Everything I Know...and So Much Less

Why We'll Survive the Zombie Apocalypse

2011-10-27T16:22:00.000-07:00

Recently, I took my boys out for exercise in the neighborhood. They rode their bicycles, I ran next to them. They're 5 and 7 years old, so for now my legs and their wheels go about the same pace. I enjoy it while I can.

We bicycled home, twilight impending and the dew starting to settle on fields around us. My younger son, irritated with his bicycle as he tried to ride without training wheels, uttered a mewl of frustration as he came to a sudden stop. "Ugh!" he cried. "If I don't go faster on my bike, the zombies will get me!"

I stopped short. Zombies? How did my precious 5-year-old, carefully insulated from super-heroes, television, and video games know about zombies?

Perhaps it wasn't that big a surprise. My siblings and I share a certain zombie fixation that managed to survive having seen "Army of Darkness." Maybe an attraction to zombie lore is genetic and my son came by it honestly.

Without meaning to sound too full of myself, I believe my kids are pretty lucky. In the event of the zombie apocalypse, I am well-positioned to protect them from the undead as well as the just as frightening living scavengers and nightmarishly unprepared nincompoops that try to drag down those who actually have a chance of surviving.

Here's what I could've told my son to put his mind at ease:

Honey, don't worry! We have supplies to wait out the zombies! In addition to a standard emergency preparation kit (which contains antiseptics, antibiotics, water purification tablets, flammables, anti-flammables, mylar blankets, and the like), my storeroom contains approximately six months of non-perishable food or ingredients specifically chosen for their shelf stability, nutrient content, and flexibility. I also have a supply of negotiables. No, not cash. Instead, I have alcohol, chocolate, tea, and coffee. Just call me Trader Tim.

Sweetie, we can get out of here before the zombies come! I have mapped out six different ways by car and three by foot to get out of the immediate area if the zombie swell requires we leave the homestead. We have backup fuel, extra tires, and stable vehicles to get us there.

Son, if the zombies come, we have a place to go! You didn't think I was going to share my proposed hide-outs, did you? Yet, rest assured, I have four identified -- all have basements, entry points that can be controlled, the potential to be on their own water and power supply, sufficient land for growing food, and good vantage points for hunting wildlife or picking off zombie predators.

Of course, there are the other assurances I could've shared but they are beyond my 5-year-old's current ken.

* I have sufficient components and knowledge of technology to create rudimentary communications devices to find other survivors to facilitate the rebuilding of civilization.

* With books on internal medicine, biology, and pharmacology, and a mother who is a chemist, I have at my disposal the information to cobble together basic medicines and treatments.

* I work well under pressure, am methodical and calm, and can make compromises to serve the greater good.

* My extended family has an extensive contact list and rudimentary emergency action plan; many are similarly well-equipped with supplies.

All of this went through my mind this recent chilly October evening when my son cried his fear that his fledgling bicycling skills would keep him from out-pacing the hungry hoard of zombies hot on his trail.

With confidence, I took a deep breath and crouched down to my son's level, enfolding him in a hug. "Sweetheart," I said, "don't worry. I won't let the zombies get you." He snuffled deeply with a phleghmmy shudder, his big blues staring tearfully into mine. "Besides," I continued, "there's no such thing as zombies."

His eyes grew wide. "Yes, there is Mommy! They're brown and yellow and they fly on flowers!" I look at him uncomprehendingly. He continued.

"They make honey and go zoom-zoom-zoom! Zoom-bees chase after people and sting you!"

And to think, I thought I was prepared.

How to Get Small Children Awake, Fed, Dressed, and Out the Door for School in Less than 20 Minutes without Yelling or Freaking Out

2011-10-27T11:43:00.000-07:00

I have no flipping idea.

To My Sister on the Eve of Her 29th Birthday

2011-10-20T23:53:00.001-07:00

I don't specifically remember bringing my newborn sister home from the hospital. But, I remember how life was different afterward.

My dad took me to the local drug store the night she was born. "Pick any toy you want," he said, "as long as it's under five dollars." I picked up a Barbie, the first brand new one I'd ever touched before. Her legs didn't bend at the knees and she was shoeless, but her hair was nylon fiber smooth and her pink dress was simple and lovely. "Can I have this one?" I asked. Dad nodded. This was the only Barbie I'd ever own and it was all thanks to her being born.

I remember loving this mewling, wrinkly thing bundled in cotton onesies who came home some slightly chilled Phoenix autumn evening. I loved her not because she was oh-so-adorably like my dolls but because she needed me. Mother was in college, Dad slept all day and burned the midnight oil. I gave her bottles of glucose water when Mother was gone, I changed her diapers. When Mother vacuumed it made my sister scream because it hurt her fragile eardrums so I rocked her and sang "Stille Nacht" until she calmed down.

Her needing me when we were little is what made being around her possible even when she got more of our mother's time, when she was preferred by our grandmother, when she so clearly was a prettier chid. During countless roadtrips, I would entertain her in the backseat of the car, manufacturing an invisible friend named "Middle" who would make her laugh. When she'd get spanked for crying (which was often), I would plead with our father on her behalf, furious at the injustice of punishing a child for crying because she was being punished. And I needed her, too. I authored many a stage play that needed pint-sized actors. Without her, I would've had to be content with only dolls.

When we were younger and I would try to emphasize the difference between us and my greater maturity, I would say that we're 'almost five years apart.' She would correct me with, 'no, we're almost four years apart.' Now that she's on the cusp of 29, our positions are reversed as I try to point out close I am to her age. She's still quick to correct me, this time pointing out that we're almost five years apart, making her that much younger. Such are the competitive vanities of sisters.

About 12 years ago, she wrote me a letter when she was 17 and had just been initiated into the same sorority. I was too embarrassed to read it all the way through then and I am now, too. Not because any part of it is inappropriate but because my then-17-year-old sister reveals her effusive, bare emotions with her "Anne of Green Gables" melodramatic style. Her letter reminds me too much of my 17-year-old self and how much I used to care (or let people see that I cared) before I wrapped myself in my own little shell.

The 20s are a rough time. It's when the childhood rubber hits the road of adulthood, when you have to actually put into action all those things you dreamed about doing and hope they yield the expected results. Sometimes they don't. Turning 29 is when a person may reasonably look back on their 'youth' and reflect on what one has or has not accomplished. It can be sobering. Competitiveness aside, I feel like I can relate, a few years ago having written about going through a little taste of something similar when I turned 30.

The last few years have been hard on my sister for reasons we share, the last 12 months particularly so. My guess is that this makes turning 29 into a certain indignity for her, insult added to injury. But, I refuse to offer her pity (it's beneath both her dignity and mine) and compassion makes it sound like I'm giving her my blessing to compromise on her goals, which is the last thing I would want for her. Getting older doesn't require compromise, but it does demand acceptance.

Over the years, I've seen my little sister become very much like me -- or at least the me I might've been except for a couple key differences in our life paths. There's nothing wrong with that and I defend all of her choices. But just like parents hope for their children to have better lives than they had, I wish I could help give her a more uplifting outlook. After all, depending on how you reckon the passage of time, I'm either almost five or just over four years older than she is and I have a certain perspective to offer.

So here's what I've learned in the last few years since I turned 29:

You don't stop feeling lonely or out of place. You just realize that it's how life will be for you and you become okay with that.

Right now at this moment you are the best looking you will ever be. Delight in that.

The only ones with you from the very beginning who will be able to relate to you in the end are your siblings, for better or for worse. Keep in touch with all of them.

Smile more. It's the only sure-fire way to look younger.

Worry less. Whatever it is you're going through now, next year it will matter less. Five years from now, it won't matter at all.

Call home. They need you, even if they don't say it. You need them, even if you won't admit it. I promise you that someday you'll wish you'd connected with them more.

Let it go (whatever 'it' is for you at any given moment).

I won't promise your 30s will be easy. But I do think they will be easier. Trust your big sister on this one.

Also, don't forget to call me in 10 years. I'll give you a preview of your 40s.

Crushes of the Well-Read Mind

2011-09-08T19:49:00.000-07:00

It's time I admit it. In spite of my (tenuous) claim on adulthood, I nearly always am crushing in a way that could make a 13-year-old slap her forehead in shame. I'm a woman who rarely gives a hug except under duress. Yet dignity, marriage, professionalism, famed reservedness, and ice queen demeanor is regularly thrown out the window for the objects of my fascination.

The fact is, I crush on philosophers the way your neighbor's pre-teen daughter crushes on Justin Bieber. No, wait. I crush on philosophers the way your neighbor's pre-teen daughter crushes on Justin Bieber if Bieber were also the hot high school star quarterback.

Now, don't get me wrong. There's nothing about C.S. Lewis' chrome dome that turns me on (I save that for Jason Statham or Edward Norton from "American History X" sans tattoos). Voltaire is a bit old for me (although I have nothing against old, providing they're living). Ayn Rand is a woman (nominally, by the looks of her photographs, but I still don't swing that way, desert island scenario notwithstanding). But I have a sometimes passion for these thought-leaders that approaches a Texan politician's love for Jesus. (Speaking of Jesus, he had some good ideas going for him, too...)

Going back a couple decades, there was my flush-faced love for the Greeks. Sadly, even if I had been interested in deceased early Mediterranean philosophers romantically, I would've been the wrong gender anyway (minus Sappho, a poetess who doesn't count). But none of this kept me from reading many of the treatises, plays, analytics, and rhetoric authored by Aristotle, Plato, Epicurus, and Socrates.

The thing is, there's nothing wrong with reading it. But there's everything wrong with a 14-year-old entering into a conversation like this:

Person A: So I saw Joe last night with Danielle. Does he know you two don't get along?
Person B: What the fuck?? That pig! He oughtta know that I hate her!
Me: Maybe Joe was just being nice. You know, Socrates would probably advocate for assuming positive intent. He believed no one would knowingly do bad things.
[cricket] [silence]

I'd like to think in the intervening 20-some years I've learned, but really, I haven't. Which is why I met a sorority sister for (liquid) dinner a couple weeks ago and we had this conversation:
Her: I think it's safe to say we're fairly liberal Catholics.
Me: What does that mean?
Her: Well, we don't necessarily believe in a literal heaven or hell or that souls exist in the way a lot of very spiritual people may believe they exist.
Me: Oh, I totally get you! In fact, I was reading this book by Julian Barnes a few months ago who I think has some similarities to Kirkegaard in how he writes about the possibility of an afterlife.
Fortunately, this sister has a nerd beacon that'd be as bright as mine if she didn't have a bubbly personality and years on dance team to mask it. She gets me. But that's just luck. Normally this would be an opportunity for my guest to gesture to the server, "more drink, please! And fast!" On the other hand, maybe she had prearranged a more discreet signal and I just didn't notice it.

Most recently I have been all about Chuck Klosterman. Okay, even die-hard fans of Cee-Kay must admit that he falls a far cry shy of being a philosopher. Let's go with "pop culture analyst with a specialized following." Klosterman (whose entire bibliography I've read save one) expounds on my generation's pop culture with references that require me to keep Google open nearby. This is all material I should know but I don't because playing Michael Jackson or acknowledging existence of the Smurfs in my parents' house was a capital offense. Klosterman synthesizes a couple decades of music and pop culture with a certain baldly gritty anti-savoir faire that is deeply appealing to me.

But the real gift that Klosterman brings to my literary table is that he's so fricking normal. I can parrot his opinions and it's immediate connection with another. Death, life, soul, morality, existence, principles of reality - those are limited appeal niches that won't get me invited back to any cocktail parties unless they're attended by Mr. Peanut and Rich Uncle Pennybags. But Klosterman and low culture (hey, that's what *he* calls it so it must be okay!) allow me to capture a little of the cool kid appeal. It's allowed me to instead have conversations like this:

Person A: Did you catch what happened in "Glee" last night? I can't believe it!
Person B: Oh, I know. Pretty heavy-handed, don't you think? When did TV become like that?
Me: I was reading Chuck Klosterman's essay about "Saved by the Bell," remember that? He addressed how the purpose of TV shows is to re-state the preferred moral reality so viewers can feel reassured.
See how I did that? I'm still irritating, but I'm relatable. There are lots of places the conversation can go from here: Was Mark-Paul Gosselaar or Mario Lopez cuter? Can you believe how Elizabeth Berkeley destroyed her career? What current show is closest to Saved by the Bell? But, everyone will have something to offer. No need to fear silence.

Now, I don't totally fool myself. Quoting writers I'm crushing on, however contemporary they may be, isn't exactly 'school-moms-drinking-wine-over-pedicures' conversation. But it's a whole lot closer than where I was. Moving from existentialism to Bon Jovi lyrics is a huge improvement.

I'm not dating Justin Bieber the quarterback by any stretch. But maybe Klosterman at least helps me be the quirky cute little sister of the almost-popular wide receiver.

On the "I Wish I'd..." List

2011-03-31T08:04:00.000-07:00

Like any fledgling creative, there's a long list of "I wish I'd..." Everyone has a wish list like this in some form or other - perhaps the "I wish I'd said..." or the "I wish I'd done..." list. Some lists may read more like the "I could've done that!" (as in "What a stupid idea! I could've thought of a protective banana case, too!") Mine consists of things I wish I'd created, that I feel I should've created because they completely capture my humor or philosophy. This ever-growing list doesn't normally include novels, art, or musical compositions. Because I'm only a fledgling creative and not being particularly well-endowed with patience, I recognize my lack of staying power to follow through on creating a work that substantial. For those who can set their brush to canvas, their pencil to the staff, or their fingers to typing long enough to finish a true opus, I hold only admiration, never envy.

This list normally consists of the blog post or article and the occasional turn-of-phrase. It's the pith, the thought that can be communicated in approximately 140 characters (give or take 500). It's the book title or the haiku.

Behold, a few items from my "I wish I'd..." list:

* The Solitude of Prime Numbers. A beautiful title for a book I've yet to read (it's in the stack) - but the title alone is what grabs. A prime number can only be divided by itself and one. There must be loneliness in this story, and I'm hoping for a sense of positive closure at the end. I don't demand happily-ever-after endings but it's sure nice to find a well-written one.

* "Me, on Shuffle" by Chuck Klosterman. I wish I'd written this entire article which is a genius post about one's relationship with fractions and phrases of music (an emotional connection doesn't take an entire song).

* The Book of Lost Things. This could be the title of my daily diary with my list of things to do and those left undone. Admittedly, I'm biased because I've read the book (a fairy tale intended for young adult readers) and adored it, but the adoration began with the title.

* Limbo: And Other Places I Have Lived. Another one in the stacks with a beautiful title.

* Ceci n'est pas un pipe. Although I said I don't tend to envy art, this is an exception. It's simple, it's droll, it's witty and it was conceived about 50 years before I even manifested as my dad's ocular twinkle.

* "You can lead a horticulture but you can't make her think," by Dorothy Parker. Just one of many Dorothy Parker witticisms to which I wish I could lay my own claim. Change "Dorothy Parker" to "Ogden Nash" and there's another sub-list in its own right.

* "On Turning Eighty" by Henry Miller. I had thought to begin by saying "I wrote similar thoughts in a blog post about turning 30," but quickly realized that's akin to claiming the ant colony had the Burj Khalifa in mind when building its nest. Miller revels in the youth of his age and unashamedly eschews certain conventions. I wish I could be Miller's 80 in my 30s but perhaps that kind of appreciation takes another half century to cultivate.

Beauty, simplicity, and monumental value packed into every word -- so representative of an aspect of "me" that it leaves me feeling that these individuals somehow delved into my brain and picked them out before they entered my consciousness. Of course, to think that I could come up with such morsels of delight is a manifestation of my ego-based envy. But it's also encouraging because to make it onto the "I wish I'd..." list requires a certain similarity of thinking, a certain oneness. It's like finding friends, even if the friendship is based on only a single shared moment.

An Etiquette Lesson [Writing Exercise]

2011-02-24T23:02:00.000-08:00

Prompt: Describe a recently renewed friendship.

She could see him in the periphery. They had been circling the room all evening, delighting the guests at the cocktail party in their subtle but distinct ways yet never in the same place at the same time. First with one person, then another, she added sparkle with her pale presence. He made the rounds as well, sometimes preceding her, generally following while adding his own slightly sharper perspective. He was not appreciated by some whereas she was liked by almost all.

It was understood that they were a package deal, although there was always the occasional thoughtless person who forgot to keep them together in spite of all good manners to the contrary. They made a wonderful couple - everyone said so - albeit an unequal one. She was more popular, passing from person to person lightly, casually, freely. Often he was left behind, stoic in a corner, perhaps resting nearby a pile of dirty dishes or smudged wine glasses while she continued to make the rounds. It was just such an experience that had divided them this last time.

Yet in spite of their many separations, they always gravitated toward each other. They had too much in common, too many shared experiences. Both were global travelers with expensive tastes. They were of a similar age, amazingly ageless yet with old souls that made it seem like they had existed for hundreds, if not thousands of years. They were occasionally misunderstood, villianized. Most amazingly, they had been blamed for causing ill-health by some and yet bringing good health to others. They had both been used, in their own ways. Occasionally they were threatened by outsiders who attempted to capture their popularity by traveling in the same circles, hopping on their coattails. Those outsiders never lasted though. He and she were a forever couple, at times near lookalikes, her stark paleness complemented by his subtle grey and black.

She rested on the edge of a buffet, surveying the room with detachment. A brush of warmth from someone's hand grazed her sculpted shoulder. It was just as quickly gone - yet she knew he was now there.

She sighed, softly glittering in the room's muted light.

He shuddered slightly, struggling to be level at seeing her once more.

She felt transparent, like he could see her half-emptiness - the feeling she always had near the end of an event like this. Yet with him nearby she knew she could be more than she'd been before. He was her complement, her perfect help-mate. She sidled closer, her smooth sides barely touching his sharp angles.

Warily, he looked at her from under his low-placed silver-tinted cap. Would she be taken away by yet another guest, abandoning him to his solitude again?

Her lip curled slightly in a semi-smile as she tilted closer to him, bobbing encouragingly, trying to show with her smooth chill body how she liked his black and grey prickliness.

A guest grabbed them both around their necks, using a single hand to do so. Both she and he felt the slight rise of panic as their insides shifted with fear they would be separated again, quite against their will. They were lifted, their bases leaving the ground, higher, higher, thrust into a shallow space together, the door closed behind them. A thin sliver of light remaining, no more.

They shook themselves slightly, becoming calm, then content, now happy. At peace. Salt and Pepper kept together.

What I Like about Running [Random Nothing]

2011-02-05T11:59:00.001-08:00

This has the potential to be a very brief post. I don't love running. I've been known to mutter expletives under my breath at passing mile markers. I enjoy running about as much as I enjoy boiled Brussels sprouts and medical examinations: I tolerate it because I don't know of any other way to achieve the same healthy result.

But this isn't about the many reasons I don't care for running (however therapeutic such a post may be). This is my attempt to leverage cognitive dissonance: if I tell myself often enough that there are things I like about running, perhaps I will indeed like it. So what do I like about running?

1. Health: The obvious reason is still the best reason. Every time my sneakers come in contact with the ground and my body is jarred, I'm reminded that every run will hopefully stave off the onset of osteoporosis or some other condition. This doesn't make me like running really, but it does make me feel pretty virtuous for doing it.

2. You See Cool Things on the Ground. During one run (okay, it was today), there was a tube of uncapped lip gloss on the ground. In a last-minute change in navigation fitting of Magellan, I steered myself over such that my foot would come down on the bottom part of the tube, making hot pink glittery lip gloss squirt out on the springtime weeds poking through the concrete. The 5-yr-old in me that still finds gross things cool thought this whole episode was pretty darn awesome.

3. Old-Fashioned Pleasures. My current running route takes me by a chain-link and several wood slatted fences over creeks and wetlands. With a stick or key fob in hand, I enjoy striking it against the fences and hearing the rhythmic "slap slap slap" syncopated against my breathing and the pulse of my feet against the ground. What's good enough for Tom Sawyer is good enough for me, too.

4. You Never Know Who You'll Meet. Recently, a stray cat crossed my path (it wasn't black so it was okay) and ran next to me for most of a block, stretching its furry haunches and going at a good clip. Now, I don't enjoy much running with others but having that grey-and-cream tabby keep me company was good for a mile's worth of spiritual buoyancy. (Given my running pace, a mile's worth of smiles is a goodly amount of time.)

5. Imagined Endings. I don't often run when it's dark out but when I do, I like peering into the homes of others (from a safe distance on the sidewalk, running with a very non-stalker-like pace) and seeing what other families are doing. Most of the time, they're watching TV which makes me feel smug and self-righteous. Occasionally they're doing something interesting and I can make a story around it. The people who are painting, the woman who was throwing laundry on the floor, the child wielding a guitar like a light-saber, the man doing woodworking in his garage building a cradle or crib. They all have stories. I don't know what they are but I enjoy making up my own sub-titles.

6. School Zones. School zones are a drag. Being a "pedal to the metal" kind of person, I resent having my Adretti-like automotive groove interrupted by school zones. The great thing about running is that I run by the "you are going this speed" signs in school zones, in quasi Michael Scott fashion, never worrying that I'm exceeding the legal speed limit. That's partially because I tend to run on Saturdays when the speed limit doesn't apply. Perhaps on a weekday I'd be more concerned. (Likely not.)

7. Mind Games. I get bored when running - so very bored. Some have told me they run listening to audio-books (irritating), radio (super irritating), or their favorite tunes (fine until you hit a song with a beat that doesn't match the stride). I listen to bland synthpop (normally by FitPod) that at least gets me through but it doesn't quite cut it. So I create games to entertain my wandering mind: I repeat the alphabet or count to a hundred in German, French, or Spanish (about as much of those languages as I remember). I say my times-tables (normally in 4s, 6s, or 7s, my weakest numbers). Most recently, I've started trying to create anagrams from the letters in street signs (good practice for Scrabble). Never underestimate the bored mind's ability to find ridiculous ways to entertain itself.

8. Dryer Sheets. Well, not dryer sheets per se. But about one house per mile will be running its dryer when I jog by and the dryer vent will be facing the street. That puff of dryer sheet fragrance and brief burst of heat is an unexpected delight on a cold wet day with only dog excrement and grass clippings to smell for the rest of the run.

Eight things I like about running. That's more I thought I'd have when I started this, and we still haven't gotten to my favorite reason which is...

9. The Past Participle. My favorite thing about running? Being able to say "I already ran today."

Storytelling [Thoughts]

2010-12-23T09:49:00.001-08:00

I see my parents today for the first time in a couple months. My family and I are visiting for Christmas, a surprise visit. After the initial small-talk is over (How were the mountain passes? Oh, let’s not talk about my health. We’re so happy you’re here – how long are you staying?), Dad will inevitably launch into a story. This is normal fare. He is one of many in my family who collects stories, creates stories, shares stories. It can be small – his experience with the local utility company. It can be nostalgic – that favorite Christmas of his 25 years ago when almost the entire family came over for the last Christmas his mother was alive. It can be lengthy – a complete recollection of his time as an on-air radio announcer and deejay in the 50s and 60s. Many of them I have heard so often that I joke that they are numbered. “Oh, you’re going to tell me about that time you and your first wife drove Route 66? Isn’t that story #22?” Like family stories, even this tired joke gets a chuckle acknowledging its truth.

In his story-telling, Dad is not unique. Mother has her stories (her exchange with a taxi driver in France when she meant to tell him she was hot but instead told him she was aroused, the wonderful parties her father would have when he was flush with cash and power, and occasionally stories about her time as an orphan). I only tease her about numbering the happy stories – numbering the sad ones would depress her.
All of my many siblings have great stories: the time they dropped rocks down the drain at a then-new hotel in Arizona; when, as children, the family was so broke that they all shared a container of frozen strawberries for our dad’s birthday; or their memories of their home in Cave Creek where I lived until I was barely a month old but they lived their entire childhood. Before she passed some 25 years ago, my 98-year-old grandmother recorded on audio-cassette many of her stories of living through the Great Depression, her immigration to the United States, and the sights of terrible wars before mankind knew to number them.

I don’t really have any stories.

Oh, sure, I have vague memories but I’m not entirely sure they’re mine or if I borrowed them from an episode of a night-time serial my mother used to watch or perhaps a preteen magazine. There’s that time I was almost swept away at a San Diego beach…or was that my little sister? What about that time I was taken to the hospital to have something inappropriately swallowed removed from my stomach? No, that was Curious George. Well, how about when I was locked in the closet for hours by my brother? Er, but wasn’t that actually Edmund and Lucy in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe? Fine, then! Remember when I had that horrible fever and I had delusional dreams about flowers burning and time travel? Oh. No. That was Mrs. O’Keefe in A Swiftly Tilting Planet.

I try to remember experiences, try to shape them into some kind of framework that consists of a beginning, middle, and end. But they’re not there. I have impressions, snapshots of raw emotion that I know occurred tied to an event – some good, some sad, some hurtful, some life-changing. But no memories, no context, no stories.

Occasionally, I’ll ask my parents during a story re-telling: When was this? Was I born yet? What did you do with me at this time? From their answers, I can imagine a road-trip to Mississippi as a toddler when my sister ran away with a boy, an exciting trip to Mexico, or a visit to my grandfather’s prison cell near the end of his life. But most of their best stories occurred pre-me. I’m not even a starlet cameo in the movie of their lives.

None of this leaves me feeling unimportant or unloved. It does leave me feeling boring, though, without any tragedies or triumphs of note. I feel groundless, without ties, like dandelion spore released from its head after my sons have loosened it with their breath. (They believe each floating seed becomes a faerie.)

I also feel pressured into a decision, either to acquire more stories from others to pass onto my children or to set about creating our own. And maybe that is what gets to the heart of it: to share others’ stories is risk-free entertainment but to create one’s own involves effort and choices, perhaps even sacrifice. I’m not sure that’s me.

But that’s not a decision that needs to be made this week. We’re home for Christmas and it’s time to listen to my parents’ stories.

Communication Techniques [Random Thoughts]

2010-12-19T01:06:00.000-08:00

Among the little ironies of life for which I'm thankful is that I have two children. This is really quite a fortunate happenstance since I hadn't planned on having any. After my first son was born, my father insisted we needed to have a second child. He claimed that, as an only child himself, being an only child was extremely lonely and kept one from building good social skills. "Okay, Dad, thanks for the input," thought I, "but your input isn't really enough for me to go through pregnancy, labor, and recuperation just on your say-so."

But, son of a gun if the old man isn't right. I had siblings, but the age difference was so great that the older ones were never really around much and I couldn't be troubled with the little ones. That's not to say I didn't pick up certain skills. According to my sibs, I dead-floated in the pool scaring them off swimming (true), negotiated the younger children out of their money (true), and punched one in the stomach (totally untrue). These are methods of managing conflict that still serve me today (avoidance, persuasion, and a different kind of persuasion).

When watching my two boys communicate, I realize they're benefiting in much the same way in learning boundaries and appropriateness, as well as how to work with each other.

When to Stop:Recently, Castor learned a lesson that you can only boss someone around so much before they fight back. He walked up to Pollux and, out of the blue and without any good reason, pushed Pollux's shoulder. Pollux, two years younger but considerably stockier, looked up from his cars, got a little glint in his eye, and pushed Castor back in the same manner. Back and forth they shoved until finally Castor said, "I'm older than you, Pollux!" [shove] Pollux's response? [super hard shove, Castor falls backwards, turns teary, and Pollux giggles]

Applying Logic:One of the unanticipated results of enrolling the children in private school is hearing certain fables quoted in daily conversation. Most recently they have used the golden rule and Jesus's claim in Matthew's Gospel that "the last shall be first and the first shall be last." Like fledgling philosophers, the children interpret (and re-interpret) these lessons for their own nefarious purposes. A typical exchange goes like this:

Pollux: [plays with a beloved toy of Castor's]
Castor: [walks behind Castor, shoves him, makes a grab for toy]
Pollux: [pushes Castor, protects toy]
Castor: [hits Pollux, takes toy back]
Me: "Boys! Do not hit each other!"
Castor: "But Mom! Pollux hit me first! And you're supposed to treat people the way they want to be treated so he must have wanted me to hit him!"
Me: "It doesn't matter. We don't hit. Also, Pollux give Castor back his toy - you know to not play with that one."
Pollux: "Fine! The last shall be first and the first shall be last so if I'm last to play with the toy that means I'll be first next time!"

Teamwork:My husband has an iTouch which is apparently the boys' white whale. The boys aren't technically allowed to play with it, although they've managed to spend enough time with it to navigate with acuity. Every night it is put away in a different location in a place difficult to find and reach. And every weekend morning, while we sleep in late, it manages to...disappear.

We always find it, located behind some large piece of furniture coddled protectively by four little hands, a cool screen glow making the boys' eyes shiny. Given the effort we spend in hiding it, we're always surprised they manage to find it - so one morning, we roused ourselves to awareness to figure it out.

It generally works like this: First, Pollux, the younger, cuddlier one runs into our room, crawls in between us and says, "cuddle me, Mommy and Daddy." Naturally we oblige. Within moments, Castor stealthily tip-toes in with a small step stool and some kind of long stick-like toy (lightsaber, hanger, paper towel roll, etc.). He sets up shop in the vicinity of the closet and goes hunting for the iTouch. Occasionally, he peeks out to make sure we're still slumbering and then he goes back to work iTouch foraging.

Once Castor finds the elusive electronic treasure, he normally mutters a breathy "Yes!", puts the iTouch in his pajamas pocket, and takes his tools of the trade out of the room with him. He then runs back, lightly climbs on the bed, taps on Pollux's shoulder who clambers out of the covers after Castor. They close the bedroom door and then count on us sleeping while they amuse themselves with their ill-gotten gains.

What have I learned from this? Yes, my dad was right. Also, they'll learn much from each other and sibling relationships are great preparation for interacting with others, with a few years of refinement, of course.

Hating Sundays - A Story Fraction [Writing Exercise]

2010-12-17T21:51:00.000-08:00

-- Written for a college creative writing class, back in 19*cough*. The last two pages are lost so at some point I'll need to rewrite the ending. --

Howie has made me hate Sundays. The eerie tranquility and the bluish shadows on the sidewalk make me lonely. Some weeks I walk the three miles home from his house without seeing another person. I count the cracks as I go, lightly skipping over them. I wonder if everyone has suddenly contracted the plague, dying inside their houses, out of sight. Maybe the musky morning-after smell is clinging to me too heavily for anyone to come near. Probably they are all at church.

I watch a family rush into a big cathedral as if they are in danger of missing something very important. All of them are dressed in pastels and white shoes. I want to run in after them and see if there is a confession booth open but I am in last night’s clothes and my teeth aren’t brushed. I convince myself that this guilty numbness between my legs is penance enough and besides, I don’t remember the Hail Mary.

I still have two miles left to walk through the empty downtown streets. Compulsively I look at my reflection in the windows of the stores as I pass and I try to fix my appearance. I wonder if Howie noticed the knots of hair that formed at the back of my head while I slept. I want a shower and a nap in my own bed. Howie offered me a ride home, but this morning, the thought of awkward silences and obligatory car conversation made me queasy.

“I like the walk,” I told him.

“Leah, you hate the walk.” He was smug. “You’re mad at me.” This is his game. If I am mad, it means I care more than he does. He craves this reassurance.

Already I regret my decision to walk home. The sidewalk cracks are unevenly spaced and difficult to avoid. Being alone makes me anxious and its cold today, even with this horrible sunlight that turns the pavement too bright. I realize that my sweatshirt is lost somewhere in Howie’s sheets and my arms are getting goose bumps. Sundays are always colder than the rest of the week.

I walk farther. I test my endurance. I consider catching the bus but I don’t have exact change and my limited knowledge of the bus routes would likely leave me stranded across town. I could call my roommate Hannah for a ride, but she will be annoyingly clean and inquisitive. I do not feel up to her prodding.

“How was it?” Hannah asks me on Sundays. And after I mumble “Fine,” with a shrug, she wrinkles her nose and asks, “How are things going with you two?” as if there are things. She is wary of Howie and Sundays make her especially preachy. “I just don’t like to see you getting all worked up over him, of all people,” she told me one Saturday after I had checked our answering machine for the ninth time. “He’s slept with the entire university volleyball team and possibly the dance squad as well.”

I don’t need to be reminded of these things. “The jerseys come and go,” I said. “I’m there every Saturday.” I smiled. I am a constant.

She shrugged. “Just remember the principle of least interest,” she said. “As long as Howie has less interest in the relationship, he’s in control.” Hannah is a psychology student. She prefers Freud to Jung. She wrote a paper about me last semester for her Motivations & Human Relations class. “Subject A engages in repeated sexual encounters with disinterested male. Subject A displays lack of concern with the consequences of her actions. Analysis concludes that the subject is motivated by a belief that intercourse will lead to stronger emotional attachment.” Her paper got a C. The professor said that her analysis wasn’t deep enough and that the subject required further study. I have become a lab rat.

Howie has genuine affection for me, I’m certain. After sex he gives me tiny kisses on my cheek, my ears, the very tip of my nose, three on each spot. Three means completion, fulfillment. He asks me to spend the night and in the mornings he hugs me tightly as if I am filling up one empty part of his life. I cuddle into his chest. I run my hands over the little hairs and then through the black curls on his head. He closes his eyes in a way that makes me think he is blissful. I kiss his eyelashes. They are longer than mine, almost effeminate. They are innocent.

Once, in the beginning, before I understood the rules, I asked him if he loved me.

“Yes.” He answered too quickly, like it was a habit. He was quiet for a long time after that. I got up to leave. I sat at the edge of the bed and pulled my socks on. He rolled over and watched me. He stroked the curve of my waist. His hand was cold. I stood up. “If you were falling off a cliff, I’d be the first one to save you,” he said. He stared at my breasts as he spoke. He reached for my hand and pulled me onto the bed. “Is that love?” he asked, whispering into my ear, kissing the spot on my neck where my hair met my skin. I shivered.

“I don’t know,” I said. I turned away from him. “Your bed is uncomfortable. It feels like there’s something poking between my shoulder blades.”

“I think that’s my hand,” he said.

“Oh,” I said. “I’m going home.”

“I’m sorry. Stay. I’ll move my hand.”

I shook my head and stood over him. “Hannah will wonder where I am. I should go.”

“Please stay,” he said. He stands up and wrapped his legs around mine. My knees buckled and I fell towards him. “I hate sleeping alone. I do love you.”

“No, you don’t,” I said. I crawled back into bed next to him and pulled the covers over my head.

Hannah's next paper was more complex. “Subject B possesses an intense need to feel loved, although he is unable to reciprocate. His need for love may point to an issue rooted in childhood trauma. Subject A attempts to fulfill Subject B’s emotional need through sexual encounters. Subject A continues to cause detriment to her own emotional well-being by maintaining passivity in the relationship.” This paper got a B-.

“B minus,” I said. “I feel extremely mediocre.”

“Mediocre? Leah, don’t say that.” Hannah rushed over and hugged me. She pulled the paper out of my hands. “You’re well above average. You’re just a little mixed-up right now.”

I am in a vacuum. My apartment seems further away with every step and Howie’s house is sucking me back towards it. I start counting to 100, rhythmically matching the numbers my step. I miss his electric blanket and his cologne-scented sweat. Now I count backwards by 3s. The breeze feels like a hurricane. I am weak and dizzy with sleeplessness and hunger. I've lost the pattern of my count and go to 5s. I wonder if Howie has found my sweatshirt yet. I close my eyes; I need to rest.

When I open my eyes, I am lying on the sidewalk, face up. The air is like an anvil on my stomach. A man is kneeling over me, watching me as I blink.

“What happened?” I say.

“You must’ve passed out,” he says. He brushes my hair away from my face. “You’re bleeding.”

“Blood,” I say. “Where?”

He gestures to my head where I sense a moist stickiness. "A scratch. It's no biggie." I get up.

"Do you need a ride home?" he asks. I walk away, concentrating on taking my leaden stomach, my bruised pride with me. I count methodically back to my room.

-- Pages missing --

Move Along, There's Nothing to See Here...

2010-12-17T10:24:00.000-08:00

My dad keeps a journal, religiously. Instead of his thoughts, it is a faithfully kept register of where he's been, with whom, and the daily start and ending odometer reading on his vehicle. He has more than 35 years of 5x7" legal-lined pads filed in chronological order in file cabinets.

When I realized as a child that young girls are supposed to keep journals, I imitated the only journal keeper I know and kept a log of my own mundane comings and goings for several months. Why do girls lock these things?, I wondered. But, on the upside, I can easily find out what I ate on September 15th more than 20 years ago.

Around age 7 or 8, I read Anne Frank's diary and realized my journal could be more than a collection of facts and could include thoughts, stories, and more. My journals took a turn and instantly became the most embarrassing aggregated accounting of my lonely and awkward childhood and adolescence imaginable.

Since then, I've been a continuous, if unpredictably intermittent, contributor to journals and I've kept them all in spite of all reason. Keeping one's own journals is like Superman juggling with Kryptonite or Oedipus taking down Jocasta's digits to call her later - it's merely sowing the seeds of one's own humiliation, if not destruction. And why? Because I've always cherished the hope that my thoughts might matter -- someday to me, perhaps my children (if I ever wanted them to read them), or to some passing recorder of human history who for some strange reason lacks the perspective of middle-class white women in the archival record.

Revelation came to me via an unlikely channel: an article in the Spirit magazine in a Southwest Airlines flight. (Link here.) The author argues that remnants of one's past are clutter. Specifically on the journal question, she states:

I have never kept a journal. I didn’t understand the point of memorializing a thought just because you had it. Not everything is worth keeping.

Well.

I was confronted with a thought I've allowed to pass through my mind before but successfully avoided until now: Just because it's my thought doesn't mean it's special. By extension this likely means that not only am I not the first to have ever thought, felt, or perceived something, I probably never will be. I can't even lay claim to having articulated it unusually well.

That's humbling.

Yet, in spite of my recently gained perspective, I'm still loathe to go book burning. It took more than 10 years after my first boyfriend broke up with me before I threw away the rejection letter(s). (I kept them around so I'd stay humble.)

So why keep that hope chest full of journals still? For that matter, why do I maintain an occasionally maintained log with low traffic? Egotism? Optimism?

My guess is that I still want my thoughts, I still want me, to matter. Finding out that I may not seems a little like the cancer victim being told s/he has only a few months left. You know it's true, but that doesn't mean you have to accept it.

Any input one way or the other? I'm all eyes.

Seeking the Short Answer [Thoughts]

2010-12-16T23:27:00.000-08:00

A friend and I chatted it up recently about answering questions: do people normally want the short answer or the long answer to any given question? We agreed that most (all?) want the short answer. Sometimes I do too. (Mentally, I ruthlessly redline my co-workers' e-mails to remove unnecessary verbiage or break down concepts into bullets.) Yet I am often incapable of forming a short answer myself.

For some, the short answer is no problem to give or accept. A question like, "why is the sky blue?" elicits an answer of "because it's a reflection of the ocean" and most are satisfied. But I'm not. This answer would lead me to other questions followed by a few online keyword searches and maybe a book purchase or two. Within a few weeks, I'll have amassed enough layman's trivia about the atmosphere, planetary physics, and light scattering to bore even the least socially inclined person at that next cocktail party. If you're lucky, I may even throw in a little analysis of the philosophical question, "what is 'sky'?" (And if you were wondering, I don't get invited to a lot of cocktail parties...at least not a second time.)

The fact is, I never grew out of my toddler stage. You know, the one every parent dreads: the stage of the endless "but why?" questions. It didn't help that my parents were often able to answer all of them, or at least try. Their careers include landlord, chicken farm owner, real estate sales, bartender, accounting, restaurateur, deejay, media sales, photographer, chemistry/forestry professor, parent, and more. Add to that life experience and the hobbies of home schooling, animal husbandry, gardening, meteorology, sewing, target shooting, military history, singing, and affiliations, by turns, with the Catholic, Mormon, Christian Science, Jewish faiths and you have parents who can pretty much answer any question a child can ask.

I'm doomed to not only normally wanting the long answer but expecting to receive it.

Some people make a living out of the long answer: Michael Pollan, Simon Winchester, Bill Bryson, Mary Roach, C.S. Lewis, Henry Petroski. These are people who probably got the short answer many times but kept on asking...and then wrote a book about it. They have written on the coevolution of humans and corn, the history of the OED, the evolution of the entryway and its etymology, the scientific dissection of the sensation of orgasm, the differences between the human and canine soul, and the design of the paperclip (respectively). If these authors are present in my library, do I even have a prayer of ever composing the short answer?

The short answer cheats us. Whatever gains in time we receive by accepting the short answer, we lose in richness of understanding. You mean you don't want to fully understand the differences between the frequently confused concepts of the virgin birth and immaculate conception as it relates to Jesus and Mary? Gah! Listening to the long answer would result in probably most Catholics realizing they're actually Protestants (if a Christian at all). You don't want to know why cheese or sugar often isn't vegetarian or how a specific virus both fueled and destroyed tulip mania and the Dutch economy in the 1600s and is occasionally considered the first speculative bubble by economists? Tsk tsk. However will you win at Trivial Pursuit?

This extends to a personal level, too. So often I have learned more about others because I just kept asking, "why?" or "tell me more." I cherish those experiences because they are the closest I've ever felt like I achieved a true human connection with another. It's exciting, it's intimate, and it's lasting.

So what's wrong with the short answer? Nothing. But let's say Don Williams is correct in saying that life is about the journey, not the destination. The short answer is a shortcut to easy fulfillment - it takes you immediately to your destination. But within the long answer is the journey of understanding and that's where one fineds all the true rewards.

Am I A Person of Integrity?

2010-05-10T10:53:00.000-07:00

As some know, I enjoy a position with my sorority (mentioned here, Alpha Kappa Mu Mu not being its real name), an organization for which I've volunteered my time almost since college. When confronted with people who are truly out saving the world and feeding the hungry, I admit that my volunteer service for this organization pales in comparison and leaves me feeling slightly inadequate. But this is an organization I like with fellow volunteers I respect and, employing the 'butterfly effect' justification, I believe it is just as worthy as any other non-profit organization out there.

Recently, I 'made myself available' for a position on our board of directors. (Social conventions being what they are in a sorority, one does not 'run for office' but makes herself available for service.) This was a difficult decision -- not only because of the time commitment and pressure often involved but because it made me ask, "do I have the integrity of a leader? Am I up for the job?"

Having integrity is hard. Anyone who thinks it isn't probably hasn't been in a difficult position where they've had to demonstrate it and been tempted to not. In my current professional role, I'm often in a leadership position where demonstrating integrity is part and parcel of my daily life -- but since I also work for a tightly monitored and regulated industry, demonstrating integrity isn't that hard because the only other possibility is to be fired for not demonstrating it. I suppose the other possibility is to simply game the system - plenty of others do - but personally I find that trying to trick others is more exhausting than simply being honest and doing the right thing.

Certain past situations weigh on me. They may seem laughable to others but to me they are times when I was tested and failed, when I allowed selfish motives and actions to hold sway over nobler behaviors -- when I intellectually knew better. There was that time in student government when I was 17, lost a re-election bid in the primary, and ungraciously wouldn't support one of my competitors (as I'd said I would) in his own re-election bid. There's that time when I 'switched' groups of friends because I met some people who seemed more fun (but turned out to be less loyal). I was elected to be the vice-president of an honors society for which I did absolutely nothing because (frankly) attending their meetings sucked the life out of me because they were so dull and I just stopped going. Sure, these examples are more than 10 years old but more recently I allowed myself to get pulled into an argument with my sister resulting in a totally unproductive two-year impasse. (Honestly, I'm willing to allow the impasse to be resolved whenever she wants to apologize -- telling me that I'm still just as stubborn and petty as she is and I have learned nothing.)

These are not examples of leading with integrity - these aren't examples of leading in any fashion. They're examples of effectively packing up my toys and taking them home because of something I don't like. It hurts my own sense of self to put it that way, but that's truth for you.

So with all this going against me, why would I open myself up to risk of graceless failure by 'making myself available' for a greater leadership role?

I'm not that person any more. That sounds like a closing statement from a 12-step success story, but it's true. With every experience gained, a person changes, learns more, and becomes different. Hopefully I will not repeat these experiences because the variables have changed, hopefully I have changed.
We're all learners. Every organization, every boss, every person would prefer flawlessness to flaws but anyone with sense will tell you we're all learners and learning brings with it the risk of errors. To learn, one must do which means being available for those opportunities.
Recognition aids prevention. These past experiences, even years and years later, still bother me to the point where I will do my best to prevent them from happening again. In each one, I recognize opportunities I had to prevent the outcome: not taking things personally, recognizing the other person's perspective, not over-extending myself, not discarding the old in favor of the untried new. Here's hoping I can recognize the slippery slope next time to prevent the same outcome.

But, the number one reason for me to hope for a different outcome is that I want to be what others think I am. I want to be worthy of the good opinion of others as well as for people to think of me as a person with integrity, someone who is honest and who will do what is 'right' even when it's difficult. For others to think that, I need to be that and hopefully the self-imposed pressure will make it true.

2010: A Ferret Odyssey - Day 1

2010-01-05T23:05:00.000-08:00

Tonight my brother and his three kids dropped off the ferrets. It was around 8:30 p.m. and, I admit, I thought they'd forgotten. Not just forgotten to drop them off tonight but forgot to drop them off period. Yes! All the credit of offering to help, none of the work.

Alas, no.

As ferrets go, these little rodents actually got it pretty good. They have a three-story ferret palace, a hammock, plumbing (water) upstairs and down, and a dedicated play area -- kind of like a ferret casita.

All of this, plus three ferrets named Rex, Bandit, and Jacob, is now in my kitchen. Trust me, not my preference, but it seemed the best option.

My nine-year-old niece provided me with a list of instructions:

Give Rex medicine once a day. (I need to give it medicine??)
Check food and water twice a day.
Clean daily (change litter every other day). (Okay, I admit...I forgot that what goes in must come out...and I need to clean it.)
Let ferrets out 30 minutes a day.
Rex and Bandit can escape from their playyard so please keep an eye on them. (Uh...ferrets in my house is bad enough. Ferrets running through my house...)

I applaud her detail but wonder what I got myself into. There's a reason I don't own pets or plants. Having children is hard enough but the fact is they cry when they need something badly enough. I can't neglect animals or plants and hope for the same.

Knowing that my brother is not terribly keen on the ferrets (he's apparently more an indulgent father than he is a smelly rodent lover), I joked that he better plan on coming back to pick them up. He smiled distractedly and unconvincingly ... like the thought of permanently abandoning the ferrets in my home has occurred to him.

Fortunately, I know both where the house key is located AND the security code to the house now. I am prepared to sneak them back up there if tested.

2010: A Ferret Odyssey - Backstory

2010-01-04T15:45:00.000-08:00

A few weeks ago, my sister-in-law called to ask if we could pet-sit their three ferrets for them. I said yes. Why? It's complicated.

They'd dish out $300 to have three ferrets lodged for a week. For that, they could probably just let these go and buy new ones. But their kids are old enough now to be considered sentient and they'd know. So I could say it's to help them save money...except that's not quite it. If anyone in my family could afford to board three ferrets, it'd be them. But I hate to see anyone spend money unnecessarily regardless of their financial state.

I could also say it's because as one kid of ten, I'm in the business of collecting favors. It's a survival skill. If you keep your sibs thinking that you're nice and helpful, they're less likely to drag you down the hallway by your hair or eat the ears of your Easter chocolate bunny. Sure, this hasn't worked for me yet, but I'm 32 so there's still time to see if things might change.

Maybe it's because I owe THEM a favor. I remember fondly those times when I moved to school about 100 miles away from this bro and his wife. When I visited their home, they let me sleep on the floor and my brother would awaken me at the crack of dawn announcing breakfast using his Yoda impersonation. (It was as good as you might think.) They gave me the run of the house...or at least the public areas...until they had to go, and then they made me leave and set the alarm system. But that's okay. I was 19 and had lived in Montana. They had no way of knowing I wasn't the Unabomber in disguise. When they moved to a new home, my brother even invited me over and let me help him clean the kitchen tile floor grout with industrial grade hydrogen peroxide and a toothbrush. Ah, these are the ties that bind.

(Okay, they also gave us our second couch set, my first DVD player that wasn't Playskool brand, and an amazing carved teakwood box my brother picked up in Mylasia that eventually grew some kind of fuzzy fungus on the inside. They've been nice to us.)

Ultimately, it's probably because I'm a masochist. And because it can't really be that bad to watch three ferrets for 10 days, right? Right?

Tweeting Musings & Finding a Niche

2010-01-02T04:50:00.000-08:00

Believe it or not, I don't spent a ton of time on Twitter. Anyone who follows my feed may find that surprising giving the abundance of tweets (what, over 8000 now in 18 months?). But really, Twitter for me is more like a stream of consciousness activity. If I have a thought that needs to be set free, I tweet it. Hopefully it's interesting to others - perhaps enough so that it earns the much coveted RT by a "verified" personality and gains me additional followers. After all, more followers is validation that my stream of consciousness is actually interesting. And that's why most of us are on Twitter, right? To show off and hopefully find someone out there who "likes me, really likes me!"

But every once in a while, I hit a dry spell where my consciousness isn't even interesting to me. I read the tweets of others and panic - where do they come up with this stuff? A few of the creative types link to their own blog posts where are not just tweets of creativity but paragraphs of creativity! Insightful, entertaining, educational! Oy, the pressure!

What can I possibly do to even hold a candle to these creative elite? My tweets would need to be pithy, insightful, humorous, thought-provoking, evocative. In short, I need to be the Kurt Vonnegut of Twitter. It's a tall order. Even Kurt didn't try (although I'm not sure he was a Twitter kind of guy).

I find my tweeting solace in shticks. A few weeks ago, I tweeted in haiku. A few days later found me tweeting in limerick. One day I felt somewhat zen-like to me so I shared fortune cookie wisdom. What next? Again I say: Oy, the pressure!

The crazy thing is that this self-imposed structure actually makes creativity easier. It centers me. It is strangely comforting. After all, Matt Drudge doesn't need to worry about pith and the creator of cakewreck.com doesn't have to muse about politics. They have a niche and, by golly, it works for them.

So what's my niche? I'm still looking. This is where being a Jill of all trades is a challenge. I cook, craft, do home improvement, perform in musicals but don't see the point in Tweeting about it. At best, no one cares. At worst, it's showing off. I'm not trying to sell anything, even myself, so I don't have to worry about promoting a blog/MLM scheme/coupon code, etc. I have a job but I'm not about to get fired by tweeting about it. So what is there to Tweet about?

Yes, the easy answer is "nothing." The biggest criticism of Twitter is it's populated by self-important, ego-centric people who tweet nothing of interest. Yup, that could be true, even likely.

But I think what I do get out of Twitter (and suspect I'm not alone here) is that it's a low-risk way to be just a little creative. There's no pressure of a blog post or article, to be an expert in anything. It's like throwing a handful of gummy candies out there and seeing what sticks.

And if you find something that sticks, that others find interesting, and you find it interesting too...

Then you've found your niche.

Resistance Is Not Futile

2010-01-01T15:06:00.000-08:00

Although October 1 isn't an official holiday (that I know), for me it marks the unofficial start of what I call 'the baking season.' It's when even the most pedestrian of cooks grabs their boxes of Betty Crocker or buy-in-the-dairy-section cookie dough and the more daring light a candle to their favorite celebrity patron baking saint on Food Network and begin combing obscure baking blogs for recipes they can "whip up" and share.

The season continues at least through the end of the year, although has been known to persist through February with its flourless chocolate dome cakes and caramel ganache. The flow of carbohydrates and calories is never-ending, merely shape-shifting -- whether that shape-shifting be from Halloween caramel-covered apples to Thanksgiving Dutch apple pies or the less-desirable shape-sifting from a size 6 to a size 10.

As a mildly capable cook and baker myself, I understand the desire to bake, as well as the need to share the wealth (one four-person home can only consume so much sugary goodness). But I also realize that stretchy pants should only be worn a certain number of times in a week. Once that threshold is exceeded, it's time to stop eating.

But how to stop eating when you are beseiged on every front with temptations? Perhaps this is what it feels like to be Tiger Woods at a Barbie-lookalike convention. (Ooh, was that too soon?) No doubt about it, whether going to the local shipping depot, the family holiday party, or the workplace, the calories flow abundantly. It requires one to be on their most vigilant guard.

When I try to resist treats, I find it helpful to understand the (sometimes underhanded or subconscious) motivation of the person who brought them in. This helps me identify the appropriate avoidance technique.

Baker's Motivation: “I really enjoy baking but my family can’t possibly eat everything I make so I’m sharing some of the bounty with you. Please enjoy.”
Avoidance Technique: Righteous indignation. (Think: "I AM NOT A GARBAGE DISPOSAL!")

Baker's Motivation: “My weight loss efforts have been unsuccessful so by making you gain weight through the treats I bring in, I feel less bad and more successful/validated.”
Avoidance Technique: Competitive zeal! (Think: “You’re not going to use me! And I’m going to feel so good being thinner than you!”)

Baker's Motivation: “I received these treats from a good-intentioned parent/sibling/distant relative and I can’t deal with the guilt of throwing them away myself. Please enjoy them so I don’t feel guilty.”
Avoidance Technique: Compassion. (Think: “Here, let me help you put them in the garbage.”)

Baker's Motivation: “I rely on your public pronouncement that you enjoy these homemade treats for my own self-worth. If you don’t try them, I’ll feel like I’m not a good enough cook and possibly be deeply insulted. Please enjoy.”
Avoidance Technique: Craftiness. (Think: “These look to. Die. For. Delicious! But I’m allergic to gluten/dairy/air and am on a strict medically-enforced abstinence diet from my doctor.”)

Don't get me wrong - I am not above any of these motivations myself. It is through using them, though, that I am able to better understand it in others and navigate the battlefield of balance versus indulgence.

Voyages with the Hyper-Sensitive

2009-09-07T23:18:00.000-07:00

My son, Castor, and I share many bonds. Our eyes are the same color and shape. He also has my nose (although it looks better on him). We both adore reading and music. Although my tastes are a bit more mature, we both enjoy a good literary romp with Dr. Seuss or a tune with Julie Andrews. As early as nine months old, Castor was plotting to steal my beloved iced tea and he’s recently taken to absconding with my chai tea lattes. We both are in a quest for fairness, although my hope is more for global compassion for one’s fellow human and animal whereas Castor’s is seeking train-sharing equity. Castor would like to marry a good bowl of Aunt Scully’s popcorn and have its babies, if he could. Hopefully, popcorn is into non-exclusive relationships because I have designs on it as well. He is my first-born - coincidentally, I’m also his first mother. Castor is one of his dad’s biggest fans, but at this point in his life, he’s still my Mini Me.

We also share allergies, although he’s worse off. Whereas I exist with the knowledge that the pollen Mafia has a seasonal hit out on me, Castor’s little body is in perpetual war with almost all nuts and sesame seed. If I drug myself heavily and live like a Morlock for four or five months, I might survive the year in minimal agony. But Castor (and us as his parents) have a year-round struggle against nuts and seeds of all kinds.

To be honest, we have it pretty easy relative to other families whose children have dietary allergies. Whereas some children would disintegrate into a non-breathing, swollen pile of goo at the merest inhalation of peanut dust, Castor needs to actually ingest it. In our home, we have a bottle of sesame oil and peanut butter on our highest kitchen shelf. I’ve been known to have a little sesame vinaigrette dressing on my cucumbers with Castor sitting next to me, and nothing terrible has occurred. In fact, we do some of this intentionally. Based on what we’ve read, it doesn’t seem like putting a child in a hypo-allergenic bubble reduces his or her sensitivity, but there is some evidence that extremely limited exposure (generally under medical supervision) can at least ensure a child will build up a modest immunity to small amounts of their respective Kryptonite. While we’re not participating in any of those clinical trials underway, we practice this a little at home – not by allowing Castor to eat any of the foods, but by allowing the occasional chocolate covered pistachio in the house or letting him eat Honey Nut Cheerios (made with almond meal, and almond being the only nut to which he is not allergic).

This is actually how we learned of his allergy. One night, I was tossing back a few chocolate-covered pistachios for dessert when I gave Castor one to see if he’d like it. Within minutes, he was vomiting and a half hour later, his stomach resembled the scaly underbelly of a Gila monster. Even after a dose of children’s Benadryl, Castor resembled a victim of the mumps. A later allergy test confirmed what we’d observed: anaphylaxis to nuts. When six months later, he had a bite of his dad’s noodle dish and grew lips that would make Angelina Jolie envious, we had him retested and added another item to the list: sesame seed and its oil.

Fast forward to today: We have four Epipens available at all times (1 for home/backup, 1 for car/travel, 1 at school, 1 at after-care). We’ve yet to use one and every year we need a fresh set of four. Health care system abuse watchdogs? Meet the Willowbottom family, wasters of four Epipens a year. But, what is the alternative? Based on everything we’ve read and learned from the experiences of others, there will someday come a time when Benadryl won’t cover it and that adrenaline shot will be what makes the difference.

There’s a lot to be said for preventative care. Ideally, neither Epipen nor Benadryl will never be used because a child’s exposure will be eliminated. That’s a happy thought, but impossible in reality unless you live in the bubble that (in my opinion) parents ought to strive to avoid. So we do the best we can: we keep those verboten products on the top shelf, we let Castor go to school with other children realizing there is risk, and we go out to eat occasionally.

It’s actually that last activity that prompted this post. During a recent road trip, we stopped at a restaurant for a quick bite on the long trip home. I ordered the easy dishes first (husband’s and mine, no alterations needed). Then, I ordered both kids’ dishes. Even though Pollux doesn’t have any identified food allergies, we realize the boys often share cutlery and food so we try to keep them both allergen-free.

Me to cashier: “Is there any nut or seed product in any component of the kids’
rice/noodle bowls?”

Cashier: “No, just noodles, rice, tofu, and vegetables.”

Me: “What about the oil used to cook it? Any seed or nut oils?”

Cashier: “No, we normally use a spicy oil with a bit of pepper in it but no nuts or seeds.”

Me: “Is the oil derived from nuts/seeds or is it like a soy or canola oil?”

Cashier: “It doesn’t come from nuts or seeds.”

Alrighty then. So I complete our order, the meals, kids, and husband come to the table and we dive in. About 10 minutes into it, Castor complains of his throat being “spicy” (translation: tingly and itchy). A tummy inspection shows clean skin but his eyes are a little bloodshot. Fatigue or exposure? Tough to tell. We wait a couple minutes until it’s clear that it’s definitely exposure. An Epipen is always our last resort and only if there’s clear evidence of breathing difficulties. Swollen eyes and lips, splotchy skin, whining not related to brotherly torment, and that’s cause for Benadryl.

Within moments, it’s obvious that Castor has ingested something to which he’s allergic. Husband goes to the car to hunt for the Benadryl and I go up to cross-examine the cashier. She had previously assured me no nuts, seeds, or their byproducts were in their food so this episode could be evidence of a previously unknown food allergy.

Me to cashier: “Hi, remember when I asked you about the nuts and seeds and
nut/seed oils? Can you tell me what else is in those dishes?”

Cashier: “I can’t tell you everything that’s in them because it’s our proprietary
recipe.”

Me: “Well, I don’t plan on selling your recipe or making this dish at home. My son has had an allergic reaction to something and I need to figure out what was in that dish.”

Cashier: “I really can’t tell you because that is our company’s recipe.”

Me: “If I need to take my son to the hospital, I need to know what he ate. Who can tell me what was in that dish?”

Cashier: “Cooper,” gesturing to the line cook, “come here.”

Cooper: “What d’ya want?”

Cashier: “Just come here.”

Cooper: “Are you going to sexually harass me again?”

Cashier: “You know you like it. Just come here.”

Cooper: “Okay, I’m coming over but only because I like it.”

[Author’s comment: While it was delightful to watch their 20-something pubescent flirting, I had a son being carried to the car who more closely resembled a blow fish than a child.]

Cashier to Cooper: “Can you tell this lady what is in the kids’ noodle and rice
bowls?”

Cooper: “Uh, no. That’s our proprietary recipe and we can’t tell people what’s in it.”

Me: “Look, my son is having an allergic reaction to something that was in that dish. I’m clearly not looking to replicate it. What are the ingredients?”

Cooper: “Well, there’s soy sauce, walnut oil, sesame seed…”

Me to Cashier: “I asked you specifically if there was either nuts or seeds or their oils in their dish and you said no.”

Cashier (smiling): “I’m sorry. I didn’t know that.”

Me: “I’m sure you are sorry but I asked you an important question and my son is allergic to both nuts and seeds.”

Cashier: “Well you didn’t tell me he had an allergy. If you had, I would’ve asked.”

With crystal clarity of thought cradled in a red sea of rage, I clean off the table, collect my other son and things, and go to the car where husband awaits with my puffy-faced son. We stuff him with a double-dose of Benadryl, flip a U-turn, and head back to the highway home to see how far we can get before he begins vomiting (answer: 89.1 miles).

The final rub? When we did the U-turn, we saw the back side of the restaurant’s marquee which proclaimed in bold black letters: “We don’t use nuts or seeds in any of our dishes!”

Long Time, No Blog (or "I Twitter Therefore I Am")

2008-10-30T11:21:00.001-07:00

Whenever I've given thought to my blog in the last few weeks, it's been with the same amount of ambition felt when I need to schedule a dentist appointment, rake the leaves in my yard, or clean the garage. That is to say, I know I should pay attention to it, but there are really more pressing things to do like cleaning out the saved shows off the DVR, reorganizing the cutlery drawer, or hanging the clothes in my closet in ROY G BIV order (yes, I do that and there's no way you can make fun of me in a way that I haven't already experienced).

The other thing that's consumed my time is Twitter. That statement alone makes me feel shame, as though I've admitted to being on a Girls Gone Wild filming (I haven't). But insofar as that Girls Gone Wild is a show predicated on a bunch of women who are show-offs, I guess the comparison is valid.

So what is it about Twitter that encourages me to turn into a capering, attention-hungry gamine? It's the ridiculously small 140-character status message.

Nothing screams "pay attention to me!" like the desperate status messages of someone who honestly thinks anyone cares that you were stuck in traffic, ate apple crisp for breakfast, or were attacked by ladybugs. In spite of this, I feel compelled to share my every activity, observation, accomplishment, or article read with a swarm of people (many of whom I don't know at all), all because I think someone might care...or I want to think someone might care. Toward that end, I suppose that tweeting on Twitter is the online equivalent of prayer. The probability that God actually hears every single prayer at all times seems a bit improbable, yet that doesn't keep us from doing it.

There's probably nothing wrong with it - except it is an incredible waste of time. Instead of praying, I could actually be doing something about fixing my problem or someone else's. And instead of Twittering, I could probably be doing something more creative and challenging ...

...like Facebook?

Music Is Made Up of Moments

2008-02-28T17:43:00.000-08:00

Certainly, I do not have exclusive province on sardonically wistful observations and insight about music ... but I am more than a bit envious that I didn't write this article. The question the author addresses is "what kind of music do you like?" He notes that for those with eclectic music tastes, it's a very hard question to answer ... especially since it's one that seems intended to cubbyhole the respondent.

The second page of the article is what I like best. He observes that an appreciation of music is not necessarily attached to genre, artist, or composer. Sometimes those moments of passionate delight can be found in just a few moments of a single song.

"Me, on Shuffle" by Chuck Klosterman

Coming of Age

2008-01-29T14:39:00.001-08:00

Shortly, I will experience a day dreaded by many women from the day after they turn 21: I will celebrate my 30th birthday.

Because I mastered counting by ones many, many years ago, I've been preparing for 30 for...well...29 years. It's not been a surprise that it's coming up (although I did spend a brief angst-inspired period of my teenage years believing that I'd die before I ever got to be "this" old). But, truth be told, I'm still trying to figure out how I feel about this coming of age. Anne Boleyn had already given birth to a future queen, been queen herself, and was instrumental in England adopting the reformed Christian religion by 29. Anne Frank was an proficient diarist by half this age. By their standard, I'm an under-accomplished old husk (although note that I am an alive husk with my head attached).

On the other hand, Harper Lee didn't write her most definitive work until she was 33 and I have approximately 92 years to go before rivalling the supercenetarian record held by Jeanne Calment. Grandma Moses didn't really hit her stride until she was a spry woman of her 70s. Throwing my name in with these great women, it is clear to me that I have plenty of time to carpe that diem.

But it is unavoidable that the prospect of turning 30 has affected to some extent the way I perceive my relationships with others: family, colleagues, my children, women, men.

Colleagues: As someone who has always been the youngest amongst my peers (going through school young will do that to you), it's a bit of a shock to learn that some of my colleagues are now two or three years younger than I am, and I'm expected to treat them as my equals. (In other words, the respect I expect from those who are older, I shy away from extending to those who are younger. But no where is it said that with age comes consistency!)
Family: By turning 30, I feel a slightly renewed sense of confidence in dealing with my family. No longer am I the irresponsible teenager nor the starting-out-in-life 20-something. I am fully an adult, empowered, unique, and independent (albeit never free) of the self-limiting impressions of childhood.
My Children: As a 20-something mom, it's always felt a little bit like playing house. My children mean much to me, but sometimes when I look at them, I see playthings, like they're really my little brothers or nephews and I'm just babysitting for a bit while the adults are out. With 30 approaching, I know that I am a mom and I now feel like the appropriate age to be one. (Maybe turning 30 and living in middle-class suburbia is just what Britney needs?)
Women: Fortunately, almost all the women I know are at least 2-3 years older. Phew. But there is a growing number of women I know who are, sadly, younger. Yes, there's a sharp twang of competitiveness and jealousy when I see them. But, what's interesting is that I always felt that, except before it was when looking at women who are older and more accomplished. So the difference here is simply perspective. I hope that some day I'll be mature (or resigned) enough to look at the younger, slimmer, prettier women without a twinge of envy or regret that I never looked like that. Until then, at least I know that age is helping me be humble.
Men: There was a time, not too long ago, when I'd look at another man and muse to myself, "now, that's a handsome specimen!" only to find out that he was (gasp) in his mid- to late-30s. Ewwww. Mentally calculating, I would quickly deduce that he could, at least in theory, be my dad. (Forget for a moment that my own dad is 40 years older than I and let's assume this other handsome Mr. X could've spawned me at 13-ish). Now, however, when I see interesting gents "of a certain age," I need to stop my recoil and realize that they're really not "that" old. Were I in the dating market (I'm not), they would be well within my range. (That takes me down another path of introspection as I realize that some of the men I notice now are actually older than my dad was when I was born. Again I say....ewwww.)

So this brings me to wonder, what will my 30s hold? If there has been a unifying theme to my 20s, it's just been to get to some place (I don't know where) and to get there as quickly as possible. A friend predicted that in my 30s, I'd derive even more pleasure from my children and find some way to wear Mardi Gras beads and a caftan together with style. Those are noble goals, although I think all I'd need to do is throw in a bad dye job, a hair cap, and some cloth grocery bags, and I could be mistaken for the portly senile lady pushing the shopping cart around down by the river.

Instead, for my 30s, I hope for direction and selfless resolve. I hope that I'll be able to make decisions based on what is best for me and my immediate family, regardless of where that takes us. I hope with that will come the confidence and determination to make any decisions successful ones.

And I hope that all those younger, skinnier, prettier women get fat with terrible acne. Quickly.

The Question No One Really Asked Has Now Been Answered

2007-12-12T15:11:00.000-08:00

I've seen dozens of pregnancies and have been pregnant myself twice.

Every time, I might've marveled at a woman's size (or lack thereof), her grace (or lack thereof), or her waddle (rarely is there a lack thereof).

Never have I wondered why a pregnant woman doesn't topple like a Weeble-Wobble.

But apparently I'm just not curious enough. Some scientists did ask, and some yahoo at Forbes and the Associated Press felt that the answer was worthy of publication.

Guess what they learned? Disingenuously enough, scientists learned that women are built differently from men and these differences allow women to adjust to a different center of gravity.

Huh. Who would've thunk it?

Read more: http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2007/12/12/ap4433083.html

Associations

2007-12-09T11:25:00.000-08:00

A call this morning with my mother started me thinking about associations and the lasting impact they have on our behavior.

When I was knee-high to a grasshopper, around six or seven years old, I found the family-sized box of Nestle Quik powdered chocolate. ("Found," in this context, means that I waited until the adults were not paying attention to me, and I sneakily crept into the kitchen and pulled my pudgy, overweight body onto the kitchen countertop and get the chocolate off the topmost shelf in the highest cupboard.)

Not being a child known for moderate dietary indulgence (I would add 1/2 c. of brown sugar to a glass of whole milk for the pleasure of slurping the brown sugar off the bottom with a straw, just to add more brown sugar when it either dissolved or was eaten), I sat my pink flower-pantied bottom on the countertop with tablespoon in hand and eat spoonful after spoonful of the powdered chocolate ad nauseam (that's a pun, by the way). How I managed to eat half a box of this stuff (not to mention without any kind of lubricating agent like sips of water milk), I do not know...but I did.

An hour or two later, I was in the front seat of my parents' 1976 white Thunderbird, sitting between them. (Anyone who can picture this situation may ask, "where was her seat belt?" To that I would say, Dad ripped out the seat belts and disabled the warning/light bell on every car he had. It was 1980-something and we probably had a metal dashboard in that car; kids were just made tougher back then.) As we made a sharp right turn into the parking lot of a strip mall, by stomach roiled. The car made the little bumpity-bump over the curve, and I experienced all of that chocolate powder a second time, this time in the upward direction, as it temporarily turned brown the white leather seats and stained my favorite yellow/white polka dot dress.

Fast forward about 10-12 years to a college drinking experience when I must've thoroughly abandoned all of the best good sense I ever learned from Grandma or Spock (I mean the logical Star Trek Spock, not the nurturing child psychologist). This 6-hour period began with homemade sushi and champagne (hey, we were cultured college kids!), progressed through beer-and-amaretto Depth Charges, and concluded with shots of tequila and cinnamon-flavored Firewater. About four hours after last call, I took a 15-minute break from vegetarianism and indulged in Chicken McNuggets because I realized I needed food. Perhaps not surprisingly, my body rebelled. Thereafter any gaps in my memory about what I had drank or eaten over the previous 12 hours were answered, in a most physically uncomfortable way.

Since I was 6 or 7, I've barely touched chocolate, eschewing chocolate milk, hot chocolate, chocolate chip cookies, chocolate cheesecake, chocolate pudding, chocolate bars, or even chocolate ice cream, or chocolate fudge. I may be one of the few women who disdains gifts of chocolate at Valentine's Day. Since that teen-aged tour of the middle-shelf of the bar, I have barely touched booze, but, more significantly, I have such a strong aversion to tequila and artificial cinnamon that my stomach clenches at the faintest whiff. For multiple reasons, I have never again attempted to acquaint myself with Chicken McNuggets.

So, back to this morning's call with Ma.

I like to cook and bake, something my mother doesn't have much time to do, and my dad likes to eat what I cook and bake. He living nearly 600 miles from me isn't an impediment, as I manage to send travel-tolerant food via carrier pigeon (a.k.a. family members taking road trips between points A and B). Knowing my dad loves cheesecake, and I like making it, caused me to call home this morning to offer to send some cheesecake to him as part of his Christmas package.

Dad was asleep, sleeping off the exhausting effects of life-saving cancer treatment which does everything to destroy quality of life while trying to preserve the quantity of it. So, I asked my mother: Would a nice, high-fat, high-sugar cheesecake entice Dad into eating a little bit more (weight gain being one of his objectives right now)?

Mother: "No, not cheesecake."

Me: "Is he just not eating anything, or do animal-based products just not seem tasty to him right now?"

Mother: "Neither. We just don't want cheesecake in the house."

It was then, in a Hollywood-like rush of flashbacks and instantaneous recollection, that I remembered.

Mother hasn't made cheesecake or had homemade cheesecake in her home for almost 30 years. Whereas she'll occasionally purchase the finest cheesecake CostCo has to offer, it is generally relegated to the extra freezer out-of-sight, and more often meets its end not through someone's enjoyment of every calorie-plumped bite but rather due to freezer burn because it sits there uneaten for so long.

So why the cheesecake prohibition? Clearly, in a home where 1-pound bricks of Jack cheese, tubes of salami, and jugs of whole milk were as plentiful as Starbucks in an urban mall, cheesecake is not verboten due to health concerns.

I last saw Grandpa Ted when I was about ankle-high to a grasshopper then so I have only the foggiest memories of him (if, indeed, they're authentic memories). My mother used to make Grandpa Ted a cheesecake every Christmas. He'd turn one 8-inch cheesecake into about 16 slices (making them very thin indeed!) and freeze each one individually. He'd allow himself one slice a week over the next 3 months or so, knowing that on his birthday, he'd get another homemade cheesecake, so his Christmas gift needed to last until then.

Grandpa Ted died some 27 years ago, and Mother hasn't made a single cheesecake that I know of since then. I have no doubt that the possible parallels have struck here: She liked to bake cheesecake for her dad, who died. I like to bake and am offering to bake a cheesecake for my dad, who is suffering through cancer. She is (or at least, can be) a rational woman. Were I to go ahead and send a cheesecake there uninvited, there'd be no Joan Crawford-type dramatics with a cheesecake flying across the room to hit the wall with a slurpy splat. But every time she saw it in the refrigerator, it'd likely trigger her own Hollywood-like rush of flashbacks and make her a little less happy until it was gone.

Her commitment to cheesecake avoidance is so great, my dislike of chocolate, cheap booze, and Chicken McNuggets pales by comparison.

Such is the power of association.

It's okay, though. To be honest, Dad probably wouldn't feel well enough to eat it anyway.

Why Write When You Can Freecycle?

2007-11-26T11:11:00.000-08:00

In a life where time is a fixed resource and demands upon it are endless, one of the easiest hobbies to let slide is writing. It's hard to justify the small selfishness of writing-for-pleasure when there's so many other impactful competing possible accomplishments ... such as writing yet another dry, banal work e-mail or the empty "wham-bam-thank-you-ma'am" ego-stroke of gratuitous social networking.

So, I fill my daily thirst for the written word by doing a little Freecycling. For anyone who might not know, Freecycling is a compendium of ostensibly locally-run online communities where people go to offer stuff they don't want and ask for things they do, and all for free. It's basically a lot like Craigslist except "Freecycling" is easier on the tongue and ears than "Craigslisting" - plus, if you have a lisp, "Craigslisting" can be a downright embarrassing word to say. The other difference is scope: woe betide the person who dares to mention on Freecycle intangibles (e.g. services), off-topic discussion, or profit.

Freecycle is a place where people come to off-load their junk for other hapless people for whom that junk as value. Who receives on Freecycle? Well, I'm not sure about that, but there are an awful lot of hard luck stories to go around. In fact, if you are ever looking for lyrics to a country song, look no further. Actually, a lot of the givers have tales that would put left-wing journalism to shame, leaving me with two questions. (1) Are the story-tellers for real or are they exercising their creative writing muscle? (2) What does it say about the community in general if we reward people not necessarily based on need but instead on how effectively they tug on our heart-strings? Maybe the giving movement is social engineering at its best.

Who are the givers? Some people give on Freecycle because they truly believe they're helping another. Others give on Freecycle because they're too damned lazy and cheap to go to the dump. This would describe me. Also, giving on Freecycle allows me to silence my grandmother's voice occasionally playing in my head. Grandma Annie was 98 years old when she passed onto her eternal reward, a survivor of world wars (before mankind knew to number them) and the Great Depression. In 105* Arizona summers, Grandma would insist we take jackets in the car in case "there is a draught!" Grandma also insisted in reusing everything from nylons with runs to cottage cheese containers. Freecycle was made for someone like her.

Interestingly, it's the givers on Freecycle who seem to take themselves the most seriously, not the apparently greatly-in-need receivers. For some reason, Freecycle appears populated with a large number of people who feel that if you do not want a cracked Thermos mug or an already-opened package of gluten-free baking mix that you're passing judgement.

Not so for me. I recognize that, by-and-large, what I have to offer on Freecycle is of likely no good use to another human being (barring some foraging survivalist group in the Andes). So, why not have a little fun with it? Go all out when writing your posts and experience a little creative writing pleasure while you're at it.

OFFER: Garlic & Candy
I'm pleased to announce that I have overcome my irrational fear of vampires. Consequently, I realize that I cannot possibly consume the entire 3 lb bag of garlic I purchased a few weeks ago. So, if you are still working through your vampire fear or if you just flat dislike people and want them to stay far away, this could be the deal for you.

And while you're feasting on garlic, why not also toss back some Welch's individually packaged fruit snacks or Haribo gummy bears? That's right, folks! Nothing goes better than some gummy candies after a meal of fresh garlic. So, come by and pick up our two large bags of individually packaged "fruit" snacks (left over from Halloween, but, hey, it's not like this stuff goes bad or anything!) while getting your garlic fix, too.

The Welch's big bag (not the individually wrapped bags) is opened but that is a concierge service that I provide to you free of charge.*

(*Note: This post was initially rejected because the humorless Freecycle mods felt it was inappropriate that I implied I'd normally charge for this function.)

OFFER: Ornaments
Offered for your consideration are four ornaments filled with Play-Doh. They're still in their original packaging telling me that either my mother-in-law or I are responsible for having purchased them, likely on impulse immediately after Christmas probably because they were dirt cheap. I'm not trying to disparage what you do on your tree, but in my opinion, having Play-Doh in an ornament just waiting for grubby childish hands to get into it when your back is turned sounds like a sure-fire way to make this Christmas one to remember…and not in the way you might hope. So, if you feel lucky (tell me, punk, do you?) and would like these ornaments filled with Play-Doh for your home or to gift to your worst enemy (or nieces and nephews), they're yours for the asking.

OFFER: Clothing
2 women's skirts -- or could be worn by a man very comfortable with himself, I suppose. Black/slate, business appropriate, size 1-2. Since they're on the small size, I assume that any man-comfortable-with-himself deciding to wear these won't have enough weight to defend himself, so make sure you travel in packs.

2 women's shirts, cotton, one blue, one white, long sleeved and long necked. Probably meant to be worn either by giraffes or as a turtleneck.

There you have it. I'm helping save the environment, protect the populace from vampires, satisfy sweet teeth, clothe transvestites and giraffes, and fulfill my creative writing desire...multiple times a week with relatively little effort.

Random Thoughts about Mozart and the Car Wash

2007-11-24T19:00:00.000-08:00

Secondary to being a musician, Mozart may have had passing claim as a humorist. Funny musical motifs abound in his orchestral compositions and his opera buffa is exactly like it sounds. One need look no further than Ein Musikalischer Spaß to appreciate his satirical musical perspective. Granted, away from the musical staff, he demonstrated an odd preference for scatological humor, and might've even had a book of Bathroom Humor (Chamber Pot Humor?) if such a thing had been published then -- interests that are a bit earthier than what is probably commonly associated with classical composers.

But would Mozart have approved of his music being used as the musical backdrop to a car wash?

In a truly Sisyphean quest to have a clean car during a typically rainy Pacific northwest autumn, I recently went to the touchless car wash for its semi-annual cleansing. Not having anything else to do for the 12 minutes or so while being queued to go through the Tunnel of Automotive Love, I popped in a CD just received in the mail that day, a promotional mailer of Mozart's best to persuade me to subscribe to a Classical Greats of the Month club.

For anyone considering subscribing to such a club, let me make it clear that I reserve the right to gently mock you. I'm musical snob enough to recognize that no truly appreciative, passionate classical musical fan has anywhere in his or her collection "Top 10 Greatest Mozart Hits!" Why? Well, consider Exhibit A, the back cover of the CD case where "Requeim, K626: Requeim aeternam" is listed as #9 on the playlist. Surely everyone remembers learning in elementary school "i before e," right? There is only one listed exception to that rule: "except after c." The rule is not "i before e except after c and in the word requiem."

That, among other reasons, is why you don't subscribe to clubs such as these. And if you still don't understand why, then nothing I can write here will explain it to you. Just trust me on this.

Anyway, point being, I was in the car, preparing to jam to a little Mozart Requiem (nothing like a melody about death, hell, and redemption to get the groove on). I found it vaguely amusing, oddly poetic, and entirely appropriate that as "requiem aeternam" opened with the basses proceeding upward to the soprano entry, the music worked to slowly engulf the listener, in much the same way as the firmly squishy tentacles of the carwash curtain slapped the car sides, sucking my little red Toyota compact into its gaping maw.

I also found it appropriate that it was during the words "et lux perpetua eis" that my freshly scrubbed, newly clean Toyota emerged to comparatively sunny skies.

Somewhere, Mozart smiled.

Religion Education = Child Abuse?

2007-10-17T18:22:00.001-07:00

A couple of weeks ago, the BBC's show World Have Your Say facilitated a conversation about whether children should be brought up with religion. Regrettably, I tuned in only in time to catch the last 15 minutes, which was enough to raise my ire to a level of simmering indignation and irritation. (Clearly, though, the sense of offense has faded with time since it's taken me two full weeks to voice my impotent rage via this blog.)

First, a general comment: The topic choice was so tremendously broad, that the received commentary was distressingly diverse and so unfocused on a certain point that it could not be rebutted or addressed in good debate form. BBC probably would've received more succinct and pointed commentary had they asked, "how should elections be run?" or "are tax collectors the epitome of evil?" or any number of broad-based questions. But the question of "should children be brought up with religion" not only begged the question asked, but also opened the door to an endless litany of responses arguing for/against atheism, for/against child or parental rights, for/against secular/sacred authority, and on and on and on.

That aside, however, the topic did generate two responses of particular note that I heard in the final few minutes of the program (emphasis mine).

Children brought up with religion "lack the ability to think critically" because they view the world through the lens of their faith and "spoon-fed" mythology.
Raising a child in a religion is akin to child abuse. According to Ken in Cleveland, "I do feel it is abusive to force children into a faith. Religious upbringing fosters intolerance and fear at an early age."

I am ... astounded. I'm astounded on so many levels that it is difficult for me to harness the volume of response into coherent thoughts.

But of course I’ll try.

"...lack the ability to think critically..."
How ill-educated a comment is this? Some of the greatest human minds have been those with a spiritual bent, including Rene Descartes, George Washington, Rembrandt van Rijn, J.S. Bach, Isaac Newton, Louis Pasteur, T.S. Eliot, John Milton, Albert Einstein, Arnold Schoenberg, Henry Kissinger, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and endless others.

I do grant this person and her argument a minor concession: in my opinion, any person who believes anything without pausing to consider and question runs the risk of having a mind numb to critical thinking. But that is without respect to religion or any other descriptor. It is a social problem, it is a parenting problem, it is an educational problem -- take your pick or combine as desired.

It is not, however, specifically a religion problem.

"...abusive to force children into a faith..."
Yet another astounding comment but one for which I have greater sympathy. I know many people who have had amazingly negative experiences with their ancestral/family faith. Those experiences ranged from just hating being forced to go to church and sit still for 90 minutes once a week when they'd rather play outside to experiencing beatings, extortion, molestation, and rape in the name of God. For those who experienced the latter, there is no excuse. There is never a way to justify it and never a way to make it right. All one can do is point out that the miseries were at the hands of people, not of religion. But that never erases the stain.

But outside of those extreme circumstances, how am I an abuser of my children because I open the door to them to a faith-based experience? To create for them the possibility that there is a higher presence, and that there is a heaven, and that there is some sort of cosmic justice that balances itself out, if not now, then at some point in the hereafter?

I acknowledge that some believe that heaven, hell, God, and a hereafter don't exist and, according to them, to intentionally mislead our children into thinking otherwise is unfair. But I submit to you that this is not abusive and, if it is, then we must first jail the people who propagate the myth of Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, and that models in the beer ads really are interested in the pot-bellied guy at the pool table.

Most people, though, shun religion for reasons enumerable, ranging from having their knuckles rapped as a child by a nun to disliking most religions' position on gays to a distrust of anything organized to sheer laziness because they have no desire to work at building an understanding of faith. What can I say to people who feel that way? Not a whole lot. They need to find their own way, and perhaps they never will. And who am I to say that my way is right and that faith is the best choice?

So back to the original question, "should children be brought up with religion?"
In my opinion, yes, I think so. My parents believed differently, feeling that I should make my own choice as an adult. Consequently, I was baptised and confirmed at 20. I'm fine with that.

But while I respect their choice, I find it somewhat analogous to someone saying that "no language should be spoken in the house, so that when the child grows up, she can decide which language she wants to speak."

How do you build a comparative knowledge without a foundation from which to start? How can I appreciate (or not) French if I don't know English?

The fact is, if I'm brought up speaking English and I really want to learn French, I'll learn French and give up my Yankee ways. If I'm brought up Jewish and really want to be a Mennonite, I'll convert.

But during those initial ~18 years when I'm under my parents' authority, I lose endless opportunities to learn the importance of morality, instructive parables, and the core mythology/faith-based stories common to any religion that help me develop a broader and more mature understanding of art, culture, and literature.

Consequently, I fully, wholly, and completely reject the tenets of the atheist, anti-religious, and their ilk when I state that...

Religion ≠ people. If a person wearing a Disneyland sweatshirt robbed a person at gunpoint, should one then disparage all things Disney on that basis alone? Presumably not. So then why would one fault the entire faith experience and deny the possibility of a creating presence because one suffered a real or imagined wrong at the hand of a priest, minister, nun, deacon, rabbi, imam, and so forth?
Religion = cultural history. Religion has great value from a sociological perspective. Building an understanding of multiple religions is critical to understanding art, architecture, music, literature, origins of government, and, most importantly, history.
Religion = societal normalization. Whether for good or ill, many of our societal norms and laws are based on religion, including the precepts to not steal, kill, lie, and so forth.
Religion = hope. Those who subscribe to the philosophy of "Let us eat and drink; for tomorrow we shall die" (a passage from Isaiah 22:13, by the way) often feel that today is today, tomorrow is tomorrow, and when we draw our last breath, we come to a hard stop. C'est finis. How sad is that? While we would all do well to memento mori, religion (and faith) creates the hope that there is more beyond this life and that the possibility for future happiness doesn't end when we shuffle off these mortal coils. Delusional? Perhaps. But if we're wrong, who does it hurt?

In summary (which could actually be the segue point to another soliloquy but I'll end it before accentuating my verbosity), there is clearly no one answer to the question about "fixing" religion, how or whether children should be raised with a faith, etc. The only possible answer is, I think, tolerance. Let others believe, and let others not believe. Lightly evangelize, if that is your calling, but be sensitive to "no, I'm not interested." Respect the openly displayed Christmas tree or a person's choice to wear the Star of David around his/her neck, but also don't get in a huff if someone wishes one "happy holidays" or no greeting at all.

All this is made possible through free will. (Interestingly enough, this is yet another [generally] religious concept.)

Montana Skies

2007-10-13T22:49:00.000-07:00

This weekend, I'm visiting my folks in Montana, a place that to many is synonymous with fly-fishing, hiking, ranchers, whiskey-drinkin' tobacco-chewin' locals, and, for those of us who know our Big Sky Conference football, home of the University of Montana Grizzlies (GO GRIZ!). To some, Montana possesses a certain as-yet untarnished purity that is difficult to find in more cosmopolitan areas. One need only watch movies like "A River Runs Through It", "The Horse Whisperer", and "The Patriot" to get a good idea of some of the brilliant natural resources existing here. Certainly, it's the sprawling openness that attracted my parents, refugees of master-planned communities, strip malls, and the press of suburban humanity, to relocate here some 20-ish years ago.

But what most people see by day can be found in many places throughout the region: Oregon, Washington, Idaho, northern California, northern Nevada, and probably, albeit with different foliage, in many of the great communities that litter the Midwest and eastern coast. What is really quite special, and less common, is the nighttime skies.

To be fair, I'm not a huge fan of Montana. I lived here for six-ish years as an adolescent/young adult, moved away when it made sense, and never looked back. While I enjoy returning "home" to see family, friends, and old haunts, I'm never so nostalgic that I want to actually live here or even relive my time here.

But every time I return, I pause for a few moments in the solemnity of the night to ponder the nighttime skies above. Always ensuring that the surrounding lights are out, and the evening is clear of any sound not native to the peaceful outdoors, I stand alone in a dark field and look above, suspecting that this is as close as I will ever get to feeling the all-encompassing vastness of space.

Looking around, it seems that there are so many stars that the untrained eye cannot pick out a single constellation. The abundance of stardust is so consuming that it dilutes the brighter stars that have an easier time standing out in a less effusive sky in a more light-polluted area. With no small glimmer of sacrilegious humor, I reflect that the dusting of white against the obsidian sky looks to me like God has a dandruff problem, where the star lights are little scalp cells resting on his dark winter sweater. I find this to be not too far-fetched an explanation for their origin. In fact, isn't in the Chinese whose mythology claims that the night sky is actually a bowl turned over with the stars being holes punched through to the outer light of the universe?

Regardless of the myth you find most appealing, it really is something quite special and increasingly rare. The dazzling darkness and pinpricks of light blanket you in wonder. Visit and experience it yourself if you can.

Park on the Top Deck

2007-09-26T18:29:00.000-07:00

While I'm a person of many words, I don't have many that even approach wisdom to share except these:

"Park on the top deck."

I'm writing about a multi-tiered parking garage, and I urge you to park on the top deck. This definitely goes against common practice. Whether due to laziness, impatience, habit, or convenience, we routinely scout for the closest parking spot on the lowest level.

How many people realize how much is missed in doing so?

I've never much liked the saying, "If you're not the lead dog, the view never changes," but I think it's appropriate here. Park on the lower level and you always see the same thing. Your car is, and, by extension, you are, just one more hunk of mobile metal among dozens of others. You leave your car to walk over a pre-determined path to a stairwell or elevator which takes you to a pre-determined sidewalk that will almost invariably take you in a predictably boring straight line to your destination. If you work in Cubeville, like I, you'll then likely spend your day walking along other pre-determined aisles of cubes and hallways that are fabric and metal on one side and drywall with boring art on the other. You'll probably spend 7-10 hours of your day in a pre-determined space of 6x6 or 8x8 or 10x1o. Am I the only one who finds it ironic that almost everything about the typical carpet dweller's workspace is pre-determined, bland, and in straight lines, yet employees are expected to think creatively? Trite though the saying now is, all managers want employees who can "think outside the box." Maybe if we were elevated six feet above our cubes, we'd be more successful at achieving that.

Most religions/mythologies claim that the greatest gift granted to humankind was free will. I find that ironic, too, since although we can exercise our free will by choosing to walk zig-zags over sidewalks and jaywalk over roads, we'll likely be ticketed or killed if we do.

So, the safest advice I can give you is to park on the top deck, where you can walk relatively safely in a crooked line or swirls or ellipticals around the floor before you go to your pre-determined path down the elevator shaft and onto the sidewalks. While you meander, you have the opportunity to see your environment in the way all those other lower-level cars do not: the sky, the top 15 levels of buildings, and even the un-curtained bedroom window of a condo where an impressively overweight and balding-yet-hairy man was dancing wildly...and naked.

How often do you see that when you're parked on one of the lower floors?

Words Fail Me

2007-08-24T23:59:00.000-07:00

This time, it's true. Words really do fail me.

But if you want to read more about platform heels for hookers that have an alarm system and GPS locator device embedded within, look no further: GPS Alarm Shoes for Sex Workers.

A few days ago, I was pondering yet again about what sort of entrepreneurial enterprise I could launch to rescue myself from the daily drudgery of being a corporate sycophant. Had I only know that financial independence was simply one proof-of-concept hooker shoe away...

Confessions of (Recovering) a Networking Addict

2007-08-13T08:23:00.001-07:00

When I was displaced from my job late last year, the employment coaching consultants preached many things: upscale your clothing (the tech-geek uniform of jeans and collared shirts doesn't work during an interview); maintain your grooming (dye, trim, clip, and polish body areas appropriately); and network, network, network because "95% of all jobs are found through networking."

Holy cow pies, Moonshine. Network? Uhm. Maybe you've not gotten it yet, but I'm not exactly the warm fuzzy type. And you want me to talk to people? People as in bipeds? Let me tell you, there's a reason I prefer to work in technology groups for companies that are geographically distributed.

I'm female, which already gives me an edge, mainly in the unpopular Affirmative Action way.
For a female in technology, I'm relatively hot. [Bear in mind "relatively".]
I'm in technology and have a personality and a sense of humor. [Mark one more for the Willowbottom-meister.]
My social skills are at least equal if not better than those with whom I work. [Be afraid, be very afraid.]
I never work with real, live, real-time people in my same location. [So yes, there are days when I can work in my pajamas at home and no one knows.]

Basically, where I work and in what I do, I need to exert very little effort to be the most personable, attractive, and charming cream of the crop. And now, you dare to suggest that I network, as in real time with other human beings who may not shop the clothing line of ThinkGeek.com? Oh, dear.

So, the consultant recommended we start our networking journey by getting an account at LinkedIn.

Whew! That was a relief. I thought you were going to suggest I apply makeup and go to cocktail mixers.

Well, the consultant suggested that, too, but I think she realized that for some of us, it's baby steps.

So, I got a LinkedIn account and got totally sucked into it. This was surprising for someone who snottily has eschewed Yahoo! 360* and Facebook and MySpace for so long as Web sites for attention-hungry twits. But yet, here I was ravenous to do as much as possible -- post my resume, solicit recommendations for my past work, etc. Social and professional networking applications have wet dreams about over-achievers like me who determine our own self-worth by how many contacts we have. At first, I was demure, waiting for people to invite me to be one of their "contacts." But I realized that networking is not a place for wallflowers (insofar as anyone who networks behind the shield of a plasma monitor isn't a wallflower). You must be noticed to succeed!

Suddenly, rather than awaiting invitations, I was inviting people to be my contacts from college 11 years ago I'd not spoken to since. Old co-workers who'd been at the same company for 25 years, siblings, professional students, the nanny, even distant relatives who have a Luddite-style aversion to e-mail and would never even see my invitation ... no relationship was too sacred. All I knew is there were people out there who had "500+" contacts and I wasn't yet one of them.

And then it struck me. Most people require a little more of their interpersonal relationships than being contacted whenever they are needed for some reason or other (like a job search). Most don't care for being treated like spices on a kitchen rack: easily pulled out, just as easily shelved. I could add all these people as my contacts, but was I prepared to maintain some semblance of contact with these folks for an indefinite period of time ... even (gasp) forever?

Well, I think we know the answer to that. And so, my visits to LinkedIn immediately became as frequent as when I put eyeshadow on. That is to say, very rare.

So, for the last several months, I've been a recovering networking addict, visiting my profile now and again to keep it updated but really not exerting any effort on this. Hopefully nothing will happen to my situation to belie this self-semi-confident statement, but I've done very well staying employed so far based on the quality of my work alone and my (arguable) charm during interviews. I'd rather try that route than the one I find more painful ... namely, the networking-with-real-live-people part.

My networking inclinations were near dormant until recently when my sorority launched its own networking site. Suddenly, like a hungry koala in search of eucalyptus, my networking urges surged to life again and I felt the flash of adrenaline-fed heat that augurs a competitive race. Here I have a chance to demonstrate my connectedness to my sisters and prove that I am a person worth knowing.

I create my account and immediately begin to add friends. I pause. Wait, think I. Wouldn't a true demonstration of my popularity be if I play hard to get and let them all add me as a friend? Briefly I entertain fantasies last experienced in high school, when I dreamt that as I walked through halls (without a pass, of course) students gaped at my self-confident saunter and the girls cooed appreciatively at my edgy black-and-white tie-dye shirt over my tights and L.A. Gear sneakers. (Yes, I wish I were making that part up.)

In this dream, though, servers crashed and networks clogged due to the number of women sending me "Add as a friend" invitations. Women would ask each other in hushed tones or in furtive e-mail messages, "Has she accepted you yet?" "No, not me either." Meanwhile, my profile would be the among the ones with the highest hits, so much so that when my sorority recruits new members every semester, they would list me as a famous member based on my sorority network hit count, along with the noted actresses, Olympians, and philanthropists. "Oh, yes," the 19-year-olds gasp in breathily excited but hushed tones, "SHE is one of our most respected members. She only accepts a very few as her friends, you know." Of course, they would never refer to me by name, as though I'm Lord Voldemort and far too awe-inspiring.

As I awake from my reverie, I'm pragmatic enough to be sardonically amused at my own shallow aspirations that, no matter how humorously presented, may have some small sliver of sincere desire. Yet, I recognize that I really am too people-shy and opinionated (and really too lazy) to ever be the Networking Pontiff, whether of my sorority or the professional world. And I don't think I really want to change, either.

So I've let it go a few days since I actually logged into any networking site and I take some small pleasure in being choosy about who may connect to me. For those connection-hungry networkers who aspire to have the "500+" symbol by their LinkedIn profile, they'll need to create some story a little bit more unique than they also used to work at the same mega-sized corporation I did. And please ... make up a good story, like about some night in some pub where I wore a chartreuse feather boa made of emu feathers and danced to the Macarena while listing off the names of the British monarchs from 1066-1603 and you and I conversed about the witty appropriateness of the word abecedarian. Then I might connect with you.

Why I'm Greek

2007-08-06T16:12:00.000-07:00

Every once in a while, those who haven't known me since college ask me, bewildered, "where does all your time go?" Apparently they think that when I'm not working or blogging, I must be buffing my nails, gently wiping my husband's sweaty brow with a soft cloth, or smoothing my children's hair into perfect style.

Well, truth be told, I'm Greek. That's Greek as in "Alpha Kappa Mu Mu" (the name my non-Greek brother has given my sorority because he thought it sounded funny), not Greek as in "My Big Fat Wedding."

In the eight or nine months I've had this blog, I haven't talked about my Greek-ness not because it's unimportant to me, but simply because the involvement of an adult woman in a college sorority tends to raise some questioning brows. To save myself the effort of justifying it, I just avoid mention of it entirely except to those who "understand." (Those who do understand would be "fellow Greeks," in case the quasi-vocal inflection and air quotes didn't convey into the blogosphere.)

Had Kermit the Frog been a member of Alpha Kappa Mu Mu, he might've sung "It's Not Easy Being Greek" instead of that other catchy tune. In some ways, it's true. After all, if you don't sport a blonde bouffant, and are not hot, a stay-at-home mom, a member of the modern wealthy landed gentry, and from Texas or Georgia, do you really belong in a sorority? And if you dare mention to some that you were Greek once-upon-a-time, will people even bother investing the time into getting to know you to learn that you're not the stereotype?

I'd like to think yes. After all, at the core of every Greek organization's mission statement is some descriptor that basically means "libertie, equalitie, fraternitie," and something about scholarship and excellence. In no organization's write-up have I seen "rock hard hotness", "PHAT," "bling," "good lay," or "toilet papering."

Maybe it's because those organizations didn't try to recruit me.

The interesting thing about being Greek is the response I get when people "find out." The response is either, "YOU were in a sorority?" or "you were in a SORORITY?" The inflection on that sentence alone tells me right there what that person thinks about Greeks in general.

"YOU were in a sorority?" = You're not blonde or hot, and you're in no way what I picture a sorority member to look or be like. How on earth did you get in?

"You were in a SORORITY?" = You're not blonde or hot, and you're in no way what I picture a sorority member to look or be like. Why on earth did you pledge?

Either way, it's uncomplimentary.

The answer is the same to either question, though. Why did I pledge and how did I get in? Well, my sorority saw in me (hopefully) the same thing that I (hopefully) see in it: The desire, ability, and opportunity to nurture leadership in young women, myself included. Sure, lots of organizations can do that but not many of them are dedicated to that and have the opportunity and organization to recruit at such a significant scale at our nation's institutions of learning. Couple that with the additional benefits of a life-long personal and professional network and bond of sisterhood to others who are all committed to the same and you have a pretty compelling argument for "going Greek."

Sure, being Greek comes with the additional trappings of any organization: jewelry (like religious organizations), robes (like the House of Parliament), sometimes a dedicated facility/house (like honors colleges), parties (similar to corporate mixers), and other paid-for extras. It also may come with some problems, and they are the problems that are native to existence as a young person. Let me tell you, college Greeks didn't invent drinking, snappy dressing, and crazy parties. It's just our leadership abilities that make us so darn good at organizing them.

(Disclaimer: That was a joke.)

But my point really is that being Greek offers the opportunity to give younger people a leadership experience under the advice and counsel of older collegians and, even better, under the auspices of a national organization and chapter advisors. Sometimes it's done well, and sometimes not. But that's how it works anywhere. Hopefully organizations are led by people who make them succeed, but it doesn't always work out that way. Fraternities and sororities are no more and no less failure-proof than any other human-led organization.

There aren't many organizations intended for college-aged youth that accommodate the blend of the quasi-professional and the academic, understanding and even encouraging students to put their school first and volunteer work second. Greek groups also help students understand, even on a relatively micro scale, what it means to be a small part of a bigger whole and of a history that may extend hundreds of years back that they can directly shape for the future. Let me tell you that every Greek member, no matter how "insignificant" his or her participation, can make or break a chapter, a college, an entire sorority/fraternity, or even lead to the elevation or destruction of the entire Greek system. Greek organizations can help shape student leaders by demanding responsibility and hopefully accountability while providing opportunities to every person to showcase their best aptitudes while doing good for their organization and philanthropic causes, even if it is under the guise of a seemingly vacuous t-shirt sale or volleyball game.

I'm not so naive that I think it actually works like that at all times, and I realize this is a little pie in the sky. But this is how it can work -- how it should work.

So, really, why do I continue to volunteer for a sorority that stopped being relevant for me when I graduated college, more than 10 years ago? It's because I truly believe that we are responsible for helping others achieve their life's passion and enabling them with the tools to make their little corner of the world a little better. How else can we enable them with those tools unless we put them into real life situations where showing up, paying bills, and fulfilling your word matter and, if not honored, come with real consequences from which your parents may not be able to bail you out? Because Greek relationships are the among the ones that really can last a lifetime, there's great accountability ... if it's done right. Almost anyone can engineer themselves into a supposed "buy-a-friend" network, but there aren't a lot of people who actually make that investment meaningful and lasting. I feel that I'm still involved to help us meet that challenge.

The Age of the Tomato

2007-08-02T10:38:00.000-07:00

Once or twice in the past, I have been accused of being an over-achiever. I find this to be a poor descriptor because I don't think I've achieved very much. Instead, I prefer to think of myself as someone who puts to use every moment of time that I can. Very little time is spent on TV or idle relaxation. Indeed, in addition to work, parenting, and homemaking, my leisure activities are often combined so more can be gotten out of less. Examples: Movies are enjoyed on the iPod while I lift arm weights on the stair machine at the gym. Books are read while nursing. E-mail is read and sent while I'm on conference calls.

But, the more I try to fit into less, the less truly gratifying it is. This is especially true when it comes to work. While I enjoy, for the present, being a corporate slog and working 50-hour weeks, I don't actually "see" the positive impact of my work. One must go through a long set of connections before my work in managing the development and installation of code for a corporation connects to assuaging the hurts of suffering children throughout the world.

It's at these times that I feel greatest personal satisfaction from good old fashioned manual labor. Painting a bedroom is more satisfying to me than saving $100,000 in production costs. Washing the car and cleaning the garage engenders a greater sense of completion than bringing the count of my unread e-mail down. And, lately, seeing things grow in the garden (however pitifully!) is more pleasurable than producing reports.

In this post you see a picture of a tomato plant (heavy with growing tomatoes). I made this. Well, truth be told, I'm not solely responsible for its creation since I bought the starter plant from a farmers' market and planted it. No matter how much satisfaction I derive from making things, I'm not so foolish to think that I'm attentive enough to living things to do a good job of nurturing them from seeds -- thankfully, children are capable of expressing their ire so I remember to feed and water them. Plants are not so capable.

But the point is that I did make this, with the help of my older son who helped me dig and relocate worms and lady bugs, and my husband who helped me water it, too.

This single tomato (and the ones that will follow) are, to me, a greater testimony of my worth and contributions as a human being than all the certificates of recognition received by my past employers.

This leads me to believe that corporate America can learn something from someone like me. Instead of gift cards to Best Buy and shiny gold coins and signed certificates of appreciation with accompanying recognition points (all of which can be redeemed for more stuff), perhaps we should usher in the Age of the Tomato. Produce is then awarded based on your contributions and capabilities. A sample recognition plan may look like this:

You're the Zest! Recognize with a the gift of a low-cost, easily-used condiment, like a lemon or lime, which comes with paring knife and zester. This is a spontaneous gift that could be awarded following management presentations, a corporate event, or after someone has helped you produce a report. Estimated cost, $7 or less.

Lettuce Thank You! This is for the person whose contributions are a bit more meaningful, probably designed for an experienced entry-level person or a more junior mid-range contributor. The gift would be a small bag of salad fixings, including lettuce, tomato, cucumber, radishes, and a salad dressing, along with tongs and a nice wooden bowl. For the extra special mention, this can be upgraded to include a bottle of vegetable oil (to keep the wooden bowl polished) and a substitution of the standard iceberg lettuce for some nicer dark or gourmet greens (think watercress, spinach, frisee, etc.). Estimated cost, $8-$13.

You're In-herb-spensible. For the seasoned (ha ha!) chef or exceptionally qualified nurturer, reward them with this premium gift of herb seeds with the supplies needed to create a hydroponic herb garden. This is especially appropriate for project or people managers who have made significant contributions. The hydroponic garden can be upgraded, as desired, to a Sur la Table-quality herb seed and garden kit for the senior-level management executive. Estimated cost, $20-$170.

Criteria for award includes not only the person's contributions, but also his/her corporate rank (which may determine overall gift value), and his/her abilities to produce (ha ha!).

This recognition program provides growth opportunity (ha ha! I'm killing me with the puns!), as well as truly useful gifts that allow a person to enjoy the stress-relieving benefits of gentle labor. Additionally, this is an entirely green, environmentally-sensitive program (perhaps it should give partial attribution to Al Gore or Ralph Nader) that provides healthy food into employee diets, potentially reducing health care costs.

I would market this concept, but that would contribute to more e-mail, meetings, and other less-satisfying labor. So, I release this idea into the world for all corporations to benefit. For myself, I ask only for my just desserts and hope to receive a cut of the take.

Irony & Why The Blog's URL Changed

2007-08-02T10:09:00.000-07:00

Several months ago, Starbucks ran a promotion that coincided with the release of Akeelah and the Bee. This promotion included cup sleeves and coasters in pale green with less-than-vernacular words. I collected several of the coasters posting them on a bulletin board in my office, ostensibly to expand my own vocabulary but also because I thought they had a quaint kitschiness ... not to mention they're provided "free" (or rather included as part of my $3 iced tea).

When I created this blog and was searching for some sort of fabulously catchy URL, I glanced up and chose two words from my Starbucks coaster collection: pastiche and elucubrate.

pastiche -- noun, "a dramatic, literary, or musical piece openly imitating the previous works of other artists, often with satirical intent"
elucubrate -- verb, "to produce by working long and diligently"

Speaking of satirical, these words were chosen in a manner aligned with my own quirky sense of humor. Nouveau riche (noun, French, "new rich") is a not-necessarily-nice way to describe people who have acquired wealth recently in an Unsinkable Molly Brown sort of way. Those described as nouveau riche may have the bucks of the aristocracy but without the breeding (imagine Molly Brown with her red velvet draped rooms -- tacky in its efforts to impress). Now, imagine the concept of nouveau riche but applied to education -- perhaps nouveau apprende? This would describe the pretentiously educated ... maybe like yours truly.

But, I digress. My intent was for this blog's URL to mean "a satirical work of art produced through long and diligent work," achieved by naming it (I thought) elucubrated-pastiche.blogspot.com.

However, no matter how many times I tried to find my blog by typing in that URL, I could never find it unless I reached it through a bookmark or logging in as the author.

Today I realized why. In my over-zealous efforts to appear intelligent and choose words beyond my ken, I actually misspelled my own URL when creating this blog.

The irony, for anyone who failed to see it, is that my blog which was supposed to be "a work of art produced through long and diligent work" was founded on a typographical error/misspelling that would've been caught through the most cursory review. Further irony is that in my effort to impress, I made myself foolish (although hardly the first time that happened!).

Side note: Further irony can be found in that today when looking at my bulletin board of vocabulary words, I apparently have "meticulosity" (noun, "extreme care and precision; attention to detail") on it four times.

My URL is now far more humble and simple: ironic-pastiche. At least that I can spell.

Understanding Plagiarism

2007-07-31T14:42:00.000-07:00

About 15 years ago, I received my graded term paper submitted for a music history course with a striking "F" scrawled in red Sharpie across the last page. Writing and research having always been one of my strengths, and generally being a student who received high marks, I was flabbergasted by the audacity of the professor who scored me so low. Acting upon her curt written instruction to "see me," I visited her during office hours that same day.

Upon entering her office, she instructed me to shut the door and sit. This diminutive and petite woman, whose primary instrument was the cello (consider that the cello was quite larger than she), barked in a voice that belied her size that I had plagiarized my paper and I should count myself lucky that she did not process my expulsion from college.

"Plagiarized?", I gasped, the hot chill of adrenaline coursing through me. "I did not!"

What ensued was a long and painful discussion (much of it filled with pent-up dislike from both sides) that included many points, some legitimate and some less-than legitimate. The short version of the conversation is that I was either misinformed or under-informed about what plagiarism is. More particularly, I did not intend to represent others thoughts as my own but believed that if something was patently obvious and documented by abundant sources (e.g. that Palestrina was highly influential in the development of Roman Catholic polyphonic church music), it was unnecessary to attribute the claim to a single source.

Okay, so I'm better informed now and all eventually ended well. But, that that allegation of plagiarism affected me greatly, especially when it could've aborted my otherwise successful college career. Consequently, I've been meticulous in citations (in effort, if not in form) in my academic and professional writing ever since.

So, it greatly surprised me to learn that plagiarism is not just representing (either willfully or through carelessness) another's work as your own. Plagiarism is also reusing your own work for another purpose. Example: Were I to write paper entitled "Ode to Antiquity of the Microbe" for Pithy Verse 101, I could not re-submit the same paper to the school newspaper for publication or to Extremely Pithy Verse 401. This seems counter-intuitive to me because it is my intellectual property so I should be allowed to do with it as I please. But, apparently it is unethical to reuse my own creation for any purpose other than that for which it was intended, unless I obtain proper permission to do so (presumably from the recipient since I, as the author, would clearly give permission).

So, fine. While I disagree, this is easy enough to apply. But what about when it comes to music?

Apparently there is great concern about "score plagiarism", which is when a composer incorporates a melody or motif or other thematic element he previously used for a new score. I find this interesting because composers (and, indeed, authors of all types of creative materials) regularly give nod to past contributions (of themselves or others) by incorporating elements into the new pieces. Indeed, I was unaware that some music aficionados found this practice unacceptable until I started reading about James Horner (best known as the composer to the soundtrack for Titanic, but also Legends of the Fall, a couple of the Star Trek movies, and the Land Before Time). Imagine my amazement when several people complain not about Horner's lack of originality but about his musical dishonesty in "quoting" his own works musically. Similar allegations have been made against John Williams (composer of the music for E.T., Star Wars, and Indiana Jones, among other non-Spielberg movies such as Harry Potter).

Am I ethically challenged? Are my standards set low? What is it I'm missing here? Why is it wrong to re-purpose/re-use your own work? Other than perhaps being criminally un-original, what is the fault?

(And can you quote your own music under copyright Fair Use without infringement? Hmmm... The court case could be, "Wolfgang A. Mozart, composer of Le Nozze di Figaro, v. Wolfgang A. Mozart, composer of Di Giovanni.")

To Vonnegut, the Bell Tolls for Thee

2007-06-17T13:41:00.000-07:00

Right now, I write this on a computer that works for about five minutes at a stretch before spitefully collapsing into a sullen heap of unresponsiveness. My laptop is exhibiting characteristics reminiscent of a college woman post-roofie. But, when inspiration strikes, I must write. For some weeks now I have searched to find a unifying element around which some of my thoughts could be built. After re-reading a favorite book, Welcome to the Monkey House, I've chosen Kurt Vonnegut.

Remember when I said how sometimes your life keeps returning to a particular theme? How odd it is that just now, when I've found my wrinkled Vonnegut paperbacks in my personal library and returned to reading them, he has passed? It's like finding the dog you had given up for dead at a puppy pound only to learn it was just taken in to be euthanized.

Vonnegut was a man who, I suspect, daily fought back his personal demons through his satirical sense of humor. He also accomplished something unbearably unique: he could describe depression.

The interesting thing about depression is that when you experience it, you can't write about it because... well... you're depressed and you don't want to do much of anything. If you do write when you're depressed, chances are anything written will read like total shit. At worst, it'll be filled with trite mundanities such as the weeping of walls and the cries of ravens floating over the crumbled, moist graves of innocents. At best, it'll be the lyrics to a Stabbing Westward song. Vonnegut's spartan writing style saved us from such nonsense and eye-gouging saccharine poignancy.

As the least among Vonnegut's admirers, I am not in a position to critique his work and my praise would be inadequate. What I can share is that I read my first Vonnegut story, Harrison Bergeron, at 8 or 9 years old and it definitively shaped how I feel about equality and uniqueness. Whether it was Vonnegut's intent or not, since reading that story, I have felt little more than suspicion and thinly-veiled disdain for any mechanism designed to assess and cubbyhole people. That's actually very surprising because I adore data and anything that can be cleanly and succinctly quantified. But, when I consider standardized testing and measures designed to enforce equality in light of Harrison Bergeron, I'm left with a sour taste and resentment of anything that may attempt to make me "equal to" or "similar to" someone or something else. In my opinion, there can be no such thing as equality because equality requires a certain acceptance of sameness, and sameness is, in my opinion, mathematically impossible.

Striking when considering Vonnegut's black comedic style, satirical perspective, and melancholy, is the hinting wistfulness of his occasional optimism. Whereas many people with perspectives such as his seem to drown in the cesspool of their own wretched humanity, Vonnegut seemed to see enough of the light that he could see positive outcomes. I think that it was Vonnegut's enduring sense of humor that saved him for so long. Get this: Vonnegut's sister had cancer and was near death. She had four sons. Her husband was quite healthy. Yet the husband died two days before his cancer-afflicted wife in a freak train accident. How's that for irony? And who but Vonnegut could appreciate the dark and bitter humor of such a tragedy?

The final sentences of Vonnegut's semi-autobiographical and (I believe) final book, Timequake, read, "I was the baby of the family. Now I don't have anybody to show off for anymore." This is not the first time he made such a statement, referencing his brother and sister who preceded him in death. It struck me, though. How much of who we are is defined by those with whom we surround ourselves? And when those around us are no more, what we we left with? Am I the sneaky child who stole my dad's chocolate only as long as my dad is around? Once he is gone, who, other than I, will remember that? Do those events evaporate into the great cosmic ether? If I define myself as daughter, sister, mother, who am I once my parents and siblings pre-decease me (the latter being unlikely since I'm not the youngest)?

Isn't it odd that a man who survived the bombing of Dresden could successfully cathartically cleanse his psyche of a monumental event like that ... but yet be brought low by the simple thought that he could never wisecrack to his older brother again?

"So it goes."

A Mathematical Reason to Believe in God

2007-05-19T00:39:00.000-07:00

There are many people who have unquestioning and unwavering faith in Something. And there are many who have a militant belief in Nothing. I'm not either.

I consider myself to be a "questioning believer." I have faith in God and hope for salvation and, more selfishly, a earnest prayer for a pleasant hereafter replete with reunification with those beloved. In my opinion, only those without a heart (or a soul?) could believe otherwise, at least about the hereafter. To be nakedly honest, nothing is more likely to push me into the Pit of Despair than the prospect that the only time I'll have with my children is the here and now.

All that said, it takes a lot of work for me to believe. Faith requires the constant nurturing of hope and the acceptance of things that cannot be explained. This goes against my very pragmatic nature and demands an exhausting amount of regular introspection.

So, imagine my relief when I found mathematical (scientific!) justification to believe in God in the form of Pascal's wager! Although that URL does provide a thorough explanation of Pascal's argument, a more digestible version may be found in the book I'm presently reading, "Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea," paragraphs of which I'll share with you here. Surely I'll break all sorts of copyright laws by sharing some of this content, but hopefully the Penguin Group (and Charles Seife, the author) isn't as militant about enforcing its rights as the RIAA.

So here's how this theory works, with content from the book very liberally paraphrased.

Imagine you have two envelopes, marked A and B. Envelope A may or may not have $100 in it. Envelope B may or may not have $1,000,000 in it. Theoretically, there may be money in both envelopes, one envelope only, or neither envelope. You just don't know. But, you need to choose one envelope to open and you get to keep the contents. Which envelope do you choose?

Obviously, Envelope B! You could win $1,000,000 with B, whereas the most you could possibly win with Envelope A is $100. It's a no brainer. This is explained using a tool from probability theory called expectation (the expected value of the envelope).

So, this is how it would look mathematically:

Envelope A:
1/2 chance of winning $0 1/2 x $0 = $0
1/2 chance of winning $100 1/2 x $100 = $50
--------------------------------------------------
Expectation = $50

Envelope B:
1/2 chance of winning $0 1/2 x $0 = $0
1/2 chance of winning $1,000,000 1/2 x $1,000,000 = $500,000
--------------------------------------------------
Expectation = $500,000

It's perfectly obvious that if you're given a choice between envelopes, Envelope B is the one you should choose. The expected value is 10,000 times the expected value of Envelope A (and the probability is the same no matter which envelope is chosen). Pascal's wager is exactly like this game except that the envelopes are replaced with God and no God/god. And here's where I'll go to quoting the book verbatim.

"If you are a faithful Christian and there is no God, you just fade into nothingness when you die. But if there is a God, you go to heaven and live for eternity in bliss: infinity. So the expected value of being a Christian is:

1/2 chance of fading into nothing 1/2 x 0 = 0
1/2 chance of going to heaven 1/2 x ¥ = ¥
----------------------------------------
Expectation = ¥

After all, half of infinity is still infinity. Thus, the value of being a Christian is infinite. Now what happens if you are an atheist? If you are correct -- there is no God -- you gain nothing from being right. After all, if there is no God, there is no heaven. But if you are wrong and there is a God, you go to hell for an eternity: negative infinity. So the expected value of being an atheist is:

1/2 chance of fading into nothing 1/2 x 0 = 0
1/2 chance of going to hell 1/2 x -¥ = -¥
----------------------------------------
Expectation = -¥

Negative infinity. The value is as bad as you can possibly get. The wise person would clearly choose Christianity instead of atheism."

I am now greatly relieved that my belief in the Great Cosmic It is not as irrational as sometimes feared. There is no need to struggle to resolve the warring dichotomies fighting for ownership of my cranial tissue. Faith is mathematically justified.

Next, I'll focus on resolving the issue of intelligently designed evolution.

Citation: Seife, Charles. Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea. New York: Viking, 2000.

Hello, My Name Is Willowbottom...and I Have a Problem

2007-05-17T10:29:00.000-07:00

The Twelve Steps to Recovery

1. I admit that I am powerless over my addiction to home improvement projects. My life has become unmanageable and obsessed to such an extent that performing even simple tasks (removing a fork from the cutlery drawer, for example) result in me thinking of new home improvement projects (buying a belt sander to re-finish the cabinets, grease the drawer rails, and seal the shelves against humidity).

2. I believe that a power greater than myself can restore me to sanity. Consequently, I have consulted a home color consultant, watched HGTV, and prayed to St. Thomas the Apostle (patron saint of builders). My prayers range from wishing for a perfect home to a prayer for more money to remodel this house into the perfect home.

3. I am making a conscious decision to turn my life and my will over to God as I understand Him. In this case, God is not Lowe's, Home Depot, the local remodeling company, or any of the other temptations that litter my path.

4. I have made a searching and fearless inventory of myself, which has resulted in me recognizing that no home can ever be perfect because a home is a reflection of ourselves and we are imperfect beings.

4a. Recognizing that I am an imperfect being, I'm considering turning my home improvement efforts into self-improvement efforts. Look for me in the self-help aisle of the bookstore reading, "Shaping the Perfect Toenail: You Can Do It Too!" and "Afraid No More: Overcoming Your Fear of Dogs to Become a Mail Delivery Person".

5. I have admitted to God, myself, and to other people (via this blog) the exact nature of my wrongs. My wrongs include choosing the wrong color of paint for our kitchen (the first time), not painting the ceiling in the utility room when we painted the walls, and buying an insufficient amount of bark and top soil resulting in me having to place a second order and not benefiting from any economy of scale.

6. I am entirely ready for God to remove all defects in character. If God could please help me have better color and design sense, I would be much obliged.

7. I humbly ask God to remove all of my shortcomings. Those shortcomings include my apparent laziness which is the only reason I can think of for the hallway being unpainted after more than a year.

8. I have made a list of all those people I have harmed and am ready to make amends to them all. To my children, I'm sorry you ingested all those paint fumes in utero. To the former owners of this house, I'm sorry I cursed you for being raving incompetents and idiots of the greatest exponential. I'm further sorry I alleged that anyone with a hammer and a piece of drywall considers himself to be a builder, although I still suspect that to be true. To my family, I'm sorry for all of the calls at all hours when an answer was "absolutely needed" that "very minute" because I was at the home improvement store and wanted to make a decision. To my husband, I feel that I should apologize to you for something but really, since we're married for "an eternity", I feel that you're to blame by half for everything we've done so...next time you're awake until 3am working on tiling, it's up to you to stand up to me and say "no more!" (and then deal with the resulting consequences which will be severe). To my son, I'm sorry I told you that paint would make your brain rot and your toes fall off which is why you couldn't help me paint any more.

9. I'm supposed to make direct amends to all I've harmed except when to do so will injure them or others. So...let's just say I did this and call it good.

10. I will continue to take personal inventory and admit any wrong-doing promptly (unless it's really not my fault because it "needed" to be done to the house).

11. I will seek through prayer and meditation to improve my conscious contact with God as I understand Him, praying only for knowledge of His Will for me and the power to carry that out. Consequently, I ask for the spirit of St. Martha (Stewart) and the producers of HGTV to descend upon my tortured soul, salve it with the unguent of frugal inspiration.

12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, I will try to carry this message to other home improvement addicts through copious forwarding of this link. I furthermore promise that I will stop remodeling my home before it resembles the Winchester Mansion and I develop an unsettling resemblance to Sarah.

In summary, please join me in prayer:

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change (like supporting beams, massive structural changes, and highly costly kitchen remodels),
the courage to change the things I can (like painting, decorating, and landscaping),
and the wisdom to know the difference (generally indicated by price tag).

No, It's Not Just Me...

2007-05-17T09:41:00.000-07:00

There are people out there who find my sense of humor to be, well...quirky. I admit, there are times when I manage to egotistically delight myself with my own wit and the humor of my surroundings and observations. Occasionally I dispair that no one "gets" me, but then I'm consoled with (again, egotistical) belief that if others don't get me, it's because their sense of humor isn't as "developed" as mine.

Fortunately, I'm lucky in that there are a smattering of people who, on any number of levels, can find humor in the same things I do. Examples: A former colleague has as his e-mail footer, "There are only 10 types of people in the world: One who gets digital and one who does not." A friend of mine from a once-attended parish knows saying "Father Hormone" cracks me up, and my sister and husband know why I find, "You're treading on thin ice" to be so chuckle-worthy. Another former (Jewish) colleague shares my laughter about when I gave her a Jesus action figure for Christmas. My brother and I snicker whenever we see the Disneyland Parade of Stars with the mushrooms dancing; we also bond over the not-as-frequently visited sections of Craigslist and find the "a-frayed knot!" joke pretty funny. Finally, my best friend knows why "rum raisin" and "you two must be twins!" induces such hilarity.

Then, there's my dear ol' pa and a recent e-mail he sent me. To help prepare you, Dad is also the one who introduces me as "my daughter, named after her dad, George." The brief story behind this is that dear ol' ma found an antique teak (say that 10 times fast, "antique teak antique teak", and you may sound like a woodpecker) elephant children's rocking toy that she wanted to send my way. Before going through the effort to do so, I asked that they take a picture of it. Dad, ever gracious and willing to oblige, did so. The picture is below with his e-mail. I find this pretty darn funny. At first, I wasn't going to share this but I'm pretty sure at least 6 other people (all of whom related to me) will find it equally giggle-worthy.

---BEGIN E-MAIL FROM DAD---
The Lincoln Division of the Ford Motor Company triumphs again with this newest innovation in custom, unique styling. Under design for a number of years, Lincoln today unveiled, accompanied by the oo's and ah's of a select previewing public, what will become the symbol of American automotive ingenuity. Toyota...BEWARE!

Questioning the Drive to Succeed

2007-05-09T14:55:00.000-07:00

Okay, so I am hardly the first person to write on this much-debated topic. I nearly cringe with shame at how pedestrian these thoughts will be. But, a recent editorial in the NYT ("Young, Gifted, and Not Getting Into Harvard") prompts my thoughts.

Mr. Winerip shares his experience as one of the many alumni applicant reviewers, people who interview Harvard hopefuls throughout the country for admission into the uber-selective school of uber-selective Ivies. He spends a few moments profiling the hopefuls who don't get in, students who poached snapper in tea, researched cancer cures in the summer, analyzed political speeches, and built homes for the impoverished.

The cynic in me wonders at the motivation of these youthful ambitious. Are they semi-professional resume builders, notching awards onto their bedroom shelves the way Casanova notched conquests on his bed post? Or, are these their passionate interests that happen to align with the profile of the not-so-common Harvard aspirant?

I also wonder at the seeming hollowness of it all. Why do we do what we do? We push ourselves and push and push and then push a little more just so we can get to... where? What is at the end for us? Acceptance into Harvard, fine, but what then? An award? That is only for a season and the bronze tarnishes. Connections with others, but to what end? Corporate advancement? Sorry, kid, but you're not going to retire with that company and they're just as likely to fire you as promote you. Perhaps President? Hmmm...the job ain't as glamorous (nor as respected) as it used to be. Beyond Maslow's hierarchy of basic needs, why do we do what we do?

I'm aware of the none-too-slight hypocrisy of this post. A college graduate at 18, I was a member of every eligible honorary society, held a laundry list of offices, pledged Greek, and so forth. Since college, my involvement runs the gamut from civic to alumni to professional organizations, doing a newsletter here, organizing a conference there, and trying to solve fund-raising woes at another. At 27 I received my first (and, to date, only) master's degree and in between times, I've married, had children, bought and remodeled homes, read voraciously, and developed an interest in cooking (and an awareness that it's not "burnt" -- it's simply "blackened"). Yet, I'm still disappointed in how little I've done. Have I really accomplished anything or just been really busy in the process? No matter what I do, the achievements feel inadequate.

Recently, I've taken to watching "The Tudors" on Showtime. Fraught with irritating historical inaccuracy, it is a fine chick-skin-period piece of fluff. Without getting too much into the errors, a recent episode showed the death of the illegitimate possible heir to England, Henry Fitzroy. It struck me then as the child's mother wept her CGI-placed tears how empty people's machinations are. What does it really achieve to be have a title or be garbed in finer clothing or have a better home? If you look at events on a long enough timescale, it's all pretty irrelevant, especially when anything can change in an instant.

So with these Harvard aspirants, what awaits them and will it be enough? Will it matter? And when does it end?

Tell me, too. Because I'm getting exhausted.

Offering the Helping Hand that May Get Bitten...

2007-04-19T15:20:00.000-07:00

This is a post I've been working on since mid-December -- so long ago in the gestation of blog posts that this one really should be put to eternal rest (perhaps in a cardboard box under a tree?) by now.

Around Christmas time (ah, the triteness of it all -- isn't that when all feel-good stories occur?), I rushed hurriedly from my 7th-storey window-facing office in a metropolitan area to the hoity-toity urban mall five blocks away. My objective in the scant 30 minutes I afforded myself was to rush to Ann Taylor, purchase two purses on sale (one for me and one for my sister), grab some lunch to go, and get back to my desk in time for a meeting.

My speedy trek was interrupted by a scruffy man, dressed in a trench coat (no, this is not that kind of story and his trench coat was closed), with ragged hair, a face gritty and unshaven, and displaying overall dishabille. He reached out his arms to anyone who walked by and asked for change of any sort so he could get a meal. Everyone, from the most questionably dressed collegian to the lawyers wearing the AX suits, stared around him. That's stronger than staring "through," by the way. To stare through something sort of acknowledges that something is there to stare through (in much the same way that being an atheist still acknowledges at some level that there is a god). So, they simply stared around him as though this dirty gent were a horizon bend, of sorts.

I'm not generally a "stare through" kind of person. I either openly ignore or boldly acknowledge. I chose to boldly acknowledge and smile.

"Can you spare some change?" he asked.
"Yes, I can spare some but I have none on me," I replied with the truth. He accepted it as something he's heard before but then said, "Do you got anything? I'm just hungry."
I hesitated and then asked, "I don't have cash and I'm in a rush, but I'm going in the food court. Can I buy you a meal while I'm there. What do you want?"
"You'd do that for me?" he said, appearing stunned.
"Sure, it's no problem."
"A burger. Some fries. Mmm, and salad. You gotta have salad because it's healthy and keeps you from getting run down. Hey, can I get a Coke, too?"
"No problem. Wait here and I'll be back in about 15 minutes."

So, I rush, rush, rush around, my heels clicking on the concrete and my calves aching because I was trying to force them into becoming battle chargers. Stopped at the little Thai place, ordered my lunch. Stopped at McDonald's, ordered his lunch. Stopped at Ann Taylor, bought purses (the primary objective, after all!). Admired mannequin at Victoria's Secret (I'm not saying I'd wear that underwear but it'd be nice if I could and look good in it!). Walked to the little Thai place, picked up my lunch. Walked to McDonald's, picked up his lunch plus added a few apple pies to it. After all, salad is healthy, and burger and fries are filling, but dessert should be a true treat. Rushed upstairs laden with hot, goopy, loosely contained food and purses that, if they stained, would likely earn my sister's ire.

Looked around the cold and breezy pedestrian mall for my hungry stranger.

He was gone.

I walked north...then south. I walked east...then west. I went inside...and walked back out again.

He was gone.

I felt betrayed. I felt foolish. I was disappointed, an experience only slightly mollified by my "responsible" side reminding me to get over this quickly and get back to my desk for a meeting.

In the meanwhile, I was schlepping around a bag full with two quarter-pounders, two large containers of fries, four apple pies, two salads, and a super-sized Coke. What to do?

Somberly, I walked toward the office with the weighty bag full of food with still the immediate problem of what to do with it. Walking opposite me were two gentlemen, also scruffy but in an indeterminable way where there was room left for doubt whether they were impoverished, manual workers on break, or just people with a poor sense of personal hygiene. I was afraid to ask for fear of giving offense. But, the practicality of the situation again presented itself. I'm not going to eat this food and someone else should benefit.

"Excuse me?"
"Yes?"
"I have all this food here that I bought for someone in need who asked for it. He disappeared and I can't find him. Would you take it? It is untouched and still hot, purchased only about five minutes ago."
"Are you serious?" asked one. "Is this for real?" queried the other.

I feared they took umbrage with my offer and thought how degrading this situation was, that the yuppie bearing food was insulting them.

Instead, they both got down on their knees and they prayed.

They blessed me, they thanked God for sending me with the food. Their prayer was brief and was followed by them going to the public water fountain to wash their hands and then eating.

How to close this blog post in a way that feels appropriate and isn't banal and overly moralistic? I don't know that I can.

So, for now, until I think of something better, I'll just say that I walked back to the office, ate my Thai food, made my meeting on time, and gave my sister her purse.

(I realized that I'm not really a big purse person so I gave mine away. Besides, what if Tiffany and I showed up at the same place with the same purse? Such a faux pas!)

The Global Warming Argument Has Now Gotten Ridiculous

2007-04-18T16:20:00.000-07:00

Do you want to help save the planet from some contributors to global warning? There are so many options that go beyond the "reduce-reuse-recycle" refrain. Consider switching out your light bulbs for energy efficient fluorescent light bulbs, air dry your clothes, and bury yourself in a cardboard box under a tree.

Surprised? Don't be. Apparently the frontiers of global warming prevention advocacy have just pushed past that big flashing (energy-efficient) sign that said, "Now Passing Tacky-ville." Now you can go onto your eternal reward in the most carbon dioxide minimizing way possible. I bet right now you're glued to this screen, panting with near-frenzied anticipation, wondering, "how can I die and save the environment, too?"

Simple, according to an Australian scientist. When you die, don't get cremated. Instead, have yourself placed in a cardboard box and interred under a tree. Then, your body can provide the tree with nutrients and, by choosing to not be cremated, you can prevent up to 110 pounds of carbon dioxide from being produced.

Now, even the most passionate of tree-huggers have a new way to help Save the Earth by "decomposing friendly." Regrettably, though, they need to wait until the patchouli-smelling cosmic life-force from above comes to take them away. It seems like everywhere I go, some environmentalist is upping the ante when it comes to environmental protectionism. There are those who recycle, those who drive hybrids, those who won't drive at all, and there are even those who espouse the goal of living without any impact to the planet. My hats off to you all.

As for me and my remains, I eschew the suggestion to inter them into a cardboard (hopefully leak- and smell-proof) box under a tree. Instead, in characteristically utilitarian fashion, my plan is to have my reusable organs donated. Anything left over can be put to much better use. There will be no cremation for me (which is my preference) since that would clearly be harmful for the environment. I also don't want to be buried. That's a lot of fuss and besides even under this new proposal, it would be environmentally careless. What a waste of a perfectly good cardboard box that would be! Instead, I would like my remain's remains to somehow be transformed, somehow changed into something useful that can be shared with others thereby keeping a very small part of me with each and everyone of you always.

What would that look like? Click here.

Mental Health Stifles Creativity

2007-04-17T08:39:00.000-07:00

For the past few weeks now, I've visited a therapist to address various challenges in my life. Before jumping to any conclusions, there's nothing really bad happening in my life but my opinion is that every once in a while, you need to wipe clean the emotional slate and start fresh. A former colleague of mine claims that periodic visits to the therapist is a mental "tune-up" necessary for continued mental health, much like dentist visits or an annual check-up. To that extent, I suppose that a discussion with the therapist is like mental floss, clearing the crevices of your brain tissue of undesirable emotional gunk that can contribute to decay. You could also think of a therapeutic visit as being like the splutter of lubricant during an annual exam that makes everything glide along better -- but surely I'm not alone in finding that analogy distasteful.

But, I've noticed a side effect of my mental health endeavors. There's been a disturbing decline in my creative productivity. Notice my blog posting, which has been reduced to near nothing in the past six weeks, which more-or-less correlates with when I began visiting the shrink.

I think I'm onto something here.

Observe the great creatives of history. Whether their means or ends were good or ill, they all accomplished something extra-ordinary and they were all suspected or confirmed mentally "different." Consider Tennessee Williams, Abraham Lincoln, Gaetano Donizetti, and John Forbes Nash. Lest you think only men are inspired by their cranial chemical imbalances, don't forget to include Mary Shelley, Virginia Woolfe, Vivien Leigh, Margaret Mitchell, and Joan of Arc (whether she was truly visited by angels or not, it's undeniable that a woman seeing visions is a little different than the rest).

When a struggling musician in college (struggling not for want of money or food but for lack of talent), I stumbled upon an epiphany of sorts: there is an apparent link between greatness and being afflicted with syphilis. Witness van Beethoven and Mozart, Schubert and Wolf, de Maupassant and Joplin. Could it be that these men had happened upon the path to accomplishment? If one can't be mentally unstable, contract syphilis and have a second chance! Even those with less noble goals seemed to be aware of this link. Manet, Henry VIII, and Ivan the Terrible all had syphilis, too. But, to be fair, one could argue these men were insane as well as syphilitic. After all, only a crazy man (and my mother's ex-husband) would marry six times.

So, perhaps a person's contributions to society is relative to their mental faculties or lack thereof. Maybe my very good mental health alone explains my (absent) contributions to the worlds of politics, literature, music, and science. Is evolution stigmatizing me for being chemically balanced (relatively-speaking)? Is my future potential forever capped because all of my synapses are synapping? Is mental stability the new glass ceiling?

Clearly then, my first step to recover any pretense to creative genius is to stop visiting the therapist.

Should that not inspire the necessary mental defects to result in prolific composition, I may need to resort to more dire steps...like contracting syphilis.

Beware All Insurrectionists

2007-02-26T00:14:00.000-08:00

As follow-up to my most recent post, perhaps I ought to be more cautious in expressing my opinion, as you ought to be in reading them.

According to this article, the Federal government has provided Rutgers $3 million to develop technology that combs through social networks, identifying and monitoring suspicious activity.

Beware all those on Facebook. That picture of you dressed up in a militia uniform for the latest fraternity Halloween party could get you tagged.

In protest, the ACLU argues that law enforcement should follow known leads rather than looking through the general population trying to find terrorists.

Gee. Ya think?

Echoes of Meaning

2007-02-26T00:04:00.000-08:00

In an almost preternatural way, there are times when "something" is a constant refrain in life for a short period of time. Example: A few weeks ago, I adopted Voltaire's wry "il sont cultivar notre jardin" in my e-mail signature. (E-mail signature files, as you may know, are one of the few remaining ways in which a cube-dweller can express his/her individuality in an increasingly homogeneous organization.) Afterward, I slouched into my compact car to hear Bernstein's Candide playing on NPR. Then, last night, I was reading Kurt Vonnegut's Timequake, where "il sont cultivar notre jardin" is quoted. You may not find this so odd. But, I haven't read Voltaire in probably 15 years, and then in three weeks I find as many instances of it crossing my path. Even in a world of miraculous fortuosity and coincidences, this seems a bit overly coincidental -- or maybe I'm just overly observant.

However, there are times when a theme continues to echo and you realize it's not coincidence. It's a sign of the times. Let's take, oh, I don't know...a quote from my buddy and pal BeeJay.**

Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety. (circa 1759) ++

This quote dances through my mind almost daily and with greater strength with nearly every current events article I read.

Now, to modern times. In the name of national security, the Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport (PSHIA) is introducing a new x-ray machine that many dub a "virtual strip search." It is designed to be used as a form of secondary search (in replacement of a pat down).

This x-ray machine is just like those x-ray goggles that adolescent boys with acne and without a chance in hell wish they had. It peers beneath your clothes and provides a sketch of what you look like underneath, to the level of detail that every pucker on your nipple's aerole or the wrinkles of your scrotum can, in theory, be detected. (The latter detail is one of little interest to acne-festooned adolescent boys, but that's beside the point.) Supposedly, safeguards are in place so that the minimum-wage-paid security guard isn't looking at you in (or without) your skivvies and taking that mental image home at night after a stop at Walgreen's for some lotion. These safeguards include blurring out detail in the key places and having the picture be broadcast in a remote location.

Let's see what people have to say about it [emphasis added].

Airport travelers had mixed opinions about the new device, saying they hope it doesn't slow down the process of getting through security. Few had any privacy concerns.

"If it's something that's going to improve safety, then I don't have any problem with it," said Ashley Houston, 32, as she waited for a plane to Albuquerque. "I have nothing to hide."

Such comments so boggle my mind that I find myself nearly unable to comment critically. (Ms. Houston's comments strike me as foolishly trusting as Wilbur's were before he learned where bacon came from.) I could grant more credibility to those who still believe the earth is flat.

For some reason, there is a perceived equatability with privacy, confidentiality, secrecy, and dishonesty. Some people seem to believe or assume that if one is private or confidential, then one has something to hide. Furthermore, some people apparently feel that honesty necessitates full and open disclosure at the expense of one's privacy. Finally, and most troubling, is that people (including probably Ms. Houston) believe that it is acceptable to relinquish one's privacy without cause and without suspicion. In other words, it's okay to be assumed that you are an enemy and be treated as such.

If these beliefs become more widespread (or if sheeple^^ continue in their apathetic laxity), what safeguards will be left to prevent the government from running roughshod over our civil rights? If people believe that the expectation and desire for personal physical and informational privacy equates to suspicious activity and possible guilt, how can those of us with a strongly defined sense of self protect ourselves?

Steps such as these taken by PSHIA and the Department of Homeland Security are regularly taken with the intent to methodically and persistently erode our civil liberties and rights. If this course is unchanged, I sincerely believe that our days of liberty can be counted in short years, if not months, before the American people are subjected to considerable civil rights violations unparalleled with anything past. One does not need to be intelligent nor paranoid to look at what is happening with RFID tags, passport and identity documentation programs, and registries to wonder with trepidation about what the future holds.

We must all hang together, or assuredly we will all hang separately. (circa 1776)

----
**If you didn't catch it, "BeeJay" is Benjamin Franklin.

++ Although this quote is generally attributed to Franklin, many researchers now believe that it was actually Richard Jackson, a colleague, who authored this adage.

^^ "Sheeple" are what may look like human beings, "people" in fact. But really, they're just creatures being led to the slaughter, doomed by their own numb minds.

I'm No Mozart

2007-02-25T01:43:00.000-08:00

The challenge when writing expressively is trusting your audience. (By the way, "writing expressively" is not a redundancy. Plenty of people, yours truly included, spend their days feeling their creative regenerative powers ebb away with every word written on behalf of some dry, dusty corporate entity. These same dusty corporate entities also suck youthful, energetic human beings into their giant maw of drudgery, gnash them into a juicy pulp, and swallow then into a dark netherworld of befuddling bureaucracy, inter-organizational partisanship, and molehill building. The acid that is productivity measurement and regulatory compliance eats away at their spirit and digests away enthusiasm, shitting out at the end a lump of human flesh gilded with a 401(k) plan that you only hope will allow you to restore some modicum of vitality before you end your days on some sort of government welfare system. Many of these people don't write expressively any more. They write e-mail.)

Anyway, as I was saying, the challenge when writing expressively is trusting your audience. The great writers of the world know/knew how to do this. Kurt Vonnegut provides you with a "teaser paragraph" with the merest hint of a story and then flitters away to dwell on five other subjects before he returns to share a little more of that original story 10 pages later. He trusts that the audience will stay with him to learn the end of the story. Not everyone does.

E. Annie Proulx (short story author of Brokeback Mountain) alludes to possibilities leaving one wondering. In Bedrock, a story about spousal abuse where an older, widowed and now remarried man is physically abused by his much younger wife, Proulx writes this near the end of the story (written from the perspective of the abused husband reflecting about when he encountered his future abusive wife when she was a child):

How easily things happened. It was ten or more years, he thought, since this part of his life had been set in motion, the first warm day after a grinding winter. [...] He was fifty-nine, his flesh was still firm. The wind filled his mouth, as thick and warm as milk.
He remembered how he had felt, cutting across his land into Trumbull's woods, stumbling down toward the river. His boot heels left deep indentations in the mat of wet leaves. He came out in Mackie's fields. The snow was gone here and he crossed the leached rows of rotted corn stubble. The cold smell of melted snow came off the river. Ice cakes tilted on the black
waves.
A girl stood holding a length of muddy clothesline tied onto a grappling hook. She watched the water. Two or three wet planks lay on the shore nearby, and he could see the drag marks where she had pulled them out. A wooden box rode down the current. She threw the hook with supple grace, but the wet box broke apart under the impact. He breathed in the thick fragrance of soil and wet bark. He could feel the beat of his blood in his swollen fingers.
"Water's pretty high, isn't it?" he said. Willow pollen streaked the child's face. Her eyes were some dark river color. She wore men's boots, worn out and patched, a muddy jacket. Her hair hung down in a long, thick braid. He knew who she was, the dirty little thing, but he said, "Now, what's your name?"
She made a short rush up the muddy bank on all fours, clawing at the dangling willow roots, her worn out boots gouging greasy scimitar-shaped marks in the claw. But when he pulled her down she was as slack and yielding in his grip as worn rope.

What does this mean? Did he molest his future wife as a child? Was she willingly intimate with him? Or did he just take her home to his then-alive wife and give her a couple cookies and send her home with a pat? Proulx trusts the reader to make his/her own decision. (Or I'm simply too dense to figure it out?)

Some composers do the same thing. When you listen to a pianist playing a Mozart concerto, for example, and the pianist breaks into an elaborate and thunderous cadenza (a period of improvisation for the performer), that part of the music was written by the performer, not Mozart. Mozart trusted the performers of his pieces to keep true to the intent of his work and participate in the magical experience of creation by composing a few stanzas of their own. Even after death, Mozart is collaborative, inviting others to share in his gifts.

When I was a young whippersnapper, about 12, I labored over a short story written for my creative writing class. A two-page draft, arguably artful (for a 12-year-old) in its simplicity, ballooned into a 52-page story where every expressive nuance and moment of introspection was described with painful granularity. At the end, it more closely resembled an episode of a Mexican soap opera with the stilted dialogue of a Russian play. It was dreadful.

Upon review, my instructor said that I simply didn't trust the audience to envision what was described. Since I didn't trust, I tried to paint the picture for them. Consequently, I wasn't satisfied with simply using a yellow paint to color the hospital walls in my "short" story. I had to describe with minutiae the exact color of ochre and labor over an explanation for how that precise color reflected the sallow insipidity of the protagonist's spirit.

The great Johann Sebastian Bach, for all of his prolificacy, was a very untrusting musician. His compositions, with their powerful, rolling chords and robust harmonies, are all composed contrapuntally. Musical counterpoint, for those of you who have not had the pleasure to take the class from Dr. Henry, is essentially the selection of notes based on mathematical options. If you write a chord with these notes (x), then you have only a fixed number of options for moving to another chord (y). There are no pauses for expressive cadenzas, no margin for flowery improvisation, few variables at all. Knowing this, it is perhaps obvious to state that Bach probably wouldn't have invited Schoenberg to be his children's godparent. For one thing, they were probably near opposites on the musical ideology scale: Schoenberg developed no-holds-barred 12-tone technique (also called dodecaphony), which is the near anti-Christ to counterpoint. For another, Schoenberg was Jewish.

It would be shamelessly egotistical to claim that in my writing I am like Bach. Instead, I will trust my reader and simply claim that I am no Mozart.

I leave it to you to infer the rest.

How We Continue to Jeopardize Our Humanity

2007-02-19T13:09:00.000-08:00

This is a strong blog title, written by a strongly opinionated person, in a time when people are strongly divided: There are those with opinions, and those who just coast through life on a sea of ambivalence. Some days, I'm the latter. Today isn't one of them.

There are a few things that really stoke my fire, pull my chain, chap my hide, spill my milk, and crumble my cookie. [Ooh, cookies. Be right back.]

[Twenty minutes later, slightly mellowed by processed sugar, wheat, and non-hydrogenated non-trans fats.]

The things that irk me are numerous and include threats to our individual privacy (many), the progress of social security reform (not much), and my husband's inability to place dishes inside the sink (instead, they innocously rest right next to the sink).

Today, I'm writing about our humanity, the quality of personhood that separates us from other animals...and not just because the word "human" is in it. Humanity describes the totality of us as human beings, it is the essences that makes us feeling, thinking, discerning creatures able to take the higher road. If you're the spiritual type, you could think that humanity is something God-given, our soul, that makes us special.

I propose that it is our humanity that endows us with the ability to be empathetic, understanding, and responsive to the needs of others. It allows us to put ourselves into the shoes of others ... not just because other people have nice shoes but because we want to know what life is like from their perspective.

Our humanity is what enables us to look at a lion feasting on a gazelle in the tundra and say, "oh, no...that poor gazelle!" It prompts us to be disturbed when we see others allow their animals to reproduce uncontrolled and the animals suffer scarcity or poor treatment. Our humanity is what allows us to look at the face of a hungry child on a Sally Struthers commercial and say, "It's not right to see a baby suffer." It is our humanity that makes us realize that it is wrong when a man beats a pregant woman, causing the pregnancy to terminate and the baby to die (not to mention the harm to the woman). It is in all of these ways that we deeply and profoundly appreciate life force and feel diminished when that life force is destroyed.

Yet, in spite of this tremendous gift of humanity which causes us to feel so much, we find ways to eschew it every day in ways that stymie me in their hypocrisy.

- We breed, butcher, prepare, and eat animals for our own pleasure. This is not an attack on the nutritional value of animals, merely a statement on the "commoditization" of animal life.

- We condone the wilful termination of pregnancies. Consider that every pregnancy is, at some level, a chosen pregnancy, because two people chose to have sex. (For the sake of simplicity, I am intentionally not addressing the very small percentage of pregnancies stemming from rape or incest, or possibly resulting in health risk to the mother.)

- We actively pursue stem cell research and other opportunities for artificially improving life. While on the surface, there is nothing wrong with this, this is an instance where the value of the lives who contributed those stem cells (aborted children) are placed below those who could be saved. I want to make it clear that I am not against medical science or solutions to remove disease from our lives. I am terrified of stem cell research because I think it's an unattractive slippery moral slope for which there are insufficient guidelines and requirements to guide future development.

All three of these issues are complicated and are presently being sliced and diced in countless ways by ethicists, the religious, politicians, scientists, cultural anthropologists, and the common (wo)man. I couldn't possibly hope to address in sufficient depth or with sufficient maturity of argument the multitude of lenses through which even one issue is being examined, much less three.

But, instead I'd like to offer, from my cesspool of concern and possibly sanctimonious conservative point of view that the willful creation and destruction of life is a practice that is not consistent with our humanity and it devalues us as the enlightened people we'd probably all like to think of ourselves as being.

How can we justify the punishment wrought on the man who beat a woman, causing the death of her unborn, and yet allow a woman to willfully terminate her own pregnancy because it's not convenient? (Again, remember that cases of rape, incest, and medical necessity are NOT being addressed here.)

How can we allow the intentional creation of animals for our own eating pleasure and yet pitiously mew when one animal kills another? At least this is arguable a case of true animal survival where the other animals don't have choices. We do.

How can we place one life above another's? What is the value of a human life and how is it calculated? At the risk of sounding like I'm part of the religious right (where I do NOT identify), that was tried with Jesus and I think the amount came to 30 pieces of silver. It wasn't very successful commerce for anyone involved.

I just really question what is happening to our humanity and how so many of us (myself included) continue to live with our decisions and allow those of others.

Comments designed to pull me off my sanctiminious high horse are welcome.

How to Make the Worst Lemon Pound Cake Ever

2007-02-15T13:55:00.000-08:00

Fair warning: If you don't cook/bake regularly, you won't get this. So just skip on and read something else.

1. Decide at 8:53 p.m. to make a lemon pound cake (one of husband's favorite desserts) in a heart-shaped mold for Valentine's Day…which is…tomorrow.

2. Realize that the recipe calls for butter at room temperature. Leave butter out for an hour, so recipe creation can begin at almost 10:00 p.m.

3. Beat butter (as called for by recipe). Notice that "room temperature" may mean slightly warmer than the 62-degree temperature of this Oregon home in February. Butter is really not that pliable. But, more beating should fix that. Let beater run for 6 minutes.

4. Realize that the recipe calls for eggs at room temperature. Quickly pop the eggs in the microwave for 15 seconds. Add to recipe. Hmmm…butter and eggs aren't quite described by the word "fluffy" used in the recipe. Oh, well. More beating will fix that.

5. Look at recipe and realize that the recipe only called for 1/2 pound of butter (whereas used a full pound). Why the hell is it called POUND CAKE if there's only ONE-HALF pound of butter?

6. Quickly scramble to add other ingredients, like more eggs. Put in microwave first to warm, then add to butter/egg mixture. Nope. Still not fluffy. Beat more.

7. Add sugar. Due to the unexpected doubling of the recipe, won't have enough granulated sugar. Add brown for the last 3/4 cup. While spooning it out of the canister, spoon slips over a granite-like chunk of brown sugar. Spoon hits corner of glass canister and knocks out a chunk, breaking it. Thankfully, no glass shards are even near this Martha Stewart like confection so cooking can continue.

8. Add salt. No teaspoon measurement required. Just eyeball it.

9. Grab cake flour. Spill cake flour on the floor. Now, there's not enough cake flour. That's okay. All-purpose bread flour will work just fine. Add flour. Half way through, remember that 1 2/3 c. flour doubled is NOT 4 3/4 c. Stop mixer and quickly spoon out excess flour.

10. Realize that although the recipe ingredients call for lemon flavoring and vanilla, it's no where in the instructions. Add flavoring late.

11. Mix some more. And more. It resembles more a very fluid taffy rather than a cake mixture.

12. Grease said heart-shaped mold and extra loaf pan (to accommodate the extra, unexpected recipe doubling).

13. Stop mixing and spoon cake batter into containers. Insert pans into pre-heated oven.

14. Realize 20 minutes into baking that although the pans were buttered, they weren't dusted with flour. Yup. The cakes will now have a slightly "fried" look to the edges. How pretty.

15. Remove cakes from oven. They're all done. Perhaps they're called pound cakes because they're so dense and thick that it sits in your gut like a stone. (It's not, of course, due to the questionable cooking skills.)

16. Once cool, take a bite from the "extra" pound cake (just in case it tastes okay, you don't want to ruin the pretty heart one!). Spit it out…hurry! Get the taste of that Satanic, rancid, flaky stuff out of your mouth…drink…rinse…brush…gargle…swish…BE GONE FOUL FLAVOR!

17. Realize that when grabbing the flavoring, neither lemon nor vanilla were used. Instead, it was peppermint and anise. Yum.

18. Clean up, and resolve to instead get a store-bought card for husband.

19. Write a blog post about your impotent rage.

The Expression of Impotent Rage

2007-01-08T10:03:00.000-08:00

A lot of people, particularly the old skool technology folks, wonder what blogs really are. Is it a Web page? Not really. An online diary? Well, it can be, but a lot of us saw 14 a long time ago. Is it for articles? No way, man! That type of structure would cramp my style!

As mere carbon-based life-forms living in a frenetic society, we're often reduced to bits and bytes and ID numbers. We want someone to care about who we are, why we do things, and the meaning of life. So, why not blog and share a little bit about ourselves? How little we realize that, frankly, notions of individuality and uniqueness are about as out-dated as un-cosmopolitan as wearing underwear in public. So, I instead propose that a blog is for the expression of impotent rage.

What is impotent rage? You have it, even if you don't consciously know it. Everyone does.

Impotent rage is that desire (hopefully fettered) to flip off that obese son-of-a-blue-assed-babboon for cutting you off in traffic. Impotent rage is the desire to find some way to switch out your neighbor's toothpaste with hemorrhoid cream because he moved his garbage can into your driveway. Impotent rage is the desire to slip some tofu into your animal-eating brother's stew because he dared to deride your job/spouse/child/home/paint job. Impotent rage is when you bitch and moan on an online blog where hardly anyone has the URL. You know, logically, that nothing productive ever results of impotent rage, but it makes you feel so damned good. The positive result of your bloggish expression of your impotent rage is that it helps dissipate it. After all, if your impotent rage ever became potent rage, then you'd probably stab a few waterbeds with pins and steak knives, or inject some yeast cultures into your sister's Vagasil.

And that'd be baaaad, mmmkay?

An Inconvenient Truth

2006-12-26T07:55:00.000-08:00

I have six sisters and three brothers. For the mathematically challenged, that's a total of 10 children. Stop and think about it for a moment before arguing: 6 sisters plus 3 brothers plus me (1) = 10. In case you can't tell, I need to explain that often.

People often marvel at the size of my family. Some are crass enough to blurt out, "Did your parents not have anything better to do?" (Yes, they did but there is time to have sex 10 times throughout decades of marriage.) The misadvised may say, "So, your parents are Catholic?" (No, they're not, and plenty of other faiths believe in no birth control.) The less socially astute bluntly ask, "Are they all your parents' kids?" implying that we're a blended family. (We are.)

It wasn't until I was in my 20s that I learned what a "blended family" is. Either I was sheltered or that is a phrase that made it into the vernacular as the last of the Generation Xers reached adulthood.

I didn't grow up realizing I was part of a blended family. Whether I was blissfully unaware or, again, sheltered, I believed that the children were all, collectively my parents' kids. Not biologically, though. I always knew that some children were my dad's alone, some were my mother's alone, and some of us were theirs combined. But, I never questioned that all children were loved and wanted equally, in spite of the disparate amount of grief that one child might cause over another. In fact, my mother used to sing a little song to the last three of us. Since Blogger won't allow me to score music, you get the lyrics alone...

"I love Timmy, I love Mildred, I love Tiffany, too! I love Sam and Debi, I love Elmo and Ruby, I love all of you!"

Notice there are seven children only listed. Well, I believe there are two reasons for this. First, my dad raised my mother's children, whereas my dad's children were raised by his ex-wife. Consequently, my mother didn't sing about them. But, I generously think that the real reason is the melody wouldn't really have worked for 10 names, nor for any more syllables.

So, did anyone sing a song of love about 10 children? I'm sad to say, no. My mother didn't for reasons mentioned above. And my dad just isn't a "sing about love" sort of guy, unless it's an aria written by Verdi. (And even then, my pops has a strange preference for singing songs from Rigoletto, either because he really likes them or he's a sexist at heart. The verdict is still out on that.)

I did have some awareness about step-siblings, although I didn't understand the concept of "half-siblings." I remember at five or so, I watched or read about Cinderella for the first time. Learning about the evil step-sisters was devestating to me. I remember, later on, as my older sisters Debi and Ruby were leaving the house, I walked up to Ruby crying and told her that I hope she doesn't hate me because that's what step-sisters do. I don't remember her answer. She probably laughed it off as she went out for the night. That's generally how someone 17 treats a child of 5, and I probably would've done the same.

When I was an young'n, I used to have fantasies about all 10 of us living in the same neighborhood. I drew pictures about it, and thought about how wonderful birthday parties and Christmas would be, with my siblings and their children around. (There's a huge age gap so I had many nieces and nephews before I hit the age of procreation myself.) I had a house design picked out for each of them. This was childhood fantasy at its best, not just because I was so ridiculously innocent of the family political dynamics but because this was in the time before Sim City, so creating a neighborhood from scratch was really quite an effort. Maybe if The Sims had been out back then, I would've been able to better project how people would've acted. Computer games imitating life imitating art, as it were.

So, now I'm an adult. And I appreciate that I don't have 9 siblings and my parents don't have 10 kids. Instead, I have percentages of siblings with relationships that are too fractionalized to even be represented by the biological "half" or "whole" sibling designation. To wit: Image a human-being-shaped measuring cup, where the crown of the head is 100%. Now, fill the human-being measuring cup to about the ankles. That represents the degree of siblinghood I share with my brother Sam. Take another human-being measuring cup and fill to just below the knee and that's siblinghood with Debi. No one sibling is filled to the crown, although some probably reach about to the shoulders, which is probably more than enough and more than some siblings enjoy. However, by comparison, if my brother Bert and sister Magda were measuring siblinghood to each other, they'd probably both be full to about the ears in relationship to each other.

This is really a sad thing because, in my opinion, family relationships, particularly among siblings, should get better as you get older as the petty rivalries and disputes (e.g. who threw rocks at the other, who drew fangs on the other's dolls' faces, and who stabbed whose waterbed with a steak knife) should matter less. Indeed, some families do seem to work that way. (I don't know this from any personal experience, obviously, but I know of other families where it happens.) But, for the rest of us, it seems that our human-being-shaped measuring cups are fated to be of the half-empty volume, and the issue of who got the larger room is a more heated debate than any political conversation you could have.

Where I'm left with this reflection is knowing that we're still all pretty young folks and we still can't move beyond these trifle issues of yesteryear. If we can't sustain strong, caring, and acrimony-free relationships now, what will we have to show for ourselves when we really are old and we don't have those common parents (however they're counted) to bind us together any more?

Keeping Big Brother at Bay

2006-12-22T18:08:00.000-08:00

While most of my posts are mini-novels, this will be a more traditional blog post -- short(er) and not-so-sweet.

For anyone out there (which will be very few given the readership of my blog which is both limited and probably only family who share my concern) who is unaware, our civil liberties are rapidly being eroded by government. This is not unique to our government either and, in fact, the US isn't as bad as some other First World governments (e.g. Britain).

So, what prompts my latest comment? The presence of RFID tags in US Passports issued after January 01, 2007. In case you're not "in the know," RFID stands for Radio Frequency IDentification. It's basically a very small chip that communicates the location of the item via radio waves. It's great for tracking shipments of goods (more durable and less work than barcodes), and useful to large retailers, like Wal-Mart or Border's that sell large amounts of highly popular, consumable, and very-likely-to-be-shoplifted goods because they know where the items are in the store and when they're trying to leave. Sometimes the tags are deactivated upon purchase, and sometimes not. It doesn't really matter if they're deactivated because at some point the RFID tags stop transmitting when they're out of range, which is why the nice folks at Wal-Mart wave you through the readers at the door when something you purchased (hopefully) sets it off.

Analysts of RFID tags are uniformly enthusiastic as the price of individual tags drops and become more accessible to businesses as a tool for inventory control. But, there's a shadier side. That minimum-wage earning guy at the local retailer with a crack addiction and a loathing of homosexuals could learn where you, someone who just bought that great Gay Dance Album 3!, live.

Okay, that scenario is unlikely, although possible. Now let's take it a little closer to home. Your passport, the one sterling piece of government issued identification that is sterling and beyond approach, will have a RFID tag implanted in it. There are two problems with this: (1) Your movement can be tracked, any time, any where. (2) RFID tags are not particularly secure so the government accessing your information could be the least of your problems.

What to do about it? Well, there are little things, like disabling the RFID tag in your passport. Wired recommends pounding that little tag with a hammer. Effective but arguably a little Office Space, leaving your neighbors to question your emotional stability.

I strongly encourage you to do something more than this. If you aren't yourself positioned to be an activist for the cause of personal privacy and to stop the intrusions the government is making onto our civil liberties, then please financially support those who can. The ACLU is strongly opposed to this and could use the financial support to fund lobbyists who petition our cause to the government.

FYI, because this was news to me, you can designate your donation to be used only on a particular cause. Therefore, if you share ACLU's position on one issue but not another, you can direct ACLU to use funds only for the cause whose position you share.

Thank you.

Scrying Using the Diaper

2006-12-06T22:15:00.000-08:00

I should've known that yesterday was going to be a momentous day when it began by my toddler, Pollux, using the potty for both No. 1 and No. 2. You may think that's a little overkill. After all, one could rightly claim, haven't you had good days where no successful potty training has occurred? Well, yes. But having a day start off with successful potty training just gives the day a fortuitous kick start that is hard to ignore.

Now, there may be some folks out there reading this (ha ha!) who are already concerned by this post. After all, my only other post of note also references earthy biological functions. Believe it or not, I'm not unusually preoccupied with thoughts about the human digestive tract. However, there are three humans in my household (including me) for whose clean bottoms I am directly responsible. That's an important job, requiring a lot of awareness, so I can't help but to mention it a time or two. Anyone who disputes how important it is should pause a moment to reflect on a time when their biological functions ceased for an unbearably long period.

But, yet again, I digress. The point was, Pollux had a good potty training day, which made me happy. I was made happier by Castor doing some tricks on the rug, namely rolling over several times. Ah me, what could make my day more complete?

Yes, a call offering me a job beginning this coming Monday!

As mentioned before, I have been involuntarily unemployed for six weeks now. I say "involuntary" because I wouldn't have quit if I hadn't been laid-off. But, even from the first, I've had a pretty philosophical bent about the whole deal. My job at EmbodyEl Corp. was kind of like a humdrum relationship with your boyfriend. You don't really plan on marrying the guy, but you would've liked to be the one to end the relationship first. Now that it's over, what really bothers you isn't the absence of the boyfriend, but all of the people you met through him who you really liked.

Addressing the whole unemployment deal has consumed much of my time daily and it is frustrating to say the least, in spite of the support lent by family and colleagues in the same boat. The job search effort is like one of those itches that you feel but can't scratch. You just can't put your finger on the successful formula because it's different for everyone. Should you spend time just applying for jobs online, or networking with other professionals? Do you work with recruiters or do direct hire only? What impact will a contract job have on your resume and unemployment payments? There are many permutations with mind-boggling possibilities.

But, at the end of every day, the decisions made really just depend on what my mental state was. Basically, did I have a good day or a bad day? As a reasonable stable and sane person, you always hope for more good days than bad, and that's generally how it works out. But the bad days can be rough, and the snake-like tentacles of your funk can permeate even your strongest relationships, including the one you have with yourself.

There's a lot more that goes into that "good day/bad day" scenario than you might think. It's really not just about diapers or infant carpet tricks. You question your value as a person and a professional, your life's decisions to this point and as far back as your grades in high school, and more. At its most ridiculous, you ponder, "Maybe if I'd been invited to Little Janie's birthday party when I was 7, I would've built better social skills that would've helped me ensure I kept my last job." A bad day can pivot to a good day so quickly that it'd make a bipolar person shocked...and vice versa.

Bad days as an unemployed person are characterized by the little things that wouldn't be seen by even the most intimate companion. It's the decision to not have that coffee at Starbucks because that $3.50 cuppa joe is an unnecessary expense. ("Only water and stale bread," cry the Old Hollywood-style Biblical taskmasters in your mind, "until you demonstrate your worthiness!") It's looking at the people who are homeless and panhandling on the highway: you simultaneously thank your blessings that things aren't that bad, and then feel selfishly guilty because even at your worst moments, your life is light-years better than those poor folks. At its most ridiculous, the insecurity of an unemployed person manifests itself in a thousand little petty economies, like reducing the heat by a degree or saving on that extra rinse cycle for the laundry.

But, there are good days, similarly inscrutable to the average person but characterized by a dozen little luxuries: an extra large dollop of premium shampoo in the shower, doing some window or Web shopping (without purchasing, of course), or treating yourself to a $1 ice cream cone at McDonald's.

So, today I'll not only have that ice cream cone but probably that coffee, too, as I foolishly cavort with Pollux singing the Potty Celebration Dance and praise Castor's acrobatic talents with words so gooey that a honey bee would get diabetes. And on Monday, I'll start a new job.

Great Expectations

2006-12-03T23:52:00.000-08:00

It is critical when launching any new communication avenue to define how often it will be published or refreshed in order to set the expectations of those devoted fans (in my personal case, my dear ol' pa only, I think) so they (ahem, in my case again, he) know how often to check back.

How often I post will really be determined by how often I have a rant (please, don't guffaw yet) that is of enough length and substance (aha! Now that narrows it down, doesn't it?) to justify posting it for those thronging masses beating down my door for pearly words of Timberly wisdom.

In my not-so-humble opinion, many things make a great writer (not that I am one, but everyone should have aspirations). Attributes include the basics (good form, style, punctuation, etc.), as well as the more inspired (an interesting or at least useful topic). Humor is helpful (which I have in fruitful abundance) but most important of all qualities is knowing when to write...and when to stop.

Life as a Run-on Sentence

2006-12-02T01:36:00.000-08:00

A few questionably insightful thoughts have occurred to me recently. Let's pause for a moment for Deep Thoughts with Timberly.

"Supposedly life is a story. If that is true, then right now I'm caught in a run-on sentence."

What does that mean? Well, here are the days of some folks described:

today i woke up somewhat earlier
i pressed snooze many times. it seemed like the alarm was going off every 5 minutes. i got up around 10am and showered. i brought my cd player upstairs to listen to the modest mouse cd while i shaved. i turned it up so i could hear it over the shaver.
i put on an extra jacket in case the weather stayed cold. i felt like i looked good, with my collar poking out over my jacket.
Copied from http://justinsomnia.org/2004/10/today-i-woke-up-somewhat-earlier/

...or...

David Copperfield
CHAPTER 1 - I AM BORN
Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show. To begin my life with the beginning of my life, I record that I was born (as I have been informed and believe) on a Friday, at twelve o'clock at night. It was remarked that the clock began to strike, and I began to cry, simultaneously.
Copied from http://www.ellopos.net/dickens/copperfield_text.htm

Note the concise, matter-of-fact sentences of the first example. Observe the evocative prose of the second (ah! Dickens!). Neither of these passages in their eloquence were written by me nor in any way relate to my life. When one's life is a run-on sentence, eloquence is not necessary. In fact, it's a near impossibility.

So, here is my day as a run-on sentence. Like so many badly written stories, the first and last few sentences are calm but the middle is a jumbled progression of thought and activity. (Note: For those who may demand a little more truth-in-advertising, please be advised that "my day as a run-on sentence" is meant euphemistically. This is really more of a run-on paragraph.)

It's 7:52 a.m. I wake up feeling groggy today to the wails of my youngest child, Castor, in the crib as the oldest one, Pollux, cuddled closer to me in my bed clutching at my neck looking for additional comfort. I need to use the restroom. Pushing Pollux gently to the side, I roll out of bed taking half the covers with me, then turning to ensure that some fraction of the warmed covers still rest over my child's body. I walk into the baby's room and check in on the smiling baby inside who reaches up for me, then grabs my shirt. He smells of sour milk, warmth, and baby urine blended with baby powder-scented diapers. I change Castor and he giggles as Pollux stumbles in, rubbing his eyes, asking for cereal, his voice repeating the request over and over again until I give him the affirmation he needs by repeating his request ("Yes, honey, you want cereal. Just a second!") and then continuing with what I was doing before which was ['One second, I've gone into auto-pilot...what was I doing? Oh, yes, changing a diaper'] changing a diaper that is heavy and must weigh at least a pound ['that's 16 oz. of urine approximately,' says my internal voice that just now is coming to wakefulness without the luxury of coffee or breakfast, 'which means,' that voice continues, 'that originally it was probably about 24 oz. of milk, so you should weigh at least a pound lighter today, but of course you've had stuff to eat and drink so maybe you shouldn't weigh yourself until after you've used the restroom this morning just to make sure you weigh as little as possible but then that means you can't eat or drink anything today yet either so how will you have breakfast with Pollux like a good mother should?'], which I now drop into the Diaper Champ, the tool of yuppy moms everywhere, where it drops softly with a resounding plop on decaying older diapers that are piling every day higher in the diaper pail until finally the entire bag is removed, cinched closed, dropped in the garbage dumpster where every Friday it is picked up by our local friendly garbage collector ['actually,' I muse, 'I think they're called maintenance engineers and I believe they make more money than I do. Well, really,' I correct myself, 'they make more money than I did since now I'm unemployed!' But that line of thought is part of a totally separate run-on sentence that is playing presently on Timberly Internal Dialogue Channel 102.7] where it is then taken off with the diapers of countless of other children and then dropped in a landfill where my children's diapers have the opportunity to live sub-terraneously until the time that cockroaches claim dominion over the earth and Twinkies are the only viable food product to have survived some sort of impending nuclear fall-out that will be no doubt the result of some ridiculous diplomatic climax that is the product of some piss-poor diplomacy between the Bush administration and Kim Jong Il that will surely send us all to hell in a hand basket...

Wait.

I digress. Where was I? Oh, yes. My life is a run-on sentence.

It is 7:56 a.m. I'm unemployed presently ['No,' I sardonically remind myself, 'I'm pursuing other opportunities or POO'] so that allows me plenty of time to "sleep in." With one child on a hip and the other child plastered to the front of me, we proceed downstairs to breakfast. Put Castor down in bouncer. Put Pollux down on the floor to run around like crazy. Walk to the refrigerator and remove frozen wheat-free waffle (check), veggie bacon (check), orange juice (check), and fruit (check). Turn around and remove from cabinet Nemo drinking cup (check) and Nemo plate (check). Pause. Notice uncomfortable feeling of abdominal pressure. Hmmm. Restroom? "Mama, waffle. Bacon! Oooooooo juice. NEMO! NEMO! NEMO!" Pollux runs around the kitchen chanting. "Pollux," I say humbly, "Mama needs to use the potty. She'll be right back." Since when did I start talking about myself in third person like Elmo? Probably around the same time I welcomed an Elmo-in-a-chicken-suit-that-dances-to-the-chicken-song in my house. "Mama? Mama!" comes the whine. Ooooooohkay, I guess the restroom will wait a bit. ['Isn't it interesting,' quips sardonic Timberly on Timberly Internal Dialogue on Channel 99.2, 'that you complain that Pollux resists potty training because he doesn't want to take the time away from his toys to use the toilet, and yet you do the same thing?'] Waffle in toaster oven, juice in cup, add water to dilute sugar in juice, slice fruit, place on plate, toaster oven dings, put bacon in microwave for 90 seconds only otherwise it burns, pick up hot bacon gingerly inevitably burning tips of fingers, break up bacon into bite-sized pieces and do the same with the waffle using a fork and knife, give plate full of food, juice, and fork and knife ['Wait, not the knife', I remind myself] to Pollux, strap him in the booster (this is inevitably the result of me having first chasing him down to get him into the chair which seems to be a ritual game in the morning), and then tell him, "Mama is going to use the potty. She'll be right back." Pollux snarls with displeasure but it's quickly managed by the stuffing of food into said child's mouth. Castor is now bored with his toys ['What did children in the 1500s do for entertainment? They got a freaking leather ball wrapped in some cloth to play with and they were content for hours!'] and is starting to whimper but, frankly, I'll just have to risk irreparably scarring his psyche for a few moments whilst I heed the call of nature. Hopefully my 401k cash out will cover the cost of his psychological counseling. And so, now, I take a moment to rest on the porcilean god and come, at last, to the close of this run-on paragraph.

It is 8:22 am.

Ceci N'est Pas Un Blog

2006-12-01T17:56:00.000-08:00

Welcome to my blog.

There. I wrote something. Supposedly the hardest part of writing is the first sentence. Of course, since everyone knows that, why doesn't everyone just start everything with the words first sentence? It certainly would be less complicated than the gnashing of teeth and pulling of hair that sufferers of writer's block experience.

All good writing begins with a thesis statement, an objective, a goal. I don't think I have one. Well, that's not quite true. I want this blog to be filled with insightful commentary, generate hundreds of thousands of hits, and be purchased by some media conglomerate like about.com or News Corp. for hundreds of thousands of dollars. But, I also want to be thin. I think the latter is more likely to happen.