My Granddaughter Won Congressional Art Contest For Tennessee

“Only through love will we find our way to create a world worthy of our children and our grandchildren.”  ― Laurence Overmire, “The One Idea That Saves The World: A Call to Conscience and A Call to Action”

One of my life’s greatest joys are my grandchildren.  They’re perfect, of course. ❤️‍🔥 I have three:  one granddaughter and two grandsons.  My oldest, Taylor, graduated from Louisiana University and he now lives and works in Mississippi for the USDA.  Mary Mace is headed to Pepperdine University in Malibu this fall with a full scholarship.  Warner is still in high school at Lipscomb in Nashville and plays basketball.  I’m so proud of my two daughters for raising such wonderful children.  God has blessed me beyond measure.  I pray for them all every night.  They’re each avid readers, my best gift to them all.  I gave them books for every occasion and we spent a lot of time in libraries and bookstores.  My husband is an artist and shared his love of art with my daughters and grandchildren, encouraging them to be creative.  God bless you all.

“Grandchildren are God’s way of compensating us for growing old.” -Mary H. Waldrip

Mary Mace in Washington D. C. today as winner of Congressional Art Contest for Tennessee.

Mary Mace did an excellent colored pencil portrait of Angela Davis.

Mary Mace & Sarah, my daughter.

❤️‍🔥🙏🏼 They’re in the middle of History today! 🙏🏼❤️‍🔥

My favorite picture of Mary Mace. 

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Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them,
but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

You are the bows from which your children
as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite,
and He bends you with His might
that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies,
so He loves also the bow that is stable. 

~Kahlil Gibran, “The Prophet”

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🇺🇸 It’s a GREAT DAY in America!  Praise God! 🙏🏼

Painters by Jewel

Painters by Jewel

Eighty years, an old lady now, sitting on the front porch

Watching the clouds roll by
They remind her of her lover, how he left her, and of times long ago,
When she used color carelessly, painted his portrait
A thousand times, or maybe just his smile,
Her and her canvas would follow him wherever he would go

'Cause they were painters and they were painting themselves
A lovely world

Oil streaked daisies covered the living room walls
He put water colored roses in her hair
He said, "Love, I love you,
I want to give you the mountains, the sunshine,
The sunset too
I want to give you a world as beautiful as you are to me"

'Cause I'm a painter and I want to paint you
A lovely way

So they sat down and made a drawing of their love,
They made it an art to live by
They painted every passion, every home, created every beautiful child
In the winter they were weavers of warmth,
In the summer they were carpenters of love
They thought blue prints were too sad so they made them yellow

And they were painters and they had painted themselves
A lovely world

Until one day the rain fell as thick as black oil
And in her heart she knew something was wrong
She went running through the orchard screaming,
"No God, don't take him from me!"
But by the time she got there, she feared he already had gone
She got to where he lay, water colored roses in his hands for her
She threw them down screaming, "Damn you man, don't leave me
With nothing left behind but these cold paintings, these cold portraits
To remind me!"

He said, "Love I only leave a little, try to understand
I put my soul in this life we've created with these four hands
Love, I leave, but only a little, this world holds me still
My body may die now, but these paintings are real"
La li lai la li lai la li lai

So many seasons came and many seasons went
And many times she saw her love's face watering the flowers,
Talking to the trees and singing to his children,
And when the wind blew, she knew he was listening,
And how he seemed to laugh along, and how he seemed to hold her
When she was crying

'Cause they were painters and they had painted themselves
A lovely world

Eighty years, an old lady now, sitting on the front porch
Watching the clouds roll by
They remind her of her lover, how he left her, and of times long ago,
When she used color carelessly, painted his portrait
A thousand times, or maybe just his smile,
Her and her canvas would follow him wherever he would go
Yes, she and her canvas still follow

'Cause they are painters and they are painting themselves
A lovely
'Cause they are painters and they are painting themselves
A lovely world

My almost twin sister & me in the 1980’s. I’m the tall one. 😼 We’re 10-1/2 months apart in age.

My Life is Painful, but Often Beautiful…

 

From:  “On Pain” by Khalil Gibran

“Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding. Even as the stone of the fruit must break, that its heart may stand in the sun, so must you know pain.

     And could you keep your heart in wonder at the daily miracles of your life your pain would not seem less wondrous than your joy;
     And you would accept the seasons of your heart, even as you have always accepted the seasons that pass over your fields.
     And you would watch with serenity through the winters of your grief.

😘💋 Johnny Depp’s band with Alice Cooper & Joe Perry, “Hollywood Vampires” 🎶

🙏🏼 Amen!  🙏🏼

🌿 A weed is but an unloved flower. 🌿

🥬 Tasty Swiss Chard, grows very fast! 🥬

💃🏼 Johnny Depp, my Rock & Roll crush. . . 🎶💞🎶

My Cherry Tomatoes coming along…

I love & appreciate those of you who have followed me all these years through thick & thin. ☀️🥰🌹

‘Flip the Script’ is the Politics of the Day, So I’m Flipping It - “1984” is Here

Nashville Buddha with a Moonflower that opened on the Full Flower Moon.

Having a very rough year, almost unbearable…

WE ARE LIVING IN A DYSTOPIAN NOVEL!

All quotes from “1984” by George Orwell, Biden’s playbook. 😱

 

Louis Ramey, Fabulous Comedian

“Your joy is your sorrow unmasked. And the same well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears. And how else can it be? The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain. Is not the cup that holds your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter's oven? And is not the lute that soothes your spirit, the very wood that was hollowed with knives?”

Khalil Gibran

“I would not exchange the laughter of my heart for the fortunes of the multitudes; nor would I be content with converting my tears, invited by my agonized self, into calm. It is my fervent hope that my whole life on this earth will ever be tears and laughter. Tears that purify my heart and reveal to me the secret of life and its mystery, Laughter that brings me closer to my fellow men; Tears with which I join the broken-hearted, Laugher that symbolizes joy over my very existence.”

Khalil Gibran

🌺🌸🌺🌸🌺🌸

Tuesday’s Roses

 

A RED FLOWER

Your lips are like a southern lily red, 
Wet with the soft rain-kisses of the night, 
In which the brown bee buries deep its head, 
When still the dawn's a silver sea of light. 

Your lips betray the secret of your soul, 
The dark delicious essence that is you, 
A mystery of life, the flaming goal 
I seek through mazy pathways strange and new. 

Your lips are the red symbol of a dream, 
What visions of warm lilies they impart, 
That line the green bank of a fair blue stream, 
With butterflies and bees close to each heart! 

Brown bees that murmur sounds of music rare, 
That softly fall upon the langourous breeze, 
Wafting them gently on the quiet air 
Among untended avenues of trees. 

O were I hovering, a bee, to probe 
Deep down within your scented heart, fair flower, 
Enfolded by your soft vermilion robe, 
Amorous of sweets, for but one perfect hour! 

Claude McKay

Love Is Betrayal

❤️‍🔥💔 Love Is Betrayal 🎶🎵 by Wayne Murray & Timothy Larcombe

Wake up
There’s a face staring back at me
And I don’t like what I see

Love is betrayal 
And heaven is hell

Falling 
Through the abyss
Waves crash all around me, each one feels like a kiss

Fighting
Like a soul going to war
Better show me something that’s worth dying for

Love is betrayal
And heaven is hell

Hit me like thunder
Hold my head under
Wrap me in chains

Love is betrayal

Wake up
There’s a face staring back at me
And I don’t like what I see

The Singularity by Malojian

 

🎶 ‘The Singularity’ by Malojian 🎶

¥€¥€¥€¥€¥€¥€¥€¥€¥€¥€¥€

The Singularity Lyrics - By Malojian

Plug your phone in for awhile
Watch the bars go up, and smile
Never need to leave your home
These days, kids play on their own

It's all around you now
The machines, the cloud
All surround you now

Is there anyone here
That can heal the trembling of my heart?
If I show you my fears
Could you heal the trembling of my heart?
Hold on
Hold on, disease
For the singularity

It's all around you now
The machines, the cloud
All surround you now

Is there anyone here
Who can heal the trеmbling of my heart?
If I show you my fears
Could you heal thе trembling of my heart?
Hold on
Hold on, disease
For the singularity

^_^_^_^_^_^_^_^_^_^

Malojian Album

My 21 year old Garfield sleeping in a sunbeam behind my Ficus Figs…

The Moonflower Opening

Hibiscus Hiding

Morning Glorious, Godlight aglow

❤️‍🔥 My granddaughter, my heart, Mary Mace, is a gorgeous grown woman, 18 years young. 💕

A Stone, A Leaf, A Door by Thomas Wolfe

These & tens of thousands more flowers have I grown, admired, photographed.  Joy!

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A Stone, A Leaf, A Door by Thomas Wolfe

… A stone, a leaf, an unfound door;

of a stone, a leaf, a door.

And of all the forgotten faces.

Naked and alone we came into exile.

In her dark womb

we did not know our mother’s face;

from the prison of her flesh have we come

into the unspeakable and incommunicable prison

of this earth.

Which of us has known his brother?

Which of us has looked into his father’s heart?

Which of us has not remained forever prison-pent?

Which of us is not forever a stranger and alone?

O waste of loss, in the hot mazes, lost,

among the bright stars

on this most weary unbright cinder, lost!

Remembering speechlessly

we seek the great forgotten language,

the lost lane-end into heaven,

a stone, a leaf, an unfound door.

Where? When?

O lost, and by the wind grieved,

ghost, come back again.

Doors are portals to the unknown… 

The Way It Is by William Stafford

 

The Way It Is

William Stafford

There’s a thread you follow. It goes among
things that change. But it doesn’t change.
People wonder about what you are pursuing.
You have to explain about the thread.
But it is hard for others to see.
While you hold it you can’t get lost.
Tragedies happen; people get hurt
or die; and you suffer and get old.
Nothing you do can stop time’s unfolding.
You don’t ever let go of the thread.

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My thread:

Jesus, Prince of Peace, Light of the World, Son of God, Healer, Savior…

Our nation needs revival.  God’s Spirit flows from this song. 🙏🏼✝️🙏🏼