NORA EPHRON, A TRIBUTE

       NORA EPHRON, A TRIBUTE                                                     (1941-2012)

         

        Dear Nora,

          Do you remember when you wrote this?  

    Kathleen Kelly:   "Sometimes I wonder about my life. I lead a small life. Well, not small, but valuable. And sometimes I wonder, do I do it because I like it, or because I haven't been brave? So much of what I see reminds me of something I read in a book, when shouldn't it be the other way around? I don't really want an answer. I just want to send this cosmic question out into the void. So good night, dear void."   (You've Got Mail)

      dear Nora,  do you know you've changed lives with your writing? With your movies? With your books?

      The day I heard the lines above it started.  You inspired me to write and so, be brave.

      If you only knew how many times your words have made me laugh. How often we've gone to bed lull to sleep by the music of your beautiful lines in "You've Got Mail."

      If you only knew how much I admire you. I find such comfort knowing your trials made you a stronger person.

     dear Nora,  it is your example, you kept writing no matter what, and your words ... what a writing friend you've been to me without you knowing it. 

     dear Nora, I already miss you....

             

   Meryl Streep:  "Nora just looked at every situation and cocked her head and thought, 'Hummm, how can I make this more fun.?' "

   Tom Hanks:    "At a dinner table on a film set Nora lifted us all with wisdom and wit, mixed with love for us and love for life....

 

          NORA EPHRON  artist, journalist, essayist, novelist, playwright, movie director, blogger, mother, wife, sister, daughter. A woman of great talent.

         Famous works: When Harry Met Sally, You've Got Mail, Sleepless In Seattle, Heartburn, Silkwood, Julie & Julia.   Famous books:  I Feel Bad About My Neck: And Other Thoughts On Being A Woman, I Remember Nothing.

     

          THE ENCOUNTER LEFT TWO IMPRINTS   from Memoir, A DOT IN TIME

               Did you ever have a swift encounter with someone that left an imprint upon you? Did you ever feel like the meeting was pre-ordained? I did. Here's my story.

               I pulled the collar of my coat around my neck and once again counted our luggage. I glanced around at the street before us and notice the grey like lead of that early morning in Rome. A sleepy sun still hiding under blankets of clouds while we waited for our taxi to come take us to the airport.  Time to go home.  

              My husband stood by me chatting with the other couple who would join us going to the airport. The man, a retired chemist and his wife a homemaker, both from the mid-west, had been on the same tour we had just completed of southern Italy.

              "You can't be too careful in the kitchen you know," the chemist said.  I heard the same speech given through the tour to many in our group numerous times.  My husband and I once again exchanged smiles. 

               "That Ebola is everywhere. It'll get you!." 

               A  dark sedan soon approached us. The brakes screeched.                   

               The chemist glanced at his watch. "These Italians are always late," we heard him whisper to his wife.

                 The two men got out of the car  as we heard an explosion like a loud flat tire.  I felt a hand on my elbow directing me inside the car. Baggage zoomed into the trunk passengers were dashed into the back seat.  My head spinned. The confusion and rush the Italians had getting us into the car left me dizzy. In the back seat, the chemist sat still rattling to my husband about his Ebola fears. Meanwhile the driver's Italian rolled out fast and furious, like a loose ball of yarn down steep steps.  And, I caught some of its threads.  La Cosa Nostra came out like a shrill into my ears! I strained to understand more.

          He was middle height. Thinning coal black hair forty-three, forty-five. He drove as he spoke to his brother-in-law who talked back with his mouth and with his hands. And this is what I heard.

         "You could have been killed. They could have been killed. What're you going to do?" 

          The driver answered.  "Quiet. Someone may know Italian. This is the risk you take in my job. Calm yourself."

           My coat felt heavy and hot and I wiped perspiration from my face. I heard myself spilling out the words.

           "Signori, io capisco Italiano."  All yarn seized rolling down steps. The Italian in the front passenger seat slapped his forehead. The car stopped at the light. The driver searched for me in his mirror. Our eyes met, locked, and something transcended. The first imprint.

            He told his story in a soft Italian. He asked me not to share it with the others. It might upset them. He was a policeman who had arrested prostitutes the night before, workers for the Mafia. Now, he was sure they were hitting back. They had tried to shoot at the car when he stopped to get us. Taxi driving was his other job. He had a family. Three children, ten, seven, three.

           I kept my eyes on the face in his mirror, hypnotized by his story, drinking in his burden, connecting with his soul.  

           Too fast, we arrived at the airport and again the two men rushed getting our luggage and  money exchanged. The policeman thanked my husband for the fare and tip and came over to me. 

            "Signora, grazie per ascoltare. Thank you for listening."

             I looked into his eyes again crushed at his situation. My Italian flowed straight from my heart.

              "Che Dio ti benedica!"

             "Grazie Signora. God bless you too."

              His hand once more held my elbow and then my hand. I felt his lips upon my cheek. The second imprint.

             FATHER'S DAY ... WHY?  WHAT?  WHO?


                  I thought this interesting ... how Father's Day got started in the U.S.

                         WHY?   The power of one woman!
                       
                        1. Sonara Smart Dodd admired her father, a Civil War veteran, William Jackson Smart, a single parent who reared six children.

                        2. Sonara heard a sermon about Mother's Day in 1909 and told her pastor that fathers should have a similar holiday.
                      
                        3. She started the celebration of Father's Day in order to honor her father in Spokane, Washington on June 19, 1910.

                        4. In the 1920s, because of her studies in the Art Institute of Chicago, Sonara Dodd stopped promoting the celebration of Father's Day in her town. 

                        5. In the 1930s she moved back to Spokane and with the help of trade groups that benefited from the holiday, manufacturer's of ties, tobacco' pipes etc., she started promoting the celebration of Father's Day again.

                         6. After many years of Congress resisting bills to make Father's Day a national holiday, President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1966, issued the first presidential proclamation honoring fathers. He designated the third Sunday in June as Father's Day.

                         WHAT?
                        
                   
                          1. What happens in the U.S. on Father's Day?   GIFTS!


                             According to a survey of the National Retail Federation of June 2009, Americans  spend approximately  $91 on a Father's Day gift.

                                            Here is what is expected this year:


                                           $1.9 billion on an outing such as dinner or a sports event.

                                           $ 1.3 billion on clothing

                                           $ 1.2 billion on gift cards

                                           $548  million on books or CDs

                                           $522  million on home improvement items

                                           $502  million on sporting goods


                            WHO?  

                               Who gets Father's Day gifts?
                                   
                                 Most people, 51.1 percent, only plan to buy gifts for their father or stepfather.
     
                                But 28.6 percent will purchase Father's Day gifts for their husbands.


                                    The rest:  7.6 percent sons

                                                    4.7 percent grandfathers
                                                  
                                                    5.1 percent brothers


                       * My Father's Day celebration started today with taking my mother to the cemetery.

           We already put flowers at my father's grave and my grandfather's and grandmother's grave.

            This is very much a cultural and family tradition.
          
                  This Father's Day ...
                          I will be thinking of my Cuban father, Tomas Gacio,  and the joy he experienced in Cuba, playing dominoes. I will remember the love he had for his children and grandchildren.

                   This Father's Day ...    
                        I will be thinking of my American, spiritual father, Gerry Robinson, known at his church as The Prophet ...  the love he had for dark, bitter chocolate and the passion he had for singing the old hymns.
                   
             This Father's Day I will give thanks for my favorite father on this earth.  My husband!       

A POEM OF THE NIGHT

                                      

                                  A Poem Of The Night         

                                            ( May 28, 2012)

                                 Requiem by M. Rassler

                                     My heart dwells,

                                     within a fist

                                     called Sorrow,

                                     No hope that

                                     tears leave

                                     my tomorrow.

                                    Grief, You uninvited guest,

                                    Again to gift unrest.

                                    What roots to

                                    fast grow deep,

                                    in those routines

                                    called Normal?

                                    What mask to choose

                                    and paste upon my face,

                                    An inner phantom's craze,

                                    To dress my countenance

                                    in shadows of the formal.

                                  Oh Grief, You uninvited guest,

                                        Again to gift unrest.

                                  What lessons to be learned?

                                   What passions to control?

                                    What future to unfold?

                                  Oh, Grief, You uninvited guest.

       
                                         
                       
                                       

THE LETTERS

     THE LETTERS

                                                                             

              Dear Checkie,

              Here we're once again. You, close by my side in the bed we three have shared for over eleven years.

How I think of the first day we saw you. Your Pop watched you climb to the top of the mountain your brothers made with their little bodies cuddled together and you at the top of the heap.

           "That dog is bright. If he were human he be a lawyer. That's it. That dog is for me!"

            The rest is history ... the history of the Jack Russell terrier that took off with our hearts. Your quirks that puzzled us. Your psychosis with the opening of soda cans.  The crazy twirling, jumping and barking every time you heard the pop! I will never stop seeing you at the pop of a can.  

            How can we ever go again to the mountains and not remember the eight years of making you fall scarves and your pillow case to match? You rode on my lap on that pillow all the way to Georgia. An extension of ourselves. A limb easily grafted into our lives by your constant adoration. A limb soon to be ripped from us. Checkers, dear Checkie, my Checkie....

          Dear Mom,

          Mom, don't you know? I can understand you now! Since the last time we saw my vet something happened! That mumbled jumble of  blah,blah,blah, then, the understood word, treats! The sounds made, like gibberish, I can understand all of it now MOM! No more blah, blah, blah. But Mom why do you and Pop keep leaking? Every time you bend down and kiss me I feel it Mom. Something like a leaky faucet. Mom, you got to get that fixed. And, Mom ... what do you mean by holding me and whispering?

      "Checkie, I'm leaving a bell on our front door. Hoping and praying that when my turn comes they send you to get me. Gotta get your wings, my little buddy." 

          Dear Checkie,

               Had to write again. Can't say too much around you. It seems different now. Almost like you understand. It helps to write you letters. Oh, my doggy, tomorrow is the day. Your Pop has chosen a place of rest for you that we can see sitting in the pool area. We know how much you loved to swim with us. Oh, Checkie, the vet will come to us. Too hard to do this in a frigid office. Our Little Muscle....

                Dear Mom,

                Mom, I got a big ball heavy on my butt. It drags me down. Why am I so sleepy, Mom? I don't like my food. Well, maybe still like chicken. Mom, why don't you smile anymore? Your leak is worse Mom. Mom, I love you Mom.  Feel funny. Gotta be around you now. Closer. Something's happening to me. Want to be on you, Mom. Or Pop.

                                                                            

THE BEST...

                                   THE BEST EXOTIC MARIGOLD HOTEL

                                                "If things are not all right...."

                                                           

              

                         He said we needed to get away for a few hours. Our doggy still showing signs ... and we struggling. He researched a movie for us to go and forget some of our troubles.  Off we went to see The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel! 

                          The attendance at the movie theater surprised us. It was not the age of the people, movie viewers about our age, those passing the 55 senior citizen line. What made us look twice at the theater were the many of them present. Most of the time at that early hour of the day my husband and I sit there like the last two pins on a pin-cushion.  

                          The movie turned out to be delightful. I won't spoil it for anyone wanting to experience it. I cried and I laughed. Usually the signs for me of wonderful writing. I wish I could tell a story so well.

                           Sure, I would have changed some things. People that have written their stories have a way of wanting to tweak material in their own way. But, many of the themes covered in the movie so moved me, that I recommend the movie to anyone that would like to take a trip into other lands ... the visible, touchable, country of India and the invisible, emotional country of the senior citizen. The senior citizen still yearning for life, adventure, and love.

                           This is definitely a wonderful piece of art. If you go see it I would love to hear what you thought of it. What did the you within you think? What beauty did the artist in you observe? 

       Best line from the movie:  "Everything will turn out all right at the end. If things are not all right then, it is not the end!" 

                      Love those words!  Shall dance with them on my hyphen for a while!

                                     To all my blog readers ... love you.

Who Was Thomas Kincade?

                                                                    
                                                        Who Was Thomas Kincade?

                                                     January 19, 1958 - April 6, 2012

             Thomas Kincade, called the Painter of Light, became famous for his paintings with glowing hihglights and beautiful pastel colors.
              He drew many of his inspirations from his hometown of Placerville when he painted streets and snow scenes.
              He loved to paint idyllic settings such as gardens, streams, stone cottages and lighthouses.
              Before his death Thomas Kincade was claimed to be "the most-collected living artist" of America.
              It was estimated that 1 of every 20 American homes owned one of his paintings.
              Even with his popularity and talent Thomas Kincade received much criticism from the fine-art world. They complained about the extent that he had commercialized his art.
              Harsh critiques called his paintings, "chocolate box art," and "mall art."
              In 2001, Kinkade said, "I am really the most controversial artist in the world."
                       
                       It makes me wonder... did such criticism have a dark influence in the painter's life?
                     
                       What drove this talented painter off the path, and into the life of addiction that brought his demise?    
                                          COMING HOME ...    (for him and for me.)           

                                                    by Amarilys G. Rassler                                  

                       Coming home                                                 

                       to myself,

                                                            A place in the woods,
                                                            with hope colored-trees
                                                            for the multiple mees,
                                                            to climb and be free.

                                        Coming home
                                        to myself,

            Finding Peace on The Way,
            Knowing Light draweth near,
            Drying fast every tear.

                     Coming home
                         to myself,

             Sensing Love's tender tap,
             As He extends me His map,

                 Where cottage divine
                   with sparkles of light,
                       Embraced by The Vine,

                                                                
                                                             Awaits to be mine.
                                                          
                                                                              Coming home....