Long time, no rant. I'll spare you all the Scooter Libby commutation comments, in honor of our foreparents, who are, I'm sure, rolling in their respective graves.
So, try to celebrate the original spirit of this country, because the current practical reality is sure a long way off from that.
So Happy Birthday, US of A. This year's gift: More executive hubris. More corruption. More King George.
Maybe next year, we'll do better.
Wednesday, July 4, 2007
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
Days are long, life is short
A stunning stretch of weather is just enough to put the kibosh on considering mortality. Beautiful spring mornings, with sun so bright and a sky so clear it hurts to look up. My city, my home, in the throbbing push of everything that is springtime-birth, renewal; it's life and and its unceasing urgency to grow, push up and out.
And yet.
We gathered last night to comfort and mourn the loss of a dear, dear friend's mother, and to watch the shadows fall across the face of another dear, dear friend who knows she's next, knows that far too soon, many of the same friends will gather around her to comfort, support, remember.
I came home from a long, wine-and-sun filled afternoon in the presence of my own parents and can only wonder: How long? How much longer do I get? And why? I don't deserve this anymore than L or D deserved to lose their own mothers in the peak of all their lives.
One mother lived to see her son happy, loved, and content in the prime of his life. One mother lives to see her daughter also happy, loved, and content in the prime of her life.
And yet.
It's just never enough, is it?
It's never long enough.
It's never enough time.
We are only greedy for life in the face of death.
And yet.
We gathered last night to comfort and mourn the loss of a dear, dear friend's mother, and to watch the shadows fall across the face of another dear, dear friend who knows she's next, knows that far too soon, many of the same friends will gather around her to comfort, support, remember.
I came home from a long, wine-and-sun filled afternoon in the presence of my own parents and can only wonder: How long? How much longer do I get? And why? I don't deserve this anymore than L or D deserved to lose their own mothers in the peak of all their lives.
One mother lived to see her son happy, loved, and content in the prime of his life. One mother lives to see her daughter also happy, loved, and content in the prime of her life.
And yet.
It's just never enough, is it?
It's never long enough.
It's never enough time.
We are only greedy for life in the face of death.
Wednesday, May 9, 2007
Rites and Rituals of Spring
Rituals exist to remind us of our connection to something deeper. Rituals force us to face our past and our future. The Changing of the Closet is such a ritual. Initiated by the vast and glorious stretches of daylight, the appearance of pale pasty flesh and nshod tootsies, the flowering of apple, cherry, and maples, a looming Lilac Sunday, those of you who live in a non-seasonal climate (and "hot" or "hotter" do not count as seasons), do not know The Changing of the Closet.
This is a dusty, tricky, self-esteem challenging rite of spring.
Let me begin with some background: The average New Englander owns Four Basic Coats.
Coat 1
This is the heavy, freeze-your-ass-off, subzero coat. It's a wardrobe VIP, in that it is extremely valuable, makes important appearances during inclement weather, and must be treasured, cossetted, and otherwise taken very good care of.
Coat 2
This is usually PolarTec, or possibly down. It's a combination of high-tech fabrics that allow you to muck about, shovel, play in the snow, and so fort.
Coat 3
Less warm, but highly water resistant, this is your spring/fall coat. The one that you can wear to approximately 35 degrees (but no lower, as this coat is not meant for snow). This is either a zip-out lined trench, or again, may possibly be of PolarTec.
Coat 4
Lightweight, maybe has a hood, and in some parts of the country, this would be called a "jacket". For dry, cool days.
(You can walk into any New England home, open the coat closet or see the coat rack, and wonder, "How many people live here?" and guess "Four or five people live here, based on the number of coats." You are wrong. It's probably just one or two.)
But I digress.
So, back to The Changing of the Closet. In addition to Four Basic Coats the boots, sweaters, pants, etc. that you need for winter, and you can see where I'm going. You need at least two separate wardrobes. You cannot keep all that stuff in one closet. So most of us have some kind of winter/summer storage system.
And that's where the fun begins.
After you change the closet, you rediscover a whole new pile of clothes. It's like shopping without the pain of spending.
But a summer or winter can have an impact.
A body can—and often does—change. Which is why The Changing of the Closet can be self-esteem building or shattering.
What if nothing fits?
This is a dusty, tricky, self-esteem challenging rite of spring.
Let me begin with some background: The average New Englander owns Four Basic Coats.
Coat 1
This is the heavy, freeze-your-ass-off, subzero coat. It's a wardrobe VIP, in that it is extremely valuable, makes important appearances during inclement weather, and must be treasured, cossetted, and otherwise taken very good care of.
Coat 2
This is usually PolarTec, or possibly down. It's a combination of high-tech fabrics that allow you to muck about, shovel, play in the snow, and so fort.
Coat 3
Less warm, but highly water resistant, this is your spring/fall coat. The one that you can wear to approximately 35 degrees (but no lower, as this coat is not meant for snow). This is either a zip-out lined trench, or again, may possibly be of PolarTec.
Coat 4
Lightweight, maybe has a hood, and in some parts of the country, this would be called a "jacket". For dry, cool days.
(You can walk into any New England home, open the coat closet or see the coat rack, and wonder, "How many people live here?" and guess "Four or five people live here, based on the number of coats." You are wrong. It's probably just one or two.)
But I digress.
So, back to The Changing of the Closet. In addition to Four Basic Coats the boots, sweaters, pants, etc. that you need for winter, and you can see where I'm going. You need at least two separate wardrobes. You cannot keep all that stuff in one closet. So most of us have some kind of winter/summer storage system.
And that's where the fun begins.
After you change the closet, you rediscover a whole new pile of clothes. It's like shopping without the pain of spending.
But a summer or winter can have an impact.
A body can—and often does—change. Which is why The Changing of the Closet can be self-esteem building or shattering.
What if nothing fits?
Tuesday, May 8, 2007
Spring, running sap, fertility, etc.
Oh my god. If one more person around me has a baby, finds a baby, adopts a baby, or somehow or other procreates, I think I will scream.
Even the FISH are having (or at at least trying to have) babies—shad roe, a traditional New England-y, old-time-y sign of spring along with asparagus from Hadley, Mass.—is in the fish store.
Don't get me wrong.
I love babies.
Babies are the future.
They are amazing, cute, innocent, smell good in a peanut-butteresque way.
But with all my emotional and physical baggage surrounding the whole baby-making oeuvre, all those babies a' poppin' and a poopin' are causing a kind of painful, disfiguring, mental baby acne.
Sigh.
And to boot, I'm having serious PMS and cramps. I think it's my uterus' way of saying, "Well, if you're not able to use me, I may as well do something interesting."
An organ has to feel useful, you know?
Even the FISH are having (or at at least trying to have) babies—shad roe, a traditional New England-y, old-time-y sign of spring along with asparagus from Hadley, Mass.—is in the fish store.
Don't get me wrong.
I love babies.
Babies are the future.
They are amazing, cute, innocent, smell good in a peanut-butteresque way.
But with all my emotional and physical baggage surrounding the whole baby-making oeuvre, all those babies a' poppin' and a poopin' are causing a kind of painful, disfiguring, mental baby acne.
Sigh.
And to boot, I'm having serious PMS and cramps. I think it's my uterus' way of saying, "Well, if you're not able to use me, I may as well do something interesting."
An organ has to feel useful, you know?
Wednesday, April 18, 2007
Life Math
What's a life worth?
At least 160 people were murdered in car bomb explosions today in Baghdad, Iraq.
And in Blacksburg, Virginia, USA, a terribly sad, disturbed, and lonely boy murdered 32 people.
So what's a life worth?
Every day, hundreds of people are murdered because of ignorance (starvation), greed (invading other countries illegally to control their natural resources), or prejudice (any religious/cultural/ethnic group against another), or a whole host of other really stupid reasons.
Is it that such large scale murders (3,000 people on September 11, 2001, or 100,000 civilians and soldiers in Iraq during the past four years) are too enormous for our tiny, post-simian brains to process? Possibly.
And if so, there are those who maintain that Blacksburg will be used to encapsulate the helplessness, rage, anger, or sadness we all feel about these large scale murders. (Let's be clear here: These are murders. Not clean, emotion-free "deaths"—but murders. The purposeful taking of a life.)
So again, what's a life worth?
According to the zombified US media, a life is only worth remembering, honoring, or discussing when it's a young American citizen who isn't fighting in the illegal occupation of another country.
So media zombies, please start talking about everyone's murder, and therefore, everyone's value. Because maybe, just maybe, if you wake from your Shrub-induced stupor, and start reporting what's really happening, people will express their outrage, anger, and sadness by actually doing something good to improve conditions all over our sad, pathetic little planet.
As Charles Dickens put it so aptly, "Any man's death diminishes me, for I am involved in mankind."
At least 160 people were murdered in car bomb explosions today in Baghdad, Iraq.
And in Blacksburg, Virginia, USA, a terribly sad, disturbed, and lonely boy murdered 32 people.
So what's a life worth?
Every day, hundreds of people are murdered because of ignorance (starvation), greed (invading other countries illegally to control their natural resources), or prejudice (any religious/cultural/ethnic group against another), or a whole host of other really stupid reasons.
Is it that such large scale murders (3,000 people on September 11, 2001, or 100,000 civilians and soldiers in Iraq during the past four years) are too enormous for our tiny, post-simian brains to process? Possibly.
And if so, there are those who maintain that Blacksburg will be used to encapsulate the helplessness, rage, anger, or sadness we all feel about these large scale murders. (Let's be clear here: These are murders. Not clean, emotion-free "deaths"—but murders. The purposeful taking of a life.)
So again, what's a life worth?
According to the zombified US media, a life is only worth remembering, honoring, or discussing when it's a young American citizen who isn't fighting in the illegal occupation of another country.
So media zombies, please start talking about everyone's murder, and therefore, everyone's value. Because maybe, just maybe, if you wake from your Shrub-induced stupor, and start reporting what's really happening, people will express their outrage, anger, and sadness by actually doing something good to improve conditions all over our sad, pathetic little planet.
As Charles Dickens put it so aptly, "Any man's death diminishes me, for I am involved in mankind."
Monday, April 16, 2007
Patriot's Day Bloggyness
Well, it's been an interesting month or so. And I am a bad correspondent! I'm sure that all one-and-a-half of my regular readers have wondered where I went? Here is a list of of locales I've recently visited:
1. Great Barrington (March 17-March 18)
2. The Burlington Mall (March 24)
3. My parent's house, Reading (March 31)
4. Beth Israel Hospital (April 5)
5. Various bizarre-o-world locations in my sleep, including my dead maternal grandfather's new house by the ocean. (Don't ask.)
Also, I'm a terrorist.
Yes, it's true. I've realized that based on the Shrub Administration's six-year mantra-chanting about elitist, lefty liberals "if you're not with us, you're with them", that, since I'm an elitist lefty liberal, I must be with them. I count myself in good company because Ben Franklin was considered a terrorist by the British and so was, oh, anyone else who thought carefully about revolution back in 1775ish.
Oh, and by the way, the country was NOT founded for purposes of religious freedom (and even it had been, the word "freedom" seems to have utterly dropped out of the equation for anyone not an Evangelical neoconservative Christian.) This country was founded by a group of 17th-century investment bankers. They supported the Plymouth Bay Colony in exchange for the Pilgrims' promise to turn a profit. Please see Nathaniel Philbrick's latest and greatest, Mayflower, for more on this.
So the next time you hear some Evangelical neoconservative freak rant and rave about how America is a Godly, Christian nation, you can just tell them to shut-the-fuck-up. America the Profit-Oriented yes. America the Size-Obssessed, yes. America the often beautiful, often frustrating, always.
I think this is all coming out because I have to attend a Daughters of the American Revolution meeting with my Mum. And honestly, if I'm going to be all Revolutionary and so forth, I'm going to get it right.
I suspect that this is why I don't play politics well with others. I have firebrand-y revolutionaries in the genes.
Things to enjoy today, Patriot's Day, here in the land of the bean and the cod:
1. Julie Powell's blog. If you can, read Julie's entire Julie/Julia Project Blogbefore you read the book. Trust me.
2. The Boston Masochist-a-thon.. Thousands of self-flagellating runners cruising along the streets of Beantown in the POURING RAIN for 26.2 miles to prove, what? That hypothermia is real? (All due respect to my sister, who ran in 1995. But I still think she's nuts.)
3. Spring in New England.
Happy Patriot's Day, everyone! Go spread some revolution!
1. Great Barrington (March 17-March 18)
2. The Burlington Mall (March 24)
3. My parent's house, Reading (March 31)
4. Beth Israel Hospital (April 5)
5. Various bizarre-o-world locations in my sleep, including my dead maternal grandfather's new house by the ocean. (Don't ask.)
Also, I'm a terrorist.
Yes, it's true. I've realized that based on the Shrub Administration's six-year mantra-chanting about elitist, lefty liberals "if you're not with us, you're with them", that, since I'm an elitist lefty liberal, I must be with them. I count myself in good company because Ben Franklin was considered a terrorist by the British and so was, oh, anyone else who thought carefully about revolution back in 1775ish.
Oh, and by the way, the country was NOT founded for purposes of religious freedom (and even it had been, the word "freedom" seems to have utterly dropped out of the equation for anyone not an Evangelical neoconservative Christian.) This country was founded by a group of 17th-century investment bankers. They supported the Plymouth Bay Colony in exchange for the Pilgrims' promise to turn a profit. Please see Nathaniel Philbrick's latest and greatest, Mayflower, for more on this.
So the next time you hear some Evangelical neoconservative freak rant and rave about how America is a Godly, Christian nation, you can just tell them to shut-the-fuck-up. America the Profit-Oriented yes. America the Size-Obssessed, yes. America the often beautiful, often frustrating, always.
I think this is all coming out because I have to attend a Daughters of the American Revolution meeting with my Mum. And honestly, if I'm going to be all Revolutionary and so forth, I'm going to get it right.
I suspect that this is why I don't play politics well with others. I have firebrand-y revolutionaries in the genes.
Things to enjoy today, Patriot's Day, here in the land of the bean and the cod:
1. Julie Powell's blog. If you can, read Julie's entire Julie/Julia Project Blogbefore you read the book. Trust me.
2. The Boston Masochist-a-thon.. Thousands of self-flagellating runners cruising along the streets of Beantown in the POURING RAIN for 26.2 miles to prove, what? That hypothermia is real? (All due respect to my sister, who ran in 1995. But I still think she's nuts.)
3. Spring in New England.
Happy Patriot's Day, everyone! Go spread some revolution!
Friday, March 9, 2007
The Good, the Bad, and the Freakin' Cold
So, no matter how craptastic you perceive your life to be, it's incredible how quickly one event can change your perception. And usually, that event is something simple. For example, dinner with a good friend. Or, five extra minutes in bed, next to the person you love.
And it makes you realize that instead of measuring your week (or day) in terms of how crappy it was, it probably might not be a bad idea to quantify all the really great moments, instead.
There's love there.
A lot of it.
And I should just shut the fuck up and stop complaining.
P.S. It probably didn't help that this week was really, really, really cold. Come on Spring, I know you're out there.
P.P.S. Early happy birthday to Mum, who is 71, and to the Lukinator, who is a spry and sassy 2.
And it makes you realize that instead of measuring your week (or day) in terms of how crappy it was, it probably might not be a bad idea to quantify all the really great moments, instead.
There's love there.
A lot of it.
And I should just shut the fuck up and stop complaining.
P.S. It probably didn't help that this week was really, really, really cold. Come on Spring, I know you're out there.
P.P.S. Early happy birthday to Mum, who is 71, and to the Lukinator, who is a spry and sassy 2.
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