poetry

The Liebster Award Nomination!

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Thank you to Dainelle Hunter for nominating me for the Liebster Award! It means a lot to me that you thought of me. 🙂 I hope this gives readers more of an insight into my writing and what this blog is about.

www.adashofsalter.com_

The rules are as follows:

1: Thank the blog who nominated you and link back to them.
2: Make a blog post telling 11 facts about you.
3: Answer the 11 questions from the blog who nominated you.
4: Prepare 11 questions for those you will nominate.
5: Nominate 11 new bloggers (those who have less than 200 followers) by commenting in one of their blog posts.

11 Facts About Me:

~My favorite TV Show of all time is Firefly. (FireflyThe fact that it only had one season is an atrocity.

~I only write with one with kind of pen. (Gel pen, black ink, pilot G-2 07.)

~I hate memes where the sentences are deliberately spelled wrong, drives me nuts! (Like: ‘he’s doin me a hurtin’….grrrraaggh)

~I like to write movie and TV show reviews.wpid-img_20140602_185717984.jpg

~I love libraries and books stores.

~I am a tea drinker, love tea.

~I love being outdoors; the trees, the quietness.

~I have an obsession with nicknames. A lot of my characters have nicknames. I think its interesting how people/characters are much more than the names they are given, and the ones they’ve grown into.

~I am a dog person. I like cats, too. But if I were to have one pet it’d be a golden retriever, lab, or a mix.

~My favorite color is now purple. (It used to be blue but my grandma passed recently and that was also her color.)

~I own about five different Star Wars t-shirts.

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Answering 11 Questions for being Nominated:

1. Why did you start blogging?

  • I started blogging to get myself to write an least something a day. I wasn’t writing anymore and it worried me. I would go weeks without writing anything. I started blogging just to get back into writing.

2. What do you love/ hate about blogging?

  • I love how freeing blogging is. It really is like writing in a diary, you can feel free to be yourself and that’s that.  I hate that I don’t have the time to write daily or more quality posts.

3.What is your philosophy?

  • I’d say…Live life to the fullest, no regrets.

4.What career are you pursuing/ What is your occupation and why?

  • I still don’t know what I want to be when I grow up. Ideally a writer, who actually makes money. 😛 Right now I’m in data entry.

5.Where do you see yourself in 5 years?

  • Hopefully published! And working on other projects.

6.Who is your favorite fictional character?

  • I’ve always loved Spike from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. He is supposed to be the bad guy, but by the end of the show you can’t help but love him. He’s so pathetic and amusing.

7. What is your favorite movie?

  • I have a lot. Inception, Star Wars (of course), Princess Bride, Guardians of the Galaxy are probably the top faves though.

8.What is your favorite book/ quote?

  • I am a big fan of Maggie Steifvater. All of her words are great. But I really loved this one from The Dream Theives:

“There are three kinds of secrets. One is the sort everyone knows about, the sort you need at least two people for. One to keep it. One to never know. The second is a harder kind of secret: one you keep from yourself. Every day, thousands of confessions are kept from their would-be confessors, none of these people knowing that their never-admitted secrets all boil down to the same three words: I am afraid.”

9.  What is your zodiac sign?

  • Gemini.

10. What is your biggest fear?

  • Fear of failure is a big one for me.

11. Describe the strangest dream you’ve ever had.

  • I had a dream I was a dolphin once. I was leaping in and out of waves, it was so much fun and exhilarating…and then I woke up.

Questions for Nominees:

  1. What is your favorite book of all time?
  2. Why did you start blogging?
  3. What is your biggest fear?
  4. If you could have a super power, what would it be and why?
  5. What is your favorite kind of food?
  6. What is your favorite movie?
  7. What is your favorite thing to do during the Summer?
  8. What is your Zodiac sign?
  9. Do you believe in the supernatural? (Vampires, werewolves, ghosts?)
  10. Describe your strangest dream.
  11. What would you say is the best thing about you?

And that’s that! I can’t wait to read what you guys come up with!

Hope everyone has a great weekend! 🙂

Poem: Uninspired

/ Ajmorse / 2 Comments

Want to write a poem
And not sure what to say
Feeling uninspired
Exhausted from the day

Should I tell a story?
Should I make it sad?
Lies and disappointments
That’s all I ever had

At least for today with
Work and fewer smiles
Don’t do this you slaves!
Yeah, I’ll think on that awhile

Good to know I matter
I love to see the praise
Yeah and guess what?
Where’s my f**king raise?

Ah, but I digress
Not the point of this poem
Writing relieves the stress
With the comforts of home

So go forth and write!
Be lovely, fun and crazy!
(But don’t be like me,
I’m so f**king lazy!)

Bahaha…I miss rhyming, it’s so silly and fun! Hope everyone has a great night!

Happy writing!

Happy Mother’s Day, Grandma…I Miss You

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I’ve been sitting here for the last half an hour on Wikipedia reading about Reba McEntire, about her recent divorce, her relationship with Kelly Clarkson, and the plot to Reba’s show, Malibu Country, which got cancelled about three years ago.

I haven’t suddenly become obsessed with Reba McEntire, (although I’ve always liked country music,) I’m stalling.

grandma roseA year ago today, May 8th, we lost someone special to us in our family. My grandmother, Dorothy, passed away from cancer. Today is Mother’s Day, but I’ll never get to say hello to her again.

Which is why…the stalling. I know I want to write something to honor her, but I don’t know where to begin. With all the poems I wrote about her in the past year? With our last conversation? The words of Reba McEntire’s song, “What Do You Say” keeps repeating itself in my head.

“What do you say in a moment like this? When you can’t find the words to tell it like it is?”

My heart breaks a little. What do you say?

Dear Grandma,

I miss you.

Love, Amanda

There really isn’t much more to say. I said it all before in the poems I wrote for her: For Grandma, Not Goodbye, Baseball Memories, Up and Up, and Big Picture.

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My sister, Anna, me and Grandma in the back seat of the car on some road trip, over ten years ago; laughing and being goofy.

P.S.  I remember the last time we spoke, Grandma, I made you laugh. I told you something that Lilly had said, and I made you laugh. You were in pain, but my last moment with you…I made you laugh. One day, I’ll type out that conversation. I’ll put it in a memoir and tell everyone how much your house smelled like you, how it felt so quiet, and cold with you down for the count, and everyone wondering, “Is it time?”

But no, one spring afternoon at the end of April, while you were lying on the couch, too weak to get up, I made you laugh. And it warms my heart like nothing else.

I love you, Grandma.  Happy Mother’s Day.

Poem: Saturday Night

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Pirated Deadpool
Ate pasta
Bread and sauce
And goodness
Broke the fourth wall
And eachother’s
Energy
Dead like Deadpool
But still got limbs
And hearts
And loneliness
Crawl into bed
With a good book
A book friend
Waiting to be held

:p This one is silliness! In case you didn’t catch it, we watched some Deadpool tonight. I love Ryan Reynolds, so great. The movie was awesome… Totally inappropriate for young ones, but still great.

Hope you guys are having a great night!

Silly Haikus and Pain Meds

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Sore, hurt, shoulder pain

I wonder what will happen,

at work tomorrow…

 

Bones ache, and head dreams

of something soft and fluffy

flying clouds and pain

 

If I were a cloud

and you were something tasty

I’d eat you for lunch

 

sick and eating junk

they don’t taste like pills I know

sleepy drunk pain meds

I strained a muscle in my back/shoulder region on Wednesday, so today was spent in a sleepy drunk stupor…never taken those muscle relaxers before. Boy, do they make for an interesting time. Thought I’d try to express it in some haikus tonight.

Happy Writing!

Spring Cleaning – About this Blog update and New Header Image

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Doing a bit of spring cleaning on the blog tonight. I realized a few days ago, how much different my blog is now from when I started out.

It seemed to take a while for me to find my niche, and then when I finally realized I was being silly and over-complicating matters, I am happy that I can finally pin down what I want from this blog and what to look for here.

I am a writer, so why not write about what that means to me? My thoughts on being a writer? My struggles: from story writing to finding a bit of creative inspiration…

The world’s the limit, also, I like to write poetry and flash fiction, too! Why do I have to make everything so difficult for myself sometimes?? Sigh.

Here’s the link to my new updated page: About this Blog.

Also, there is a new header image of my favorite books for now. I am still deciding if I want to change it to something different…so that’ll probably be updated soon. Hope everyone is having a great night!

Happy Writing!

Poem: Hold/These Arms

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This was meant to be something else entirely. I’ve been watching some of Bindi Irwin’s dance routines from dancing with the stars. I don’t normally watch the show, but I’ve been cheering her on from the beginning. She’s such a wonderfully positive person, and I guess I was inspired by her.

Hold/These Arms

These are my arms
Every freckle, every scar
The heel of my hand
Bony, creased and wrinkled
These hands have been
Sanded down by desktops.
See the blue veins,
The purple, the red
Several tiny waterfalls
Sliding down
The pulse of my wrist

Further down
And inside
The skin is pale
A flick of the wrist
Some hair
And more freckles
These ones burned on
By the sun

These arms are thin
And always moving
Weakened by heavy loads,
Low blood sugar
And the flu.

Hold a candle to them
They burn
Hold a lamp
And the skin lightens
But put them up
Against life’s little troubles:
A broken down car, a
Sickness, a work drama

And show me someone
Who is suffering
And these arms will fold,
Beat back
and hold up the world
So they can rise above it

To MFA degree…or to not?

/ Ajmorse / 8 Comments

Remember when writing was fun?

 

I’ve seem to forgotten that lately. Back in my college days, Writing Workshop was fun. I spent those three-hour classes just letting go. I wrote my heart on the page and I felt free. I felt so relaxed and in-tuned with my inner self, that now four years out of college, I seem to be having a hard time remembering those days.

Sometimes I’ll have my moments in the sun. I’ll write a few pages to a story I haven’t touched in a while. I’ll write a new poem. I’ll come up with a new story idea. I might take a week and work solely on one project, (for once.)

And then by next week it’s all trashed again. Remember those bills I got to pay? That work or job I don’t want to go to? Those places I want to travel? Those mountains I want to see?

What will I find in the shadows of the mountains? Is the California sun really as bright as it looks on TV?

I keep telling myself that writing is my dream, but more than lately I feel like writing seems to be what I’ve been using as an excuse to get to those places. Can’t be a best seller if I don’t write…right? Can’t make money if I’m not a best seller and everyone knows that you can’t travel without money.

Sigh. I’ve just been so bored with life lately. Nothing inspires me. I love being busy, but when I’m not…suddenly I have a hard time breathing. I never knew that a person could get anxiety just by simply doing nothing?

Someone would think that with all this down time I should be using it to write, but sometimes I feel like I don’t have enough life experiences to write anything remotely interesting.

Now that brings me to my next thought: What if I went back to grad school?

I’ve been toying with the idea back and forth to get an MFA (Master of Fine Arts Degree) in Creative Writing and I spent some time today reading some pros and cons to such a venture.

Some people argue that the MFA degree in some areas has become so structural. That you often become influenced by the program that your writing changes as a result. It changes because you’re told that the world is looking for a particular type or style, while other people argue that it’s not really worth the debt that you’ll be potentially putting yourself in. It’s no secret that college in the U.S. is expensive.

Others say that yes, the MFA degree is for those that are looking to get back in the craft, (or it used to be,) to fine-tune writing that already has great potential.

Whatever the reason, an MFA could…inspire. Or put me in more debt.

The pro for me would be getting out seeing new places of the world, and getting back into that writing world, which I not only dream about lately, I yearn for it.

The con would be uprooting my life that I have now, a boyfriend, leaving family, a lack of money and where would I work while getting a grad degree?

But I can’t seem to get rid of that distant dream that has always been beckoning me on the horizon. Although an MFA degree might not be particularly useful in the job industry, (I mean, honestly, what English degree is nowadays,) it would be wonderful just being back in a college environment again. Oh, I miss it. I really do.

And I could always pursue journalism, or something.

What do you guys think? Where do you stand on the whole MFA issue?

I figure if J. K. Rowling can go without…that means something. But it doesn’t mean that someone can’t benefit from going back, right? Hmm. Certainly deserves some thought.

My Likes and Dislikes, an Amelie-Inspired Post

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I recently watched Amelie again, which is an adorable french film about a very shy young woman, who appreciates the small things in life and how she finds love. Although socially awkward Amelie should be miserable and lonely, she takes joy in small pleasures like:

‘Dipping her hand in sacks of grain, cracking creme brulee with a teaspoon, and skipping stones at St Martin’s Canal.’

9999It’s both simple and beautiful in an unsuspecting way, and I just love it. On the opposite spectrum are other characters dislikes: like puckered fingers in the bathtub, wet bathing suit shorts that stick to the skin, and the touch of someone you don’t know.

There is a lot of focus on the detail and that’s what makes it so great. I thought I’d make a list of my own just for fun:wpid-img_20150508_165734016.jpgAmanda is a shy yet passionate writer. She likes when men give their girlfriend’s flowers, running her fingers through the scruff on her boyfriend’s cheek, and driving down a long stretch of road with the sun on her face. 

wpid-img_20140602_185717984.jpg She likes listening to songs that make her cry, and the sweet yet, chewy taste of a warm chocolate chip cookie when you bite into it. Amanda likes when the colors of her food compliment each other, but she hates it when restaurants use too much salt.wpid-img_20141014_173831795.jpg
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She dislikes long lines at the grocery store, scraping ice off her car windshield in the early morning, and when parents yell at their children in public.

She likes the smell of old books when you first open them and the crunch of potato chips after drinking a nice, cold Pepsi.

I think this is something that I could go on and on with, but why not try one of your own? It’s fun, trust me!

Happy Saturday everyone!

Poem: Freedom and the 4th

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I kept thinking yesterday was Saturday because I had the day off, but today IS Saturday and it is also the 4th, and to me, that means family, freedom and fireworks! Oh, and hotdogs. I make sure I consume at least one hotdog around this time of year. Usually at a cook out. With pasta salads. And watermelon. And cupcake desserts.

Source: deviantart.com

Source: deviantart.com

Anyway, we wouldn’t be here celebrating the 4th, if it weren’t for the brave soldiers many years ago, who made that dream a reality.

Free our troops

Really free them

Each sacrifice is sacred

Each life is special

Don’t forget the lives

Our soldiers give up, but

Mostly: Pray they come home

Pray they come home safe!

I am eternally grateful to the men and women in service and the sacrifices that they have made and continue to make on a daily basis. Without them, we would not be here to celebrate the freedom we so desperately love on this independence day. Thank you all!

Happy July 4th everyone! 🙂