Silverado the Survivor (A Mama Kat Writing Prompt)

Yes, Kat has been in Greece while we have not, but we have dutifully chosen prompts and written or vlogged. I ditched the first prompt that http://www.random.org/ handed me (Describe a memorable first date) because I covered that territory in this post. I also knew that whatever prompt I chose needed to be one that could cover Silverado (to be introduced momentarily). Good thing one of the prompts is Write about a child you find inspiring. The "child" I have chosen has four legs and a whole lot of "inspiring."

Meet Silverado:

Silverado and her story have kept our office transfixed since the day a couple of weeks ago that my coworker Karen stopped on a busy road to try to keep her from getting run over by rushed morning commuters. Karen takes over from here and tells the rest of the story:

I stopped at the stoplight at Waffle House on the Parkway and a calico kitten dashed out from under the car in front of me and slammed into the curb and crouched down looking terrified. Without thinking, I put my car in park, turned on the four way flashers and got out to try to grab the kitten so when the light changed it wouldn't run back into traffic. Well, the kitten disappeared! I looked down the embankment and under my truck. The girl behind me got out of her car and told me the kitten was by my front tire. So I went to that side and saw ....no kitten. I slowed traffic in the lane next to me. A guy from Advance Discount Auto Parts came out and asked if I was having car trouble. Nope kitten trouble. Well, after searching for a few more minutes, I decided the kitten had either run off or was up in my truck somewhere. I eased the truck forward and not hearing any screaming drove to work and parked. I worked until 12:30, drove to my dentist's office for an hour and 15 minute appointment, drove back to work, worked the rest of the day. That was the day it was 105.

Worked until 5:30, drove home and was sitting at the dinner table when I heard what sounded like a kitten crying. Tom said it was a bird and as soon as we went outside it stopped. So we went back inside and sure enough a few minutes later I heard the kitten crying. Tom and I went out and spent the next 90 minutes searching for the elusive kitten. We finally determined it was somewhere near the back of the truck and thought she was up in the frame work. While both of us were lying on our backs under the truck pondering how much it was going to cost to get this kitten out of our truck, I noticed a space above the gas tank. Tom hoisted himself up by hanging an arm around the driveshaft and sure enough there sat a frightened kitten. When we went to reach for it, it ran down the driveshaft like a tightrope walker and into the spare tire. Needless to say, I couldn't drive the truck to work the next day.

Tom got a trap from a friend and we captured little Silverado, as our healthy 1 pound, six week old baby girl has been named [editor's note - Karen's truck is a Chevy Silverado]. We are now in the process of fostering her to prepare her for adoption.

Silverado's total mileage traveled that day on the gas tank of my truck was almost 40 miles! This kitty is a survivor!

That 105 degree day in Tallahassee was brutal, even for those of us who spent most of the day indoors .... not perched on a gas tank .... not recently separated from our loved ones. I am inspired by Silverado's tenacity and her story.

If you are here in Tallahassee and know someone who might want to adopt her when she is old enough (she has to be two months old or weigh two pounds) let me know (opuswsk {at} aol {dot} com). If you are not a Tallahassee reader, I hope you'll still enjoy and be inspired by Silverado's story. I was.

Here she is in action:

Here are some more pictures of Silverado the Survivor:

Wordless Wednesday (Lake (Y)Ella Edition)

Tallahassee's Lake Ella is a popular downtown gathering spot.

When I visited Lake Ella to visit my friend Yoche, knowing she would have some photogenic yellow squash that would be perfect for "yellow" week of the Crazy Days of Summer Photo Challenge, I found much more...such as a reminder to slow down and enjoy my walk:

Healthy Organically Grown Veggies from Artzi Vegetables:

Something pretty to wear:

And dessert:

Thank you, Lake (Y)Ella, for a treat of a day!



I am linking this Wordless Wednesday post up to the Crazy Days of Summer Photo Challenge sponsored by Kristi of Live and Love Out Loud and Alicia of Project Alicia. This week's theme is "yellow"!

Letting Myself Off The Hook (A "Let's Reverb" Prompt)

The June 2011  "Let's Reverb" prompt is: What can you let yourself off the hook for? I have responded via a vlog:

Special thanks to Julia Chambers for the use of her crochet images! Find Julia's work at http://pixieworx.net/.

Abrupt Little LOVE (A Mama Kat Writing Prompt)

The Mama Kat prompt that I ended up with this week, thanks to the randomness of random.org is the best kind of writing prompt - one I have no clue how to address! It is number five: What is something you could stand to learn from your significant other?

It is important to understand one thing about my husband to understand the rest of this post. When I needed a date to the Huey Lewis and the News concert in 1987, after my original date backed out, my friend who offered to set us up warned me, "Wayne is an Abrupt Little Sh*t," and I said, "oh, that's okay, I need someone to go with [translation - I didn't want to get stuck with the cost of the ticket!]."

Things didn't look good when he showed up at my door, beer in hand. There was not going to be any old-fashioned chivalry here. After the concert date, we continued to spend time together. The friendship evolved into romance. Throughout our friendship, through the living together, my subsequent ending of the relationship and moving to New York, and our reunion/marriage, there has always been a huge contrast between Wayne's relative refusal to gladhand just for the sake of gladhanding, and my almost deferential approach to most social interactions. Between his (relative) bravado and my (relative) lack of confidence. Between his assumption that his opinion matters (and is right, of course!) and mine that my opinion may not be that important in the long run and is probably wrong.

What is something I could learn from my spouse? A little more bravado, a little less deference.

Lessons I may learn yet through "The Power of Love."

Wordless Wednesday (Wet From Head to Toe Edition)

In the blazing summer heat of Tallahassee and South Georgia, we are dealing with water from head:

to toe:

and everywhere in between!

 WA(hhh)TER!



I am linking this Wordless Wednesday post up to the Crazy Days of Summer Photo Challenge sponsored by Kristi of Live and Love Out Loud and Alicia of Project Alicia. This week's theme is "water"!

Help Lauren Spierer Surface

This is a special post, as part of an effort to help find Lauren Spierer. Lauren has been missing since June 3, when she disappeared from Bloomington, Indiana. If you don't have time to read the whole post, here are the crucial points:

If you are on Twitter, follow @NewsOnLaurenS for updates.

If you are on Facebook, post Lauren's Poster on your page.

Donate to help fund the search.

 

Here's the long version of why this story matters to me, and additional ways you can help.

About 14 years ago, our family had just figured out that my sister-in-law, Ann's, sudden death at the age of 30 had been caused by Long QT Syndrome, a hereditary cardiac arrhythmia. Our family was gathered by the pool and my niece (Ann's daughter), Jordan, who was about seven years old and had just been confirmed to have Long QT, was gleefully swimming from the shallow end of the pool to the deep end, not coming up for air. Her father, new to the experience of having two children with a cardiac issue, and having lost his wife to one, was freaking out, pleading with her to come up for air and not risk the time underwater without oxygen. That moment stands out in my mind as the juxtaposition between letting your child be a child and wanting to protect them from danger.

Lauren Spierer, who is very close in age to my niece Jordan and who also has Long QT Syndrome, is in extreme danger. She was last seen at 4:30 a.m. on June 3, at the corner of 11th Street and College Avenue in Bloomington, Indiana. As of today, she is still missing. For a detailed timeline, read this.

I am joining bloggers from all over the world to ask you to help in the effort to find Lauren. There are ways you can help, even if you are not in the Bloomington area. Here are ten tips defining things you can do from your own space to help. 

Keeping news about the tip line and reward prominent is a great way to contribute. 

If you are closer to Bloomington than I am (I am in Florida) or want to help with the search, here are instructions.

As I mentioned above, if you are on Twitter, follow @NewsOnLaurenS for continuous updates.

Sri Sathya Sai Baba said, "No one will go to the rescue of a drowning man if his cries are feeble." Seventeen days have passed since Lauren went missing. Let's band together to keep the cries for her rescue for becoming feeble.

Let's help Lauren surface.

 

This Is Not About You

I would be a really inept private detective. In deciding to write the blog post that follows, I may have made a conclusion that is 100% wrong. But the subject weighs heavily on my heart and mind so I am going to write this post, and if the audience I am writing to reads it and scratches their heads, saying, "What on earth did she think we said?" then I'll just hope something about the message still edifies or entertains someone.

The office grapevine came back around to me with the message last week that I had hurt people's feelings with my YouTube videos. Specifically, with the impression that I had stated that people I work with are poorly educated. For 24 hours, I scratched my head about this, prayed about it, lost sleep over it, and (the only good thing) used the stress to fuel a great workout. Then it hit me, the acting monologue that I had recorded to be included as part of my "Faster, With More Energy" post in April 2010 talks about call center representatives who, despite being college graduates, "have the vocabularies of fourth graders." Here it is:



If you don't have time to watch and/or don't want to endure a minute and 35 seconds worth of my amateur acting (trust me, I wouldn't blame you!), here's the monologue, word for word:

I talk to the American People on the phone every day as part of my job, and I can tell you -- they're dumb. And petulant. And worse than 5-year olds. Are they dumber than they used to be? Hell, yes! How else do you explain two terms of George Dubya? Worst president, ever! I don't suppose you could say this is the dumbest country on the planet. There are worse, I'm sure. But the other countries have excuses: famine, war, oppression, plague. We did it to ourselves! My co-workers are college graduates. Those under the age of 30 have the vocabularies of 4th graders. If I had a dollar for every "like" "you know" "I mean" and "awesome" that comes out of their mouths, I could vacation in Reykjavik. Or in some other interesting city whose name Americans can't spell and about whose geography and history they haven't a clue. And let's not even discuss their writing skills. It's like dealing with foreigners who have learned individual English words but who can't yet put them together into sentences. What's the point? Everybody's connected to their iPod, surfing porn, getting down, being cool.... Dumb's #1!

This monologue is from Minute Mouth-Offs by G.L. Horton. When I was choosing a monologue, I liked this one because I have been involved in a lot of call centers, so the topic of a call center did not feel foreign to me. And haven't we all been in the position of the consumer contacting a call center who had a less than stellar experience? 

That video is no more directed at anyone in my real life than I am really pregnant in this scene from "An Impossible Marriage" that I did in December 2010:

When I cross the threshold at work every day, my mindset is "This is about us" -- what can we do as a team to help the uninsured children of Florida?

In Lori Deschene's "25 Reasons to Embrace Criticism," she opens with an Aristotle quote: “Criticism is something you can easily avoid by saying nothing, doing nothing, and being nothing.”  True. 

My favorite reason of her 25 was number 21:

Learning to receive ... criticism ... without losing your confidence is a must if you want to do big things in life. The more attention your work receives, the more criticism you’ll have to field.

I do want to do big things in life. I want my children to grow up to be happy, decent, fair people. I want to slay the debt monster once and for all. I want to write a book that chronicles the blend of courage, patriotism, and humanity that overtook Carrabelle in the early 1940's in the form of Camp Gordon Johnston. I would love to write a blog post or vlog that makes just one person (or 1,000) say "I am going to do something differently today because of what you wrote (or said)."

I do want to do big things.

But I will never, ever do that by intentionally making someone else feel small.