Tag Archives: anc limited

Over the river and through the woods

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Since my five siblings were married before I turned four, I essentially grew up at Grandma’s House. My mom and dad were Grandma and Grandpa. My nieces and nephews loved to come stay during summer break and during Christmas vacation. Living a lake with more than twenty miles of forest behind us, there were always plenty of things to do.

We loved to have winter skating parties. My dad, my uncle and I would clear a big square on the ice and put up posts about every eight to ten feet, stringing Christmas lights from post to post, encircling the open skating area. We piled a big stack of wood and brush at the deep end for a  bonfire and set down some logs around them for seating while we roasted marshmallows and hot dogs. We laid an old wooden door on the piled snow for a table for our hotdogs and marshmallows for roasting and there was always a pot of baked beans and some casseroles resting on cans of Sterno® to balance the meal. Picnicking in the snow is something not to be missed!

Mom had an outdoor speaker system to pipe music down to the lake and we danced on our skates. My brother would bring his sleigh and horses, the neighbors would bring their snowmobiles. We partied for hours and the signal to go home was when the bonfire melted through the ice and fell into the lake  – which usually took about four hours or so since the ice was so thick. 

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You Got Me Singing

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One of the rules I live by comes from Voltaire, who said “The perfect is the enemy of the good.” A similar idea is attributed to Confucius, “Better a diamond with a flaw than a pebble without.” I really took this aphorism to heart when a friend of mine was writing a book on dismantling racism. I was reading, editing and helping him find illustrations. The book was ready to go for a few years before it was published because he kept trying to perfect it, looking for a better example, a more perfect metaphor, a stronger anecdote, a better adjective. I ended up making him a sign on a huge poster board with Voltaire’s quote blown up big and stuck in on the wall by his desk. It still took him another six months to let it out of his perfection-seeking hands.

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I was listening to Leonard Cohen’s newest album, Popular Problems. His 80 year old voice is rough, dry and imperfect, but those imperfections give it such an emotional resonance that my skin prickled and raised goosebumps and my eyes became hot with emotion ready to brim over in tears. While listening, that quote from Voltaire came to mind again and I had a small epiphany. The perfect is the enemy of the good in another way – not only does the search for perfection paralyze us, but it also does not move us emotionally. Thinking of another Canadian singer, Celine Dion has perfect pitch. Her voice is flawless and strong and she has never once moved me emotionally. Even singing songs with sentimental lyrics, she leaves me cold and I don’t care for her at all. Perfection is not beautiful, imperfection is.

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A very, very fine house

My House

from left to right: [we’re CLOSED] summer flowers and shrubs, Silver Birch from Studio Skye, Lark – Desert Retreat Deck – Painted, [ba] hollyhocks, Trompe Loeil – Brooklyn Carriage , Sway’s [Door Mat] international, [we’re CLOSED] tree 01D spring

I do not move houses very often in Second Life® or in real life. It is just too much work. However, when the Brooklyn Carriage House came out at Collabor88 last month, I could not resist its bright red doors and fine brickwork. I finally have everything arranged, but will be moving shortly. I thought I would share before I pack it all up. I love the house and how it looks, but I guess my four year old computer really cannot handle such an open floor plan where everything fezzes all the time. I need rooms and walls that limit the textures my computer has to handle, so I will be on my way to a more traditional space. That is totally a reflection of my computer’s age and is no criticism of the house – which is gorgeous, very, very gorgeous.

My outdoor decor is pretty limited, just a few shrubs and bushes from We’re Closed, a couple trees and the gorgeous deck from Lark that was released at The Liaison Collaborative a few month’s back.

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When you dream

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One of the joys of Second Life is allowing us to inhabit parallel lives, the lives we dreamed in our youth. Like many of you, I dreamed of all sorts of “when I grow up” scenarios. Mostly I said I wanted to be an archeologist when I grew up, but there were times when I declared my intent for president, supreme court justice, artist and dancer. Of course, I did grow up to inhabit none of these dreams, finding instead my adult dream as a political activist. I am happy with my adult dreams and only feel a faint nostalgic wistfulness for my childhood dreams. How fun it is, though, to live those dreams as an avatar. This season’s offerings from The Arcade are really the stuff dreams are made of.

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