I am privileged

Today I feel privileged to have witnessed a great historic event in the history of our United States, the inaugeration of the first black president. Regardless of our political standing, this day will go down in history. I was the daughter of a southern mother and northern father, neither of whom were very politically minded. I grew up in the north. When I was a little older I saw a few things that shocked me and never forgot them. I was very happy to hear our new president emphasize the need to be one united nation.
I was also privileged to have been born toward the tail end of the depression years, hear about days gone by in the old south, about the rise of Hitler, about unions and then World War 11. There were some terrible times in history, but I feel privileged to have been around to hear first hand about them. There was industry moving south and then to Mexico, competition from foreign countries, wars and skirmishes, the Cold War, Korea, Vietnam and most recent the problems in the Middle East. I feel privileged to have been around for parts of history that we would like to have been erased. I have been privileged to have known very fine people and read wonderful books. If I'm very, very lucky I'll be around to write about some of the things I
can remember. Most of all, though, I'm privileged to be an American.

New beginnings

Well, the holidays are over and people are beginning to get back to their usual ways of life. Some are still dieting, others have given that up. I never promised myself to stay on a diet because I know how terrible I am at that, but I did decide to try to eat sensibly. That means less sweets, generally.

I had a wonderful beginning to the new year. I received a check for a short story I wrote called "Cooling Off the Fireworks." It's published in the new Love Stories Magazine. Right now the magazine is by subscription, but soon will be on the stands. I'm wishing it lots of luck. I like writing short stories, but most of what I've written is not about love, but other topics. I have written a few about nursing subjects, sold two of them and would like to try to sell more if I could find a place to send them. I hope short stories comes back as a popular form of publication. I remember my mother spent many an hour reading short stories from women's magazines. I used to like Redbook Magazine with all its stories and it was a great place to try to sell what you've written. Other women's magazines used to sell more short stories, also. With today's economic problems, it's anyone's guess what's to happen.

Well, have to get busy catching up after the weekend. I'm going over a story I wrote.