C.S. Lewis, from "The Problem of Pain"

If you can spare a few minutes, this is worth the read.

“You may have noticed that the books you really love are bound together by a secret thread. You know very well what is the common quality that makes you love them, though you cannot put it into words: but most of your friends do not see it at all, and often wonder why, liking this, you should also like that. Again, you have stood before some landscape, which seems to embody what you have been looking for all your life; and then turned to the friend at your side who appears to be seeing what you saw -- but at the first words a gulf yawns between you, and you realise that this landscape means something totally different to him, that he is pursuing an alien vision and cares nothing for the ineffable suggestion by which you are transported. Even in your hobbies, has there not always been some secret attraction which the others are curiously ignorant of -- something, not to be identified with, but always on the verge of breaking through, the smell of cut wood in the workshop or the clap-clap of water against the boat's side? Are not all lifelong friendships born at the moment when at last you meet another human being who has some inkling (but faint and uncertain even in the best) of that something which you were born desiring, and which, beneath the flux of other desires and in all the momentary silences between the louder passions, night and day, year by year, from childhood to old age, you are looking for, watching for, listening for? You have never had it. All the things that have ever deeply possessed your soul have been but hints of it -- tantalising glimpses, promises never quite fulfilled, echoes that died away just as they caught your ear. But if it should really become manifest -- if there ever came an echo that did not die away but swelled into the sound itself -- you would know it. Beyond all possibility of doubt you would say "Here at last is the thing I was made for". We cannot tell each other about it. It is the secret signature of each soul, the incommunicable and unappeasable want, the thing we desired before we met our wives or made our friends or chose our work, and which we shall still desire on our deathbeds, when the mind no longer knows wife or friend or work. While we are, this is. If we lose this, we lose all.”
― C.S. Lewis, " The Problem of Pain"

This is a video made by one of my ballroom instructors, Collin O'Brien, for my birthday, that I will treasure for a long long time! Collin's many talents have led him to accept new challenges in his career, so, sadly, although he'll still be around, he won't be my instructor anymore - and that just makes these 5 years of memories all the sweeter to me. Thank you ♥

Movie Maker: Happy Birthday Acsa ! - Slideshow

"It's a curious thing, the death of a loved one...."

Everybody has their own way of dealing with grief. You think you know what yours will be when the time comes, but really, you don't - till you are faced with it. Less than a year ago I lost both my parents and an uncle in a car accident in Brazil. Horrible and inconceivable. Made even more horrible and inconceivable by the fact that it happened on the same stretch of road (barely 5 miles apart) from where I lost my younger brother nineteen years ago.

I have since returned to Brazil twice with my only sister, and am now getting ready to go again. My mom owned a small photo developing business which was actually started by my brother. The Brazilian courts have finally gone through all the red tape of taxing any property that both my Mom and Dad (divorced now for over 19 years) had and now, as executor of the estate, I must oversee and dispose of it as my sister and I see fit.

The fact that my parents didn't live close to me, kind of masks the full effect that they are now gone forever. It hits me like a ton of bricks and without warning every so often, though. I got to see them every other year, on average, but did talk to them over the phone frequently. Being busy taking care of business, dealing with lawyers, insurance company, government agencies, and frustrating relatives, have all had a role in becoming the focus of my rage and grief. As long as that is going on, the heart breaking cannot be heard much over the cacophony of demands my brain has to concentrate on.

And that's just it. The legality of it all, although long from being over, is finally settling down to the point that we can now proceed to the slow steps of disposing of assets. Slowly. Nothing ever happens in a timely fashion in Brazil. If I had a dime for every time I heard "Miss, this will only take 5 minutes..." I'd be retiring in my own private island next to Oprah right about now. Regardless, in my mind, I have a specific time plan to get this done and over with. At which point, should there be any money left, I would love to throw a good bye party (never ever underestimate the many ways in which a government can and will tax you and yours while alive and then, not thinking that death is anything much in the way of an obstacle to deter them in their avarice for taxing beyond the grave, they keep on taxing you). Not good bye to my parents - they, as my brother, will always be with me, wherever I go (that's the mantra people say to you and that you keep hearing in your head, if for no other reason than to keep yourself from falling apart). But good bye to that country as I once knew it. The world is a vast and beautiful place. I'd like to start re-visiting places that I saw in my younger days (Scotland, England, Argentina, Uruguay) and others that I have only dreamed of or talked about. Places that come with no baggage but instead, promises of different adventures and happier memories.

That's a thought, anyway. We'll see how it goes. We'll see how I go along with it. You know what they say about best laid plans...

"It is a curious thing, the death of a loved one. We all know that our time in this world is limited, and that eventually all of us will end up underneath some sheet, never to wake up. And yet it is always a surprise when it happens to someone we know. It is like walking up the stairs to your bedroom in the dark, and thinking there is one more stair than there is. Your foot falls down, through the air, and there is a sickly moment of dark surprise as you try and readjust the way you thought of things."
— Lemony Snicket

Best of both worlds: WHOLOCK - Sherlock meets The Doctor!

Creating this year's Christmas Card

Stationery card

View the entire collection of cards.

So much fun playing with all the possibilities! Never to early to start on Christmas stuff, you know!

Invictus - by William Ernest Henley

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.


Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll.
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

War Kittie

Having just watched the movie "War Horse" with the family, we got inspired to do our own parody (what can I say in our defense? it's a slow Sunday afternoon??). As most of you know, War Horse is about this remarkable horse that gets separated from his young owner in England when WWI comes around. SPOILER ALERT (ie, stop reading if you haven't seen the movie yet, and intend on doing so): being the miraculous horse that he is, he manages to survive the war and find his way home. While not being the direct cause, it's interesting to notice that apart from his young owner, everyone else who comes in contact with this Thoroughbred for an extended period of time, manages to get killed. END OF SPOILER ALERT.

So, to find the perfect protagonist for our parody we had to search far and wide. Not owning a horse ourselves (not yet, anyway) and since my Great Dane, Odie, is long gone, may he rest in peace, we had to rely on our very own cat, Truman, who, albeit, a bit reluctant, did fit the part marvelously. You can see in the picture that when portraying one of the most traumatic scenes in the movie, where War Kittie gets trapped by barbwire, Truman did the agonizing face quite convincingly. OK, so I have to fess up, I was actually calling it "bobwire" when hubby corrected me. But you can see how I would be easily confused: Bob or Barb, they are both names, so I just thought Bob is the guy who invented that wicked wire, and like scientists who discover a new planet or plant and get it named after them (see, watching PBS always pays off), I thought Bob was the genius behind this contraption. Makes perfect sense, right? I thought so.