Nature can be so beautiful, and so cruel. Sad days ahead for those who lost family and friends in the tornado that tore a deadly path through Oklahoma yesterday. Let’s hope that search and rescue teams find more people alive.
Oscar Wilde
“Education is an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing that is worth knowing can be taught.”
‘Tis a soft day thank God
The rain, even paced and misty, falls steadily today. It reminds me of Ireland. Maybe that’s what made the great classical Irish writers sit down with pen and paper and write; the rainy weather.
I have been thinking about Ireland, the writers and heroes she produced over the years; or more precisely the wives or women connected with Irish writers and heroes.
To be married to a writer, hero, or soon to be legend is no easy task. In fact, there are times when I wouldn’t like being married to me at all. I would hate it. 
When I sit and type the stories in my head, the people around me must be quiet, and that’s impossible with a teenage son and a husband whose hearing isn’t what it used to be. So I write when I am alone in the house. No music and no television, just me, a keyboard and a screen. We’re a finicky bunch, us writers, that’s for sure.
Something my husband said a while ago promoted me to write this post, in conjunction with a quote I just read on Facebook. The quote, by F. Scott Fitzgerald, an Irish name by the way, is this:
“Show me a hero and I’ll write you a tragedy.”
That quote struck me. My response to it on Facebook was, “Behind every great hero, is a suffering woman. Behind every great heroine is a suffering man. When I think of all the heroes of the Easter Rising in 1916, I think of the families left behind, when I think of Bobby Sands, I think of his wife and son, when I think of James Joyce, I think of Nora his wife and the same goes for W B Yeats and his spouse. Heroes have families whose lives were impacted by their actions. OK I’m rambling, so I’ll shut up now….Gandhi, that was the last one, I promise.” I try to be funny, but fail miserably.
My husband once told my mother-in-law, “Be careful what you say, she might write about it.” And that’s true, I probably would if I found a place for it in a story. So I’ll stop rambling and get to the point.
Nora Barnacle, the wife of James Joyce
I couldn’t live with me because, like Nora Barnacle, James Joyce’s wife, I would be afraid that there would no longer be such a thing as my “private life.” Would my every little action and utterance become part of a book?
Take for example Joyce’s book Ulysses. The character of Molly Bloom is based on Nora Barnacle. Sounds flattering, at first, but Molly Bloom is described as a woman who has an affair with another man, after living celibate for ten years within her own marriage.
Nora’s letters to Joyce during the earlier part of their courtship were used by Joyce to create Molly’s soliloquy at the end of the book. So far, the idea of having a writer/husband base a character in his next novel on me isn’t all that flattering.
Was it a tragic relationship between Joyce and Nora Barnacle? No, not really. But it was far from dull. It probably did provide him with a lot of writing material.
Georgie Yeats on the left, with her husband, 26 years her senior, W.B. Yeats on the right.
Or how about the wife of William Butler Yeats, Georgie Hyde-Lees?That’s her with the jaw of granite and the floppy black hat in the picture on the left. Who says make-up can’t be an improvement?
Not only did Georgie have to deal with Yeats’ extensive volume of love poetry to Maude Gonne, there she is, down there on the left, but Georgie also had to endure his love affairs with other women!
Yeats was 26 years older than Georgie, they had two children together. Where did he get the energy for love affairs in his sixties? Viagra hadn’t even been invented yet!
Maude Gonne, the woman Yeats kept proposing too, even when she became “less than desirable” in his eyes.
This might explain why Georgie said to him that upon his death people would talk of his love affairs, but she would not, for she knew he was “proud,” and this also would explain why she tinkered with contacting spirits to help with “automatic writing.” Reality was hard to deal with, the spirit world was easy in comparison.
Maude Gonne had inspired Yeats to write beautiful poetry, plays, and propose multiple times. The last proposal coming after she buried two husbands and told everyone that the daughter she had with Sean McBride was really her niece.
Was the relationship with Yeats, Georgie Hyde-Lees and Maude Gonne tragic? No. Complex? You betcha. But we got a lot of poetry out of him because of it.
Constance Payne Townshend, the wife of George Bernard Shaw
Then there is the great George Bernard Shaw.
His wife, Constance Payne-Towneshend, and he never consummated their marriage, because she wanted it that way.
Shaw allegedly had numerous affairs with married women. Shaw was 42 years old when he married Constance, and she was 41. Yet, despite what most people might think as a strange marriage, when Constance died, Shaw kept her ashes until his own death, whereby he was cremated and both of their ashes were spread around a garden and statue that was significant in their lives together.
Was Shaw’s and Constance’s life together tragic? Unconventional, definitely, but not tragic.
Constance Wilde and her son Cyril Wilde
Or how about the wife of Oscar Wilde? Constance Lloyd was the wife of the great Oscar Wilde before he discovered he was homosexual. In the meantime though he had fathered two young boys.
When Constance, due to Oscar’s imprisonment because of his homosexuality, could no longer deny that her husband was gay she changed her children’s last name to Holland and left Wilde behind as she moved away, with sole parental rights, to mainland Europe. Was Oscar and Constance’s life tragic? The only tragedy here, in my opinion, is that homosexuality was then considered a crime and grossly indecent behavior.
I started off thinking about that quote by F. Scott Fitzgerald and how the wives of the great classical writers of Ireland suffered because of their husbands’ calling to write. But the more I read about these women, the more I understood that they made a choice. They stayed or left because of their own free will. There’s no tragedy unless free will was not an option.
So, tragedy, like beauty, lies in the eye of the beholder. Only those who lived with Joyce, Yeats, Shaw, or Wilde can attest to whether or not their lives with their writing husbands were tragic. And that’s a tough thing to do. To look back on a marriage and say it was tragic because he wrote so much, he wrote about our private lives, he loved me but had multiple affairs, he chose me because his true love said no, he married me but loved men.
But still, I wouldn’t marry me, I’d date me maybe, but marriage? Nope.
Well, good morrow folks! Today, the start of week 9 is all about extension work: the back, neck, and shoulders.
The neck is very important, because it is with correct neck alignment that we can avoid neck pain, which can very quickly trickle down into our shoulders and back. Altogether an uncomfortable, yet avoidable, experience.
Scalene Muscles
I work the scalene muscles in the neck. Think about that poor neck for a minute. On top is the head, and it weighs on average 10 lbs. You’ll hear me say this in your sleep: for every inch your head sheers forward, you add ten more pounds of weight to your spine. Remember, your spine stops at the base of your brain, not the top of your shoulders. So by moving the neck, we are keeping it mobile and strong. It needs to be!
We are also working the muscles in the back today by doing swan dive and cobra.
The lady in the picture looks a lot nicer than I do, but I won’t deprive of you of a giggle…, you’ll get to see me look more ridiculous than usual as I do my very best to attempt swan dive in the video. My back HATES it, but my back needs to do a lot of extension work. You don’t have to come up as high as the woman in the picture, and if you can, I am flying down to see you do it.
A very quick, but very important word now about Pilates and Osteoporosis. There are exercises that can help you, and others that can do damage. There are ways to modify exercises to prevent fracture. So please read this post here, click on the blue word, and I have created a list of Pilates mat exercises and modifications for you.
Back muscles
The spine is very important, and so are the muscles, the core, wrapped all around it.
With that being said, without further ado, and now appearing from stage left…., let’s start week 9 with 90 repetitions of the ab series.
Monday, Wednesday and Friday for arms and legs. Abs can be done Monday through Saturday!
Here is a list of safe and modified exercises for Pilates mat clients with osteoporosis:
Safe Pilates Mat Exercises
Hundred–with head down
Single Leg Circles
Single Leg Stretch–head down
Double Leg Stretch–head down
Single Leg Stretch With Straight Legs–head down
Double Leg Stretch With Straight Legs/Lower Lift–head down
Criss-Cross–head down
Swan-Dive (1 only)
Single Leg Kick
Double Leg Kick
Shoulder Bridge–not too high
Side Kick
Hip Circle/Hip Twist With Stretched Arms–neutral spine
Swimming
Leg-Pull–Front
Leg-Pull
Side Kick Kneeling–neutral spine
Side Support–neutral spine
Push-Up
Pilates Mat Exercises Clients with Osteoporosis SHOULD NOT do
Hundred–unmodified
Roll-Up
Roll-Over–both ways
Rolling Back/Rolling Like a Ball
Scissors
Spine Stretch
Rocker With Open Legs/Open Leg Rocker
Corkscrew
Saw
Neck Pull
Scissors
Bicycle
Spine Twist
Jack-Knife
Teaser
Boomerang
Seal
Crab
Rocking
Control Balance
Other Important Exercises to Add to the Osteoporosis Exercise Program
Psoas Stretches–adapted from Eve’s Lunge on the Reformer
90/90 Posterior Tilt–modified Hundred
90/90 Lower-Abs Leg Lowering–modified Hundred, lumbar spine flat
Dead Bug–knees straight, lumbar spine flat
Prone Hip Lift–modified from Single Leg Kick
Squat/Plié Variations–done in front of the Wunda Chair, not as mat work
Standing Balance Series
Half Kneeling–“marriage proposal” position
Prone Trunk Extension With Varied Arm Positions
Modified Wall Push-Up
Foam Roller
Thoracic Spine Extension
Prone Spine Extension–modified from Trapeze Table “Swan”
Vigorous walking program
Source for Pilates exercises: Pilates, J.H., & Miller, W.J. 1945. Return to Life Through Contrology. Miami: Pilates Method Alliance.
I am about two weeks away from publishing Mona, the body in the bog. This book has lived with me on and off for 7 years. But I felt I had to tell the story, or both Maire Moylan and Elan/Mona made me tell the story.
The new cover art by Jeff Buckholz really does the book justice. Much thanks to Jeff.
The picture on the right is an unfinished version of the final product. I am heading into the Book Expo of America on June 1st with 10 copies of The Foundling, and 5 copies each of Outward Walls and Mona, the body in the bog as well as a half finished proof of Death and the bereavement group.
So keep reading and I’ll post the link to Mona, the body in the bog when it’s up on Amazon.com.
I just need your votes every day from now until Thursday May 16th until midnight! Please click here and just press the green vote button. Thank you!
And here is why we want to go back; My TripAdvisor review of Beaches Turks and Caicos:
This was our 8th trip to the Beaches resort in Turks and Caicos. We book the next year's vacation before we leave, that's how good it is.
