Friday, January 18, 2008

the beginning of a new chapter.....



This is about the beginning of a new chapter ... in my life.... Now, before you go, "oh, yeah, right!" Let me tell you more .... there are seeds ... and there are patterns in raindrops. Not just random, you see, but small tell-tale signs that you can see you're heading for the waterfall and if you're lucky or very, very attentive, you can high-tail it out of the boat before the rapids come.... or so they tell me. The old ones, you know, the ones who traveled the earth before the rains came and melted the crops with acid that etched our trees and houses with the fine dust of a million acid rains. Those old ones. The last ones to see the automobile, the train, the commuter copter -- all those motors based on oil and gas and burnin' up a dirt road.... Haven't had 'em for a long time - about 50 years or more. Since we dug up the last of the oil reserves in Antarctica and the Ice Melts flooded London and New York and about all the coastal areas there are. There was such a rage and panic that the safest thing to do was to deliver your vehicle to the city center and abandon it there. For you weren't going to get any gas to keep it up. Not with all them folks drowned and cities submerged under water and people everywhere rioting.

Not that I minded, though. I was living in Austin at the time and it was fairly peaceful still. We didn't get hit directly by the Melts. Just the hordes of people coming up north from Galveston who crowded into our city's hotels, motels, and homeless shelters. People started getting riled, though. They couldn't tell which way was up with all the directives coming from the government, which was supposed to make things clearer, but instead muddled it up. What with the feds arguing with the state and the local bosses even having their own ideas about things, and no one wanting to repeat the mistakes of New Orleans ... you couldn't get one definite agreement on what was happening without hearing new accounts which confirmed or contradicted what you already knew. And everyone was depending on the news, but since all the reporters had been assigned to the Russian Gulag and the networks broken up in anti-trust legislation, there was no centralized source of news anymore. With every citizen having their own internet connector, there was no need for it. Everyone was free to seek out their own news and post their own views. So different from the broadcast days of old when the Voice of Truth came in two or three varieties, though they all told the same story only in different makeup. Now you couldn't tell how many stories there were. But still the biggest ones were known to all. Like how .....
(to be continued)
[photo from PhotoDisc at i.abcnews.com]

Thursday, January 10, 2008

Happy, happy, happy....


I am happy. I just ran my usual couple of miles at the park by the lake and before that, got my wireless internet connection set up and going. Only took 3 hours, talking to 3 tech guys (made a couple of dates... just kidding), and now the internet world has opened up for me.
Well, actually the thing that precipitated this post is getting email from two unexpected sources - a new friend, who is multi-talented (I'll tell you more about her later), and a viewer who left a comment on my blog (YAY!) Such a thrill! Either it's been way too long since I had some positive feedback on the blog or else I am easily satisfied with the simple pleasures of life, but either way, I am happy, happy, happy.


Puts me in mind of the saying from Abraham:
Happy, Healthy, Dead. This means that there's not a lot of time to put it off - Life is too precious. Whatever you want to do, start it now. And before I start thinking of all the quotations that might be appropos here, let me end this for now.... more to follow.... thanks.....

Friday, January 4, 2008

am moving

I am moving from my office to a new office in the main area of the
department. It's not a happy move. New job responsiblities, new
co-workers, new office, new work arrangement, etc. But I am
determined to make it work - for me. I am determined to prosper from
what I learn and do ... as a stepping stone to what's next for me.
And there is something next -- and new -- for me on the horizon.

I haven't taken the time to write during the holidays but want to
start up again now. My blog may change intention a little - we'll
see. Meanwhile, I hope you are yours are gazing up at the stars at
night -- at least metaphorically - so you don't lose sight of what's
up there. Of what's all around us.....

Laura
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Laura D. Havlick
Administrative Assistant
Curriculum Studies/Social Studies
Curriculum & Instruction Dept.
University of Texas at Austin