July 31, 2002

Dave Winer and b!X have been going at it, it seems. I haven't been following the details; all I know is what I read on b!X's site, so, granted, I'm only getting one side. One of the issues is Dave W. assaulting b!X's credibility and authenticity because he doesn't use the name he was given at birth.

Now, that's one issue I know lots about, so Dave, let me just tell you about the evolution and authenticity of b!X's identity. Let's begin now and work backwards.

When I call anywhere for him, I don't ask for him by the name I gave him when he was born. I ask for b!X. The toddler for whom he "caregives," calls him Uncle b!X. His week-old nephew-by-birth is going to call him Uncle b!X. Everyone who knows him on the Internet, knows him as b!X. Everyone who knows him where he lives in Portland, Oregon, knows him as b!X. Over the years, he has grown into the identity we all know and love as b!X. b!X is who he has chosen to be. He is as much b!X as you are Dave Winer.

Now, that name and identity actually have an interesting history. Somewhere back in the 80s, he started writing wacky little vignettes about "Baby-X" and his (mis)adventues in an absurd and uncompromising world. It was obvious that he was writing metaphorically about himself. When he first began getting on the Web, he used the name slowdog, but that soon changed to baby-X because he knew that, without a doubt, he is a child of the infamous Generation-X. As he became more involved in the Web community, he began using b-x to identify himself in real-time chats etc. Somewhere along the line, the - became a !. If my memory of his evolution has any inaccuracies, he's welcome to correct me. After all, I was watching all this from a distance.

If you've been reading b!X's blog over the many years he's been posting (and he began a blog-type site long before there were official weblogs), you know that he doesn't reveal many specific details about his life or Self. His credibility lies in his reputation for clear writing, (sometimes) brutal honesty, passionate opinion, and intense commitment. Because of these qualities, in October, 1995, Rolling Stone magazine featured him in an article on Ten Things You Can Do to Make a Difference. (a jpeg of which I don't know how to upload into this trackback, so I'll post it after)

Anyone who really wants to find out the name he was born into can find him on WHOIS. But that's not who is is today. And what he does to earn a living isn't who he is either. Who he is, is on his weblog. I should know.

July 30, 2002

My therapist/shaman friend counsels Viet Nam vets. A while ago, I posted about a healing ritual in which I participated to support the painful healing process of a U.S. army nurse who is still struggling with PTSD. Several times a year, my friend leads a pilgrimage to Viet Nam as a way of continuing the healing process for the many affected by their experiences in that war. He sends back his thoughts on their journey, reminding us all that we in America are continuing to repeat the same mistakes, believing that our might makes right.
This is his latest message:

I stood on the busy streetcorner in Ho Chi Minh City, the old Saigon. I
crossed into the intersection jammed like an ant colony full of vendors,
bicyclists, cyclos with their weary drivers hard-peddling, sputtering
mopeds. It all zigzagging every which way at once, yet no one ever hit
another. Traffic in Viet Nam is a cacaphony of communal spirit.

So must we all in order to live our lives well, and in order to stop the violence.

July 29, 2002

Do male and female thought processes differ (beginning with human formation in the womb) and so there really are innate gender differences in terms of our skills and abilities?

The Brain Game: What's Sex Got to Do With It airs on ABC-TV at 10 p.m. EST this Wednesday. Dr. Nancy Snyderman, Good Morning America contributor, surveys the latest scientific research, which seems to indicate that male and female brain powers differ because of biology.

I don't know about you, but I sure will be watching it. Or at least taping it to watch later, since I'll be taking my mom to hear the Rymanowski Brothers play some Polkas at a nearby outdoor concert.

July 28, 2002

Well, I managed to hook up by phone with Tom Bolton, who lives in the Boston area. It just felt good to make that next connection. Maybe on one of my future trips, we can meet for coffee (tea for me) and solidify the connection. Chris Locke made the point at one point: we blog so that we can finally get to meet each other.

Halley and I missed connections this time, but there will be other times. And we'll always have Maine. I know her life is racing toward a new destiny. I'm thinking of you , Halley.

Over in the larger world of Blog Sisters, conversations abound about women and all of their evolving choices, stresses, and potentials. It is easy for me to saturate myself with the big picture. There are big issues out there -- mountains that need all of our strengths and efforts to move.

But, over here, in my current smaller world, I am immersed in the little picture, struck by how at least one aspect of our biology hasn't evolved in eons; how we are still intimately connected by that biology to the first human woman who ever gave birth, lactated, and became the sole food source for a totally helpless and dependent entitity; how, somehow, despite the pain, frustration, energy-sapping sleeplessness, and almost total loss of personal choices, we nevertheless learn to love these amazing, demanding parasites.

For all of the evolution of our brains and other body parts, it is disconcerting to realize that, for a women's body, the birthing process has never changed. The tiny new human grows inside us for three-quarters of a year, shoving our other organs into places they're not supposed to be, throwing our fragile spine's alignment off so much that nerves get displaced, muscles stretched beyond easy return. Vampire-like the little being feeds off our essences, drains our life forces. We are prisoner to its every need.

And then, when it's ready, it rips out of our bodies, tearing and bruising and demanding. For weeks the pain persists -- when we sit, defecate, walk. And then come the bursting breasts, aching, sore, insisting -- the bleeding nipples that send sharp stabs straight into our backs each time it latches on and starts to suck, suckle -- continues to assert its needs, its choices, its destinies.

For all of the ways we have evolved as women, when it comes to the birthing process, we have no choice. Our biology is our destiny. Yet, we continue to accept this biological fate. Generations of us continue to line up to keep the human species going, despite the primitive nature of our ancient biologies.

Because ultimately we hold in our arms a magical human child -- a human soul as pure and innocent as it will ever be -- eight pounds plus of pure and unbound human potential.

And we are connected to this miniature human by DNA and blood, by histories and hopes. We look into its hungry face and see ourselves. We look into its shining eyes and see our futures. We learn to love -- with fierce commitment and compassion -- this helpless, demanding angelic creature, this new connection to all that's meaningful about being human, this ancient connection to the biology of the eternally generating female.

July 27, 2002

I'm back home, trying to catch up with the rest of my life. Meanwhile let me brag a little with this:

July 26, 2002

Go here to see a photo of Alexander that b!X already has posted. And, yes, he does resemble Winston Churchill.

July 25, 2002

The beginning of everything he's ever going to be is here now -- in that tiny perfect being, my grandson, Alexander. He is humanity in a Ralph Loren onesie. I watch his miniature features spontaneously rehearse all of the expressions his face will ever form -- he frowns, grins, rolls his eyes, purses his rosebud lips, wrinkles his tiny nose. He cries only when his diaper becomes too unbearable. Mostly he eats and then he sleeps, tucked against his mother's (my daughter's) heart.

I watch my grown-up child nurse her own child with intense caring, diligence, intent. She says "I understand, now, what they mean when they say that you learn to love your children." She is learning to love as a mother loves.

Alexander's father is at her side most of the time. He can't do the nursing (although I can tell that he wishes he could), but he is right there, making sure that she has everything she needs when she needs it. They are an seamless team. A true family.

I am here mostly for moral support, cheerleading, and affirmation. And to cook dinner. And take photos, which I will download when I get back home. And to sit next to my daughter and listen and listen and listen as she talks through her concerns and fears and hopes and limitless joy.

Alexander. Our universe.

July 21, 2002

Well, it turns out that GranElaine is needed out in the Boston area after all. It's been tougher on my daughter than she wanted to believe it would be. So, I'm frantically setting up my mom with food, instructions, phone numbers so that she can, hopefully, survive without me here for at least a week. She's going to take care of my cat, and I'm going to take care of my daughter. Am I ever feeling the "sandwich generation" press! I'm leaving early Tuesday morning.

I can blog from her house, and I will make an effort. But no guarantee. Wish me luck. I haven't held a baby in more than 30 years.

July 19, 2002

Found an interesting idea over at bluvox. She says, Independence Day. At Harbin there was a sign reminding me that there's no such thing, and that it should rather be, Interdependence Day.

Maybe we should institute a blog-wide annual Interdependence Day.

My grandson has arrived -- born at 4:26 est, 8 lbs 12 oz, 20 inches, brown hair and he looks like Winston Churchill. Mom is doing great. Dad is beyond ecstatic. Of course, he was there for the whole thing. And now he's taking two weeks paternity leave to to take care of his family.

So, while the Gary Turners' baby actually will be the first born to this extended blogger family, Alexander is the first grandbaby. Ain't that just grand!!!

Over the past several weeks, there have been about a dozen new great women bloggers signed up for Blog Sisters. And as I surf their blogs and old favorites, I keep finding more guys blogging out there. So, I'll just mention the latest several here: Tom Bolton, George Partington, George Sessum, and Fertile Jim. All unique voices. All worth checking out.

So says fertile_jim in an excellent post on the subject. (You have to scroll down to the article on Jim Throws Gasoline on the Fire because his permalink takes you somewhere else.) I found him from a comment he left on Blog Sisters to a strong piece by Helen Razer, who has finally resurfaced.

On that subject, my grandson is on his way. According to my son-in-law (the best one in the world), my daughter went into labor at 3:30 this morning (which is when I woke up the first time). Her water broke around 6:30 (which is when I woke up the second time). Just a little synchronicity here, a little magical motherthing connection. So send good vibes out Boston way, everyone. I'm about to become a granny.

July 18, 2002

Blog Sisters' reputation is spreading. We are one of four group weblogs cited in an article by Steve Outing at Poynter.org. My thanks to b!X for emailing me about it.

According to the main page of the weblog article, Poynter's Steve Outing also is a columnist for Editor & Publisher Online. Recently, he wrote a column suggesting that newspapers give weblogs to all editorial staff (read the column here), which generated considerable discussion and controversy.

Gary Turner's at it again. And b!X and I join the ranks of Turner spoofs.

At least we don't get into the kind of trouble this local guy did.

As the story goes,
On the Internet and telephone chat lines he [Kevin Gudz] went by the name 'Sir Kevin,' and his alleged fantasies included kidnapping a woman and bringing her to his home where she would become his consenting bondage sex slave.

'The victim in this was a complete stranger to the defendant,' said Columbia County District Attorney Beth Cozzolino.

Talk about embarrassing moments!!

I can breathe again. The splints are out (now that was a yucky process!) and so far so good. I have to go back next week and get the passageways scoped to make sure it's all healing the way it's supposed to. Thanks, you all, for all the good vibes sent my way. You're the best!!

July 17, 2002

Weblogging is losing one of its most provocatively intelligent voices. Shelley Powers, AKA Burningbird, who has been debating whether to make the move for months now, is moving on to build the life she wants beyond the virtual. With her usual honesty and eloquence she has said her good-byes. Shelley Powers has left the party.

And, for many of us – like me -- the Blog is just that: a party where we can wander around inserting ourselves into catchy conversations or lurk around the edges of a group listening and learning, or if we are more gregarious, set ourselves up as the center of our own group dynamic. It’s a neverending planetwide party. A constantly re-created carnival where we can dress up in our verbal finest and strut our best stuff. A salon full of creative and thoughtful people with whom we feel we have enough in common so that they just might become our good friends.

But it’s not like that for everyone. For some like b!X, blogging can be an effective medium for trying to awaken a world-wide constituency to little known and globally important truths. For bloggers like AKMA, it’s more a venue for philosophical discourse that’s open and relaxed and accessible. For others it’s another medium in which to practice the art and craft of journalism, or a very visible corner soapbox, or a zany roller-coaster ego ride, or a very personal experiment in reaching out from deep inside. If you’re Burningbird, Jeneane Sessum or Mike Golby or Chris Locke, it’s often all of these things. In Blogdom, as in Life, we create our own realities.

But blogging is not life. And Shelley Powers wants a life. She’s going for it. You go, grrrl. And take our respect, affection, and best wishes with you.

I wanted the music to play on forever
Have I stayed too long at the fair?
I wanted the clown to be constantly clever
Have I stayed too long at the fair?
I bought me blue ribbons to tie up my hair,
But I couldn't find anybody to care;
The merry-go-round is beginning to slow now
Have I stayed too long at the fair?
The music has stopped and the children must go now
Have I stayed too long at the fair?
Oh, mother dear,
I know you're very proud,
Your little girl and kingdom is so far above the crowd;
No, daddy dear,
You never could have known
That I would be successful, yet so very much alone...
I wanted to live in a carnival city,
With laughter and love everywhere;
I wanted my friends to be thrilling and witty,
I wanted somebody to care;
I found my blue ribbons all shiny and new
But now I discover them no longer blue...
The merry-go-round is beginning to taunt me,
Have I stayed too long at the fair?
There's nothing to win
And there's no one to want me
Have I stayed too long at the fair?
-----Lyrics by B. Barnes

July 16, 2002

See inside Gary Turner at Sandhill Trek!!

See b!X analyze the new Phil Donahue show on MSNBC.

See George Sessum finally come home!!

See Golby take on Winer!!

Recognizing that the mothers over in Nigeria are getting mad for a much higher purpose, I'm still herewith chastising Adam Curry and Dan Gilmor for not researching their sources far back enough to note publicly that it was b!X who first blogged the news about blog.salon.com. You can follow b!X tracking of the sin of omission on his site, where he admits feeling passed over.

So, know all ye who pass here, it was indeed theonetruebix who got there first.

Is this a good example of how blogging differs from "professional" journalism (where writers accurately document the ultimate sources of their information)? And is it also an example of the fact that blogdom is just as much a hierarchy and "old boy" network as the world under our feet?

July 15, 2002

As a way of distracting my mind from my nasal discomforts, I've been working on Marek's t-shirt, and it's finished, except for "heat setting," which is what you have to do to fabric that's been painted. Heh. The front looks like a third grader's art project, since that's about the level of my drawing talents. But the back is another story. First, here's what it all looks like (the colors didn't come out exactly, but close enough):

Now, for the story of the design on the back, which came out pretty well, I think:

The legend of the coronation sword of Polish kings (the pommel of Szczerbiec) begins with the first king of Poland, Boleslaus the Brave (ruled 992-1025), who is said to have jagged his sword against the Golden Gate in Kiev on his victorious entry into that city in 1018. The most interesting part of the sword is the hilt, which bears some symbols and inscriptions of esoteric character.

One of these symbols is an image of the Rose of Jericho, a flower that grows in Palestine that is able to revive after it had been dried, and, therefore, is a symbol of resurrection. Curiously enough it is not a rose at all, but rather belongs to the plant order called Cruciferae or cruciferous, which features "cross-like" components. The image of the Rose of Jericho on the pommel of Szczerbiec has twelve petals, the number of the signs of the Zodiac.

Like the symmetrical design of rose windows, the image of the Rose of Jericho becomes an appropriate focus for a meditative mandala -- a symbol of the eternal Polish spirit that refuses to be crushed, diminished, or silenced.

The symbol in the center is called the “world triad.” It is an emblem of cosmic creativity, the threefold nature of reality or fate, and the eternally spiraling cycles of time. In Tibet it is still known as the Cosmic Mandala, a graphic image of eternity.

So, that's what's going to cover Marek's back -- strong metaphor medicine to give Marek long life, good health, and, I hope, lots and lots of money.

Now all I have to do is find someone to mail for it me. Luckily, one of my friends works in the post office. I'll give her a call. Watch your mail for a package, Marek.

Addendum: Just as I was finishing this post Marek called to see how I was doing. Poor guy, he's home in bed, on meds, but still sounds just like Marek. Of course.

Since I can't blow it yet, I'll blog it. I'm feeling a little better, although breathing is still a challenge, and my right eye feels like it has a toothache -- a situation not unusual given the work done on the sinuses around it. So, I'm continuing to doze off watching watching tv movies and beginning to work on Marek's t-shirt. (My eye doesn't seem to hurt if I keep looking in one direction.) Yawn. Time for another nap. (Jeneane's been expending enough creative energies for both of us. She'd better save some up for George's return tomorrow.)

I get the splints out of my nose on Thursday. I'm not looking foward to that! Luckily, I recently made the acquaintance of another woman who lives here with her mother. She's ten years older than I (and her mother is ten years older than mine), and we have little in common except our caregiving, but that's sure plenty at this point. She's offered to take me to the doctor's, and I'm going to take her up on it. It's kind of nice to have someone nearby I might be able to count on -- and vice versa. Yawn, again -- both because I'm tired and because my blogging about this is getting tiresome.

Taken from here via this.

ABOUT 600 women who took over a giant ChevronTexaco oil terminal in south-east Nigeria and trapped hundreds of workers inside did not budge in their demands for jobs for their sons and electricity for their homes.

They complained that previous company promises had been broken.

I can't help but wonder what would happen if all American women banded together and took control of the economic and political power bases (using a variety of strategies, such as those in Nigeria and in Lysistrata, as well as consumer boycotts etc.). Of course, it won't happen because we are too comfortable. We have electricity and food and the bombs are not dropping on our chidren. Not yet.

July 14, 2002

I'm having one of those synchronicities again. A column by a local writer in my local paper today refers to Ray Oldenburg's old idea of a 'third place,' an idea that I first remember reading about sometime in the 70s in, I think, an article in Psychology Today. Then I check in on b!X and find this reference to a new site, blogs.salon.com, which might or might not turn out to be something worthwhile.

Twenty years ago, when I really got excited about the idea of a third place as a public salon, an activist lawyer friend of mine and I went and looked at an historic building that was for sale in Albany. (As a matter of fact, it's the building where they shot the nightclub scenes in the movie Ironweed, written, btw, by a another friend with whom I've lost contact -- Pulitzer Prize winning novelist Bill Kennedy. He did a great jitterbug in the old days.) Anyway, there was federal money available for renovation, and we had this dream of buying the building and turning it into a social justice center/cafe-salon/dance hall. I know that sounds weird but we both were ballroom dancers and were always looking for non-bar places to dance. As it turned out, our own personal and professional lives were just too complicated and too busy to take on the project.

So, instead, I tried inviting people over for salon-type evenings, but that didn't work out either because there was no spontaneity. It was just like throwing a regular party and inviting your favorite people. Fun, but no salon.

In the 80s, I hung around a bar that had a big dance floor where many of the dancers I knew would stop in several nights a week for some socializing and exercise. So, I had spontaneity and connections, but no chance for any kind of interesting discussions.

And now here we all are on the Blog. Almost the perfect third place. Poets, activitists, philosophers, passing acquaintances, good friends -- they're all here whenever I stop by. And I don't have to worry that my hair looks like a fright wig and I'm sitting here in my nightshirt with a cold pack over the right side of my face where my eye feels like a toothache. Third Place. Salon. Without the physical constraints of time, place, and putting on clean clothes. Although I still wish there were a place to dance when I wanted to.

July 13, 2002

Can't breathe. Can't sleep. Head's going to explode. Meds. Ice packs. Groan. Groan.

Sorry, Marek, you shirt's going to arrive later than I hoped. But it will look something like this, only sage green and hand painted. Hope you're feeling better than I am. Uuuuuhhhhhh. Groan.

July 12, 2002

Marek and I are both Polish. He's the same age as my son and very similar in heart and spirit, if not style. We've talked on the phone a couple of times. In a real way, I feel that we are family.

Marek and I were both in the hospital yesterday. They knew what my problem was and fixed it. I'm home now. That's not the case with Marek, and his friend Ann has posted about it all with great love and concern.

Marek is one of those idealistic, creative, energetic young men who feel deeply and speak with passion and honesty. He has always had my deepest respect. Now he has my deepest concern. Especially since they haven't figure out what's wrong yet.

I sent Ann an email, offering to do a healing ritual for Marek and conjure up a metaphorical object to make him feel better. Jeneane is posting requests for ideas on how to keep in touch with Marek and keep a stream of good wishes flowing. They're starting to flow.

Doc Searls has reminded us about Marek's love-filled yet tumultuous life. Euan has added his feelings. Join in. Blog for Marek.

We love you Marek. Our hearts are with you.

July 11, 2002

Home. Still groggy. Splint up nose but no packing. Hardly any pain. You all must have been sending good thoughts like crazy!! Going to sleep now. Thank you, thank you!

July 10, 2002

If you've been following all of the conversations about anger (I've lost track of where they all are taking place), be sure to check in and read what's been going on at Blog Sisters over the past few days. Great insights from some of your younger Sistahbloggers about why that anger is there for them. And don't miss Deborah Gussman's rant on her own blog that relates to all of that. Guys, you can't post, but you can read and link. And you really should.

Tomorrow I will be given a general anesthetic for my sinus surgery. I am remembering the first time I had a general anesthetic. It was when I was in labor with my daughter. I was young and totally clueless and in excruciating pain. She was born ass-first, but the idiots in the hospital never figured out that my yelling and complaining were really warranted until more than a dozen hours into it. Somewhere along the line they finally knocked me out, during which time my little girl finally managed to emerge.

The next thing I remember was hearing a loud buzzing sound and seeing a white light at the end of a long tunnel. Having majored in English in college, of course the first thing I thought of was Emily Dickenson's poem that begins, I heard a bly buzz when I died. I was convinced that I was dead. My only thought was that I would never see my baby; I'd never even know if it was a boy or girl. I didn't feel afraid or concerned -- only a sense of terrible loss. Of course, as I slowly came out of the anesthetic, I realized that the buzz was the sound of the hospital staff's voices and the the white light was the light on the ceiling. Nevertheless, ever since then I haven't been afraid of dying. What I am afraid of, though, is unalleviated PAIN!

They tell me that I will have to live on ice pops, jello, and ginger ale for several days after the surgery. (Only cold stuff; no dairy.) And my nose will be sore and swollen and filled with packing and a splint, and I'll have to breathe through my mouth. So, today I'm eating all the stuff I won't be able to eat for a week -- fresh strawberries and cream, a salami sandwich with basil and tomato on a hard roll, cheese cake.... And I'm going to sit outside in the sun and read while I still look presentable to the world. I'm stocked up on movies I taped off the tv, books, Fimo to work on a jewelry design I have in my head, and every kind of cold stuff I can imagine, including lots of watermelon.

So, remember to send me your good thoughts tomorrow.

And while I take tomorrow off from blogging, make sure you go and read Frank Paynter's interview with Dorothea Salo. She's half my age and twice as smart. I wonder if I had been born thirty years later than I was, if I might have been at least a little like she is. I like to think so.

The One True b!X - 09 July 2002 - The Return

Now, where are all the other Phil Donahues of this world? He's the only reason I envy Marlo Thomas these days. I can't wait for his new program to begin on July 15 at 8 p.m. on MSNBC.

July 09, 2002

The One True b!X - 08 July 2002 - Doing The "Smirk And Shuffle"

Two purposes to this post: to see if I finally remembered how to do the Trackback and to point you to another great post by b!X, which ends with:

I wonder just how many people in America are aware of how much of the rest of the world laughs at us, shakes its head at us, because this is who we have running the country. Have we no sense of shame at all? Are we really more satisfied with an idiot than we were with a philanderer? Are we really more satisfied with someone whose "malfeance" has to do with his performance in office, rather than his performance in the sack?

Are we really, after all, exactly that stupid?

Last week, I went to a picnic at the local home of a young woman artist with whom I worked very closely for several years in the field of interdisciplinary education. My friend is a funky visual artist with an incredible aptitude for technology, and so she took a job doing both at a small college in New Hampshire. Her real home with her really cool boyfriend is not too far from where I am, however, and she does go back and forth a lot. We never seem to find the time to hook up, so I was glad to have this chance over the holiday. While she focuses mostly on painting (now she's experimenting with painting on digital images) the piece she did that I like best is a little white table on which she glued white plaster casts of her nipples. Heh.

Over the weekend I went to a family picnic at the lakeside home of one of my cousins -- about a half-hour from where I am. He's the only cousin of mine with whom I've ever felt enough in common to consider a friend. I don't see too much of him and his live-in lady during the rest of the year, but I love going out there in the summer. He had also invited some other relatives -- all Polish born and still bilingual. I grew up being able to speak Polish, and I get a kick out of realizing that I can still follow conversations in that language even though I can't remember enough of the vocabulary to speak it. Except for my cousin and his girlfriend, I felt as unconnected to these relatives as if they were just passing acquaintances. And it has nothing to do with the language. It has more to do with the way we view the world and our places in it.

It must be awfully nice to have your family members also be your friends. It must be.

Old friends, memory brushes the same years,
Silently sharing the same fears....
--- Old Friends, Simon and Garfunkel

Over the course of a lifetime, you meet a few people who become your friends and stay your friends, even if you lose touch for a while. I don't know what the variable is that keeps the connection open between some old friends but not between others.

Yesterday I had a visit from a former Significant Other. He lives in Pacific Northwest now, and we exchange emails every once in a while. He had come out to visit his family in various locales in the Northeast, and he had a few hours in between visits, so he stopped by. We had had a few good years together, years ago, -- dancing, vacationing, just hanging out, arguing politics (both government and gender). One summer we rented a houseboat and cruised around the St. Lawrence Seaway for a couple of weeks. I remember that he invented coffee bags long before anyone else had every heard of the things. He would empty out tea bags and fill them with ground coffee beans, and then he could just make himself a quick cup of regular whenever he wanted. (I neither drink nor make coffee). I guess our relationship just ran its course.

Before he moved across the country, and long after we had stopped being each other's Significant, I ran into him at a ballroom dance and he told me that he was going out to Oregon to check out where he might want to live. When I mentioned that my son was living out there, he invited me to come along on the trip and pay a visit to theonetruebix and the cybercafe that he owned back then. My old friend and I had a relaxed, comfortable, and Platonic time visiting and sightseeing and even making it out to the Pacific Ocean for the first time in both our lives. My mother still says he was the nicest guy I dated since my divorce.

July 08, 2002

Last week, Tom Bolton rescued a bird in danger of being run over in traffic. He has since found out what he should do with the lost creature, and he's done it.

According to this site,
Native and tribal peoples believe that all living things have lessons to teach us. By observing the characteristics and behaviors of our four legged and feathered relatives, we can become aware of these lessons. Many native peoples carry or wear carvings of animals or birds (fetishes) as a reminder of the wisdom, experience, understanding and medicine power of that animal or bird. These likenesses honor these teachers, as well as inspire us toward a clearer understanding of our own strengths and remind us of where we may need to concentrate more effort in our own lives.

Over the years, working with my shaman/medicine man/therapist, I accumulated several totem animals -- two salmanders, a young fox, a bear, a tiny dragon the size of a dragonfly, and an osprey.

Last year, I had an encounter with a woodchuck. Really two woodchucks. I passed one dead by the side of the road, and, as I always do with roadkill, I sent a mental apology to the spirit of the creature, honoring its short life and hoping that its death was quick and painless. My thoughts stayed with the idea of woodchuck and what its spirit might teach me. And then, several yards in front of me, a very much alive woodchuck stops to watch me. Of course, I had to write a poem about this synchronicity.

A chubby woodchuck
in the middle of an empty parking lot
stops to watch me walk in circles
around a June afternoon
awash in dandelion seeds
and gently dappled sunlight.

He twitches his nose,
ambles a few more steps
sits on his haunches,
rests his paws on his full belly –
a curious and patient and satisfied
Buddha.

The soul needs its burrow,
the woodchuck says,
a warren to wend a way
through the solitary earth,
some private ground to hog,
a place safe to spend
that deep season of wonder.

And, with a fanciful last twitch,
Buddha leaves the spotlight,
his coat a slow and sensuous shimmer
along the grave pavement.
Without looking back,
he disappears into the grasses
under a sprawling sycamore,
leaving me to search the shadows.

So, I wonder what message the bird spirit had for Tom.

I wonder how many of you remember that cute little blonde-mopped tyke who danced and sang her way through her childhood and was known for pursing up her cute little mouth and saying Oh my goodness! I know that Tom Shugart probably remembers, but I forgot to remember to mention that he's the latest intervewee over at Frank Paynter's, and, again, Paynter strips away some of the net anonymity and gives additional dimension to our already warm impression of this blogger friend.

July 07, 2002

Why aren't more people getting really, really angry about situations like this and this and this?

And why aren't all Americans as angry as I am about this country and its leadership. The Ticking Bomb, an article by anthropoligist Wade Davis that appears in The Globe and Mail, pretty much provides the best of my reasons. Thanks to b!X for most of the above links. These are some angering excerpts from The Ticking Bomb:

A nation born in isolation cannot be expected to be troubled by the election of a President who has rarely been abroad, or a Congress in which 25 per cent of members do not hold passports. Wealth too can be blinding. Each year, Americans spend as much on lawn maintenance as the government of India collects in federal tax revenue. The 30 million African-Americans collectively control more wealth than the 30 million Canadians.

We must aspire to create a new international spirit of pluralism, a true global democracy in which unique cultures, large and small, are allowed the right to exist, even as we learn and live together, enriched by the deepest reaches of our imaginings. We need a global declaration of interdependence. In the wake of Sept. 11 this is not idle or naïve rhetoric, but rather a matter of survival.

Long ago, in a Kalilily Time far away, I mentioned something about how AKMA -- even though I'm not partial to clerics -- always leads my thinking down pathways I haven't felt inclined to explore before. Last night, after I made the post below and went to bed, I couldn't fall asleep. I couldn't let go of the question I kept asking myself about why, after all of these years of 'experience,' I still get confrontational with authority figures. Of course, it has to do with my anger (yes, ANGER) at patriarchal systems of any kind. But, since I don't do it with all authority figures, there has to be something else. I think it has something to do with style -- not with the essence, but with the accidents. (Those are words I have never forgotten from some Philosohy of Religions course I took in college that interpreted the Catholic belief in the transubstatiation of the wafer and wine into the body and blood of Christ as a metamorphosis of the essence of the objects but not their accidents [physical properties]. Stay with me; I'm getting to point.)

July 06, 2002

Well, I guess I did sound condescending when I commented on Paynter’s interview of Shugart that ‘I think that those who have lived long enough to experience enough of the process of self-discovery and subsequent re-invention know that Tom's got it right.’ I admit that there is something in me that compels me to sound like that when faced with the opinions of younger, scholarly/learned/educated (and especially religiously affiliated) individuals who always seem to sound so sure of what they believe. Sorry AKMA --it’s one of the big flaws in my character. I just can't seem to help challenging ‘authority’ figures. And the compulsion is so strong that I don’t even take the time to check for typos. (So I did correct them in the above quote.) Heh.

As a committed opponent of determinism and a determined proponent of free will and choice, of course I latched right onto Tom’s statement ‘But true self, in my view, is created as a conscious act of existential will.’ It is not that we are not influenced by genetics, environment, and the people who touch our lives; but we can choose just how deep we allow that influence to flow. Gary Zukov in his book The Seat of the Soul places a great deal of importance on ‘intention,’ on what we consciously aim for, ‘intend.’ To me, that ‘intention’ is ‘the conscious act of existential will.’ If we don’t consciously choose, we have not become our ‘true’ selves. Rather we are what various influences have determined we will be. Confronting, understanding, and choosing from among those influences continues to be my spiritual journey toward my true self. I become what I intend.

Addendum: Sheesh. That really sounds confrontationally opionated, doesn't it? Sorry, again.

July 05, 2002

As usual, b!X does a better job than I would have of explaning why I never even acknowledged the passing of my hypocritical county's most patriotic holiday.

July 04, 2002

In the late 60s and early 70s I was a big fan of Janis Ian, even though she was (is) a good decade younger than I and her lyrics told stories very different from my life. I wasn’t [At] Seventeen or one of those ‘with ravaged faces, lacking in the social graces,’ but in my heart I always felt like Society’s Child. I think that I still have that LP somewhere.

Andrea’s post about today’s Janis Ian as ‘amazingly technically savvy for a woman who's musical heyday was in the 70's’ brought back my memories of that era. Early on, when Ian’s first album came out, I was teaching English and writing in a very 'white' school district with a good complement of rural poor. I remember using Ian’s lyrics as examples of contemporary poetry. While my junior high students understood Ian’s feelings of alienation, they couldn’t accept the interracial relationship that was the subject of Society’s Child. If they knew she would eventually come out of the closet, they would have really flipped.

Last week, as my mother was going through her box of stuff that she has collected over my career years, she unearthed a playbill from a youth theater company that I helped to organize during the 70s. I remember the day that the photographer took the dramatic head-shot of me (see above, next to Janis). Everyone knew that I was barely holding it together as my marriage was falling apart, but the photographer was there, and I had to deal with it. The funny thing is, I look at that photo now, and it’s one of the best ones I’ve ever had taken of me. Something about the drama and poetry and haunting fragility of disturbing emotions that refuse to be suppressed.

Which takes me back to Janis Ian. And the wonderful coincidence of having one of my favorite 'younger generation' bloggers discover her in an entirely new context so that I could re-discover her ever-expanding talent.

July 03, 2002

On Blog Sisters today, Gina Guiliano posted some info about an article in the Chronicle of Higher Education by Carol Tavris that reviews many of the current books that examine gender differences. Tavris ends her piece with the following statement:

...as long as we keep seeing the sexes as opposite players in some unwinnable zero-sum game, rather than as allies seeking to solve a specific problem, whoever suffers from it, society's responses will careen drunkenly from one sex to the other, depending on who is making the most noise, whose problem seems worse, and whose problem makes the news this week. And as long as women focus exclusively inward on their feelings and their pasts, as long as they are lulled by the mindless if soothing hum of psychobabble, they will lack the knowledge and will to find solutions beyond the self -- and to reframe the conversation away from 'us versus them,' and forward to 'us and them.'

Of course the ideal is to get to a place where it's 'us and them' and then maybe even on to just 'us.' BUT -- BIG BUT -- getting there is not as easy as Tarvis seems to think. At this point in our history, males and females value very different qualities in their opposite genders. And the paradox is that it is just those differing values that often cause conflict and misunderstanding.

Until both genders agree on what kinds of human qualities are desirable for all humans to demonstrate -- AND until both genders make an effort to actually demonstrate those qualities -- it just ain't going to happen. Too many men are still in the place where they value certain qualities in males but very different qualities in females. And too many females are still in the place where they value certain qualities in females but very different qualities in males. When both genders start valuing many of the same qualities in both genders, then we'll be getting somewhere.

Of course, the question then becomes 'what should those universally valued and expected qualities of both genders be?' Here's my partial list: nurturing, honest, empathetic, tolerant, generous, patient, fair, communicative, participatory, non-judgemental, forgiving.... Hmmm. Sounds to me like the qualities one probably would want in a good friend. How about that!

stolen from Doug's Dynamic Drivel:
The illusion of freedom will continue as long as it's profitable to continue the illusion. At the point where the illusion becomes too expensive to maintain, they will just take down the scenery, they will pull back the curtains, they will move the tables and chairs out of the way, and you will see the brick wall at the back of the theatre. ---Frank Zappa

stolen from new older/wiser Blog Sister minimouse:
If you can't convince them, confuse them.---Harry S. Truman

As Mike Golby continues to conjure a literate path through his own dark, he brings more light to some of our lives than I’ll bet he realizes.

His link to a post by Eliot Gelwan MD, a psychiatrist and blogger, shed some light for me on how taking low dosages of Prozac (one every third day) affects me in a very positive and helpful way. I have – in jest, of course – often said that Prozac keeps me from committing matricide. Gelwan explains:

Even when they are not effective with depressed mood, some patients to whom I have prescribe SSRIs do not want to come off them because of how effective they are against irritability and temper outbursts. In fact, I sometimes think they may be far better against this target symptom than as antidepressants.

The doctor who first prescribed Prozac for me somewhere in the mid-nineties, described it as a 'brain organizer,' and, indeed, that’s exactly what it does for me – helps me to keep the stresses of my confined life in perspective so that I neither overreact to difficult situations (unless they are really impossibly enraging) nor do I get terribly depressed. And I am not completely 'leveled out' in the way that some people fear. So, it works for me.

Golby’s lyrical chronicle of his nighttime immersion in his inner darkness prompted me to dig up the following poem, which I wrote sometime in the mid-80s, when my mood swings occasionally sent me careening down some alienated brainway.

War Zone

Each of us finds her own way
to deal with darkness.

Some of us huddle in corners,
doubling the darkness
behind eyes held blind
by our own foreign hands.

Others find refuge in hands
reaching through darkness--
find hands to hold the darkness in,
fix hands to close the darkness out.

And I move through that darkness
like the shadow of the moon
on that battered landscape
locked between dreams,
holding close only
to the rhythms of the night --
that dark dance
without corners,
without refuge,
without hands.

That was about the time I started getting massages. Now I get them once a month, as much to enjoy the touch of other human hands as to relieve chronic shoulder and neck stress. That's one of the down-sides of living alone and unattached. Not enough touching. But the virtual ones do help a lot.

July 02, 2002

Andrea posts today about two issues dear (or rather not so dear) to my heart. And in my mind they are related because they reflect the traditional competitive and controlling attitude that old-guard males tend to bring to both creation and recreation. In the workplace, it's manifested as the 'old-boy' network and the old 'X' management style. In sports and physical fitness, it becomes 'be better than everyone else at any cost so that you/we can win' rather than 'be the best you can be and have fun with the becoming.'

I like physical activity. I will stay on the dance floor until my hair's a sweaty hank and my legs and arms feel like rubber. But I refused to take gym in high school and I flunked it one year in college. Having to compete ruins it all for me. It becomes just more work, more pressure, more stress. Physical activity is supposed to relieve stress. I've never been physically strong or prone to enjoy competing. That's why I like dancing (mostly ballroom) so much. It relies on grace and cooperation and is a great stress reliever --as long as you don't get caught up the competition circle that the dance studios promote.

That said, I'm not saying that people shouldn't compete in sports if they want to. It is, after all a great way to release the effects of all that testosterone. I'm just saying that equal value should be given to engaging in sports or dance or any other physical activity for the sheer fun of it. I remember when b!X was somewhere around ten or eleven years old and I was working in the office responsible for the State Library and State Archives, the staff of those two organizations got together for a 'pick-up' softball game once a week all summer. Kids were welcome to play as well, and so I opted to play on the Library team. The only rule was that we played until it got dark and then we all went out for pizza. We sort of kept score, but there was a lot of leeway given to the younger kids and lightweights like me. Exercise, camaraderie, encouragement, fun. That's my kind of sport.

This is my brain. Well, not really my brain. It's sort of my skull. With my sinuses. The sinuses that have given me trouble all of my life, but no one -- until now -- ever figured out that I have a badly deviated septum (and resulting sinus blockage), a situation that I'm going to have surgically remedied on July 11. It's out-patient surgery -- in in the morning, out in the afternoon. There are some risks, the doctor tells me, since my deviations are pretty high up -- near my eyes (those large round empty places in the X-ray). But the risk factor is very small, he says. Of course, the sinuses are also right next to the brain, so they have to be careful there, too. He has to tell me that. It's the law.

And, since they have to give me a general anesthetic and they're going to be poking around some dangerously delicate areas, I have to have a 'Living Will,' just in case I wind up a vegetable, I guess. Boy, that would sure pull the rug out from under some of my family members. Heh.

I haven't had that many surgeries -- the birth of my kids, a couple of fibrous cysts, the ankle I broke badly four years ago. I didn't have to have a Living Will those times. Maybe it's my age now. Maybe it's the thing about the brain.

Oh well. I'll either be breathing really well or not breathing at all. Even the breathing well option will take a couple of weeks, what with the splint and the packing and all. At least I'll have a good excuse to hole up by myself for a while -- which, after the kind of day I had today, I will really welcome.

July 01, 2002

You see men sailing on their ego trips
Blast off on their space ship
Million miles from reality
No care for you, no care for me
So much trouble in the world now
So much trouble in the world now
All you got to do is give a little
Give a little, give a little
One more time YE-A-H! YE-AH!
So much trouble -- Bob Marley

Jeneane and b!X blog daily, voicing frustration, isolation, and caring as different as they are personal and compelling. They are my first reads each day, although not always my immediate comments. I follow the echoes of their voices until I find the beginnings of my own.

When Jeaneane posted about ‘reggae sea’ the other day, I remembered how much I like reggae music, although, until her scanning of Marley’s melodies as they rise and fall to the eternal rhythms of the sea, I wasn’t sure why. Now I’m sure. Especially after watching the VH1 special on Marley, which I wouldn’t have noticed was on if not for having the reggae sea awash in my brain.

How much we all yearn to be free of oppression – the oppression of patriarchies, of matriarchies, of work without meaning, of places without heart or hope. Yet how much we also yearn for connections. Freedom with connection. Wings and roots. Safe houses. Safe homes.

Including my move out of my family home in 1957, I have moved 16 times – and only one of those was back to my family for the summer after my college sophomore year. My mother calls me a gypsy. I always have thought that somewhere in my genes hide a few DNA strands that connect to those other times, those 'Other' people. I look around my interiorly un-designed apartment, overflowing with books and technology and yarn and beads and fabric and wonder who I am, really. Dilettante? Crone? The Good Daughter? Homeless Gypsy? A wanderer on the reggae sea, adrift in the dark?