Breaking the rules

I really don't know what I am going to write about today. I guess I can start with a confession. I already bought the Uniball pens. We stopped by the random Halloweeen store in a nearby strip mall to get the final piece for E's costume and the Office Maxx was right there. Sooooo, I popped inside and bought not one, but two sets of Uniball pens! Then I couldn't resist. I came home and journaled with a fresh, wonderfully smooth new pen.

Technically, this should be my last post in the week of 15 minute writing. The pens should've stayed hidden away until this posted. But what the heck! I am a crazy lady throwing caution to the wind!

There is a poster hanging in my room. It has hung in every room or home I've lived in since my freshmen year at the University of Illinois. The poster pictures four African American women picking apples off a tree. Two are standing with their backs to me, reaching both of their muscled arms to the pink sky to pluck apples from the tree. The other two at directly in front of the standing women, yet they are bending over to pick apples off the ground. All of the women are wearing simple dresses, and their hair hangs down in braids. The artist's name is Anthony J. Smith. I loved this poster from the moment I first laid eyes on it at the Krannert Center, on the U of I campus. This is the same place I went to see James Galway from my previous post.

Somehow, I feel as if these solid women protect and guide me. It is like they are standing in that field, watching me sleep at night and saying to each other, "Well, that was quite a day huh? I don't know just what she was thinking by doing that, but I am not at all surprised." The huff and roll their eyes, but still look upon me lovingly. I imagine them whispering their favorite Maya Angelou poems in my ear, their dry lips brushing up against my check allowing their voices to rise and fall deep into the night. I know it's just a poster, not even an original piece of work, but I feel a strange connection to it all the same. Some objects seem to take on a life of their own.

Time