Ford Resurrects a Legend

She stepped out with him, then studied the black Mustang. "You own a car."

"This is not merely a car, and to call it such is very female."

"And to say that is very sexist. Okay, if it's not a car, what is it?"

"It's a machine."

"I stand corrected."

Blue Dahlia

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By Stahlkocher - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, 
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=308499

Steve McQueen's speed machine gets a muscle-y 480hp upgrade.

The Mustang Bullitt is cool. But it would be cool whether it was called the Bullitt or the 5.0 SVO or the GT Dark Green Edition. Its coolness is innate and not tied to the time Steve McQueen ripped up the streets of San Francisco in a mean green Mustang back in 1968.

Popular Mechanics

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"So, you're into classic cars."

He settled behind the wheel. The minute he turned the key the radio exploded with Marvin Gaye. Byron turned it down to a murmur before cruising through the lot.

"Sixty-five Mustang with a 289 V-8. A car like this isn't just a mode of transportation. It's a commitment."

"Really?" She liked the creamy white bucket seats, the trained-panther ride, but couldn't think of anything more impractical than owning a car older than she was. "Don't you have to spend a lot of time babying it, finding parts?''

"That's the commitment. Runs like a dream," he added with an affectionate stroke to the dash as he merged into traffic.

Holding the Dream

Anticipating and savoring the sunrise

Some mornings the sun seemed to rise more slowly than others, as if nature wanted to show off her particular majesty just a bit longer. 

When she’d gone to bed, Kate had left her shades up knowing that the morning light would awaken her before the travel alarm beside her bed rang.

She took the dawn as a gift to herself, something individual and personal. 

Standing at the window, she watched it bloom. 

The first quiet breeze of morning drifted through the screen to run over her hair and face, through the thin material of her nightshirt, cool and promising. 

While she stood, Kate absorbed the colors, the light and the silent thunder of day breaking over water.

The lazy contemplation was far different from her structured routine of the past months and

years. Mornings had been a time to dress, a time to run over her schedule and notes for the day’s classes over two cups of coffee and a quick breakfast. She never had time to give herself the dawn, so she took it now.

Treasures Lost, Treasures Found

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By Kotofeij K. Bajun - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, 

https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2006390

But most of us have watched the sunrise, at some point or another. It can be a painful experience, if you’ve waited through a long dark night, and found yourself watching the east for light, for hope, for a beginning or an ending, but weighted with sorrow.

Or it can be a joyful moment, especially if you went to a special vantage point, moving up to it in the dark, in pre-dawn gloom, and were where you could enjoy to the fullest the gathering light moving up in advance of the breaking forth of the sun’s rays over a distant horizon.

NEWARK ADVOCATE

World Poetry Day 21 March

“There’s a copy of Byron downstairs.”

Despite her determination not to, Kate looked toward him again. “Byron?”

“I bought it after you left. The words are wonderful.” He had the three buttons undone with such quick expertise, she never noticed. “But I could always hear the way you’d say them. I remember one night on the beach, when the moon was full on the water. I don’t remember the name of the poem, but I remember how it started, and how it sounded when you said it. ‘It is the hour’,” he began, then smiled at her.

“‘It is the hour’,” Kate continued, “‘when from the boughs the nightingale is heard/It is the hour when lovers’ vows seem sweet in every whisper’d word/And gentle winds, and waters near make music to the lonely ear’…” She trailed off, remembering even the scent of that night.

Treasures Lost, Treasures Found

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~~~WORLD POETRY DAY~~~

Classic Cars

"So, you're into classic cars."

He settled behind the wheel. The minute he turned the key the radio exploded with Marvin Gaye. Byron turned it down to a murmur before cruising through the lot.

"Sixty-five Mustang with a 289 V-8. A car like this isn't just a mode of transportation. It's a

commitment."

"Really?" She liked the creamy white bucket seats, the trained-panther ride, but couldn't think of anything more impractical than owning a car older than she was. "Don't you have to spend a lot of time babying it, finding parts?''

"That's the commitment. Runs like a dream," he added with an affectionate stroke to the dash as he merged into traffic. "She was my first."

"First what? First car?"

"That's right." He grinned at her baffled stare. "Bought her when I was seventeen. She's got over two hundred thousand miles on her and still purrs like a kitten."

Kate would have said it was more "roars like a lion," but that wasn't her problem. "Nobody keeps their first car. It's like your first lover."

"Exactly." He downshifted, eased around a turn. "As it happens, I had my first lover in the backseat, one sweet summer night. Pretty Lisa Montgomery." He sighed reminiscently. "She opened a window to paradise for me, God bless her."

"A window to paradise." Unable to resist, Kate craned her neck and studied the pristine backseat. It wasn't very difficult to imagine two young bodies groping. "All that in the back of an old Mustang."

"Classic Mustang," he corrected.

Holding the Dream

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Nine Unreliable Classic Cars We Can't Help but Want

Some bad decisions are still worth making.

MSN

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She spotted the car now, a low-slung beast in shining black. “That's quite a car.” 

“It's heading toward cold tonight. I didn't think you'd want the bike.” 

She walked off the portico and had to admire the lines. Del had been right. It was very slick. 

“It looks new, but it's not.” 

“Older than I am, but it's a nice ride.” He opened the door for her. She slid in. It smelled of leather and man, a combination that only made her more aware of being female.

When he got in beside her, turned the ignition, the engine made her think of a fist, coiled and ready to strike.

“So, tell me about the car.” 

“Sixty-six Corvette.” 

“And?” He glanced at her, then shot up the drive. 

“She moves.” 

“I can see that.” 

“Four-speed close-ratio trans, 427 CID with high-lift camshaft, dual side-mount exhausts.” 

“What's the reason for a close-ratio transmission? I assume that was transmission, and the close ratio means there's not much difference between the gears.” 

“You got it. It's for engines tuned for max power—sports cars—so the operating speeds have a narrow range. It puts the driver in charge.” 

“There wouldn't be any point having a car like this if you weren't.”

Happy Ever After

Single Girl's Guide to Decorating

He wandered out of the living room, into the bedroom that held nothing more than a closet, which was already full of clothes, a few boxes and a rug that he figured probably cost the equivalent of a year's rent for him. 

"Where are you going to sleep?"

"I'm expecting a sofa bed to be delivered today. I want to take my time picking out a real bed."

Waiting for Nick

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By Castelaa - Own work, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=8957842

best tips on how to pimp out your bachelorette pad

MY DOMAINE

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"Mama, Dad," Katie called out from the bedroom. "Come here. You've got to get a load of this!"

"My bed," Freddie explained to her puzzled parents. "It just came yesterday."

It was, if she said so herself, utterly fabulous. 

The spacious room had allowed her to indulge in king-size, and she'd chosen a head and foot board of iron, painted a soft green, like copper patina-ted over time. The rods curved in a graceful semicircle, and were accented by metal flowers and small exotic birds in flight.

"Wow" was all Brandon could say with his mouth full of the scorned rabbit food.

"Great, isn't it?" Lovingly Freddie ran her fingers over the bars, and along the ivory-toned lace of the spread she'd chosen.

"Like sleeping in a fairy tale," Natasha murmured.

"Exactly." Freddie beamed. If anyone would understand and appreciate the sentiment, she knew it would be her mother.

Waiting for Nick

You Can Garden for Nature

He'd planted something at regular intervals along the fencing. She could see tender young plants and the carefully packed mulch around them. She imagined he'd done the digging there himself.

Some sort of trailing flowering vine, she supposed, that would, in time, grow and tumble color over the fence.

A patient man, Byron De Witt, she mused. One who would enjoy watching those vines grow and bloom and tangle year after year.

And she knew he would experience a quiet satisfaction when the first bud blossomed. Then he would tend it. The man enjoyed tending things.

Holding the Dream

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Landscape by Minnetonka Landscape Architects & Landscape Designers Holm Design & Consulting LLC

No matter your aesthetic preference — from formal to informal, straight lines to wavy borders — you can garden in a way that honors and supports wildlife and the land that intersects with your landscape.

HOUZZ

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She made four trips, her Glock against her hip, her dog trotting at her heels before she began to lay out the plan she’d sketched out on chilly winter nights.

The cardinal flowers and coneflowers, the sweet-scented heliotrope mixed with airy lantana, the flow of verbena, the charm of New England asters, the elegance of oriental lilies for nectar. She had the sunflowers and hollyhocks and milkweed for host plants to tempt the adults to lay their eggs, the young caterpillars to feed.

She arranged, rearranged, grouped, regrouped, gradually veering away from her initial, somewhat mathematical layout when she found the less rigid and exact pleased her eye.

In case, she took out her phone and took pictures from several angles before she picked up her trowel to dig the first hole.

An hour later, she stepped back and checked her progress before going inside for ice to add to the tea she’d left steeping in the sun.

“It’s going to be beautiful,” she told Bert. “And we’ll be able to sit on the porch and watch the butterflies. I think we’ll draw hummingbirds, too. I’ll love seeing all this grow and bloom, the butterflies and birds. We’re putting down roots, Bert. The deeper they go, the more I want them.”

The Witness

When Life imitates Art

"Look at them, Daddy. Aren't they wonderful?"

She walked to them, feeling the music. And when her father put her hand in Brady's, it was steady and sure.

"Kate." As her father had, Brody lifted her hand to his lips. "I'll make her happy," he said to Spence, then looked into Kate's eyes. "You make me happy."

"You look pretty." Forgetting himself Jack bounced in his new shoes. 

His voice carried through the church. "You look really pretty. Mom."

Her heart, already full, overflowed. 

She bent to him, kissed his cheek. "I love you, Jack. You're mine now," she told him, then straightened, met Brady's eyes. "And so are you."

She passed her bouquet to her sister, took Jack's hand in her free one.

And married them both.

Considering Kate

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Groom’s touching vows to bride’s daughter go viral

"Boutonniere-whitesuit" by David Ball - Own work. 

Licensed under CC BY 2.5 via Wikimedia Commons

A wedding video is going viral, and not because of a cleverly choreographed bridal party dance or a flower girl throwing a tantrum. The part of the video that stole the show is the groom Brian Scott’s vows to his bride Whitney Kay’s young daughter, Brielle. 

He said, “I promise to always hold your hand and skip with you down the street and bring comfort to your life. I vow to make you say your prayers before you eat. I promise to read you stories at night, to always tuck you in real tight. I vow to show you how a man should treat a woman in my relationship with your mother. And above all else, I vow to protect you, care for you, and love you forever.”

Not surprisingly, there was not a dry eye in the house. 

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ground rules for dating a single dad

Freddie played with the edge of her blanket. "Will you come and see me when I'm not sick?"
"I think I might." She leaned over to make a grab and came up with a mewing kitten. "And to see Lucy and Desi."
"And Daddy."
Cautious, Natasha scratched the kitten's ears. "Yes, I suppose."
"You like him, don't you?"
"Yes. He's a very good teacher."
"He likes you, too." Freddie didn't add that she had seen her father kiss Natasha at the foot of her bed just the night before, when they'd thought she was asleep. Watching them had given her a funny feeling in her stomach. But after a minute it had been a good funny feeling. "Will you marry him and come and live with us?"
"Well, is that a proposal?" Natasha managed to smile. "I think it's nice that you'd want me to, but I'm only friends with your daddy. Like I'm friends with you."
"If you came to live with us, we'd still be friends."
The child, Natasha reflected, was as clever as her father.

Taming Natasha

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Great news: You just met a wonderful guy! ... Yes, you’re dating a divorced dad, and he’s a tricky species, indeed. Whatever rules you’ve applied to dating in the past, just throw them out the window. Because when it comes to having a relationship with a man who has kids, you’ll need to follow a whole new set of guidelines.

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"And you've done everything you can to give him a happy and normal life. Don't you see how much I admire that? How much I respect it?"
Flustered, he stared at her. He'd never thought of parenting as admirable. "It's what I'm supposed to do.
Thinking of him first, that's how it has to be. It's not just you and me, Kate. If it were… but it's not. A change like this—a life-altering one—he has to be in on it."
"And who's saying differently?" she demanded.
"Well, damn it. I can't just go tell him I'm getting married, just like that. I need to talk to him about it, prepare him. So do you. That's the kind of thing you'd be taking on. He needs to be as sure of you as he is of me."
"For heaven's sake, O'Connell, don't you think I've taken all of that into account? You've known me for months now. You ought to be able to give me more credit."
"It's not a matter of—"
"It was Jack who asked me to marry you in the first place."
Brody stared into her flushed and furious face, then held up his hands. "I have to sit down." He backed up, dropped down on a flattened stump. Because the dog was shoving the rope into his lap, Brody tossed it. "What did you just say?"
"Am I speaking English?" she demanded. "Jack proposed to me yesterday. Apparently he doesn't have as much trouble making up his mind as his father. He asked me to marry you, both of you. And I've never had a lovelier offer."

 

Considering Kate

Ballerina Irina Dvorovenko: ‘All Artists Are Very Vulnerable’

 

“All ballet dancers, all artists, are very vulnerable,” Dvorovenko said. “There are so many insecurities because it’s a huge responsibility and you’re dealing with discipline, routine and pain. From an early age, you have to learn how to control yourself. And have tremendous inner strength.”

 

“The ballet world is pretty hidden,” Dvorovenko continued. 

 “We dedicate our life to it. The audience sees beauty, grace, glamour, lightness, passion. Behind the curtain it’s a very difficult routine and strict discipline.”

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