Myanmar You Are Not Forgotten

The tragedy in Burma/Myanmar, is beyond comprehension. Only a few short months ago, I was there. It is impossible to believe what nature has imposed on people who were nothing short of amazing. Friendly, intelligent and ingenious in their ability to work within a restrictive environment. I loved my time there. My heart breaks for those who died and those who struggle to survive.

Myanmar you are in my thoughts every day.

Ryshia

Time Travel With Man's Best Friend

The park was full of them - dogs! Yesterday's walk for the local Humane Society took place around Regina's Wascana Lake. There were dogs everywhere and people and dogs dressed in all sorts of costumes including yours truly and a group of dog-loving friends.

Although we didn't start out with anything but an Hawaiian theme
we did end up with the handle of best tacky tourist.

Yesterday's walk got me thinking about how much Wascana has changed through the years. It is one of North America's largest man-made parks, a depression-era make work project that created a beautiful lake from what was once really just a creek. But before the dirty thirties, before it officially became a lake, people came to swim here. In the years before World War II and even for a time after, it was still a place to go swimming.

Now, it seems only the birds and the occasional dog take a dip.

The park is still beautiful, maybe more so, and there's all sorts of recreation but it's not a beach destination - at least not anymore. And yet - once, it was.


It amazes me the imprint of time, how it changes our lives.

If you could journey back in time, would you?

For me, with a slight hesitation, a resounding yes - just give me a return ticket!

Til next time

Ryshia

Characters Do Not All Live In Books

As I travel through life the people I meet are often more interesting than the characters that populate my books. Today, on a twenty minute walk, I viewed some interesting vignettes and got a view of just a piece of someone else's life.

Act 1 - a line at the post office that was being delayed because a package was being paid for in carefully folded and refolded bills. The customer was tall, thin with hemp beads and long stringy hair and a placid baby face. He didn't seem to notice the consternation on the postal clerk's face as he carefully removed one carefully folded bill after another from a small pouch he carried. Five dollar bills were folded to one inch squares. He would place a carefully folded bill on the middle of the counter and wait. The clerk would painstakingly unfold the intricately folded bill and place it in a growing pile. Then the man would slowly reach for another similarly folded bill and set it on the counter, and the clerk would concentrate on unfolding that bill and placing it on the pile of unfolded bills. With the transaction appearing to cost close to one hundred dollars the whole performance was very slow. Neither he nor the postal clerk spoke, but their expressions told a story - I'm sure each of us in that line had a different tale to tell at the end of the day and not one of us knew the real story behind the man and those intricately folded five dollar bills.

Act 2 - As I walked away from the post office and down the street still smiling over the very different reactions of the postal clerk, the customer, and the people in line, I caught a flash of plaid. There, standing in front of a full length window at the main entrance of an apartment building stood a man in boxer shorts and under shirt. I blinked and looked again. Surely he would duck now that there was a woman on the sidewalk in front of him. He didn't and I walked faster, just in case he was in the mood to show a tad more than his boxers.

Just another interesting day on a cool spring day on the prairie.

And you - what strangers made an impression on you today?

Ryshia

A Journey through Time and Music

Why is it that music can reach out and touch our emotions through years and decades or in some instances, even centuries?
Take a Peek at - The Doors in Concert

Jim Morrison would be turning 65 this year, no longer that sexy hunk slinking around the stage singing provocative songs. Yet, by dying young we're forever left with that ageless image of raw, edgy youth.

Life is never easy and it's never fair - make the most of what you have.

Ryshia

International Day of the Book

Today is International Day of the Book. On this day, April 23 in the year 1616, Cervantes and Shakespeare both died. And they weren't the only writers to enter or leave this world on April 23rd, there were other famous and not so famous writers. But the purpose of this post isn't to honor writers long dead. Their legacy doesn't need a day. Their work lives on. The literary greats are honored again and again every time we pick up a book, every time we write a line. No, today is about the books and their readers. About remembering, appreciating and giving the gift of books. Books mark the passage of time, guide the milestones in life and record our history for as long and longer than we can remember. So, readers and writers alike, spend some time alone in the good company of a book.

A good book can be found almost anywhere.

Books are a refuge, a sort of cloistral refuge, from the vulgarities of the actual world. - Walter Pater

Reading is to the mind what exercise is to the body. - Richard Steele, Tatler, 1710

Now be off with you and your book. I'll leave you two alone.
Enjoy!

Ryshia

From The Other Side Of The Looking Glass

I never travel without a book. Usually a book or two. As a reader I love to delve into history, romance, mystery, real life, made up life, I love it all. Although I do love romance best. As a writer, I write romance but within that genre my curiosity takes me in many directions.

But reader/writer that's two sides of a glass. And it's hard to know from the writer side what readers want. The industry gives statistics every year of what's popular and what's not according to what they think the readers want. But what do readers really want? Are readers all as eclectic as I am? Am I naive to think that if I love a story, and I love every story I write, that my readers will love it too? Do readers expect that if an author they enjoyed wrote one historical that another will follow? Or, like me, will they be willing to follow an author from a historical to paranormal to suspense and back again?

Every story I've read has taken me on a journey, as a reader that's all I've ever expected of an author. What about you? What do you like to read?

And, to a post with many questions - a virtual toast!

Ryshia

Through the Shroud of a Bad Day

Some days are just off. You know the kind, doesn't matter where you're going, that shroud of yuck follows along behind. The other day began as one of those days. No good reason, nothing much different that morning except the gray mood but then things began to change. First I found the penny - bright, shiny new, lying in the middle of the street. I won't bend to pick one up if it's not shiny. I mean it's only a penny. But if it's shiny, call me superstitious, I'll pick it up - my good luck charm for the day.

And it was.

Morning coffee break was indeed a break. With a shiny new good luck charm in my pocket, my shroud of yuck was about to be broken. My favorite coffee shop owner brought my latte over with a big smile and a special heart frothed on the top because just the other day they had learned I'm a romance author.

How incredibly special is that! There's no way my shroud of yuck could contend with that and so it slid off into the drain from whence it came.



So if you're ever in Regina and in need of a mood booster or just some time around truly special people, or just for the great food and beverages, check out this little vegetarian cafe.

Green Spot Cafe
2012 12th Ave, Regina, Saskatchewan

What brings you out of the unexpected blahs?

hmmm - usage of the word, whence - me thinks I've been playing in medieval land a tad too long. Til later.

Ryshia

Is it Night or Pre-Dawn?

It is 4:38 a.m. and I am out walking the dog. Sleep alluded me somewhere around 4:00 a.m. So here I am taking a journey through the pre-dawn darkness. An eerie, lonely walk or so it seems. It's soon apparent that I and my dog are not the only ones awake at this hour of the morning.

Who said the birds sing when the sun comes up? Apparently they sing long before that as a group of feathered crooners chirp through one melody after the next. The houses are in darkness and not another living being in sight. Just us and the birds. It is rather strange listening to the birds
sing their cheerful little hearts out this early in the morning. It is also rather refreshing how between the song of the birds, there is silence. There is no sign of sun rise. The air still has the night time nip.


Twenty minutes later, life is slowly starting to arouse. A house light in the darkness, another further on. Then dawn begins the transition from darkness. Without warning a layer of night sky seems to peel back and
the sky is suddenly lighter. I'd stick around for sunrise but there's breakfast and a shower to think about, and of course the beginning of another routine day. Or maybe not.

A little lightness to start the day - Click here


What did you do today that was out of the norm - and was your day better for it?


Ryshia