Pause to Reflect

I have a feeling this post may ramble a bit. I'm sitting at my desktop computer, not the laptop. Normally, this hour of the day is reserved for catching up on Facebook games. For some reason, this morning started out differently. Brian and Amanda had left before Annie got up to check on Seth. (There you have the list of people with whom I share this apartment.) The boy had apparently managed to get ready for school this morning without the usual drama and fustication. Annie's back is tweaked so she didn't want to get out of bed, and I reset the alarm to accommodate her. I had stayed up a bit late last night working on the web site for LaughingBear Ventures. There's a chill in the air. Nothing like the cold of Rhode Island, for which I am so grateful you can't imagine.

I brewed my pot of coffee. I have to have my coffee. I get cranky if I don't. If a Laughing Bear is cranky in an empty house, does anybody know it? No. He just becomes sullen. Anyway, I looked at the setup in the bedroom where the laptop lives at the end of the bed. I looked at my desk in the living room with the chair I've had for years. I'd much rather be in the chair. But the windows at that end of the apartment leak pretty badly. It'll be less than pleasant for typing fingers. Still, better to be overall comfortable.

Fully intending to visit the stupid games, I start the computer. Many of my Facebook friends are people I have actually met. Some are in other parts of the country, other parts of the world even, and I know them only through the persona they project on the internet. There are a handful whom I am proud to call friend, so much so that I refer to them as brothers and sisters.

One of my sisters, I realized yesterday, reminds me of another very close friend, at least in appearance. Neither of these women are the picture of physical perfection that modern society defines. I describe them as the embodiment of the mother goddess. In my opinion, women are supposed to be soft and have curves. Nature, it seems, agrees with me. For if a woman does not strive to the ideal of Madison Avenue, her body takes on the dimensions of motherhood - slightly wider hips, soft curves in the middle, breasts that are not pointing at the stars. I remember a study that showed a variety of silhouettes images of female bodies to a group of men and the softer bodies were the most popular. The primary question of the study was, "Which shape appeals as your potential mate most?" What does it mean? It means that bodies that look like they can carry and produce offspring must be inherently more attractive to males whose basic drive is to procreate. And there I go rambling.

That ramble started with the visual appeal of my friend. To be honest, I think she's beautiful. She has an amazing smile and is soft in all the right places. She makes me think. One of the things I love about her is that she makes me think not only about the primal urges she inspires, but also about some much deeper issues. Through her own words and the sharing of words of others, somehow she manages to reach into my head and stir me to the very core. Mind you, she's not the only one. All the people in my brother and sister list have that effect. At one time or another, I've hated each and every one of them for revealing to me the shortcomings I see within myself. But because I've developed a spiritual relationship with my Creator, I also realize that those people have been journeying with me for a reason. It doesn't take long for me to change my initial emotional response to something a bit more positive. I love them. (I could SO go off and ramble again.)

So today I scan down the hundreds of posts that appear on my Facebook home page. It's how I start before going to the games. While I may spend the majority of my time at Facebook in the game applications, I do actually read what my friends have to say or share. Sometimes I find their posts worth sharing with my list of friends. If you've read my posts, you may have come to realize that I'm not very focused. I have a lot of interests. It sucks. I want to be able to do all these things and there just aren't enough hours. It's been over an hour and a half now since I sat down and started reading and then writing this. I spent some of that time reading a few blog posts. Each one reached inside me, grabbed hold of something and shook it. Each one got hold of something different. Each one made me take a hard look in my virtual mirror. Each one made me realize I have a lot of work left to do on myself.

Time for my second cup of coffee. Time to unload the dishwasher. Time to empty the sink. Time to find my focus again.