Photo from a book store - and a Poem for Friday Writings

You can count the keys on this LARGE PRINT typewriter pictured.
Please also note that it is a manual and not electric.
"Typewriter" posts, http://jimmiehov.blogspot.com/search?q=typewriter

  Words we speak 

"If I had my choice, I probably would've 

gotten married in my twenties, 

had three kids, and never left my hometown.  

Sometimes life doesn't work out the way 

we wish it would." 

Words were spoken like I've heard before

'I won't ever marry a man, and when I have 

children I'll teach them to not marry either.'  

Thus sayeth a senior girl in my typing class 

(I and one other were the only boys enrolled) 

which shocked a farm boy like me. 

Later I read in the paper when the girl above 

had married that summer a fellow who drove 

a batch truck for the paving gang making the 

new highway to a neighboring town.  

Later still, I read of the birth that fall of a baby 

boy to the couple.  

The author of the book from which I quoted, 

then married, did have a child, at the age 

of forty-two.  

Things don't often, seldom, work out like 

our plans.  

I didn't plan things, never did.  Instead when 

there is an open door of opportunity I evaluate 

choices and most often have taken the good ones. 

 

I ended up not rich but have retired well enough 

off to have retired many years now. All my 

degrees aren't helping me now but they did produce 

quite well. 

Moral of the story from my book, the author 

was telling, "God has a plan for us" and it may 

differ greatly from our own. 

_ _ _

Notes:

1. The book I'm reading is “Mostly What God Does”

written by Savannah Guthrie. The words I have used here

are to be found in Chapter 4, titled “Like a Mother”.

2. My “Prose Poem” has 290 words not counting the title 

but counting the author's quotation from the book. 

_ _ _ 

- Writing Copyright, Jimmiehov 2024, All rights reserved 

-  I am linked with Magaly at Friday Writings #130 at 

  https://poetsandstorytellersunited.blogspot.com/ 

..

A Question -- a Piece of Prose for dVerse Prosery and for NaPoWriMo Day Nine

["Fu Bao in quarantine ", In China, born in 2020, 

Panda Bear just came from lease at South Korea]

            

                    Bears Checking Out 

    I was asked the other day a question about the stars, "What does it matter that the stars we see are already dead?" I was stumped and of course I put it to rest along with seems a zillion rhetorical questions I have been asked. "I dunno."  

  

    When I got home I went to old trusty fellow, Mr. Bing whose helper is Ms. AI. They know a lot, trivia and otherwise. Well, he scratched his head calling a friend. Those two knew, he wanted to make sure.

    Bing's retort, “No matter how you look at it, the idea that all, or even most, or even a lot, of the stars you can see in the sky are already dead is simply wrong. It sounds true, and kinda sorta fits with things you might think you know, but in the end the facts will win.”* 

_ _ _ _ 

 

 - * Note: found when asked the question in paragraph one, Bing (substitue for Google) answer word for word.  (URL)

 - Writing Copyright, Jimmiehov 2024, All Rights Reserved 

 - I am linked with Dora at dVerse Prosery at 

    https://dversepoets.com/2024/04/08/prosery-amy-woolard/ 

 - Dora's instructions Write a piece of prose (not poetry) of no more than 144 words that includes what is the question asked in my first paragraph here.

 - Click here to read others' works with the prompt

 - I am also linked with NaPoWriMo Day Nine at 

     https://www.napowrimo.net/day-nine-10/

 - NaPoWriMo to choose a Day is here, https://www.napowrimo.net/ 

 . .     

Lilac bouquet Valentine -- a piece of prose and a poem for dVerse Prosery

.  

        Image by Julia Butsykina on Unsplash

I know today is for prose.  I am trying to learn how to write hip hop poetry and don't get much help, even from Google.  

If any of you readers have written hip hop poetry you could leave me a helpful comment below. 

Here's my attempt, today's prompt words are the title and first and second lines:

    '…city lilacs 

    release their sweet, wild perfume 

    then bow down, heavy with rain.’ 

    a purple bouquet for you 

    one I cut for you with pain 

    there's much love mixed with my blood 

    mixed in with shiny petals 

    bright red and a bit of mud 

    all from lack of parasol 

    city lilacs traffic dust 

    purple pieces with my red 

    different than the country ones 

    fresh and clean and pure it's said 

    I cut myself with my knife 

    your Valentine worth the price 

_ _ _        

Pretty well does it for now.

                             _ _ _

 - Poem Copyright, Jimmiehov 2024, all rights reserved

 - I am linked with Kim at dVerse Prosery at          https://dversepoets.com/2024/02/12/prosery-city-lilacs/ 

 - Click here to read other writers' works using Kim's prompt lines find.  We are to use 144 words, no less.  Mine, including the ditty has 144.

.. 

May your dark clouds have silver linings!
(my, Jimmiehov, photo)

                 Bad News and Hindsight 

    I had dropped out of college way back in years passed.  

 

   A job in the Elgin Watch Factory seemed waiting for me.  I then bought a car, another story there.  When I did all this the draft had slowed as plenty were volunteering.  Sigh of relief, although that didn't last.  I got my draft notice three years later.  Bad news for me.  

    Into the Army I went, and my last eight months training was the clerk typist school teaching.  When time for my discharge there was a major depression and the Watch factory had closed.  So I enlisted for three more years, to attend the first 43 weeks in an Air Defense NIKE Fire Control Systems Maintenance school.  There I learned Electronics, Radar, and Computers. 

    Time for discharge, I left as the Viet Namm war had just started and I wanted out of the service.  It was easy for me to get a job teaching in the army school but our company lost their contract after two months.  I was transferred to New Hampshire with the company as a Field Aerospace Engineer with my Army class, third of forty-some students and my experience of the last of three years in Army.  

    This project was to make an already installed Air Force Satellite installation work, teach the Airmen how to operate and maintain it.  After another three years I had worked myself out of a job there and was transferred to NASA'S Houston Johnson Space Center as an Aerospace Engineer. 

    I hummed along with the open doors and kept my peace.  But then Voila, the local colleges had day and night classes, so I enrolled.  My education ended after ten years, mostly financed using my GI Bill benefit, with the receiving three degrees.  

    That qualified me to teach at the community college which I was offered a job, I taught for 22 years there before retiring.  My doctorate degree put me with PhD instructors, pay and the title of Professor. 

   My unwanted stint in the Army had paid off, that was the silver lining in the dark cloud. Hindsight said my taking of the open doors had paid off.

_ _ _

 - Prose Writing here is Copyright, Jimmiehov 2024, All Rights Reserved

 - I am linked with Magaly who is hosting and brought the fun but revealing Friday Writings #112 at

    https://poetsandstorytellersunited.blogspot.com/

 - Magaly has invited us to write poetry or prose that includes a silver lining, or an advantage that comes from a difficult or unpleasant situation.  Our word for Friday Writings count is limited to 369 words not counting the title, I have 358 words.

..

[Our back yard after our snowfall] 

 

    Let the Snow Fall, Please 

I was where I am when the snow began, softly first, with inklings of a bit more.  The holly trees with red berries were welcoming a little storm; they love to dance when surrounded by snow.

The last snow we had then was several years past; it only snows here, maybe once every ten years. I make my wish for the snow to come stay again. We are expecting only a tiff here and there, most times those never last the morn.

So for now the snow I get will be in memory only. I'm getting years, our daughter doesn't want us to go where snow is common; that's because I would want to drive.

My memory is good, pictures albums help, the album in my head is about as good. My youthful sled hanging on a hook helps me too. I am ready.

_ _ _

 - Photos and Prose Copyright, Jimmiehov 2023, All Rights Reserved

- I am linked with Merrill D Smith, at dVerse Prosery, Winter is Coming 

    https://dversepoets.com/2023/12/04/prosery-winter-is-coming/ 

 - Merrill has asked us to write not more than 144 words, mine is exactly 144 words long, excluding the title.  We were to include these words, "I am where I am when the snow began."  They were from a poem, "TheDead of Winter" by Samuel Menashe, found here.

 - The pictures are of our backyard, the snowy one the time it snowed and the snow stayed a while. 

- Click here to read what other writers have written

.

Snowy Release -- a Prose Poem for dVerse Prosery

     Packing Snow 

‘Snow would be the easy way out’ .  Those words would be her rescue road.  Locked in here like a caged lion  

Mountainside lodge snow piling in. Snowman packed would it hold her up?   Up to windows high break the glass 

Then freedom at last!  

 _ _ _  

 -   Prose Poem Copyright 2023, by Jimmiehov, All Rights Reserved 

  - I'm linked with  kfim881  at dVerse Prosery     https://dversepoets.com/2023/11/06/november-for-beginners/ 

   Where Kim's prompt words for us to use is my first line, ‘Snow would be the easy way out’.  We were to limit ourselves to writing with no more than 144 words including the seven she gave us. I used 44.

 - Click here to read some of the other writers using these words

.. 

My Garden - How does it grow? - a Prosery Write for dVerse

 

[Click on pictures for larger view -- Back button to return 

The older we're getting the more lists we should make 
Top of the List of Lists would be our grocery list 
The older we're getting the more we will forget 
The lists tend to remind carry them where you go 

Don't Quit 

People growing older and older 

Then items disappear from our list 

We even name that list, "Bucket List"

It means that when we kick the bucket 

Those things we want to have accomplished 

List shows those and things I'd like to be doing 

Today is Mourning Day for 9/11 disaster 

  

- - - > My piece of Prose for dVerse today: 

Bucket list garden 

My bucket list is mostly fun things to do. Things I've not done*, that can't be done, or that I'd like to do. So here goes. They all are growing, wilting, or dead for you, to be pretty for you I have dropped two seeds of turnsole in the dark of both eyes.** 

a.Strawberries, hardest on my Bucket List is to touch the South Pole* 

b.Onions, dead, was to replace my pet that died 

c.Beans, don't smoke anymore, I've quit, been 48 years
d.Carrots, drinking alcohol no more, maybe a glass of wine socially 

e.Spinach, stopped teaching Sunday Bible School  

f.Sold my motorcycles 

g.Asparagus, driving less at night, especially on major highways in town 

h.Cucumbers, driving not so fast, for sure not over 100 mph for very long, hardly over eighty's my top now 

i.Corn   

Made yours? You may be better than you think.

 _ _ _ 

 - Writing and Photos Copyright, Jimmiehov 2023, All Rights Reserved 

 - ** I am linked with Sanaa Rizvi at dVerse Prosery, 

    https://dversepoets.com/2023/09/11/prosery-through-the-eyes-of-isabel-duarte-gray/ for her prompt line, "from the Poem Garden" and is written using 144 words not counting the title 

 - Click here to read other writer's prose writing efforts 

.. 

Josh and Joline -- a "Reader make an own" Prosery Write for dVerse

[Photo from my 2014 "Living on the Thames" post, URL] 

. - - - 

A bad night 

Josh had wakened early that day.  He could sleep no more and had lain wide awake, reviewing last evening.

Why did he crash the Peterman Dance Hall party in progress?  Why?  There was only one reason, one he wished would leave his mind. 

Joline had been invited to the party, “but come alone”, by her ex-college roommate. All girls he had surmised, why else come stag.  

Lots of cars he had thought, driving in. He had wanted to see the roommate again too, he knew as he cracked open the door.  Oops, he quickly closed the door. Joline on the floor, dancing with her first romantic crush.  

Josh could take no more, last night nor this morning. Leaning over the rail, below and in the distance was coming his target, an 18-wheeler.  Overhead ‘traffic holding its breath, Sky a tense diaphragm’ . . . 

     _ _ _ 

 - Poem Copyright, Jimmiehov 2023, All Rights Reserved  

 - I am linked with Kim881 at dVerse Prosery prompting, at 

    https://dversepoets.com/2023/08/14/prosery-twice-shy/  

 - Kim's prompt sentence was the last phrase, in italics, in my "reader make an own ending" piece of prose.  It can be no longer than 144 words not counting the title and must contain said above phrase.  Mine has exactly 144 words.

 - Click here to read other's work using Kim's prompt.   

..                                         

Grown Girl Advice -- a Poem for dVerse Prosery Night

Barbie Doll, dolled up in Pink

    The Mother's Advice 

"For beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror.”

    Those my mother's words, as I stepped onto the train after we'd exchanged parting hugs. Irritated me a bit, I'm a grown girl who shouldn't need that kind of advice. 

    All was well when I chose my bench seat, all forward facing ones were taken in the section I was assigned.

    Thinking those words over, I know in the sight of many I am a pretty girl, young adult now. Younger less aware should heed them for sure.  

    My thought train was interrupted when the fellow next to edged my way, close making me feel uncomfortable. I gave him a defensive nudge to hint that he was sitting too close. 

    He didn't take that hint, played it like an invitation to come some closer. I jumped up, changed my seat. 

    Mom, you were right. 

     _ _ _ 

 - Poem Copyright, Jimmiehov 2023, All Rights Reserved 

 - I'm linked with Mish at dVerse, Prosery Night , 

    https://dversepoets.com/2023/07/17/prosery-rainer-maria-rilke/ 

 - Mish has a Poet tonight, Rainer Maria Rilke, chosen for us and are instructed to right a piece of prose, not more than 144 words, including the title.  That first line of his poem, “The First Elegy”, Duinos Elegies, was the opening line of my writing here, The Mother's Advice.' 

 - Click here to read the writings of other participants.

..

At Early Moon -- a dVerse Prosery Piece

.

[click picture for a very large size view]

. . . 

Journey into the Trees

"An early moon is just a piece of change in the softening sky." **   Standing on the bridge squinting my eyes in the waning light I could see into the trees.  

There a little brown monkey just weaned from his mother, a beggar bedded down for the night, and swarms of mosquitoes who greeted me. They invited me into their little forest, I willingly went.

Quite an adventure for me, my eyes gradually adapted to the dim. The monkey had playthings scattered beyond his rug, the beggar was swigging a bottle of cheap gin, and none of those mosquitoes would bite.

Playing interrupted there came visitors, Mama Monkey and Beggar's Wife with chicken sandwiches and a can of Bactine. Though we had nothing, not one thing, in common we became best of friends. In the tree shadowed moonlight never to be seen except by me. 

**  first line by James Masao Mitsui, “Spring Poem for the Sake of Breathing, Written After a Walk to Foster Island”  for full Poem, click here

_ _ _ 

 - Photo and Prose piece Copyright, Jimmiehov 2023, All Rights Reserved (The bridge was a part of my friend, John's, five-acre yard. We often had car club meetings at his home. John died a few years ago.  

 - I am linked with Merril D Smith for the Prosery Prompt Line which I used as the opening line here.  To read about the line's heritage and to see the requirements for the Prosery writing tonight (one is not more than 144 words, I have exactly 144 not including the title), go here, 

  https://dversepoets.com/2023/06/05/prosery-breathing-and-moons/  

 - Click here to read others writer's Prosery piece 

..

A Date?" -- a short Prose Piece for dVerse Prosery

        The blind date

"On this day without a date, on a back street, dusky" and greasy, leaned a lady await. Dateless, still she was ready, willing to go.   Name the place, she'll hop in your jalopy.

Drove to a stop, what to do next?

_ _ _  

 - Photo and Prose Piece Copyright, Jimmiehov  2014 and 2023 respectively, All Rights Reserved 

 - Photo from http://jimmiehov6.blogspot.com/2014/07/blog-post_19.html (2014) and also https://jimmiehov6.blogspot.com/2016/08/by-day-i-troubled-poem-for-tuesday.html#comment-form (2016 - a dark poem)  

 - I'm linked with Lisa, aka msjadeli , at dVerse — Prosery — Charles Simic: Finding Our Pack, at 

        https://dversepoets.com/2023/05/08/dverse-prosery-charles-simic-finding-our-pack/

 - Lisa wishes for us to use these 11 words from Charles Simic, and write a short piece of prose with no more than 144 words--mine has 44 

    "On this day without a date, 

     on a back street, dusky" 

 - To read other's few-word works, click here 

..

"Learning How to Study" prose for Friday Writings

[click on picture for larger viewing -- our grade school, I am the boy in back]

I learned the hard way how to pay attention when a speaker is trying to make a point that we should know and learn.

Pay attention to the teacher, read the book, take notes!! I grew up on a farm and didn't plan on going to college. Probably do something related to agriculture after high school graduation. 

That all changed when a brownish post card came in the mail. It was from the University of Nebraska saying that I had been awarded a Regents Scholarship for five eights of my tuition, $50 a semester for four years.  

The kicker was that I must keep at least a "C" average to keep it. My grades slipped down; I decided that I must drop out so that some day I could get back in school later if I decided to. 

Later I was drafted into the Army, in my third year I opted a forty-three-week school.  It was for the maintenance and operation of a NIKE Hercules Missile Control Systems.   Three different radars and a van full of computers and consoles. I graduated third in my class of forty-some GIs.  Two officers had better grades; maybe I wasn't really "Dumb".

Towards the beginning an instructor taught me how to study.  Start with taking notes of the material being presented and from the books, then study the notes by reducing them to fundamentals, like an expanded outline.  Review these new pages and study to master items that give trouble.  Finally review before exams. An added benefit of taking notes is using another sense, of seeing what was being said, to that of hearing. 

I realized that since I needn't study in high school to make good grades, but in college I surely did. Seven years later I went back to college and after twenty more years I finished school with three degrees. 

Then I began teaching college and stayed twenty-two years until I retired. In my classes' beginnings when I found students not taking notes I'd tell them this story I've just told you. 

Worked for me, pay attention to the teacher, read the book, take notes and study them. I'm still doing that, even for church sermons. Two senses.

_ _ _ 

 - Photo and Prose Writing  Copyright, Jimmiehov 2023, All Rights Reserved 

 - I am linked with Magaly Guerrero for her Friday Writings #74 at  

    https://poetsandstorytellersunited.blogspot.com/?m=1 

 - Magaly's optional prompt is "all about the act of paying attention." in 369 or less words, I have exactly 367.  

..