Category: random thoughts

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This is 28 Years

My current view

This year for our 28th Wedding Anniversary, we did something different. We went to Gatlinburg, Tennessee, and stayed at the Westgate Smokey Mountain Resort.

And while the views are beautiful, we both learned that we prefer the roar of ocean waters instead of navigating mountain roads.

Here are eight things I learned after being married for twenty-eight years (cause no one has time for a list of twenty-eight things):

  1. It’s possible to love someone in several ways
  2. You will discover new things you didn’t know about your spouse
  3. Laughing with your spouse is the best medicine
  4. Be willing to compromise
  5. It’s okay to go to bed angry. Sometimes you need a moment to cool off
  6. Your spouse should be your biggest cheerleader, but they don’t have to cheer for everything you do
  7. Working toward a common goal makes the journey easier
  8. Falling in love may happen by chance, but staying in love is a choice

Let’s hear from you. What are some things you’ve learned about marriage?

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6 Secrets About the Blue Marlin Restuarant featured in “Moment of Truth”

My debut novel, Moment of Truth, is set in my hometown of Columbia, SC. Here are some secrets about a location visited in the book.

  • The Blue Marlin Restaurant is located in the downtown area of Columbia, SC is known as the Congaree Vista, or simply The Vista.

  • The restaurant is housed in the former train station. Today a venue for fine dining, this distinctive circa-1912 building was known for decades as a hub for transportation into and out of the capital city. Its adjacent loading platform and the Seaboard Air Line Railroad baggage room, a smaller, circa-1905 building to the north, reveal the property’s original function. Both buildings benefited from adaptive efforts that transformed the Vista into a vibrant commercial and residential district.

  • Well into the early 1980s, the Vista’s light industrial and mercantile character remained largely unchanged. However, twenty years earlier much of its residential life had been erased through Fight Blight programs instigated by national trends in urban renewal. Totally lost was the almost exclusively African-American neighborhood known as Ward One, whose modest houses, stores, schools and churches fell for the construction of such buildings as the Carolina Coliseum in 1968. The new view by city planners was this district that lay within the shadow of the State House was ripe for redevelopment – a vision that would change its landscape within the next generation.

  • The shrimp and grits are a signature dish.
  • My favorite is the Firecracker Flounder with fries and greens along with a cup of She Crab Soup.
  • Adrienne and Christopher dine here after their visits to schools for his daughter.

#books #book #read #reading #reader #page #pages #paper #instagood #kindle #nook #library #author #bestoftheday #bookworm #readinglist #love #photooftheday #imagine #plot #climax #story #literature #literate #stories #words #text #goodreads #ebook #getcaughtreading #michelledrayford #mdrayfordwrites

http://bit.ly/MomentofTruthMDR
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One Lakers Fan Heartbreak – A Tribute to Kobe Bryant

Print created by Matt Sanoian.
Print created by Matt Sanoian.

I was upstairs writing when the call came. My daughter’s Face timed me with the news. Kobe Bryant was dead. I told them to stop playing.

I’ve been a Lakers fan since Dad sat me down beside him on the couch to watch the Showtime Lakers. Magic, Kareem, James Worthy, AC Green, Bryon Scott. I fell in love with their style. I’ve always loved basketball (my jumper was nice) and the LA Lakers became MY team.

Even through the down years, I rooted for them. Then we traded for Shaq. And drafted a young kid named Kobe Bean Bryant. The Lakers were back, baby.

And I got to watch a young boy grow into a man. His work ethic was nuts. You had to admire the tenacity. The arrogance to believe he would emerge as THE best basketball player. And he did it. He won at the highest level. It was inspiring. It made you want to work hard on your own chosen craft. Kobe made it possible to believe that a strong will and consistency would reap rewards. I didn’t want to be like Mike. I wanted to be like Kobe. #MambaMentality

He wasn’t perfect. There are some that may condemn him forever but I saw the growth, the maturity. And I’m no one’s judge and jury. I didn’t know him personally, of course, but from what I could see he was a wonderful father. He seemed to be happily married. He loved to teach the next generation of ballplayers. Especially girls. #GirlDad

I was looking forward to his new path. A more creative path. He wrote a series of children’s books. He won an Oscar for Best Animated Short for his poem, Dear Basketball. In winning that award, he showed he was more than an athlete. It’s depressing to think of all the work he was still planning to do and know it’s not going to happen. Kobe was only 41 years old. The world was robbed of his gifts.

So, to Kobe, his daughter Gianna, Sarah & Payton Chester, Alyssa, Keri & John Altobelli, Christina Mauser and Ara Zobayan, rest in peace.  You will be missed but remembered forever!

This print was created by Matt Sanoian of Sanoian Designs. If you would like to purchase it, please go to www.sanoiandesigns.com/buy

All proceeds will be donated to the MambaOnThree.org

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7 Fun Facts About Me

Photo by Braydon Anderson on Unsplash

Let’s get to know each other better. Here are some fun facts about me:

(#1) My first car was a “hoopty” I named Bruno. It was a 1970 something, mud brown muscle car. There was no air conditioner, heat flowed from the floorboard, the windows would get stuck if you rolled them all the way down and the ceiling pilings fell on your shoulders like snowflakes. But I had a ride.

(#2) I was a member of the Navy ROTC in high school. I learned quickly that the military life wasn’t for me. I fainted from standing at attention for an hour.

(#3) I learned all the moves to Janet Jackson’s “What Have You Done for Me Lately” and “Pleasure Principle” videos. I spent hours watching the videos on repeat.

(#4) I lived my football dreams by playing in the Ludy Bowl at Columbia College. I was a wide receiver. Didn’t score a touchdown but I did pick up a first down.

(#5) I love playing NBA 2K on my cell phone. We bought an Xbox for the kids and I played it more than they did.

(#6) To get over my first heartbreak, I played “Careless Whisper” by George Michael on repeat. For an entire week. I made an entire cassette tape of that one song by recording it off the radio.

(#7) Favorite boy band: New Edition. We’re the same age and I just knew I would meet and marry Ronnie DeVoe one day.

Now it’s your turn. In the comments, share a fun fact about you.

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Celebrate

One of my favorite childhood memories is gathering with the other neighborhood kids and watching the fireworks show one of the Dad’s would put on every year. Lighting sparklers was a major deal for a six year old me.

What are some of your 4th of July childhood memories?

#4thofJuly #summertime #childhoodmemories #mdrayfordwrites

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Thoughts on Becoming

 Like everyone else, I’m reading Michelle Obama’s memoir, Becoming. It’s a really good read but something in the first chapter stuck out at me.

In the chapter, Obama describes her big piano recital. She had practiced for hours on her aunt’s “less-than-perfect upright, with its honky-tonk patchwork of yellowed keys and its conveniently chipped middle C.” She knew she could play her piece without really thinking about it. But suddenly, she was sitting at a perfect piano with gleaming white keys and couldn’t figure out how to begin.

It was a moment I could relate too. The moment when “the disparities of the world” show themselves for the first time.

I grew up in a diverse neighborhood that experienced “white flight” by the time I became school age. We had one lone white neighbor left and the elderly lady kept to herself. My high school was majority black. You could count the white students on one hand.

Now, we weren’t naive enough to think that we had the best resources. Our teachers did the best they could with what they had and we all prospered. But it became clear to me the day I took my SAT at a high school in another district. A predominately white district.

I walked into this newly built high school and marveled at the shine on the floor, the spacious classrooms and bigger desks. We walked past the computer lab and I couldn’t believe the number of stand-alone computers that were available.

I sat in the big comfortable desk and stared straight ahead.

It’s hard to describe the sense of unfairness you feel. The moment you realize that “there are disparities in the world”. And those disparities make you feel “less than”.

But like Mrs. Obama, I had someone to show me where to start. Aunt Robbie showed a young Michelle where to place her hands on the keys. Words of encouragement from my wonderful English teacher, Mrs. Dantzler, played in my head and helped me find my way.

If you are reading, Becoming, please share some of your thoughts in the comment section.

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Introducing…

Coming to the book self, a bobble head you all know as Joe the Policeman from the “What’s Going Down” eposide of That’s My Mama. Click all the likes for Jackson Heights own, Mr. Randy Watson! Yes!

#comingtoamerica #randywatson #classicmovie

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Back in the Lab

Now that the short story for the Spice Anthology is done, time to get back on my novel in progress.

But where to start? How do I regain the momentum I had before?

What are some suggestions for getting back on task?