Happiness is an Empty Cage (But We Still Have More) (Wordless Wednesday) and Words for Wednesday

***********************************

Linking up with Wordless Wednesday, Steve at BeThere2Day, Catsynth, and Sandee at Comedy Plus.     

***********************************

Words for Wednesday was begun by Delores and has become a moveable feast of word or picture or music prompts to encourage us to write stories, poems, or whatever strikes our fancy.    

The prompts will be posted by Elephant's Child this month and are provided by  Alex J. Cavanaugh.    

This week's prompts are:

• Parachute
• Reindeer
• Shark
• Clay
• Ruins

 

And/Or

• Telescope
• Totem Pole
• Black
• Severed
• Surf

Charlotte (MotherOwl)  has given us Pearl Opal Green as the colour of the month.  If you can also incorporate it into your stories she (and EC) will be grateful.

He lived down at the cove, because he said he had to hear the SURF or he could not live.  Since he'd been a sailor his whole life, it certainly was understandable.

The house was not a shack, although it sometimes appeared that way at first glance.  It was too snugly built to be that, but it was small and fit with the landscape so well as to look like it might have grown there.

In his days of roaming the world he'd picked up tchotchkes and keepsakes, he called them the flotsam and jetsam of his life.  He enjoyed showing these things to people who visited the cove, if they cared to come see.

When he first moved there, the children told wild tales of his adventures and were a bit afraid of him.  Some had claimed the missing small finger on his left hand had been SEVERED by the SHARK whose teeth he wore as a necklace, but the truth was much more mundane and he was loathe to tell the tale.

Instead he put the TOTEM POLE he'd had carved for his family out next to his door and used it to attract attention.  Once he'd told someone what the carved images symbolized, he'd invite them in to see his collection, and so won people over.

He had CLAY pottery from the RUINS of an ancient civilization, a miniature REINDEER carved from bone by a native of the far north, and so much more.  His crystal bowl full of sea glass, including a piece which looked BLACK in some light and Pearl Opal Green in others was mesmerizing.

He kept a TELESCOPE out back, covered with a huge faded red piece of PARACHUTE material to protect it, and offered for anyone to come on a clear night and look through it with him.  Even that protective cover had a story to it, he had no end of stories, as people found who visited often.

It was the perfect life for a retired sailor, fishing from his dory and visiting with any who came to see him, and when the time came for him to "sail out beyond the sunrise" he was missed by a whole town.

***********************************

Today is:

Basketball Day -- birth anniversary of James Naismith

Birth of Tiamat -- Ancient Babylonian Calendar (mother of gods, goddess of primeval chaos; date approximate)

Chhat Parwa/Chhath Puja -- Nepal (start of the four day Hindu/Vedic Festival of the sun god Surya)

Constitution Day -- Dominican Republic; Tajikistan; Tatarstan, Russian Federation

Electric Razor Day -- Jacob Schick patented the first electric razor on this day in 1937

Finnish Swedish Heritage Day -- Finland

Green March Day -- Morocco; Western Sahara

Gustavus Adolphus Day -- Sweden

Halfway Point of Autumn

International Day for Preventing the Exploitation of the Environment in War and Armed Conflict -- UN

International End Gossip Day -- the founder of this didn't want to be gossiped about, and left no trace

Marching Band Day -- birth anniversary of John Philip Sousa

Marooned Without A Compass Day -- internet generated; how's your sense of direction?

National Nachos Day / I Love Nachos Day

Saxophone Day -- Adolphe Sax birth anniversary

St. Illtyd's Day (Abbot, reputed cousin of King Arthur)

St. Leonard's Day (Patron of barrel makers/coopers, blacksmiths, captives, childbirth, coal miners, coppersmiths, greengrocers, horses, imprisoned people, locksmiths, miners, porters, P.O.W.'s, prisoners; Castelmauro, Italy; Conegliano, Italy; Kirkop, Malta; against burglaries, robberies/robbers)

Birthdays Today:

Ethan Hawke, 1970

Pat Tillman, 1976

Rebecca Romijn, 1972

Thandie Newton, 1972

Ethan Hawke, 1970

Kelly Rutherford, 1968

Lance Kerwin, 1960

Maria Shriver, 1955

Nigel Havers, 1949

Glenn Frey, 1948

Sally Field, 1946

Mike Nichols, 1931

Walter Perry Johnson, 1887

James Naismith, 1861

Ignace Paderewski, 1860

John Philip Sousa, 1854

Cesare Lombroso, 1835

Adolphe Sax, 1814

Debuting/Premiering Today:

"Good Morning America"(TV), 1975

"The Phil Donahue Show"(TV), 1967

"Meet The Press"(TV), 1947

Today in History:

Shipwrecked Spanish conquistador Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca becomes the first known European to set foot in Texas, 1528

Spain grants independence to the Dominican Republic, 1844

Scenes of Clerical Life, the first work of fiction by the author later known as George Eliot, is submitted for publication, 1856

Canada celebrates its first official, national Thanksgiving Day, 1879

Mohandas Gandhi is arrested while leading a march of Indian miners in South Africa, 1913

Colonel Jacob Schick patents the first electric razor, 1928

Edwin Armstrong presents his paper "A Method of Reducing Disturbances in Radio Signaling by a System of Frequency Modulation" to the New York section of the Institute of Radio Engineers (hello, FM radio!), 1935

Parker Brothers acquires the forerunner patents for MONOPOLY from Elizabeth Magie, 1935

Plutonium is first produced at the Hanford Atomic Facility, 1944

The United Nations General Assembly passes a resolution condemning South Africa's racist apartheid policies and calls for all UN member states to cease military and economic relations with the nation, 1962

Cuba and the United States formally agree to begin an airlift for Cubans who want to go to the United States, 1965

Green March begins: 300,000 unarmed Moroccans converge on the southern city of Tarfaya and wait for a signal from King Hassan II of Morocco to cross into Western Sahara, 1975

Australians vote to keep the Head of the Commonwealth as their head of state in the Australian republic referendum, 1999

Sweibodzin, Poland announced the world's largest statue of Jesus, called Christ the King, has been completed, 2010

Tammy Duckworth becomes the first disabled woman and first person born in Thailand to be elected to US Congress, 2012

Officials crack down on foreigners working illegally in Saudi Arabia and over 16,000 are arrested, 2013

According to a UN report, ISIS left behind over 200 mass graves containing thousands of victims in the area they once controlled, 2018

According to a study of over 400 million records on Ancestry and published in the journal Genetics, less than 10% of human longevity is due to our genes, 2018

The US Powerball jackpot rises to a world record of $1.9bn, 2022