Lol Just sharing this funny coincidence!
I’m reading this psychological thriller, and September 7th is mentioned, and coincidentally it really is September 7th! 😆 I get too happy and giddy over the d*mbest/simplest things! I had to blur most of it out because I’m not sure we’re allowed to share any of it. It’s called “The Insomniac” by Miranda Rijks Very good book up til now! It’s on Amazon Kindle for a low price.
It’s the little things!
Xoxo Kim
This is a picture I made. It’s a pic of a real cemetery near where I live and I edited it to make it extra creepy. Those are real cemetery stones! It was taken in the daylight and I made it look like night. The apparitions are not real. 🤣
There’s a novel called, “Terminus,” about an angel who falls in love with a human, which is forbidden, according to the spiritual world. He would have to give up being an angel and become human to stay with her, which they don’t encourage in his realm. He meets her in an operating room when her little girl dies on the operating table. He knows the child is going to die and has to show up just before, to escort her soul to the afterlife when it leaves her body. No one in the operating room can see him or knows he’s there except the little girl after her body dies. He stands there as the doctors are working to keep her alive. He sees the crying woman at her daughter’s side and falls in love with her instantly. This is what he thinks when he sees the woman:
“The auburn hair falling over emerald eyes shimmering with tears made her look achingly beautiful.”
He makes the mistake of touching her(it’s a loving, spiritual thing, not a pervy thing lol). She doesn’t understand exactly what happened but she’s suddenly & momentarily filled with joy at the touch of an angel. Then later she meets him again in his human form when she’s s*icidal and recognizes him even though she did not see him in that operating room. The love story is only part of the whole book; it’s a mystery thriller where a few people’s lives are all connected somehow and something big & bad is going to happen if the angel doesn’t stop it. The angel doesn’t know what is going to happen, just that something is, and the woman he’s in love with is meant to die for the greater good but he doesn’t want her to and instead of aiding in her death like he’s meant to, he keeps intervening and saving her life, which is against the rules in his spiritual realm.
Anyway, I want to share a scene in the book I love!
Matthew is a little boy and Riley is his puppy. His puppy gets hit by a car and is dying and the angel, Nick, witnesses and heals the puppy instantly, even though he’s not really allowed. Angels have healing power but are only allowed to use it under certain circumstances. The angel, Nikolai or Nick, is very human-like.
“Matthew fell to his knees, crying. Riley had been hit and was gasping her final breaths—something Nick was all too familiar with. Matthew looked at his puppy, his face all tears and dirt and heart-wrenching despair. ‘I’m sorry, Riley! This is all my fault!’
‘It’s not, Matthew. Not your—’
‘I let her out without me. Oh, Riley…Riley, please don’t die!’ He turned back to Nick. ‘I messed up—I always mess up! That’s why Mommy and Daddy don’t want me.’
‘That’s not true!’
Nick made up his mind. The laws about unassigned healings couldn’t be so inane as to apply to animals. And if they did, he didn’t care. He knelt down and placed his hands around Riley’s head. His entire body tingled with a pulsating light that started from his heart and radiated to his fingertips, which glowed as he pressed them gently against the puppy’s furry brow. He shut his eyes. Connected with Riley’s soul. It surprised him, how deep was the love a puppy felt for her master, how intense the memories. But there they were, strong as any human’s if not stronger. He had to take care not to send too much light into so young a puppy. A tear slid down Nick’s cheek. Joy and sadness.
‘Get up, Riley,’ he whispered. The light left him. The puppy’s breathing returned to normal, and she lifted her head.
‘Riley?’ Matthew’s face was alight with joy and wonder. ‘Riley!’ She rolled to her feet and let out a happy bark. Tail wagging furiously, she leapt into Matthew’s arms and proceeded to bathe his face with puppy kisses. Matthew finally managed to lower her enough to look up at Nick.
‘Wow, mister! That was awesome!’
‘Be careful crossing the street, okay?’
‘Thanks for fixing up Riley. She’s good as new.'” ❤️
Xoxo Kim
Sometimes the dead come back….
“July fourth, the fireworks are beautiful. Loud. Terrifying. I suppose it’s like life, love, sex, death.”
Recently I was looking through Amazon movies for Kindle and saw an amazing looking movie! It’s called “Abandoned Dead” and looks like the creepiest movie that ever did exist! I LOVE scary movies, especially supernatural thrillers! This movie does have supernatural overtones.
It’s considered a “B movie” like one that isn’t good, second rate, bad horror movie….and has terrible reviews! it got like two and a half stars out of like ten I think! :-O
The movie is about a young woman who is a security guard and suffers with a fear of nighttime and she’s asked to work the night shift at a creepy medical clinic she has never been to before. The girl doesn’t like being anywhere but home at night. She makes sure she only works day shifts. The clinic is located in a very bad neighborhood where there’s gangs and stabbings and shootings frequently. The medical clinic specializes is treating those afflicted with drug addiction. So there is breakins kind of frequently there because people who are addicted need a fix and in the clinic they have a drug used to help treat them.
The girl, Rachel, agrees to work the night shift to help out her coworker who needs off, even though she’s terrified of night. She has to work alone in the building that she has never been in before. Very bizarre things start happening. She hears whispers and someone saying her name now and again, strange phone calls occur, she hears someone whispering “he’s coming…,” and other strange occurrences.
Three people who worked at that very same clinic were murdered in the last two years, presumably by the same person. And nothing connects them but the fact that they all worked at that clinic at one point. A police detective is investigating the homicides late into the night but feels like he’s getting nowhere. They were all killed in a most gruesome way, in a similar fashion. And their hearts were taken out….while they were still conscious! They don’t show these scenes in the movie; we see the detective at his desk at night going over files and we hear his thinking voice. For the most part it’s not a gory, gruesome movie.
It is a strange, scary, fascinating movie!
I read some of the reviews. I like reading reviews for movies and books but they usually don’t influence my decision to read/watch something or not. If they are objective and say something I really don’t like then I may not watch/read it, like for example if it says the book or movie doesn’t have an ending and just cuts off. I don’t like when stories don’t have an ending. Even series, I prefer them to all be “stand-alones.” But I usually go through them to find more reviews similar to be sure instead of just going by one.
Also, maybe when the reviews say there’s no plot or real story and just a bunch of scenes thrown together, I may not read/watch.
But if the reviews just say something like “this movie/book sucks” I’m most likely not going to listen. That’s subjective and just because one person or even thousands think a movie or book sucks, it doesn’t mean I will think so.
Anyway, this movie has some BAD reviews!
Some say that the main character isn’t really well developed, like we don’t know much about her.
I do prefer characters in movies and books to have substance and be well described by the writer.
Some have said the camera lingers longer than necessary on the freaky scenes or something like that.
Others have said that the end doesn’t make sense.
I think someone said there’s not much of a plot.
Some admitted to not even watching the whole movie before writing an unpleasant review.
(I usually don’t think this is a good idea….at least watch/read to the end before criticizing! but there may be some exceptions though like maybe if the spelling, grammar, punctuation….is so horrible it can’t even be comprehended to get to the end…)
But I did not let any of these reviews deter me!
I just had to see the movie!
So I bought it on Kindle and watched it two nights in a row!
I just love it! What a gem!
The only reviews out of those I mentioned here, that I agree with are the ones that say the ending doesn’t make sense. It is difficult to interpret.
But after I watched the movie again, even before seeing the end again, I started to make more sense or it. It’s a great ending. A shocker and creative.
I still don’t completely understand the entire thing. Maybe it’s meant to be that way?
I did see a review saying it’s too slow, the movie. It’s only an hour and seventeen minutes long. It is kind of slow paced in a way but I love it.
We do learn more about the girl and her traumatic past. And the movie does have a plot or storyline that makes sense for the most part. But there are some confusing scenes and things that are open to different interpretations it seems.
I like the music that plays throughout the movie, it seems somehow fitting. It’s not creepy but still perfect for certain scenes.
I love the scenes where the police detective is running through the streets at night and strange things happen. I love the city lights and the feel of the night and his long tan trench coat. And the weird phone calls he receives whenever he runs past a public payphone.
“She isn’t safe….” in a weird voice!
There’s something lonely and poetic and beautiful about the movie, something I can’t quite explain, especially about the parts with the detective. Something about him being alone and frustrated late into the night trying to catch a murderer to keep everyone safe. He wears a wedding ring but we never see him interact with a lover of his.
The acting is good, the filming and directing all seem good. I’m not a movie critic though so don’t have the skills to truly judge the setup and all. But I still know bad acting and filming when I see it and this isn’t it! Then again, I’m very easy to please. It’s rare that I see a movie or eat food I don’t like!
This though, is a fantastic movie! I love it!
Great job! 😀
The reason I’m sharing this movie here now is, the beautiful quote above! It’s out of this movie. We hear the detective thinking it along with other interesting things.
I love the comparison with fireworks and life. Beautiful, terrifying, messy….
I don’t like fireworks, it’s true, they are loud and terrifying but beautiful.
They are horrible and dangerous and traumatic for some, but seeing the colors bursting in the night sky, the sense of unity and celebration among those watching….is beautiful.
Something similar can be said of life itself and the situations we experience in this life. Even though it can be terrifying and disturbing, it’s still beautiful and there’s always something good to seize and embrace and cherish. It doesn’t have to be perfect to be beautiful and happy. 😀
❤
Much love & light to you, always. ❤
Xoxo Kim
“‘It’s going to happen in three minutes.’ Mark Tapper sat on the edge of his son’s bed and tried to comfort the eight-year-old. He considered calling an ambulance, but he didn’t know if what Jeremy was suffering from qualified as an emergency. He decided to wait for his wife to get home, since she’d be there in just a few minutes anyhow. She’d left work early when the school called, but Mark was able to get to Widowsfield Elementary to pick Jeremy up first.
‘What’s going to happen in three minutes?’ Mark glanced at the clock on the nightstand that displayed 3:11 on the stomach of a Batman figurine. ‘I told you,’ said Jeremy. The desperation in his voice terrified Mark.
‘The Skeleton Man’s coming.’
‘I don’t know what that means, kiddo. Help me out here.’ Mark tried to wipe sweat from his boy’s brow, but Jeremy jerked away as if frightened by contact. ‘Who’s this Skeleton Man you keep talking about?’
‘He’s coming, and then everyone’s going to go crazy. Dad, I don’t want to kill you again.’
The statement was more than a little disconcerting. Mark stood up and put his hands on his head in exasperation as he stared down at his quivering child. He’d tried to stay calm through all of his son’s outbursts, but he couldn’t take it anymore.
‘That does it. Mom can meet us at the hospital. Do you think you can walk, or do you want me to call an ambulance?’ This manic episode confounded the school nurse, and it was getting worse the longer it went on. When Mark picked his son up from school, Jeremy had simply been crying, but now his mania had gone from concerning to disturbing.
‘There’s no time. I can already hear his teeth.’ Jeremy looked at his father and chattered his teeth, as if he was freezing cold. Then he looked at the clock and they both saw the time change. 3:12
Jeremy put his hands under his pillow and bunched it up so the sides covered his ears. He clenched his eyes shut and continued to weep.
‘You should just kill yourself. Make it easy. Just shoot yourself in the head and get it over with. You can’t handle what’s coming. No one can.'”
(The beginning of book 1 in the trilogy.)
Wth?! Lol This scene is what got me hooked (a little bit obsessed!) with this trilogy a few years ago.
I wasn’t sure if I was going to read it if it doesn’t have an ending until reading all three but that scene pulled me in and I decided to read it anyway even if I had to wait for the other two books to come out.
Today is a special, special day! (so is every other day but today is especially special! Lol ;-))
It’s 314!
There’s a fiction book trilogy, called 314 (see the scene above!) , It’s one of the best things I ever encountered in this life.
Lol
It’s an incredibly bizarre story, involving what seems like other dimensions. We cannot read books 2 or 3 without first reading book 1 or we won’t make an ounce of sense of it. Book 1
Itself is very difficult to comprehend in some ways. And books 2 and 3 only get weirder.
I wrote about it here
https://inspirationalgem.wordpress.com/2013/12/06/some-comforting-words-about-moving-forward-and-book-review-314/
a couple years ago.
If I remember correctly, there’s a lot of errors in my post that I don’t think are corrected, like spelling and grammar errors and stuff. I don’t know why. Usually, I don’t mess up like that. I remember reading my post a while after publishing it and thinking “like wth?!”
Lol
I was going to correct the errors but never got around to it. Who cares, right?! You get the message. I’m no grammar phanatic (i’m a philadelphia girl, it’s how we spell fanatic lol) so yeah.
Anyway, today is 314! So in honor of this lovely, lovely (and wonderfully rainy!) day, I’m going to promote this wonderful author and his trilogy! And again share some deep wisdom in this story!
I must warn you. These books are nassstaaayy!
Lol Full of gore and stuff, which I usually don’t care for! But at least the violence can’t occur for real because it’s like dead human-canine kids who kill people. They come out of some green fog and just tear everyone to shreds.
I can’t even begin to explain.
Book 1 doesn’t have a complete ending, it doesn’t even touch on the conclusion of the story but I was satisfied at the end before reading books 2 and 3.
I felt as if I had some somewhat sensible, if vague, answers.
One thing I love about the books is, the story involves friends, both new and old, unconditional love, wisdom, and is just wildly entertaining and freaky.
You won’t read anything more bizarre as long as you live. I can almost guarantee it!
Each year on March 14th, at 3:14pm, incredibly bizarre and terrifying things begin to happen to a town called Widowsfield.
And the people kind of know something is about to happen but they don’t really know, at least not consciously. Some remember some of the events better than others. They know they are going to die….again….then again…in the most horrific, agonizing ways.
It’s just freaky!
Here are some interesting scenes:
“Jaime looked down at her scrawling. 3.141592653”
‘Is that pi?’
‘Yeah. We were supposed to memorize ten digits of it for Mr. Trager for pi day.’
Anna settled back in her chair and snickered. ‘Sure, for the test this morning. Why are you still writing it?’
Jaime paused for just a moment. ‘I don’t know. There’s something calming about it. Is that crazy?’
‘A little bit, yeah.’
Anna watched Jaime write the sequence over and over, oddly transfixed.
Then Jaime wrote the final digit as a 4 instead of a 3 in one line.
‘You got that one wrong.’ Jaime didn’t stop writing and didn’t look up.
‘There’s no such thing as a perfect circle. There’s chaos in all of it.’
Jaime looked up at the ceiling and then at the window before she asked, ‘Do you hear that?’
“Anna watched the shapes in the fog advance. The silhouettes of children ran across the field from their school, and the barking of dogs grew louder. Soon, the soccer players were attacked and chaos erupted in the library. Teachers and students rushed to the window and time returned to normal as everyone panicked. Jaime moved closer to Anna and ignored the massacre outside. “Why are we doing it again? Why do I know what’s going to happen? I’ve never felt this way before.”
“Jaime and Anna ignored the bloody scene; they’d seen it countless times before. Jaime pulled Anna between two book shelves, away from the screaming mass, to speak in private.”
“…’I don’t know, I can’t explain how I know. I’m not sure what’s going on. I just, for a minute, I could hear him in my head. I knew his thoughts. He’s looking for a girl he lost. She was an innocent, and he needs her to help him stop this from happening again.’ ‘I don’t understand any of that,’ said Jaime.
‘I don’t either, but I know he’s going to keep doing this over and over until he finds her.”Then what?’ asked Jaime. ‘I don’t know.'”
“Jaime and Anna embraced as they waited for their inevitable death. Then it would begin anew, slightly different from the times before, and they would forget the prying mind of The Skeleton Man as he continued to try to complete the circle.”
And here is a scene out of one of the trilogy books that I shared in the post above. This scene is full of wisdom & hope.
This is what I wrote in the other post:
The girl, Alma, whose brother disappeared in 1996 meets a little girl but the little girl isn’t real. She’s kind of ghost -like or a figment of someone’s imaginings. She was sent to Alma to help protect Alma. She is a very wise little girl. And she has some comforting words for Alma. Alma’s life has been painful. She’s a young teacher. Her dad was abusive to her and her brother and he still comes after her as an adult. He is addicted to the meth drug. Her mom went insane after her son (Alma’s brother) disappeared and she became sick with severe depression. And she died by suicide because she couldn’t handle her son being missing.
Then Alma watches her friends dying over and over all day everyday and she is so confused and worn out and knows her own life is in danger. All the characters think they’re going crazy. Alma just wants to give up. Just when she collapses outside thinking she can’t go on anymore, a little girl about ten years old comes to Alma. She reminds Alma of herself when she was a little girl.
This little girl takes Alma’s hand and says:
“It’s not a bad thing to remember our worst days but it’s important that we learn to move on. “
Alma responds saying
“I’ve had a lot of bad days.”.
The little girl puts her head against Alma’s arm and says
“I know you have. But you can’t let those bad days ruin the ones you’ve got left to live.”.
Isn’t this beautiful?! So much wisdom and light. We don’t have to allow painful memories and things that happened before to hold us back and ruin our present days.
I hope you’re having a lovely 314 full of love & laughter and not full of gore, green fog, canine kids, and the Skeleton Man! 😉
❤ 😀
Much love to you,
Xoxo Kim
“For united we stand
Divided we fall
And if our backs should ever be against the wall
We’ll be together, together, you and I”
One movie I love and have always loved is The Langoliers.
Ever heard of it? A Stephen King movie/mini series.
It’s a fascinating and freaky movie.
It’s considered horror/mystery/sci-fi/thriller.
My favorite thing about it since I was a little girl is how a group of strangers who seem to be the last few people left on Earth, come together and love each other. They knew each other for less than 24 hours but they become close and stand up for one another, sticking together in their weird, twisted horror.
They wake up on an airplane and there are less than 15 of them and they realize the one thing they all have in common is they were sleeping.
When they wake up everyone else is gone.
They at first think the plane must have landed while they were asleep and everyone but them got off.
Like, that’s the only reasonable explanation isn’t it?! But they soon realize that’s not the case.
The plane never landed. People just disappeared but all their belongings like pocketbooks, glasses, wigs, even pacemakers and metal pins used for surgical purposes, are still there.
It’s like some freaky ass twilight zone shit going on! Lol
Here are two descriptions for the movie:
“On a red eye flight to Boston from LA 10 people wake up to a shock. All the passengers and crew have vanished. When they try to contact the ground they make no connections. They land the plane only to discover that things haven’t changed. But its like the world is dead. No one is there, the air is still, sound doesn’t echo, the food is tasteless. And a distant sound is heard coming closer. A race of monstrous beings bent on their destruction is heading for them, eating everything in sight.”~Anonymous
“A blind girl, a teacher, a machine worker, a musician, a stoner, a mystery writer, a businessman, a mysterious Englishman, and a raving psychopath in a business suit on a flight to Boston find themselves utterly alone when the rest of the passengers and all of the crew vanish. Diverting the plane to Bangor, Maine, they discover that they seem to be the only people left on the planet, at that time and the Langoliers are catching up with them all too quickly…” ~ Anonymous
Imagine waking up with a small group of strangers and everyone else in the world seems to be gone! That is so bizarre!
None of them ever experienced anything like this before. Other than this, it’s not the kind of movie where weird stuff happens. Life is just mundane, normal, ordinary…til this.
The group of people are “average,” various ages, professions, struggles….one little girl is blind, one young girl struggles with substance addiction/abuse, one young woman, a teacher has some struggles with romantic interests, there’s a college aged boy, an airplane pilot grieving for his ex wife who just died, he isn’t the pilot for that plane exactly and was just traveling to where his ex wife was shortly after he found out the tragedy, but luckily he happens to have the skills to take over the plane as the pilots disappeared, a mentally ill man who they mostly all see as the biggest asshole(because in a group, we always need that one asshole no one can stand, right?!), a sexy man with a sexy accent, a writer….
So they’re just your average group of people going about their lives when something incredibly perplexing and out-of-this-world strange occurs.
It has some very sad scenes in the movie.
Anyway, I just LOVE how the people stay together and love one another. They find consolation in each other, strength through each other’s strength,defend each other, connect with one another.
They’re all in this together. ❤
We're all in this together. ❤
"And if the world around you falls apart my love
Then I'll still be here
And if the going gets too hard along the way
Just you call, I'll hear" ~ Brotherhood of Man
Mobile:
Desktop:
😀
Much love & light to you,
Xoxo Kim
I keep posting here about the one word challenge for the new year. My word is Beauty. I have a post about the challenge and my views about it saved in my drafts and will post it soon. My word for 2016, beauty,reminds me of a post I wrote a while ago about a beautiful novel I read called My Grandfather’s Eyes.
I wrote about it here before I read the ending when I still wasn’t sure what the novel is actually about. When I warned people that there may be violent sexual/abuse scenes in it and unnecessary violence. I read a book review that says that and couldn’t remember if the review is for “My Grandfather’s Eyes” or some other book. It is for another. “My Grandfather’s Eyes” has no such scene. No sexual or any kind of “unnecessary” violence. Just pure beauty.
And I recommend it.
There’s another fiction book I read called, Alex, about a little boy who was kidnapped and murdered. It’s a good book with some slight supernatural overtones, I guess you can say. This one does have horrific sexual and other violence in it. The dad has visions after his son is found dead and sees the violence that was done to him. I don’t judge authors or artists who portray violence in their work. It doesn’t necessarily mean they support it. Many creators like to create things that provoke strong emotion whether pleasant or unpleasant. It brings their work to life and helps deepen our empathy and stir things within us. For the most part, even if it seems so, I don’t think anything in a work of art is “unnecessary.” Even if it seems the work can do without, for some reason the author wants it there so it does have purpose to that person. And it will resonate with some and not others. There is beauty in that.
But most of that book is not violent scenes, just the dad not knowing if he’s mentally ill or actually being haunted by his dead son. It is very interesting. The main character in My Grandfather’s Eyes, the woman telling her story, is named Alex as is the little boy in the fiction book, Alex. So I got the two confused.
Anyway about “My Grandfather’s Eyes.”
My heroine, Alex, who is the narrator, is a woman who is about 32 years old and she’s kind of a sociopath, like really. She sort of has no conscience and attempts to kill her sincerely loving husband(i won’t give any spoilers and tell you if she succeeds or not, that’s for you to find out. Lol – {he does die though} But just know, she attempts to kill an innocent man just to be rid of him and yes, I called her my heroine!) just to get rid of him and get his stuff and live with her best girl, Liz. but she is very beautiful to me anyway. She was always in love with her best friend Lizzy but Lizzy is a straight girl and she’s married with children. Alex has no kids and doesn’t want any.
At first when I was confused about the other fiction book and thought this may be the one with the sexual violence, I wasn’t going to read this but the description of the beautiful love Alex has for Liz, is what inspired me to take the chance and read and I’m so happy I took that chance. Later I read the book, Alex, not realizing that’s the one with the horrific violence but I’m happy I read that too.
Alex is arrogant, doesn’t give two shits what anyone (except Lizzy) thinks of her. Other than herself, the only two people Alex ever really loved are Lizzy and Alex’s grandfather. She is arrogant but also truly loves herself for how she genuinely is, both physically and her intriguing mind. She has big, dark moles on her face which she loves because they are part of who she is, and since she was little, refused to get removed when she had the chance. They grow bigger and darker. People stare. She doesn’t like it much but loves herself too much to care too much. As a child it hurt her deeply to be the target of cold stares and cruel words. But she still loves herself. She thinks she’s a beautiful woman.
Here is what she says:
“My moles continue to grow and darken. I take less care to hide the bump on my head, and I wonder whether my deformities will eventually take me over. I am impatient with them, wishing they would stabilize. I think I notice people staring more, and imagine they are whispering to each other but I decide that I will not try to hide myself away. It will be easier if the people who are alienated by such things have the chance to avoid me, and I reason that those who are indifferent to them will not care.” ~ Alex
And here is what I wrote one day in June (not the most recent one but the one before, if I remember correctly) about this excerpt:
I love this and completely agree. I would never want friends or people who like me only because they don’t know something about me that if they found out later they would reject me for it, whatever it may be. We don’t have to like everything about a person we like but we can accept, tolerate, or overlook it and love the person as a whole. I don’t necessarily want someone to like every single thing about me, like all of my opinions or anything, and I won’t conceal something just to have them like me or not reject me. It’s like an asshole repellent,if you show your ugliness or controversial views or something right off, you weed out the assholes and the true ones are still standing by your side. Or if you’re the asshole and people are going to reject you for it then they can back off and the ones who don’t mind asshole-ness will still be there.
I don’t always like people’s opinions but I often appreciate the courage it takes them to stand up for whatever it is and the passion that drives them.
I am what I am whether I conceal it or not and whether someone likes it or not. So why deny or repress it? Instead I will give people the chance to know me and embrace me or know me and reject me.
I still agree with what I wrote. There are some things we may want to wait before revealing until someone gets to know us better. But for the most part, I believe it’s best to let our true selves loose and shine. If they love us, that’s amazing! If they reject us, oh well, we can love them and move forward. ❤
I love Alex's sense of beauty. It's kind of dark and unusual.
“…the Gothic Hall complete with turrets and gargoyles – where I will study English Literature. It is ugly-beautiful and will suit me very well. A fitting place in which to study the works of great authors. I feel the hairs bristle on the back of my neck with the excitement it generates in me.” ~ Alex
Here's the link to my original post about this:
https://inspirationalgem.wordpress.com/2014/06/25/ugly-beautiful/
"My Grandfather's Eyes"
😀
This is one of my favorite books ever! It is beautiful, unusual, fascinating, thought-provoking, and deeply inspiring!
After reading the whole book I love her more now than ever. I found beauty in her at first but also felt repulsed by her for her complete lack of empathy and compassion for others, not just that but her coldness, almost cruelty, towards people to the point of almost being a psycho. But I gave her a chance and fell in love with her. I wasn't going to read the book at first but then I did and am so thankful! ❤ This can apply to real life, we may have certain traits we adore in others and then meet people who lack those traits or have traits we strongly dislike in others and meet someone who possesses them, and think we don't like the person but it turns out that person is STILL somehow beautiful to us and catches our heart. We may just fall head over heels in love (either platonic or romantically) with someone we never would expect. I decided to buy the Kindle book merely because I love the powerful love she has for her best friend, which turns to unrequited romantic love. But doesn't destroy their friendship and the platonic love Liz has for Alex. Then I read it and love the entire book! She also has powerful love for herself.
“In the mirror, I see a woman sitting bolt upright in her chair, with her handbag on her lap. She has long mousy hair, parted in the middle, her scalp white in the harsh fluorescent light. There is a large, dark mass spreading across the side of her face. I think her elegantly middle-aged, sensuously beautiful. I cannot identify with her. I see her smile, first with her eyes, which remain young, and then with the whole of her face. We fuse together, and I feel an energy building inside me, so that my reflection seems to disturb the air in the room, like a breeze across the surface of a lake. It is a lake I have visited many times in my dreams. We are luminous and powerful.”
This scene is breathtaking. A woman who looks into a mirror and sees a woman who is incredibly beautiful in every way, scars, "flaws," and all. And that woman is herself. I love how she dissociates and sees her own self without negative judgment, sees herself in perfect beauty, as if she's looking at another woman, then fuses with the woman in the mirror as they become whole, one.
This is one of the most beautiful scenes I ever read in a book.
We often look at others without judgment in a negative way and see their beauty but hold ourselves to greater standards and criticize our own self in a destructive way. Imagine seeing yourself with loving eyes and a self compassionate mind.
How beautiful it is to be in love with our own self.
I love how she refuses to cover up what many see as ugly. Not only does she not think her deformity is ugly, she thinks it's quite beautiful. She loves it because it is part of herself.
(meeee <3)
One reason I felt drawn to her right away, along with the fact that she has her grandfather’s eyes, is I have a facial dysfunction, though it cannot be seen. I mentioned here before that people with visible facial deformities or disfigurements, birthmarks, or scars probably would not agree with me since mine cannot be seen by others, only felt by me, but I often feel an especially strong relation or connection to people with facial/head conditions whether visible or not, because I have one so bad.
Alex speaks of "a large, dark mass spreading across the side of her face" and wondering "whether my deformities will eventually take me over." I feel this same way on different occasions. I cannot see that large, dark mass spreading across the side of my face. But I sure feel it. And so many moments, especially late into night, I wondered in fear and incredible loneliness whether it will eventually take me over. Hers isn't physically painful like mine but she has to endure the pain of society's cold, sometimes cruel reactions.
Her self love inspires me to remember to love the parts of me that hurt. They are a part of me.
She inspires me to see beauty even in my agony.
My pain flares up to unbearable levels and feels so ugly. But I see beauty in my whole situation.
Sometimes I wonder what Alex would think of me if she were a real person or if I was a character in her book.
I imagine we would get along well. And we both love to read! She attended college for English Literature.
I love Alex and love how she loves herself.
Give her a chance! Maybe you'll love her too! ❤
Love & light,
xoxo
Kim
(This is the old church in the process of being demolished. 😦 I wrote about it before. It reminds me of the mini creepy castle in the horror book I’m reading!)
“Once upon a time she had pretended that the castle had been built thousands upon thousands of years ago by men from Saturn. And well it could have been, so far as any local person knew. She had chosen Saturn because of its rings. She could place herself in imagination upon the planet and look up at the colorful rings encircling the planet and see the most beautiful of all sights. And on Saturn the trees were all colors, like flowers, like the rings, and beauty was everything, just for the purpose of being beautiful.” (pp. 39)
I’m reading a good mystery fiction book, published in 1981, called Hear the Children Cry .
This excerpt is out of this book.
😀
I love it because not only is it beautiful, it’s also very wise. Not everything we do or have has to be practical/have a practical purpose. It reminds me that it’s ok to not always be productive, just to sit back and bask in the beauty.
Much, love, light, & beauty to you!
❤
xoxo Kim
“You are the music while the music lasts.” ~
(edited: Rumi – not T.s quote!)
Today I woke up very early after only three hours of sleep. It was still dark out and very windy and rainy and freezing cold! Just yesterday it was like 60 degrees! Lol
Now today it’s 30 something degrees.
Wth? Lol 😀
I woke up to the windchimes sounding in the backyard. So beautiful.
I felt peace & inner calm and a deep connection to the musical wind.
I remembered this quote above. It’s a lovely quote that can be interpreted different ways.
It’s perfect for my one word challenge. (my word is beauty)
I don’t function well at all with only a few hours of sleep. I always needed a lot of hours of sleep in one night, like nine or ten!
But I woke up in a great mood still! After the shower and brushing my teeth I was afraid to look in a mirror before leaving for work. Lol
I don’t always look fabulous after not getting enough sleep or getting too much sleep. My face breaks out, my throat gets sore, my eyes have dark circles or bags around them, I look tired and just a wreck with not enough sleep! And my hair falls out in clumps!
Today instead of putting my makeup on, I worked on my one word challenge even though I wanted to put makeup on. I should have gotten up earlier (and went to sleep earlier.)
So I dreaded looking in a mirror!
But I did and was surprised. I don’t look half bad! Lol Probably not perfect but quite alright for only three hours of sleep and not an ounce of makeup to cover up any blemishes.
Here’s a couple pictures.
Also yesterday was very warm and I celebrated with an iced coffee! Today is very cold and I’m celebrating with a hot blueberry coffee! I’m at work for my manager while she’s away. I’m here alone reading books, drinking blueberry coffee, laughing all by myself! Lol ❤
I’m reading a fiction mystery thriller Kindle book (but I think it can be ordered as a physical book as well?) about a serial killer who dresses as Santa and creeps around with an ax killing just about anyone she can. (admit it – when you saw “serial killer,” you automatically assumed the thing is a man, right? They are usually men both in reality & in fiction, it seems. But a lil lady can bring just as much destruction!) It’s in December. She’s a young woman with orange/red hair. People think she’s a mental patient who recently got out of a mental hospital after ten years.
It’s called Santa Took Them. After they are murdered, the words “Santa took them” are written on the wall in blood. Ten years ago on Christmas Eve, a little girl’s family was murdered in a most grusome way and somehow she survived and ended up in their neighbor’s house. She was so traumatized she was hospitalized in a mental hospital for children for ten years then released because she’s 18 years old. She goes to live with her uncle and his girlfriend who are then murdered in a similar fashion as her family years ago and on the wall says the same thing, “Santa took them.” And the girl vanishes without a trace. Many people think she killed her family all those years ago and now her uncle and his girlfriend. But their heads were all chopped off and she was eight years old. Can an eight year old cut four people’s heads off? It takes place in a small town where homicide is virtually unheard of. Now some people see a Santa girl creeping around the woods and the house where the family was murdered. And a couple teenagers and some adults go missing. And all kinds of weird shit keeps happening. It’s one creepy story! It’s really good, a page turner for sure.
I think in murder mystery fiction books there’s two characters who won’t turn out to be the murderer if the author is good at writing mysteries. The character who seems most likely to be the one. And the character who seems least likely to be the one. The author doesn’t want to make it obvious who the killer is. So the character we just “know” is it, likely isn’t.
But in a way, the character who is least likely to be the killer is kind of obvious because we know how fictional murder mysteries go. They are supposed to be shocking. But knowing this, we may assume it’s the most innocent seeming or weakest person who will be the killer.
It’s definitely not the explicitly obvious one unless the author suspects we’ll suspect it’s the obvious one, therefore assuming it’s not since it’s so obvious, then decides to make the most obvious one the actual killer because we’ll never see it coming.
That would be disappointing!
Am I rambling?
It’s interesting because in the beginning of this book there’s a quote by Dr. Sam Loomis. Do you recall who he is? Maybe you haven’t seen the movie. He’s the character in the movie, Halloween, the mental health doctor for Michael, the killer. He says “Death has come to your little town sheriff.” And the author of “Santa Took Them” has that quote in this book on the first page. And in this book, the mental patient’s mental health doctor is also named Dr. Sam Loomis, short for Samantha! I like how he made her a woman with the same name! And same kind of doctor! And the girl is named Michelle and I think that’s a feminine form of Michael. I wonder if there’s anymore little details taken out of Halloween and put in this book with little changes! Maybe the whole book is full of them!
My sister and me before were saying how hilarious it would be to write a really fascinating mystery book with an intentionally sucky ending just for shitz & gigglez. I can’t stop laughing when I think about it. Like a serious mystery that people can’t wait to see unfold then at the end it makes no sense or just cuts off abruptly and says “the end” and there’s no real explanation. Or like if it’s a murder mystery, a realistic one then at the end the murderer turns out to be a flying hot dog or a ghost when the story isn’t a supernatural one. People would be so pissed and want their money back! And their time! Lmao
You think you read books with lousy endings before, you haven’t seen it yet! j/k Luckily for the world I’m not a writer (except here lol), not now, not ever. But my sister is and hopes to publish books and write films one day. She wouldn’t really do that sucky ending thing though! It’s just a funny fantasy. ;-D
Anyway, I just love fiction murder mysteries! (but never real ones) It’s disgusting isn’t it?! My guilty pleasure!
I’m listening to Tom Jones singing
She’s A Lady – mobile / desktop and it’s a great song! But a bit condescending wouldn’t you say?
“I never would abuse her…”?? Really? No shit, Tom! The way he says it like it’s even an option!
&
“She never asks very much and I don’t refuse her.” Why should she have to ask him for anything like it’s his place to refuse her. He’s not her master!
She always knows her place?
She’s never in the way?
Excuse me??
I can leave her on her own?
What is she your dog or your child or something.
lol But I love the song & music!
Another Guilty pleasure!
😀
Much love,
Xoxo Kim ❤
p.s. I don’t know the end yet of “Santa Took Them” but I have a suspicion of how it will pan out and I would love to write it but I don’t want to in case someone is reading it or planning to, I don’t want to influence the person’s perception but if you don’t mind, I’m going to share my suspicion which may be completely incorrect.
Possible spoil alert
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I think maybe the mental patient, Michelle, has a dissociative disorder and like a split personality and is killing them but doesn’t consciously know she’s the one killing them. Anyway, I can’t wait to see! 😀
“The stranger is here. I can feel it. She’s close.
The words vibrated in the dark room and stirred the night air inside the small izba at the far end of Tivil, where two dark-haired figures leaned close across a table within an uncertain circle of light. A measured sprinkle of aromatic powder sent a spiral of flashes swirling out from the single candle flame that burned before them. Together they inhaled its delicate fragrance.
‘I’ve drawn her close,’ Rafik murmured. ‘So close I can hear her heartbeat in Tivil.’
His hand hovered over a black cloth on which lay a heavy crystal sphere. It gleamed, shimmered, and seemed to pulse in the darkness as the gypsy’s hand circled above it, slow and attentive, listening to its voice.
‘What do you hear?’ whispered the olive-skinned girl.
‘I hear her heart tearing. I hear her blood spilling, drop by drop, and yet…I hear her laughing.’ The sound was sweet as birdsong in his ears.” (The Red Scarf, Kate Furnivall, pp. 52)
Isn’t this beautiful?! It’s out of a novel I’m reading that takes place in 1933 about a young woman who escapes a Siberian labor camp to try to help another prisoner escape later.
Labor camps are prisons where many innocent people were locked up unjustly and for stupid reasons like just disagreeing with authority.
They are tortured and not taken care of. They are worked sometimes literally to death. They are killed if they make mistakes or do not submit to authority. Many died before their sentence was up. This story isn’t real but labor camps were.
In prison, this young woman, Sofia, meets another young woman, Anna, and they become very close friends. Anna saves Sofia’s life when Sofia gets cut and it becomes infected. She cares for her day and night until it heals. The guards and others do not take care of the prisoners and couldn’t care less if they die, are sick or in pain.
Anna tells Sofia often, about the boy she loves and hasn’t seen in years. Sofia takes great pleasure in the beautiful stories Anna tells. It’s what sees her through the pain of being locked away in a labor camp day after day, year after year.
Anna becomes deathly ill and Sofia wants to get her out of there and get her proper care but Anna is too sick to escape so Sofia risks her life escaping so she can go find Anna’s lover and bring him back to her so Anna can escape.
I haven’t read much of the book yet but on the back it says Sofia finds Anna’s love, the boy she still loves after all these years, and Sofia falls in love with him! Uhh ohh! 
But it’s more than just a love story involving romantic & platonic love. It’s a mystery and full of danger and adventure. It has a lot of substance and the characters have depth unlike a lot of characters in romantic love stories, who seem one-dimensional.
I love how it’s a love story that involves both friendship love & romantic love. I love novels about friendship.
This book has over 400 pages. I’m on page 73.
So I don’t know what happens later in the story but it seems Sofia finds herself in a position where she can potentially make a choice to betray her friend or remain loyal but deny herself the love she has for her friend’s man. I hope she will choose loyalty to her friend.
I want to share the scene above because it’s beautiful and mysterious and I believe it’s a positive message how we can find joy & laughter even in the midst of sorrow, anxiety, and uncertainty.
The man and young girl above are father & daughter, Rafik and Zenia, and the teenage girl, Zenia, finds the young woman, Sofia, stealing vegetables out of their garden before Sofia suffers a head injury and falls unconscious. The father and daughter take Sofia in, knowing she’s a fugitive and it can put their own lives in danger. But they are good people who want to help her. The man and his daughter have some psychic abilities. They don’t know everything though and the daughter’s are not as strong as her father’s.
It’s a lovely book if the part I read up until now is any indication.
So, I hope you are having a great day or night and lots of love to you! ❤
😀
Xoxo Kim
I read a fiction book called “In Love With Nowhere.” I loved the name as soon as I read it. I automatically interpreted as something positive like we can be in love with “nowhere” like either being physically “in the middle of nowhere” or loving each stage of life even if it seems to be going nowhere.
The book is about a man who is 30 something years old and struggling with severe substance addiction. He is a popular writer of horror fiction books and is well loved by many fans, but his addiction gets the best of him and his career, his marriage, and his whole life are suffering.
So his agent sets up a place in the woods, a cozy cabin, for him to stay alone for a while to get better. He’ll have no contact with the outside world, other than walks through the woods and the kritters there, and no access to drugs except smaller and smaller doses of Valium until he’s off it completely. He has to write a blog post each day to let the world know how he is doing and what he’s up to but he has no contact with readers.
Shortly after he gets to the cabin, very strange things begin happening. He’s not sure what’s real and what are hallucinations and delusions. He suffers immensely, both physically and emotionally. He experiences depression and serious physical opiate withdrawal symptoms. He is plagued with nightmares and terrible visions.
It’s a psychological thriller and a horror fiction book but runs deeper than just thriller and mystery. There are little life lessons and reminders throughout the book.
Also it helps deepen our empathy for those struggling with addiction. Some scenes are gutwrenching. The author really goes into detail about the physical and emotional torment that people with addiction experience.
The book is also full of hope and inspiration.
There are little reminders to cherish the beauty all around us. To be mindful of nature and the people we see everywhere we go.
It also reminds us to take comfort in the simple pleasures, when we are sick and in pain, hot tea, a hot shower, a comfortable bed, a cool breeze, just focus on each little thing and allow it to distract us so we don’t have to focus too much on the pain or sickness we are experiencing. It’s ok to find sweet little escapes to help us cope and bring some sense of consolation no matter how small.
Also it reminds us to let go of our painful past, not to be haunted by mistakes we have made and horrific things that happened to us. Acknowledge that they happened, never repress them, but just let them go. They can’t be changed and letting them imprison us does no good to anyone.
The book also conveys the message that as long as we’re alive, there’s always hope no matter how terrible our life seems now.
Also, it reminds us to smile big like a “simpleton!” lol! A couple occasions the man smiles a big goofy grin like a “simpleton,” The author calls it! My grandmom often called me a simpleton when I was little and I still think it’s funny! There’s nothing more beautiful than those moments where we are so filled with joy, we can just laugh and be silly without a care in the world no matter what’s going on! I have those occasions sometimes no matter how depressed or how much physical pain I’m in. We’re never too old or too bad off (as long as we’re alive) to be simple and silly and full of child-like wonder! 😀
Some scenes are beautiful and serene, some bizarre, and some frightening and very distressing but all together it’s a beautiful story and even though I don’t and never have had a drug problem, I can relate to so many of this man’s underlying experiences.
This isn’t really a spoiler but a line out of the book in case you don’t want to read it and read the book first.
.
.
.
.
Just when the man is about to just give up, someone has this to say to him:
“You have so much potential, you can give the world so much, you will give the world so much.”
“Like I said, the world needs you and eventually it will find a use for you. But not as a repressed drug addict.”
I find this message to be beautiful and inspiring. We are more than just our struggles and pain and we all have potential and so much to give.
We are more than a drug addict or a depressive or schizophrenic, or someone with an eating disorder or low self-esteem or someone drowning in grief. We are more than an asthmatic or cancer patient or an anxious person or whatever physical or emotional ailment or disease we have been afflicted with. So much more. Even when it feels that all we are is someone with pain or a disorder.
We are not a disorder or a condition or an addiction. I am not my pain.
You are not your anxiety or painful experiences or emotions or words that have hurt you. You aren’t your bad habits or mistakes or flaws or shortcomings.
We have a whole personality and love and skills and gifts beneath those labels and agonizing experiences. Look, feel, and they are there. Here.
We have so much potential.
So this book is a fun thriller and mystery but it’s also much more. It’s grounded in hope and healing.
And I just feel the desire to share!
Even if you don’t read the book, maybe you can find these little reminders helpful or inspiring anyway!
❤
Lots & lots of love to you! 😀
Xoxo Kim
A Dose of Inspiration 