People Power Granny

Rape of the Lady!

2009-07-15T21:10:00.004-04:00

Those around her blush in shame
To see their friend abused and harmed.
She had always risen over them,
A sweetheart of many lovers.

She sang, moved her limbs with ease
And turned the head of many passers-by.

Many moons ago, her neighbors heard the rumor
That this fine lady was to be disarmed,
Humbled, defrocked, ravished and raped.

But her friends were powerless to help,
Themselves living in fear they would be next.

And so it happened. The plunderers came in
and scalped her, tore off her limbs,
Plunged into her soul, her body, her flesh
Was ripped and scraped, pillaged and crumbled.

She cried, she hollered throughout the hollows!
The madness of the rapists poisoned the lady,
Making her an eyesore amidst God's beauty,
A sacrifice for lust, violence and greed.

Our lady's children cried for mercy,
Pleading, bargaining, lost in shattered flesh.
Neighbors scolded, shivered, shared the nightmare.
Was there no justice, no savior, no remorse, no shame?

Now our lady still weeps, her skin hollowed rock.
Her seams of coal are gone, tore from her muscle,
Her history, her trees, her streams, her fertility
All gone...gone for greed that never knows guilt.

Once a-flower with beauty in each season adorn,
Today, she stands a mess so we others can be warm,
So we can heat our lotions, dry our clothes,
Vacuum and blend and cook, cool and make popcorn.

Our lady lays scalped, her head removed and gutted.
She did not give her richness; it was scraped from her,
For money, for comfort, for yours, and my "way of life."

One more lady used, abused, left for dead
Among ruin, tears, wrinkles and nakedness.
While life goes on in the city just a valley away.
Her Majesty the Mountain, screams a heedless cry.

2009-07-11T21:28:00.001-04:00

2009-07-10T23:11:00.001-04:00

President Obama, You're not listening to us!

2009-07-10T20:41:00.003-04:00

President Obama, listen up:

You won the election last November. You beat your competitors handily. Your followers were jubilant. But remember, we expect some type of follow through on your part. We haven't seen much to make us point with pride to you lately.

You speak about clean energy. And you include coal mined in a dirty way from mountain tops.

You speak of peace and winding down the war in Iraq. Meanwhile you go after the Taliban in Afghanistan, killing women and children, while Osama bin Laden sleeps well at night in the mountains hundreds of miles away. As a matter of fact, you're proposing a bigger defense budget in US history.

You create a stimulus plan to help the little guys. Who gets the most money? The big guys, major corporations, big banks, Wall Street firms who pay their bosses big bonuses.

You say you're for health care reform. Yet the two words "single payer" never passes your mouth. Maybe if we are lucky, we hear about a "public option." Creating two health care programs: One for the rich; one for the poor. How American can you get?

You expand the National Service program, whereby many of us can give a year of our life serving our country here in the USA. But there's no increase in stipend for those who serve, who must try to get by on about $750 a month, making the income of those we serve double and triple that of ours. And we can't even get a physical or blood lab tests or go to the dentist for tooth cleaning. You're creating many more positions, but no one can afford to serve, especially if they have children to raise.

During the campaign you tell us that you will close Guantanamo Prison Camp. It's still housing most of the same detainees as it did in January.

You tell us during the campaign that torturers all the way up the ladder will be punished. Now you have changed your mind, and won't even release some documents and pictures that would hasten what you said you would do.

You told us that when you became president returning caskets of fallen soldiers would be available to be photographed for Americans to see results of this war we continue to fight for oil in the Middle East. You changed your mind.

You said that your Administration would be open and transparent to the press. Ask the media today just how open the Obama Administration is to the press.

You gave us the impression that the government during your administration would not do the spying on its own people like the Bush Administration did. It continues.

You tell us that real change comes from the grassroots, from the bottom up, and that you would always listen to us. You send your new group OFA (Organizing for America, which used to be Obama for America)out into the towns and cities of this country, asking us to help pass your programs....the way you propose the programs be, not the way we propose. Bottom Up has become Top Down. Sorry that doesn't work for me, a former organizer myself.

Folks, we have our work cut out for us. True, Obama comes off looking good when he gets out and speaks for us in country and outside the country. But we need to pay attention to what he really says and what he really does and what he doesn't do or say. That's what just isn't right.

So President Obama, take some time in the next few weeks and go back over your old campaign speeches from last year. Remember when you spoke out against the war in Iraq when you ran for Senate in 2004. Remember how Russia got bogged down in Afghanistan. Remember how Israel has had a free ride for far too many years from our government. Remember who got you elected.

Then come back to us. We'll forgive you when you start acting like the Barack Obama we thought we really elected.

We are like those trees standing by the water. We won't be moved. We hope you come back and stand with us soon. Otherwise we'll be looking for leadership elsewhere.

What will your Sponge-Child soak up from your parenting?

2009-07-07T23:00:00.005-04:00

When we come into this world, we have only our parents to show us just how the world works. We quickly learn what actions are acceptable, and which aren't.

The majority of our parents really do want to impart healthy information to their descendants. After all, those kids will be their link to the future of their genes in the centuries ahead.

However, I would venture to say that it's also the majority of us that mess up to some degree. Maybe we let our child cry him or herself to sleep because we don't want to spoil the child.

Maybe we tell him or her to shut up, or criticize them that they'll never amount to anything. There are times when we parents may become self-absorbed with our own problems. Maybe we'll argue about sex or money within hearing of our children.

Or we may criticize each other in front of the kids. All of these actions and a myriad of others leave huge imprints on our innocent children.

Before we know it, our children are adults, with sexual or financial hang-ups themselves. Their relationships may be threatened because our children are carrying on wounds that we may have inflicted without our knowledge.

Now I'm not saying that a one-time argument with your spouse around your kids will ruin the lives of your children forever. No, but this kind of thing happening more often than not, even as little as once every couple weeks, can cause our children to carry into adulthood preconceived negative ideas about the opposite sex, the need to keep your mouth shut rather than calling a wrong a wrong, the fear of not pleasing people, of being criticized. Our little child doesn't put away childish thoughts and habits. No, these childhood "wounds" become ingrained in that child as he or she takes on the responsibilities and freedoms of an adult.

Many of us adults have found ourselves unable to accept either praise or criticism. We are afraid of our bosses and of all authoritarian figures. We know as adults we won't be slapped or spanked. We won't be sent to bed without supper, but sometimes we would rather have these punishments instead of living day in and day out in fear of being abandoned, of being laughed at or talked about, of being unchosen.

It is a very very difficult job to be a parent. We can't always show our fears and displeasures to our young children. We shouldn't loose our tempers around them. We shouldn't drink or eat too much around them. We shouldn't ignore our episodes of depression or anxiety.

Remember, our little ones are like little sponges. Whether we like it or not, they soak up the good and the bad in our lives, and all of that either gives them true hope and freedom as adults, or they continue to swish around in the dirt and slime they carried through the years in that sponge we call a brain.

My parents had too many children. Many of us lived with neglect, were lacking of necessary supplies, but most of all, we were not able to be cuddled, loved, or stroked by adoring parents. When it came time for me to have my family, I carried the same mistakes I had learned from my parents into the lives of my children.

I only hope they will have time for their children, that they will transfer a sense of awe and wonder to their children. I hope they will show them the power of love, the warmth of touch, the beauty of a smile, the thrill of a job well done.

Get yourself a sponge before you get yourself a kid. Then teach yourself (so much that it becomes second nature to you) that your job will be to be sure that your child will soak up only the good stuff.

Your reward a couple decades later? Another able, confident and happy parent, now making that chain more secure for the generations that will follow.

Losing Michael and Farrah 10 years after Ruth.

2009-06-25T23:24:00.003-04:00

I'm going to visit my farmer-daughter this weekend, the one who was born the year Michael Jackson recorded "Thriller."

The BBC has devoted an entire half hour of its half-hour news program that I watch every weeknight on my local public television channel. I can't believe that the staid BBC would preempt all of the other news that happened today to carry on and on about Michael Jackson.

Well, even this old granny liked his music, especially his early stuff. As many of his fellow stars noted after his death, he was a genius when it came to his musical career. One commentator went as far as to say that Jackson even planted much of the bad news about him so he would remain in the limelight.

Just how were the stars aligned today? We lost today another star from our female gender...Farrah Fawcett, the most gorgeous of late 70's "Charlie's Angels." My brother-in-law still has her famous wet swimsuit poster hanging in his garage.

While Michael's "Thriller" sold more records than any album in history, Farrah's swimsuit poster also sold millions, up there with at the top of beautiful women who have won the hearts of most red-blooded men in our history.

So here we are, June 25, 2009, which is also the 10th anniversary of my mother's death. She wasn't quite as beautiful as Farrah (especially in her old age, but not bad when she was 18), and not much of a singer like Michael. But I bet she could cook circles around either of them, and do more in a day work wise than either one of them did in a week or a month.

But it still makes one wonder, what is it about June 25th? Is it such a tragic day because it is one of the longest days of the year, exactly six months before and after Christmas? I'm not an astrologist, but this day leaves its mark for me in 1999 and 2009.

As we release Farrah and Michael from our lives and tuck them into the pages of history, we find that the glamor of the 80's has taken a big hit. Wicked cancer took the life of Farrah, while a messed up life and an absent childhood eventually did Michael in.

As a child from a dysfunctional family myself, I find that I have more compassion for Michael who died much too early. I think his entire life was about trying to placate that inner child which never was allowed to be just that, a child. Thus, his attraction to young children....perhaps to such an extent that was immoral...can be understood. Not legitimated, but understood who he turned out the way he did.

Michael was also the victim of a racist culture. He was a man who wasn't happy with the body he was given by his Creator. What a shame that he felt a need to change his nose, change his skin color and change in other ways that did not seem to glorify who he innately was, but which made him into almost a manikin.

Some final words about Farrah and her former lover Ryan O'Neal. It's a given that O'Neal is probably also a camera hog, perhaps going as far as to tell the public that he and Farrah were planning to finally get married. As an older person who remembers his best movie ever, "Love Story," I couldn't help but see that movie become a reality if he and Farrah did marry. In case some of you don't know, the movie dealt with a young man who marries a young girl who soon dies herself of cancer.

So here we are. June 25th, just about a day in history, just as movie, TV and music greats Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett. May they both be in peace at last, out of the limelight and in a new light of eternity.

Blue and Brown in Flight

2009-06-22T21:42:00.003-04:00

I see a brown bird and blue bird side by side.
Like the earth and sky in a dual flight.
They land in my oak tree side by side,
Brown and blue eggs to warm and tend.

My life here on this land beneath the sky
Is like the trees where the eggs lie.
Two birds so different yet so much alike
Work together to add balance to life.

They are the ying and the yang
In the rhythm, song and dance of life.
They bring hope and wonder surrounding
Me -- over, behind, under and around.

These birds care for their nests so hidden and soft.
Nothing’s too grand for their little tree loft.
“Why can’t I help,?” I ask down below.
No answer. No sign. Not even a nod.

While the bluebird is like my glorious sky
And the brown like the firm ground I stand,
The birds are just birds with jobs they do.
That’s their sign: Don’t think. Just do.

Get ready to Respond to Crafty Health Care Reform Reframing

2009-06-12T20:51:00.004-04:00

Winning on an issue isn't always based on the merits of a proposed solution, but instead on how you frame that issue. The Democrats are still playing catch-up on framing issues. The Repugs have "issue framing" down to an art, fine-tuning their skills since well before Reagan became president.

The master of framing has been Republican political strategist Frank Luntz. He has successfully advised the Repugs on how to vilify environmentalists, how to make global warming a joke and how to transform the long accepted estate tax into what is now called the death tax.

So no one if very surprised that now Luntz is advising the Repugs, the pharmaceutical companies, insurance companies and the American Medical Association on how to make us Americans decide that we really don't want health care reform after all. So beware of the following messages that you'll be hearing on talk shows, interviews, news reports and on C-Span in the next few weeks. Don't be swayed by these code words you'll be hearing over and over:

Words and phrases like:
*Rationing (or anti-choice)
*Big Brother (anti-government)
*Socialism/Communism
*Politicians
*Washington
*Bureaucrats
*Government Takeover
*Current Healthcare Quality
*One Size DOES NOT fit all!
*Protection of the personalized doctor-patient relationship
*Waste, Fraud, and Abuse
*Patient-centered rather than Government-centered

We Americans have been nurtured to hate anyone or anything many or most of these words describe. We quit thinking when we hear these words. We almost automatically get sucked into becoming putty in the hands of the corporate lobbyists and their purchased decision makers when they use these words. So Beware!

What words you'll hear (and I suggest you use these words too) from those who want Real Health Care Reform are:
*Choice
*Freedom
*Common Good
*Shared Responsibility
*Health Insurance/Pharma Big Wigs
*Bean Counters
*Wall Street
*Economic Security
*Common sense solutions Americans understand
*Same benefits as Congress, no more, no less. It’s only fair.
*Public plan choice will fuel competition to benefit all Americans.
*Balanced Care
*quality coverage through choice of private and public plans.  

Another bit of advice: If you get into an argument where the top list of words are used, and people want your response, DON'T REPEAT THE WORD(S) THEY USE! Instead, get your words out there by bridging. All you do is start your response with a phrase like:
*The reality is... or
*The point is....

Those who don't want true health care reform will scare folks by telling them that some bureaucrat will put himself between you and your doctor, denying you exactly what you need. This is how they will define the "crisis." They'll also say “If you have to wait weeks for tests and months for treatment, then you have a healthcare crisis.”

Your job will be to show that the crisis is instead the health insurance industry being allowed to put itself between patients and their doctors. We need national reform now—so Americans have coverage that they —and their doctors— can count on.

So you say: "The point is, too many millions are now being told to wait forever. Or wait until you die, because if you can’t afford the best care in the world, you won’t get any care."

Also remind your audience that today tens of millions of families go in to medical debt and financial ruin simply paying for life-saving care.
 
Luntz and company will dig up stories of healthcare denial from Canada & Co. They will tell you that in countries like Canada "...politicians make YOUR healthcare decisions. THEY decide if you’ll get the procedure you need, or if you are disqualified because the treatment is too expensive or because you are too old. We can’t have that in America.”

Here's what you say: "The reality is: Germany, Japan, Switzerland, and every other capitalist democracy are covering everybody with public-private partnerships. That’s what we’re talking about. We will have an American solution that is about common sense and choices."

The Repugs will also drum into American heads: “The plan put forward by the Democrats will deny people treatments they need and make them wait to get the treatments they are allowed to receive.”

Your point will be: "The reality is, too many millions are being told to wait forever now. Or wait until they die, because if you can’t afford the best care in the world, you won’t get any care. We must have health reform that covers everyone and provides Americans with choices."
  
Luntz has advise his followers to be sure to offer a vision of “more access to more treatments and more doctors…with less interference from insurance companies and Washington politicians and special interests.”

What vision can you offer? Common-sense solutions Americans understand. If you like your current health insurance and doctor, nothing will change. If you don’t or are among the 47 million uninsured, you will get to choose from the same coverage plans that Congress has. Americans will get the same benefits as Congress, no more, no less. It’s only fair.

(Thanks to the excellent blog by Susan McKay at http://thcc2.wordpress.com/ for her advice on how to successfully frame health care reform in our daily conversations.)

Was World War Two the Good War?

2009-06-06T21:38:00.004-04:00

Can pacifism show a way so we never see another Omaha Beach, a Tet Offensive, a blanket bombing of Dresden,a Pearl Harbor, a Hiroshima, a 9-11?

All of the battles and/or atrocities listed above are not successes. No, they are each signs of failures...failures of diplomacy and toleration, of humane treatment of peoples, of people having access to the necessities of life (food, water, clothes, shelter).

We can argue that of course, what leads up to a war is a failure of a national country to get along with another. President Obama says, for example, that the Allies had to fight the evil of the Third Reich, that no one could say that the Second World War was not a necessary war.

And we did try, we are told, to negotiate with Hitler before we went to war against him. But Hitler thumbed his nose as he went through Europe, defeating one country after another. What alternative was there to such an onslaught?

But there were cases of non-violent resistance during this war. (See http://blogs.setonhill.edu/ncche/019079.php.)

Most importantly, let it be said that no war would be possible without the complicity of those who serve under tyrants and other leaders who command the military.

(I know there are now corporations who probably could also conduct their own war with hired mercenaries and ammunition and armaments, including the new weapon, unmanned drones, but that is another blog.)

Today we mourn for those thousands who lost their loved ones on Omaha Beach some 65 years ago in France. In all, nearly 100,000 soldiers lost their lives during the two months that this battle continued.

The Second World War was a result of failure of Christianity to stay true to the ideals of the God they worshiped. Instead of valuing the early faith of Jesus's followers, who were pacifists, leaders in the church instead vilified the people from whom Jesus came, the Jews.

It was this extreme bigotry against Jews throughout Europe and beyond for nearly 2,000 years that left an opening for Hitler to capitalize on that very suspicion in order to get Christian Germans to follow him so obediently. And it was also because we punished Germany so harshly after World War One that the Germans did experience hardship postwar. But their target was the Jews, their scapegoats.

Of course, we know that this bigotry led to the holocaust against the Jews, as well as others who defended the Jews or who were considered of a lesser ethnic background than the Aryan race itself, or had some other unacceptable trait such as homosexuality.

Jesus, the ultimate pacifist, gave up his life rather than fight for his life. His followers did the same up to at least 300 years after his death.

From there, Christianity went into a Dark Age that lingers yet to this day.

Whenever a religion aligns itself with a government, that religion will more likely compromise its highest held moral ideals in order to fit in with the common denominator of the government.

And even though here in the United States, where there is separation of church and state, in order to be accepted by good patriotic Americans, the church has a very difficult time not being patriotic, as well, encouraging its young people to serve in the military when their country needs them.

To this day, even though I was born post World War Two, I feel that war was not the good war. No war is ever good. No war is reason to send off thousands, even millions of young human beings with whole lives ahead of them, to be slaughtered.

Leaders start wars because of pride and posturing. Young men and women fight the wars because of obedience and patriotism.

Meanwhile God in our souls cries.

Do you continue to carry the basket of dysfunction?

2009-05-31T22:07:00.004-04:00

I see my mother as the noon sun erases all shade. She is sweating and heavy with child, burdened with a huge basket of junk that she carries ahead of a line of people older than her. Some are bent over, graying. Some are mere skeletons.

My mother trudges up the hill toward me. I don't know what to do. I am frozen in place and reach out for her.

Just as she shifts the heavy basket to me, she begins to melt to the ground. It's as though the heavy basket has pounded her into the ground. In a moment she is gone without even a smile or a thank you for taking her load from her.

I stare behind her. The older, zombie-like characters bid me on with the load. I turn to continue the trek up the hill toward a marvelous wide and full and welcoming maple tree.

I look at the tree. I look in the basket. It stinks with decaying works, words, actions, resentments, bitterness, addiction and neglect. But I feel obligated to carry it up the hill as generations of my ancestors carried the load in their time.

If I could only remove some of this junk from the basket, I could get to the shade of the tree sooner. But I look behind me. I see those people shaking their heads, urging me on with the full basket, warning me to not drop anything.

I remember to earlier times when my mother was many times heavy with child. How I wanted to climb on her lap, to have her hug me, tickle me, tell me she loved me as she cradled me in her arms!

But she always had the basket in her hands. He arms were not for me, but for carrying that basket of burdens accumulated from generations of mothers and fathers before her.

So I turn and carry my burden. I become angry, bitter and resent the load. I also resent those who are pressuring me to carry their old burden. Why? I wonder.

Meanwhile the tree beckons. With every step I get just a little closer until by early evening I become within a few feet of the cool shade.

I look back at the people behind me. They are still following me, scrawling and reminding me of obligations, loyalty, bloodlines, responsibilities to our "family secrets."

At last I feel I can call it a night. I plop down beneath the tree.

And the tree talks to me.

"I welcome you after your heavy journey. I am sturdy of trunk with supportive branches. My leaves bring me beauty in the summer and shade to those carrying heavy loads.

"But I also know to shed my leaves in the fall. Some cling and want to stay attached to my limbs. The Breath of the Spirit eventually convinces them to let go, and they float down to the ground to bring warmth to little seeds that will sprout after a cold winter ahead.

"This is nature. It is sometimes painful. But we in nature know that there is a rhythm to life, and we cooperate. The Creator keeps her promise though every year by giving me new leaves, new shade and another ring around my trunk.

"But look at you. You continue to carry a burden that should have been dumped long ago. Why do you continue with these dysfunctions? Leave your basket here in the morning. There is nothing in it that will help you grow into the person your Creator wants you to be. Leave it here, and I will transform it. I will let my bugs and worms wallow through it. By this time next year, it too will bring warmth for my roots and for new life in the years ago."

I was amazed at the wisdom found in the old tree. I looked beyond over at my ancestors. They were now floating away into the setting sun. It was as though I now had permission to let go of my burdens that had been passed on to them, and them to me, generation after generation.

Now I could have my arms free to love, to nurture, to nestle my children in my arms, along with their grandchildren.

As I closed my eyes, I imagined that I was at last in my mother's arms. She was laughing with me. She was free of burdens. She had time and a basket of love for me. She put me in her basket, swung me around and around, and we were happy and secure at last.

2009-05-22T00:12:00.001-04:00

Oh, to write a poem pretty!

2009-05-21T23:11:00.004-04:00

They say writing a poem isn't really so hard---
---Just harder than rocks thrown at my nose.
It hurts my head to write so damn well,
So now both nose and head cry out in pain.

I thought I would get the words to rhyme,
Make the words prettier than pretty,
The rhythm of verse, the meter, symbolism,
Language that dances and lingers in time.

I wrote about lost love, about aging,
About kitty cats and rattled brains.
I searched deep inside to grab the feelings,
To write from the deep and make it sound so right.

I listened to others, oh, so right, tight
And wondrous! I loved them. Could I borrow
them? Make them mine, I'd pretend just once.
Maybe twice. Oh heck, forever! You have plenty!

My poetry, my poetry, come pretty and sweet.
Make my readers happy, sad, and weak at the feet.
I want to stun them and shock them, make thinking
Obscure, as feelings aroused and tears streak the cheek.

Don't we all envision our great poem one day
Being marked in the book, read by God Herself
On the throne, all covered with velvet and silk?

So poem,I'm waiting, and waiting til dawn.
Please come, fill my heart with words like hell!

Til then, chocolates soothe my dreamy hurting heart.

What brought you to my site today?

2009-05-19T22:42:00.005-04:00

What draws people to People Power Granny?

I'm not a pro at Search Engine Optimization, but a few people do find my blog by doing searches with a few main keywords. Occasionally I check to see just what words people are typing into Google, Yahoo, Ask.com or other search engines before they get me. Here are just a few:

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It never fails to amaze me overall just what some folks seem to think of Granny. This word is used most frequently in searches that find People Power Granny. However, I don't think that those looking for such subjects as well built granny movies or naked granny are going to be satisfied when they arrive at my site.

So let me just warn my readers now. If you're looking for naked photos of wrinkly sagging old grannies, you won't find them here. Neither will you find find granny sluts or grannies having sex with their grand sons. Sorry!

Hate to waste your time!

If you want to read about an older person who respects you the reader, and who wants to leave a better world for those who follow her, you've found the right place here at People Power Granny.

Please let me know.....or offer your own stuff.....and let's make this site something worth your time and something we wouldn't be embarrassed to have anyone read.

Meanwhile, I continue to wonder about the fetish that people associate with granny. Folks, we're good and decent people! Look elsewhere online to get your kicks!

We Americans thrive on news of politicians' affairs, but live double standards ourselves.

2009-05-08T23:12:00.006-04:00

Just when I was getting comfortable with Barack Obama, Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton being in power at the national level, news of the Edwards once more hits the media.

Elizabeth Edwards has had her book published. It's called Resilience, and included in it is information about her husband John Edwards' affair during the most recent presidential campaign.

Ms. Edwards is hitting the talk shows and is making the rounds in the news. Like her, I know it's horrifying when we find that our spouse is having an affair. We mistakenly figured this would never happen to us. But to be truthful folks, this happens more than it doesn't happen. Those of us who live in a dream world and think that it won't happen to us are due for a hard fall at sometime in our marriage. Few of us will be spared.

Or we may find that we are the straying partner. We may find all kinds of excuses why we have a right to stray, but most likely, if we do, we are no different than John Edwards himself. We may not get the $400 haircuts, but we can be gullible to the flirtations towards us by members of the opposite sex. And if one of us is sick, is perhaps suffering from a terminal illness, and we're feeling left out of the entire picture, to stray becomes all that more tempting.

I'm not saying that John Edwards only did the natural thing for a good looking man. Nor am I saying that I'm surprised that it happened. He had an affair. He tried to hide it. He didn't confess the complete extent of the affair. He probably didn't admit that he gave in to an alluring woman who may have been looking for another feather in her hat and a baby in her tummy.

But let me set this whole affair aside and look at the political race that included a very important message voiced by both John and Elizabeth Edwards. They were alone in criticizing the world's major corporations as being among the major reasons for inequality in this country. They reminded us that you don't negotiate with these corporations. You regulate them and pass legislation that trims their feathers. When you develop healthcare reform, you don't ask the big insurance companies what they are willing to take. You develop the reform with the American people in mind, not how the insurance companies and pharmaceutical companies can continue to make their billions and trillions.

We will never know what kind of president John Edwards would have become, nor what kind of First Lady Elizabeth would have been. It is probably good that he left the campaign because his message wasn't winning votes, not because his affair was discovered.

But even if that had happened, I would be much more upset. In most countries on this globe, a candidate's love life and his or her political statesmanship are two different things. If we look at some of the world's most successful leaders throughout history, many many of them had affairs, but they were still darn good leaders. Just a few have been the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., President John Kennedy, President Franklin Roosevelt and the Rev. Jesse Jackson.

Maybe when we witness leaders being in the midst of an affair, we discover the hypocrites that we all really are deep down inside. Or perhaps we love being the voyeur of seeing a couple in turmoil. We find the evil one and condemn that person. The other half of the couple may come off as the victim or hero. It will all depend on how she or he handles the publicity. Does she write a book about it? Does she keep her mouth shut? Does she welcome the other woman and child into her life? Does she forgive? We're all watching.

We all love the black and white of affairs. One is the bad person. The other is the good person. We trample the bad person, and if the other is enough of a victim, we will help that one lick his or her wounds.

Meanwhile more than half of all marriages today fall apart because of a variety of pressures on the institution. We have to get over the idea that these marriages have been failures. No, two people have simply changed. Circumstances in their lives have changed. Both may be ready for new relationships, new adventures, new dreams. They may have deep deep respect for one another, but they may also know that it's time to move on.

Maybe this is what the Edwards should do, or the Clintons. Only the couple knows for sure. But whatever they do, they shouldn't live a mirage just so the public will like them. Their personal life should be their own, and it's not fair for us, their adoring public, to force them to stay together when the spark is gone. It may be time for each to move on, becoming more whole and happier in the long run.

Are we willing to let our political figures manage their own personal relationships? Would we want them to force us to live relationships we knew were wrong for us?

How we continue to wipe out The American Indians

2009-05-03T22:32:00.004-04:00

I'm of a privileged class. I'm of European descent.

I grew up in Iowa, a descendant of farmers who benefited from the Homestead Act. All my ancestors had to do in order to become owners of 640 acres (one square mile) or more was to stake it, live on it and start working the land.

My great grandfather came over from Germany where land was getting scarce. Over here the land was in abundance. The only folks who walked on it were the natives. We called them Indians, because our ancestors couldn't tell the original residents of this land from the people who lived in the East, India.

So today, our "Indians" live on reservations. The nation that may have once hunted on the land that my grandfather took over was probably the Sioux. The most Western band of the Sioux are the people who call themselves the Lakota, who live on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota.

Just a mile or so south of the Pine Ridge Reservation is the northern boundary of Nebraska. I also had relatives on my mom's side of the family who also lived very close to the small Nebraska towns close to the northern border. They had learned to live with, and in most instances, benefit from the Indians who were their neighbors.

Not long ago I met a Lakota who visited my fair city. He informed a small group of us about the continued threat his people still have to contend with from us people of European descent who live near their reservation.

Pine Ridge is alcohol-free. No one is allowed to consume alcohol of any kind on the reservation. Many of us know that we introduced Indians to alcohol when we started trading with them centuries ago. One older man I know, who happens to be a priest, claims that we Europeans didn't win the West with guns. No, we won the West from the Indians with alcohol. Many of our ancestors wanted to completely exterminate the natives of this country back then. And today, some of us are still working at it, still with the alcohol.

In the case of the Pine Ridge Reservation and Nebraska, especially in White Clay, NE, some of us White folk are doing a pretty darn effective job of extermination.

Duane Martin or the Lakota Nation tells us that few adults are reaching old age on the Pine Ridge Reservation. Alcoholism takes their lives in mid-age. Children are left without parents. They are forced to grow up too soon, and many turn to malt liquor in White Clay to drown their sorrow like those before them.

I asked Martin if there could be a more systemic problem that is causing his people to turn to alcohol. Have we Whites taken too much of their culture away? Have we also forced them to quit eating their native foods, replacing it with food that their ancestors would have refused?

Although he didn't disagree, he noted that the fact that White Clay exists mainly to sell alcohol to Indians, first priority must be shutting down these beer joints so the nation can begin to stop this epidemic that is like a genocide against his people at this time.

These four beer establishments sell more than $4 million in beer, mostly to the Lakota people, annually. The Indians are dying on the deserted streets of White Clay. They are not allowed to drink in the reservation. Nebraska law says they can't drink on the streets in White Clay or on the premises of the beer establishments, but hardly any beer joint owners are shut down although they continue to allow the buyers to consume the alcohol on their premises. They also continue to sell the beer and malt liquor to anyone who wants to buy it, even if they are noticeably drunk already.

People who care about what is happening to the Lakota people have tried to get local beverage boards to deny permits, to take away permits, to legislate from Lincoln, to move the beer joints much further away from the reservations, but the business is just too good to move. Thus everyday is business as usual.

Indians and progressive whites have participated in direct action and civil disobedience to draw attention to this genocide that is taking its slow and methodical toll on this once powerful Indian nation.

Some would say that drinking is a personal choice. No one forces an Indian to take a drink. Some would say that Indians are not any more prone to drink than is an Irishman, for example.

But where are the drug treatment centers or the rehabilitation centers in White Clay. Merchants there pay nearly $500,000 a year in taxes and fees from their alcohol sales. Yet this area where the four beer joints operate looks like something from a war zone. All it is are beer joints. No schools. No parks. Just places to sell beer to Indians.

If a white neighborhood had to deal with this, they would be listened to. Elected leaders in their community would at last get the message and would find some way to deal with this problem. But this doesn't seem to be happening in the White Clay or Pine Ridge Reservation.

Our neighbors in the Midwest deserve to be treated better than they are by us descendants of those who took their hunting grounds from them some hundred of years ago.

Can we stand with the Lakota people as they try one more time to try to stop the genocide that continues to wipe out the descendants of a once great and stable nation? Do we accept any responsibility to stand in solidarity with them this summer in White Clay?

Visit http://battleforwhiteclay.org and decide what you can do in solidarity with those of the Lakota Nation.

New vehicle inspections, insurance, license, auto plates....Oh, the confusion!

2009-04-28T19:46:00.005-04:00

Have you ever felt that you're spinning your wheels in the mud?

You have to do this and that, but you can't do that until this gets done. And this is stuck. So you go on to something else, but the spinning continues. And time is ticking away while your tires lose their tread and the air smells of burnt rubber.

You go to bed at night and wonder what you were able to accomplish today. Nothing. You think ahead to tomorrow. What needs to be done? Everything.

I have decided that I need a driver's license in a new state, but I have to prove that my car's insured in my new state before I can get the license. Will the insurance company want to see my new state's license proof before they insure me in the new state?

And I have to get new plates for my car, but the state also requires that I get a safety and emissions inspection first. But my car's on the older side? Will it pass the inspections? Will I need instead to look around for a good used car that I think will pass these inspections?

And say, I do buy another car, I'll have to sell my old one. I never received the title from the other state I used to live in. The bank that financed the car is now out of business. The county clerk has no record of a title. Am I now stuck with a car that I can't sell? Will I thus have to get two car inspections and two sets of license plates?

Gee, I wish life were simple! How I would love to go to work and not worry about all the personal stuff that hangs over my head. Is there anyone out there who has ever put together a list of things one has to do when they move to another state?

What about those of us with limited funds and time? Some of us feel walled in by rules, by tasks just to live a somewhat normal and legal life.

When we fall behind in meeting these legalities, we cringe when folks ask us for our driver's licenses. Will we be "found out?" Will we be fined? Why don't you newbies just do what you have to do and get it over with?

Some of us have come from states where inspections, either safety or emissions, aren't required. We don't know what we will need to do to pass such tests. Are all those cars being advertised on craigslist there because they can't pass these inspections? Will the owners selling such cars be honest when we decide to go with their car as the one that will carry us around the area?

So I continue to procrastinate. Maybe I can pretend I'm only visiting for a few more months. Maybe I'll just quit driving altogether. Now that's an option!

But there's no bus service on Sundays in my new city of choice, the day I need the service the most. I do have two legs and a bike, but there are times when most of us need our own vehicle.

Will someone put together a recipe for us newbies so we can take steps in the right order without wasting our time and the county and state officials' time in the process?

2009-04-26T14:12:00.001-04:00

Some ideas straight from the source for Earth Day parties

2009-04-21T19:34:00.004-04:00

So let's say tomorrow you're invited to a party. You have to bring a gift with you to the party.

First information you need to know: How old is the honoree? What kind of gift would she like?

The honoree is ancient, older than anyone or anything you've ever known. She is Earth, a very old woman often called Mother Earth. More accurately by now she would be Great Great Great Great Great Great (to the billionth power)Grandma Earth. However, since she's still giving birth, she is Mother to most of us.

Now you know who the honoree is. What can you give her?

I called the old lady and put the question straight to her. And just for you, I recorded my call. Here it is verbatim:

Ring, ring.....

Mother Earth?

"Yeah, what do you want? You know this is a busy time. Let's see, I've got to get a couple storms brewing so I can get the morels to come out. Then before I can turn around, I have to get the old oven Sun going to get my temperature up to 70 degrees by noon. I sure don't have time to talk, but now that you've got me, speak up, Child."

Excuse me, Mother. You know tomorrow is Earth Day. What would you like for a gift from your children?

"Well, Child, that's a ridiculous question! Everything is mine anyway. Nothing belongs to you humans or the birds or the snakes, and especially not to those damn yellow jackets. Biggest mistake I ever made! So forget the gift. You own nothing."

Okay, Mother Earth, I own nothing. It's already yours. But you know we human beings, we have free wills. Sometimes for special occasions, we don't give material things. We may do an action. Maybe we'll write a poem, or kiss our loved one.

"Hmm, that was a great idea of mine, wasn't it? But you know, I sure never thought this so-called free will would mess up my home as much as it has. If you humans would just behave, you would make my life much easier. Do you think you can talk folks into treating me with a little more respect for a change?"

What, you think people don't respect you? We all love you, Mother Earth!

"That's a bunch of spoiled baloney if I've ever heard any! You children don't respect me! Look at those dirty smoke stacks stacked all over me, just so you guys can warm your hand lotion or keep your coffee hot or run your air conditioners down to 65 degrees all summer. Beats me. You children then turn the thermostat up to 80 in the winter. Contrary folks, I do declare!"

But, Mother Earth, tomorrow is your day. Take advantage of it. What can we do for you tomorrow?

"For starters, just stay in bed. You can do very little harm while you're laying flat. Should have never given you children legs, hands or a brain. But even Mother Earth can make mistakes, right?

"But I guess most of you will eventually have to get up. Don't flush that stool every time you tinkle. You're wasting my water that way. Open the blinds. You don't need lights on when you can get plenty of light from the great outdoors.

"And you don't have to shower every morning. Just wash up a little. No one will know, and if anyone complains, send them to me.

"It will help if you lay off of the bacon and hamburgers for a day. Killing my other creatures is a waste of good resources and besides, I like my hogs and cows.

"Walk to work or take mass transit. Better yet, work from home. Save fuel. That damn fuel comes from fossils, another mistake of Father Nature, by the way. You children discovered that stuff, and you're drunk on it! Why, my state of West Virginia is a disgrace! My children are cutting down my beautiful mountains because of their addiction to fossil fuels. They're also killing themselves by burning the dirty old coal."

Well, thanks, Mother Nature for some ideas. I'm sure....

"Honey Child, I'm not done! I haven't even started! Your homes are way too large, and you are not sharing with one another. Why my children in Africa are ignored by my children in America. My children in South America are trying to survive by moving north, and you treat them like criminals! This land belongs to me, not to individual humans, some of whom think they are better because they own certain metals or those darn blasted computers say they have lots of money in your banks. Baloney again!"

But Mother Nature, we humans have evolved. We are civilized now. This is how we organize society.

"Ridiculous. All excuses for how you oppress more than half of my creatures, both humans and otherwise. I just don't know about any of you! I'm getting mad! Maybe I had better stop all of this, and get on with my spring preparation. Those pinks, yellow and purples do my body good. Flowers, oh flowers! Now there's a good example of my creative talents!"

So, Mother Earth, you've given me lots of ideas on how we can honor you tomorrow. Thanks for the ideas. Any last words?

"You betcha! Be humble. Get in touch with your roots like my flowers do. And breathe in my spring fresh air. Watch my butterflies. Listen to my songbirds. Listen also to your hearts. Your hearts love me, but you humans have lost touch with your hearts. Instead you listen to your greed, and that's what hurts all of my creation. So tomorrow, try not to be greedy. Love your fellow creatures, plants, animals, fish, even my reptiles and worms. They are also my children.

But I've got to go for now. I'll be looking forward to your gift of selfless-ness tomorrow."

So there you are! Earth Day, 2009. Do your Mother Earth a favor and live selflessly and frugally one day of the year. Maybe you'll enjoy it just a little. Mother Earth will be proud!

Sacrifice, Chapter 3

2009-04-14T21:12:00.004-04:00

The moment Josiah walked into the old lady's feeding lot, she was out on her front porch, broom in hand and giving the thirsty man her dirty look.

"What are you up here for? Got some more threats or offerings? I'm not going....never! This is my land. It's been in my family since any of us could remember. Now just turn yourself around and get out of here before I trade this broom in for my 22."

"Now Mary Elizabeth, I do think you need to get into town a little more. You're going nuts with just these deer and vultures out here to keep you company. I came by to see how you were doing, and to share some of my dry land fish with you. I know it's harder for you to trudge around these woods lately."

The old woman's eyes softened momentarily.

"Josiah, did I hear you say dry land fish? Well, I guess those Yankees haven't taken a few good habits out of you yet. But just give them some time..."

"Old lady, are you going to take these here mushrooms, or do I have to carry them all with me down the mountain so I can eat 'em all myself? All I ask is a little drink of your clean spring water. Can you spare me some?"

Josiah noticed the old woman had aged more than her share in the last couple years. He remembered her when she always had a glass of sassafras tea for him and her boys Joe Kyle and Merrill. Even back then she was a real homebody. When her husband died from the bad epidemic of flu in '23 she took over his work growing a little corn, some beans, milking the goats and cows, even working on the old Ford, under the hood and outside, inflating the tires whenever it was time to go into town to Leepers Grocery.

Josiah knew that those trips were getting more and more infrequent these days. But he also knew that Mrs. Stubbs was a stubborn old bitty if there were was one. She would rather starve than ask for a morsel of cornbread from a neighbor.

So about once a week, he ambled his way up to her place and just checked on her. When she would go into the shack to get something, like a glass or water, he would leave a little cornbread, some beans or fatback on the porch swing, knowing that the old woman would soon find it, and he wouldn't worry for a few days.

As she put the tin cup of water into Josiah's hands, he noticed that her arm as swollen and old rags were wrapped around a wound. He touched it for a moment before she quickly drew away.

"What happened here?" he asked.

"Nothin. You know, Josiah that the old man never built this shack so that it was level on the ground. Just fell out of the bed again in the middle of the night. Maybe you can help me put the mattress on the floor someday, so the fall will be shorter next time."

Josiah knew that the old woman was hiding something, but he didn't have time to get too snoopy. That was her business, and he had to get going.

"I swear you have the best water around, Mrs. Stubbs. "What do you do, run it over gold in that spring house of yours?"

"You know why it's good, Josiah. I don't have to tell you why. There's none of that stupid picture-making potions in it up here like down there in Chrisburg."

"Oh, you're full of beans, old woman! Those guys done went to college, they got letters after their names. They're no dummies, and they got to drink the water, too.
But your water is still better. You could put it in those quart jars over there and take it down into the valley and make yourself a mint if you had a little more spunk."

"Money is the root of all evil, don't you know that, Josiah?" She looked into his eyes, and he knew that she was getting ready for her daily lecture on the evils of smoke stacks, drainage ditches, coal dust and railroads.

"Well, Old Woman, I've got to go feed the hogs and keep the little lady happy down the mountain. Anything I can bring ya next time I'm up this way?"

She shook her head and got up to finish her sweeping. "Nope, just keep your eyes open and your mouth shut as much as you can. Bye now! And thanks for these great dry land fish. They'll go good with my new lettuce tonight."

Josiah said his good byes and started down the trail to home. He couldn't help but envy that little old gal for her gumption and nerve to hold her ground. No money would have buy her. Not bad for the old mountain. It needed someone like her to plant her heels in it day in and day out.

As he got closer to the home place, he could hear old Sally neighing out back. It was time for her daily dose of hay before he started the milking for the night. But first he would have to dump the shrooms on the kitchen table so Ruth May could salt them down and soak out the bugs before cooking them for dinner tonight.

"I'll do better tomorrow," he whispered to himself."Maybe even 'nuf to take into Leepers for the town folks."

A good way to get a little extra to buy some home brew from Figgins on the way home.

Symbolism of Holy Week -- Stories for all of us!

2009-04-11T10:25:00.002-04:00

Tomorrow Christians celebrate New Life by commemorating the Resurrection of Jesus Christ some 2000 years ago.

Of course this joyful day follows a week of sorrow in which most Christians commemorate the death of the Suffering Servant, the same Jesus Christ.

Many Christians believe in the literal story of a real life historical Jesus who indeed died for all of our sins since the beginning of humankind. We were responsible for his death. His Father gave up his only son so humans like you and I could be saved.

What a wonderful story! Kind of reminds me of ancient myths, however. Now before you throw your shoes at me through cyberspace, I'm not writing this to refute Christians' time-honored faith in the saving power of the cross. I'm just trying to widen the circle somewhat so that other non-believers can at least also benefit from this story.

First of all, let me tell you that I will NEVER be able to understand an all-powerful father relinquishing his son, making him suffer almost unbearable pain in order to appease his sense of justice.(At least Abraham's potential killing of Isaac would have not been as cruel as what was to happen to Jesus.) But let it suffice that this was a father, not a mother, at least when we look at archetypes. So I'm glad the central figure in this story is a man, not a woman.

Nevertheless, in this story of the Suffering Servant (Jesus)we have a story of a life of a wonderful man who had many of the powers of a (God)(god). He healed. He changed properties of liquids. He raised people from death. He literally walked on water. I won't try to explain how, but let's just agree, this man was godlike.

Yet he let himself be betrayed, captured, beaten and condemned to death. He could have gotten himself a lawyer, defended himself and at least served time instead of being put on the cross. But he was the Suffering Servant.

In mythology, we learn of characters who do extraordinary things so that we common humans can learn from them. In this sense, we can all see in the story of Jesus Christ an example of how as humans we too should have some heroic leanings in ourselves. Sometimes we need to go beyond what we in justice should do. Sometimes we need to make those heroic steps. Perhaps we won't defend ourselves so that others can be saved.

Then we looked at the story of the Resurrection, which follows Good Friday by only two sunsets. Did Jesus really rise from the grave? Christians think so. But again, we don't all have to believe in the Resurrection. We can possibly just benefit from the symbolism that this story tells us. Of course, we can take from this story the hope of new life after a grave misfortune in life. But we can also find hope that good eventually wins over evil, and brilliantly shines forth as in the glorious body of Christ which by common sense by Sunday should have looked pretty darn bad.

Other symbolic stories we find during Holy Week involves the Last Supper, which this year coincided with the Jewish feast of Passover. But the story of the Last Supper expands on the symbolism of the Passover (survival of a people amidst great injustices) to offer the symbol of community. The sharing of the bread and wine (both of which were already increased in quantity and quality in previous miracles of Jesus), and the instruction to continue this practice, signifies the sustenance of bread, the joy of wine and the community of sharing both among friends and even enemies. These two elements are very much the simple symbols of what we all need to be a part of life. We need food and joy shared with one another.

So the next time you happen to pick up a Bible at a hotel or a doctor's office, don't put it down thinking that someone is trying to convert you. Outsmart them. Read the stories in the Bible and glean from it similar stories that have been written in many other people's legends passed down from generation to generation.

No matter where you are on a faith journey, we can all benefit from the lessons we learn when we read them or hear them as stories of the human condition. They teach us to understand our calls in life as flesh and blood and feeling humans. We are burdened in many of the same ways as our ancient ancestors. These stories are carried down to us to show us possible ways of facing our struggles as we go on with the human (and somewhat mystical) story of humankind.

Have a wonderful Easter!

The Two Daughters: Grace and Faithful

2009-04-09T11:14:00.003-04:00

Once upon a time in a beautiful kingdom, a mother had five children. She was a poor mother who was very busy washing clothes at the stream, ironing the clothes, wiping dirty noses with the clean cloths and hunting and gathering for her husband and beautiful children.

Our mother loved her five children very much, but they gave her very little time to rest and to thank the Great Goddess for her beautiful and healthy children.

Of her five children, two were daughters. She looked at both with pride.

She thought of her two daughters as her right and left hand. Each could help the mother with her many tasks as she hunted, gathered, laundered and swept.

One daughter named Faithful was always at her mother's side. She also loved to hunt and gather. They would talk for hours about hunting wild fruits, mushrooms, greens and nuts as they spun the wool from the sheep and made beautiful garments for the family.

The other daughter named Grace meanwhile loved to dance, to talk with her friends and to dream wonderful dreams of fairies, stardust and handsome young princes. Often the mother of these beautiful daughters would confide in Faithful that she didn't know how to talk to Grace. Grace was a very strong young woman. She did not want to live the hard life of her mother. But she did think that her mother made many of her own problems.

She would often remind her mother that the family's small hut was a mess. In a huff, she would straighten the hut up because a dirty hut made Grace very irritable, and she and her mother would quarrel, and often cry.

Meanwhile Faithful continued to help her mother hunt and gather. They would laugh and cry together. Neither one knew how to get Grace to be more like them.

One night after a very hard day in the fields, the mother had a dream. She saw her two daughters. Faithful was holding her left hand and Grace was holding her right hand. Together they formed a circle and sang songs outside the king's castle.

Grace kept drawing the circle of women towards the castle and all that was beautiful, while Faithful pulled the circle to all that was familiar. In her dream, the mother was happy in both places. She had no cares when she was pulled one way or the other. At last she admired her daughter on her right, for she was challenging her mother to step beyond into beauty, dance, music and mirth. But she also clung to her daughter on the left who shared and loved what she knew and had experienced with her mother, her grandmother and all the grandmothers before her.

Startled, the mother awoke from her dream and called both daughters to her side, even though both were asleep for it was the middle of the night.

She told her daughters to join her outside. Together they built a big fire and watched the flames reach up into the heavens. It was at this time that the mother spoke to her daughters the following story.

Once there was a mother who had two wonderful daughters, one at her left hand and one at her right hand. One daughter she understood very well. The other daughter she did not. But in a dream the great Goddess spoke to the mother and explained to her that her two daughters were really part of who she really was. Of course, the mother recognized the daughter who cried when she cried, hunted when she hunted and laughed when she laughed.

But she didn't understand the other daughter who loved all that was beautiful in the world, who liked order and song, dance and mirth.

In a dream the Goddess came to the mother and told her that she had given her two daughters for a special reason. The one daughter Faithful was to bring her comfort, to be her helpmate and share all that was held in honor in the traditions of the women before them.

Grace, on the other hand, was to be the reminder of the dreams that the mother once also had as a young child. She also loved to dance, to party, to have a pretty house, to believe in fairies and to make the entire world beautiful. But family traditions would not stand for all of this head in the clouds, the dancing and revelry. The dreams of the mother became veiled by what was expected from family tradition.

Now the mother could see that Grace was she the mother as a young child. She had wanted to dance and to sing and wonder at the magic all around her. Grace was at her right hand tugging her along, to reclaim the wonder of womanhood.

So it was through a hard working mother with two daughters that we now can understand that we all have two sides. We have the side we are comfortable with, but we also have the side that leads us ever so gently into our shadow self, the self we have long forgotten, but which is now tugging at us to reclaim.

After the fire turned to dying embers, the mother hugged both daughters. And they hugged her back, continuing the chain of womanhood into the next generation, knowing that we all have the person we have become as our comfortable force with us day in and day out. But we also have that hunger to explore that which has been forgotten from many years ago, or perhaps never really explored at all. As women, we are obligated to search for that magic and wonder that will at last bring us full circle into the wonderful nurturing creatures of magic that the Goddess always intended us to be.

The Dream: Massive secure building or neglected creek?

2009-04-07T22:17:00.003-04:00

I find myself home, recovering from surgery. I'm reading a book about dreams in bed. As is normal with me as I read in bed, I become drowsy. I put the bed down for a few minutes and close my eyes.

I'm troubled about a person in my life as my imagination becomes active. I'm not really dreaming, but I now see myself behind a huge old abandoned warehouse. I feel like I'm looking down at me as a small girl. I see my back as I stare and wonder about the huge old building.

I notice all the boards that cover the old building. I walk around the building, and see that all the doors are padlocked and the building is completely secure. There is no going in or going out. The building is still in good shape, but it's so massive, so cold, unmovable. If it were a person, I think it would be lonely and sad.

I'm back behind the building again, noticing that if it were a person, its eyes would be closed and no one could look into its eyes and it could see no one. With its door padlocked, it can't speak, smile or even cry.

I turn around and there is a creek overgrown with trees and plants along side it. Many would say its trashy which is often the case in creeks on the other side of an alley behind old abandoned buildings. I seem to look at both the old building and then at the creek.

I see life in the creek. There are birds flying around in the trees and butterflies darting back and forth. Water pushes its way downstream over the rocks and trash.

For some reason I must choose to remain with the old building that refuses to move, to show emotion, to be willing to change anything about itself. And it is so big! It can't move. It can't change. I think that persons could try to bring it to life, to paint murals on its bricks, perhaps scenes of wildlife like the creek behind it. But the building would still be the same. Maybe it was once an old factory. It was closed down. All the rusty machinery is still in side it, old papers are scattered around. The old building finds comfort and warmth still inside it's many hardwood floors and dusty steps. It doesn't want anyone to come in and sweep it out, to remodel it. It finds comfort in having all the chaos that has been in it for years. "Leave me alone," it seems to say with its massive presence.

So I turn around. I leave the old warehouse and follow the stream. I don't know what path it will lead me on, but I do know that it has more to offer me than the huge building that could protect me with its massiveness from a strong wind or a driving rain. It offers some security but a bleak existence day in and day out.

As I leave my imagination, I know what my creative imagination seems to be telling me. Is it time to leave the security and history of where I've been most of my life? Or do I move where there is life, even if it is unpredictable? In what mode do I want to spend the rest of my life? Is it better to be alone or with someone or something that won't change, that will be predictable?

I choose the other and walk away with some sorrow mixed with courage and expectation and excitement.

Tell me about your dreams or creative imagination. We can find out much about ourselves by examining our inner souls and our dream life frequently.

Sacrifice, Chapter 2

2009-04-06T23:18:00.003-04:00

Friends, this is my second installment of my "Rape of a Model City," which I shared with you a few weeks ago. Note that I'm changing the name to simply "Sacrifice" now. In this chapter, I'm jumping ahead some 40 years to Josiah's grand daughter. Enjoy and critique!

The rock had always looked a little funny. As a child Sally Grimes had climbed it, danced on it, slid down it, had her picture taken on it, and (and only two people knew this) made love on it one summer night when the stars and moon made Scott Morrison's eyes glow like burning embers.

This was her rock. The Resurrection Rock, she called it because if she looked real hard, and if the sun was at the right angle, she could almost make out the details of how one part of the rock seemed to be hewn out it and then pushed back in almost perfectly. Grandpa had said that that little half circle nestled into the mid side of the rock was just a vein of serpentine so familiar to the rocks all around these mountains. Sally knew there was no other rock around as special as this rock was to her. Why her Grandpa Josiah even gave her that rock, saying that no one on this here earth could care for it like she could. When she and Scott lost their virginity on it far too long ago, they called it the rock's christening. Most girls wanted a rock of some type on their fingers. Not Sally. The one in her back yard would be the only rock she wanted to ever own.

She noticed how the honeysuckle and that darn English Ivy Grandpa had planted ten feet away around the house a couple generations ago were both beginning to sink their tentacles into the huge rock. It looked kind of pretty like that, like green framing around it, and when the honeysuckle was in bloom, the darn thing even smelled like that moonlit night with Scott. No, she wouldn't sweat to remove it this year. Maybe next. Besides she had a meeting in town with the lawyer. Grandpa wasn't the paper, legal type of guy. He would rather be out there in the garden tying up tomatoes or digging potatoes than sorting out tax notices, writing wills or any of that stuff. And now that his possessions, including this farm, had worked its way out of probate court, it was just about hers at last.

Sally took one last glance at the rock, the remains of the garden, the woods behind it all, and walked to her car. She noticed the North Carolina license plate looked a little out of place in this little still rural mountain community, but she wasn't going to live here, she reminded herself. This was going to be her escape refuge from the ruckus of Asheville, just 90 odd miles away.

"My, how this place just doesn't change," she whispered to herself as she started the car's engine. "When this place becomes mine at last, I'm going to get myself more turn around space here by the house. Getting out of this driveway will be the death of me or one of my kids someday if I don't."

As she got off of Barton's Hollow Road and turned onto Reservoir Road, she remembered once more those fun trips as a kid to Grandpa's house, a peaceful wild place with wild turkey's, groundhogs always getting into Grandpa's garden. She could still see him with the shot gun in his hand, daring it to just one more time show it's face...

Then she remembered the police cars that one Sunday parked in the driveway, the red lights blinking on and off, the confusion, the aura of sadness. Someday she would have to bring this memory up with Susan. She couldn't remember why this scene always crowded out the other more pastoral peaceful memories. They didn't belong there....or did they?

2009-03-31T23:45:00.001-04:00

Getting older can be humbling

2009-03-31T20:06:00.003-04:00

At this time three years ago, I was CEO of a community group. (Well really, community groups don't have CEOs, but you get the idea.)

I was also chief financial officer, secretary, an ex officio member of the board of directors, development officer, media relations director and janitor.

Today I am lower on the food chain. I no longer tell others what to do. They tell me what to do, such as clean up the conference room after a meeting. Go get pizzas for the meeting. I am told to make copies and put together board packets. I answer phones for important persons in the office. The calls are seldom for me.

I had thought a year or so ago that this would be a relief after being a person who had the weight of an entire organization on her shoulders. My group was my baby. She was conceived when some folks got together madder than hell about the expansion of a polluting paper factory right in our downtown.

Gradually we took flight. We organized. We developed bylaws, were incorporated and then earned our tax exempt status. We started to get more members and to win grants from proposals I wrote. We met regularly, working from an agenda that I got approved by our board chair.

We became stronger as our board developed and bonded with one another. We won on some issues, lost on others. The media contacted us when they wanted environmentalists' opinions on pressing issues. We testified at public hearings. We paid the rent on a nice office with a fountain in the atrium.

It was fun. It was hard work. It was stressful, but I felt that the group was in tremendous shape as at last I prepared to leave the organization for a chance to take a job as a director of organizing for a statewide environmental group. But most of all, I saw a chance to get healthcare benefits. I said good bye to my baby and hoped for the best as I went forward to greener pastures.

Well, as luck would have it, within nine months I was laid off by the statewide group due to shrinking funds. My former baby had been left unattended and died an early death, as well.

Some nine months after the layoff, I was given an opportunity to join another environmental organization, and to help it by doing "capacity building." Sounded good. I would be filling a niche that was necessary for the health and sustaining growth of an organization. I could go home at night and enjoy myself. Essentially I could leave my work at work. I could have a personal life, not one of finishing the grant proposal at 1 AM and then catching a few hours of sleep before standing up to the pressure another day.

Yes, in many ways, I glad those days are behind me. However, the ego laments. Now instead of giving orders, I must take orders, such as one veggie, one pepperoni and one cheese.

I am the oldest employee where I work. I know the least about technology and everything computer. I now must ask the 26 year old recent college graduate how to design name tags or how to get something on Facebook or how to Twitter a message to volunteers.

I put together lists....lists of businesses, foundations, petitioners, bicyclists and other nonprofit groups.

When someone walks in the door, I ask them whom they would like to see. Of course, they're not there to see me!

I watch organizing taking place. I want to get in there and lend my voice, my experience, but I'm not asked. Essentially, that's not my job. They can do well enough without me.

I write grant proposals and see them ripped apart by someone else who has other ideas on how to convey our message. It's no fun seeing your masterpiece come under the edit pen of someone else the age of your children.

I had always heard that growing older was a mark of wisdom and good fortune. The older person held the golden knowledge of a life and career that left a mark on the community around you.

But today instead some of us older people see ourselves as not much more than the go-fer that someone has to be. Many of us have not been able to keep up with ever-changing technology. People who made up our relationships have retired while we are left to try to build relationships with younger generations.

In the office, we may be the reminder to younger employees that life is about getting older. Eventually hair gets thinner and whiter. Wrinkles show up and are harder to cover. Figures lose their sexy curves. Hearing and vision may not be as sharp as they once were. Welcome to older age, to the world of seniors. This is a sight many in the USA would rather not deal with, and to see such people in the office on a daily basis can cause one to resent such people as reminders of where they will be sooner than they care to see.

Or perhaps we remind a colleague of a parent who bore down on them as children. They couldn't wait to get away from those older people, and now here is someone who is very much like that parent the younger employee left. But this time, the younger colleague has seniority, and through transference, he or she makes the older person pay the price of a past parent-child relationship that didn't leave pleasant memories.

In less than three years a person who used to head up an organization now carries the pizzas to the board meeting and she cleans up afterwards.

So a word of advice, younger folks: Be kind. You will also be older someday. And if the economy continues the way it is now and your health remains relatively stable, you too will be that older person who is ridiculed by the recent college grad. You may end up out of the loop. You may be lonely and desire to be included in decision making. Will you be?

Unless you die early, you too will reach beyond 60 or 70 or 80. That day will come to you as it is coming to me. Will you be ready to be called an old fogey then as I am now?