LIttle by little

It's officially looking more like fall. The leaves are changing colors and dropping down--the acorns are dropping down too. Just the other day I saw a squirrel sitting on my fence with his cheeks stuffed. I don't know where his little nest is, but Henry's been on the case all summer.

As summer slowly fades, it's hard to imagine it was ever around. It seemed to last forever, but now all those days at the pool, and sweating it out on long walks with Henry, they're all gone. A chill is in the air, and the sky is a fantastic clear blue.

I'm in the middle of edits. I'm also about to release my album (finally). Both of these are making me nuts, but I asked for it, so I have to take the stress. One thing I know for sure: there just are not enough hours in the day. I went to bed last night exhausted, and woke up like I'd never slept. To combat this, I down a good cup of coffee every morning, do stretches and drink tons and tons of water.

When I get some extra money I'm going to buy my favorite brand of cod liver oil. It's Nordic Naturals strawberry flavor. I absolutely love that stuff. Two teaspoons a day and I feel healthier and my brain works so much better. But, it's twenty bucks a bottle, so . . .

I notice that when I don't get enough sleep not only do I look tired all day, but I get grouchy and I'm less motivated to make the right choices concerning food and exercise, etc. Hopefully tonight I can catch up again!

You guys sleeping? Anyone have any good dreams to share?

Music, not words

Sometimes I have a problem with expressing myself. It's good to have a blog to help me work through that, but still even writing becomes difficult. When I was a child I learned to be quiet, real quiet. I learned that records were an escape, with their hypnotic rotation of crackling orchestration; warm voices crying, wailing, hoping. For the last couple of years I've had to learn to be quiet again, because sometimes saying anything destroys all that is around. That's just the way it is, for me and a lot of people.

Today I'm thinking of Neil Young. Actually I've been thinking of his songs all weekend, but today I can't get this particular song out of my head. Heart of Gold. You know, Neil is an acquired taste. But once you get it, it goes deep. So, to all my Rust comrades, here's a song to share.

A pot to stew

So last night I blasted music and Liam and I danced and danced and danced. I could twirl and kick and shake my hips forever, but eventually it was bedtime. I love dancing with my kids.

Julia has been having a difficult time this week with bullies, though I would never have known. I just asked her out of the blue, "Are there any bullies at your school?" "Why . . . yes." She went on to tell me about the kids at recess who push her behind trees and trap her. I guess they threw rocks at Julia's face on Friday, busting her lip, and said, "We hate you, you *****." This, to a six-year-old girl who is very nice, and really very smart. Julia is too nice, and too smart, and she's too naive and too overwhelmed. She's like a little butterfly; easy to hate and hurt if you're the hatin' hurtin' kind.

So anyway, my first urge was to go kick some grade-school behind, but I can't do that, so I'll just have to send a note to the teacher and keep a close eye on the situation.

Bullies. They'll always exist. One leaves, another sets up shop. Mean faced, scrunchy-eyed, pot-faced, yellow-teethed, rock throwin', hatin', fowl-mouthed cowards. Go away already. Leave us cool folks alone.

My mom says that when her school had bake sales, some kids would get revenge on others by putting chocolate Ex-Lax in the brownies. Now, I'm pretty darn sure that's against the law these days, but the thought of it makes me smile. Also, voodoo dolls look real good right now.

More of the same

Since all of my posts this week have pretty much been about the strange and disgusting I might as well carry on the tradition. Let's talk about oysters. Why in the world do we eat these slimy things, and RAW no less? I tried to swallow one once and just couldn't do it. That mineral-ish sea odor, that oozing slime of marine life . . . Ooooh, it gives me shivers. You can slab on as much horseradish and cayenne as you want, but those things are still not going down my throat.

What about Lima beans? They're like chunky, powdery capsules with the flavor of ear wax. Yuck.

And Liver. Please. Why would we eat a body part meant to filter out toxins? And serve it with onions? Why not serve it with dirt and rotten egg shells? It's not going to taste better, so go ahead. I have enjoyed goose liver pate in the past, but only in tiny amounts, and that was a looooong time ago. My goose toxin filtering organ days are over.

Also, I hate custard.

And that's about it.

Horrible, disgusting post

Last year in one of my many quests for healthy living I bought a box of Kashi GoLean Crunch. I wasn't looking to lose weight necessarily--though I can be somewhat obsessed with staying thin--it was more about detoxing and feeling good. The cereal tasted great, though it was a bit too crunchy. Even soaked in milk (rice milk for me) for extended amounts of time it maintained a rock-like crunch that rattled my teeth and gave my jaw quite a workout. But it tasted good. I had been afraid that Kashi would be all benefit and no pleasure. I liked it so much that for the next few days I ate it as a snack, instead of cookies or chips. But then about one evening in, I began to notice a horrible stench was following me around. I was experiencing some unusual bloating and gas, but not your usual bloating and gas. This was like super evil bloating and gas . . . with a horrible odor. But that stench just couldn't be me. I looked around to see if Henry the dachshund had been around. Nope. I ate more cereal. Another day went by and I was still having really bad gas with a horrid, rotten flesh/rotten egg aftershock. Slowly, and with dread, I realized that I could possibly be the maker of this deadly oxygen mutating nuclear plant power gas. Me. The first thing I did was stop eating the cereal. Then I went online and began to read story after story of all the other fools who'd been lured in to healthy living only to be turned into the most hideous humans on earth. Some accounts were so funny that I laughed myself into hysteria. I think it was just a relief to find out I wasn't the one making the evil stench. I mean, I was, but it wasn't me me, it was Kashi.

Have any of you tried this stuff? Had similar results? It would make a great party favor at Spencers. Or they could package it for Halloween in cute little bags with a skull and crossbones for decoration.

All I can say is losing weight and being healthy can't be worth losing your social life. I don't want to die lonely.

Strange ideas

My last post got me thinking about other phenomenons of time and space that will probably never happen, but it's fun to wonder "if." For instance, what if we had ten lives that ran parallel to each other, like lanes on a rack track; we all start off at the same spot, and time is still standard time, but each of "us" runs the race different. It would be like we intuitively know the happenings in each lane and are affected by it, but we're so concentrated on our current one that we just keep moving until we reach the end, or fall down, or pull a hamstring. Eventually we'd find something that would allow us to jump in each lane and experience the lives which are going better. But would we run the risk of destroying "our" life/lane by doing so? What if trying to find a good life, happiness, success, only makes sorrow and failure worse?

Or . . . what if when we die, we instantly go back to our life again as a baby, and each time we have that little bit of knowledge from our past trial to help us make a better life each time? Like playing cards, hoping for a good hand, playing over and over until we get a win, then when we win it's all over--we die and The End.

Or . . . what if dreams are real life, and our awake times are us dreaming? If you were an insomniac then you'd be drawing more and more away from your reality, slowly dying.

I could go on.

Time, time, time

If you found a time machine and could go back to any day or year in your life, or era/event in history, what would it be? I had a friend who explained her ideas on time travel to me back in high school, that years are like layers of an onion and someday we might access the inner rings. Or maybe time is like a movie always playing, and someday we might find a way to access each event with a remote control. We could rewind, watch, pause, then fast forward back to present day.

I would go back to the first year or two that my daughter was born. It was such a beautiful time. The feel of her in my arms, the soft feathers of her hair, her smile, her cooing, the smell of powder and milk and baby lotion. She was a smiley, happy baby in my arms and I loved every minute of her infancy. I'd visit the time my son was a baby as well, but if I had to choose, I'd choose Julia's because she was my first. Sorry Liam!

For events outside of my own personal life, I would visit the 70's (of course) and just hang around all the groovy people in a small town somewhere. Maybe just a day. See if I can get invited to a party, go to a bar, go shop at some old grocery store with all the products and their vintage packaging, read a newspaper, drive around in some old Dodge or something, talk to strangers . . . I'd go to an old department store and get decked out in all the crazy clothes, hair, makeup. I'd go to a rock concert. It would be hard planning it so that all the things I wanted to happen could happen in one area and in twenty-four hours, but it would be a blast! If you don't hear from me in a week or two, you know where I am baby!

I'd also visit the 50's. Aside from a few major flaws in society (like sexism and racism) the 50's were full of an optimistic viewpoint that is almost divine. The war was over, life was getting good. Food was a-plenty, music was everywhere. You could smoke, drink, wear bright red lipstick, drive a huge car, which, by the way, you didn't have to fill up yourself. Pollock was king, movies were cheap . . . A kid could walk not only down the street, but through the town, all by him or herself without fear. Jimmy Stewart was still around. I love Jimmy Stewart.

Let's see . . . I'd spend five minutes in these times: the ice age, the prehistoric age, the Sermon on the Mount, American Victoria, the wild west, my teenage years (shudder) . . . and many more!

What about you?

Let you entertain me

It's raining and fall has settled in and I'm in the mood to hear some real ghost stories. Real? I know some folks don't believe in ghosts, but if you have *what you believe to be* a real one-on-one encounter, or an account from a friend or relative, it'll do.

My closest ghost encounter happened at a relative's birthday party held in a Victorian bed and breakfast in Topeka, Ks. It was nighttime, and a few of us had gone to the second level of the home to check out the house design, furniture, etc. I had the overwhelming feeling of being watched as I looked over old lamps and paintings. There was a sort of feeling of not being wanted, like I was intruding, but there was no one there that I could be intruding on. No physical person, just a feeling. A trip down to the cellar heightened those feelings. There were dirt walls, creaky flooring overhead with cobwebs and slits of light shifting through. Mostly it was the shadows, the cold shadows. It felt like a grave.

Another time I had that feeling was the night I stayed at a carriage house in Aspen. Don't ever sleep in the room that used to act as a mortuary. Just. Don't. Every second of that night I felt like someone was in my face staring at me. I never was so happy to see daylight! Of course, morning in Aspen is a beautiful thing. You open the shutters and all around you are gorgeous mountain peaks and a blue sky. And no ghosts.

My next experience might occur again in Colorado, but this time in my favorite town ever: Manitou Springs with its haunted Marimont Castle. I couldn't take a tour last time, but when I do get to go again, I am definitely stepping inside.

An now it's your turn.

Late thoughts

I wanted to write about September 11th yesterday, but I felt a little overwhelmed. It's one of those subjects that, unless you know what you're really speaking about and have experienced it directly, then best leave it alone. I will say that I remember it was a beautiful fall day, and I remember all the white circles in the sky from airplanes that had been ordered to turn around and land. I remember watching the people on tv with pictures in their hands; pictures of family members who they were desperately looking for. It was chaos. It was terrible. Ten years seem like nothing, and I pray all of those who lost a loved one that day as I'm sure their pain is still fresh.

As I was explaining the memorials to Julia last night and why it all happened, all I could think was that no one on this earth should ever hate another person so much that they want to kill or cause pain. That the second we feel hatred, we should find a way to diffuse it, to find a solution to whatever is making us think we'd have a right to hate. I couldn't explain all that to a little girl, but I felt like I needed to say it to myself as a human being. We all should stop whatever we are doing, every once in a while, and remember that the strongest people on this earth are those who treat every one else with love and respect, even if it means they feel as if they've lost something. It is better to lose a little dignity than it is to hurt another human. It is better to be laughed at than it is to hate. There's that song by Paul McCartney, Fool on the Hill, about being an outsider with the weight of the world, yet the world is laughing. In my experience, those who laugh at others are incredibly insecure people. So . . . be a fool, be a clown, let people laugh. No one will see the massive muscles of your beautiful soul, but believe me, the world will feel it.

Jesus Christ Superstar

Last night the movie Jesus Christ Superstar was on, so I watched it with the kids. The first time I ever saw this movie was when I was about nine I think. Mom read in the local tv listings that it would be shown late at night, so she made my brother stay up to tape it on our Betamax. It was summer time so it was okay. The next day, my brother told me what a strange, but interesting movie it was and that I should watch it. So I did.

If you've ever watched JCS then you know how dated the movie is. There are hippies everywhere: long hair, beards, beads, halter tops, bare footed dancing . . . I was a little grossed out at first. But I really liked the music, and I was strangely pulled in by Ted Neeley (Jesus) and Carl Anderson's (Judas) phenomenal voices, and the wonderful, effective way in which they portrayed their roles. Of course, the music was great too. By the end of the movie I was in tears. We've all heard the story of Jesus dying on a cross, but seeing it was something else. It moved me, it changed me. I felt a sort of devastation and loss that seemed beyond me to understand.

I think the thing that is so effective about the movie is how Jesus is allowed to show anger. Something about that made all his pastoral scenes of quiet forgiveness and healing so much more effective. Another thing I love is how they had Jesus speak in parables: Put away your swords! Don't you know that it's all over? It was nice but now it's gone. Why are you obsessed with fighting? Stick to fishing from now on!

Did you know Ted Neeley originally wanted to play Judas in the stage version of JCS? He ended up as Jesus's understudy for a while before he took the lead role in a Los Angeles production. He has a vocal range that many rock vocalists covet. The only other male singer comparable IMO is that of the late, great Steve Marriott.

Now someone tell me if this is a real fact: did Ted really take all the lashings in the whipping scene? My brother always said he wouldn't let them fake it. If you watch that scene, it looks very real, but at the same time what kind of movie producer would let an actor endure such pain? It could have killed the poor guy!

No matter what your beliefs are, this is a beautiful movie. It is well acted, well directed, well sung. Some people love it, some hate it. But it holds that magic ability to make us think far past the ending credits.

Another sticky one

Since we're on the parenting subject, let's talk about drugs. Someday my kids are going to ask me about this, or maybe they won't. I hope they will. But since I never did any of that stuff in high school I will probably sound like a pollyanna. Someone I worked with had a great answer for her son, and that is that the problem with drugs is that they make you feel good, and you can't go around feeling good all the time, it's just not natural. Though in high school what kid doesn't want to escape the hell of being filled with doubt and hormones and bad relationships? My relief was music and books. I'd come home from school and play piano and just let all those notes take me somewhere else. I was afraid of drugs, and what they might do to change me.

There's also something about getting high that takes away growth, not physical but mental, and I'll tell my kids about that. When you're high all the time you miss all those rough spots that make you strong. It's like, if you're driving on a road and it's bumpy and full of narrow turns, and you just close your eyes and tell someone else to drive, then how can you ever claim ownership of your arrival? Does that make sense?

But at the same time, we're humans, and humans deserve to try different things in life, and a life without experimentation is closing your eyes too.

I hope I get the message across that no one's life is easy, but the good things are found with hope and love, and there's a light inside each of us that can be killed by complacency so whatever you do, do it with a good honest heart and an open mind.

Spank!

Let's talk about spanking.

Anyway, I know spanking is a dying form of punishment, and for the most part, I'm happy about that. It's humiliating for the child, and seldom ever teaches the right message. But I do believe it probably has its place in certain extreme situations. For me, being warned about a spanking was much more powerful than the act. But the act had to happen at least once for the warning to have any effect. Anyway, I've always gotten down on one knee and spoken one to one with my kids (if they weren't screaming) and tried to explain and give them options. Then there's been a lot corner time, time out, etc. Julia hates time-out and will do just about anything to avoid it. If you give her a better option, she'll gladly take it. Like, "You have to go in the corner, or you can go clean your room." "I'll clean my room." It's a winning situation!

How do you folks feel about it? I'm not asking because I want permission to spank my kids--I just thought it would be a good topic for discussion. Like I said, my way is to talk things out. But I've had some pretty interesting debates with people who think spanking is a form of abuse. I think hitting is abuse, spanking is not hitting. And the thing is, we all grew up with it and knew our parents loved us. So . . . your thoughts?

By the way, our principal in elementary school used to spank kids in his office. I know this because my brother bent all the spoons one day at lunch, and had to go in there to face the great wooden paddle.

Home Ec 101

I was just listening to NPR and they were talking about Home Economics and how it isn't taught in school anymore. Callers were saying how even though they felt their H.E. classes seemed a waste at the time, they now find themselves utilizing the basic skills they were taught such as how not to burn soup, how to make dough, how to sew. I agree. We all thought it was a stupid class but learning how to measure ingredients, how to clean . . . those were building blocks to survival as an adult. These days both parents work. Everyone eats of out of a can or a box and no one is being taught basic skills--we think we've already reached the age of the Jetsons where everything happens like magic.

A caller mentioned gardening being taught in the schools. That would be awesome. If kids can have access to a greenhouse in the winter, and tend a garden in the sunny months then that would be fantastic! If my school had allowed us to garden at recess I totally would have. I hated sports and all the dichotomy of how to be popular. Plants would have given me a much healthier view of school. I would have actually wanted to go every day!

So, what do you think? Did you have Home Ec and did you like it? Did it enhance your life? All I can say is I learned how to make biscuits, how to clean, how to sew a kitty cat door stop. I'm set for life!

Something ain't right here . . .

Well, I've been hacked. Spammed. Virused. Here on the blogger apparently, and on twitter. I don't even want to know the horrible tweets some spambot was sending out under my name, but I do have a sense of humor about it and can laugh at how absurd it is. Not sure what I did to start the whole thing, but I'll fix it somehow. I already closed down my twitter account. And now that I've shut it down it feels kind of a relief to not have to deal with that stuff anymore. Do you we really need to know who's doing what every second of the day? I loved re-tweeting friends' book announcements and good news, but other than that it was just a big popularity contest of who could be the wittiest or the most friendly twitterer. It was like high school, man.

So, I'm out twitter. Sayonara. Adios. And as for google blogs here, I don't know. I'll find your little virus and squash it somehow.

Rings

I woke up this morning with a David Bowie song in my head: Modern Love. Man, I really had a crush on David. There are certain childhood memories that come back stronger than the others, and many of them have to do with music. I grew up listening to old records, so there was a period when Gene Autry was all us kids listened to, then it was Steve and Eydie Gorme, "Go away little girl . . ." I mean, I grew up singing songs that other kids definitely weren't, and I'm really happy about that. But then the modern music became interesting and I loved Blondie and Elton John, Rick Springfield, Queen, David Bowie, and then Billy Idol. Remember Eyes Without a Face? That was a great song!

Other childhood memories that really stick out have to do with nature and playing in the backyard with neighborhood kids. There's just something beautiful about the memory of being this little, fresh human in the middle of a big field with the sun and the grass and all of us kids running around laughing, being free. It sounds corny, but it outshines all the moments that came. But one thing I've thought about is how much life changes. Sometimes it feels like it stays the same, but if you sort through all the years, there are phases and those phases change us like rings in a tree trunk. We keep adding these layers; we keep growing. We're standing still, but something is shifting and branching out. It's strange and exciting.