30 June 2006

PS-It's the 30th, the day Roomie said the Internet might go down. If it is, well, I'll be seeing you, I hope...

A couple of years ago around this same wretched time of year when I wasn't handling it near as well as this year, I went for a ride in my little "Holy Cow, I managed to pay it off car" (which my son then proceded to trash over the next year, neccessitating the new car note, dammit) and I turned on the radio. I lived in a rural area, was driving in a more rural area, and not much was coming in-except somehow a song from what seemed like forever ago; Jimmy Durante sounded somehow just right in the scratchy in/out reception as he sang:

"Smile, though your heart is breaking/smile even though it's aching..."

How I'd love it if that happened again!

I was taught in one of my chaplaincy required courses that there are four stages to grief, and that those stages are rarely experienced consecutively. I knew that from personal experience, and knew I would be using that knowledge in aftercare for "the loved ones."

We were taught that anniversaries might bring letters or phone calls from "the loved ones" and that if those letters/calls came we could take that as a measure of our success in having made a connection with "the loved ones."

I knew that already, too.

If you are a regular reader, you know that I originally trained in abnormal psychology because my presentient father hoped I would become the first and greatest nut-job serial killer profiler; his hopes for me included ending once and for all the so-called myth of criminal insanity.

Truth 'bout that is that we both wanted to see his second wife go down-HARD, and he was counting on me to get the job done. I confess I kept working on that one for years, long after he'd died.

And she will-trust me. Only not here, I'm thinking. Some, like Alice and Crusty (Alice being the second wife-Pop loved it that I called her 'Alice Capone' and Uncle Bill thought it was appropriate that I figured her out before I was ten. They really should not have left all those True Detective mags lying about!) never go down while they have skin-their end is in God's hands, truly.

Any road, I knew all about anniversaries.

And grief; how just when you think, wow, maybe that's done-BAM! The tears/rage/vehement denial come crashing back with tsunami like force.

Some years you unknowing go all numb; a few days after the date you notice a calendar and say, "Hey!" Cool, you think, made it through that one! (But you didn't, not really, because later when you read back over something you wrote in the weeks leading up to the date you see you only thought you made it through...)

Other years the date begins to announce itself in myriad ways-you notice the clock-"Oh hell, 0627/1827, here it comes..." Important appointments have to be made on that day-"Ok, the doctor can get you in on his last appointment hour on the 27th."

The number crops up everywhere-license plates, billboards, ticket stubs, bloody receipts!

The only way to get away from date reminders is to cave dive, only even there it will bash you over the head. Somehow. Someway.

Dammit.

So, you take steps to avoid inflicting your pain on others. Sometimes those steps even succeed.

Sometimes.

At my age, I've rather a lot of dates to remember/avoid...

My motto though, has always been "That was then-this is now" and I've tried really-really-really hard to keep thing in perspective. You know, learn and move on.

But some things you never get past/over/through. And the scars show sometimes, although you try not to let them.

All of the above as a typically akward attempt to apologize to any readers I may have for inflicting my dire circumstances over the past week.

Um, prayers/good vibes/positive thoughts would be greatly appreciated. (Gods, I'm such an unashamed begger!)

I've lost my sense of humour, could you please pray for me that I find it-SOON?:)

29 June 2006

Some days I am simply grateful to have made it through that particular day without dissolving.
Yesterday for example, I managed to make it home again without crying. That made two days in a row-how small is my life now that making it home without slumping over the steering wheel in sobs at a red light is the main achievement of the entire day?

I never had the Cinderella Syndrome, as I've mentioned in this blog before, but I did want to be a homemaker. I'm quite good at it. And in a way, being a homemaker is about making money-I have to say that I really think without someone at home taking care of all the little things frees up those with different aspirations. The aspirations to find one's job satisfaction in making oodles of money for someone else while making enough for the aforementioned one. (Something I've never 'got' and probably never will. I say if you're going to make piles of money for someone, it really out to be for you and yours.

My father always had a business; I started work in one of his factories at the age of five. I have a photograph of my youngerhalf-sister and I toting a venetian blind from the delivery truck. By six I was answering phones-rather nicely, thank-you, people mistook me for my sister (12 years older) or my wicked step-mother.

By eight or nine I was secretly checking the books after the aforementioned step-mother-who was robbing my dad, and thus the sibs and me, blind as a three day old fish.

Pop didn't want to hear it, although he must have noticed something, because for my birthday one year he gave me a really fine slide rule-which my step-mother promptly stole and pawned.

I'm a damned good business person, an outstanding business manager. I've no idea why anyone thinks that odd, given my homemaking skills-a good homemaker in my day (oh Christ, could my day really be so far in the past?) had to run an estate of well over 5K hectares! People starved if I screwed up-I got good at managing and I stayed that way.

I mean, stuff happens, right, and even the vest efforts can be momentarily thwarted by the avaricious; so there were a couple of lifetimes wherein Pinhead Boy (AKA husband of the lifetime) got us into some fine mess, and at least two or three wherein politics found it's way to our part of the world-I will never forget the last days of the siege of R__n; that woman's eyes as she held the body of her son, who'd starved along with half the population, she blamed me for insisting along with my lord that we live free or die. Ergo I confess to not caring much if the woman survivied the rape/pillage that ensued when that filthy little scum of a knave opened the gates for a loaf of bread, as I was too busy running to the highest tower for a jump-the whole damn thing then as now was about who ends with the most toys and I've had an aversion to being some fat bastard's toy since day one.

This life, to put it crudely, has been something of a majour bitch. It's been increasingly difficult to find hope for improvement.


You see, every single damn time I think, whew, that's done, something else crops up to make the last look like a cake walk comparitively.

Well, I've no-one to talk to. It's interesting how very quickly one discovers just who really is one's friends during a disaster, and I've been made clear on just how friendless I am since Christmas 1998-all of a sudden the cards dropped from well over 50 to the house to three-all from business people.

And the phone calls stopped when what few 'friends' I thought stalwart discover I couldn't treat for lunch/lend out a few quid against the next pay packet/help out with the garage bill that cropped up unexpectdly...

Add to that I'm funny 'bout A-paying my bills and B-keeping the aforementioned bills done to the barest minimum 'casue there is more to life than bills.

So, I've been going without much of anything really, so that I can pay the car note and my storage bill, and the rent, and now I find, looking at my bank statement online, that the company I've been permitting to auto-debit my account has been double dipping-the NSF fees are triple digit, and although I'm reporting them, I don't see the money coming back fast enough to provide even enough money to buy a couple of loaves of bread and a jar of peanut butter-the staples of my diet since I arrived here really, since Roomie, who told me I could stay rent-free for a few months before I got here and promptly changed that offer the minute I arrived and demanded all that I had on arrival-he even accepted the $20.00 in pennies from the piggy bank I started for my grandson! I found work three weeks later and he demanded two-thirds of every paycheck saying I owed him.

When I told him I needed to pay my last cell phone bill and make the car and storage bills he became rather frightening. As I've no-where to go, I ask you, what do I do?

So I started this blog, for amoung other things such as a 'safe' place to vent, for a place where the occassional visitor might leave a suggestion as to just what the bloody hell I should do-ya know, a bit of advice here, someone, anyone...

I've mentioned that elsewhere, too.

I got a comment on the last couple of days blog; it made me think and I made some changes hoping to make it easier. I read back over some to see what I sound like.

Truth is, from looking back, I'm fairly certain I won't be read again anytime soon-folks don't like Debbie Downers, myself included, so why read on?

I used to have a sense of humour, I miss it-I used to be able to make a laugh into food.

Things are so grim right now. What does meat and fruit taste like? I've forgot.

God help me, when did I become such a damn pity princess?

When did I become so bloody damn tired?

28 June 2006

And the snow kept falling.

By dawn of the 28th June 1981 it blanketed the city.

And my mind. I knew something. But what was it?

Crusty's little snowball. It started with a lie.

"I'll kill myself." He said this around the barrel of a .41 magnum he had in his mouth as he sat naked on the edge of my bed in the apartment he had no business being in. In July 1981.

I knew something had happened. What? I kept having these nightmares, since the 28th-what was it?! I didn't know I would have these nightmares for the next 18 years, until finally in 1999 the snow would melt that kept my brain in a deep freeze. Too bad Crusty's little snowball didn't melt, too.

But his eyes said if I moved the wrong way, he would kill me first.

Crusty's little snowball, that began with a lie, kept rolling with lie on lie on lie...

And growing until it crushed lives.

Why did you take my family?

I want my life back! I want my family! I want it back, everything that you stole from me! I want my son to know the truth-ALL OF IT-and I want JUSTICE! For my son! For my husband! For me!

Why did you do this, Crusty?

WHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY?

All the years of you knowing, and knowing I didn't know-you waited until you knew it was too late, and then you let yourself get caught!

Well, I hope you get you wish, Crusty-I hope you get caught all the way, for what you did to my family, and to all the others.

You finally may have got your Thanksgiving 1998 wish you sorry Euro-trash bastard! I think I actually do hate you now. Wasn't that what you said, "I want you to hate me." Well, I do now.

I hate you because you destroyed my family, because I am completely alone by the evil that you did.

Knowing you, Mick, I have EVERY reason to believe that is what you wanted me to hate you for, the total horror you've inflicted on me and mine.

But ya know what, you sorry son of a bitch (and I can say that because I know your mother), the day I really stopped feeling sorry for you and began to hate you with a fervor that astonishes me now, two years on, WASN'T the day in March of 2003, when I found out my husband had bought the rest of your filthy lies, had given up and remarried at the same time I finally managed to get free of you.

It was the day I found out the truth about you and your buds.

That's right Crusty. I began to hate you the day I read about you and your pals in the New York Times. October 2004.

You didn't just kidnap Fox, and rape me repeatedly for nearly twenty years at gunpoint.

You raped babies, too.

Oh yes Crusty. I absolutely hate you.

Happy?

Damn you to Hell for ever, this should have been my 25th wedding aniversary!!

I have to wonder, too, on behalf of every young girl you and your 'friends' assaulted, what would today have been for them?

27 June 2006

The mimosa are blooming.

Again.

Twenty-five years.

The last time we three were together.

Crusty lied. Crusty held a gun to my head, and then to Fox's.

I lost my family and my family lost me.

What's next-make it all a lie? A figment of imagination?

I don't know how to go on without hope, you two were my everything.

I don't know why I've made it this far knowing Fox hates me, thinks I lied to him and on top of it that I am crazy.

I could have made it without you, maybe, but losing Fox?

How in the name of all that is holy do I get through this day, and the next, and the next, and the next, and the next and the next and the next and the next and the next and the next...

26 June 2006

IF YOU DON'T GET IT THEN IT WASN'T MEANT FOR YOU-MOVE ALONG. HEAVENLY AND HOLY FATHER, LET THOSE WHO COME HERE TODAY BE ONLY THOSE FOR WHOM THIS IS INTENDED:

The snow began to fall today,

25 years ago,

today,

for Crusty's little snowball to build,

and devour a family God intended.

That which God hath putteth together let NO man cast asunder, thus speaketh the Lord...

Occasions for stumbling will come, but woe, WOE, unto the one that placeth the stumbling stone before so much as one other...


I knew-but didn't know what I knew; because of your lack of trust in me and in God, you who was, is, and will always be my heart-my soul-my everything-there was no-one to ask the meaning but my captor.

I forgive you. I understand why you did all of the things you did, this despite the hurt from knowing that after 5 thousand years thou knewest me not.

But Crusty? And that lying slag who told our son such lies that he wanders homeless, parentless; drenched in utter grief?

Hell bloody NO!

I BEG God to let the avalanche He has held back for His mercy to now fall with the ultimate crushing blow on those so intent they shewed no mercy while holding out their avaricious, evil, FILTHY hands to receive!

There is nothing hidden that will not be exposed.

Well, I pray, I scream aloud! Let it be exposed this day-I WANT YOU TO KNOW THE TRUTH! All of it, and if you cannot handle it, think what I have been through, when and since I managed to put the scattered pieces together-only I and Fox have been through it alone-cast apart even from each other, because, trust me for once, the acorn is so verily like unto his father!

Blessed and Holy mother of Christ! Yeshua! Blessed Saint Joseph-thou patron saint of the family!

Saint Michael!

Saint Raphael!

Saint Gabriel!

Saint Nicholas, Saint Monica!

All ye angels and saints whose presence is before the Lord!

All ye mine kinsmen and all ye who hath ever loved that which is good, and clean, and right before the Lord, whose whole hearts, minds, bodies, and souls ever walked in the same way before me and all these afflicted here on His earth!

I call you now from the deeps!

Arise all you His holy ones, ARISE and cry out with one voice-do thee all now intercede for all who art mine before the presence of the Lord, and join thee thine voices to mine-

LET THE TRUTH OF ALL THAT WAS DONE-ALL THE WRONGNESS THESE EVIL HATH DONE-BE SHEWN NOW THIS DAY!

Yea Lord, let the avalanche fall with crushing strength on him as built it, and on her as used it!

Confound now and forever those who sought to damage thine cause, be it within thy holy will so to do this day.

God!

Oh Father in Heaven, how do I get through this? I looked for comfort Father, but found myself besieged in Dothan by those who sought only to profit by my grief!

I asked for water and bread, they gave me gall to drink, and tomb worms for meal!

They spied on me at every chance; they came at me with knives to cut out my praying tongue, with clubs to break my beeching hands!

When you upheld me they howled, and when a soul was moved, they sought to cast that one down!

They razed the sanctuary; they cut down the trees that gave shade to me and shelter to your sparrow!

He made us homeless, they worked to keep us so.

They mocked your mercy, and when that did not silence my prayers, they sought, they seek still, to make even belief in faith a crime!

God! Oh God! Why do they forsake you?

The snowfall began today.

Let those with eyes to see, see.

Let those with ears to hear, hear.

If you don't get it, it wasn't meant for you.

24 June 2006

TO THE PERSON ATTEMPTING TO CONTACT ME AT MY EMAIL ADDRESS:

You will have to identify yourself and put a suitable sentence in the subject line, or I will continue to delete your email.

Little thing called "virus" don't ya know? I did not fall off of the pine log truck this morning; while I am not especially fond of the 21st century I am fairly able to navigate it. In other words, I am not going to blindly click on such a fishy piece of email.

Duh.

Look, I'd like to think that you have good intentions, but I still have to look out for myself and my computer. So I will continue to delete your attempts to contact me as long as you send them in such a fashion.

Sorry. Really. For all I know, you are trying to do something great for me.

Wouldn't that be novel?

18 June 2006

As Fox's mom, Mother's Day is and has always been, a not-so-good day. Crusty went out of his way to teach Fox that I was not worthy of respect, much less a card or any of the other trappings of Mother's Day. Or Christmas, or my birthday, or...

But Father's Day has always been the hardest day for me as Fox's Mom.

I'm reasonably sure it has been horrible for Fox.

At first, back in 1981, I didn't want to become too involved with Crusty (once I got to know him) for the simple fact that since I was sober, and didn't do drugs to the point of passing out on street corners with appalling regularity, I'd retained the lucidity required to understand that Crusty and I had different values, different beliefs, and different plans; we had very different ideas about what made a good dating relationship and from there I felt he wasn't good husband material.

I knew from all of that that he wasn't anyone I wanted to become too invested in.

Which is why I told him in May of 1981 that I thought it best we not see each other anymore. I told him he was a great guy, but since our interests, etc, were so different it would be best not to drag it out. I didn't know how far he would go when I tried to break up a relationship I didn't even know we had-how does a couple of dates and hanging out in the same crowd escalate to needing to break-up??

Of course having a gun pointed at my head a month and a half later went a long way toward ensuring that if I managed to survive to escape this nutter, I was going to have a VERY low opinion of him indeed.

Nothing he did up to and including the blessed day in August 1999 he rang out of the blue and said he would give me a divorce ever improved my opinion of him.

The divorce was final on 9th September 1999-we squeaked in under the wire and got the divorce just before Alabama changed the rules; we would have had to go through counseling and over a year of waiting if he'd delayed finally giving in and 'getting' that I couldn't bear to be in the same zip code as him after finding out he'd been frequenting South and Central American prostitutes for years.

And really, in all honesty, the only reason I married him in the first place was the gun to my head, and the only reason I'd stayed was the gun to Fox's, and why finally getting the proof of the hooker habit was the key to mine and Fox's freedom is that I threatened to go to his parents.

Father's Day was always rather dreary at our house.

Poor Fox. His first full sentence was "Daddy is an a---ole." And he was right; I looked down at Fox and the only reason I didn't kill myself in that moment was that Fox was still a little boy, and I was so sure that somehow, someway, God would fix all of this.

But I think God was waiting for Crusty to. I really believe that. See, that free-will thing, the right to choose thing. I know that it is the true covenant, God's promise that he will never strip us of our freedom. And I really think God was hoping Crusty would 'get it' but Crusty never did, he just kept pointing the gun. And finally I gave up on my personal hope that Crusty would 'get' it and so catching him that day in July 1998 more than made up for all the birthdays, and Mother's Days, and Christmas' and all the moments he stole from me over the years, like the times he would sabotage my jobs, school, or solo in the Christmas choir presentation. Because I WAS FREE!

But Fox, my beautiful boy, grew up fatherless.

Knowing that he blames me for that is the worst. But truly I believed Crusty would kill me and Fox if I left.

Crusty isolated me so completely that I had NO-ONE to turn to. He had the acquaintance circle convinced we were the perfect family, and when little cracks showed, he managed to turn it around to my bad mothering, teaching Fox to be defiant...Crusty only hit me once or twice, most of the time he shoved me, once he choked me, but for the most part the physical violence was a fist to the wall, a thrown piece of furniture...a gun pointed with trembling hands while he told me, through clenched jaw-"Look what you are driving me to! Just behave!" And I would.

Crusty DID NOT LOVE FOX-he used Fox as a chain, a weapon, an object of scorn...if I tried to defend Fox, Crusty made life even more miserable for Fox and me.

From day one, all Fox wanted was his dad. I could have fallen off of the face of the planet, and as long as Fox had his dad he would have been fine-"Huh, whadda mean Mom's gone?"

But Fox didn't have a dad. He didn't have Crusty, either, much; I used to beg Crusty to let Fox and me go, I'd say in perfect truth-"You don't love him or me, we have nothing in common, and I'm basically raising Fox by myself-you don't even want to help him with his homework, and I'm the one who taught him to spiral a football! LET US GO!"

Tomorrow is Father's Day. Again. I was going to focus on my dad, try to remember the saving grace, the man my dad was, became for me and my brother before he died. He loved us. It's time to focus on that; I told myself Fox is cherishing his hurt and anger instead of trying to turn it to God's purpose, and that at least one of us had to get past that, and if it wasn't going to be Fox, it would be me.

But late last Sunday night, the guy I had my first crush on-a real guy, a guy I knew, who in a limited way knew me-hey, he was six years older, OK, not a perv, so he was soooo not into little 11/12 year old pests-a guy whose home phone number I actually had and was welcome to call his house because his little sister and I were friends-late last Sunday night, my first crush died.

He died. After I found out, I found out his brother and father had also died. I knew them too.

Jerry and Mike had been hit in the head so many times they developed a condition called Pugilistic Dementia. Jerry died first, back in '99. I knew about Jerry, had known for years. But I didn't know about Mike until late Thursday night-really early Friday morning.

Their dad and mine knew each other. We all knew each other, each other's parents, sisters and brothers. Ours was a big little world back then, and hearing about Mike brought it all rushing back.

I could see their dad in my mind, a man we called Black Jack because his temper could turn dangerously fast. All I could think about was how he loved his boys, and his girls, and how very much he scared me. I am and always (trust me-always) have been rather timid; roaring men scared the bejeebers out of me, almost as much as men who went peternaturally quiet with an equally peternatural swiftness-those kind too could inflict serious damage. Mr. Quarry died in January of this year, and I thought about how terrible it must have been for him to watch his Mikey die the same way Jerry did.

I thought about the differences and the similarities between Mike's dad and mine. I thought about boxing-our very big little world, because we moved in a touch higher crowd than the wannabes.

I thought about how very damn strange it is to be so close to fifty; and having to write a condolence letter to his widow; I thought about his sister, who taught me about make-up and finger nail polish, and who never once (nor did Mike) embarass me about my crush on Mike. I thought about how we'd all lost touch back in the early seventies; I thought about how wrong it was that I heard about his death from an online newspaper.

I thought how wrong it was that Mike died the same way Jerry did, and that he and his wife didn't have a chance to have children-I really think Mike would have been a great dad.

A dad. A real one.

16 June 2006

I know you're out there somewhere,

somewhere...

14 June 2006

The delivery room nurse put Fox into my arms, and I knew real fear.

I looked into his eyes and complacency left forever.

Forever.

It's called 'parenthood' and it is the deepest and truest of all fears-the sum of them, I am sure of this.

Over the next years, as he grew into a very angry young man, I was silently promising him that when the time came I would 'let go' gracefully-no clingly mom here, uh uh, no sir, not FoxsMom.

I cannot tell you how much I miss my son, how much I miss my grandson.

So this weekend when NOAA and The Weather Channel advised a storm was brewing in the Gulf of Mexico, I kept myself from flipping out, to my son, and about my grandson.

But oh MAN, was I praying!

And kicking myself for leaving-were I there I could just hogtie Fox, snatch Baby's Baby (ya know, we call our grandkids the oddest little names, don't we?), and get EVERYONE the bloody hell out of Dodge!

I just stayed REALLY-REALLY close to the Internet. I mean really close.

I have an old fashioned work ethic that tells me 'net surfing during company hours is highly unethical, and normally I heed that voice in my heart.

I suspect everyone on the management team knew I was watching the storm, albeit checking only at lunch and break. OK, and um, maybe once or twice extra, when I knew NOAA had posted a scheduled update.

I suspect that because they know how I am now.

After Ivan. After spending 18 horrific hours huddled in the bathtub with an aging Boxer dog as tornado after tornado swirled around my miserable little shelter down there in Dothan.

We had a tornado warning during working hours here in Metro Atlanta a bit over a week ago, and although I handled my utter terror so well that I have been asked to help form a corrected disaster plan, my co-workers had no trouble at all seeing how traumatized I still am-TWO bloody years later! I've come to realize that I need help-as in professional-dealing with it.

So I wasn't written up, no-one commented, and the one time I gasped when I saw that the "Cone of Uncertainty" had grown to include Dothan all I heard was "Hang in there, it hasn't made landfall..."

Everyone was careful around all of us who've relocated up here from Down There. Everyone was calm. Everyone was behaving as though they'd been briefed on how to help those of us who'd been through Ivan, Dennis, Katrina, in case we needed help.

It was rather nice, the sense of "We're here for you if you need us" that everyone exuded without being overt about it all.

And meanwhile I stayed REALLY-REALLY close to the Internet.

It's 'Cane Season.

Again.




10 June 2006

Where indeed, did I sign up to be an anachronism? I've been asking that question for nearly fifty years.

But I know the answer-it was five thousand years ago, honest.

Sir Edmund Burke called me a blue stocking-I still haven't figured out if he meant it as a slur or a compliment. I've been smarting about that one for nearly two hundred years.

People ask me how I can in good conscience call myself a Christian as I believe in reincarnation, and utterly refute the idea that Jesus wanted the 'mystery of the mass' to include the completely pagan notion involved in the transmutation of the bread and wine into his body and blood.

And I do not believe Jesus bar Joseph ben David was, is, or ever will be, God in the flesh.

I came to those conclusions nearly two thousand years ago, BTW. Sects of the Jews believed in reincarnation, seeing it as the penultimate (a word that means second, by the way, not first. Grrr I hate when the word is misused!) expression of God's love and mercy for our kind. Jesus affirmed his belief when he told his followers that John the Baptiser was the returned Elijah.

Most importantly, though, Jesus himself refuted pagan beliefs of 'sin-eating' and flesh eating to gain the spiritual strengths of the consumed.

He also said that he was not God, only God is God, and there is no other God. (The Jews call this the Schema-forgive me if I have spelt it incorrectly.)

Of course, he also said "I come not to abolish the law but to uphold it!"


Which is why I have a REAL problem with Saul of Tarsus (AKA St. Paul of the Miraculous Conversion on the Road to Damascus). Saul contradicts the Christ repeatedly in his writing, and the blowhard's claptrap has been swallowed whole by two kinds-false shepherds and the ejit sheep being led to slaughter.

But because I am the sum of all my parts, I usually try to explain it, or at least I used to; I think today will be the last time I try.

I think that because I am an anachronism-a thing out of time and place.

For the first time ever, I feel the weight of all of the years I have been around, and I am so close to despair for the majourity of humankind that I really am tempted to give up and find a nice mountaintop to hide on until the dust settles.

Because no-one listens. And for the first time, I find myself beyond my usual amazement; I am moved to outrage.

And that is not a good thing.

I'm sitting here watching yet another civilization collapse, and I'm watching the collapse manipulated/escalated by the worst of the worst, who of course know the world will not really end, just civilization, and they can't wait to get their avarice swollen hands on the remains and the survivors, because they are sure that as in the past, they will be able to take brutal advantage of the aftermath of the collapse.

I was a business admin majour two years ago-hey, a girl nowadays has to pay her own rent, what? I was 4.0 to 3.9 and I say that then I hit the math wall, but the truth is that I got a look at the state of my student loans and simutaneously realized my degree would ensure my continued exposure to the (for me) dreaded Corporate Culture.

But before I came to my senses completely and dropped the hell out, I started my thesis intending to explore why and how the abuse of credit has led to the dis-enfranchisement of the middle class.

What I found was a global drive on the part of Corporate Culture to use the disenfranchisement to bring back feudalism.

Hey, will you at least consider this: if I saw it once before, I surely can recognize it now, right?

Well, I DID see it before, not once but several times!

For YOUR sakes, will you please look it up?

Every time a civilization falls, there comes the vultures. Well kiddies, the damned vultures are gathering, just as the Christ and all the prophets and messengers have been telling you for millennia-why in the name of all that once was holy do you think the war on faith-ANY faith in God-is so seriously escalated now?

Because if your faith, (which teaches you right from wrong and tells you that you are better than an instinct driven evolvement of a one celled amoeba, and shows you how to transcend savagery) which strengthens you, is stripped away, what's left besides vulnerability to a brutal enslavement and then an empty death?!

Can you say despair? Who profits from despair?

Well, duh!

After I dropped out, I continued my research until finally, a few months ago, I just let it all go, thinking, what's the damn point?

It's my bloggy and I'll vent how I want to!

09 June 2006

D+2.

I saw it, Johnny. I saw you and the two guys who reminded me of Stan and Ollie, placing a piece.
And then the three of you, and the piece, were gone in a silver cloud. The last thing I saw that night, I NEVER forgot.

Your legs, being sucked into the cloud. (It took me 55 years to figure it out.)

I woke up and thought for a minute you were standing at the end of the bed, looking at me.

Ever since, I've not been able to sleep under a window.

Oh, Johnny...

I'LL BE SEEING YOU
(Sammy Fain / Irving Kahal)
Who was singing:
Kate Smith

I'll be seeing you
In all the old familiar places
That this heart of mine embraces
All day and through
In that small cafe
The park across the way
The children's carrousel
The chestnut trees
The wishing well

I'll be seeing you
In every lovely summer's day
In everything that's light and gay
I'll always think of you that way

I'll find you in the morning sun
And when the night is new
I'll be looking at the moon
But I'll be seeing you



GOODNIGHT WHEREVER YOU ARE
(Al Hoffman / Dick Robertson / Frank Weldon)
Who was playing:
Russ Morgan & His Orch

Goodnight wherever you are
May your dreams be pleasant dreams wherever you are
If only one little wish that I wish comes true
I know that the angels will watch over you

Goodnight wherever you are
I'll be with you dear no matter how near or far
With all my heart I pray everything is all right
Wherever you are goodnight

04 June 2006

Please, add your voice, if you visit here and read these words:

Heavenly, Holy Father, I implore you with all my mind, body, and soul, reach down your hand to your Curious Servant, and to his beautiful, wonderous wife, and to their beloved sons.

I know that You are with Will and Brenda now as always, and that I have no need to ask you to magnify Your presence for them-they live in Your light and feel you so strongly that I have come to depend on them as a living lighthouse (for this I thank-you! You led me to his blog just when I needed most to read the witness of a man after the manner of Joshua.).

I come before you partly in selfish need today, Father, to ask You to heal Will, and grant him a long and healthy physical life.

I ask you to increase in his Brenda the strength of a good wife, that she is able to withstand the trial she now endures as they wait to hear from the doctor.

Lord, I know that You know if Issac is ready to take on the responsibilty of his brother Jeremiah; too, I know that if Will should be taken from his family now, that You will be with Brenda and Issac as they strive to fill Will's place in Jeremiah's life.

But Father, I beg of you, if it is at all within Your will, leave him here with his wife and sons, in full possesion of the renewed eagle's strength You have promised all who choose The Way.

Help us who are worried, Father. We know the enemy has looked upon Will and his loved ones as especial targets in his war against Your love for all souls. And Will is such a tremendous warrior-we are all of us stricken at the thought of the enemy winning by silencing Will's testimony!

Father, I know what I want, You know what I need, just as You know what Will, Brenda, and their sons need.

Again, I pray with every fiber of my being that Your will extends to keeping Curious Servant serving here on Earth; for Brenda's, Issac's, and Jeremiah's needs, and for all of us who have been led to his blog, and thereby strengthened as people united in Your grace.

Amen.

Again, I say, Amen.

03 June 2006

Brace your selves. SpellChek is being a goober tonight. Sigh. Sorry in advance to you all for any mispelled, gramatically incorrect, or just plain silly bloopers.

Also, the DSL and telephone are in my roommate's name. he is again threatening to shut off phone and DSL.

Any blog may be my last.

I visit several blogs daily-sometimes I leave a comment. I've learned some folks like a comment, and others don't. It isn't easy to know what to say sometimes, but the willingness to reach out and give a cyber-shoulder pat is irresistible.

Especially when the writer is in the middle of a grief or a triumph.

Seeing the comments of others tells me there is still hope for our kind-if we can summon the compassion to reach out to another in peace, no matter how the reach is extended, then we are still worthwhile as an on-going project.

I know, the next minute will bring a distressing example of man's inhumanity...

But the next one after that will bring another out reach of caring.

I met an atheist (no, not Fox, although he says he is one, too; who am I to disagree? I just miss the little guy who was offended when people used God's name to damn someone or something.) through leaving a comment on his blog. Turns out he isn't so much an atheist as he is an agnostic.

We are having a great intellectual exchange.

I've met a number of fellow 'believers' including some who believe in Santa. OK, I'm not at all reluctant to admit it. Heck, I trumpet it!

I TOTALLY BELIEVE IN:

Saint Nicholas
faeries, elves, and brownies
twilight wishes on the first star
miracles

I'm not too sure about the 21st century-too much technology and way too little ethics. Too, TOO damn much negativity, and not nearly enough positivity.

Not nearly.

BUT.

Maybe a blog is a little pebble; cast into the huge cyber pond, could the resultant ripple make enough of a difference?

All I know is that the blogs I've been blessed with reading, and the writers of said blogs that I've been really priviledged to converse with have had an impact on my life-a rather pleasant ripple.

I truly hope that by adapting to the 21st century, I will perhaps become a like positive, contributing ripple.

But, um, I think I'll hang onto the anachronisms, too. Yeah, some of my memories hurt in ways those of you who choose to (or need to) forget cannot begin to imagine.

But most of them are so wondrous:)

And hey, the way the climate is changing, the way the planet is geo-physically unstable, and OK, not to mention the rampant social unrest, and oh yeah, global terrorism, and a war against it...

Well, who knows? Maybe I'll come in handy someday.

Think about it. If I am real, if I am what I say I am, then I've lived OFF the Grid for WAAAAAY longer than I've been living on it...

01 June 2006

"Been There-Done That' was once known as Elder Wisdom.

I vote we get back to the old term.

Been There Done That just seems pushy, and somewhat, well, in-your-face. It puts out negative vibes of "I know more than you and think I'm better because I do."

Even when it is NOT meant that way.

We old codgers were quietly mourning our next generation yesterday. "This younger generation..." We half-centurians looked at each other, half smiling and half heart in throatish as we contemplated the next set of kids who will rule the world. We knew we sounded rather like our parents and grandparents as we bemoaned the apparent lack of work ethics, morals, and future our kids face.

But we also knew we were right to be concerned.

The world is more and more becoming a frankly ugly brew of "Mad Max Beyond the Thunderdome' and 'Matrix Reloaded' with an underlying base of 'A Clockwork Orange' and to be straight forward, things don't look too good.

I've polled my generation-those with children. We agree, our children, by and large, sprang from the womb screaming:

"YOU'RE NOT THE BOSS OF ME!"

And a great lot of the little goobers would very much, thank-you, like to think they sprang not at all from the womb, but slithered out from under rocks.

That notion seems to satisfactorily (in their minds) absolve them of any responsibility, while somehow imparting a curious sense of entitlement to reaping the rewards of ours.

I used to say that today, kids will kill you with a smile, and then be angry with you for not cleaning up the blood and whipping up a nice breakfast afterwards.

Well, then a kid about a mile from my place woke up for school one morning, and instead of getting on the bus, got a shotgun instead, and tried to kill his parents. So I don't say that anymore.

But I think it.

Especially when these 30 something brats want to move back in, chew through the retirement, equity, pantry/freezer, and all the while proclaim:

"Oh my God mother, will you please?! I have to learn from my own mistakes, please don't preach to me!"

This while toast crumbs (from the low sodium bread you hand bake because the local grocery doesn't have it, but your doctor insists you better have instead of the regular stuff or you will drop dead at work) deck your child's face, bathrobe front, the floor-which you will clean because "Oh my God mother, will you get off me?! I can't handle this, you always critize me!" as he/she stomps back to their cosy little parentally provided cave after you have asked him/her to tidy up after their toast.

And PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE-do not tell them how to live their life-OK?

'Cause, you know, what could you possibly know about anything important?