Tag Archives: hope

The Snowman (A Children’s Classic Christmas DVD)

For those of you who do not know me…I love Christmas.  Yes, I’m the one that secretly plays Christmas music well before Thanksgiving, mostly so I can be more creative in my drawing.  I don’t know, but the songs,  or even the music alone, brings out the child in me. I also love certain Christmas movies that I just have to play year after year, no matter how old I get.  I just have to.
One is of course, is A Charlie Brown Christmas. That’s a given.  Second, The House Without A Christmas Tree (my favorite). Third…The Snowman.  If you have not seen this one, you have to.  I first saw it on TV when the kids were small and they just sat in awe the whole time it was on.  Of course, I loved it because of the artwork and creativity in the piece. But, the interest lies in the fact that it is based on a children’s book which has no words…and so they made the movie wordless as well, except for a few sounds and a musical flying scene, which is one of the best parts of the movie. The drawings are done in colored pencil (which is my media)and it plays on the fantasy of every child’s dream, a snowman coming to life.  He plays with the boy who created him and takes him on an adventure all in one night.
Here is a description of the movie I found on Amazon:
‘This is a charming British animated short film based on the classic children’s book by Raymond Briggs and crafted with a colored-pencils-on-paper look, like fluffy, hand-drawn illustrations.  It tells the story (although without words) of a small boy in rural England whose lovingly constructed snowman comes to life and takes him flying over the white-blanketed landscapes, in a beautiful rotoscoped (traced) sequence based on live-action flying footage. Part of the charm of the film is the gentle, everyday quality of its fantasy adventures: the snowman is invited in to try on clothes and play with the Christmas decorations, then plays host to the boy at a party in the woods, at which his snowy relatives do English country dances. This is one of the very few Christmas tapes on the market that really deserves to be a holiday perennial, a gentle fable of friendship and the power of imagination.” –David Chute
I have found the flying scene on you tube and the music you may be familiar with.  The song is beautiful…please listen.
So please, if you get a chance to rent the movie or buy it , please do and add it to that collection of yours.  You won’t regret it.  Also, don’t be disappointed in the end.  Just play it from the beginning and it starts the adventure all over again.  There’s always hope. :)

One Morning The World Woke Up – A Poem About The Ending Of War On Earth

I am posting a poem that my mother had me read a long time ago and it stayed with me…almost haunting me.  It is by Oscar Williams and it is especially perfect for today, with all the war and terrible tragedies going on in the world today. Although it mentions the Jews, you can put yourself or anyone else in their place. It really makes you think, and it is almost impossible to imagine a world without war, but it is beautiful to imagine.  The last stanza gives you the hope you almost are afraid to wish for, for you cannot imagine it ever happening, but it is nice to think about.  Read on and dream…

One Morning the World Woke Up

One morning the world woke up and there was no news;
No gun was shelling the great eardrum of the air
No Christian flesh spurted beneath the subtle screws,
No moaning came from the many agony-faced Jews,
Only the trees in a gauze of wind trembled and were fair.

No trucks climbed into the groove of an endless road,
No tanks were swaying drunken with death at the hilltop,
No bombs were planting their bushes of blood and mud,
And the aimless tides of unfortunates no longer glowed:
A break in the action at last…all had come to a stop.

Those trees danced, in their delicate selves half furled
And a new time on the glittering atmosphere was seen; The lightning stuttering on the closed eyelid of the world
Was gone, and an age of horizons had dawned, soft, pearled.
The world woke up to a scene like spring’s first green.

Birds chirped in waterfalls of little sounds for hours,
Rainbows, in miniature nuggets, were stored in the dews,
The sky was one vast moonstone of the tenderest blues,
And the meadows lay carpeted in three heights of flowers:
One morning the world woke up and there was no news.

Lone Soldier

It’s So Hard

Yet another journal entry on when my mom and dad got sick (the 1990′s) and with their passing, how I dealt with all the pain.  As I write this now, I can remember the feelings I had when I wrote this, like it was yesterday.

This is titled, “It’s So Hard”

It was hard when Mom got sick…the medicines,the doctors, the chemotherapy, the tiredness.

It was hard when Mom died…the last day,the funeral, the getting rid of clothes.

It was hard when Dad got sick…the confusion,the forgetting,the oxygen,the pills, the preparing.

It was hard when Dad died…the closure, the silence,the empty house.

It was hard when we had to sell the house where they lived for 30 years…the yard sale,the dividing of goods, the stress.

It was hard having a yard sale to sell all the little things that we thought didn’t matter.  We had to choose pieces of Mom and Dad scattered everywhere.

It was hard to close the door to the house for the last time.  Their spirits were there and I knew it.  I could feel them every time I visited…in plants, in books and music, in sweaters and caps and pieces of furniture.

The coffeepot my dad used everyday.  The decorations…everything…gone.

It was hard to leave the house on that last day.

I stood at the doorway and I whispered into the empty air, ” I’ll miss you, Mom and Dad.  I love you. Please be with me, not here anymore.  Goodbye!”

Then I took one last look and drew in a long breath, then closed and locked the door.

And as I backed my car out of the driveway, I passed Dad’s azaleas, morning glories and lush,green grass.

I knew this would be the last time, so I didn’t dare watch as I drove past the house.  Hold the tears back!

Oh, it’s so hard!

Close the door to the past, and press on into the future.  I remember the saying, “Bury the dead and live.”  It’s so easy to say, but hard to achieve.

I can only hope their spirits are not held prisoner at that house, but with us- their children, and in their belongings we got to keep for memories sake…

In the wicker furniture that was theirs…on my deck.

In their telephone stand… in my hallway.

In their hope chest…in my bedroom…

and in the aging, yellowing pictures in my albums.

They are with us now in spirit and I try to imagine them smiling and watching over us everyday now…

but it’s so hard.

I Hope You Dance

Do you remember this song?  Once you hear this song, you never quite forget it.  The words stay with you.  They did for me.  

I had to illustrate what the song was saying to me.

A little girl dancing down the road to her future,  not knowing all that lies before her, but dancing anyway.

I hope you like this.  :)

Sorry about the blurriness in the pic.  I somehow can’t find the original.  I came across a refrigerator magnet I had  made with the picture, which was not only small, but also laminated.  Hope you can still see it ok.

I Hope You Dance