Thursday, April 19, 2012

Q is for Quiet, Quotations, and Qualtagh (Oh, my!)

The letter Q has far more to offer than I ever thought! Here are three Q words I love:


Quiet:

Photo by Maria Shemesh
Courtesy of Public Domain Pictures
I crave quiet time. A few years ago, right about the time my second child was born, I started getting up before everyone else in the house, just so I could spend an hour or two alone. (Luckily, I've been blessed with children who started sleeping through the night at a young age.) I use this time away from everyone to read and write and just enjoy quiet moments of "me" time, with no one asking where the car keys are or demanding that I make pancakes for breakfast or find the missing Hello Kitty sock. I admit that some mornings I'm tired and it's all I can do to get out of bed at 5:30 or 6 a.m., but I know that if I don't have that time to myself, the rest of my day won't feel quite right. What helps on those eyes-won't-quite-open days? Coffee, of course!



What about you?  Do you crave time alone? How do you fit "me" time into your life?


Quotations:
Photo by Petr Kratochvil
Courtesy of Public Domain Pictures
Ever since I was in college, I've been a quotation collector. I have a huge list now, and I sometimes refer to it when I need writing prompts or just a new perspective on my day. Following are a few of my favorites. Some are about writing and poetry, and others are about life. All of them, at least to me, are inspiring. (You can find these and other quotations at The Quote Garden.)
• This one gives me hope on days when following my writing dream seems hopeless: 

"The pages are still blank, but there is a miraculous feeling of the words being there, written in invisible ink and clamoring to become visible." ~ Vladimir Nabokov, Russian novelist, poet, and short story writer

• And this one gives me the courage to push through, even when I feel like nothing I write will ever be good enough:

"And by the way, everything in life is writable about if you have the guts to do it and the imagination to improvise. The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt." ~ Sylvia Plath, American poet, novelist, and short story writer

• There's something beautiful about this truth:

"Poetry is life distilled." ~ Gwendolyn Brooks, American poet

• And this one illustrates what I think is a fun truth:

"To succeed in life, you need three things: a wishbone, a backbone, and a funny bone."  ~ Reba McEntire, American country music artist and actress

• And how could I leave out this life quotation from one of my favorite poems:

"I have measured out my life with coffee spoons." ~ T. S. Eliot, American-born poet, publisher, playwright, and critic, in "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock"


Do we share any of the same favorites? What quotations do you find inspiring?


Qualtagh:

I couldn't resist this word. It's a new one for me, one I discovered while I was searching online for all things Q. According to The Phrontistery, a qualtagh is "the first person encountered after leaving home on a special day." Other sources define it as  "the first individual a person meets after exiting his or her house."

Interesting, right? I never would have imagined a word existed for that!


My qualtagh today was a sales associate at Barnes & Noble. Who was yours?


See you tomorrow with the letter R!

50 comments:

  1. For quiet time, I like sitting in my living room. It's wide open to the foyer, but for some reason my husband can circle the house three times looking for me and never find me sitting right there. What - am I wearing upholstery camouflage? My favorite why-do-we-need-that-word word is "penultimate."

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    1. Upholstery camouflage! Too funny! Maybe it's good he can't find you easily. There's more quiet time for you that way. :)

      I agree: "penultimate" is a great word.

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  2. Your Reba quote is my favorite. She could turn that into the perfect country-western song (next to David Alan Coe's of course).

    Lucy

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  3. I love the picture you posted to go with quotations. Here are two of my favorite:

    "Who am I? I am a poet. What do I do? I write. And how do I live? I live."--Rodolpho, La Boheme

    "Our truest responsibility to the irrationality of the world is to paint or sing or write, for only in such response do we find the truth." Madeleine L'Engle

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    1. Good ones! I especially like the Rodolpho quotation. Thanks!

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  4. I have lots of quiet living alone with a cat--LOL! And I do love it!
    Endless quotes that I relish.
    I hardly ever leave home, so I seldom meet my qualtagh. ;)
    Have a great weekend! :)

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    1. That's what's nice about cats--they don't bother us too much. :)

      You have a nice weekend, too!

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  5. My Qualtagh was an ex-pupil who had missed the bus! Quite a nice one, so that's ok! I loved the quotations, especially the Sylvia Plath one. Thanks for food for thought!

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    1. I think about Plath's quote often...

      Glad your qualtagh was a good one! :)

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  6. I wish I could have more alone time. Only time I can is late into the night. :(

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    1. I hope you don't have to get up too early in the morning. I know how hard it is to try to function on too little sleep..

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  7. wonderful quotes--i haven't really felt the need for alone time until i started this a-z thing--i find my husband is jealous of my computer time--so i try to do it when he isn't here--who knew

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    1. I think my husband is a little jealous of my computer time as well, especially since he works such long hours and is gone for so much of the day. I guess that's another reason why I try to live my "online life" while he's still sleeping.

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  8. Hi, Dana! These quotes are fantastic. I love the Sylvia Plath one and have included it a couple times in different quote posts!

    I need my quiet time, too, but it's much easier for me since it's just me and my husband. I'm enjoying it now while I can!!

    Hope you're having a great week!

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    1. Yes, I never realized just how much I needed to have quiet time until my children were born. :)

      Have a great weekend!

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  9. I love the idea of collecting quotes. And what a great reason to buy a new notebook to put all those quotes in!

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    1. That's a great idea, especially since right now, they're all scattered around the house. :)

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  10. My quiet time is midnight -2. Sleep is sacrificed, but it's my main time to write.

    I love the Sylvia Plath quote!

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    1. I definitely need more sleep, but I gotta write! ;)

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  11. What an awesome blog you have!! I am your newest follower!

    I crave quiet time, too. I NEED a little alone time and seldom GET lonely!

    One of my favorite quotes:
    "We are all faced with opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations!"
    Charles R. Swindoll

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    1. Thanks so much! I appreciate the follow. :)

      What a wonderful quote! Thanks for sharing it. :)

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  12. I love the Nabokov quote. And the T.S. Eliot quote (I do love T.S. Eliot).

    I almost chose my theme today to be "Quartets" for the T.S. Eliot book I'm reading, but I didn't finish it in time.

    Qualtagh... what a fun word. I'll have to remember that next time I leave home. :)

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    1. T. S. Eliot definitely ranks high on my list of favorites.

      Thanks for commenting. :)

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  13. Qualtagh - love this word. Mine was a wonderful woman called Birdy who fitted me for a new bra without using a tape-measure - the woman's a genius!

    Quiet time? When the household goes to bed.

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    1. Birdy definitely sounds like a genius! You'd have to know your job pretty well to do that. :)

      It's night now (over here, anyway). Hope you're enjoying some quiet. :)

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  14. Quiet time is such a necessity: I didn't realize this until I quit my full-time teaching job to write and work from home. Now I get it!

    And I love, love, love Sylvia Plath! Great post :)

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  15. quiet time is a luxury, private time is a necessity and writing time is a commodity!
    i may have those out of order...

    reba's quote is the best!!

    and i bet qualtagh is a wv oldie that got published!

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    1. LOL

      I think Reba's just awesome!

      You might be right about qualtagh! ;)

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  16. I am a quote person. I collect them. Any T.S. Elliot quote is a treasure to me.

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    1. Glad to meet a fellow collector! I agree: T. S. Eliot is wonderful. :)

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  17. I love alone time too, I am trying to set the clock early to get up and have morning jogs for my alone time.... no iPod or music in my ears, just me and fresh air :)

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    1. That sounds wonderful! I really need to start walking again--even though I just walk down to the basement and on to the treadmill. I used to like the treadmill, actually. I found I was able to get a lot of reading done as I exercised.

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  18. I love quotations too. It's my A to Z theme! :) I'm always on the lookout for new morsels of wisdom and I LOVE the Plath quote!

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  19. Quotes and quiet are favorites here too :)

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  20. The Quote Garden is one of my favorite sites and I use it often. I always seem to find just the right quote for whatever my needs are at that particular time.

    Just when I thought I knew it all *wink* along you come with "qualtagh" which I've never heard before. :) Wonderful post, Dana!

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  21. I am so glad I found your blog via Super Earthling. I am feeling so uninspired today, writing a difficult emotional story. Hard to explain I enjoy all writing but this story won't leave me and it brings up too many emotions.

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    1. I hope some of the quotations here helped and that you're able to get out of that slump soon. *hugs*

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  22. I'm with you on quiet time, Dana. I get up several hours before Ralph to work on my blog and other things. I get so frustrated when he decided to get up early because I want to devote time to him and don't get my things done.

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    1. I know how you feel! When my husband decides to work from home, I could scream! LOL I need my quiet. :)

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  23. I love your quotes!!! I collect quotes too..and think about in my oh so lovely quiet time!!
    i am your newest follower..pls follow back if you can.
    happy weekend.

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    1. Thanks so much! And you've got a new follower. :)

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  24. Dana,
    I love quiet time mornings. Some Saturdays I get up early before the family and I go out on the sun porch and just spend time praying as the sun comes up.

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    1. That really sounds like the perfect way to spend quiet time. :)

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  25. Love learning new words, thanks for qualtagh.

    I just read some amazing quotes from Russian Poet Vera Pavlova. Here is just one of my favorites:

    "I know all my poems. It’s just that some of them I have already recalled, and some not yet."

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    1. What a beautiful quote! I've never heard that before. Thanks for sharing it. :)

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