WHEN WINDMILLS FREEZE OVER!

 

A series of essays....

A WINTER SCENE THAT IS SEEN MORE AND MORE OFTEN: WIND FARM
OPERATORS ARE FINDING SUCCESS NAVIGATING AROUND 
MOTHER NATURE IN COLD CLIMATES.

Photo Courtesy of Getty Images

....as seen through my eyes!

By: Jacqueline E Hughes

Many of us might believe that our natural creativity and talent would come pouring out while we have the time to concentrate on the things we love to do and organize the imagination and originality trapped inside of us. COVID-19 seems to have allotted us the time, but is it reasonable to believe that we are able to take the upmost advantage of it under the current circumstances?

What sounds reasonable, feasible, and justifiable may not always be the truest picture that tells a particular story. There will always be a story behind a story and it is useful and, frankly, advisable to do your research before drawing any hard-and-fast conclusions. I began asking myself if anyone else was feeling a bit lost within themselves right now? When given ample time to work like a bat out of hell on many projects I’ve begun, why aren’t they progressing more smoothly, coming to fruition? So, I started doing my research.

Humans tend to place blame when things go awry on other people, organizations, or things they don’t like or approve of. Such was the case of the innocent, hard working wind turbines located in Texas last week. Fox News host, Tucker Carlson, said, “The state’s power grid failed because windmills froze.” Carlson, who exists in a parallel universe, is known to strenuously push his far right agendas on to those who will listen to him as he sits in his bully pulpit of so-called authority at Fox News. Unfortunately, some people will hang-on to his every word instead of employing a modicum of common sense and reason to what they hear.

In this instance, climate change denial is not an excuse, especially when it comes to correcting our mistakes and embracing progress. Learning how to weatherize our resources or knowing  how to store energy for emergencies are top priorities when it comes to dealing with changes in climate. Denying these changes will prove to be detrimental to all of us in the near future.

My Mother told her four children that we should always finish what we started before moving on to other things even though she was one of the best multitaskers I have ever known! She wanted us to feel that sense of accomplishment and take pride in it before we attempted anything else. Even though we desperately tried to comply, it was a struggle as young, undisciplined minds often veered off in multiple directions at any given time.

With Mom’s voice in the back of my head, and despite the meanderings of my thoughts, I slowly slip down the rabbit hole of research and understanding on the Internet surrounded by juicy nuggets of opinions and examples. Finding several recent articles that jump out at me, my own beliefs are reinforced via instances of others experiencing similar anxiety.

In an article published on February 19, 2021, by Alison Flood for The Guardian, she offers writer’s block examples entitled Writer's blockdown: after a year inside, novelists are struggling to write. Author William Sutcliffe wrote on Twitter: “I have been a professional writer for more than twenty years. I have made my living from the resource of my imagination. Last night I had a dream about unloading the dishwasher.”

If the first lockdown was about finding space to write (along with an energetic spirit and a Meijer ‘ship shopper’ schedule), “...then the second has been far bleaker and harder for creativity. Whether it is dealing with home schooling, the same four walls, or anxiety caused by the news, for many authors, the stories just aren’t coming,” she explains.

I know exactly what they’re talking about, especially the ‘anxiety caused by the news’ part! I have woken up in a fog, eventually seated with iPad on my lap, fingers hovering over the keyboard, my imagination abandoning me: “With my shadowy characters screaming for me to get them out of this or that mess, I shake my head knowing that I don’t always have the emotional and intellectual strength to do that. Life is just a sea of greyness, timelessness,” sighs author, Linda Grant. 

Personally, it began on November 9, 2016, with dark thoughts surrounding an even darker future and a soulless creature slated to be at the helm and leading our country deeper and deeper into the abyss. My dark feelings intensified to unimaginable heights about a year ago. We’d just returned from a memorable trip in Florida with good friends and landed smack into the clutches of the COVID-19 pandemic upon returning to Michigan. As the tan began to fade, fear and anxiety of not being able to be with loved ones and friends, along with the prospect of contracting COVID-19, began to grow and I realized that we were in it for the long haul—for better or worse.            

Before the scientists injected us with hope via small vials of precious vaccine, our darkest hours hit as hospitals filled to capacity and beyond, healthcare workers shed their tears of sorrow and fatigue, and death toll numbers quickly began to rise. Many people denied (and still do) what was happening. But, many of us learned how to coat the blades of the windmill with carbon fiber (love) and circulate hot air inside the blades of our wind turbines in preparation for bad times, freezing weather. We wore face masks and kept our distance from others in public. We sacrificed human contact with family and friends. We struggled but we kept those wind turbines from freezing!! And today, our actions are beginning to pay off.

Hopefully the fog that encompasses creativity will burn off...soon! Old projects will be completed and new ones will begin without the anxiety or pain. May we all learn how to weatherize our resources and store energy for emergencies. These will always be our top priorities when it comes to dealing with climate change, the coronavirus, and all of life’s battles that ceaselessly confront our well-being.

Copyright © 2021 by Jacqueline E Hughes

All rights reserved

RIDING ALONG ON A NATURAL HIGH: RESEARCH AND SCIENCE AT ITS BEST!

A series of essays....

MY NURSE WAS GENTLE AND KIND WITH A GREAT SENSE OF HUMOR!

....as seen through my eyes!

By: Jacqueline E Hughes

How does one finally react after receiving something you’ve had to wait for and wanted for such a long time? Well, I will tell you how I reacted: positively giddy! About as happy as anyone has a right to be. I’m still not certain if the Pfizer vaccine jabbed into the upper portion of my left arm had anything directly to do with it, chemically speaking, but I’m sure this act opened-up a large dose of emotions I’d been holding back for quite a while.

After hoping and wishing for and dreaming about being scheduled for our inoculation here in Kalamazoo (with the Portage Pfizer operations just a few miles down the road from our house), for weeks now, the email arrived last week inviting us to schedule our appointments for this past Tuesday as new supplies had been allocated for Michigan. After complying, Dan and I found ourselves high-fiving each other and giggling and stepping a bit lighter all last week!

We’d missed the boat during the last go around of shots while many of our friends were already receiving their second shot in the series of two with the Pfizer vaccine. I have yet to hear of anyone I know having been administered the Moderna vaccine.  

So, we woke-up on Tuesday morning and dressed for both the bitter cold weather and the act of easily exposing our upper arm for the generous gift from science and the first step towards bringing life as we enjoyed it in the past back to fruition—for all of us! I did not like being left out of the equation for so long; deprived of participating in a life I missed and longed for again.

For all of you who know me, when confronted with a choice between snow boots or flip flops, the latter wins every time. Until now. Socks, boots, fake-fur hooded coat, and gloves all contributed to my proud Michelin Woman image. Stuffing myself in the car for our short trip to the designated venue was such a joy. I felt like a small child heading to Orlando for my first trip to Walt Disney World. Seriously special!

The people working at the Kalamazoo County Expo Center were kind, efficient, caring, and helpful all rolled-up into one organized entity. I found myself skipping from one station to another, from Kilimanjaro Safaris to Expedition Everest, on my journey through the cavernous rooms of the building and smiling along the way. 

We reached the ‘holy gates,’ otherwise known as Station #4, and were guided to Table E to await instructions. By this time, I would have attempted a backflip if they’d asked me to. There was plenty of room. It was amusing to look around to see some people in various stages of undress, though. Several older gentlemen had stripped down to bare chests, suspenders casually draping down their sides, almost as though they anticipated the shot penetrating their upper buttocks or thigh as if they were small children once again.

After swabbing my arm with alcohol and saying, “This will prick only slightly,” it was all over. My first question was, “Why are so many people afraid of getting a shot?” One nurse at Station #4, Table E, answered me with a political twist stating that many are still not sure if the vaccine is real and if it works and won’t subject themselves to it. But, my own nurse knew what I meant and relayed a story of how one person fainted dead away when the syringe came two feet from them. Both answers evoked a reaction from me as, with scientific endeavors throughout the years, people will always see science and progress in a different light based upon beliefs instilled in them by the various teachings in their own background.

At Station #5 we set-up our second shot appointment for three weeks later and sat-out our ‘observation’ time period before leaving the building.

TWO HIGHLY PRECIOUS PROOF OF VACCINATION CARDS!

Jumping into the car, a broad smile spread across my face. And, by the time we drove over to our daughter’s house where we planned on having lunch with her and our two grandchildren who were enjoying a ‘snow day,’ I was full of vitality and spirit. I knew it was a natural high. I didn’t believe it was a reaction to the vaccine so recently taken. The power poured out of me like molten lava from a highly active volcano. It engulfed me with its natural energy as I elicited the strangest looks from husband, daughter, grandkids, and even their dog, Oreo. 

I played games on my grandson’s Oculus that required extremely exaggerated arm movements. I was feeling no pain. We played a dice game with the kids that generated laughter from the joy and happiness felt deep down inside. My lunch was devoured with the gusto of the starving and I reveled in a simple and sweet conversation with my beautiful daughter as she worked at her desk from her home office. She has been working from home for a year. Life as she had been accustomed to was becoming obsolete.

Meanwhile, I felt like a kid in a candy store; a woman shopping for an unlimited amount of shoes; the lady in a crowded room laughing louder than anyone else; the captured being released by the invaders; a person fully appreciating the freedom of being in the moment. By the time we said our goodbyes and arrived home, I crashed like the Hindenburg—fully engulfed in flames and without a single bit of fight left in me.

Having the first round of the precious vaccine opened up the world and helped me see the endless opportunities ahead for all of us. With a bit more caution and common sense applied, we can love, laugh, socialize, move about the cabin on our own terms, and be the curious creatures we have been and are meant to be. Eventually, we will get to hug and hold each other, kiss a friend, as well as be surrounded by others in all social settings that had been taken for granted not long ago.

My ‘natural high’ was a release of pressure that had been building-up for months. Like a tea kettle when its contents comes to a boil, it can make the kettle’s whistle create ear piercing pitches of sound. Coming down from such a high can be an experience in itself. Sleep. Sleep and more sleep was the remedy to neutralizing my emotions. Honestly, this was the eye-opening event I’d been hoping for for weeks. I can’t help but feel among the blessed and the grateful. What an amazing experience!

If 2020 has taught us anything, it’s that our health is the most important thing we have. Do whatever it takes to get your own vaccine inoculation and feel the euphoria for yourself. Continue to wear your face masks no matter what and always take care of yourself and others.

Copyright © 2021 by Jacqueline E Hughes

All rights reserved

AHH—THE MAGNIFICENT SHORT MONTH OF FEBRUARY!

 

A Series of essays....

 
DRIVEWAY CHALK ART BY MY GRANDCHILDREN, DATED APRIL 3, 2020,
DURING THE INITIAL MONTHS OF THE CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC.

....as seen through my eyes!

By: Jacqueline E Hughes

A Select List of February Monthly Holidays and Observances:

• Chinese New Year
• Groundhog Day
• Valentine’s Day
• President’s Day
• Mardi Gras and Ash Wednesday
• Black History Month
• American Heart Month
• Friendship Month
• Library Lovers Month
• Chocolate Lovers Month
• National Dental Month

With Valentine’s Day fast approaching, coupled with the personal confinement of this COVID-laced world we live in, we have learned how to be a bit more creative when it comes to celebrating this year. Yes, a bit less adventurous, yet more open-minded and realistic allowing us to see and love the world in a much deeper sense while retaining the romantic value of a heart-shaped box of chocolates and freshly cut roses.

I’ve always been a hopeless romantic and can visualize its potential in everything, every place, and everyone I know or hope to meet one day! You might say it began with formal tea parties with stuffed animals which grew into tiny, porcelain tea cups adorned with hand-painted roses and filled with water poured from a matching teapot to be shared with my friends on a sunny front porch in late June. When I close my eyes the smell of ginger delights my senses as I recall the crisp snap of the tea cookies we’d eat with our cuppa tea.

As a young wife I would create a full Bed-and-Breakfast feast for my husband on weekend mornings when we’d sit and discuss our future and where we hoped to travel to when financially possible. Oh, I was definitely the dreamer, the romantic back in the day while Dan struggled to maintain the realism required to keep us stable with feet planted firmly on the ground. Thank goodness!

In our own way, Dan and I kept our dreams alive, our goals intact, and learned throughout the years how to mesh our ideas together and create a life that satisfied both of us. Eventually, this included two daughters who broadened our circle of love and helped shape our close knit family for many years.

Today, I find it highly appropriate that this special day of sharing love is sandwiched right in the middle of the shortest month of the year and serves to anchor, balance if you will, Black History Month. Carter G. Woodson, known as the ‘Father of Black History,’ dedicated his career to the field of African American history and lobbied extensively to establish Black History Month. 

DR. CARTER G. WOODSON

Dedicating himself to the field of African American history after being the second African American to receive his Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1912, Doctor Woodson authored numerous books during his career which include A Century of Negro Migration (1918), The History of the Negro Church (1921), and The Negro in Our History (1922). You might say he was a bit of a romantic and a dreamer, as well!

Biography Newsletter notes that Doctor Woodson “lobbied schools and organizations to participate in a special program to encourage the study of African American history, which began in February 1926 with Negro History Week and choosing the second week of February to coincide with the birthdays of Frederick Douglas and President Abraham Lincoln.” The program was soon expanded and renamed Black History Month. 

It wasn’t until fifty years later that President Gerald Ford officially recognized Black History Month in 1976. He called upon the public to “seize the opportunity to honor the too-often neglected accomplishments of Black Americans in every area of endeavor throughout our history.”

Growing up a young, white female in the 1950’s and ‘60’s, the plight of the Black Americans touched me in one way or another every day of my life. You see, for some reason I can’t totally explain, I never saw humans categorized by their color or religion. Eventually, I did come to the realization that others did. Perhaps it was my strict Catholic upbringing by many diverse and honorable nuns who taught that God does not see His children through a lens of color or stigmatized by a particular religious belief. May God bless these ladies with His love and grace!

Alongside the Black achievements throughout history we were taught in school, it was the Black struggle that etched its mark on me, especially in the early 1960’s. The peace, love, and kindness displayed by Dr. Martin Luther King and his close followers helped to meld the radical Black groups, fists held high in pride and protest, with the gentle nature of Doctor King and his beliefs of how to genuinely portray the Black struggle with head held high and ideals held even higher!

Did I fully understand the blending of Woman’s Rights, Black struggles, and the beginnings of Gay Rights emerging as the common threads weaving their way through an unpopular war being played out in a country called Viêtnam? My entire college career was based upon and centered around all of the above struggles with the hope of achieving progress by embracing their cause and understanding their history.

I have always embraced being a product of the 1960’s and influenced by the particular circumstances of each cause presented to my generation. Sadly, after centuries have passed, we continue to struggle with all of these issues while time has proven that multiple generations have unsuccessfully passed through the eye of the needle and into the Kingdom of Acceptance and Love.

Today, I remember that little girl passing out small cups of tea and plates of cookies to her friends on a sunny afternoon and cherish the memory of an innocent moment dictated by a splash of etiquette and whimsy. How proud she would soon be to know that her ultimate ideals will include the betterment of ALL lives while holding on to the notion that this knowledge can and should be shared with everyone.

Because of my beliefs and the passing of time, I already knew how life was filled with strife and adversity; to love and be loved leaves us vulnerable, susceptible to temptation, and being wounded both physically and emotionally. But, who knew that the month of February could contain so much knowledge, history, celebration, and love all crammed into the shortest month of the year?

As I make the coffee and bake an apple Dutch Baby pancake for my particular Love this Sunday morning, I will remember the little girl, college student, young wife and mother, career woman, and friend I’ve become to others via the passing of time. I will be grateful for the numerous accomplishments, as well as the personal strife that have served to shape the person I am today.   

We have so much to be proud of during this month. I encourage you to take time to rejoice in the dedication of people like Carter G. Woodson for keeping the achievements and struggles of Black people alive and strong. Be prepared to stretch this one month of Hope and Love throughout the remaining eleven months of the year and share the positive results with those you love every day of your life. Let’s make each day another Valentine’s Day and give Groundhog Day a bit of a rest.

Happy Valentine’s Day! Stay safe and healthy and protect the people you love. This defines Romanticism for me.

Copyright © 2021 by Jacqueline E Hughes

All rights reserved

Photos Copyright © 2021 by Jacqueline E Hughes

All rights reserved

ACCOUNTABILITY

 

A series of essays....

A TRULY MAGICAL PLACE: FLIGHT OF STEPS LEADING UP INTO THE LIGHT!
THE SEVEN CHURCHES OF GLENDALOUGH, COUNTY WICKLOW, IRELAND

....as seen through my eyes!

By: Jacqueline E Hughes

As our country becomes charged and electrified by the emergence of positive change, it becomes more and more imperative that we thoroughly examine exactly how and by whom we got where we are today in terms of being led by someone completely inept and uniquely dysfunctional. Doesn’t this describe the world we were forced to live in for the past four years? It is time to hold those responsible for stirring up this pot of ‘crazy’ justifiably accountable.

Accountability is the expectation or requirement to account for one's actions; to be answerable for the negligence of leadership responsibilities that have led to the hardship, lack of peace of mind, and untimely death of so many people by not properly managing a swiftly spreading pandemic. To allow anyone to blatantly shirk or even deny their responsibility of placing the lives of others in any form of danger only adds more names and faces to the list of those to be held accountable for their actions or lack thereof. 

Some might contend that if you want people to be accountable, you have to create an environment that fosters accountability and you have to be accountable yourself. If our current leadership drops the ball on holding those liable for their actions then we, as a nation, must and will suffer the consequences of our inactions. The new leaders in Washington D.C. understand this explicitly and cannot allow themselves to turn a blind eye to treacherous acts if they are to be responsible for leading us into a secure future. 

This is not the time to rest on one’s laurels, accept the irresponsible actions of the past, and make no further effort to improve life as we know it. With so much misinformation and an underlying current of hatred and mistrust bubbling around us, we can’t afford to ignore its source and not make him accountable for placing us in the depths of despair and having to have others dig us out. 

Allowing ourselves to admit to having thrown the ball that broke our neighbor’s window should be enough to promote responsibility for our actions. Telling your neighbor that you will do chores to earn the money to pay for the window is taking full accountability for your actions. Blaming others is easy. Being accountable can be difficult. However, being accountable for your actions displays integrity and the adherence to a strict ethical code; ideals that have been completely ignored and thrown out of the window during the last administration.

It is time—it is time to set a good example for all of us, for our children, for future generations, as well as for the rest of the world and let them know that those displaying a moral compass are back and performing beautifully. We must not and will not allow those responsible for failure, amoral practices, and especially the death of so many innocent people, go free and not be forced to account for lack of good consciousness and ownership of all of their past actions. At the same time, we have an affirmative obligation to all Americans to move ahead and get things done. It is time. It is time to be accountable!

Remember to wear a mask even if you have received your vaccination. Protect everyone, including yourself. We’re all in this together!

Copyright © 2021 by Jacqueline E Hughes

All rights reserved

Photo copyright © 2021 by Jacqueline E Hughes

All rights reserved