dear hallmark

i have neglected you.  i have neglected our relationship.  i have allowed this to turn into a one-way relationship.  cards coming in, but no cards going out.  i use to be so dearly devoted to you and now it is as though i just have no time for you.  friends send me cards, notes of encouragement.  very few cards have been put in the mailbox with the mail is outgoing - thanks sign being put to use.  i am ashamed.  i am saddened for my dear friends and family whose mailboxes have been left unused by cards from miranda. 

so to those who have been neglected over the last several months:  happy birthday, happy anniversary, thank you, praying for you, i am thankful for you, happy mother's day, happy father's day, happy nurse's day, thank you, congratulations on your pregnancy, happy administrative professional's day, thank you, congratulations on your engagement, congratulations on your graduation, get well, and THANK YOU!

clean out your mailboxes...come august, you may have a card coming your way sometime soon.

it was the best of times...

...it was the worst of times.  a tale of two cities - interesting read.  i wouldn't categorize it under favorites, but i would categorize it as the other extreme either.  at times, it was difficult to continue and fully comprehend.  i have little else to say about it, so here are a few quotes...

"you were always somewhere, and i was always nowhere." {a tale of two cities, charles dickens}

"sadly, sadly, the sun rose; it rose upon no sadder sight than the man of good abilities and good emotions, incapable of their directed exercise, incapable of his own help and his own happiness, sensible of the blight on him, and resigning himself to let it eat him away."  {a tale of two cities, charles dickens}

"troubled as the future was, it was the unknown future, and in its obscurity there was ignorant hope." {a tale of two cities, charles dickens}

"i see a beautiful city and a brilliant people rising from this abyss, and, in their struggles to be truly free, in their triumphs and defeats, through long years to come, i see the evil of this time and of the previous time of which this is the natural birth, gradually making expiation for itself and wearing out."  {a tale of two cities, charles dickens}

favorite era of reading

"but angry people are not always wise." {pride and prejudice, jane austen}

"i could easily forgive his pride, if he had not mortified mine." {pride and prejudice, jane austen}

"vanity and pride are different things, though the words are often used synonymously.  a person may be proud without being vain.  pride relates more to our opinion of ourselves, vanity to what we would have others think of us." {pride and prejudice, jane austen}

"a lady's imagination is very rapid; it jumps from admiration to love, from love to matrimony, in a moment."  {pride and prejudice, jane austen}

"think only of the past as its remembrance gives you pleasure."  {pride and prejudice, jane austen}

"as moderate as those of the rest of the world, i believe.  i wish as well as every body else to be perfectly happy; but, like every body else it must be in my own way.  greatness will not make me so."  {sense and sensibility, jane austen}

"between them no subject is finished, no communication is even made, till it has been made at least twenty times over."  {sense and sensibility, jane austen}

"don't cry so bitterly, but remember this day, and resolve with all your soul that you will never know another like it.  jo, dear, we all have our temptations, some far greater than yours, and it often takes us all our lives to conquer them." {little women, louisa may alcott}

"i want my daughters to be beautiful, accomplished, and good; to be admired, loved, and respected; to have a happy youth, to be well and wisely married, and to lead useful, pleasant lives, with as little care and sorrow to try them as God sees to send.  to be loved and chosen by a good man is the best and sweetest thing which can happen to a woman, and i sincerely hope my girls may know this beautiful experience.  it is natural to think of it, meg, right to hope and wait for it, and wise to prepare for it, so that when the happy time comes, you may feel ready for the duties and worthy of the joy.  my dear girls, i am ambitious for you, but not to have you make a dash in the world--marry rich men merely because they are rich, or have splendid houses, which are not homes because love is wanting.  money is a needful and precious thing--and, when well used, a noble thing--but i never want you to think it is the first or only prize to strive for.  i'd rather see you poor men's wives, if you were happy, beloved, contented, than queens on thrones, without self-respect and peace."  {little women, louisa may alcott}

"then let me advise you to take up your little burdens again, for though they seem heavy sometimes, they are good for us, and lighten as we learn to carry them."  {little women, louisa may alcott}

"i don't pretend to be wise, but i am observing, and i see a great deal more than you'd imagine.  i'm interested in other people's experiences and inconsistencies, and though i can't explain, i remember and use them for my own benefit."  {little women, louisa may alcott}



"...he did not own it till long afterward; men seldom do, for when women are the advisers, the lords of creation don't take the advice till they have persuaded themselves that it is just what they intended to do; then they act upon it, and, if it succeeds, they give the weaker vessel half the credit of it; if it fails, they generously give her the whole." {little women, louisa may alcott}