Finding one’s comfort when life is anything but normal makes food, sleep, and everyday existence seem like a long vacation to nowhere. Finding joy with uncertainty is a task made of cement bricks.

As the year closes, not in the cheerfulness of the upcoming holidays, but rather in an exhausted breath of anxiety, we are reminded (in just a few weeks) a new year will force us to change the calendars. Can we dare hope for a more optimistic lifeline than the frayed one we’ve been holding onto:  preoccupied madness because of so many elephants in the room?

What will the new balance emerge in the NEW YEAR? Continue reading →

Inspiration for this writing is a reflection. October, years ago, my father died (age 52) from black lung cancer, after working half of his life in a steel mill. Coincidentally, I just finished re-reading the novel, A Raisin in the Sun, produced as a play, which I saw several times. One of my fondest memories was taking my nephew (Woodrow, named in honor of my father) and his classmate to Ashland, Oregon, to see the theater production of A Raisin in the Sun.

Lorraine Vivian Hansberry (May 19, 1930 – January 12, 1965) was a playwright and writer who died at the age of 34 of pancreatic cancer. She was the first African-American female author to have a play debuted on Broadway in 1959. Her work, A Raisin in the Sun, highlights the lives of Black Americans living under racial segregation in Chicago, as they attempt to improve their financial circumstances with an insurance payout following the death of the father. The title of the play was taken from the poem Harlem by Langston Hughes: “What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?” At the age of 29, Lorraine won the New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award—named the best play in 1959, making her the first African-American dramatist, the fifth woman, and the youngest playwright to do so.

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“Life, even in the hardest times, is full of moments to savor. They will not
come this way again—NOT IN THIS WAY.” Paula Rinehart

The kitchen calendar made me shake my head. Fear has mounted since the beginning of the year. Much of the last six months, my writing is bundled into short sessions of creativity. I laugh, for this is the first time in a long while; I’m not bound by a regular job. Happiness should be defined by my own schedule. Yet, COVID has changed everything and made me think I need a stronger lifeline. Continue reading →

Insanity Is A Mere Reflection Of What Has Happened Today

Author C.L. Charlesworth shares a childhood memory of herself as a young girl with her father.

When I close my eyes, blue skies make me happy, because they are of my childhood. Fears were really absent, except from the occasional bully (who I eventually befriended).  My parents, the church, extended family, and peaceful, multi-cultural neighbors gave me a good foundation.

As an adult, I admit, I’ve lost my footing.

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Recognizing (and accepting) one’s power isn’t hard if you have wisdom. Not everyone processes the right wisdom to avoid crossing the street against oncoming traffic—because they don’t trust instincts.

“For age is opportunity no less than youth itself, though in another dress, and as the evening twilight fades away. The sky is filled with stars, invisible by day.” —Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

My grandmother, who lived to be over 100 years old, imprinted her wisdom—think for yourself and be an honest and compassionate person. Not all people would Grandma invite or even want in her home, let alone sit on her porch. Grandma was particular, not liking phony people, or those who drew a breath off someone’s misfortune. Grandma’s father, a Seminole Indian, and mother, a runaway slave, had a wagon full of children, who lived in Florida’s wooded swamps. As the eldest grandchild, I grew up hearing Grandma weave a quilt of stories from her Native American and Slavery Heritage. Continue reading →