The Realms within Creative People - The Dark side?

Down a couple of lines I posted about the"Dark Side of Creativity"... but not because I feel creative people are more dishonest, I feel creativity, high intelligence, etc... people with these gifts in many ways do show an "oddity" that surrounds them, much more than others. Anyone, that paints, plays music, writes, is a very deep thinker, has an aptitude to be genius, etc. more over shows to have emotions, and deep seated realms that usually give them the talents they have. I can say that will all honesty because with my creative talents come also very at times a darkness that evolves within me. Those are the times that my writing is at its best. Although it does not mean what I write is "dark or evil", actually it is usually just the opposite of being filled with horror etc. But if you look at people like DeVinci, writers like Twain, William Blake, Silva Plath (who wrote dark also), Tom Robbins, songwriters such as Kristofferson, Willie Nelson - often seem to not "fit in" socially among some, many of our singers, actors, actresses, bands and band members (who have even some killed themselves) like Jim Morrison... Within the realms of the artistic nature, are some things that some may deem as evil, but that is what makes that person the creative artist they are... of course that does not mean just because we are writers, poets, song writers, musicians, painters, and so forth, we are going to knock our self off... just that many of us find ourselves not "fitting in" at times with the what is ever considered the "norm" for society. We tend to be almost anti-social, kind of rebellious, not going for what "normal is"... which is a good thing...

Valentine's Day and Celebrating my Birthday Tomorrow

Lots of things are going on this week. Some of them are good, for a change. We are celebrating Valentine's Day today, and I was almost a Valentine's baby, since my birthday is tomorrow. We went to the casino in OK yesterday to celebrate both events. We have been going to Winstar lately, in Thackersville, OK, rather than making the longer trip to Bossier City, LA. The drive to OK is not nearly as long. You can be there with light traffic in about an hour and a half or so. Where as the trip to Bossier - Shreveport is more than almost 3 hours, depending on traffic. I thought about staying overnight, but after all day there, and then the line for the buffet being hours long all day long, I with my blisters on my feet after not thinking to put socks on over my hose since my thigh high boots are a little big, my feet are really hurting. The price I usually pay for even a day trip the next day or so. I am sore all over, worn out, and feel drained. But, with the Lupus, Sjogren's, Raynauds and other immune issues that is typically what happens. Never the less, the trip was good. I had a great time!!! I think all of us won a little, or at least won enough that we broke even. I have not counted up yet, but I think I may have won a little over what I took. That is a good thing. There were a couple of machines I got on later in the afternoon that I won two of the small jackpots on. One was like about 45.00 and the other 20.00 or so, then I won several of the bonus rounds, which one was 35.00 and then several of the 10.00 and 20.00 bonus rounds.
Being Valentine's day and everyone talking about it on Facebook, made me think about how the day is celebrated around the world in different countries. Interestingly enough, many other countries do celebrate the day for "lover's" when I did a Google search on it. They do some of the same things we do, and some do other really awesome things also.

I have a couple of links I will post with this to see how others celebrate.
http://www.novareinna.com/festive/valworld.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valentine%27s_Day

It is really interesting to know so many share in this day for lovers. :) I also thought about the vintage Valentine Day cards that my Dad has back from when he was a young boy in elementary school. He kept a couple of his cards from back then, and they are so delicate and ornate. Back then they were truly spectacular, with almost a lacy dye cut look to them. I looked up some on Google and never thought about them being antique, but they have to be around 80 years old. Dad would have been 88 I believe this month, on Ground Hog Day, and he got these when he was fairly young in school, so I know they have to be about that old. I need to get them and put them in my cedar chest for safekeeping to hand down to my kids for them to keep also.

I can remember all of the years that this week meant snow skiing in either Santa Fe, NM or in Pagosa Springs CO! Each year for the week of my birthday, we went snow skiing. That was our vacation and celebration of my birthday. Also, the tradition of my birthday cake is a heart shaped red velvet cake. My Mom has made one just about for every birthday I have ever celebrated. Probably other than the few years I spent in Seattle she has kept that tradition from my very first birthday. :) I have always looked forward to that cake each year. It became a tradition that I truly enjoyed. :)

Since my 50th birthday last year was not so pleasant, with me actually not just in the hospital, but in surgery for my birthday in 2010, it was very important that this one be special... almost extra special. I hope never again to spend my birthday or any day that ill, and on the edge of being not even here again. It was a scary time in our lives that I pray never is repeated.

I wish all a wondrous Valentine's Day also.

Weather, Winter, Cold & A first for many in Texas!

As we endured a wondrous balmy 70 degrees last weekend, as of Monday we went to freezing ice, and now temperatures well below freezing with wind chills at 3 degrees and even down below ZERO! It is not a pretty picture as we watch the idiots in Dallas on the freeways. They decided the roads were good enough to go, and they are quickly finding out the bridges and overpasses are covered in black ice as 18 wheelers, along with cars and trucks slip and slide all over into ditches, and stuck over the medians. It is wild. We also shall not even see temperatures above freezing until probably Saturday. We are under a very hard freeze warning, along with a wind chill warning, and expectation of more ice and snow on Thursday and Friday. It is far from what we saw this past weekend. Of course we are also looking to endure state wide of rolling black outs from Oncor. We can possibly expect our lights to go out for anywhere from 15 minutes to an hour per our local news channels. People are calling in and reporting they have been without power for more than an hour. We do not have enough power to carry the entire state of TX, since even down at Brownsville is right at the freezing level.
Our other huge ordeal is the fact that we have the Super Bowl in Dallas in the new stadium on Sunday, which is a huge thing for Dallas and the Metroplex area. It appears we will have "nice" weather and be in the upper 50's by Sunday for the game! I guess most will consider that a heat wave on Sunday since our temps are at about 16 degrees here, with a wind chill of 3!!!!

I can honestly say of all the years of living in TX, I never have seen it get this cold, with these wind chills. Or at least not in our area around Dallas. It does get very, very cold in Amarillo and the panhandle. I have been in Amarillo in February when the wind chills had to be very well below zero! That wind would cut through you like a knife! by the time you got out of the car, and got into the bathroom, you were almost too cold to even think about peeing!

We are looking at possibly more snow and sleet on Friday! Snow, oh yes, it is so pretty and so awesome in the late evening when everything is so quiet!!!

So as today would have been my Dad's 88th birthday, and the ground hog saw no shadow thus we should get an early Spring time coming.

Hard to believe Dad has been gone now for 6 years....