Monthly Archive

Jujubee turned one this month. He is a source of endless delight to us; he is cute, funny and has a squishy, huggableness that we adore. Sunday, after his birthday party, I took him for a walk in the backyard. It has been raining, like cats and dogs actually, so there are nice puddles in the lawn. Jujubee finds himself in one with his feet bare. He looks at me with joy and then starts to splash with all his might. That was a wee slice of heaven watching him discover the reason God gave little people feet when he invented rain puddles.

Insomnia has been my ever-present friend these past few weeks. The drugs aren’t working as well anymore, so I don’t get to sleep until hours after I go to bed. bleh. Nevertheless, I’ve gotten some reading done, watched a few shows on the pyramids, Rome, Greece and seen most of Bride and Prejudice. Last night wasn’t any different; I was awake well into the wee hours and finally went to sleep.

Until the thunder came rolling in, then I was awake again for two hours, listening. I leapt out of bed when one huge strike hit the ground somewhere nearby, close enough to rattle the windows. Thankfully, we never lost power. Most of the thunder was of the low, rolling kind, which is actually kinda comforting.

I woke up late this morning, oversleeping is the curse of the insomniac; you only get to sleep right before you must wake. Oh well.

My cat, Moxie, insisted that I get up and feed her. She’s heavy enough that when she plunks down on my stomach I lose my breath, but she’s cheerful about it so I don’t mind. Moxie is very vocal and likes to make sure I know she’s ready to eat.

So, I get dressed, take care of personal business and go downstairs to feed the beast and make coffee. When I sit down to have my first cup I look outside to see the washed, dewy landscape of a summer morning after the midnight rain, and there in the middle of the yard is a doe eating the lower leaves off our mulberry tree. She’s lovely, dainty even, so I don’t scare her off, which I know Dad will the moment he sees her. He can’t stand that something would eat anything in our yard without invitation and that the deer may damage the trees. She leaves before he wakes up.

Later, I’m still drinking coffee and reading, Dad is also and he’s reading the morning paper, just enjoying a companionable silent morning sit. Out of nowhere, the outside dinner bell begins to ring. I turn in time to see a little brown wren clinging to the clapper cord desperate to figure out where this noise is coming from. She lets go and flies away. Then it was time to leave for work.

 You’ve seen it as many times as I have, the obnoxious commercial selling some purely cosmetic solution to some “affliction”. ‘They’ promise to save you from “suffering” from any number of horrific conditions like male pattern baldness, wrinkles, gray hair, etc…

Suffering? I just can’t bring myself to use that word for something like baldness or wrinkles. And since baldness is a visible testament to testosterone I’m not quite sure why any man would want to cover it up. Comb-overs are not allowed in any universe, but surgery and drugs are needlessly risky ‘cures’ for what is essentially a sign of virility. The only circumstance I can think in which actual suffering occurs in a bald man is that he forgets to use sunblock and gets burnt. Other than that, it’s just his vanity that suffers nothing else.

The same is true of wrinkles; they just are what they are. You can and should take care of your skin, use sun block regularly, moisturize, etc, and you won’t get damaged skin, but all skin wrinkles. I like them, you can read a lot in a person’s face. I’m especially enchanted by the older faces of happy couples, they have a lovely wrinkly radiance that no amount of botox, chemical peels or surgery can replace. Frankly, the stretched and unnatural look of plastic surgery patients creeps me out. But again, I would question using the descriptive “suffer” for what happens when a person wrinkles.

Suffering is limited to actual pain: grief, sickness, starvation, injury, and trial. Having wrinkles or a bald pate just doesn’t qualify as suffering. Watching your child die from starvation would.  Not liking what you see in the mirror is a different problem, the kind that needs addressing in your heart not your surface.

Next time you are tempted to think you are suffering for something merely cosmetic, stop, drop and roll in the reality.  You aren’t experiencing suffering, you are experiencing AGING.  Say it with me, AAAGGGGIIINNNNGGGGG.  Really, you want to age, it means you’re alive, and that’s a good thing.  So save the money you might have spent on unnecessary surgery and cosmeceuticals and give it to, say, an emergency relief fund for the victims of Darfur; the Tsunami or even cancer research. 

10. The smell. 

9. Face it, it’s one of the few legal stimulants you can safely brew in your own home. 

8. It provides a cash crop for Columbia that can’t be snorted up your nose.

7. It provides a handy foil for my half and half habit.

6. It’s just sooooo good with chocolate.

5. I get to say “Sumatra” when I order my favorite beans at Peaberry’s. (say it like this ‘SooooooouuuuuuMAHtraaaaaahhh’)

4. When it’s done, it’s done, I don’t have to wonder if I can get a stronger caffiene kick if I leave it in the pot for one more minute.  It only gets worse.  Whereas tea gets stronger the longer the leaves are in the hot water, thus I end up drinking semi-warm tea half the time.  Hot coffee is ready to drink the minute it’s through the grinds.  Unless you use a French Press, which, though it makes the best coffee, is a pain to clean. 

3. Holding the warm mug on a cold winter’s morning.

2. That lovely burn at the back of your throat when you gulp down the first sip early in the morning. 

1. The taste, really I love it.  Just half and half (see #7) and coffee, no sugar, no sprinkles, just the milk and the coffee.  I like espresso straight up. 

The nectar of the fall is on my lips still,

Swallowing the fruit, I race from the edge,

Yet always, I retrace my steps to find myself

Back at the beginning, facing the forbidden tree.

Crying out to heaven, aching for innocence lost

Creeping forward through the brambles,

Torn and bleeding, I hear Your voice

Calling, gently wooing me to come

Longing and terror mix, drawing me

Willing or not, to your touch

Your hand goes deep to silence

The blasphemous screaming inside

Limp and tired, I can not resist

Rest and peace follow your caress

Blessed sleep washes wounds that would not heal

Waking, I find my body whole

Cleansed and fragranced with your breath

Clothed with wonders and light

You touch my eyes, and blindness gone

I see the Great I AM.

It used to be, way back in the day, that the measure of a man or a woman was the level of self control they exerted over their baser nature. That self-control was taught, often brutally, by life, parents, nature and circumstance. Bad character wasn’t some scary creature in a B movie, it was those parts of a person’s soul that had been given over to the dark. Good character is that part of a person given over to the light. Dark meaning sin and light meaning godliness and righteousness. (Not self-righteousness, two different things.)

Yesterday I heard from Brian Williams on NBC that a new “disorder” had been “discovered”, IED, or Intermittent Explosive Disorder, the condition that makes it impossible for one to control their temper.

WHAT??????????? These are the times I’d long to use an expletive, but in the interest of showing restraint I won’t. But, WHAT???? Suddenly that fool who gets ticked on the beltway and rams the person in front gets morally let off because he has a condition that made it impossible to control his temper? Used to be that kind of “condition” got you locked up and a months worth of electro-shock therapy to boot.

Brian Nieman on WMAL rattled off some specious argument that if it’s a disorder and the person gets locked up but gets help, either way the person is off the street and they didn’t get off. Wrong, Mr. Nieman, wrong. It matters one heck of a lot HOW the person is charged and if they are held responsible for their actions morally. It matters how they are treated, what gets treated and what punishment they get. Fundamentally it is the sin of anger, which is a heart/soul ailment for which there is only one cure. That cure is repentance, there is no other way. That’s about as much “disorder” I’m willing to concede. It is morally two very different things, if, say, a man murders his wife in a fit of rage, and we find him guilty of murder rather than innocent by reason of a disorder. Guilt connotates responsibility. Innocent, even by reason of insanity, connotates a lack of responsibility. If a man has this disorder then perhaps, since he isn’t responsible for controlling his temper, he shouldn’t be allowed to date, marry or have children. Further, he shouldn’t be allowed to drive, vote, have conversations in public, visit family. He should be locked away forever in solitary since by virtue of this “disorder” he may someday go postal and murder, sorry, kill innocent people.

I love America, mostly. But this part I hate. Despise wouldn’t be to strong a word. I despise our steadily increasing insistence that we are not responsible for our actions. I guarantee you that 99.999% of those people who will say they have IED would maintain their tempers when confronted by someone bigger and armed. That miniscule minority really do have a problem that requires them to be locked up. The rest need to learn some self control and others respect. We are not all victims. Even when we are we don’t get to act with abandon.

This year my garden is producing few peas, I don’t know why, and many many more radishes. Growing up I wasn’t a fan of that little spicy red thing, but now, oh yum. But anyway, I’m still not so enamored of the straight up radish. I like it slightly marinated in Rice Vinegar, a little salt, a little pepper and I’m gone. By slightly I mean about five minutes. That seems to take the bitterness away and leaves the clear taste of the radish.

Even better than that just straight is a salad made of fresh greens and herbs straight out of my garden, seasoned with salt, kosher or sea salt, fresh ground black pepper, add a dash of really good olive oil. Then pour the bowl of marinating radishes over the lettuces and toss. Oh my lanta! That’s a really good salad. You can add a touch of grated Romano, but you don’t have to. It’s nearly perfect exactly the way it is.

Zarqawi is dead.  What good news, we have killed the number one terrorist in Iraq and several of his henchmen. 

Now hopefully we can get on with working through the peace, which is actually happening.

If I have to have a nanny I want one that possesses magical abilities, can teach me to fly and makes carousel horses run across fields. I want to dance with Dick Van Dyke and hop in and out of chalk drawings.

What I don’t want is some government agency to tell me what I can and can not eat, drive or say. There was a report this morning on the radio that the FDA is considering regulating portion size in restaurants. That’s outside the pale. The government has absolutely no business telling us how large our portions can be. They can, and do, make recommendations, but at no time do they have any business mandating portion sizes. It’s already disgusting that they regulate smoking they way they do, and tax cigarettes prohibitively the same way they tax gasoline. I don’t smoke anymore, and actually have no intention of taking it up again, but still, unless they ban the substance altogether, tobacco users should be free to smoke where they want to. I can chose to go to a restaurant that is voluntarily smoke free, or I can choose to put up with smoke. What I don’t get to do is dictate to other people what they can and can not do with a legal substance.

I readily acknowledge drinking and driving is an obvious exception to that rule, so don’t yell at me.

Anywho, I don’t elect politicians to babysit me or my neighbor, to tell me what to eat, what cars to buy, what things to wear. I expect my politicians to read the constitution, get to know it real well, pass as few new laws as are absolutely necessary, strictly enforce the ones that are, repeal old bad laws as needed and to refrain from spending my hard earned tax dollars on stupid frivolous crap like regulating portion size at The Outback. If I needed a nanny I voted for, I vote for Mary Poppins. If I want a steak bigger than is good for me, I’ll eat it and pay for it too.

Plus it would be fun to jump into that carpet bag of hers. OH, and to steal her umbrella and play pranks.