Do Your Life

“Nobody’s going to do your life for you. You have to do it yourself, whether you’re rich or poor, out of money or raking it in, the beneficiary of ridiculous fortune or terrible injustice. And you have to do it no matter what is true. No matter what is hard. No matter what unjust, sad, sucky things befall you. Self-pity is a dead-end road. You make the choice to drive down it. It’s up to you to decide to stay parked there or to turn around and drive out.”  

― Cheryl Strayed

• Creator(s): Barribal, William H., 1873-1956, artist—London
• Date Created/Published: New York : Published by Puck Publishing Corporation, 295-309 Lafayette Street, 1914 November 14.
• Public domain illustration from the Library of Congress.

Wealthy and Great

Let the wealthy & great roll in splendor & state. I envy them not, I declare it.

I eat my own lamb, my own chickens & ham. I sheer my own sheep & I wear it.

I have lawns. I have bowers. I have fruit. I have flowers. 

The lark is my morning alarmer.

So you jolly boys now, here’s God Bless the plough.

Long life & success to the farmer.

– From a 15th century song

Public domain illustration from the Library of Congress

Out of Whack

“Our environmental laws are out of whack with the laws of nature.”

– Mary Christina Wood, author of Nature’s Trust: Environmental Law for a New Ecological Age

• Title of photograph: Zakat na mori︠e︡. Title Translation: Sunset at the sea
• Creator(s): Prokudin-Gorskiĭ, Sergeĭ Mikhaĭlovich, 1863-1944, photographer
• Date Created/Published: [between 1905 and 1915]
• Medium: 1 negative (3 frames) : glass, b&w, three-color separation
• Public domain photograph from the Library of Congress

Gone Blank

“I could do what I had to. I’d done it before: gone blank, push forward.”

–Donna Tartt The Goldfinch

• Title: Diana in the snow
• Jessie Tarbox Beals creator and photographer.
• Date Created/Published: [ca. 1915]
• Medium: 1 photographic print : gelatin silver
• Public domain photograph from the Library of Congress

Why Aren’t You Nicer?

“If you have God in your heart, why aren’t you nicer?”

– Boy George

I love this quote by Boy George. I wonder about people and how they can be so mean! Especially certain people in a certain State who are known for supposedly being very friendly. Not!

• Title: Sacred Heart of Jesus: Sacre ́Coeur de Jesus / Saǵrado Coŕazon de Jesus
• Creator(s): N. Currier (Firm),
• Date Created/Published: New York : Published by N. Currier, [between 1835 and 1856]
• Public domain illustration from the Library of Congress