KATNISS, WATCH OUT

If you have told me a few years ago that I would read and enjoy a book about youngsters killing each other in an arena of nature, I would have laughed.

But I loved the novel "The Hunger Games." 

And I think they did an excellent job of adapting it into the movie of the same name.

I have wondered if the fantastic archery in the movie inspired anyone beside my daughter.

Although very much an adult, Harmony has a bulls-eye on a couple of bales of straw set up in her backyard, and tonight we spent probably a good 45 minutes trying to hit an apple off the top of the straw. Her kids and husband have gotten into it also, but no one shoots as well as she does... at least not yet.

An article in the New York Times states: "Archery has enjoyed blips in popularity from films in the past — “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy and various iterations of Robin Hood are frequently cited — but nothing as big or sustained as the current surge. Nor have films ever resonated much with girls, who now frequently turn up for lessons in variations of Katniss’s side-braid hairstyle.

"'Katniss has helped give archery a hip factor it’s just never had before,” said Teresa Iaconi, the spokeswoman for USA Archery, which fields the Olympic team. “No disrespect to Kevin Costner” — the star of 1991’s “Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves,” she added, “but he was an old guy in tights.”

"Since December 2011, individual membership in USA Archery has jumped 25 percent, while the number of clubs has nearly doubled, to 540 from 279. ...The United States Olympian Khatuna Lorig helped Ms. Lawrence prepare with 15 lessons, but she greatly underestimated the film’s potential effect on the sport. “She told me in passing that she had coached an actress for ‘some movie of a kids book,’ ” Ms. Iaconi mimicked, then laughed. “We had no idea what was coming'. "

I think I might go ahead and purchase a bow when I get home.

I DON'T CARE ANYMORE

I realize that a large part of growing up is simply learning not to care.

When you are three years old, and your play-date friends calls you a poo-poo head, that is terrible.


When you are eight years old, and your best friend suddenly plays at recess with someone else, it's horrific.

And then when your heart is broken for the very first time, either by the most popular boy in the school who never notices that you exist, or that movie/ television/music star that you know if he really really got to know you, you would be the most wonderful couple in the universe.

But then when you fall in love - he falls in love with you - you are a couple, a pair - and then he, the louse, the loser, the bastard, falls in love with someone else - or gets bored and leaves - or doesn't want to commit or does want to commit... regardless, your heart is shattered.

Okay, enough about love.

But you learn, hopefully, to move on. You learn that you can live - regardless of what your heart feels, it continues to beat, you continue to breath, life continues to happen.

And when you don't get that job - you have to move - your parents die - your best friend comes down with cancer - you end up turning into someone that you actually don't like -

Well, you keep living. So. Where am I going with this?

For me, at least, a lot of this has involved a great deal of letting go. Lowering your standards. Some times abandoning high standards. And abandoning sometimes even LOW standards.

Yesterday I felt like I hit rock bottom.

After almost an hour of juggling three people (two of whom really 'knew' horses - NOT) and seven horses, trying to let them have the 'experience' of being around the horses while keeping anyone from being kicked, bit, stepped on or knocked over --

-- and also ensuring that the horses were not messed with or wrongly disciplined or messed with --

-- I was, admittedly, weary and tired and frustrated.

But, after one of those 'knowing' horses persons got her fingers bitten by the colt, I had to bring her into the house to wash and bandage the wound.

And was greeted by my usual dirt and urine patches on the carpet (courtesy of three dogs, especially one simply impossible-to-house-break one), scattered coffee grounds & bits of bread, salad and smooshed banana on the kitchen floor (courtesy of my sixty-one year old brother and his poor eyesight), ripped furniture (courtesy of an Australian Shepherd and three cats) with dust all over (courtesy of our southwestern Arizona wind).

I could care less, but I would really, really have to work at it.

Have my personal criteria gotten this low?