Die Slowly

by Pablo Neruda

He who becomes the slave of habit,
who follows the same routes every day,
who never changes pace,
who does not risk and change the color of his clothes,
who does not speak and does not experience, dies slowly.

He or she who shuns passion,
who prefers black on white,
dotting ones “i’s” rather than a bundle of emotions,
the kind that make your eyes glimmer,
that turn a yawn into a smile,
that make the heart pound in the face of mistakes and feelings, dies slowly.

He or she who does not turn things topsy-turvy,
who is unhappy at work,
who does not risk certainty for uncertainty,
to thus follow a dream,
those who do not forego sound advice at least once in their lives, die slowly.

He who does not travel,
who does not read,
who does not listen to music,
who does not find grace in himself, dies slowly.

He who slowly destroys his own self-esteem,
who does not allow himself to be helped,
who spends days on end complaining about his own bad luck,
about the rain that never stops, dies slowly.

He or she who abandon a project before starting it,
who fail to ask questions on subjects he doesn’t know,
he or she who don’t reply when they are asked something they do know, die slowly.

Let’s try and avoid death in small doses,
always reminding oneself that being alive requires an effort by far greater than the simple fact of breathing.
Only a burning patience will lead to the attainment of a splendid happiness.

Officially old...er

Once a year, you get an opportunity to be reminded of the love and the care of the people around you. I'm thankful to them all.

We Didn't Start the Fire

They say "Any publicity is good publicity". I kind of disagree. I'd rather stay anonymous than being recognized for 'Ayatollahs' in the song.
The song also names Toscanini. I recently went to a concert in his honor. He died 50 years ago on Jan 16th.

Let it snow

The first Winter snow.
So white,
so calm,
and so beaustiful.

Why we hardly break up with our friends

It might have happened to most of us. That your best friend had said or done something you extremely disliked. Yet you don't usually breakup with your friend. How come we are more compromising towards our friends, and less in our relationships? Perhaps it's because we can give a friend a break; she says something you don't like, you take off for a couple of days and then the issue is cooled down and you both can ignore it. Or maybe because we don't feel the need to change our friends' attitudes, we accept them as they are and are happy with whatever we can get from that friendship, nomatter big or small. Our expections are high in a relationship; I say that's why we tolerate less.

In constant sorrow

The break is over, and I feel blue. The same old kind of feeling you have when you get to the end of some time period and you haven't accomplished what you has considered you would in the beginning. Sometimes you wonder if you could turn back time would you act differently. Well, I know I would handsomely waste my time all over again, if now was Dec 15th again. I'm a lost case.

A man (girl!) of constant sorrow

Audience

I was thinking today, when somebody writes a post in his weblog, does he have a specific audience in mind? Sometimes I do. Sometimes I write something here with the consideration that some people in particular would read it. And this to some extent is normal. After a while you got some returning visitors to your weblog and you automatically consider this in your writing. But what sometimes slips the mind is that potentially 'anybody' can be reading your posts. Even the people you had not have accounted for.

Wicked

Wicked

If I were living in Chicago, I would defenitly have kept going to those first row seats draws, till I could get my tickets:-)

A good cook!

I had some guests over for a small dinner party tonight. And here you see my apple pie. Looks good, doesn't it?:-)
Such a pity that I didn't make a picture of the main dish, but that was even more delicious than the pie. Saffron chicken over orange peel rice. Although I don't like bragging, but I guess it would be fair to say : I am a good cook. (No exclamation mark!)

Here's to 2007

One year passed. With all its ups and downs.
Lights and darks.
Smiles and tears.

Here's to 2007,
May it bring more smiles and less tears,
May it have more friendship and less lonesome.
May it bring more success and less devastation.
May it fulfill your dreams (well, at least some of them)
and
May it be filled with love.

And you know what, I have the sneaky feeling that it will be. Odd years are noble:-)
Happy 2007.