Category: Blogging

Friday Morning FYI – 6/5/2015

Ron Delaney JrLeave a comment

Welcome to your Friday Morning FYI, my chance to share observations/wisdom/rants in short, easily consumed form.

This week’s FYI is a little ranty, and about the words others put right in our earholes, but we don’t hear:

How often we ignore what others tell us about themselves. I’m not talking about body language, tone, or any of that. I mean the WORDS that come out of people’s mouths. We hear but don’t accept, and then react like we’ve been slighted – angrily casting blame. We paint Rockwellian pictures, script elaborate scenes and monologues, and erect statuesque pedestals – all outside of someone’s confessed reality – and then cry like children burned by touching a scolding oven we were warned was hot.

If a serpent tells you it bites, it goddamn bites. Don’t cuddle with it thinking it lied about biting, or just doesn’t know itself, or won’t bite YOU. Leave it the hell alone.

 

Thanks for reading,

{RDj}

Friday Morning FYI – 5/29/2015

Ron Delaney JrLeave a comment

Welcome to your Friday Morning FYI, my chance to share observations/wisdom/rants in short, easily consumed form.

This week’s FYI is about the oft-times heavy impact of unrealized expectations:

No one can disappoint you. All anyone can do is fail to live up to expectations you set for them in your head. How and what you feel when that happens, and how you react, is on you, not them.

 

Thanks for reading,

{RDj}

In the Times Which Try a Man

Ron Delaney JrLeave a comment

I read ‘Invictus’ at least once a day. I find it motivating on good days, and comforting on not-as-good days. Today, for reasons only the Universe knows, I found it inspiring – as in, ‘Go write a thing,’ inspiring. So I wrote a thing.

Here’s the thing.

 

In the Times Which Try a Man

In the times which try a man,
His courage and his soul,
Shall he fail or shall he stand
To face the night alone?

Shall he bend his neck to fate,
A conquered, broken beast?
Or march bravely to the gate
And claim his honored seat?

Oh my heart and all I am,
From gods born unto earth,
Beat the song and dance the dance,
So I may prove my worth.

Bring me all wisdom can show,
And to my brothers, too.
Bring us the unburdened souls
Of men who know the truth.

 

Thanks for reading,

{RDj}

A brief observation on tree climbing and Isaac Newton

Ron Delaney JrLeave a comment

Well lookie here, a post not-about writing. Weird, I know, but I’m feeling a little philosophical today, and don’t want to wait until the next Friday Morning FYI. Warning: this may be a little unorganized. Stream of consciousness, and all that. Indulge me 🙂

During a recent conversation, a friend mentioned tree climbing, and it’s been stuck in the back of my mind ever since – leaning back with it’s arm folded and feet on the coffee table, grinning mockingly, waiting for me to figure out why it struck a cord.

It’s not because an adult talking about climbing trees is odd to me (just the opposite – I was glad to hear it). It’s not because it was a strange thing for that friend to say. It fit her perfectly. So why?

And then, on the train this morning, with innumerable trees swinging and dancing past my window, it hit me: Newton’s Third Law: For every action there’s an equal and opposite reaction.

At this point, the tree climbing idea nodded and winked at me. Enigmatic little devil.

See, I’ve recently been doing a lot of research on different physics topics for my WIP, so Newton’s Third Law (which tells us that when you push against something, it pushes back) was itching at the edge of my memory, too. Apparently it and the tree climbing idea wanted to hang out and play Trivia Crack, or something.

So what’s the connection? Think about this: if something pushes back when you push it, that means when you climb into a tree, the tree responds by lifting you. Like it wants you to go higher. Like it enjoys you being with it, in it.

I. Love. That. So. Much. (and kind of hate myself for not seeing it before)

Oh, look. Now I’m feeling a bit poetic. Hmm.

Oh, blessed inspiration – from words to heart to words. Now I just need to find a strong tree to climb and sit in and write.

 

Thanks for reading,

{RDj}

 

Are There People in My Universe?

Ron Delaney JrLeave a comment

I’ve been so busy editing over the last however-many-months, I haven’t posted anything besides a few book reviews, a note on querying (which was mostly for my own benefit), and the weekly Friday Morning FYIs. So here’s a short (<900 words) thingy I banged-out, oh, probably a year ago. I wrote it one day when a strange, naggy little idea way-too-small for a novel broke through the topsoil in my mind, and watered itself.

Enjoy!

Continue reading “Are There People in My Universe?” →