Debra Smouse O'Connor

“Once you embrace your value, talents and strengths, it neutralizes when others think less of you.” -- Rob Liano

“Nothing is a waste of time if you use the experience wisely.” -- Auguste Rodin

“The most potent muse of all is our own inner child.”– Stephen Nachmanovitch

“Nothing is ever really lost to us as long as we remember it.”-L.M. Montgomery

"Live with the questions. They can be answered in the thoughtful things you are naturally inspired to do." --Alexandra Stoddard

“I am choosing to flow with the current of life rather than lying in a tide pool experiencing the same things again and again.” -- Marilyn Barnicke Belleghem

Vintage St. Patrick's Day cards ☘️ #FairyTaleTuesday

The Original Cat Lady St. Gertrude of Nivelles is recognized as the patron saint of cats. She was a seventh-century abbess who founded the Abbey of Nivelles. (626-659) Her feast day is celebrated on March 17th. #StGertrudesDay

“It is easier to resist at the beginning than at the end.” -- Leonardo da Vinci

@mamboitaliano__ Not man...but I wonder if its the long distance between her neck and the top of her breasts combined with a short waist?

Guys, I need your opinion She’s Vittoria Ceretti, the 27‑year‑old Italian 🇮🇹 supermodel dating Leonardo DiCaprio The top fashion brands are fighting over her, and she looks like she stepped out of a Renaissance painting Yet men don’t seem to go crazy for her Too small breasts?

“The beauty of a woman must be seen from in her eyes, because that is the doorway to her heart, the place where love resides.” -- Audrey Hepburn

To celebrate the 60th anniversary of Gemini VIII, the museum sat down with mission recovery pilot Les Schneider to get his perspective on the emergency recovery of the crew. armstrongmuseum.org/interview-gemi…

In the hushed rhythms of rural life, there once lived a quiet, mystical tradition known as “telling the bees.” Rooted in 18th-19th Century Europe and America, this custom treated bees not as mere insects but as sacred members of the household. When someone died, got married, or a child was born, the head of the house or often the goodwife—would approach the hive, knock gently, and whisper the news. Mourning cloths were sometimes draped over the hives, a mark of respect for creatures believed to sense joy, sorrow, and the weight of change. This practice wasn’t just quaint folklore—it reflected a deep belief in the bees' spiritual connection to human life. Bees were thought to be messengers between worlds, possibly stemming from ancient Celtic myths where they carried souls or bore witness to transitions. To neglect them in times of change was to risk misfortune: the bees might stop producing honey, abandon the hive, or perish from heartbreak. In joyful times too, like weddings, beekeepers would offer the bees a sip of wine or a crumb of cake, drawing them into the fabric of family celebration. “Telling the bees” reminds us that our ancestors lived in close harmony with the natural world, acknowledging it with reverence and ritual. In an age where the bond between people and nature grows ever fainter, this gentle tradition speaks of a time when every living thing was seen as part of the same great mystery—where even the smallest creature might carry the soul of a loved one or the whisper of something sacred. © History Pictures #archaeohistories

Today marks the 60th anniversary of Gemini VIII, Neil Armstrong and David Scott’s first journey into space. The mission saw the first docking of two craft while in orbit and Armstrong became America’s first civilian astronaut in space.

"Faith consists in believing what reason cannot." --Voltaire

This paragraph by C.S. Lewis hits so hard: “Good and evil both increase at compound interest. That is why the little decisions you and I make every day are of such infinite importance. The smallest good act today is the capture of a strategic point from which, a few months later, you may be able to go on to victories you never dreamed of. An apparently trivial indulgence in lust or anger today is the loss of a ridge or railway line or bridgehead from which the enemy may launch an attack otherwise impossible.”

“Maybe you have to know the darkness before you can appreciate the light.” -- Madeleine L'Engle

The púca (Irish for spirit/ghost) is a shapeshifting trickster, often taking the form of a rabbit, goat or black horse. The mischievous púcaí are known to be capricious, either wreaking havoc or bringing good luck. 🎨Jessica Donnelly #FolkloreSunday

#FolkloreSunday The Lady of the Lake known as Nimue or Viviane is a central character in Arthurian legend. She is depicted as an enigmatic, magical fairy-like enchantress. It was she who gave the magical sword Excalibur to King Arthur. 🖼️Walter Crane.

This is Rome's most famous crime scene Today, March 15, marks the day sixty men stabbed the most powerful person on earth and accidentally destroyed the very thing they were trying to save. The lesson he died for is one the world still hasn't learned... In 44 BC, Julius Caesar was proclaimed dictator for life. He had ended a civil war, conquered Gaul, and remade Rome in his image. The poor loved him. The soldiers would die for him. But 60 senators called themselves the Liberators and plotted to kill him. At their center stood Marcus Junius Brutus, descended from the very man who had founded the Republic. Yet it was Caesar’s mercy that helped restore Brutus’s political career. Caesar had spared his life after the civil war and allowed him to return to public office... Brutus took the blade he sharpened on Caesar's generosity and drove it into his chest. But before the blood, there was a warning. According to Plutarch, a seer had told Caesar his life would be in danger on the Ides of March. On his way to the Senate that morning, Caesar spotted the man and said to him that the Ides had arrived. The seer's reply was: "Aye, they are come, but they are not gone." Caesar was stabbed twenty-three times. He fell at the base of a statue of Pompey the Great — his oldest rival. When he saw Brutus among the assassins, he stopped fighting and sank to the ground... Brutus had prepared a speech celebrating the restoration of the Republic. He was shocked to find outrage instead of praise. Caesar's death triggered civil wars. His heir Octavian crushed the conspirators at Philippi — Brutus and Cassius both died by their own swords — then became Emperor Augustus, terminating the Republic forever. The Liberators had liberated no one. They had a plan for the assassination and none for the morning after — certain of their own righteousness, blind to everything else. Every revolution led by people drunk on their own virtue ends the same way: not in the freedom they promised, but in the chaos they swore to prevent. Power does not fall into a vacuum. It falls to whoever is most prepared to catch it. The men who killed Caesar set out to stop a dictator. They created an emperor instead. That is the oldest political truth there is, and the one we keep forgetting: removing a man changes nothing if you haven't changed the conditions that made him necessary in the first place.