Simple Pleasures

My Mug Reminder

To find the universal elements enough; to find the air and the water exhilarating; to be refreshed by a morning walk or an evening saunter… to be thrilled by the stars at night; to be elated over a bird’s nest or a wildflower in spring – these are some of the rewards of the simple life. ~ John Burroughs

Quail Couple

Every morning I look forward to my cup of hot chocolate. Some people prefer coffee, tea, or maybe juice as their morning comfort drink. I prefer hot chocolate. I guess I should actually call it hot cocoa since I don’t use heated milk with ground unsweetened chocolate in it. At least according to an article I read recently, but who really cares what I call it. 

My hot cocoa is special though. I don’t buy the packaged stuff. Oh no! I use Cadbury Drinking Chocolate mixed with dutch unsweetened cocoa powder. I put a dash of cayenne pepper, pumpkin pie spice, and a bit of almond milk in the cup with the mix. Then I put two tablespoons of coconut oil in the bottom of the blender. When the water is hot I pour it into the cup and dissolve the powders. I pour that into the blender and mix it all together. When it’s finished it has a nice foam on the top. That’s the part I love the most. Some people can’t speak until they’ve had their morning coffee. The Brits drink tea as their preferred morning, late afternoon, and comfort drink. My morning isn’t complete until I’ve had my large cup of hot cocoa. (See above photo)

I must say that I postpone the pleasure of drinking my hot cocoa until after Barry and I have had our green smoothies and he’s driven off to work. Once he’s gone, I do my morning meditation, MindValley class, and sometimes journaling. So, my hot cocoa fix is a mid-morning delight. I take it with me into my office as I begin my work for the day. It has an honored place on the device to keep it hot. I savor it as long as I can. 

As I was thinking about writing this essay about my love of hot cocoa, and the ritual I’ve created around it, I was reminded of a Star Trek: Next Generation episode where Troy describes to Ryker the ritual she’s created to eat her chocolate dessert. Ryker was amazed as Troy described each step she created so she could gain comfort from eating the tasty sweet dish. 

Maybe that’s what I love about my hot cocoa. I’ve made a ritual out of making and drinking it. Part of the ritual is watching the birds eating the bird seed Barry has left for them in the yard as he goes out for his morning walk. 

My favorite birds are quail. We have lots of them and this year we have two or three families. I love watching the baby quail scurrying around the yard after their parents. I know there are other baby birds in nests nearby, but the quail are the only ones who bring out their babies for us to see as they feast on the bird seed. It’s fun to watch them grow into young adults.

The other morning one family came out to feed and the babies were all hunkered down in a depression by the water trough scratching and pecking. Barry and I were trying to figure out why they were doing that. I said, “Maybe we should write down our observations and make a study of quail behavior.” We’d been watching The Essex Serpent. The main character, Cora, is an amateur archeologist. We thought it might be fun to be amateur quail experts.

There are other joys of living in a place with very little night light. The sight of the rising moon and stars is one of the reasons we moved out so far from town. The other night was a super full moon. We went out to see it rise over the San Jose Mountains in Mexico. It was so big and beautiful. Barry took pictures of it with his new iPhone. We are also blessed with gorgeous sunrises and sunsets. 

Today I’m filled with awe at how much beauty there is all around us. When things out in the world seem so hopeless, I remember that there is also beauty and maybe taking time to focus on that will actually help change the world.

What are the simple things you take pleasure in? I’d love to read what you have to share.

Thanks for reading, liking and occasionally commenting. I appreciate it.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden © 2022

Have you ever experienced life shattering events? Yeah, most of us have. In The Space Between Time, Jenna Holden gets slammed by her fiancé walking out, her mother’s untimely death, and losing her job all in one week. But she receives unexpected help when she finds her three-times great-grandmother’s journals and begins the adventure of a lifetime.

The Space Between Time is available in all ebook formats at Smashwords and for Kindle at Amazon, or you can find the ebook at iBooks or Barnes and Noble. If you prefer a physical copy, you can find a print-on-demand version at Amazon. Stay tuned for news when the audiobook version is published 

If you are a podcaster, or have a message or fantastic product you want to share with the world, I encourage you to check out PodMatch. Use the affiliate link and tell them, Lucinda sent you. Then contact me so we can set up a Story-Power chat.

I’m so passionate about stories that I created the Story-Power podcast and Patreon communities so I’d have an excuse to talk story. You may have seen my Story-Power posts here. If you’re passionate about stories too, and want to talk about your favorite stories, come join me at either SageWoman.life, or patreon.com/StoryPower.

Creating Little by Little

Oregon Trail wagonwheel ruts

“Focus on the journey, not the destination. Joy is found not in finishing an activity but in doing it.” ~ Greg Anderson

We’ve all heard the quotes, “Rome was not built in a day,” or “The journey of a lifetime begins with the first step.” We get into such a yank to make life changes or to create something. But if you decided to change your life in some way, it’s not going to happen over night.

I quit teaching public school in 2008 to become a writer. In 2013 I started this blog. I published my novel in 2017 and in 2020 I started my podcast Story-Power. This year I’ve created a Patreon Community, am finally putting my podcast up on YouTube and finishing the rough draft of my second novel. I’ve done all that one step at a time. 

There are times when I want my business to progress faster. In fact, I was in a bit of a tizzy just recently about wanting things to go faster with my business. I wanted more blog and podcast followers. I wanted to have more than three patrons on Patreon. But what I’ve had to remind myself of is that creative projects must be done one step at a time.

I should have known that being a theatre artist. You can’t throw a production together over night. There are the auditions, the rehearsals, which have several stages, then the performances and throughout the entire process everyone who is collaborating on the play production is learning and growing. Small adjustments need to be made here and there to make a polished final production. Any artist will tell you the same thing. The song, painting, dance choreography, choral or band performance takes time and constant tweaking. Movies take months, or even years to make and so do books. There are so many steps to any creative endeavor and sometimes there are steps I wish I could skip, but I can’t. I’m sure you know what I mean.

So, I’ve decided to enjoy the process that I started in 2008 and see where it takes me next. Thank you for coming along for the ride.

I hope you have a wonderful weekend and are enjoying creating something all your own.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden © 2022

Have you ever experienced life shattering events? Yeah, most of us have. In The Space Between Time, Jenna Holden gets slammed by her fiancé walking out, her mother’s untimely death, and losing her job all in one week. But she receives unexpected help when she finds her three-times great-grandmother’s journals and begins the adventure of a lifetime.

The Space Between Time is available in all ebook formats at Smashwords and for Kindle at Amazon, or you can find the ebook at iBooks or Barnes and Noble. If you prefer a physical copy, you can find a print-on-demand version at Amazon. Stay tuned for news when the audiobook version is published

I’m so passionate about stories that I created the Story-Power podcast and Patreon communities so I’d have an excuse to talk story. You may have seen my Story-Power posts here. If you’re passionate about stories too, and want to talk about your favorite stories, come join me at either SageWoman.life, or patreon.com/StoryPower.

If you are a podcaster, or have a message or fantastic product you want to share with the world, I encourage you to check out PodMatch. Use the affiliate link and tell them, Lucinda sent you. Then contact me so we can set up a chat.

Everyone Is Creative

Isabelle Hardesty has always had a love of magic and nature and weaves this into her books. Hardesty is currently working on Midnight in Belle Fleur, the sequel to The Witch of Belle Fleur.  She lives with her family in the Pacific Northwest. 

Isabelle Hardesty

You can find Isabelle at: Website, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest

Isabelle at Dragon Con 2022, Atlanta, GA

Isabelle’s books:

  Jade’s Awakening

  Jade’s Descent

  Jade’s Paradox

  The Witch of Belle Fleur, Quarter finalist for the Screencraft Cinematic Book Competition

  Midnight in Belle Fleur

  Return to Belle Fleur (Coming soon)

Young Adult category WINNER for the SPF Foundation (Self Publishing Formula)  2022!    https://www.instagram.com/p/CaiSy0nlhKi/ 

Pam Grout on Story-Power Episode 21

Foundation, Book series by Isaac Asimov, TV series (2021 – )

The Wheel of Time, Book series by Robert Jordan, TV series (2021 – )  

The Expanse, Book series by Daniel Abraham, TV series (2015 – 2022)

Buffy the Vampire Slayer, TV series created by Joss Whedon (1997 – 2011)

The Circle of Ceridwen, Octavia Randolph 

The Island of Gotland

Memories of Hollywood: Time Travel Novel, William Hardesty

Harry Potter series

How to do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy, Jenny Odell 

Eleanor, David Michaels

The Roosevelts: An Intimate History, TV series (2014) Ken Burns

Star Trek, original series (1966 – 1969)

Edward James Olmos

Battlestar Galactica, TV series (2006 – 2009)

Nichelle Nichols

“Humans are not ideally set up to understand logic; they are ideally set up to understand stories.” ~ Roger C. Schank, Cognitive Scientist

This episode is brought to you by PodMatch, the dating service for podcasters. They introduced me to Vance, and I’m so glad they did. I hope you’ve enjoyed our conversation and remember that if you have a podcast or something to share with the world, check out PodMatch and tell them Lucinda sent you.

I’m so passionate about stories that I created the Story-Power podcast and Patreon communities so I’d have an excuse to talk story with other story lovers. If you’re passionate about stories too, and want to talk about what you’ve learned from your favorites, come join me at patreon.com/StoryPower.

I Want to be Like Mr. Rogers

https://media.npr.org/assets/img/2014/05/24/mr-rogers_custom-7627a367f40c101dd1d2b6599ab41346bf3b8f5e-s600-c85.webp

“As human beings, our job in life is to help people realize how rare and valuable each one of us really is, that each of us has something that no one else has- or ever will have- something inside that is unique to all time. It’s our job to encourage each other to discover that uniqueness and to provide ways of developing its expression.” ~ Mr. Rogers

“In times of stress, the best thing we can do for each other is to listen with our ears and our hearts and to be assured that our questions are just as important as our answers.” ~ Mr. Rogers

“It’s the inner world that needs adjusting, tweaking and plucking when the outer world fails to please.” ~ Mike Dooley

After a week like we’ve just lived through I have only one thing to say, I want to be like Mr. Rogers.

I was too old to be the target audience when Mr. Rogers’ television show first aired. Which kind of makes me sad, but I was lucky to live with a Mr. Rogers type person, my dad. 

This is what I learned from my dad, and Mr. Rogers: I feel better when I’m kind, when I help someone feel that they are important, and when I try to understand how another person must be feeling. I feel worse when I’m mean, blame other people for my problems, when I’m judgmental, or want revenge. It’s that simple. 

I know, I know, the way we feel about ourselves gets in the way of remembering to be kind, as do our wounds. The popular idea that we’re all separate from each other also gets in the way. But the truth is, we’re all connected. That’s why we can feel the atmosphere when we walk into a room, why we cry at sad movies or books, why when the parent is yelling at their kids in the next aisle at the grocery store, we feel like they are yelling at us. Or when we see someone do something nice for someone else, we feel like they did it for us.

Popular movies like the Star Wars series using the concept of “the force” are based on the idea that everything that exists is connected. Carl Sagan tried to get us to understand that when he said in the first version of the TV series, Cosmos,“The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, the carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars. We are made of starstuff.” Which, in my mind means we’re connected to everything that exists because we’re all made of the same stuff.

Since I don’t live in those communities where the tragedies happened, the only way I can share their pain is to weep and hold those in pain in my heart, then go out and be like Mr. Rogers and spread as much love and kindness as I can. It’s the only way I know how to balance or reverse the negativity that is spiking right now.

I hope you are finding a way to stay balanced during these crazy times. Blessings to you all.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden © 2022

Have you ever experienced life shattering events? Yeah, most of us have. In The Space Between Time, Jenna Holden gets slammed by her fiancé walking out, her mother’s untimely death, and losing her job all in one week. But she receives unexpected help when she finds her three-times great-grandmother’s journals and begins the adventure of a lifetime.

The Space Between Time is available in all ebook formats at Smashwords and for Kindle at Amazon, or you can find the ebook at iBooks or Barnes and Noble. If you prefer a physical copy, you can find a print-on-demand version at Amazon. Stay tuned for news when the audiobook version is published

PodMatch

If you are a podcaster, or have a message or fantastic product you want to share with the world, I encourage you to check out PodMatch. Use the affiliate link and tell them, Lucinda sent you. Then contact me so we can set up a chat.

Story-Power on Patreon

I’m so passionate about stories that I created the Story-Power podcast and Patreon communities so I’d have an excuse to talk story. You may have seen my Story-Power posts here. If you’re passionate about stories too, and want to talk about your favorite stories, come join me at either SageWoman.life, or patreon.com/StoryPower.

When Will This Stop?

Chapel of the Red Rocks

“Only a man that carries a gun ever needs one.” Territorial Marshal Wistful McClintock from Angel and the Badman (1947) James Edward Grant, writer/director and staring John Wayne

I apologize but today I’m going to be preachy. I’m appalled that it is taking us so long to get it that we have to turn away from guns and find a better way to relate to each other. I know I can’t force anyone to see things my way. But I do believe that we’re all here for a reason. And more and more I feel that my reason for being here it to spread love. Unfortunately today, I’m feeling angry and judgmental. My heart is broken. I have old wounds to heal too. I’m not perfect but I do want to share some thoughts. Take them or leave them as you see fit.

When the mass school shooting happened this week in Uvalde, Texas, my first thought was, “When are we going to stop this?!” My second thought was, “How long has this been going on?” So, I looked it up. My jaw dropped. The first mass shootings, which also happened to be school shootings, took place in this country in 1891! What?! What is wrong with us?

Here is the link to one article, A Brief History of Mass Shootings, that I found enlightening. 

Here’s my take on why we fail to stop the sale of guns in this country despite all the suffering it causes. We’ve been living under the illusion that we live in an unsafe country. So we arm ourselves. For some people knowing there is a gun or guns in their possession makes them think they will be safe from all the bad people out to get them. Fear, fear, fear is at the heart of this erroneous assumption. And because we’re fearful we place our faith in guns.

Some people blame Hollywood for our violent ways. I say art reflects the society around it. It doesn’t create it. Well, it can try. I was thinking about John Wayne, the epitome of the 20th Century tough guy. Yes, he did lots of movies where he was the tough guy. But he was the star in three really important movies where his character realizes that there was another way to live other than by the gun, or his fists. Stagecoach, (1939), Angel and the Badman, (1947), The Quiet Man, (1952). In perhaps his most famous movie, The Searchers, (1956), his character comes to realize that seeking revenge is soul killing. Using guns to solve problems is soul killing too.

I’m only an amateur student of history, but it seems to me that the earliest immigrants came to this country for freedom. But it was freedom for them not anyone else. They wanted to be able to not only worship as they pleased, (though if you didn’t worship the same way they did, you were wrong) they also wanted to own land and govern themselves so they could become wealthy. But, they saw the people already living here as threats to that freedom, so they took up arms and stole from them. Taking up arms became an unwritten necessity and was solidified when they decided to rebel against England and King George.

But maybe a reckoning is coming. Maybe the more mass shootings that happen, the pain and suffering helps people wake up to the fact that if you’ve got a weapon in your possession, you are more likely to create violence than you are to create peace. We need to flip the narrative that has had us in its grip for so long.

Guns can’t protect us. There is plenty of everything to go around. Not everyone is out to get us. We do not live in a dog eat dog world unless we create that in our minds. Wealth does not buy us happiness, only inner peace can do that. The greatest truth of all is that only love is real. Everything else is a false construct we create. It’s our false beliefs that trip us up and make us miserable.

I know that breaking the habit of long held beliefs is difficult. We’ve assumed certain things to be true. Examining those beliefs and easing our fears is not an easy task. I know because I’ve been doing it for a very long time. I KNOW that society will change as individuals do their personal healing work. 

Let’s remember one thing. Stamped on our money is: “In God We Trust.” Not in guns we trust. Do we believe that or not?

I’m sending my love to all of you who follow me. Thanks so much.

Lucinda Sage-Midgorden © 2022

I’m so passionate about stories that I created the Story-Power podcast and Patreon communities so I’d have an excuse to talk story with other story lovers. If you’re passionate about stories too, and want to talk about what you’ve learned from your favorites, come join me at patreon.com/StoryPower.

If you are a podcaster, or have a message or fantastic product you want to share with the world, I encourage you to check out PodMatch. Use the affiliate link and tell them, Lucinda sent you. Then contact me so we can set up a chat.