I missed participating in Cee’s Share Your World Challenge last week, so I’m going to get on the ball and try to post my answers on the first day this week.

Question # 1: Given the choice of anyone in the world, whom would you want as a dinner guest?

This question was a serious challenge for me — mainly because when you think about the opportunity to invite anyone in the whole world, you naturally turn your mind toward someone you’d never have the chance to invite except in this rare situation. You don’t consider the ordinary, everyday people.  Not that they are not just as important, but because you can invite them anytime — right? — so you don’t want to waste this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity on someone you can call on the spur of the moment anyway.

Several people came to mind — people who are my favorites in their various fields of endeavors — but, alas, they all seem to be gone from the earth. My favorite authors, my favorite preachers, my favorite world leaders, my favorite musicians, my favorite artists, and my favorite teachers. They have moved on to greater rewards than having dinner with me.

But the more I thought about the question, I decided that I’d probably most enjoy having the wonderful friends I’ve made through blogging these past three years. Those people who have interacted with me online in a caring, encouraging, loving manner, and whom I have grown to genuinely care about in a very personal way. Every one of those people is bright, creative, interesting, encouraging, and stimulating to me personally — and to my own creativity. So, without further ado, I’d like to issue the invitation. Every single one of you who genuinely considers that you and I have become firm friends and family through the amazing technology made available by WordPress, would you please come to my house for dinner?

Question # 2: When did you last sing to yourself?  To someone else?

Yesterday and yesterday.

 Question # 3: If you could wake up tomorrow having gained any one quality or ability, what would it be?

The ability to make decisions without looking at the situation from every possible, conceivable direction and without envisioning myriads of scenarios and asking pounds of questions concerning possible outcomes, both positive and negative. Sometimes I stop and chastise myself with words like, “For heaven’s sake, stop thinking so much and just make a decision!!! Yes/no; black/white; do/don’t: Just pick one!”

Question # 4: What, if anything is too serious to be joked about?

People losing their memory and their mental faculties is a deadly serious thing as far as I’m concerned. I cared for two different family members who lost their ability to think and reason and eventually their ability to communicate. I know other people who went through the same experiences. It was a horrifying, humiliating, debasing experience for them, and it is a far too serious and painful thing to be joked about.

I am astounded and angered at all the people in this world who seem to love to make jokes about having what they term “senior moments,” or about how elderly people say and do ridiculous things because of mental failures. I have seen scores and scores of those kinds of jokes on social media throughout the world. I delete every one of them when I see them because they don’t deserve to be left online as far as I can control it. And I’m totally fed up with people in my own personal life who find the subject an excuse for comedy. I can guarantee that if they ever truly had a memory loss or a malfunction of their minds, they would not laugh at all.

Moreover, words have power. Even medical science has proven time and time again that the words we speak affect our physical bodies. People may think they are joking, but the more they say their memory is bad — “I can’t remember things anymore,” or “I have a terrible memory now that I’m older,” or “I have senior moments all the time now.” — the more their memory will deteriorate. And the more people say “I can’t think straight anymore”  — or worse yet — “I’m going crazy” — the more their physical brain will begin to comply with their own words. And pretty soon, they won’t be laughing either.

Mental failures are absolutely nothing to joke about, and people with good minds should appreciate and be so grateful for them that they speak about being blessed with a good mind instead of saying every negative thing they can think of to try to get a laugh out of somebody.

Bonus Question: What are you grateful for from last week, and what are you looking forward to in the week coming up?

I’m very grateful for having the opportunity this last week to spend a little time with some truly great friends whom I had not seen in years.

This next week, my spring term of creative writing classes begins, and I am very excited to meet my new students and help them on their way to a more disciplined and more expanded use of their gifts and talents.

 

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