (& beyond) hero Adam Ant. Like many of Adam’s utterances in interview & song, the concept was beyond my understanding back then. It took me a long time & a specific context to understand this one at all. I didn’t think about the lyric very much until the last few years, when I was forced to part with the company of art in my hometown. Aberdeen, Scotland is grubby magnificence. The majority of buildings with any age to them are made of granite. People from other towns, unable to deal with all those shades of grey, often think it “dull.” But it’s solid. Stoic. Once pneumatic tools were developed, it turned out there was a lot you could do with a lump of rock, no matter how hard it was. The result is a city full of staggering detail: domes, spires, pillars, statues & fancy gable ends. Not least within this grandeur rests our Art Gallery (founded in 1884), a peculiar specimen in pink granite. It i

Friday! Black Friday!  A great day to stay home if you have that option. (If you don't, then I'll mis-appropriate the late Dave Allen's "May your God go with you.")   Not to mislead: Nothing that follows is holiday-specific. Parades or football games, I've no interest in and nearly no knowledge of. The same goes for Lifetime movies of holiday-themed romances.    Once I headed home Wednesday night, aside from final preparations for Thursday's feast - which is meant to carry us at least through Friday - most of my time is technically my own through Sunday night. So, some of that time will find me looking for things to watch.    Probably the biggest streaming splash of the week is Martin Scorcese's Netflix-funded latest:  The Irishman .     It was released in theaters early this month, a requisite step in making sure it's eligible for Academy Award consideration, it hit Netflix' streaming service Wednesday the 27th. Clocking in at a conside

So I hope these videos are good quality. I am uploading them on a computer that has no sound.(from work) Tool is an interesting band.  They use mathematics in their music. There are people who have figured it out. I read about it and math is above me quite a bit, especially the kind they talk about. I do know that one of the songs is set in time to the Fibonacci Sequence.  It has been a very busy week at work, and I have not had the time to properly blog.  I thought I'd share these video's while I talk about something that came to me while I was making rounds between four buildings.     I thought about how people "have" songs.  Not only their favorites, but ones they attribute to things, occasions and people in their lives. I touched on this in a prior blog, about how when you are young/teenager and you have "your songs," "love songs."  If you are too  young for the "adult" messages in some of the songs, does it  devalue your em

When last we left Grace, her beloved husband George had just died. This installment is about that man, her first love. Next week, we will resume Grace’s tale. For more about Garnett/George’s story during the years of their marriage, please refer to Matriarch Tales #8 and 9.   You can go to https://consortiumofseven.blogspot.com/p/c7-posts.html and scroll down to Wednesday’s list. My father had two names: George Humes Rader was born Garnett Melvin Marksbury in Marion County, Indiana in April, 1915.   He was the last of 6 children of John and Margrette (Maggie) Marksbury.   The family was from Mercer County, Kentucky, where John is listed as a farmer in the 1910 census. Eventually John, Margrette, and their two daughters moved to Beech Grove, Indiana, where John worked in the railroad repair yards. Two boys were born and then Garnett.   The family was shattered six months later when Maggie died of epidemic spinal meningitis at age 33. The family story is that the two gir

For those of us who write, or who think we might want to write, It's my view that we ought to take a moment to think about our readers. I'm not talking marketing today, though of course focusing on your demographic(s) is important if you want your work to reach a wider audience. Today I'm thinking about the effects our words have on our readers. Personally, I like to leave my reader better off than when they started reading my words. As anyone who was in Scouts or the Camp Fire programs learned, one is supposed to leave a campsite better than they found it. That's my goal for people who have begun (and finished, I hope!) one of my books or stories.  Now, the meaning of "better off" could be a matter of debate. if someone felt fine when they started my story and then they were sad afterward, one could argue that "better off" might be the wrong phrase. But if someone does feel sadness, my intention is that this would be as a result of