Month: September 2008

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Random Thought

You know, I was thinking this morning about giant bank failures after Wachovia bit the dust.  Surprise surprise.  I looked through the FDIC bank failure list.  While it appears a few small banks have failed recently, the number of large bank failures to small ones is bigger in comparison to the overall number of banks.  Perhaps part of the problem is that these institutions were too damn big…a dinosaur effect if you will.

This got me thinking further about those who scream and yell about big government, how it is horrible, etcetera.  I don’t hear these same people screaming about ginormous companies.  They would probably say this is because the giinormous companies are “private” and don’t use taxpayer money.  But that is a false argument.  Just because the money isn’t deducted from a paycheck or mortgage statement doesn’t mean it doesn’t come from taxpayers, and it probably means we paid extra so the private business could make a profit.

I don’t know where I’m going with this.  I just got to thinking about it this morning.  It’s not a discussion I have heard.

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Periodically Disappear

The problem with wanting to be open about who you are and put your name on what you write is that if there are things you want to say that you don’t want certain other people to know about, you can’t write them on your blog, even if they are things you would really love to put on your blog.  There are so many things like that right now. Maybe I should make an anonymous blog.  But who really cares.

I’ve said it before, but I wish I could disappear.  I wish I could be someone else.  I wish I could feel optimistic most of the time like I used to, but that’s been years ago.  One thing after another after another after another.  Now it’s not so bad but my spirit has taken a major nosedive.  I don’t know if I’ll ever get it back.  I know I’m supposed to learn to be happy right now no matter what my life is, but I can’t do it.  It’s like there is one thing in my life that when it’s going well, I’m happy and when it’s not, I’m not.  Nothing else affects me in this way.  Nothing.  But I can’t stop being this way.  I’ve spent a decade trying and it does not work.  I have to just pretend there isn’t a future because to imagine the rest of my lifetime feeling like this is unbearable.  So I don’t imagine anything at all except a desire to disappear. I don’t mean die.  No.  I mean exist as barely as possible.  I can hear it now.  I can just hear it.  I’ve heard it before, all the reasons against living this way.  But no one is me.  No one has my brain and its energy and its unfulfilled desire.  I am sure others have felt this.  No doubt.  None.  And some went on and became happy again.  And others didn’t.  But I’m so tired of not having the one thing I want, the one and only thing I have consistently wanted for as long as I can remember, and I can’t imagine 40 or 50 or 60 or 70 more years like this.  I can’t even imagine the next 1.  Is this living in the moment, avoiding considering a future that might reflect the way things have been?  Is this just it?  So rather than live with that hope I will live barely.  I will periodically disappear.

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Drive Your Car, McCain

This piece can be seen on Huffington Post:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lara-m-gardner/a-leader-should-be-able-t_b_129341.html

Out of curiosity, I made a small survey of job postings just to see what kinds of skills employers are requiring of potential employees. Among other things, one of the primary requirements of job seekers is that they possess the ability to multitask. Multitasking is a simple concept really. It means doing more than one thing at a time. Quite a lot of jobs require it. I did this because of all of the discussion yesterday on McCain’s desire to cancel the debate, as well as his temporary cessation of campaigning, both in order to “focus on the economy.”

How does this “focusing on the economy” work exactly? Does one sit and stare at numbers for a while in order to create this focus? Perhaps it means getting together with other people to talk about the economy. Maybe it means actual participation as a senator, an activity he was rightly allowed to place on hold while running for president.

What I find confusing is why McCain’s focus on the economy cannot take place concurrent with running his campaign or why it impacts his ability to debate. If he knows the issues, if he is prepared to lead this country, then he should be able to think on his feet and debate as necessary. He should be able to throw out a sound bite or two or answer some questions on talk shows for his campaign. Basically, he should be able to multitask. While debating may require some skill, certainly campaigning does not require as much. All he has to do is show up.

The man has been a senator for what, twenty-six years? Based on the number of years McCain has spent in public office, debating and campaigning should both be skills in which he is quite adept. These activities should be the sorts of things he can do without a whole heck of a lot of effort, the sorts of things at which he should be able to multitask quite well. It should be easy for him to focus on the economy.

For McCain, debating and campaigning should theoretically operate like driving a car. At first, steering and braking and shifting all at once is overwhelming, requiring our complete attention After a few years, these actions become so automatic we do not even realize we’re doing them. We can focus on other things while we’re driving, even stressful things like driving someone to the hospital or navigating through bad weather. Although our basic skills may be diminished, requiring greater attention so we do not end up in an accident, we do not suddenly stop being able to drive at all just because something bigger is happening at the same time.

I find it puzzling and distressing that rather than using the economic meltdown to display his prowess at multitasking, in order to focus McCain must stop performing skills that should be as automatic to him as driving a car. When older drivers reach the point where they cannot perform these basic functions we take away their driver’s license. If McCain has reached this point, should we really allow him to drive the country? I don’t think so.

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Pitiful

It just makes me sick, those poor babies made ill by milk powder in China.  It reminds me of Nestle going into third world countries, telling the women to stop breastfeeding and to “use formula like western women,” all the while ignoring the fact that the water is unsafe to drink.  The result is a 50% infant mortality rate in these countries because the babies die from dysentery.  Now we have over 59,000 babies sickened and killed in China from drinking poisoned milk powder.

Fifty percent infant mortality rate.  59,000 sick and dying children.  All these giant numbers, all these sanitized words used to cover one salient fact:  some parent’s baby got really sick or died.  Each of those hurt or killed had a mom and dad who either had to sit up worrying about a sick baby or they lost a little baby they loved, not to mention the fact that these little kids had to suffer through sick stomachs, diarrhea, and vomiting.  Use sanitized words and it becomes so easy to forget that.

The other piece of this that strikes me is how truly sad it is that formula is fed to children instead of breastmilk.  I wrote a law review article calling for laws requiring employer accommodation of breastfeeding women.  For that article, I did extensive economic and medical research to back up my arguments.  The conclusion I drew was that breastfeeding saves lives and money.  We never should have switched to a system where it was not the norm.  Of course, money drove the trend on many levels.  Money, money, money.  Everyone wants it.  Everyone wants everyone else to think they have it.  Stupid decisions are made because of it, from the decision to make our babies sleep in other rooms to the decision to feed our children milk made from powder to prove we can afford it.  Later these decisions became the norm to the point where children who want to sleep with their parents are considered problems and babies drinking from mothers’ breasts is considered obscene.  No one questions why it started and what was normal for thousands of years becomes disgusting and unnatural.

I continue to marvel at the ridiculousness of human beings. We’re too smart for our own good.  Unfortunately, we aren’t smart enough to make milk that is as good as our own and the result is that it makes babies sick and kills them.  Pitiful.  Truly pitiful.

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There Oughta be a Law…

How many times has something really catastrophic happened followed by people scratching their heads and saying, “There ought to be a law.”  I wonder how many of these same people would call such laws “regulation” because that’s exactly what they are.  Deregulation?  Deregulation is the removal of laws, including laws that protect us from harm.  In all the talk and rhetoric about less government and deregulation, this point is lost.

This morning I opened the newspaper to read about babies sick and dying in China because of tainted milk.  I searched for articles from all over the world about the scandal.  All of them contained the same refrain:  tighter regulations.  What does this say to me?  There were not enough laws to protect these people from milk that could kill or harm their children.

When it comes right down to it, deregulation is only a good thing to people who are only concerned with making more money.  Deregulation means letting the market (e.g., greed) determine entirely what should happen and what should not happen.  Here in the US, we are experiencing firsthand what it means to let the market make decisions.  It means letting greed make moral choices.  It means letting corporations balance a baby’s life versus the cost to make its milk safer.  Unfortunately, in many cases it is cheaper to let the child die than it is to fix the milk.  There are profits to be made by putting someone into a house they can’t afford.  Who cares if a family ends up on the street in three years?  We made our money. The market made the decision for us.

When we use sanitized terms to describe real, human, moral conditions, when these terms become buzzwords, it is so easy to forget that real people with real lives are involved and affected.  Deregulation means there are no laws to protect us from harm.  Letting the market regulate itself means letting money and profit determine what decisions are made.  Too often, these decisions have nothing to do with humanity and morality and instead focus entirely on making a profit.

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Smitten

I’m completely smitten.  Okay, here’s an aside.  How is it that a person who reads as many books as I do, who loves words and word origins, who loves language actually, can have gone through life and not known that smitten is a past participle of smite?  How is this?  I am completely pitiful.  I should have known this.  I knew its use as an adjective, as in struck with a hard blow, grievously afflicted, and very much in love.  I knew these definitions.  I did not put together that the very much in love use was metaphoric for being struck.  Cupid’s arrow and all that.  I make these discoveries that there are so many things I do not know.  Sometimes they seem so obvious, I wonder how it is I came this far in life and did not know them.  It’s like driving down the same road every day your entire life and suddenly noticing a gas station that has been there for years.  Duh.

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Published!

So how cool is this?  I submitted an article to Huffington Post and they accepted it!  It is a piece I wrote here on this blog about Sarah Palin.  If you’re interested in viewing it, go to the link here:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lara-m-gardner/lowering-the-glass-ceilin_b_128346.html

If you like what I wrote, feel free to hit the buzz up button.  The more hits I get on that, the more likely the post will make it to a more visible page.

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Sleepy

I’m sooooo tired.  Somehow adding the extra o’s makes it more.  I like that, that adding a few extra letters means emphasis.

When I first arrived here, my insomnia returned with a vengeance, mostly because I missed my boyfriend and sleeping with him.  Then a couple of weeks ago I started sleeping a bit better, actually making it through the night.  Of course, it helped that I figured out to close the windows to the noisy roosters, put up curtains to keep out light, as well as remembering to wear my usual eye pillow and ear plugs.  These things helped immensely.  Plus I think I just settled down or something and was able to sleep.

Yet the night before last I woke up and could not go back to sleep even though I knew I could sleep in the next morning (for some reason knowing I have to get up the next morning makes insomnia worse for me).    I was tired and grumpy most of the day as a result.  Last night I was so tired and fell asleep quickly when I went to bed.  Only this did not stop me from waking up too early this morning.  Goddamned insomnia.  I hate it.

Yuck.  I know the experts don’t call it insomnia if it doesn’t last 2 weeks.  Whatever.  It’s all not sleeping.  Last night I fell asleep sooner than the night before, which is good, but I’m still pooped this morning so I am going back to bed.  Hopefully I will be able to get over this hump or I’ll turn into a monster and it won’t be good.

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Enough Already

Every time I open up my blog or look at my web-based email or go anywhere I like to go on the web there is another article another analysis another something looking at Sarah Palin and John McCain and on and on and on.  I’m so tired of it.  She’s a disaster.  He’s a disaster.  This does not stop him from being about equal to Obama in the polls.  If ANYONE who would vote for McCain gave a shit we wouldn’t be in this mess. We’re all yammering on and on about it but it isn’t changing anything.  Guess what?  Those of us who get it get it.  Those of us who don’t never will.  What’s the point of pointing out the obvious to people who DON’T FUCKING CARE?  I just can’t see it.

I would love to be able to go back to the time before Sarah Palin, back when we pointed out the pitifulness of McCain’s positions on various things, back before every day brought a new low to the discourse.  I am normally not that sort of person, the one longing for the past.  I like change.  But this change, this is ridiculous, and frankly I’m tired of it all.  I wish we could stop being red and blue and fighting all the time.  I wish there wasn’t a cultural battle being waged.  I hate this.  It makes me want to go bury my head in the sand or run off to somewhere where none of this matters on an everyday level.  I’m not naive enough to believe what happens here won’t affect the rest of the world, because it does–unfortunately it does to a frightening degree.  But I would love to find a place where it wasn’t so corporeal, somewhere it wasn’t in my face every day.  Enough already.  Really, I’ve had just enough.

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Deregulate Insurance Like We Deregulated Wall Street

Good one, McCain.  You’re on top of things.  You obviously know your stuff.  I cannot believe there are people out there who would make this man president…

http://thinkprogress.org/2008/09/20/mccain-deregulate-insurance/

Paul Krugman notes that Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) published an article on his health care plan in the current issue of Contingencies — the magazine of the American Academy of Actuaries. In his article, McCain attempts to make his case for deregulating the health insurance industry by extolling the benefits of the last decade of deregulation in the banking sector. He writes:

Opening up the health insurance market to more vigorous nationwide competition, as we have done over the last decade in banking, would provide more choices of innovative products less burdened by the worst excesses of state-based regulation.

As Yglesias writes, McCain is “such an enthusiast about financial market deregulation that he was bragging about his plan to make the health care system as awesome as the financial system.”

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Missing is So Unkind

What possible biological basis can there have been for us to evolve a mechanism that allows us to feel like a limb has been removed when we miss another human being?  Is it truly only the mating sequence? Why couldn’t our biology be content to know another mate will someday take the place of the first?  Or is it that in ancient times if our mate died or was lost to us, we couldn’t easily find another?  Is that it? Maybe it is something else.  Whatever it is, I just don’t get it.

Perhaps it is some other mechanism that has simply gotten stuck in the missing another human category.  Maybe we’re supposed to feel serious missing when we lose an actual limb because losing an actual limb could pose a serious detriment to our ability to hunt and gather.  It would impact our ability to find a mate. Perhaps the two are juxtaposed in some manner in certain brains.

I know I am not the only one like this.  I watched this film last night called My Blueberry Nights.  One character, rather than live without the person who left him, drives himself into a tree.  This after drinking himself into oblivion every night for months.  Yep, his limb missing mechanism was severely out of whack. And the woman who left him realized after he was dead that she missed him like a missing limb as well.  So her missing limb mechanism was juxtaposed onto her missing partner as well.  Maybe I’m onto something here.

I am going to see the person who I miss in a little over a week.  Ironically, I am feeling his absence more acutely as his visit draws closer.  It is like knowing he will be here, that he is somehow within reach, makes the desire more visceral.  I have to fight myself NOT to send him text messages telling him how much I miss him and all the things I want to do with him when he gets here.  I have to force myself to be here and now, focus on my legs, focus on my arms, recognize they are actually in place and I do not require a prosthesis.  I can do this.  When I do this it is easier.  See brain?  Limbs intact.  Man will arrive shortly so stop thinking about him so much.

Then he calls and I’m listening to Woody Herman sing about being in love and clouds having silver linings and his own melancholy without his dear, the piano tinkling perfectly in the background, and I feel that old familiar pull in my belly.  Gads, missing is so unkind.

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A Windfall Plum

I feel so crappy in the morning lately.  I would blame it on needing tea, but I have always had tea in the morning and it did not engender this level of unpleasantness.  I ache.  I think one reason may be my bed.  It is a futon on the floor.  It is hard.  It is not comfortable, not in the least.  I keep doing yoga stretches and lying on tennis balls in an effort to alleviate my aching muscles, but to little avail.  It may also be that I keep staying up too late watching movies on my computer, writing, or reading books.  I’ve had two books in the last week alone that I did not want to stop reading at bedtime.  I kept reading on and on, well after a reasonable bedtime when I knew I had to get up early the next morning.  Oh, then there was the day my dog died.  This was not an easy means to relaxation, I can assure you.

So here I am this morning, sitting in my chair at my desk and my shoulders hurt, my chest hurts, my neck hurts, my lower back hurts, and my ass hurts.  I am doing little stretches, but they aren’t working.  I creak.  My neck just cracked.  I’ve got to do something about this bed, but I don’t know what.  And I need to go to bed earlier.  I hope this works.  Feeling achy does not awaken in me a desire to get out of the bed, regardless how uncomfortable.  I would rather lie there like a plum on the ground next to the tree, its bruises spreading to mush, turning into a brown and soft plum rather than a firm and purple one.  I landed on a root rather than on some grass.  My plum skin is withering.  My insides are turning brown.  My pit is sinking and shifting.  Yep, that’s me, a bruised plum.  Yummy.

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Obama and the Palin Effect by Deepak Chopra

I just had to post this here because it is so well written:

Obama and the Palin Effect
by Deepak Chopra
http://www.chopra.com/node/1064

Sometimes politics has the uncanny effect of mirroring the national psyche even when nobody intended to do that. This is perfectly illustrated by the rousing effect that Gov. Sarah Palin had on the Republican convention in Minneapolis this week. On the surface, she outdoes former Vice President Dan Quayle as an unlikely choice, given her negligent parochial expertise in the complex affairs of governing. Her state of Alaska has less than 700,000 residents, which reduces the job of governor to the scale of running one-tenth of New York City. By comparison, Rudy Giuliani is a towering international figure. Palin’s pluck has been admired, and her forthrightness, but her real appeal goes deeper.

She is the reverse of Barack Obama, in essence his shadow, deriding his idealism and turning negativity into a cause for pride. In psychological terms the shadow is that part of the psyche that hides out of sight, countering our aspirations, virtue, and vision with qualities we are ashamed to face: anger, fear, revenge, violence, selfishness, and suspicion of “the other.” For millions of Americans, Obama triggers those feelings, but they don’t want to express them. He is calling for us to reach for our higher selves, and frankly, that stirs up hidden reactions of an unsavory kind. (Just to be perfectly clear, I am not making a verbal play out of the fact that Sen. Obama is black. The shadow is a metaphor widely in use before his arrival on the scene.) I recognize that psychological analysis of politics is usually not welcome by the public, but I believe such a perspective can be helpful here to understand Palin’s message. In her acceptance speech Gov. Palin sent a rousing call to those who want to celebrate their resistance to change and a higher vision

Look at what she stands for:
•    Small town values — a nostaligic return to simpler times disguises a denial of America’s global role, a return to petty, small-minded parochialism.
•    Ignorance of world affairs — a repudiation of the need to repair America’s image abroad.
•    Family values — a code for walling out anybody who makes a claim for social justice. Such strangers, being outside the family, don’t need to be needed.
•    Rigid stands on guns and abortion — a scornful repudiation that these issues can be negotiated with those who disagree.
•    Patriotism — the usual fallback in a failed war.
•    “Reform” — an italicized term, since in addition to cleaning out corruption and excessive spending, one also throws out anyone who doesn’t fit your ideology.

Palin reinforces the overall message of the reactionary right, which has been in play since 1980, that social justice is liberal-radical, that minorities and immigrants, being different from “us” pure American types, can be ignored, that progressivism takes too much effort and globalism is a foreign threat. The radical right marches under the banners of “I’m all right, Jack,” and “Why change? Everything’s OK as it is.” The irony, of course, is that Gov. Palin is a woman and a reactionary at the same time. She can add mom to apple pie on her resume, while blithely reversing forty years of feminist progress. The irony is superficial; there are millions of women who stand on the side of conservatism, however obviously they are voting against their own good. The Republicans have won multiple national elections by raising shadow issues based on fear, rejection, hostility to change, and narrow-mindedness

Obama’s call for higher ideals in politics can’t be seen in a vacuum. The shadow is real; it was bound to respond. Not just conservatives possess a shadow — we all do. So what comes next is a contest between the two forces of progress and inertia. Will the shadow win again, or has its furtive appeal become exhausted? No one can predict. The best thing about Gov. Palin is that she brought this conflict to light, which makes the upcoming debate honest. It would be a shame to elect another Reagan, whose smiling persona was a stalking horse for the reactionary forces that have brought us to the demoralized state we are in. We deserve to see what we are getting, without disguise.

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Lowering the Glass Ceiling

See this piece on Huffington Post:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lara-m-gardner/lowering-the-glass-ceilin_b_128346.html

I would like to take you on a journey of the imagination…

Imagine that Sarah Palin is not a woman, but a man.  We’ll call him Mr. Palin.  Mr. Palin has been mayor of a small town in Alaska, and governor of that state for less than two years, a state whose entire population is less than that of most US major metropolitan areas and in this position.  In this position, Mr. Palin is being investigated for questionable conduct.  Imagine that he obtained his passport within the last couple of years, and that he considers foreign policy experience living next door to another country.  Take it further and imagine he believes the earth was created in a few thousand years, that dinosaurs roamed the earth with humans, and that creationism should be taught in public schools.  Suppose also that this man believes women should not have the right to choose, and that rape victims should pay for their own rape kits.  Imagine Mr. Palin hunted moose from a helicopter and sought removal of environmental protections for polar bears. Imagine he has no knowledge of financial markets, the cold war, weapons systems, or Middle Eastern history.  Imagine all of this and more.

If this were true, and Sarah Palin were a man, would he have even been on the longest list of potential US vice-presidential candidates for any political party?  It would be unthinkable.

Why are the standards for this woman running for vice-president so much lower than they would be for a man?  Shouldn’t the standards be the same?  To determine whether someone did not get a job because of something other than merit, simply slip whatever that person is not into the position in your mind and ask yourself whether the same standards would apply.  If there are disparities in the standards required between two people seeking the same position, it is quite likely that discrimination is occurring in some form, even if it is allowing someone to be worse at something in an effort to pretend there is no -ism taking place.

Here, we have a woman running for vice-president who is grossly underqualified.  Those who support her claim that her position as a vice-presidential candidate is evidence of women shattering the glass ceiling.  Actually, the opposite is true.  Allowing her to take a position for which she is not qualified and giving her extra points for being a woman is the ultimate in sexism:  it is using gender as a qualifier rather than merit.  Beyond the obvious arguments against her abilities, her position as a vice-presidential candidate assumes on some level that a qualified woman could not perform the job.  Sarah Palin’s place on the Republican ticket does not shatter the glass ceiling, it lowers it.

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Miss Molly

In December 1996, I decided that I wanted another dog.  I had lived with my sweet dog, Autumn, for four and a half years. We had moved back to Oregon from the east coast, and I had finished college and begun working full time. I decided Autumn needed someone to hang out with during the day while I worked, so I chose to go to the humane society and look there.  I had been donating money to the humane society for years and fully supported animal adoption that way.  I considered myself an ideal owner; an animal that lived with me would be a full member of the family, receive top of the line care, and lots of love.

I was living in Corvallis at the time.  I decided to go look at the humane society in Salem because it was bigger and would therefore have a larger selection.  I was not sure exactly what kind of a dog I wanted, but I knew I did not want a brand new puppy and that I did want a female dog.

There were so many dogs to choose from.  There were lots of brand new puppies and most of them had signs on their cages indicating they were already adopted.  I entered the back kennels to search for an older dog.  The kennel was bedlam.  Because it was a Sunday, there were lots of potential doggie parents milling about looking for dogs.

I wandered up and down the aisles, occasionally stopping to pet one and say hello.  One dog in particular caught my eye.  She was about the same size as Autumn, but mostly black, almost like Autumn’s photo negative.  Where Autumn was brown, this dog was black.  Where Autumn’s points and eyebrows were dark brown, this dog’s were beige.  She sat quietly in front of the fence.  I went over and started to pet her.  She looked at the floor, but leaned into the fence of the kennel so I could pet her ears.  She was extremely thin, so thin I could count all of her ribs and see her hip bones.

This dog had curved front paws.  There was no obvious bend like an L.  Rather, her paws simply curved like the bottom of a U.  Later when Autumn contracted diabetes and gradually starved, her paws began to curve too and I learned that curved paws were caused by starvation.  I did not know at the time that the reason this dog’s paws were curved was because she had been starving.  The sign on her kennel read QUEENIE. Her breed was listed as a doberman mix.  I did not think so.  Her colors might have been vaguely reminiscent of a doberman’s, but nothing else about her resembled that breed.

I pet her for a bit, then moved on to look around some more.  I would wander up and down the aisles then return to the kennel with Queenie.  Other visitors would stop at various kennels, but no one else stopped at Queenie’s.  I kept going back.  She would look up at me, then look at the floor, then look back up at me.  The workers allowed me to take her out into a back yard to walk her around and spend time with her.  She sat next to me and walked quietly beside me while we walked around a bit.  I asked her if she wanted to live with me.  She just looked at me, then looked away, then looked back again at me.  She won me over and I decided that she was the dog I wanted to take home.

The workers told me that Queenie had been found wandering the streets of Salem three weeks prior.  The day I chose her, she was extremely thin.  I could count each of her ribs and she had those curved paws I did not know signified atrophied muscles from malnourishment.  If she was in this shape after three weeks, I can only imagine how thin she had been upon arrival.

Prior to that day, my dog Autumn lived as a child with my husband and me.  She slept in our bed.  She ate the best dog food.  When it was determined she had hip dysplasia, she received top of the line vet care.  She was a priority in our lives.  I cannot imagine an animal more loved and cared for.  Yet the humane society in Salem would not let me adopt Queenie because the house we lived in was rented and did not have a fence.  There were other smaller reasons as well that I no longer remember.  The main thing that stood out was the house situation.  Even though I had owned another dog and cared for her in that house for over a year, the people there determined it was not good enough.  No wonder so many animals can’t find homes.  If someone like me could not adopt a dog, I did not see how anyone could.

I hugged Queenie and left the facility completely dejected.  I wanted her.  I knew she would fit well with our little family.  I had to find a way to bring her home.

Knowing the criteria that had kept me from adopting Queenie, I set out to find a friend who would “kidnap” her for me.  I called around and described the situation.  My uncle John had just moved to the area.  When I told him what was going on, he agreed he would go and get Queenie out for me.  I was so pleased!  Perhaps she would be coming home with me after all.

The next day, Uncle John went down to the humane society.  We rehearsed the story we would tell in order to ensure he could adopt Queenie.  I waited and waited for him to call.  Over an hour later, he finally called to tell me he had Queenie and was on his way to my house.  I clapped in joy.  She was mine!  The story my uncle had told was convoluted and long.  He told them he owned his own house with a fenced yard.  He said he had a little boy who wanted a dog.  They told him he could not take the dog until the little boy had visited.  He then created some sob story where they had had a dog who had died.  His little boy was desperately sad and missed this dog more than anything. Queenie looked like that dog and he wanted to surprise his little boy.  The people bought it, thank God!

The night Queenie came home I changed her name to Molly.  She did not look like a queen, but she did look like a sweet Molly girl.

As part of the agreement to adopt, I had to pay a rather large fee, something like eighty dollars.  It was claimed that most of the fee was to pay for a certificate to spay Molly.  The humane society where she was adopted was in Marion County.  I had been assured the day before that I could use the certificate at a vet in the county where I lived.  I scheduled the appointment to have her spayed.  My vet told me that the certificates were not good in our county.  I called other vets and was told the same story.  Because I was not going to get to use the certificate anyway, I took her to my vet.  He decided he would honor the certificate even though he would not be remibursed for the work by the humane society.  I was grateful to him.  We had only been shortly acquainted at that time, but I now consider him a good friend.

Two days later I took her in to be spayed.  She was afraid of the vet’s office, but went along willingly.  That was Molly. There were many situations where she was afraid, but she would trust me and go along if I was there.  She stayed that way her entire life.  A couple of hours after dropping her off, I received a phone call from the vet letting me know her surgery was complete.  It turned out that when they opened her to spay her, she had already been spayed!  The doctor sewed her back up and called me to come and bring her home.  He said because the humane society told me she needed to be spayed, it had not occurred to him to question it before performing the surgery.

As I stated before, I had donated a lot of money to the humane society.  I wanted to help the organization so it could help animals.  However, after my experience that day trying to adopt that dog, after the experience with the spaying certificate I was told would work and then did not, and finally the fact they did not even know she had been spayed already requiring she undergo an unnecessary procedure, I stopped donating to them.  It has been my experience, then and since, that there are many people who work in the animal adoption industry who seem to have the attitude that they are the only people good enough to care for animals.  I absolutely understand taking steps to keep animals out of bad homes or laboratories.  Yet when organizations that claim their purposes are to serve animals, to keep them from being euthanized, and to find them decent homes, they should not make it impossible for a good owner to adopt a pet.  Unfortunately, because of the holier than thou attitude at some facilities, this is exactly what happens.

Molly was initially skittish, but she loved me and trusted me right away. Autumn was not thrilled by the interloper considering I had been sole mommy for the four years comprising her entire life.  However, she grudgingly accepted Molly into the pack once she determined she was not going anywhere.  For the rest of their lives the two basically ignored each other.  In my attempt to get Autumn company with Molly, I failed wholeheartedly.  Later when we adopted Poppy, Autumn and Poppy became good friends. And later after that, Autumn and Edna seemed to like one another as well.  But Autumn and Molly never did.  They acted like the other did not exist.  About once a year they would get into a nasty quarrel and one or the other of the two would end up with a bloody bite.

From the beginning Molly knew certain words and was terrified of them.  Her entire life if I said Vacuum she would go and hide.  In the early days, she was genuinely frightened.  In later years she would go and sit on the back porch or in the closet when the vacuum came out.  She could not stand the thing.  She also knew cuss words and would go and hide even if they were spoken in a sentence full of other words. For instance, I could say I’m going to go and dump the damn garbage and she would go hide.  It was like a parlour trick, her knowledge of naughty words.  I often wondered what happened to her in her early days to instill such a fear.

My vet and friend, Dr. Fletcher, examined Molly’s teeth very closely the month I brought her home and told me he was 95% certain she was just under two and a half years old.  This would have put her birth around September 1994.  A lot could happen in that time and I will never know what.  In addition to her fear of cuss words and vacuums, she was terrified of loud men, arguments of any kind, and she knew sit, stay, and come.  It was obvious she had lived with someone, but who knows what her life was like exactly.

Molly did not like being in trouble.  Her perception of trouble had a higher threshold than most of us.  During Autumn’s last years, Autumn would get into the trash and try to eat things beyond her diabetic dog food.  I would come home to Autumn wagging her tail and Molly sitting in the corner hiding.  Simply based on Molly’s body language, I knew Autumn had done something naughty.  I know some animal behaviorists would say that Molly was reacting to my reaction, that she had no way to know Autumn had done something naughty.  This explanation does not satisfy.  Molly would be reacting to Autumn’s behavior before I even knew and reacted to it.  Molly was smart.  She knew.

Molly was also extremely fastidious.  She would hold potty for hours and hours rather than go in the house.  For a couple of years we lived in a 1930’s farmhouse with a full basement.  There was no door on that basement so we put a gate at the top of the stairs to keep Milla from falling down them.  The top of the stairs opened onto an enclosed back porch.  When we were gone, we would leave the dogs on this back porch.  One day I came home to discover Molly on the top stair to the basement.  How did you get over the gate? I asked her.  She wagged her tail.  I went down into the basement to discover Molly had gone potty in the farthest corner of the basement.  Rather than potty on the back porch Molly had jumped over the gate landing on stairs and gone down and as far away as possible to do it.  That’s how she was.

Molly loved sleeping on the bed, but we had decided after we had three dogs and a cat and a child that the bed was too crowded so the dogs were relegated to beds on the floor.  Every so often, Molly would slip quietly onto the bed and lie there as still as possible hoping we would not boot her to the floor.  Most times we let her stay; she was not obtrusive.

Last April, Molly had a severe seizure.  I wrote about that on this blog.  You can click here to read about it.  The seizure was horrible.  When I woke to her twisted body writhing on the floor, her eyes rolling in two different directions, feces and urine everywhere, I thought for sure she was dead.  But she did not die.  Three hours later, to the surprise of everyone who had seen her, especially the vet, Molly was 95% better.  And she stayed better.  The vet warned me that more seizures were to come, that she likely had a brain tumor and would continue to seize until one of them killed her.  But that never happened.  She never had another seizure.

Because of her age, I knew Molly would not be able to cross the ocean to live with us in Hawaii. I arranged for her to stay with my boyfriend and his dog, Tanya, in Portland.  She seemed to accept the change after I left.  She spent a good deal of time under the bed, her favorite place to be.  Boyfriend bought her a rug to lie on under the bed and a pillow for the living room.  He bought her a new tag for her collar that said Miss Molly on a pretty pink flower.  I would talk to her on skype.  I don’t know if she knew what was going on, but she always had a happy face and would come out to play and say hello.

Yet over the last week and a half, Molly seemed to deteriorate before our eyes.  She fell down the stairs to Boyfriend’s basement.  She has had difficulty with stabilty on slippery floors for some time now and these stairs are covered in linoleum.  She stopped wanting to eat.  We thought maybe hard kibble was bothering her so Boyfriend bought wet food on Saturday.  Molly gobbled that up like a starving beast and we thought things would improve.  Only the next day she did not want to eat wet food either.  Boyfriend fed her some by hand and she ate that, but the next day she wanted even less.  Two days ago when he took her outside to go to the bathroom, she slipped and fell going up the back porch steps.  Yesterday when she went out to go to the bathroom, she urinated then lay in it.  I knew then that something was dreadfully wrong.  My dear, sweet, fastidious dog would never go anywhere near her urine if she could help it.  Boyfriend bathed her and I made an appointment with our vet for today.

Molly died this morning in the arms of my boyfriend.  The vet said she had a large tumor in her spleen that had burst and her belly was full of blood.  She said we could operate to remove the tumor, but she would likely not survive any surgery.  There would have been no benefit in trying to save her life.  She was fourteen years old.  Her body was old and worn out.  Trying to keep her alive would have been selfish and cruel.

Milla and I spoke to her over the phone telling her we loved her and goodbye.  I hope she heard us and if not I hope our love was there for her.  I imagined her flying away from that body just like Autumn did a little over three years ago.  My boyfriend took her body home and buried her in the corner of his backyard.  Tonight he went out and sat by her under the full moon.

I am so blessed this creature was a part of my life for almost twelve years.  She was always there, quietly in the background.  Molly loved a lot of people.  She was always so excited to see my mom or my good friends.  She loved my boyfriend and enjoyed his company, following him around the house for a snack or to have her rear end scratched.  She took a bit of time to warm up to a person, almost like she was sizing them up to determine whether they were worth her friendship.  Yet once she decided she liked you, she always liked you and would remember someone after months or even years of an absence.

Upon hearing of her death, a good friend said this to me, “She was such a good friend and such a polite and gentle dog.  What a blessing to have had her for so long – she loved you all dearly.”  These words are simply true.  I am grateful Molly came into my life. In her quiet way she was a fixture in my life for over a decade.  Of the hundreds of dogs I could have chosen from the humane society that cold, winter day, I am so thankful I chose her.  I loved her and I will miss her terribly.  I am glad that she was my friend.

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My Response to a Comment

Some person commented on the letter I posted written by Lyra Kilston and Quinn Latimer.  In the letter, Kilston and Latimer make several statements about Sarah Palin.  They then ask that those who agree Palin is the wrong choice for VP and that she is not representative of women send them a statement to this effect. It was their intention to take all such statements and create a blog with all of the statements they receive.  I posted the letter because I fundamentally agree with the premise that Palin is wrong for VP and wanted to allow others who agree to add their voices to the mix.

The commentator stated that I lose “credibility” when I publish something that isn’t the truth.  On that point, I agree.  If I am asserting something factual and it is wrong or inaccurate, I lose credibility in my assertion.  I also agree that I should fact check something before I publish it.  (Incidentally, I did check to ensure the purported letter writers had in fact written and disseminated the letter.)  However, my issue with the commentator and the reason I am responding via blog post is to point out that I did not allege anything other than that I agreed with the letter writers.  How could I fact check my own opinion or lose credibility when I have not attempted to persuade anyone of anything that would require my words be reliable?  I have little doubt that the comment writer intended that I somehow lose credibility by agreeing with persons she claims make inaccurate statements, yet I reassert my original assertion:  I agree with the letter writers.  No one should have any reason to disbelieve this assertion.  Does anyone think that in posting this letter I might actually want Sarah Palin for vice-president?  I seriously doubt it.

The fundamental point of the Kilston Latimer letter is that Sarah Palin is wrong for the vice-presidency and that although she has a vagina, she does not represent American women.  They wanted to create a statement by women saying as much.  Because I find Palin’s positions on a number of issues to be completely reprehensible, I wanted to add my words to this statement.  I wholeheartedly believe that Sarah Palin is the wrong choice for vice-president of the United States.  She may not have taken the steps necessary to successfully ban books in her library, but she asked what would happen if she tried (per factcheck.org).  Yet her position on certain books is the tip of the iceberg as far as I’m concerned.  Her lack of education and experience, her methods for management, her perspective on the environment, her religious views, her previous actions while in office as mayor and governor, as well as so much more all compile to create what I perceive as a disaster should the unthinkable happen and she and McCain are elected.  If there is any doubt as to my credibility in holding this opinion, I hope this post puts it to rest.

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We Need to Help Haiti

Imagine Katrina hitting New Orleans not once, not twice, or even three times.  Imagine just as one storm flits away, people are dying and starving, levies are bursting, the city is in utter chaos.  Then it gets hit again, and again, and again.  This is the situation facing Haiti today, and Haiti has even fewer resources and options than New Orleans did when it was hit by Katrina.

We are not hearing enough about Haiti, and what we are hearing only skims the surface of what needs to be discussed. Haiti has been bombarded by storms, several in just the last few weeks.  The country has been so deforested in the last five decades that there are no root systems to hold the ground together.  Water sits on the soil creating a muddy disaster area.  There is no ground in which to grow crops, there are virtually no trees, there is no fuel to heat or cook with, the country is nearly under water, and its cities are cut off from the rest of the world.  We need to help, not just the problem today, but the global problems the country faces.

Immediately, people are suffering. They need food, clothes, and shelter from the elements.  Then we need to help them with their long term problems.  The country needs to be properly reforested.  There needs to be an alternative fuel plan so citizens do not have to continue using the remaining forests as a fuel source. Food security needs to be created and developed by addressing unfair trade practices and creating jobs.

For more information on this global problem, see this article in Wikipedia and another that gives some detail on the complexity of Haiti’s problems.

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Cute Fuzzy Thing

I signed up to elect Michael Palin for President.  You can do it too.  Simply click here to show your support.  Anyway, as part of my support, I got a free cute fuzzy thing!  It is so adorable.  I love it.  After I got the cute fuzzy thing, I received a thank you message from the campaign with instructions on how to proceed to ensure Mr. Palin is elected president.  Part of my duties as a supporter include rubbing my cute fuzzy thing all over republicans and doing silly walks in government buildings.  I’m going to get right on that.

You too should work to elect Michael Palin as president.  As his website attests, he knows all about government processes.  He even has proof.  I would contend his foreign policy experience is far superior to Sarah Palin’s (no relation).  She just lives near Russia.  Michael Palin has actually lived IN a foreign country!  This is obvious evidence of his foreign policy prowess.  Sarah Palin is a hockey mom.  Well, Michael Palin has actually worn ice skates!  Further evidence again of his superiority as a presidential candidate.

America is truly beautiful my friends. It is a place of opportunity where anyone can attain the highest office in the land.  Show your support for this dutiful and officious servant: MICHAEL PALIN FOR PRESIDENT!! (And don’t forget to pick up your free fuzzy thing.)

I urge you voters.  Vote Michael Palin for president.

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Please Give Me a Big City

I want to move to the east coast.  I want to move to a big city on the east coast.  Boston, New York, Philadelphia.  As part of my gradual understanding of parental conditioning, I realized I had bought into the family story about me. This included certain statements that were presumed to be true, but were in fact not.  For instance, for years I was told I was a “country girl.”  I bought into this notion because I loved horses.  Several years ago I realized that I am so far from a country girl it is nearly laughable.  Going to the country for a ride or a run or a boat ride can be fun, but take me back to the city as soon as it is over.  I am not a country girl.

Another of the claims my family has made about me is that I would “hate” living in a big city.  When I moved to the east coast, first to model, later to go to school, that was the statement.  You will hate it there.  There were things I hated, yes, but these things had everything to do with being broke and nothing to do with the cities I lived in.  I loved those cities.  Why did I buy into this thinking?  Maybe because it never occurred to me to question it.

Now I am living in Honolulu and I am bored to tears.  I realize that part of why I wanted out of Portland was because I was so bored there.  I needed a change of scene.  I needed an increase in activity, not a decrease.  I want to go somewhere that never sleeps.  I want to live in that kind of energy.  I have expressed this desire to some of my closest friends.  Their responses have been unanimous that they believe such an environment would be most suitable for me.  Why is it that something so obvious about me to others is so inapparent to myself?  Am I that blind?  I guess so…

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Are YOU Ready to Be President?

Do you think you can be president of the United States of America?  Should you be president of the United States of America?  Do you have the qualifications necessary to run this country?  Regardless whether you want to be the president, would you like to have a president you see as a person with whom you could share a beer or hang out with?

It seems to me that the desire to hang out or have a beer with the president comes from a desire to view this person as human, as “like us.”  But think about it, how much “like us” should the president really be?  Are any of the people you hang out with ready to be president or should they be?  Are the people in your child’s soccer league ready to run the country?  What about the people in your PTA?  Are the people you have a beer with at the park ready to run the country?  Hell, are the people in your city council, or even your mayor ready to run the entire United States of America?

Just because we could sit and have a conversation with a person does not mean either of us is ready to run one of the most powerful nations on earth.  Think about it.  Faced with the prospect of leading at least two wars, global starvation, natural disasters, increasing environmental concerns, a worldwide mortgage crisis, an economy on the brink of collapse, millions of uninsured and unemployed Americans, and a multitude of other issues, are you or your neighbors ready to run this country?  Could you do it?  Could you fix these problems?

Don’t just ask yourself if the person running for president could drink a beer with you or hang out at your church.  Ask yourself if this person can manage the complex and myriad problems facing this massive nation. Over three hundred million people are citizens of the United States. Three hundred million!  Could you lead three hundred million people?  Perhaps in considering whether someone should be president we should worry less about whether that person is “like us” and start asking if they can do the job, because I highly doubt that most of us could run this country.  I doubt our neighbors could.  I doubt our friends could.  Perhaps after years of experience and training we could do it, but not right now, not today after drinking that beer. Being “like us” does not qualify someone to run this country.  It might make someone more likable.  It might provide us with some link to the enormity of their responsibility to feel that person could be “like us.”  Being “like us” may make us feel in another lifetime at another time we actually could do that job.  Unfortunately it is not enough to determine whether someone could be president of the United States.

Presidents should be super heroes.  Yes, they are human.  Yes, they shit.  But I want someone in charge of the fate of a very large number of people to have superhuman strength and abilities.  Just because this person could have a beer with me is simply not good enough.

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Ginormous Headache

My head hurts like nobody’s business, right at the base of my skull in the back.  I slept wrong.  I wear this eye pillow.  It was cockeyed, plus my regular down pillow had slipped under my shoulders, so I awoke basically balanced on this little lump of eye pillow and my skull screaming in pain.  Every time I turn my head, I see white light and feel like vomiting.  The only thing that alleviates the pain is to stab my thumb or a finger deep into the tight muscle.  Unfortunately because of the angle, my arm cannot twist that direction very well.  I’ve tried stretching my neck to the front and back, left and right, to no avail.  This is so much fun.  I think I’m going to have to try an NSAID, and I generally avoid taking medications for such things.  Only for this, I don’t care.  It hurts that much.

I don’t know why I”m blogging about this.  It’s kind of a ridiculous subject.  But I told myself I would write some blurb every morning and all I can think about right now is this headache and Vantucky.  I know.  It’s silly.  There is a town next to Portland called Vancouver.  Portlanders call it Vantucky.  The reasons for this are self-evident.  Boyfriend is going to Vantucky this morning and he called me on the way. For some reason, the word Vantucky is stuck in my head, along with the headache, and the lyrics to Judy Garland singing I’m Always Chasing Rainbows.  It’s quite a combination, I can assure you.  The song is getting annoying.  It’s been crawling around in my head, worming its way through the neurons for days now.  I’m ready to be rid of it.  I will have to listen to something else over and over and over in an effort to make it go away.  Then that song might get stuck, but at least it will be a different song.  Last week it was Cape Verdean Blues.  I did not mind that song being in my head.  It flittered around, showing up periodically.  I would hum bars of it here and there.  It did not sit insiduously on one line for hours like the chasing rainbows number.  No.  It was a pleasant visitor.  Chasing rainbows is like a houseguest who has overstayed her welcome, leaving empty dishes around the house with food stuck in them and her underwear in the bathroom with the crotch up.  I want her to leave me.

I’m off to take drugs to try to obliterate this headache, then I need to take my baby to school.  Hopefully by the time I return home the drugs will have kicked in and this pain will have been alleviated.  If not, I’ll poke a nail in my hand.  It would probably feel better than this wretched headache.

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Latimer/Kilston Letter to Everyone

I received this letter in my email inbox today.  Because I agree with the letter writers, I have decided to post the letter here in an effort to disseminate the information.  After I posted this, I received a comment about it.  I have responded to that comment here, if you’re interested…

Friends —

We are writing to you because of the fury and dread we have felt since the announcement of Sarah Palin as the Vice-Presidential candidate for the Republican Party. We believe that this terrible decision has surpassed mere partisanship, and that it is a dangerous farce on the part of a pandering and rudderless Presidential candidate that has a real possibility of becoming fact.

Perhaps like us, as American women, you share the fear of what Ms. Palin and her professed beliefs and proven record could lead to for ourselves and for our present or future daughters. To date, she is against sex education, birth control, the pro-choice platform, environmental protection, alternative energy development, freedom of speech (as mayor she wanted to ban books and attempted to fire the librarian who stood against her), gun control, the separation of church and state, and polar bears. To say nothing of her complete lack of real preparation to become the second-most-powerful person on the planet.

We want to clarify that we are not against Sarah Palin as a woman, a mother, or, for that matter, a parent of a pregnant teenager, but solely as a rash, incompetent, and all together devastating choice for Vice-President.

Ms. Palin’s political views are in every way a slap in the face to the accomplishments that our mothers and grandmothers and great-grandmothers so fiercely fought for, and that we’ve so demonstrably benefited from.

First and foremost, Ms. Palin does not represent us. She does not demonstrate or uphold our interests as American women. It is presumed that the inclusion of a woman on the Republican ticket could win over women voters. We want to disagree, publicly.

Therefore, we invite you to reply here with a short, succinct message about why you, as a woman or man living in this country, do not support this candidate as second-in-command for our nation.

Please include your name (last initial is fine), age, and place of residence.

We will post your responses on a blog called “Women Against Sarah Palin,” which we intend to publicize as widely as possible. Please send us your reply at your earliest convenience.

The greater the volume of responses we receive, the stronger our message will be.

Thank you for your time and action.

VIVA!

Sincerely,

Quinn Latimer and Lyra Kilston
New York, NY
womensaynopalin@gmail.com

**PLEASE FORWARD**  If you send this to 20 women in the next hour, you could be blessed with a country that takes your concerns seriously.  Stranger things have happened.

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I Don’t Get It

Here’s the thing I don’t get.  What damn difference does it make whether climate change is man-made or not?  If we know we can help slow its progress, why not do it, regardless whether we caused it? Why let it continue unabated until we are all dead simply because “it’s not our fault”?  Alaska is falling in the ocean.  Hurricanes are destroying cities and killing thousands every year.  Wet places are getting wetter. Dry places are getting drier.  Hot places are getting hotter.  Cold places are getting colder. Whether we caused it or not, it is happening.  The evidence of this is irrefutable.  We can slow these changes down, but we don’t want to because we didn’t do it?   Such thinking is ridiculous.

I know there are those who think that because we didn’t cause it, we can’t fix it.  Ample evidence exists to the contrary, but I doubt these naysayers will change their minds.  What does it hurt to try?  If by some anomaly we cannot affect the changes, we are certainly no worse off than if we did nothing; we are in exactly the same place.  But if we can affect the changes and do nothing, the results are going to be catastrophic.  They already are.

Every time I hear the discussion about whose fault it is, man or nature, I want to ask Who cares?  I just don’t get it.  Whose fault it is does not matter.  What does matter is whether we can change it and actually try to do so.

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Miscellaneous Thoughts

So I’ve been convincing myself that it is okay to skip inconsequential writing because I’m working on a book.  The problem is that when I stop blogging or at least writing in my journal, then the words start pounding on the inside of my skull again and I start turning a little nuts.  That’s not a good thing.  I am not the best human when I am nuts.  I guess even when I work on a book I will have to write some little blurb here or in the journal or I’ll never end up completing the book because I will be in an insane asylum.  What a wierd brain I have, one that requires I write in order to be functional.  It also doesn’t seem to remember this until it’s going blathering nuts and I start wondering why I’m such a bitch all the time then I think Well duh, Lara.  It’s like food and sleep.  I know if I’m off and losing my mind, food and sleep are usually required.  I should add writing to the list because lately, I’ll have the food and sleep and still be going nuts.  Duh.  Write.

I have had a lot of thoughts about the political situation in this country, but there is so much to say and so many people saying it, I feel a bit overwhelmed to even know where to begin.  The progressives seem to understand that the McCain Palin ticket is a disaster.  It’s all we’re hearing about.  My question is whether average Joe American who pays little attention to politics can see past the fact that Palin has hot legs and McCain is a good ol’ boy.  Unfortunately, I’m not so sure.  Of course, there is the consolation that a person with these views would not likely vote, but that’s not much of a consolation.

I read an op ed piece today whose author said he did not want someone he could take out for a beer as the leader of the free world, he wanted a super hero.  My sentiments exactly.  I would love to try and reach average Joe American with that image…we need superheroes running our country or we will not be leaders for very long.  I cringe at the thought of what the rest of the world will think if McCain is elected, how humiliating that will be, especially after Bush.  I am not a person who gives much credence to what other people think, but I do care that our country does not appear as a pathetic joke.  If that moron and his Caribou Barbi are elected (or steal the election, which is a possibility with Diebold still in the picture), we may as well kiss our asses goodbye.  Or stage a revolution.  Unfortunately, in 2008, I do not see many people willing to go there.

I read another article where the author argued that we need to send Hilary after Palin.  I could not agree more.  This would eliminate the complaint that the men are picking on her because she is a woman, and Hilary is brilliant as an attack dog.  I wish she would do this.  Come on, Hilary.  If you are with the Democrats, do this for your country.  Take that pitiful excuse for a woman down.  She wants to claim she’s on your side, but she’s so far from anything you represent, she deserves your intelligence, your debate, everything you have to offer.  Go for it.  Do it for the country.  Do it for women.

Apparently Obama went on the O’Reilly Factor.  Here’s hoping they don’t edit the piece before airing it in such a manner to make Obama the fool.  I don’t trust that O’Reilly bastard or his network one bit.  Putting someone who can answer questions intelligently next to a man who screams, cajoles, and calls names….I’m not so sure. We will see.

Well this is it.  We’ll see if I can tame the word poundings.

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Palin the Distractor

The Republican party wanted to use useless, no-experience Sarah Palin to distract America from the fact that their candidate has nothing and to allow her to attack Obama while McCain looks like the good guy.  It’s working.  We need to get off the Sarah Palin bus and start looking at the team that is terrible for America.

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I Cannot Think of a Clever Title for this Post

I have not been writing as much here as I usually do because I have been working on a book idea that I have.  It’s an academic book so I’ve been doing some research in an attempt to solidify a thesis argument.  I have also been researching grad school programs to determine whether it might be worth my while to turn this idea into a dissertation (it’s that sort of book).  It might be useful to turn it into a dissertation because I could get a degree that would allow me to teach if I wanted to.

As an undergrad I wanted to become a university professor.  I entered the honors program at my university because it was designed to determine whether one would be interested in that track.  After spending a year on my subject and writing the thesis, I decided I was not interested enough in any one subject to become an expert on it.  Since then, I have often wondered how different my life would be if I had made that choice instead of law school.  I have considered attending law school one of the biggest mistakes I ever made.  I decided to attend law school because I thought it would be a way to make money while writing.  I realize that for me, making money should never have been part of the equation.  It’s one of those life lessons that are often talked about, but have little meaning until you experience them yourself.  Actually, thinking about it now, if I had chosen grad school then, it would not have been the right choice because I was not fired up enough about any one subject to become an expert on it.  Oh, I probably would have liked my job better than I liked being a lawyer, but it still would not have been just right for me.

Since I have had this idea for a book/dissertation, it is nearly all I can think about.  I believe that if I had been this fired up about a subject when I was considering graduate school as an undergrad, there would have been no question I would have gone that route.  I would have wanted to pursue something that arduously if I was passionate about it.  This latest is a subject I have been thinking about, talking about, and even blogging about for about 8 months now.  The friends of mine I’ve told about it kind of go hmmm, like Lara is nuts.  I just can’t get it out of my head.  Lately, I see and hear more and more around me that make me want to write about it even more.  The idea is solidifying, taking form.

This is how it was for me when I had the ideas for the papers I wrote in law school that eventually became law review articles.  One of them started niggling my brain in a constitutional law class.  The professor had made a passing remark about something and I started turning it over and turning it over, wondering and thinking.  I finally went and spoke to one of the con law experts at our school, an absolutely brilliant constitutional law professor.  After discussing the thought with him, I still kept thinking about it.  I went back and asked him if he would advise me if I wrote a paper about it.  I had already written my A and B papers.  I did not have to write about this, I just wanted to.  He agreed to act as my advisor and I wrote the paper and published it.  I was similarly fired up about the subject of my A paper, and I got it published too.  I feel just as excited about this latest idea.  Maybe I can turn it into something.  If not, I can at least write about it and try to convince a couple of people that my argument has merit.  Rather than sitting around on the computer lamenting myself, I have been working on this book, giving it shape.  It is preoccupying.  I need to find a temp job, or some job, but I keep thinking about this and wanting to work on it instead.  Ah, the muse…

Some who read me may have noticed a rather large number of my posts disappeared.  Well, they are not gone, they are simply marked private.  This means they don’t show.  Why did I do this?  Ah, hell.  I don’t know.  I was having one of those days when I wanted who I have been, at least parts of me, to go away.  So I hid everything I had written.  I periodically go back and unhide certain posts when the whim strikes, but like I said, having a project to focus on has been quite useful for my overactive brain, leaving me little time to worry about myself, or to repost my writings, as the case may be.  It’s a good thing.  I don’t imagine people are going back and reading old posts anyway.  My saying this is not me being a martyr; it is me being realistic.  If I thought anyone really wanted a post, I would put it back out there.  I just doubt it’s that important.  I am not some famous author, after all.

Aaaaanyway.  Didn’t my professors tell me never to begin sentences with aaaaanyway?  Maybe not.  Anyway, if I don’t post, it is not because I have jumped off of a bridge or drowned in the ocean.  Rather I am likely holed up in the library here where I cannot check out books. Or I’m online researching grad school programs.  Rest assured, if I decide to kill myself, I will write about it first.