No Excuse

Coyotes yipping on the hill across the road in the hours before dawn and their voices entered my dream world as screams; heck of a way to start the day.

These entries are written on the fly.  Sometimes I will develop a subject beforehand if an event occurs or a word intrigues me.  Sometimes I stare at the blank screen without hope.  I do proofread several times before posting anything; even so, I may have to go back and make a correction, as I did with yesterday's entry.  I had written "...the woman that lived...."  Rereading it this morning, the error leaped up and slapped me.  I can remember Teacher saying, "People are 'who' and 'which;' things are 'that.'"  My apologies, Teacher.  "...the woman who lived...."

Life was easier when there were rules.  Rules were the oil that greased the cogs of society and smoothed the way for interaction.  Rules were the formalization of courtesy.  There were books of etiquette, Roberts Rules of Order, even Ann Landers, for crying out loud.  There were consequences for not following the rules.  Ignoring an RSVP meant one would not be on the next invitation list.  Rules for English (which, I will say, is a very confusing, sometimes ambiguous language) are meant to clarify communication; no need to speak to the consequences of muddy writing.  Going over one of my children's homework, I noted there was a lack of punctuation and capitalization.  "Teacher said that wasn't important."  Say what?!  I spoke with Teacher.  "Oh, we don't want to stifle their creative juices."  That might have worked for e e cummings, but it didn't fly in my house.  Said child was required to rewrite that piece before handing it in.  Even creative juices need discipline.  Everyone knew what the rules were.  Not everyone followed them, but knew that they were breaking one and expected, if caught, to suffer consequences without excuses.  There is something to be said for The Good Old Days.

And that's all I have to say about that!  (Obviously, not much went on here at the farm yesterday.)