The Passionate Writer: Coming to Create with Your July 1 - 31, 2014
The last week - and still now - I've been dealing with construction at my house - which has made for a very grumpy and often displaced version of the usually happy-go-lucky me.
As we say in theater, the show must go on, and in that vein, The Passionate Writer Series began right on schedule and is continuing here throughout the month of July.
The Passionate Writer with Julie Jordan Scott offers quotes, prompts and more each day in July - join the writing fun!
Naturally you may join in the writing pleasure at any time, but if you want to get each and every yummy morsel, start tomorrow and keep coming back for more!
Ready to be inspired to be a more passionate writer and blogger? The Passionate Writer is another inspirational series from the Let Your Words Flow Program.
The month of July will be filled with quotes, prompts and more for you to be even more passionate in your writing and blogging. Each day I will create a number of prompts for you to play with either now or in the future.
Whenever you feel like you need some extra ooomph for your writing, you can trust the Passionate Writer will be here for you.
If this is your first visit, you will want to visit our Let Your Words Flow Guide so that you will receive the most value from the life changing content you find here.
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Julie Jordan Scott is a writer, performance poet, Mommy and mixed-media artist. Coming soon - more creativity camps, playgrounds and workshops to grow yourself artistically (and hey, just for fun!)
Check out the links below to follow her on a bunch of different social media channels, especially if you find the idea of a Word-Love Party bus particularly enticing.
I had great hopes for this, but blehhh - I feel like I did Sarah Bernhardt a disservice!
There are times when art works out fabulously. Happy accidents are beautiful and I just want to create and create and create from when I wake until I sleep. I was very excited when I started Index-Card-a-Day. Now? Not so much.
This week I bombed on what had great potential, as you can see by Sarah Bernhardt above. My best outcome may have been when I tried the least with "Write*".
This card has multi-layers and texture - whisper shouting "write*" seems as close to perfection as I'll get this week!
Finally, I have been working on my July Blog Series - The Passionate Writer. I created a preview for it as well as an ICAD card. I wonder which one you like better?
This is my ICAD version of the Mary Oliver Quote. I love the Vintage Book Page, the ink... even the sharpie writing. What do you think?
OR do you prefer the looks of this image featuring the same quote?
The July Writing Series - The Passionate Writer - starts July 1. I made this with one of my photos from 2011, Picmonkey and Pixlr.
My lifestyle requires I be flexible with my time so sometimes I have hits and sometimes I have misses. I confess I enjoyed much of these burst-moments of creativity. Some outcomes I like better than not.
I would love to know what pieces resonate with you as well as what you are up to creatively this week -
Thank you for being here!
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Julie Jordan Scott is a writer, creative life coach, speaker, performance poet, Mommy and mixed-media artist whose Writing Camps and Writing Playgrounds permanently transform people's creative lives. Watch for the announcement of new programs coming Spring, 2014 and beyond.
Check out the links below to follow her on a bunch of different social media channels, especially if you find the idea of a Word-Love Party bus particularly enticing.
Today is the longest day of the 2014- a fact which always confused me as a child.
It is actually the longest day of sunlight for those of us who live in the Northern Hemisphere - and a time when the days actually start getting shorter. In Bakersfield I like to think the worst of the heat is leaving and I know that is far from so.
I am almost half way through my year of Feminist Selfies and I haven’t blogged about it much AND it has been an intriguing journey, as always. This is not my first year of selfie taking. I took selfies for a full year back before “selfie” was a word.
I did it to learn about myself and to grow as an artist.
I do the same this year, only I am also doing so to grow as a feminist and to continue down the path of self acceptance.
With this in mind, I share with you seven moments in time from this past week. Sort of a visual “This is YOUR life!”
Mommy Daughter Selfie: We went to see "The Women" at the Empty Space - Katherine, Emma and Mommy
Sometimes the setting is more important than how I look in this case, Cayucos Beach was the star... not me.
Contemplative: Considdering cancer and its fingerprint, heartshaped, on my face.
Tuesday I went walking on the Bluffs to enjoy the sunset and as a bonus, the wind came out to play!
Do you see my fingers holding my cereal bowl? Alice the Cat gets a bigger feature and it still qualifies as a selfie. Yes, this is how my living room looked on Wednesday morning. Used it on my writing camp facebook page....
Julie in Film: Throwback Thursday and In-this-Moment Thursday. Five years later, still doing Inclusion Films work.
This one never made it to Instagram. Just wasn't feeling it. Reading this awesome book, though, is feeling it! Literary Granny, Feminist History, Great wordplay.... waiting at Panera for my social Emma to finish her evening with friends. Mom of the year. Tired.
I woke at 345 am and spent the rest of my sleeping hours on my front porch. In homes of my home's era, there was oftentimes a sleeping porch included. I'm sure my neighbors hated this, if any of them caught me snoozing on a Saturday morning. Note: I needed a blanket!
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Julie Jordan Scott is a writer, creative life coach, speaker, performance poet, Mommy and mixed-media artist whose Writing Camps and Writing Playgrounds permanently transform people's creative lives. Watch for the announcement of new programs coming Spring, 2014 and beyond.
Check out the links below to follow her on a bunch of different social media channels, especially if you find the idea of a Word-Love Party bus particularly enticing.
In May I focused on fitness for the first time in a long time with my friend Jen at JVKom Chronicles. She is a gem. Each Friday she will be asking fitness questions and then we'll link up on Friday. I adore Jen - and know that by having this smidge of accountability in my week I will page more attention to my fitness levels. Very exciting for me after so long.
Here is today's check in.
Thank you, Jen, for keeping fitness on my mind continually. I know this will make a big difference in my life.
In fact, I made it to the gym this week for the first time in over a YEAR thanks to Jen
I made it to the gym: aqua circuit hooray! And yes, I felt the burn
(and my daughter, Katherine) double teaming me. I sent this photo to Jen via twitter of me by the lockers... I was trying to get a photo of the gym logo - I think when I go this weekend I'm going to do a mini-personal photo challenge of me working out on different machines just to show Jen (and you!) I'm working it! :-)
What is your favorite time of day to workout?
My favorite time to workout is sometime between 3 and 5 pm. I like it for several reasons. I read somewhere it is a great metabolism boosting time - this was way back when and I remember I would get home from work and walk a couple miles each day. I felt great and looked great and was happy. Very content in my life. Now the time of 3 and 5 pm is more challenging because of my Mommy duties but maybe, since it is Summer and I am remembering, I will do this again - at least try it. The class I took yesterday was at a horrid time for me... right smack dab in late morning when I am working away here and loving it - uber productive! I want to be flexible enough though to get my fitness in and realize sometimes I won't be able to do so at "my best times."
2. What is your favorite Super Food?
Right now, flaxseed meal hands down. TRY IT! Reminds me, I need to eat my breakfast oatmeal with flaxseed meal!
3. What are some of your fitness goals?
I want to feel healthier, feel stronger and more able. I want to be able to do physical activity without getting winded. I would like to look better - more toned and less flabby. A smart goal for this, though, is to go to the gym three times a week and do cardio at least five times a week for at least 30 minutes a pop. Because of the May Challenge, I know I can do this.
4. What is your favorite vegetable?
Green beans! I know, I've talked a lot about tomatoes but I think they are, in some circles, considered to be fruit!
5. What is something fitness or health related that you’d like to work on?
I want to get back into Yoga classes. I was thinking of actually taking a senior yoga class at the gym, just because I oftentimes can't do the poses well and want to do a remedial type class where I feel like the expectations aren't quite as high. I love yoga, though, and the meditative quality along with the fitness part of it. Right now I've been feeling rather discombobulated and could really use the restorative nature of yoga.
There is my five on Friday! And hey,my beloved readers - you may join also. Just visit jvkom.com to get join the fun!
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Julie Jordan Scott is a writer, creative life coach, speaker, performance poet, Mommy and mixed-media artist whose Writing Camps and Writing Playgrounds permanently transform people's creative lives. Watch for the announcement of new programs coming Spring, 2014 and beyond.
Check out the links below to follow her on a bunch of different social media channels, especially if you find the idea of a Word-Love Party bus particularly enticing.
I'm spending my weekend working on my blog with all the awesome people at the Biannual Blogathon Bash!
Dear Fellow Blogathon Bash Friends,
I wasn't sure if I would be able to participate in this Blogathon Bash until mid-week. I had an opportunity to go to Sacramento but unfortunately (or fortunately, depending upon how one looks at it) I was unable to attend. Instead, I get to focus on my blog this weekend which is actually at the perfect time.
I feel like I am setting the stage for a strong future as I prepare to launch a new blog on September 21, 2014. I could have chosen frustration because I bought the domain and hosting back in March but haven't been successful in finding a match designer wise. This is difficult because I know what I want and I could probably do it myself if I felt more confident and willing to invest a lot of time in design.
Anyway - I am striking a compromise with myself and setting my goals for the Blogathon Bash has been instrumental so far in creating the context for the compromise.
THIS IS EXCELLENT!
⦁ I plan to participate in at least 25% of the mini-challenges, the likes of which I haven't seen at all yet. I simply know they are always helpful so I know I will want to play along.
⦁ I plan to create 15 or more templates for the July Ultimate Blog Challenge. When I say "template" I mean dated, ready to go blog posts created primarily via a formula like I have used in previous Ultimate Blog Challenges. I have had great success with my writing prompt series and plan to go with "The Passionate Writer" this time around.
BONUS: Prepare a Word Doc to be transferred into a Kindle doc and prepare for publishing the series into a book ready to launch when the new blog is. This is another skill set that has, until now, eluded me. Fear - I'm coming to bite your butt!
⦁ Create announcement pages for two Summer Writing Camps and devise a marketing plan for these camps as well as a basic marketing plan for the New Blog to be followed up with at least one hour daily in the weeks to come.
⦁ Follow up with Go Daddy about the new blog - what can/will they do as far as transferring content from old blog to new, etc. Ask about any guidance re: themes, etc. These terms are ones I hear Wordpress people bandying about but other than knowing they exist, I'm lost.
⦁ Follow up with Canva graphics - create at least one or more for the future blog.
BONUS:Experiment with themes and graphics for the new Wordpress Blog, paying careful attention not to completely frustrate myself!
⦁ Communicate with other Bloggers doing the Blogathon Bash
⦁ Have an excellent time! :-)
So there you have my basic goals with room to stretch, roam and contract from these goals as necessary during the course of the weekend. I look forward to getting to know as many of you as I possibly can!
With Passionate Gratitude,
Julie
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Julie Jordan Scott is a writer, performance poet, Mommy and mixed-media artist. Coming soon - more creativity camps, playgrounds and workshops to grow yourself artistically (and hey, just for fun!)
Check out the links below to follow her on a bunch of different social media channels, especially if you find the idea of a Word-Love Party bus particularly enticing.
Sometimes invitations are not what they appear to be....
I was reminded of something last Saturday that continues to feel important today, but like many messages that are intuitively based rather than otherwise, it may take a while for it all to sink in and make sense.
Do you know what I mean?
Inconveniences are invitations. The RSVP - or how you respond - is up to you.
What they are invitiations to: the where the what the who - is yours to choose. In the last few days I've gotten increasingly annoyed by the way people choose to whine and complain and fault find when there are so many other options.
Perhaps I am pointing the finger to myself.
My Saturday was meant to be spent basking in the breezes from the ocean. I was to sit along the hem of the Pacific ocean, breathing in the last threads of the previous school year and metaphorically set sail for the "what's next" and "what if's" patiently waiting for my attention and intention back at my home tucked deeply in the central valley.
My phone charging system, however, tugged me away from the ocean in the early afternoon.
My car charger surrendered to electrical current overload while I surrendered to finding a public place with suitable plugs . My GPS guided me to the closest Starbucks, which I discovered was one of the grocery store locations. Outside the grocery store was another corporate behemoth of mediocrity which was also known for some of us as a location for wi-fi and electronic device charging.
I walked into the familiar golden arched facility and sought after a plug.
I found one plug right where a gentleman with a very tanned face was sitting. I quickly discerned there weren't anymore plugs so I asked the gentleman if I could please charge my phone there. His blue eyes met mine and he was quite pleasant.
I plugged in my phone and asked him if he would like anything to eat. This seemed a fair exchange. When I returned to the table with his burger and fries, I almost did what seemed unthinkable later. I almost sat myself away from him.
I had allowed his weathered skin, his dirty hair, his oversized clothing and obvious lack of a place to call home to cause me to be glad to give him food and charge my phone near him, but not share the intimacies of sharing a table with him.
The jolt of humiliation brought me to my senses.
I steered the tray to him and took my iced tea from it, offering him the food. "May I join you?" I asked him.
I introduced myself and took my seat, smiling. He looked down at the food I offered and I looked down at the book I brought. We amiably shared the time together before I asked permission to ask a question.
"Are people kind to you?" I wondered aloud.
He nodded yes, which pleased me, even as I wondered how honest he was being. "Do you stay around here?" I asked him, "Its such a beautiful place."
"I'm traveling," he told me. "Looking for work....from Texas."
This was unexpected.
I would not have thought he would be even thinking about looking for work. I wondered if he believed himself. I wondered why I didn't believe him.
My voice said a simple, "ohhhh" and we continued in silence until he got up to leave.
"Thank you," he said softly.
"Best wishes with everything," I said, slightly less softly.
It was inconvenient to charge my phone away from the beauty of the beach. It was an invitation to reconsider wonder, work and what we seek both individually and collectively.
As I was writing this, my thirteen-ear-old son, Samuel, came into the room.
"Why are you looking out the window?" he asked, as my fingers paused and my heart turned from the screen.
"Because sometimes when I am writing and I don't know what to say, I stop for a moment and wait for the words to come."
That satisfied him. He left the room, back to his space and his computer games and his realm of creativity.
Words came to this page, but I'm not convinced they are "right" and I'm pretty sure there is more to this story. I'm still discerning what this inconvenient invitation was all about, actually, though I am pretty sure it is about asking, living and writing the questions.
I decided to take a walk on the nearby bluffs to have some quiet, reflective time as I bid the sun goodbye.
The unseasonably cool wind lifted my hair and danced with it as I laughed and snapped photos. I sat on a bench and watched other people who took time out to be with the setting sun. We are sometimes a unique tribe. One gentleman sat on the very edge of the outlook, using his backpack as a stool. There was a family of four on a blanket, the little girls playing with a ball and running around the trees. There was a bird whose feathers I didn’t recognize, who played “how can I best enjoy this wind current” who caught my attention and held it until she flew out of sight.
It wasn’t until this morning, the next day, I remembered my writing group.
I love writing in groups because what comes off the end of my pencil is different when the prompting is not solely my own. When I just write from what is on my agenda I tend to get more of the same of what I usually write. This changes when I allow others to urge me. It is like instantly allowing the rumblings of my heart to meet up with the rumblings of other hearts and just-like-that my words and I grow differently.
The words I birth in my writing groups are unpolished gems. This is a given.
Here’s what I mean: warm up writing is common in groups. Stream of consciousness is the only way to go and what words come are often ridiculous or lack form or at times they actually manage to refresh one’s life.
Prompt = In the wide open air, I feel...
In the wide open air I feel rejuvenated. How I love it.
I think of skies, stretching out... I think of the joy of opening my arms or quietly stretching into the sunset. West coast = sunset sky hugs rather than sunrise sky hugs. This year, before its end, I will reach into sunrise and hug it.
The school year = more sunrise sky hugs.
Out there, heading east after dropping Emma I discover things.
A surprisingly yellow dumpster, a bricked in arched doorway, surely a victim of that legendary long ago earthquake that swept away much of our historical architecture here. Gold country, my mind floods over to gold country and the hopes, perhaps, this weekend. Gold country.
Sunrise into the flecks of river water, golden river water.
I'm grateful warm ups don't need to make sense.
In the wide open air I don't need to make sense. I don't have to wear a certain hat. I don't have to button up my shirt or wear matching socks. In the wide open air I can speak pig latin, I can eat a chicken breast for breakfast, I can actually roll on my back, laughing at a joke from three years ago I finally understood.
Did you get it?
Did you hear it?
In the wide open air, you do. And I am. And together all is just right.
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Do you see how my time of writing in community in the morning actually predicted my future last night?
I hadn’t even remembered writing those words when I was sitting on the bench, writing and being with the sunset, yet those words remembered me.
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Julie Jordan Scott is a writer, performance poet, Mommy and mixed-media artist. Coming soon - more creativity camps, playgrounds and workshops to grow yourself artistically (and hey, maybe just for fun, too!)
Check out the links below to follow her on a bunch of different social media channels, especially if you find the idea of a Word-Love Party bus particularly enticing.
Creative Improvization means letting go of control - and getting comfortable with whatever flows your way.
Summer may be both a time of increased creativity as well as a time of squished creativity.
My days are sliced differently in Summer.
I find myself longing for hours of open time-space to immerse myself in some form of creative process yet I also find myself arriving in those spaces not ready to commune with the muses. Instead I find myself cruising facebook or instagram or pinterest and before I know it my time is frittered away rather than invested well.
This is why I am so grateful for challenges that are well suited to Summer creativity.
This index card features words from poet Sylvia Plath. It has brought me to thinking more of "What if"... been quite a heart opener for me.
This morning I spent perhaps thirty minutes creating backgrounds to be used on mini-mixed media projects that will be a part of the Index Card a Day challenge.
Now I have six 4 X 6 index cards ready to be used and in the creative process I felt completely grounded, present and in the moment. I let go of control and allowed the myself to partner with the media rather than controlling it.
I glued Russian language book pages I couldn't translate onto the cards and covered them with a layer of modpodge before I added acrylic paint or ink or tissue paper. No intellectualizing was involved, just playful experimentation.
I still don't know what will come next but as in life: this is part of the fun. Once we learn improv is where life expands the best, everything else dribbles where it will without us pushing or shoving or relentlessly willing anything to go "our way."
To flatten my cards, they each get a 24 hour (or so) time period in a photo frame. Sometimes they even get fancy photos like this one.
These backgrounds serve as foundation for other stuff, just like my daily approach to this improvisational life become a surefire way to simply feel better about whatever comes up rather than confusing myself by believing I have control over anything except my opinion about whatever comes up.
John Lennon knew this when he said life is what happens when we're busy making other plans and Epictetus knew this when he said it isn't what happens that upsets you, it is what you think about what happens that upsets you.
My Summer creative self knows this, intimately.
My delight in these backgrounds is like the initial crack in the doorway.
You can smell what's baking a little bit, but the tasting will wait for maybe five seconds and maybe, for some of us, five decades.
How are you slicing up your creative life this Summer?
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Julie Jordan Scott is a writer, performance poet, Mommy and mixed-media artist. Coming soon - more creativity camps, playgrounds and workshops to grow yourself artistically (and hey, just for fun!)
Check out the links below to follow her on a bunch of different social media channels, especially if you find the idea of a Word-Love Party bus particularly enticing.
My family knows I will wander off in the early mornings, sometimes for several hours, while they do things like sleep in. I will stretch out with the GPS device as my dear friend to do something that inspires me like nothing else.
I seek former residences of writers.
I hadn't realized Worcester, Massachusetts, held such treasures as the one I found on one of my early morning expeditions. There, at 4 Woodford Street, is the home Stanley Kunitz lived in as he hovered right on the edge of adulthood.
A plaque marked the home's prestigious history.
Stanley Kunitz was a Pulitzer prize winner, a poet laureate for the United States at age 95. That is not a typo, when he was ninety-five years old and still active in his writing and publishing, he served as poet laureate of the United States.
He was a legend who walked up and down the stairs I stood on.
I imagined him looking out over the neighborhood in those days before the depression. What did it look like then? What was his take on his industrial but education rich hometown? What were the sounds and smells of the neighborhood as compared with today?
Stanley Kunitz has a body of work that is multi-faceted and layered, it seems like a joke for me to try to even begin to define him as a poet.
Several quotes:
"A poet needs to keep his wilderness alive inside him. To remain a poet after forty requires an awareness of your darkest Africa, that part of yourself that will never be tamed.”
"...few young poets [are] testing their poems against the ear. They're writing for the page, and the page, let me tell you, is a cold bed.”
"“Some poems present themselves as cliffs that need to be climbed. Others are so defensive that when you approach their enclosure you half expect to be met by a snarling dog at the gate. Still others want to smother you with their sticky charms.”
and this poem, The Layers, is one I want to have read at my funeral someday:
I have walked through many lives, some of them my own, and I am not who I was, though some principle of being abides, from which I struggle not to stray. When I look behind, as I am compelled to look before I can gather strength to proceed on my journey, I see the milestones dwindling toward the horizon and the slow fires trailing from the abandoned camp-sites, over which the scavenger angels wheel on heavy wings. Oh, I have made myself a tribe out of my true affections, and my tribe is scattered! How shall the heart be reconciled to its feast of losses? In a rising wind, the manic dust of my friends, those who fell along the way, bitterly stings my face. Yet I turn. I turn, exulting somewhat, with my will intact to go wherever I need to go, and every stone on the road precious to me. In my darkest night, when the moon was covered and I roamed through the wreckage, a nimbus-clouded voice directed me: -Live in the layers, not on the litter- Though I lack the art to decipher it, no doubt the next chapter in my book of transformations is already written. I am not done with my changes.”
(You may find this poem and many other evocative poetry of Stanley Kunitz in his Collected Poems.)
What favorite writer's home would you enjoy visiting?
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Julie Jordan Scott is a writer, creative life coach, speaker, performance poet, Mommy and mixed-media artist whose Writing Camps and Writing Playgrounds permanently transform people's creative lives. Watch for the announcement of new programs coming Spring, 2014 and beyond.
Check out the links below to follow her on a bunch of different social media channels, especially if you find the idea of a Word-Love Party bus particularly enticing.
Creative People: Please please please hang in there. Find your island (again and again and again!)
I am listening to a group of young men doing math homework. One guy seems to get it. The other guys are at varying levels of understanding.
I feel this tonight, even though I sit alone, surrounded by the bland art of a corporate coffee establishment, by myself. My phone is charging next to me, my computer screen waiting for something of interest to be thrown down in rows of some sort of intelligible configuration of letters.
I am sitting at a virtual table, suspended somewhere midair, miduniverse, mid-river flowing while I float on a raft wishing I could find an island to sit on and dock, alone with these words of mine not those words of theres.
A bunch of people I love and adore peppering me with questions and I don't have the answers for any of them. All I want to do is write. I want them all to stop asking me questions and just let me do what I need to do: write. Express. Make meaning from life experience and put it on a screen and hopefully help others to find meaning, too.
I am reminded I can't forget I am an artist. Sometimes that requires reminding those around me I am an artist. If I don't dock on that island with regularity, things - and I - may get ugly.
It was as if in a moment my fairy god mother arrived.
My phone went dead mid sentence and the peppering of questions stopped.
I took a breath and dove in to my sea of words. These are the ones that came out.
Nothing particularly mind-shattering yet exactly what I needed, like the iced tea-lemonade beside me. It is a corporate, not-too-tasty-yet-not-offensive blend.
The boys working on their math assignment have left. They were chatting about rugby, drinking and the use of protein to bulk up as they left. "But I don't drink anymore," was the most memorable of the words spoken.
A young woman just rushed in, headed straight for the restroom.
Another nerdy boy-man is here, about to study his Bible and plug in his ear buds.
I notice they've changed the furniture here. No longer any comfy chairs, instead replaced by college dorm modern. The girl who rushed for the restroom scurries out as quickly as she arrived.
Clarity arrives on the road of jazz vocals and a man with a plaid shirt and a barrista calling out "Roberto" and putting a straw on the counter next to what I think may be green tea.
I'm going to save and continue. What about you?
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Julie Jordan Scott is a writer, creative life coach, speaker, performance poet, Mommy and mixed-media artist whose Writing Camps and Writing Playgrounds permanently transform people's creative lives. Watch for the announcement of new programs coming Spring, 2014 and beyond.
Check out the links below to follow her on a bunch of different social media channels, especially if you find the idea of a Word-Love Party bus particularly enticing.
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