Rewrite Or Accept

This week's Booking Through Thursday question was
"If you could rewrite the ending of any book, which book would it be?"

Interesting question, but actually I couldn’t think of any book I’d really like to rewrite the ending of. There may have been books I felt that way about, just after reading them, but none pop into mind just now. Either I’ve forgotten, or the problem went deeper than just changing the ending!

However, the question did remind me of heated discussions about the last book in the Harry Potter series (Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows, 2007). Reading some of the other BTT-comments, I saw that I wasn’t the only one. So I decided to expand a little on that; digging out some comments that I wrote in a HP discussion forum about six months after the publication. If you're interested, pop over to Through My Spectrespecs (= my own, not very frequently updated Harry Potter blog).

Season Moving Fast

'

I’m walking slowly
through a season moving fast
the leaves are falling

            ♥ 

Scroll down or click here for my previous post today:
Permission To Move Hell

Unexpected Flashbacks

Yesterday, I had a surprise, since suddenly on my Blogger reading list, a very familiar-looking photo appeared. But I had not posted it! Not recently, anyway… However, I knew that I had posted another photo of the same building only the day before. For a second or two, I was very bewildered indeed!

Then my brain started working again. I realized what blog the picture was on: Write With Pictures. A blog to which I have given permission to use my pictures. I also realized that in my recent Picture Book post (Museum Church), I had linked back to an older post (17th century church) where this photo was included. So the whole thing was not at all as strange as it first seemed!

The Write With Pictures ‘Monday Meme’ means sharing “what memories that come to mind” when looking at the picture. Hm! Since it was my own photo, and I had revisited the place only two days ago, of course it brought back memories!

So I wrote down what went through my head. And after having done that, I decided to go back here and repeat some of it, and add a couple of more photos. And words.

♥-♥-♥

I think it was two years ago one year ago that I last went inside, one day when the door was open. Coming in from the bright light outside, it was so dark in there that I had very little idea what I was taking photos of. But I did take some flash photos. Not until I was back home, getting the photos up on the computer screen, could I see the details.

Now this reminds me of two things:

1. Some doors are not always open.
We have to find them at the right moment.

 
When I was there last, the door was closed.

  
When I took this picture, the door was open.

2. Sometimes we do not really see things clearly until in retrospect.

 
Collection of old keys inside the porch; and a box, in which visitors can leave a contribution to the maintenance of the church. I think it is probably supposed to be St Peter on the pillar. Or maybe that’s just how my mind wanders because of the keys in the background. It was to Peter that Jesus said: “on this rock I will build my church” and “I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 16:18-19)

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” John 1:1

“The true light that gives light to every man was coming into the world. He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world would not recognize him.” (John 1:9-10)

Quotation of the Week (41/2010)

“You know you’re getting old when you stoop to tie your shoelaces and wonder what else you could do while you’re down there.”

~ George Burns (1896 – 1996) ~

Another quote I came across while trying to find out who the man behind last week’s quotation was... American actor, writer and comedian who lived to be no less than 100 years old. I have no idea how old he was when he first uttered these words, though! ;)

About Haircuts and Years Gone By

 

Earlier this week, I had an appointment with my hairdresser. Mentioning this to a male friend, he kind of assumed that meant ’an afternoon out’. I replied that if you include the time it took me to get there and back, which means a bus ride one way and quite a long walk back afterwards, it could be called that. The actual “hairdressing”, though, is usually a pretty quick and straightforward thing with me. About half an hour if I go to my usual hairdresser. With my neck-and-shoulder problems, what I need is a hairdo that requires a minimum of daily effort to keep up; and which also does not suddenly turn into complete chaos after six weeks. Hence, I’ve given up pretending that my hair is really gorgeously thick, or naturally curly, or quite the same colour as twenty years ago.

I know I’ve not been too generous with pictures of myself on this blog (or any other blog, for that matter). I’m usually behind the camera, not in front of it. One sharp-eyed reader with good memory recalled in a comment to yesterday’s post (where you did get a glimpse of me) that in my previous blog header I had appeared to be brunette. And now - subtly implied - I was not…? I had to laugh… For one thing, the picture referred to was from the early 1990s. For another, it was taken against the light so really just a silhouette, not revealing details. That’s why I thought I could get away with it… (LOL)

For you who might have forgotten, or joined me since I last changed my header, here is the picture I used:

 
1992 – south coast of Sweden near Ystad

Some years back, I had a “Memory CD” made from a choice of photos taken with my old Olympus camera (including the one above). Here are a few more:

 
1984 (age 28), in the flat where I was living then.

1988, on the west coast

 
1992, I think… (town of Borås in the background)

  
1995 - 40th birthday, with friends

 
50th birthday (taken by friend with her camera)

 
2010 – up to date, in my study.

I’m still trying to persuade myself some days that that’s ash blond, not gray. (Cameras can’t be trusted, right?)

Oh, who am I kidding…

PS. Two posts today. Scroll down or click here for the other one.

Licensed to Blog?

Yesterday, it seems I managed to use a blog title from a meme I did not know existed. Had I been in a different mood when I was made aware, perhaps I would have joined in. But I’m not, so I won’t - not this weekend, anyway. Maybe some other time…

Today, in my morning paper, there was an ad for the college in the town where I live, with a list of courses they have to offer. What a lot of things you can study these days. How about, for example, a course called “The Theory and Practice of Blogging”…? (No, I’m not joking. There is one.)

Maybe I was too lighthearted and amateurish in my Tuesday post this week… Maybe in the future we’ll need a license to be allowed to even get started. No more playing around just to see what happens.. We’ll need to know all the Blog Traffic Signs first, and pass a Blogging  Test to prove that we master the arts of Linking and Commenting and giving proper Credit, and whatever…

Weekend Reflections

After a gray morning, today turned out one of those almost unbelievably crisp and clear and sunny autumn days. I had intended to go into town, but changed my mind, and went for a much longer walk. The long way round, and many photos later, I ended up in the town centre after all.

I just downloaded around 300 pictures from the camera to the computer. 200 from today, the rest from earlier this week. I don’t know where to start! I’m sure not all of them are of blog-worthy quality, but you might be seeing autumn colours on my blogs long after all the leaves have fallen from the trees outside…

I chose some “reflection” pictures for this post.

The first two were taken by a little lake which is a bird sanctuary. (Link goes to a post from last year.)

The third is a mirror reflection of the photographer (i.e. me), in town. The mirrors are on a wall on one side of the river, reflecting the trees in the town park on the other side of the river. So I’m facing the wall and the mirror, and the trees are behind me. (The link goes to a post in my Picture Book back in June, where you can see the whole mirror wall along the promenade.)

Turning around, facing the park, I got the view in the fourth picture.

The last picture was taken from one of the bridges over the river, looking towards another one.