Category Archives: Reflections

New Year Planned… Is YOURS?

Posted on December 31, 2015 by Raymond Alexander Kukkee

Happy New Year 2016![/caption]

"We'll take a cup of kindness yet, for Auld Lang Syne..."

Is Your New Year Planned?

Wow, no doubt about it, it is exciting —the end of one year, the chance to start on a new one—but is your exciting New Year planned? Really? It is that time of year again. Res0lutions, promises, renewals, parties, dances, celebrations, decorations, champagne. Let us all celebrate tossing of the old, tired, and sing, bringing in the new...There. Done. That ought to do it. Pop the bubbly. Sing, hug, have a smooch or two. Enjoy. Smile. Here's Auld Lange Syne, sing it, baby! Beautiful, isn't it?

Without careful, thoughtful planning, a.k.a. New Year planned well, and singing aside, what will be changed? The same old, same old. And perhaps, it seems we are doomed to repeat the same mistake every year. We all get older, but are we necessarily becoming wiser in the process? Once-a-year friends. Once-a-year promises, best wishes, fences mended, destruction of the old in the hope the new shall somehow be a new year planned, kindness renewed, and we shall somehow smarter, better, richer, faster, happier, have greater opportunities, more hope, more happiness... Okay...you get the idea, better dreams all around.

The reality is, unless we have worked hard—diligently—gone all out— to have our new year planned —and do the groundwork required for all of the above to coalesce into solid progress and reality, alas, 2016 is likely to remain more of the same. Unless we make it so, a new year is unlikely to turn out much different. Not better. Not exciting. Not encouraging. Not the stuff from which sparkly dreams appear. It is up to each of us to plan...does that overwhelm you?

No matter. Think about it. For the moment, go out. Have fun. Enjoy your friends. Celebrate. Stay safe. Promise not to drink and drive. Decide what you'll do with the next 365-1/4 days. Recognize that 2016 can be heady stuff!—and then go for it. Keep in mind, a new year planned well can be an amazing inspiration, —and your dreams and plans can actually become your NEW reality.

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Thumbs UP, Happy New Year![/caption]

As for us here at Incoming Bytes, the muse can be pretty convincing at times...so we're going for it. Happy New Year, everyone! Stay safe! Let's play Auld Lang Syne again...

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Is that Incoming I hear?

Posted in Home & Hearth, Humanity, Life, Reflections, Uncategorized, Writing Life | Tagged celebrations, habits, Happy New Year, New Year duly noted, traditions | Leave a comment

Voter Boy

Posted on October 19, 2015 by Raymond Alexander Kukkee

The Peaceable Kingdom (Edward Hicks)[/caption]

Voter Boy*

When I was a boy I wanted to vote;

Why, I did not know;

I went to political rallies next door; an old schoolhouse;

It was the thing to do,

With farmers, mechanics, curious, mothers with babies, families, neighbours,

Other kids like me, watching, open-eyed,

Watched with eagle eyes by mothers and old ladies, grandmothers knitting mitts;

When I was a boy I paid attention, and listened, carefully,

Words of hope, eyes wide open, pie in sky,

And the people went mad with delight, strangely entertained by signs,

By strangers with lying lips

Clapping and cheering for sweating, fat and slippery Soap-Box Stumpers,

With bold offers of Utopian life, promises ever savoury, bright tin badges;

Grits and Tories all, entertaining hallowed promises of prosperity, jobs and happiness.

When I was a boy, I wanted to vote, and too soon it came;

I became a voter boy,

I heard men make promises they would not keep, turned cold.

When I became a voter boy,

I heard Stumpers Red and Blue speak the same liberal language of convenience.

When I became a voter boy, I watched lies, deception, and hearts pricked;

Bleeding trust profusely;

Pondered memories of unanswered questions from the past,

The stumping sweat of fear, shifty eyes, embarrassed silence;

Scandal, delusion, willful deception,

Echoes of clapping, entertaining fools drifting home

With egg salad on face, furrowed brow, darkness of heart, lies remembered;

When I became a voter boy, I discovered disillusion, — yes,

—But also how to think

—For myself.

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*Voter boy I was, —and I still vote today--but sadly, in decades, nothing much has observably changed in Canada- as we participate in the 2015 Federal Election, strangely, and predictably, with high expectations.

Is that Incoming I hear?

Posted in Civilization, Poetry, Politics, Reflections, Uncategorized | Tagged Canadian election, life, reflections, Voter boy | Leave a comment