(Because some people like Blogger and some like WordPress, i am putting the same content at both. If you would prefer to read this on the other site, it is linked here.)
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Linking up with Wordless Wednesday and Sandee at Comedy Plus.
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Words for Wednesday was begun by Delores and has become a moveable feast of word or picture or music prompts that encourages us to write stories, poems, or whatever strikes our fancy.
This month, Delores is providing the prompts. This may be the end of an era, as she has had so much trouble with a troll that she is planning to shut down her blog after she provides the prompts this month. She will be missed.
This week's words are:
kindness
handicapped
blessings
fight or flight
and/or
gruff
spike
hurry
include
and/or
blind
chance
fright
frigid
She took a deep breath and tried to suppress her initial reaction, which was to be GRUFF at the slightest hint of KINDNESS from a man she didn't know, and to react with a FRIGID attitude even toward those she did.
Like a hedgehog ever ready to trust his suit of SPIKEs, she knew it was a FIGHT OR FLIGHT response. Knowing didn't make the FRIGHT she felt any less. She was still scared for her life, even though she'd been rescued. The deep fear would take time to release its hold.
The counselor assured her she was only temporarily HANDICAPPED with this response, and that it was only natural.
"You have family now," the counselor told her. "They want to INCLUDE you in their lives. It's a BLESSING, even though it feels odd to know at first." Then she added, "Don't be in too big of a HURRY to accept or reject them. They know what you've been through, and want to give you space and time to get over it."
It was BLIND CHANCE that she was the one kidnapped as a child, held captive and abused. It was her snatching a lucky break that got her out of the situation.
Now her freedom came with a price, the price of learning how to be free again, without fear, without wondering if there was a motive behind every nice thing a man did for her. She took another deep breath and said, "Thank you" to the orderly who had handed her an extra cup of juice.
She couldn't quite manage a smile, but he knew what an effort it was for her to even acknowledge him. He gently said, "You're quite welcome." As he headed back toward the kitchen, he grinned. Orderly or not, he'd been there long enough, he knew a breakthrough when he saw it, and even he celebrated in his own way.
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Today is:
Autumn Equinox Festival at Chichen Itza -- beginning today, thousands will gather for the amazing play of light and shadow each evening at sunset through the 27th)
Chiropractic Founder's Day -- celebrating the first chiropractic adjustment ever performed, by D.D. Palmer on Harvey Lillard, on this date in 1895
Ear Wig Fitting Day -- Fairy Calendar
Eleven Days of Global Unity -- Day 8, Human Rights (sponsored by We, the World)
Golden Aspen Motorcycle Rally -- Ruidoso, NM, US (trade show, bike shows, riding tours, skills event, stunt show, parade, and fun; through Sunday)
Hug a Greeting Card Writer Day -- they are generally anonymous, often underappreciated, so today, give one a hug! (if you know any, that is)
Independence Day -- Chile
Kentucky Bourbon Festival -- Bardstown, KY, US (self explanatory; through Sunday)
National Cheeseburger Day
National Guitar Flat-Picking Championships and Walnut Valley Festival -- Winfield, KS, US (through Sunday)
National HIV/AIDS and Aging Awareness Day -- US
National Rehabilitation Day -- US (on the Wednesday of National Rehab Awareness Week)
National Respect! Day(sm) -- US (encouraging abused women to respect themselves enough to get out)
National School Backpack Awareness Day 2019 -- US (or anywhere else that you want to weigh your child's backpack on the 3rd Wednesday of September, to make sure it's not heavy enough to hurt them)
Plataia -- Ancient Greek Calendar (date approximate)
St. Joseph of Cupertino's Day (Levitating saint, and so Patron of air crews, air travelers, astronauts, paratroopers, pilots/aviators, students, test takers; Cupertino, Italy)
World Water Monitoring Day -- International
Anniversaries Today:
Constantine II of Greece marries Princess Anne-Marie of Denmark, 1964
The United States Air Force becomes a separate military service, 1947
Hull House opens, 1889
Birthdays Today:
Jada Pinkett Smith, 1971
Lance Armstrong, 1971
Alsha Tyler, 1970
James Gandolfini, 1961
Ryne Sandberg, 1959
Frankie Avalon, 1939
Robert Blake, 1933
Scotty Bowman, 1933
June Foray, 1920
Jack Warden, 1920
Rossano Brazzi, 1916
Agnes DeMille, 1905
Greta Garbo, 1905
Eddie "Rochester" Anderson, 1905
John Diefenbaker, 1895
Joseph Story, 1779
George Read, 1733
Samuel Johnson, 1709
Marcus Ulpius Nerva Trajanus, Emperor Trajan, 53
Debuting/Premiering Today:
"Baseball"(Documentary), 1994
"Love is a Many Splendored Thing"(TV), 1967
"Get Smart"(TV), 1965
"The Addams Family"(TV), 1964
"Wagon Train"(TV), 1957
"The Paul Winchell Show"(TV), 1950
"Johnny Belinda"(Play), 1940
"Strictly Dishonorable"(Play), 1929
"Disraeli"(Play), 1911
Today in History:
Christopher Columbus lands at Costa Rica on his 4th and final voyage, 1502
Ft. Ticonderoga, NY opens, 1755
The British capture Quebec City, 1759
John Harris builds the first spinet piano in the US, 1769
President Washington lays the cornerstone of the Capitol Building, 1793
Royal Opera House in London opens, 1809
A horse beats the first US made locomotive, near Baltimore, 1830
Tiffany and Co. (first named Tiffany & Young) is founded by Charles Lewis Tiffany and Teddy Young in New York City; the store is called a "stationery and fancy goods emporium", 1837
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette is first published, 1842
First publication of The New-York Daily Times, which later becomes The New York Times, 1851
Old Faithful Geyser is observed and named by Henry D. Washburn during the Washburn-Langford-Doane Expedition to Yellowstone, 1870
The banking firm of Jay Cooke & Co. in Philadelphia declares bankruptcy, which starts the Panic of 1873 and a severe economic depression, 1873
The Blackpool Illuminations are switched on for the first time, 1879
Riots break out in Montreal to protest against compulsory smallpox vaccination, 1885
In appreciation for all she had done for the tribe, Harriet Maxwell Converse, adopted as a member of the Seneca tribe, is made a chief of the Six Nations Tribe at the Tonawanda Reservation, 1891
Daniel David Palmer gives the first chiropractic adjustment, 1895
A typhoon with tsunami kills an estimated 10,000 people in Hong Kong, 1906
The Irish Home Rule Act becomes law, but is delayed until after World War I, 1914
The Netherlands gives women the right to vote, 1919
The Columbia Broadcasting System goes on the air, 1927
Juan de la Cierva makes the first autogyro crossing of the English Channel, 1928
Margaret Chase Smith of Maine becomes the first woman elected to the US Senate without completing another senator's term, 1948
Fidel Castro arrives in New York City as the head of the Cuban delegation to the United Nations, 1960
U.N. Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjöld dies in a plane crash, 1961
Burundi, Jamaica, Rwanda and Trinidad and Tobago are admitted to the United Nations, 1962
The Bahamas, East Germany and West Germany are admitted to the United Nations, 1973
Hurricane Fifi strikes Honduras with 110 mph winds, killing 5,000 people, 1974
Voyager I takes first photograph of the Earth and the Moon together, 1977
Soyuz 38 carries 2 cosmonauts (including 1 Cuban) to Salyut 6 space station, 1980
Joe Kittinger completes the first solo balloon crossing of the Atlantic, 1984
Liechtenstein becomes a member of the United Nations, 1990
ICANN is formed, 1998
The 72 year run of the soap opera The Guiding Light ends as its final episode is broadcast, 2009
Chileans celebrate the 200th anniversary oof their independence, 2010
After a large storm that took the roof off of Stadium Southland in Invercargill, 100,000 people in New Zealand are left without water, 2010
Scotland votes to remain a member of the United Kingdom in an independence referendum, 2014
The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Journal publishes finding about the earliest known fishhooks, at 23,000 years old, discovered on Okinawa Island, Japan, 2016
Those vet signs are funny! I hate to hear that someone may close down their blog due to a troll. So sad.
ReplyDeleteLove the vet signs. And yes, a flat earth would be perfect for many of the cats who have shared our lives.
ReplyDeleteLOL those signs were funny and clever heheh!
ReplyDeleteHave a puntastic week :-)
Mimi,
ReplyDeleteI'm glad the world isn't flat. :D Ooo, it's National Cheeseburger Day - yum, num! I'll take mine with extra pickles, please. Have a wonderful Wednesday, my friend!
Cats are trouble and they would push everything off if the world was flat. They never follow rules.
ReplyDeleteWe like the vet signs a lot. That is a cat's job to push things off the table. You all have a terriic day.
ReplyDeleteI love both your signs and especially the last one. So very true.
ReplyDeleteThank you for joining the Wordless Wednesday Blog Hop.
Have a fabulous Wordless Wednesday. ♥
Those signs were purrfect and funny too, the trolls are not and should be spayed or neutered without anesthesia.
ReplyDeleteShear madness, ha,ha,ha. Have a great Wednesday Mimi.
ReplyDeleteCruisin Paul
So true about cats :) Great job on the story.
ReplyDeleteI really like what you did with this week's words. I'm having trouble thinking of something. As usual, I'll leave it till the last minute and then it will somehow come together. Unless it doesn't...
ReplyDeleteWonderful Vet signs ~ my former hair stylist's place was called Sheer Maddness ~ LOL and cat quote is so true!
ReplyDeleteHappy Day to You,
A ShutterBug Explores,
aka (A Creative Harbor)