IBEX

We can share our thoughts in a rendition of "Après un rêve" Perhaps an old recording by Pau Casals is the most haunting one.....whenever I try to play it I lose all track of time....and get lost in the elegy of the sad long notes

I am still in a very somber mood given the background here.... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRL447oDId4

Having lost too many friends on the way to AIDS and suicide this chapter once more makes me cry and mourn. After a while I can cherish the gift of life again. Carrying the memory of the brothers forth another day.... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NzUMfVpugq4

peace, and a prosperous new year!

sweet

A heartfelt lullaby might be appropriate, when a mother is worried and in anguish about her child... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tvOMzPCOiQI And translations for those who have difficulties with yiddish. Lyrics by Mordechai Gebirtig http://yidlid.org/chansons/yankele/index.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2fMVNFq4Nmo Probably my favourite of the season... or in the original version of this 16th century carol. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTndWoNENnI

As long as the kidneys and ADH are ok....keep the kids hydrated! Although I sometimes wonder how we managed all these years without schlepping bottled water around all day....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mOCeiAYzuo8 A tough combo....

Thank you for the explanation! I like to learn new things....always looking up stuff that's new in your stories to me. Missed this one - looked like an obvious typo to me! Sorry bout That! I stand corrected, Docktor!

"At dinner Todd and Tayloe each told the other about their respective calls. " Should it be not Todd and Eric?

"...Tayloe was a Lawn Scholar.." earning some extra change on the weekends?

Nice to see Καβαφησ appreciated. Only he did not write in Italian, but Greek. ( There are two poems in English known...)

I might take up throwing clay again... the vivid description of the creative process in Elias' shed made me long for mud!

Good. No scary stuff - Still got moist eyes....sweet

Sex scenes. Definitely. I much prefer some insinuation, innuendo if need be...I can imagine quite well the how and what...it's almost exclusively second grade vanilla anyway. Poor grammar - at least when it's much worse than my own as non native speaker. A distinct pet peeve are the, oh so frequently appearing, homophones. - I only have a 30 inch waste, because I waist so much of my time in the gym. 😉 Long winded description of eye and hair color, body shape and what not, of every, even minor characters. It's never necessary for any story...readers will always picture your characters in their mind differently. What makes me actually quit a story? Repetitive plots by the same author. When I realise, I have read it all before - and there is absolutely NO new twist, character development or a new/exciting finish... Or, when I get the feeling an author has run out of ideas, and either rushes the story to a poorly planned out and unsatisfactory finish, or some weird "deus ex machina" plots get introduced, in an - usually futile - attempt to save a storyline that got stuck in the mud, or run up to a dead end in a single track street. Preaching. I stopped following an author when after his first story, the second and third promised to be just more of (in that case) a pro-catholic proselyticing. Mind you, characters can have their faith, cherish it, be destroyed by it, but I don't want sweetly sermons constantly in the storyline. Pet peeves? Too obvious stereotypes. Overused plots - one more accident killing both parents at once, and I start screaming! Trigger warnings. Absolutely. Spare me those, as long as the bible is a topic in school still. I can deal with emotions, should they overcome me. In fact, I consider writing to be good when it can actually change my mood - either direction. I am sure I can find more....but you get the idea! Besides, I rather see what you guys have written for my perusal and enjoyment now, than spend too much time thinking about the lttle things I found annoying in the past! Keep up your work, and have my sincerest thanks!

Great art! But how is this raven standing? I can only imagine it hanging from a high ceiling....

Wow. very powerful. It is a shame the Alpha did not register what happened or never acted before, to keep up the peace...

Did an ancestor of Woorawa leave the realms with his stone? Millenia ago? Anyway, the threatened people of Woorawa's might make good settlers in the new Realm.

an interesting discussion about faith coming up....I can see a situation where the harm done by religious beliefs, can be held in check by clinging onto a slightly better flavour of said religion. If only because no other values / avenues have ever been taught/learned

I see things are going to be ok in the end.....Harlan's Don is no other than the great and generous Corbin Reina. Devoted to his love Paul. With greta resources, financial and otherwise at his fingertips. Of course, some strange people and happenings could make matters more interesting for a while.....

Having lived through the early years of the plague, I very well remember among the first spreading the disease - as soon as the cause and ways of transmission had been discovered - the first were closeted gays (in sham marriages) or bisexual men, who brought the virus from their real or made up 'business trips' to US bath houses. And most likely those were also the ones infecting the blood banks through their blood donations. While gays visiting the then paradises of gay culture NY, Chicago, LA; San Fran....did their part as well, the closet queens spread it to the wider population. Since for years nobody could figure out what the actual disease was - there was just this sudden and massive uptick in rare sarcomas and pneumonias and related deaths - you can't ever blame them. we were all clueless for years. Frightened, yet still inadvertently spreading and spreading.....

That nightly phone call from Nick made me think of abuse.... The initiation might turn out quite differently this year.

Righto.... go Sam!

Sweet and sexy. It pays to present the wares well! But we already got a glimpse of two good hearts...