20 August 2010

Nothing soothes me more after a long and maddening course of pianoforte recitals than to sit and have my teeth drilled. (George Bernard Shaw)

11 August 2010

I have this incredibly passionate feeling about what I do that can make me annoying, and I recognize it. People ask me if I could just lighten up a little bit: Sure just give me a hot dog and tell me to shut up.  (Jodie Foster)

20 July 2010

The charm one might say the genius, of memory is that it is choosy, chancy and temperamental; it reflects the edifying cathedral and indelibly photographs the small boy outside, chewing a hunk of melon in the dust. (Elizabeth Bowen)

1 June 2010 – something I deeply believe in:

Older Americans have fought this country’s wars, built its cities, reared its children, and tilled its soil,  They have a right to our deepest respect. (Claude Pepper)

17 May 2010  In all the years I have been solving cryptograms, I was so surprised when one of my favorite quotes turned up:

I hold that every man owes something of his time and substance to the upbuilding of the profession or industry from which he gains his livelihood. (Theodore Roosevelt)

4 May 2010   Eighty’s a landmark and people treat you differently than they do when you’re seventy-nine.  At seventy-nine, if you drop something it just lies there.  At eighty, people pick it up for you. (Helen Van Slyke)

3 May 2010  I always avoid prophesying beforehand, because it is a much better policy to prophesy after the event has taken place. (Winston Churchill)

30 April 2010   A walk through the Paris streets was always like the unrolling of a vast tapestry from which countless stored fragrances were shaken out. (Edith Wharton)

27 April 2010   Mothers are basically a patient lot.  They have to be or they would devour their offspring early on like guppies.  (Mary Daheim)

by Lori S. Goldsmith, SPHR,  GPHR

Between work, family, wife to my husband whom I am married to (you may have seen that startling revelation of mine in a tweet recently), a new dog that makes two, and a variety of volunteer lives: HR Florida Council Certification Director, HR Florida State Conference Program Chair, Taoist Tai Chi beginning instructor; it has been challenging to find the time to read and respond to all of the great articles I would like to contribute my two cents too. So I have been thinking, what could I do in the interim and still stay connected and share something of myself?  Last night, it occurred to me.  Cryptograms.

My father was a cryptogram aficionado and began writing cryptograms for me as far back as I can remember. As soon as I completed my puzzle, I had to recite it out loud.  That practice has carried on in to my adulthood.  Be warned if you happen to sit next to me on a plane.

I did not inherit the gene giving me the ability to complete puzzles in pen.   I still use a pencil to this very day.  My husband usually writes me cryptograms for special occasions. His are usually especially challenging as he does not stay consistent with the code.

My father passed away in 1981.  I still feel him next to me and smiling as I take on a new puzzle.  The first cryptogram that I thought I would share with you is one that my father left for me in my old bedroom night stand.  I have no idea how long it lied dormant in there.  A year or so after Dad passed away, my mother sold their home and moved to a condo much closer to me.  In preparing for the move, my manager/mentor purchased my bedroom set for her daughter.  Although, the set had been emptied out years ago, I just felt compelled to open the night stand drawer.  There was one index card in my father’s incredible computer like printing:

OMZ JZSCZL BU LSBYZC, JUC

OMZ WBZQ BU OXB. – LCRLZB

The cryptogram should not have been a challenge to an expert like me. Obviously, the words were common.   I erased so many times that I nearly wore the index card out and eventually wrote it out on a piece of paper.  I’d pick it up every now and then.  Three years later, I just picked the index card up and completed the puzzle in the fashion automatic writing.  It was then that I realized my struggle was not based in solving the cryptogram.  My struggle was in letting go of the last physical piece of my father.

The cryptogram: She feared no danger, for she knew no sin. – Dryden

Since I can’t read my cryptograms out loud to you, my plan is to publish my completed cryptograms.  Some are funny, some sad, some profound, some poignant.  They are all a part of me that I would like to share with you and hope you find value in reading.