Author Archives: A Star on the Forehead

Absence makes the heart grow fonder :-)

03 Tuesday Sep 2024

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“For a moment I felt the quiet hungering thing that comes inside when you return to the place of your origins, and then the ache of mis-belonging. It was beautiful, this place, and it was savage. It swallowed you and made you a part of itself, or it you proved too inassimilable, it spit you out like the pit of a plum.
I’d left here of my own will, and yet it seemed the city had banished in much the same way I’d banished it. Seeing it now after so long, seeing the marsh grass pitching wildly around the edges of the city, the rooftops hunkered together with their ship watches and widow walks, and behind them, the steeples of St Philip’s and St Michael’s lifted like dark fingers, I was not sorry for loving Charleston or for leaving it. Geography had made me who I was.”
― Sue Monk Kidd, The Invention of Wings

The child becomes the parent

09 Tuesday Jul 2024

Posted by in Daily Life, travels

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“No man is an adult while his parents are alive. Until they die he is merely a performance to either please or punish them.”
― Chuck Palahniuk, Adjustment Day

Things have been crazy for me in Brazil.

I am juggling work and the household operations at my parents. My brother helps my parents, and as they age he has to step in more and more. I came to Brazil to see my parents, but specially to give my brother a break.  He just took off on 2 weeks vacations now, and I intend to have him take some more time in August.

We have 2 ladies that come to clean and cook. One comes Mondays and Fridays and the other comes Tuesdays and Thursdays. They are fairly new to the house, so they are a bit lost, and still have to been told what to do. We used to have one person 2 days a week.  She was great, but she relocated and we haven’t been able to replace her.

I got here right at month’s end and beginning of the new month – my busiest time at work. I have an audit to do and bonuses to work on, so it will get a little crazier before it gets better.

I have been cleaning and organizing. Every time I come to Brazil, I try to leave things better than I found them.  I like to think that I often succeed. 

I have been able to start Pilates. I will be doing it at least 3 times a week. Some days it will be at 7am and other days it will at 7pm. My body needs it. My body is showing the effects of over indulging in the cruise and all the amazing Brazilian sweet desserts.

Have you ever Coffee flavored Coke?  I tried and I am not a fan.

Coca-Cola com CafeCoca-Cola com Cafe

I want to be persistent as this flower.  They grow anywhere, even sprouting from the cement in my mom’s backyard.

Persistent Flower

Persistent Flower

Michael adores animals, specially these little monkeys that we have in a park in a neighboring town.  There are about 50 of them living there. Unfortunately, I have been told that most of them have diabetes because people feed them sweets.  They live in an area full of kiosks selling all kinds of treats,  so it is very easy for people to give them some, without realizing the harm they are doing.

 

On the way

26 Wednesday Jun 2024

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Writing from the Uber on the way to JFK.

There is always so much to take.

There will be the day when I travel with just a backpack.

One can dream…

Selling, Buying, Cruising and Flying

24 Monday Jun 2024

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Since my last posting of May 9th, a lot has happened.

Michael and I had decided that in 2024 we would try traveling more, and see how remote work from different places would work out.

We also thought that we would take 2024 to decide where we would be making our official headquarters.

That was the plan. While in Florida in May, we were driving around in nearby towns in Florida, when we saw some balloons indicating an open house. We decided to stop and check it out.

While there, the realtor mentioned another condo for sale. We drove to the other condo, which was 30 minutes away. We fell in love with it. We made an offer and after some negotiating we got the place.

Michael sold his place in New Smyrna. I am selling one of mine in NY. His place went fast, mine has been in the market for a couple of weeks already.

Our new place is already ours as of 2 days ago 🙂 but we will not move in until we return from Brazil.  We are going to Brazil on Wednesday for at least 2 months.

I was forgetting to mention, at the beginning of June I took my first cruise and I loved, loved, loved. It was a MSC cruise to Bahamas. I enjoyed everything about it, and plan on taking more cruises in the future.

Below are some pictures.  I hope to have more time to write from Brazil. It has been  insane for me.  I will give more details in the future.

Thank you for stopping by.

Silent, but not gone :-)

15 Saturday Jun 2024

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Today is all we have!

17 Friday May 2024

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“Write it on your heart
that every day is the best day in the year.
He is rich who owns the day, and no one owns the day
who allows it to be invaded with fret and anxiety.

Finish every day and be done with it.
You have done what you could.
Some blunders and absurdities, no doubt crept in.
Forget them as soon as you can, tomorrow is a new day;
begin it well and serenely, with too high a spirit
to be cumbered with your old nonsense.

This new day is too dear,
with its hopes and invitations,
to waste a moment on the yesterdays.”

― Ralph Waldo Emerson

Meeting new old friends, and eating mistakes

09 Thursday May 2024

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“It is one of the blessings of old friends that you can afford to be stupid with them.” ― Ralph Waldo Emerson

Last Saturday Michael and I met his best friends for lunch at Fishlips Waterfront Bar & Grill in Cape Canaveral . He has been friends with this couple since college. Michael, like myself, is not the best at keeping in touch with friends, so I don’t expect to meet many more people.

I really enjoyed meeting them. They are such great people.  We plan on traveling together in the future. The husband and I share the same birthday.  I love such coincidences.

The food was good and fresh. I had the mahi mahi tacos and to drink I had a prosecco wit lychee. I saw a couple of dolphins and seagulls. It was a fun day!

“There’s not a word yet, for old friends who’ve just met.” ― Jim Henson

My baking continues with mixed results. Lately I have had some success, but also some really bad failures while attempting to make the perfect rye bread. I don’t really care for rye bread, but it is Michael’s favorite, so I am in search of the best bread-machine rye bread recipe.

At lunch I was talking about my adventures with the bread maker, and mentioned the mistakes I made with the rye bread. My number one mistake is not following the recipe properly.

My new friend said: “we eat our mistakes”.

Haha, I love that. I also eat all my mistakes, the edible ones and all others.

Isn’t it better to eat our mistakes than to let them eat away at us?

We have to learn from our mistakes and move on. Stop obsessing about it. Just do better next time.

Here are 2 winners that tasted amazing:
A rye bread, that I have not been able to reproduce not matter how many times I try.  


Irish soda bread

“Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.”
― Albert Einstein

Less social media, more real living

03 Friday May 2024

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“Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.” –  Maya Angelou? (not sure)

Embarrassing confession here: I have been wasting time on social media. 

Why?

Curiosity? Killing time? 

I don’t know.

I know it is a waste of valuable time, and an exercise in nothingness. 

I guess what sparked my social media binging, it was, at first, a trip to the past.  A few people reached out on Valentine’s Day and on my birthday.   I call them ghosts from the past.  They resurface every now and then.  I don’t reply anymore.

I started looking into some of their social media. For the record, I don’t want these people in my life.  

Still,  I got curious and went snooping.  And I didn’t stop with them.  All of a sudden I am back to a place I was in the past, which is, the constant social media surfing.  I now know the latest about all celebrities and influencers.

What a waste of time! Who cares what dress an influencer is using, or where an old friend went on vacation?

I caught myself when I realized I was using this internet surfing, as a mental escape from the stresses of work.  Every second I felt overwhelmed, I found myself in someone’s social media.

This whole rambling on, is just to say that I am, once again, fully resolved to stop going down this path of destruction.  Destruction of a good mind and precious time.  I am resolved to stop the endless snooping and reading of stuff that has nothing to do with my life, and it doesn’t add anything to it.

I have so many projects to finish, at work and personal.  I am behind on my visits to your blogs. I haven’t caught up with any friends.  There is so much I could be doing instead.   I am embarrassed I am robbing myself of precious time.

And another thought on checking up the social media of old friends and exes, it keeps dragging me back to a past I don’t want to go back to.

Realization and accountability are the first steps.  I promise myself to do better.

Wishing you all a blessed weekend!

“I feel keeping a promise to yourself is a direct reflection of the love you have for yourself. I used to make promises to myself and find them easy to break. Today, I love myself enough to not only make a promise to myself, but I love myself enough to keep that promise” ― Steve Maraboli

ps. please pardon typos and other error – too busy surfing 🙂

March the month of meaning

29 Monday Apr 2024

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“When the future begins to run out, the journey to the past in our minds increases tremendously because there is no longer any room to go beyond, so we go back to expand our lives in a virtual way!”  ― Mehmet Murat ildan

Hello friends,

I am still trying to cleanup my Drafts Folder.  It will feel like a huge accomplishment when I am done.  I have already deleted a lot of them, but will be posting some every now and then.  No editing.

The comments will be turned off on the old posts, as they represent where I was, but not where I am today.

This one is form 2015.

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Welcome March!  One of the best months of the year for me!!  Why?  Well, for starters it is my birthday month:-)

It marks 3 years of writing this blog

It marks my 49th birthday

It marks my getting my 2 bedroom apartment

It marks the International Day of the Woman

It marks my favorite person’s b day.

It marks the past, it marks the future.

So much to be grateful for.

So much to be proud of.

Hard work, God’s blessing, tenacity, luck, the right people, patience, lessons and learning.

My 2015 starts now.

I didn’t go skiing, but I am not terrified as I was before,  that I will never go skiing again.

Life is good, and it will only get better.

Always grateful!

We are Invaluable

26 Friday Apr 2024

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“I have always said that if you undervalue what you do,                                       the world undervalues who you are.             
And when you undervalue who you are,                                                            the world undervalues what you do.
My experience is that women are, unfortunately, masters at both.”
― Suze Orman

 

“Strong people have a strong sense of self-worth and self-awareness; they don’t need the approval of others.”
― Roy T. Bennett

 

“I will not be “famous,” “great.” I will go on adventuring, changing, opening my mind and my eyes, refusing to be stamped and stereotyped. The thing is to free one’s self: to let it find its dimensions, not be impeded.” – Virginia Wolf