Good Morning.
Putting the “novel” on hold while we hunker down for a happy sentimental week, and by hunker I mean frantically clean and search for bedding as we are ground zero this yero, and eldest is home from the Rock today and grand-parents are imminent. Even the youngest had to find his floor.
That said, I think it is a lovely time to get back to our two terrifying children, ignorance and want
because I am a confused person who wouldn’t give money to a World Vision outreach thingee at the Newfoundland airport, even though it seemed very well-meaning on first glance, because they are an overtly Christian charity.
I got into a discussion with a very nice young lady who started out all wrong by saying she understood where I was coming from because she had thought the same thing too … and she was maybe 19. I had great discussions with a passionate niece when she was about the same age, and she actually told me, a mother of three children at the time [I hesitate to put it in quotation marks, because I will have it slightly wrong, but there was a witness, the father of all those three children] that “I needed to take control of my own clitoris”. In fairness, I think I was taunting youth by discussing starting a “Take Back the Rainbow” campaign to remove the growing association between rainbows and homosexuality. And I have managed to raise those three children and have had some very interesting discussions with them too. I think there is a very natural tendency to be extremely socialist inclined when you are young and have no resources, and to be a little more of a capitalist once you are the one with the capital.
And it was one of those discussions where youth was strong in its arguments that has lent backbone to my being uncharitable because of my atheism, but not of course with any consistency. I do find missionary religions creepy in the extreme and am often the first to cry cult when anyone comes through the door with a robe and a book, but close to home I am much more open to the wonderful effects of charity, no matter which religion spawned it. But why should religion spawn charity? And can one move past supernatural superstitious religions and find charity from within? And how to satisfy ignorance when everyone has an axe to grind, but satisfying only want is insufficient?
Ha! You thought I was going to answer those questions, but no … my only answer really is that charity should start close to home. Don’t go saving the distant world by pretending to buy a goat somewhere … look around and see who is feeding the hungry in your neighbourhood … dang but it often all comes back to Dr. Stephen Covey and his 7 irritatingly effective habits. Own of his most effective visual metaphors is the circle of concern versus the circle of influence
People have used this in many ways, and I think my favourite is to think of the circle of influence being the one where you make choices [and we make many more choices than we realise once we start imaging things in terms of a re-action where we choose how to respond and don’t get to say “I have to” nearly as much as “I am choosing to”] and the circle of concern being the one where you can’t make choices but still worry. And when you let your circle of concern swamp your circle of influence you drown in panic. Trust me …
The reason Dr. Covey is so loathsome of course is that he is right. You can slowly rebuild your circle of influence one choice at a time. I don’t mean this in a monster way like that fellow who used to tell you late at night that you could be just as rich as him, just day-to-day proving that it actually might be possible to pull yourself up by your bootstraps, as my parents used to recommend. I am not sure how old I was when I realised that this was technically impossible … but it was too late, the proof was in the pudding and for once theory met practice and whacked it down. 1 for ∞.
But back to those two children, lets just hope that what we are feeding the boy is truly nourishing, and not secretly divisive. I love Christmas [or better, Xmas, if you get my drift like the snow storm said to the highway] but because of the reminder to be loving and to be lovely.
Perhaps we might start calling it Saturnalia again, after all, we still name a day after Saturn, which is 1 out of 7, where as Christ only gets 1 out of 365, and he even had to borrow his from Saturn, who so graciously stepped aside for the renaming of the winter feast. Or at least I hope it was gracious and there isn’t going to be some WFW matchup with Saturn in red in one corner and Jesus in white in the other.
But today is most definitely Saturn’s day and I hope you can make the best of, unless of course you have made better plans!
Funny how our situations so often seem to parallel each other. We too had all our fledglings returning to the nest as of yesterday for the Solstice. I got to cook breakfast for the crew this morning, one of my great joys in life. Son and Girlfriend will stay 2 or 3 weeks and then depart, then leaving Daughter to rule the roost alone for another 2 weeks after that.
Major logistics has been planning out all the things we want to cook over the period, in between command performances at Grandma’s House.
Other good news: The Girlfriend has landed an internship here locally for the summer, and so will be living with us. Not sure where the Son will be, job searches still up in the air. Odd, perhaps, to have the Girlfriend for sure under our roof, but Son’s situation uncertain. Testament to how tight we all are. She is family already, regardless of how fast those two get around to making anything “official”. I’ve decided to stop nagging about that. Probably past the point of being productive.
Bucker tends to get his nose out of joint during these periods, because he can’t find a clear space on a couch. All is full. Jenny loves it since she prefers to be on top of someone, but Bucker needs his own space. I’m going out to buy some kind of a big dog bed today (while gathering Lasagna fixings, Daughter’s #1 menu request) and give that a try.
Also, I want it to be known that I stand firmly in support of clitoral independence everywhere. A Clitoral Libertarian, as it were. I stand ready to help in any way that I can.
Oh yeah, and…Good Morning!
i was saving this for the next time the topic of the extreme political right came up, you know the “wing-nuts”, and their obsession with what they call the “free shit army”. you know, transfer payments, all 4/10ths of one percent of the federal budget that it is and all. but today’s subject works too. um F U teabaggers. 🙂
………on the other hand, I personally would not object to a little penile servitude.
i have been inside and seen the workings of some charities, especially recently, so i will have to generally agree with your theme to keep it close to home. it is simply the case that we all know instinctively, visual aids aside, that neighbors make the best neighbors. um duh!
there’s more to it of course. the big charities need to be run like real businesses to be efficient, and they also need to have one foot in the the real world anyway, because they obviously need funding. and because of their size, there is all the crap going on behind the scenes, just like at my old career job at megatelecomco. my wife worked for 5 years at a food bank that distributes food regionally to smaller charities. her and i both are a bit less idealistic than we once were because of that.
the tamale cook off last week was interesting. it could not be officially sanctioned by any of the charities that received food, because we would have had to have paid for a catering license and have a kitchen inspection and many other rules and regulations that we did not even discuss, that complicate things to the point of impossibility. so just as Xty suggested, the tamales will go to some volunteers known by first name, that also will give some to other people, some that happen to be in need, and at events formally dedicated to other holiday themes. so the food will get to some hungry neighbors, but may have to go around the block first, instead of right across the street.
i guess i am rambling again. but i have an excuse this time. it has been cloudy here for 13 days in a row. and i mean no sun at all. my brother who lives about 70 miles from me got two hours of sun yesterday, and i am jealous as hell. so i fear that i am coming unhinged. to you other Wisconsin guys, have you seen the sun at all in the last few weeks? i am wondering if maybe Janesville doesn’t have a great big cloud stuck above it.
Sunshine? I’ve heard tales of it from the village elders. They swear they used to see it back in olden times.
They say the sky used to be blue as well. Crazy talk. I think their old brains are addled.
the weird thing is that some of the weather sites claim that we have had a few partly cloudy days this week, including yesterday and the day before, both which were ‘all the lights on on at noon’ dark here, all day, in fact the suns position in the sky never could even be guessed at by looking for a brighter spot in the overcast.
so has the Orwellian PR gotten so thick now that even crappy weather has to be spun? are they afraid we will stay home instead of going to the mall if we remember that the sun hasn’t shone in two weeks? but, yeah, i admit it, maybe i am becoming too conspiratorial from reading so many gold themed sites. though at least not the scatty one. 😯
but what i do know is that i feel about like my houseplants look. i have even considered going to a tanning place to try to knock myself out of this funk. but not yet. if i remember right, the record for consecutive cloudy days here is 41. i will not risk skin cancer for under 40 days of gloom. 🙂
the solstice is also the new moon this year. so every day after that will be longer, and the nights will be getting brighter too for a few weeks. that is keeping me going for now, and also the fact that the fricking sun just has to come out eventually. oh, and the fact that the weather is a convenient thing to blame if you are feeling a little “scroogy” around the holidays is also a plus. 😈
Good morning … I tell you my plants sure love those bulbs and are beautifully green whereas I am more of a sickly green. But yesterday here a strange brilliant orb lit the sky, and it had nothing to do with the itsy bitsy baby Jesus … and it was melting the snow on the back deck. They are also promising 4 degrees C on my birthday and a bucket load of rain … but we deserve a little thaw. Last year it was cold from about Halloween until April if I remember correctly, which I won’t.
And speaking of similar lives! I sent our living room furniture out to be reupholstered (after 20 years, 2 dogs and three kids – and my hubby still thinks it was just fine as it was) and there has been a delay (2 1/2 months!) and it is now promised for Monday and I realized that poor Mouse somehow lost her bed in the kerfuffle – so funny you should mention the need for a bed and a dog with her nose out of joint – not only did Mouse lose her couch and view out the window, I cleaned out her hideous old bed and didn’t replace it – she and I have been sharing a pile of memory foam and a sheepskin – but it is not the same and yesterday she just stared me down until I figured it out. So new bed on the list and I have to be stopped from getting her a heated one for the front porch.
Great to have a good match for your son … we are lucky that way with our eldest, but luckily I think his mum is worse about the getting hitched – I am just going straight for the babies.
And yes – the further the charity is from the recipient the less appropriate the help will be, or a bit will have been lost in the process, and I think that when you lose the personal you get more caught up in the ego and feeling like you are helping a cause … like parents who would be passionate about chairing parent/teacher councils, but be too busy to volunteer for a field trip with the actual kids.
And we didn’t get any drop off this year for hallowe’en. It did start to happen for a few years, just one van I remember. But we knew the neighbourhood kids pretty well, and frankly the drop offs often didn’t bother to wear any costumes – once I asked a guy what he was dressed as because he was just wearing street clothes and he answered “a thief”, which was very funny, so I did give him candy. But we would just kind of stiff the rest.
Been awhile. See if this works. http://www.productmanualguide.com/fishing/trout-fishing-in-america.html
happy Longest Night, Decemberween, Hogswatch, Festivus, Mōdraniht, Saturnalia, Hanukkah, Yule, HumanLight, Newtonmas, Kwanzaa, Boxing Day, Feast of Winter Veil, Winter Solstice, and/or Christmas? especially Mōdraniht if you are Xty. and Hi 44. sorry for jumping queue. 🙂
Good morning! Happy not quite so short a day!
well, we woke up cloudy here again today, so i’m feeling a little scroogy.
now just in case, i forgot one of these. 🙂
and on the positive side of things, it was colder in November than in December, so far.
Let’s go back to about 1981, or so. In the parking lot at the Mole Lake Bluegrass Festival. That’s where all the jam sessions happened.
Somehow, my banjo and I ended up singing the lead on this one. A mistake to be sure, but somehow we pulled it off, and it wasn’t half bad.
I don’t think I’ve ever heard Paul Warren (long time stellar Flatt & Scruggs fiddle player) sing before. Just goes to show there’s something new every day.
Skip ahead to about 1:30 for all the good stuff.
And here’s Paul back in his natural element.
Most people our age probably first heard “Pig In A Pen” on the Old & In The Way record, released in 1975. Stocked with Legends (like, Jerry Garcia on banjo!), it introduced a lot of people to the good stuff and drove many to search out the sources.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_and_in_the_Way
it’s turnip gratin!
over to baby sis’s/mom’s place for Christmas, then headed to the western part of Va on fri, younger bro and sis there as well. (six of us).
incredible friends these families we have.
mucho rain, seriously cloudy, temps in 70’s tomorrow w/thunderstorms and it always floods here. Norfolk was built below the water table. (we have brilliant politicians ), anyway: hi all..w/love, Pete. old tune that i like,
in case you don’t check in here for a while 44, have the best Christmas ever!
notes from the couch:
scratched it all;
for the dogs.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/absolutely, confusing, yep.tunes.,more
hold on Woodpecker. http://www.defenders.org/woodpeckers/basic-facts
yikes!…don’t even know anything. some jerry and brandford, ..please enjoy!
thanks for checking back 44.
Happy Birthday Xty. I was in such a hurry to be first that I forgot your present. Don’t know what I would have said if I wasn’t first, ’cause I still wouldn’t have one.
Have a great day.