It's this moment that counts

Living in the moment ... what does it mean exactly?

Today I learned that someone died that shouldn't have. A young woman, a little older than myself, diagnosed with cancer on Thursday and gone by the end of the weekend. As I thought about her through the course of the day, I wondered if she lived in the moment. I suspect not. I don't think that she was very happy -- at least not ultimately.

I then thought that this is the second person, a contemporary, who has died. I remember reading a long time ago that the stage of life you are in is very easy to recognize ... if you are in your 20's, you will be attending weddings. When you are in your 30's you will be having children and everyone else you know will too. After that ... it will be funerals.

You really don't think that it's going to be in your 40's -- but I haven't been to a wedding in a long time nor had a friend who has had a baby recently. I guess, as they say, the writing is on the wall!

There is nothing wrong with reminders I suppose of your mortality. And this living in the moment idea -- it has merit if the string of moments will cease sooner than later. Making every moment count ... not whiling away your time in a job you hate or a marriage that is unhappy or wondering when things will get better ... is the only way to live. Because otherwise you aren't living.

When I picked Charlie up from school today he had something to tell me that "would make me very mad." Great.

Apparently he had to serve a detention because during his Spanish class he hadn't finished his homework and while asking the teacher how to do the second problem, another kid walked by and supposedly the teacher thought he tripped him, but he really didn't blah blah blah.

I said to Charlie, people get exasperated with you after a time. I get exasperated ... and maybe you didn't trip the kid then but you'd done other things that exasperated the teacher ... and the ultimate consequence of that is an "unfair" detention. I told him I wasn't mad -- I was exasperated.

He said he could do nothing right ... the usual. I just calmly told him that it was a daily choice to believe that someone else was in charge of the way his day went ... his feelings. But the real truth is that HE is in charge of everything.

We came into the house from the car and he was quiet, upset. I know he has a vocabulary test tomorrow, but I also knew that it wasn't the time to bring it up. So I did not. After a few minutes, he asked me if I would do something with him. I said sure. Then he seemed to let the feelings of inadequacy and worthlessness slip away in reaction to my willingness to participate with him in something other than my constant reminding him of his inadequacy and worthlesness and he suggested we watch a movie.

Dinner has yet to be dealt with and I was hoping to get some reading in as chapter five is being discussed with Oprah and Eckhart tonight ... but said yes because it felt right. We decided to watch Into the Wild, which we'd seen a few months ago in the movie theatre but the fire alarm went off and we'd never seen the end. It is about a boy who graduates from college and then retreats from society (and his family) and eventually ends up in a bus in the wilderness, where he dies from starvation. It is a true story ... and it's actually an appropriate movie to be watching with your exasperating son!

We've had several thoughtful dialogues ... such as how awful it was for this boy to just abandon his family -- and no matter what your parent's have done to you, it sure doesn't seem fair to make them suffer by not knowing whether or not you're dead or alive.

And also, the boy is very intelligent and therefore ultimately a disappointment to his father because he won't use that intelligence for things that utilize that intelligence, such as being a lawyer, continuing on to law school and "doing something with his life." So we talked about that -- expectations of other people. And I said, no matter what I think a parent would rather have their child in their life -- and if you believe you are a child who is a disappointment to your parents -- the only thing you can do is not be a disappointment to yourself.

I don't think he gets that, but then I started to wonder why he was so much more relaxed and open to conversation and it hit me. The reason he wanted to watch a movie with me is because Maddie has been talking about how much she has enjoyed the past few weeks hanging with me and watching movies.

My AHA moment. And then I thought about how many moments we have missed that could have been steeped in intellectual conversation based on being in the moment ... and instead we fought about the future ... homework, a test, and lost precious moments.

It's really all about time. All he wants is someone to relate to him for who he is ... right now. He doesn't want to have to DO something (homework, chores, etc.) in order to "earn" something. That something even being human contact.

It's hard to live in the moment.
It's hard to be a parent.

But if I am living in the moment ... then I am only ... a good mom!

A little sketchy ...

This is me as a sketch?  What do you think ... ?  I have been playing with Photoshop Express -- an online version that you can use by simply signing up.  It doesn't offer a whole lot of things I don't have in other photo programs (with the exception of this sketch like thing that really makes me look as though I am melting!) but you can also use it to crop photos, etc. and embed them directly to Facebook -- which might come in handy for all you Facebookers.

Check out the link:  Adobe Photoshop Express

For only 18 cents a day

It is late Sunday afternoon and I am lanquishing in the living room after an awesome (gosh I hate that term but sometimes another word just doesn't seem to portray the awesomeness of the event!) half day of skiing. The conditions were primo and the weather to die for. Sunny, blue skies and ... I got to ski with NO HAT! Ahhhhhhhh. It doesn't get much better than that.

But back to the lanquishing ... as my muscles relax and a haze of happy contentment envelopes me because I am glad to be doing nothing ... the television is on and these commercials keep coming on. I am not paying a lot of attention, I am more on the computer than watching the tube, but the first commercial that caught my glance was one on the dying polar bears. Sharon Lawrence (she was on Hill Street Blues) speaks in the most solemn of tones about how polar bears are going to be extinct soon. With a picture of a mommy polar bear and her baby on a floating piece of ice ... she voices over about how the moms have to swim so far to get food and the babies die while waiting ... but then her voice changes a little and she says that for $19.95 a month you can help save the polar bears, and you will receive a photo of the bear that you are "sponsoring" and remember, for only pennies a day you can ensure that your children's children will have polar bears in their lifetime.

It kind of felt like those Saturday Night Live commercials that were fake -- spoofs on commercials. This one felt like a spoof on the Save the Children ads where you see the pictures of the malnourished kids surrounded by flies and for only pennies a day you can help save a child's life. (And you receive a photograph of the child you sponsor ...)

But of course with global warming we no longer just have to worry about children we can save with our pennies -- but polar bears. And I thought to myself ... polar bears, what next?

Then Sarah Maclachlan (a singer) came on and she had a dog in her lap, and she was talking about all the animals that need homes, or food, or shelter or medicine ... and there were pictures of cats getting shots and dogs getting a bowl of food ... and this one was for the SPCA of America and for only pennies a day ... and I thought, you have to be kidding!

It's one of those "Am I on Candid Camera" situations ... where you look around sure that something is up ... because honestly I had no idea so many animals of the world were in such dire straights. And where does one draw the line? How many different animals do we sign up to save for pennies a day before we're broke? And do we let the children starve so that the polar bears can survive?

I am not against such campaigns -- at the very least they create an awareness of various situations. I've heard about the polar bears, but exactly what will the money go to? Rescue missions? Will these polar bears be rescued and taken to some zoo? Because I bet if you asked the polar bear whether they wanted to die in their own environment or live their life in a tiny cage with people staring at them, they might not be so appreciative of the pennies-a-day approach to saving.

The polar bears are a symptom of a greater problem -- and it might just be that there is nothing we can do to stop the melting of the polar ice caps at this point, and it might just be pointless to save the polar bears. They are who they are because of where they lived ... if their environment ceases to exist ...

Gosh, that sounds heartless. I don't mean for it to be. Years ago I sponsored a child for $18 a month through one of those organizations, and I received my photograph and my letter and then I started to receive pleas for more money. And the pleas for more money came on nicer stock paper -- fancier (and ultimately more expensive) and I was actually told forthright in a glossy postcard that if I did not up my monthly fee my child would go hungry.

So I called them and said I am going to continue to send $18 a month and I would like for you to make up the difference in their new $25 a month fee by NOT sending me expensive mailings ... well, of course, I was eventually dumped for being a delinquit member! Can you imagine? These organizations are machines -- they employ people and their focus is to make money. Their focus is NOT whatever their cause is. I am sure there are ad agencies that have created a nice niche in "cause commercials." Because they all sound the same and have the same formula: Celebrity with solemn voice, heart-wrenching photos and mournful music. And the exact same mentality that even YOU (you selfish person sitting in your living room watching your big-screen TV) can spare pennies a day.

Are there any causes that are pure? Or am I just jaded beyond rehabilitation?

For only pennies a day you can make me a better person. You will receive a photo of me and a note of thanks.

Or, you can just ignore my plea. It is up to you.
::::::::::::::::::fade out music:::::::::::::::::::::::::

Shot again

It happened again last night:  I was shot.

I was standing on a dark city street and my thought was "I probably shouldn't be standing here," and out came a couple, a man and a woman, and the next thought I had was relief, "oh, I am not alone," then one of them raised a gun and shot me.

"Not again!" I thought, and then woke up to a less jarring feeling (the last time I literally felt a whoosh as though the blood was draining from my body).  This time, it was just in my stomach, and I felt a tingling that spread, kind of like when a rock hits the water and then the circles grow wider ... that is what I felt throughout my center.  And while that was happening I was consciously thinking "nope, just a dream, it's happened again."

I am assuming that this is all about my "enlightenment" but I have to say, it's a little disconcerting.  I was scouring the Internet for more information on gunshot dreams, and this explanation appealed to me: a gunshot is a spontaneous discharge of energy similar to a lightening bolt.

Like BANG, there goes the fun Lisa, the Lisa that gets to pick on persons, places and things!

Nah, my personal interpretation is that as I become more aware of what I am learning through A New Earth, old beliefs are falling away, and that is kind of like a new person being reborn.

I was reading the book this morning and I noticed that I kept closing my eyes and retreating into myself, focusing on the aliveness in different parts of my body, basically taking an "awareness break," and then returning to my reading.  Because it is heady stuff, and because I am always, always, always consumed with thoughts and I just don't see how any of this works without thoughts!  And yet ... I kind of do.  It's like ... it's like a word that is on the tip of my tongue, I know what it is, but it just won't come.  That's how I feel about all of the information in the book.  I get it!  I just don't get it.  You know?

I was watching the fourth installment of the webcast with Oprah and Eckhart Tolle today and everything they discussed made sense to me.  The fourth chapter is about roles the ego plays -- and I can look back through my life and see the roles I have played, and actually felt as though I was playing a role in many instances!   There is nothing wrong with a role (mother, doctor, woman, daughter, etc.) the key is just not to identify with those roles as your total being.  I have never done this to any extreme -- I think many of the aspects of this chapter come naturally to me -- like I am a mother but it's not who I am and I've always known that my role is to guide my children but not to smother them or believe that I always know best.  And I don't do guilt -- and I never have, and that was one of the questions that came up ... how do you avoid feeling guilty about not being a good mother, etc., and I thought, "oh, I don't have that problem!"  (Is this my ego talking?  I think so, I am squirming in my chair again like I am great ... geesh).

But here is something to ponder.  A Zen master stated:  "His need to win drains him of power."

To have mastery in any endeavor you must be 100 percent present.  

I am working on this!  But man, then I think, well, I am often thinking of five different things at the same time, and if I am doing that, well then again, how can you think all the time and be present because the thoughts are like little black flies buzzing in your ear demanding your attention and ... clearly my problem is focus.  I need to F O C U S.

And I didn't do that did I in this entry?

Well I don't care, I don't feel guilty :P

I hate school

I've always hated it ... and now I hate it for what it does to my child.  I hate how it makes him miserable, how it is truly a compulsory waste of hours upon hours of his life, steeped in negativity.

For that, I have decided, is what this public school system is rooted in:  Negative energy.

He received his book report back and the grade was a 92.  Why not a 100?  I had gone over it with him, he'd read the book, he'd put together the report according to the instructions.  Bottom line, he'd read the book and done the time.  That in my mind is a 100 percent.

Well ... yes, in a positive-energy world, that would be so.  But in a negative-energy world, the focus must be on what was done wrong, not all the right.  In this case, he had neglected to put the name of the book and the author's name in this particular spot -- and hence, in the rubric, four points were taken off for "not following directions properly."  Four more points were taken off for "grammar and punctuation" though for the life of me I couldn't find any problems, and the teacher didn't take the time to underline or point out these things.

But in this school it's no big deal, you just make an appointment with the teacher and you can bring your grade up.  Well, it seems somewhat pointless, doesn't it?  The damage has already been done.  I know how I felt when I sat there and read how many things had been done wrong (with no acknowledgement whatsoever of anything positive) -- and this after going over it with him several times to make sure nothing was missing.  The fact of the matter is, it is set up to make a student fail if a writer and editor can not find anything wrong with a book report but a teacher can.

Peter doesn't get it.  His viewpoint is you are mad about an A grade.  Well, Charlie doesn't see anything but what he's done wrong and so it makes him feel bad and he stops trying.  Which makes perfect sense to me because it's a game of simon says -- and it's hard to pat your tummy and your nose at the same time.  Try it!  And once you figure out how to pat your tummy and nose as best you can, it will change and you'll have to pat your tummy and nose and hop on one foot.

It's crap, and yesterday I told him we'd look at another school.  He looked the school up on the internet, said it looked cool, and once again I saw my son return.  The happy-go-lucky one that isn't decimated by a bunch of negative-energy happiness sucking stupid-rules-loving "teachers," who in truth only teach you that no matter how hard you try you will do SOMETHING wrong.  But never fear, we can go over all the things you've done WRONG, to reinforce that you aren't that bright as we have been showing you since grade one ... have you not gotten it YET?

Yeah, well, I got it on day one.  And so did he, and yet we've been struggling through this for years now, like one does in a bad marriage, hoping that tomorrow will be better, when of course we know it will not.  I've tried to divorce it, (home schooling)  I've tried to remarry (private school) -- but ultimately the problem lies with us.  Charlie and I.  We see through the facade -- we see that the system isn't working -- never really has -- and that doesn't sit right with either of us.  I can see myself in Charlie many years ago, but I had the benefit of a few teachers who liked me, even respected me for my need to rebel.

But there are no people left like that anymore within the public school system (and if there are, they don't last long) because you can't spend your days banging your head against the wall.  It hurts too much and it doesn't do a damn thing toward change.  There are people who can bide their time, get through ... and that is what we have been trying to do.

But ultimately, Charlie and I, we're not good at living lies, or trying to be people that we're not.  We can be inside the box for only so long, then we start to rot.

I don't know if I mentioned this before, because it has been in my head, but if I had children now I would have them "off the grid."  A kid off the grid.   Therefore no one would know of their existence and they wouldn't have to go to school!  They would be phantom children until one day we wanted to come out of our cocoon and get all the benefits of the system.  Oh wait, that day probably wouldn't ever come now would it?  Benefits?  Like what?  Paying taxes?  

I say this kid off the grid thing because I'd just like to take him out of school.  And do what with him I don't know, maybe travel across the country and pick up odd jobs to fund our adventure and meet all kinds of different people and see how people live their lives and build deep relationships with others based on just because you are there at that time and space of life.

Now that would be learning.  Not dying inside on a daily basis.  I know that's what it feels like.  

I've been there, done that.  And I was so much stronger then than he is, and so much more sure of myself than he is, and I barely made it through. 

This is why I can't send him back there much longer.  

It's killing both of us.

I love him, I really do, it's only been a few days, but he's my soul mate

I had an epiphany last night.  It hit me out of the blue like a brick between the eyes.

I am not eligible to be on The Bachelor as a potential bride-to-be.

I mean, overlooking the obvious reasons such as I am already married, don't want a man that has to have a stable of them to choose from and I'm not within the right age group, the one thing that stood out to me was:

I am not, have never been and never will be that PATHETIC.

Yeah, yeah, it's a label, blah blah blah but come on, are you kidding me?

Why would you do this to yourself?  As a lark?  Fine, then stick with that plan, because every single woman sobs into the camera how she didn't expect to, but she is "falling in love" with this man.  And then, humiliation after humiliation follows as these women who sort of become friends have to watch each other get kisses and time alone with the "prize."

OMG -- I am so not going to walk into a room after he's played tongue-tag with sexy blonde and then stick my tongue down his throat to try to get him.  I mean, gross.  But that's what they do -- they keep cornering the guy, trying to get him to kiss them.  I am saying this as though it is a challenge, but of course it's not.  The guy has 25 women who want to kiss him.  He's not using a stick.

This one is from London and he has the lovely accent and quite frankly, I'd be interested.  But not under those circumstances!  Not to mention LADIES ... to date not one match-up from this silly series has ever actually culminated in marriage.  So why put yourself through all the angst?  And again, the humiliation!  One sexy blonde kept repeating that she did NOT need to share a man with anyone, she did not NEED to be put into this situation, and yet ... she gushed with relief when she got a rose.  

It's like a dream situation for a guy -- he can weed out the uglies, wackos and brunettes if they aren't his style right from the get-go and then narrow it down to a nice manageable bunch who are all willing to do ANYTHING to get him.  You notice I do not question why the BACHELOR is doing this show.  I get that.  It's these women!  I can't find out whether or not they get paid -- but I hope so.

Anyway, I will never get to witness this humiliation myself.

Isn't that sad?

Somebody's compost is another person's garbage

This is what the restaurant-owner down the road calls compost.  He carries his dirty paper towels (from the bathroom?) and other garbage mixed with food waste and dumps it in his field.

Bears, coyotes, turkey vultures and domestic dogs adore this "banquet" of treats that he puts out for them daily.  Oh, sorry, that he puts out to "compost" daily.  And my dogs just can't leave it alone -- and it sucks.

I've tried everything, put this dog out and not the other, those two but not that one, and there is no secret combination.  If the wind is just right and the pile just ripe, they head down.  At breakneck speed -- I've caught them en-route, the day I went down to take this picture.  They are single-minded in their pursuit of yummy yummy garbage.  And with the full moon the past few nights, they've been headed down at night too.

Today I realized something had to be done, so I called the owner and in the most genial tone I've got going, I said to him, Hi, this is your neighbor up the road and I was wondering if you would mind if I came down there with a shovel and some bags and got rid of that garbage for you in the field.

He said no.

I said, genially, soothingly, encouragingly, but why not?   You don't have to do a thing!  I will just come and remove it and take it to the dump.

He said no.

I said, but it's really a problem, there are wild animals traipsing through my property to go feed on your pile, not to mention my dogs.  And since it is just garbage, I don't see why you would mind ...

I said no, he said nastily.  How many times do I have to say it?  This is my property ... I pay $8,500 a year in taxes and it is my field and I can do whatever I want on it.

I said with a purr, I knnnnnow it's your property, I do not dispute that at all, and I agree, we should all be allowed to do as we wish with our own property, I am just asking if I can dispose of your garbage.

It's not garbage, he interrupted me, it's compost.  (please refer to picture here).

I was getting a little ticked off at this point -- clearly his agenda is I get to do whatever I want and no one is going to tell me otherwise -- I heard that loud and clear.  But that doesn't SOLVE MY PROBLEM.

I said no, it's not compost.

Yes it is, he said.

I said I hope that you don't actually use that in your garden ... in your food.

And he said "only on yours."

Nice, huh?

I took a deep breath and said, can't we just be neighborly about this?  Can't we come to some type of an agreement here.

I get visits from your dogs all the time, he said.

I know, I replied, and I would do anything to stop it.

Build a fence, he said.

Or, I said, I could take your garbage to the dump for you!  

It's not garbage, and this isn't Russia or Iran, I can do whatever I want, no one gets to tell me what I do with my property.

I said, but I bet that even in Russia or Iran there are people who wish to be good neighbors.

Then he got really nasty and I actually hung up, because I didn't want to lose my cool.

And then I reacted and wrote a letter to the N.H. Bureau of Food Protection and I think we all know I might just as well piss in the wind as to believe that anything will come of that, but it's better than going down there with gasoline and torching the pile, which has been my latest thought.  Though my dogs probably would appreciate BBQed garbage!

I have actually been avoiding this because to me it seems steeped in negativity and I didn't want to go there.  But the fact of the matter is that it's getting worse, not better, and I am so frustrated with the situation.  

I then watched the third installment of the Oprah videocast of A New Earth -- and it was speaking to me.

Whatever you fight, you strengthen -- and what you resist, persists.

Am I fighting this?  Well, ultimately I suppose, but my conscious thought today was how can I deal with this in a positive manner?   And my answer was to offer to rid us both of his garbage.  He didn't like it.  Then, I thought, well he is a very sad person, and I realize that it is his ego ranting and raving and I've known from meeting him in the past that he is abrupt and rude, so none of that was a big surprise.  I consciously understand this, I understand it is his ego holding on to his garbage pile for all it is worth -- and I understand that it is my ego trying to be a better person than he is!  I get all this.

But the damn pile is still there!

But in retrospect I can see that I was reactionary-- and this is very, very bad!  And here's the thing -- I am strapped with a honking ego AND a trigger ready reactionary response.  I have no problem ranting out emails and pushing the button.  I am doubly cursed and I know this.

But then ... Oprah said about dealing with irrational people -- that you had to be highly evolved to receive them as they were and ultimately bring them into your conscious state of awareness.  And I thought Ha!  I had it, I tried, but it's not easy.  And Eckhart Tolle said that people react automatically -- because there are thousands of years of such behavior hard wired into us.  But if you realize after an event has occurred what you did, then you are on your way to a harmonious state of consciousness and not resistance.

Well phew!  I don't want drama!  Truly!

I just want the pile of crap to dissolve.  And somehow my ego and my reactionary impulses must dissolve too.

 I am mellllllllllTing.

Across the Universe

I am watching http://www.sonypictures.com/homevideo/acrosstheuniverse/ for the second time with the kids. (Second time for me, first time for them). It is a beautiful film that is set in the 60's and is told with an amazing weaving of Beatle's songs that results in a dramatic musical with the coolest cinematography.

It's a true work of art. And like anything thought-provoking and magical, it eclipsed the box charts and went directly to oblivion. I only heard of it because on Oprah, she was interviewing the director, Julie Taymor, in an old episode. I knew it was an old episode because Oprah was thin, and when they showed clips from the movie, I wondered, how did I miss it? I go to see a lot of movies, but really, we are subjected to so few movies through mainstream media -- primarily only the bang-bang-beat-'em-up blockbusters make box office glory. Just another sign of our society.

No depth!

Anyway, I'll stop picking on society long enough to tell you why you should see this movie. Jude (as in Hey Jude) comes from Liverpool to find his father and ends up with an ivy-league drop-out in New York City, who happens to have a lovely blonde sister named ... Lucy (in the sky ... with diamonds). The brother gets drafted into the war and Lucy becomes entrenched in the anti-war movement, while Jude, a shipyard worker in his native homeland which has no draft, just falls in love with Lucy. And makes beautiful art.

The symbolism is thought-provoking -- and with the exception of a few scenes that I presume are acid trips -- it flows very well with the music.

"We're in the middle of a revolution Jude. And what are you doing, doodles and cartoons?"

"Well, maybe when bombs start going off here, people will listen," Lucy screams in frustration.

(Oh yeah, we'll listen.)

All you need is love.
All you need is love.
All you need is love.
Love. Love is all you need.

Happy Spring (HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!)

As a non-rule follower, I am not one to get too upset if say, Mother Nature decides to be a little coy in her delivery of Spring.  I mean, I can take a joke.  And just because the calendar says so, and half the country (and one state over) is talking about normal spring-like activities such as yard work and sports practice on green fields, I can hack a few extra weeks of winter, even if I am not particularly in the mood.

But this is ridiculous.  And this was today.

 

Up at the top of the mountain, it was gloriously beautiful.  The sky was achingly blue and the contrast of the ice-jeweled trees was spectacular (and near impossible to catch in a photograph).  I kept putting myself in the moment and enjoyed the scenery with all my being.

But come on now.  This is getting out of hand.  It is ridiculous.  Utterly.

    

I may have a smile here, but do you see behind me?  That is shiny moguls, shiny because they are encrusted in ice.  They are ice-oguls.  Inside I am not smiling, I am disgusted that I have to wear a hat.  Anyone who knows me knows I will endure some pretty frigid temps in order to ski without a hat and goggles.  To me, it is sheer freedom to have my hair flying in the wind as I zoom down the trail.  But today I had to wear a neck warmer for heaven's sake.  

It's wrong I tell ya.   We should be skiing in our spring togs -- light jackets, NO hats, and we should be getting our late season tans.  HA!

But every negative has a positive and it was fast skiing -- like whoa!  Next time I take my camera skiing with me, I am NOT going to be wearing a hat.  I don't care, Mother Nature can screw around with my head as much as she wants, but it's not going to be in a hat.  

Nurturing vs. tough love

Maddie had surgery on Tuesday to repair a torn ACL -- I had written in an earlier blog entry that I questioned the necessity of this, but now it is done!  And she is in pain, which I truly think is a surprise for her.  And I get that.  I always think that I am stronger than anything and can hack whatever is thrown my way.  But pain, pain is tough.

Since Tuesday I have virtually been by her side constantly.   Not through any design -- it just turned out that way.  After we came home on Tuesday afternoon and I'd set her up in the living room on the couch, made sure her pain meds were up-to-date, that she had something to drink, a pillow to prop her leg, a blanket to keep her warm, the jelly beans she wanted so badly, her laptop and phone ... I at last settled down beside her in the chair and felt exhaustion creep into my body.

It's not easy spending a day waiting for someone to get out of surgery and not easy watching them be in pain.  In fact, I have discovered, it is quite debilitating!  So I spent the rest of the afternoon watching taped episodes of Ellen -- and everytime Maddie would wake up, she would say, "We're still watching Ellen?"  It was kind of funny -- she was in a drugged daze anyway, and then to find Ellen everytime she opened her eyes, was like Groundhog Day!  Finally she asked if we could watch another show!  (She never watched any of the shows, she would fade out the moment she opened her eyes!)

Fortunately I had meals prepared, so I could continue to hibernate in the living room with her.  When she would wake up and look to see if I was there, it reminded me of when I was on the same couch recovering from gallbladder surgery, and I was always alone!  No one wanted to watch what I was watching on the TV, so they all went into the other room.  So I spent hours and hours and hours alone, and I didn't like it.  So I wanted to be there for her, to give her that sense of security.

Then she started to ask, when I rustled in the chair "where are you going?"  She was becoming attached to my presence!  But there she was, a total invalid with this knee trussed in bandages and a brace and tears running down her cheeks from the pain, who could leave?

On Thursday we had to go to the doctor's office to have the drain removed, and I took a look at the knee.  Now, I don't know what I had been envisioning, but there it was, her knee, perfectly intact!  It was done arthroscopically, so the only incisions were tiny and below the knee.  There was, however, a hole drilled into the top of her knee for the drain tubing, and that was pretty cool looking.  But ... here I was babying her thinking that her entire knee might fall apart or something (you know how the imagination works!) and really, all that bandaging, padding and ace bandaging is one big overkill.  There is no bleeding.  At all.  I started to think, hmmmmm.

They want her to do excercises, they want her to start putting a little pressure on the leg.  And she's calling me to help her adjust her position on the couch.

I had, officially, become an enabler!  She didn't want to give it up!  Even her brother would come home from school and immediately put himself in her service, and he was busy bustling between kitchen and living room making deliveries!  So when I put her to bed last night I said, tomorrow you need to move around more, take less pain medication and a SHOWER!

So thus far it has been interesting.  She went into the kitchen and assembled her breakfast (leftover chinese food, but a recovering enabler can't jump off the wagon at the first sign of something they don't like!)   Then I watched as she tried to crutch her way into the living room balancing a tray of well, grease.

I jumped up.  Not to enable the patient but to save my rug!  She saw her opportunity and took advantage:  Oh, you don't have to take my plate, but since you're here, could you grab me a drink, that tray and my laptop?

She is good.  I didn't see any of that coming!  Like I said, my concern was for the rug!  But I found myself helping her get into position and I stopped.  No!  You NEED to lift your leg, I told her.  It's not some hunk of wood attached to your body, it is full of muscles that are perfectly intact and you need to use them.

She looked at me with such a look of sadness.  Clearly, she enjoyed the pampering, the special attention, the $15 bag of gourmet jelly beans (my mother got those).  But it's my job to discern the fine line between nurturing and the application of a little tough love in order to get her motivated.  And while it takes a strong stomach to be a tough parent, I can see that she needs it.  It doesn't mean I won't continue to help her out, but she HAS to take a shower.  She doesn't believe that this is an issue, but I am telling you, it so is.

She stinks.

 And I think once she sees her knee (she wouldn't look at the doctor's office yesterday) she will realize that she really is fine, that it's not a bloody pulp of quivering useless flesh.  Which is what I thought before I saw it!  Like I said, I have quite the imagination.

And so does she!

Awareness

It is Monday and Oprah and Eckhart Tolle will have their "class" tonight on the book A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose.  I was listening to last week's today because I haven't had a chance up until now.  It really does re-ignite the sparks one generates from the initial reading, going over and over the meanings and interpretations of things until all of a sudden it fans into flames and you go OUCH.  Well, you know, it "burns" into your brain!

Chapter two is about ego -- and its content and structure.  While I have a general understanding of ego and its role in basically ruining our lives, I have been questioning it the past few weeks.  Like is any type of want bad?  Are there any situations where one can think something or someone is bad or wrong or right even?  It made me angry to think that here I was controlled by this ego-maniac (me) and yet, if I removed this ego-maniac (me) then who the hell am I?

And then again, have I not been asking this question since I was a child?  Why didn't someone just hand me this book then?  Why did I have to spend years in egoic delusion?  And no one thinks everything isn't a conspiracy.  HA!

One thing we know for sure is that the ego is never satisfied.  And the basis of our world economy relies on ego -- the more one wants, the more one spends, the more one spends, the more stuff can be generated to meet the never-ending demands of the ego.  Yikes!

And that I can see clearly.  For example, I walked into the store one day to accompany my father and sister who were both looking for laptops.  I had already ordered myself a new desktop and had no wants or needs -- I'd custom-designed the perfect system for myself.  But then I went by the biggest, honking, most beautiful screen I'd ever seen and I stopped and said ... "I must have that."

Well, I know when I utter those words it's a done deal, as do my sister and father, and they both looked at me in confusion.  Were we not in this very store to buy THEM computers?  Sure, yeah, fine, but it was clear to me that I could not live another day on this planet without being in possession of that iMac.  With its 24" screen and the fact that it was comprised solely of the monitor itself -- no big box to kick on the floor -- well, we both knew we were in love.  I helped them look at laptops, but I kept drifting back to the iMac to run my hand lovingly across its sleek, white smoothness.  Ahhhhhhhhh.

My sister knew I was distracted and she looked at the computer, but she didn't want a desktop.  She wanted a laptop.  So I pointed out the Mac laptops -- just the clarity in the images were to die for.  But they were ... more expensive.  Unlike me, who would never let a price tag make a decision about something that I will spend more time with than anyone or anything else on this planet ... my sister is quite taken by cost.  She bought a cheaper PC laptop and I made sure I could cancel the PC I'd already ordered and paid for and then welcomed my new family member with loving arms.

And it was perfect.  Is perfect ... except that it's not new anymore.  And the new ones have really necessary improvements like different colors and sleeker software that everyone complains doesn't really work but still ... they have it and I don't.

It's RIDICULOUS!  There is nothing wrong with this iMac -- it is as fast and beautiful as the day I brought it home ... but the marketplace is geared toward making me feel bad -- making me feel as though others have something I should probably have.  Because ... I deserve.  Right?  The ego is NEVER satisfied.  It identifies with the past and the future -- the past was when I had the best darn iMac on the market, and the future is when I realize I can't live without the more bestest darn IMac on the market.

What the ego does not engage in is the here and now.  The ego overlooks the now, and the secret to all is that ... there is no life apart from now.

Wow!  Got it?  So if I don't go into the past and recall the salad days of new computer ownership, and I don't look into the future and wonder if life will be much better if I have a pink computer, but instead just say RIGHT NOW I have this computer and it is perfect and it does EVERYTHING I need it to do, and more ... then I am one hundred percent enlightened.

Hot damn!

Ahhh, but here is the rub.  If I think that I am superior, then that is my ego talking.  So do I believe that I am superior because right this very second I am wallowing in the fact that I am being present and enjoying my computer for what it is, not what it was or will be?  

Guilty as charged.  I do!  I am sitting here with a little grin on my face and hopping up and down in my chair and thinking I AM BETTER THAN YOU ARE!  I swear to God.  (And quite frankly, it is actually even possible that **I** am better than you are.  I mean, it's possible, right?)

So ultimately I will reach my inner peace (I will be awakened, though obviously it is apparent to all reading this that I am WIDE awake!) before you all, and then I will have to dissolve the egoic rantings that I am better than everyone (we are talking about a person who referred to herself as Lisa The Great into the 80's) and move into a space where I am forever in the present -- which will then in turn be the foundation for the rest of my life.

The ultimate goal is internal alignment with the present moment.

Accepting is ness.

Have I mentioned we're only on Chapter two?

I am officially NOT NICE

You know, all this talk about being a better person, becoming enlightened -- destroying ego, etc. is all well and good, but I think the bottom line is, I am NOT a nice person.

Now, theoretically, my recognizing that I am NOT a nice person should somehow mean that since I am conscious of it, I am somehow less not nice. At least that is my best interpretation of it, but it is obviously silly. How can you be NOT nice, know it, and then be nice? Doesn't make sense, because the NOT nice acts that you have committed have still taken place.

Anyway, I do try to be nice, I try to be friendly, not over-critical, judgemental and overall kind. I am not saying I reach these goals on a daily basis, but ultimately that is my intent. But what I did yesterday and what I've done in the past in the same situation makes me realize, nope, I am NOT nice.

When you go skiing you use a chairlift to get to the top of the mountain. They came in all sizes, but primarily a chair will fit between two and four people -- doubles, triples and quads. I ski in groups of all sizes and when there are say five of us going up on the triple, two people will go together and then three, or if there are seven people going up on a quad we will split up, four and three -- basic math equations that we figure out before we get on the chair.

But there is one variable that always comes into play that I HATE! Yes, I hate it. It shouldn't bug me so, but it does. It's the damn singles line!

When I ski alone, which I don't prefer to do, but I have many times, I will go up on the chair alone, by choice. I like to go up alone, it is a time to be reflective, to meditate or just be. I experience the alone time for what it is, both on the chair and off, and I don't expect anyone else to be there for me.

What does that mean? Well, "those" people in the singles line I believe have ulterior motives! I know this sounds ridiculous, but I truly think they choose to ski this way just to bug me! HAHAHAHA. Yes, I know, the whole world wants to ride the chair with Lisa. Sounds crazy, but unless you are out there skiing with me, you have no idea. It is true. Because how else would you explain the way people will go to all sorts of extremes to get on a chair with me?

Well, maybe not all sorts of extremes, but it sounds good! Often when Peter and I are skiing, some person will get on the chair with us because they want to talk. And that is what they will do. Blab blab blab blab blab. Because I am seriously a wench and am thoroughly disgusted that they have hijacked my chair, I won't participate, but Peter is always more than willing to chat them up. Not that you have to, they just want to talk, so it's more a listening role, but I won't do that either. I just sit there and fume that I have to share my space with a perfect stranger who won't ride a chair alone. I think they are selfish. (Heavens yes, I get that I am too, but this is my blog!)

Let me also explain that this does not pertain to crowded days when there are lift lines and it makes perfect sense that each chair should go up with as many people as it can hold. I am talking about when it is not crowded and that person could easily catch an empty chair, but makes a concerted effort to get into your party and they are CRASHING it. For when you go up with another person pressed up against your person, it is more difficult to have the conversations that you normally do. They are listening, or they will interject, whatever they case, it's not a whole heck of a lot different than if you were sitting in a booth in a restaurant and someone came and sat down next to you.

It's obnoxious.

My friend Cheryl and I will have no part of it. And when you ski as two women, it seems the creepy men come out of the woodwork, holding off in the singles lines, counting down the people so that they can coincidentally be standing there ready to go up when you are. Forget about the dozens of other chairs they could have taken beforehand, or the millions of empty ones behind you. No, they target. And we fight back.

We stand there, seeming as though we are going to ski out and get the chair, and at the last moment one of us has a little episode, oops, my boot is undone, oh no, my goggles are falling off ... and the person who thinks he is scoring a ride with the LADIES turns around to discover to his dismay he's on a SOLO ride. Thank you very much.

We get as much pleasure from this as he probably does trying to get on the chair with us! I know, I am incorrigible. Or really, just horrible?

So yesterday, Lisa, a friend that I have never skied with before (and so therefore does not know the leave 'em behind protocol that Cheryl and I practice) and I had two episodes. TWO. There was hardly anyone at the mountain, and we have to deal with it twice on a triple chair.

The first time a guy pushes his way into our lives and Lisa doesn't notice him and so he kind of gets more pushier and explains to her that that is what the singles line is for, so she has to move over and let him in. She was a little taken aback and sidestepped to give him more room, while I gave him the evil/evil eye and nodded towards the two boarders that were in line ahead of us (and why doesn't he go up with them?) He got the message and says to me "I'd rather go up with skiers than boarders." No you pushy prick, you want to go up with two LADIES. I know your kind, believe me. BUT ... I didn't know how to impart to Lisa that we have to do the ole trick him thing. So my choices were to leave her to go up with him, or jam all three of us on to the chair and be disgusted.

I chose the latter and of course ignored him, leaving Lisa to answer his questions. When we got off I explained to her what Cheryl and I do, and she was like, okay. And she said she was too nice, she couldn't NOT talk to him! LOL Obviously so not my problem.

So then, much later, we are getting on a chair, there is no sign of anyone trying to push into our party, and it was a triple, and I was on the left hand side, Lisa was on the right, and we skied out, and when I turned around to catch the chair, I see some doofus adult male boarder struggling to smush himself into the middle spot. And because he was so slow and oafish, he didn't catch up to us, so he ended up sitting on the chair first, which meant that Lisa and I get a chair crashing into us. And I was pissed. He could have caused both of us to get hurt and to what end? Because he wanted to go up with the LADIES.

This guy was a piece of work. I was so mad I turned to him and yelled "why didn't you just go up on your own chair?" This was a reaction to having a chair slam into me, and the obvious fact that we had no idea he was going up with us because what two women split apart and let a guy come between them? Ummm, no one. He knew what he was doing and he thought he was so cool. Bet he didn't bank on Angry Woman!

He was taken aback and he said "Well, I guess I could have," and I said "Yeah, you could have." And then followed a rather uncomfortable silence for a few minutes. But he quickly got over it and he was yelling down to his buddies, Hey Joe, as in "Hey Joe, look at me, I am between two LADIES." What a putz. I of course ignored him and seethed that this had happened to me TWICE in one day, and he completely ignored me and talked to Lisa. Who of course engaged in conversation with him, because she is so nice!

The bottom line is, these are not thoughts or actions that a nice person engages in! A nice person would welcome another human being onto their chair with open arms and participate willingly in conversation. I do want to point out that I **do** do this, but only when it is crowded and therefore necessary to share my life with strangers. I have had many conversations with people doing this, but it is an expectation that I will do this because that is what the situation calls for.

But when it is not crowded, it is NOT NECESSARY! And I do believe that I have every right to enjoy my day in the company of my own choosing and to sit pressed against people I know and enjoy!

I will know that I am in hell if I end up spending eternity on a beautiful mountain with perfect conditions, blazing sunshine, perfectly tuned skis and one chairlift ride after another with a pushy stranger!

:O I am Lisa and I am NOT a nice person.

Frustration and refocusalization (my word!)

Oh!  I am so frustrated.  There are so many things that I want to do and I can't seem to concentrate on any one thing and just DO it.  

I am taking my self-portrait everyday, and the people in there spend a lot of time coming up with new ways to use various scripts and photo techniques and I am getting jealous!  So this morning I spent some time trying to work out what they were doing ... and discovered that I need to use the Firefox browser as opposed to my Safari browser in order to use certain scripts that people have come up with so that you can do certain things easily.  (Like when you respond to someone's comment, via use of this script a small picture of their icon will appear so that they know you are responding to them.)  It's very cool, seems easy, and I can't figure it out!  But that is mostly because I have never used Firefox so I have to get accustomed to that, and this being a Mac and all, I don't know how to apply extensions to applications!  AAAAAAAAAAAARGH.

So that is frustration number one.  Then my book ... it is not at a standstill, it is going all over the map!  I just re-wrote a pivotal scene and this morning I woke up thinking, no, that isn't going to work.  So do I return to the original scene?  I DON'T KNOW.

That is frustration number two.  Then today it is sunny and nice out.  My plan is to hike, but then again, should I be skiing?  But if I skied, then I wouldn't be able to tackle all these things that I want to do.  But ski season is on its way out (though it might last a few more months since we have all this snow!) and that makes me think, oh no!  I should ski.

And then there are piles of things I need to read everywhere.   

P I L E S!  Not to mention get back to work on my enlightenment.

Which by the way has all but ruined my life.  I know I said it before, but all this living in the moment is slowing me down!  I have way too much to do everyday to just stop and smell the damn flowers.  See, it's so much fun to be bitchy and pick on things, but nooooooooooooooooo, somehow I am supposed to be calm and all-knowing.  I find it irritating.  So, in retaliation I have been hpyer-critical and wallowing in the fact that I haven't felt all that good (a touch of the flu, perhaps?) and instead of smelling anything I have been curling up in the living room come 3:00 every afternoon and watching the tube. 

Has anyone seen Clockwork Orange before?  It's an old, old movie, 1971 vintage, and I had read (heaven only knows when I read it!) that it was a must-see film, and is still pertinent today.  I didn't hate it, I found it extremely disturbing and the thing that made me laugh was their interpretation of the future.  It was just sex and wild colors.  A high tech holder of music was a mini-cassette tape!  HAHAHA.  Not much imagination in the 70's if you ask me! 

CHILL OUT!

So I went on that hike with friends and it was lovely, and when we were walking by the river, I noticed this fabulous ice sculpture that I hadn't noticed yesterday.  And I had forgotten my camera!  On the drive home I couldn't get the picture of the ice formation out of my mind, so I ran home, grabbed my camera and drove back to the trail.  The dogs were beside themselves, so much so they kept coming up to me and gazing at me with their loving eyes!  (I'm not kidding!)

It was beautiful, but by the time I reached the ice, the sun had moved and it was no longer as spectacular.  Which is a huge lesson:  Enjoy the things in front of you, because you might not be able to capture them later.   I actually pondered this (and gave myself a little atta girl for taking pictures on the walk in where the sun had actually created more magic instead of being in a hurry to take this particular picture) and started to look around and enjoy my surroundings instead of being focused on one thing.  The dogs didn't know what to make of the whole deal -- they kept running ahead, but nope, I wouldn't follow.  They'd return, stare at me, I'd re-position myself for another picture, and they'd think, oh good!  She's coming.  But nope.   

Here are some of the pictures -- and when we first saw it, we identified the ice as looking as one thing, but now that I look at it more closely, I've decided it looks like teeth -- X-rays of teeth that is.

It is a little dull without the sun shining but you can see it's pretty awesome

 

The ice was actually fanned across a log across the river -- almost like a curtain.  It was sooooo coool.  

                               

                                                                                                                       

Anyway, while in the woods I tried the excercise where you are supposed to experience nature without any labels.  So you're supposed to be among the trees, but not think of them as trees.  Well .... my little thought machine kept saying, "well, if it's not a tree, then what is it?  Is the snow on the path, well, there is no snow or path therefore what is it?"  I could NOT abandon the thought process -- despite really trying.  I stared up at the sky and thought SKY!  I said to myself, NO, that is not a sky!  Then what is it?  It is nothing?  Well how can it be nothing?  GRRRRRRR.

  The only time I felt even a hint of a moment of grace was when I looked around to see what the woods held with no expectations.  So, you can't really consciously become unconscious of your surroundings -- it just has to happen.

So you can see how all these things are a little frustrating to an ultimate control freak!  But the walk itself chilled me out and I no longer feel as though I am a top spinning about unable to focus on any one thing.

Got this blog done, didn't I?  Whose counting that it's taken days since the last one and all day to do this one!

Ahhh, chill out.

A Walk Through The Woods on a Sunny Morning

I am no Robert Frost ... but a walk in the woods does scream poetry, does it not?

 

  

The sun reaches through the trees and seeks

the Earth ... shadows abound

The snow twinkles, the tree branches stir

it is so quiet and yet everywhere there is sound

The dogs rush ahead, free to chart their own pace

And yet they happily return at the very first call

The footing is tricky, hard packed snow and ice

there is some slipping, wrenching but ultimately no fall

I stop to gaze at how the water has contoured the ice

sculpts it, moves it, you have to look twice

Ahhh, the river it calls my name

it speaks to me in a soothing voice

It beckons me with its siren song

I seek it out -- I have no choice

The puppies find a stick and the battle starts to mount

Who can get the most in their mouth -- it's very hard to measure

Yet they tug and chomp and hold on tight

One stick can provide a doggie trove of pleasure

Rush to the rescue

Apparently to the rescue of Hillary Clinton?  I was querying various people I know who reside in the states who were voting yesterday as to whom they were voting for, and stumbled across a new phrase "party raiding."

Apparently in Texas, Republicans were taking the advice of that lovely fellow Rush Limbaugh to not worry about their in the bag candidate John McCain, but to instead mess up the results of the Democratic race by voting for Hilary (who was not the front-runner and probably on her way out for good).

When I first heard the term I was a little taken aback.  And I asked myself, would I do the same thing?  No, I would not.  And it only goes to show the integrity of the people who did do it -- that their reasons for voting were not to get this country on the right track, but to watch "the soap opera continue."

This is an excerpt of an interview Rush had with Laura Ingraham on The O'Reilly Factor:

“… INGRAHAM: Rush, I understand that the Rush Limbaugh audience is mobilizing in Texas for Hillary. Am I hearing that right?

RUSH LIMBAUGH, RADIO TALK SHOW HOST: I don’t know if the audience is mobilizing or not. I am urging people — I am using a phrase — the Republicans — our nominee is chosen. It’s John McCain.

Texas is open. And I want Hillary to stay in this, Laura. This is too good a soap opera. We need Barack Obama bloodied up politically, and it’s obvious that the Republicans are not going to do it and don’t have the stomach for it.

As you probably know, we’re getting all kinds of memos from the RNC saying not to be critical there. Mark MacKinnon of McCain’s campaign says he’ll quit if they get critical over Obama.

This is the presidency of the United States you’re talking about. I want our party to win. I want the Democrats to lose. They’re in the midst of tearing themselves apart right now. It is fascinating to watch, and it’s all going to stop if Hillary loses.

This is such a sucky time to have to relinquish (alas remove) the hatred from my own being, because I could have some fun picking on this ... (blankety blank) but no, it's not that I won't go there, it's that I have to recognize that this man is full of himself (ego) and the sad (ooops, a label) people who follow him are lost beings

How exactly are the Democrats tearing themselves apart, I ask?  And if that is what politics are, then it surely explains why George W. Bush is in office, does it not?  Just so that we Americans can experience the demise of our country in soap opera style!  Hail to Rush!  What a guy.  We have Oprah on one end of the spectrum gathering hundreds of thousands of people together in order to make a better world, and then we have Rush -- thinking how funny it would be to mess up the election.

“We need Hillary,” Limbaugh declared on his show on February 26. “We need the soap opera. Hillary Clinton is J. R. Ewing, and her husband, Bill, is Sue Ellen. We need to keep this soap opera going, but we also need the chaos,” Limbaugh added.

In a segment entitled, “We Started Mrs. Clinton’s Slide, But Now We Need Her to Stay Alive,” Limbaugh argued that Hillary was now the Republicans’ best hope for victory in November.

“We need somebody roughing up Obama before it’s our turn to get there, because, as it’s been demonstrated, the Republicans have a reticence in doing so,” he told his huge listening audience, apparently referring to John McCain and the Republican National Committee. “They are sending out memos, we can’t attack Obama, we’ll be accused of racism,” Limbaugh continued, referring to a recent memo from the RNC warning Republicans not to use language that could be interpreted as racist or sexist.

“Somebody’s gotta criticize him; somebody’s gotta bloody the guy up,” enjoined the self-crowned king of right-wing talk radio. “He’s shown he’s sensitive to it here, and the Clintons are the one to do this,” Limbaugh added, speaking of Obama. “If they can pull out one of these two states, Texas or Ohio, then she will go on. We need chaos in this party.”

Well, it worked. But will it ultimately succeed?  Rusho doesn't want Hillary to win, he just wants to watch her dig up dirt on Obama (one must assume that if she hasn't done so by now, it just might not exist!  Not everyone has led a life like the Clinton's, with their hands in everyone else's cookie jars and their cigars gawd knows where.)

John McCain, who is meeting with George Bush in the Rose Garden today (isn't that nice!) commented that Americans no longer have patience for an "uncivil brawl over the spoils of power."

Apparently he hasn't met the pals of Rush -- who not only have patience for it, but encourage it.  There is no such thing as a group "Americans," who think with one collective mind.  So to say Americans are anything is just plain ignorant.  Yes, it's ignorant!   And I'll tell you why.  He makes that comment in regards to the election -- but he doesn't take the time to think that it might just mean something else, to say an American, who has no patience for an "uncivil brawl over the spoils of power," otherwise known as the War in Iraq. 

Which John McCain supports.

Cutting Edge

Last night I participated in the worldwide "online classroom" that Oprah and Eckhart Tolle (author of the book I keep talking about!) created in order to further discuss the book A New Earth.

Oprah kept referring to it as "cutting edge," and it was a pretty cool thing -- to think that more than 500,000 people logged in at the same time to watch a live event.  You could send emails and access the "class" via Skype (which allows you to see the person if they have a camera) and phone.  Hence, it was completely interactive and unscripted as questions were addressed as they were asked.

But after 20 minutes my feed crashed and I couldn't get back in.  I received an email this morning apologizing and explaining that it was one of the largest single online events in the history of the Internet.  I could feel it -- the energy of it, the excitement of breaking new ground or pushing the bytes as it were.  I was not the least bit surprised when it crashed -- it was an experiment, and only Oprah could harness that many people and convince them to be online, no matter where they were in the world.  One woman was in Germany, and it was the end of the night for her (it was on 9:00 p.m. my time).  

It resulted in 242 gigabytes per second of information moving through the Internet -- which is one of those big numbers hard to imagine.  Eight bits make a byte.  A byte ... you know, I started to explain this in "layman" terms and then realized that no one would read it!  So let's just say that it was a SHITLOAD of information pouring through the Internet -- which is really just a bunch of cables all attached to people's computers at home which send their information through servers (where your email is stored for example) but ultimately 500,000 different computers were accessing the SAME information at the same time and it was too much.  Not a big surprise.

What does this mean?  Well, for one, it means that technology has to meet the demand, and if Oprah is saying that for the next ten weeks she needs enough bandwidth available to remain stable for 90 minutes and feed into the homes of 500,000 people across the WORLD, then I am thinking it has to get done.  And that's pretty wild.  I know I seem to have an Oprah thing going, but I am beginning to understand it.  I am beginning to see that she is something greater than herself, and for a long time she knew it, but now she is starting to smack herself upside the head and say stop buying shoes girl and get on with your life's purpose.

She is removing ego from the picture, and I am removing labels from mine and we're finding each other again!  :::::::::::::::sniff:::::::::::::::::  I'm having a moment.

I predict it's all going to be Internet ... I believe there will no longer be network television or printed newspapers in the not-to-far future.   

And I'll get to write about how I saw it all happen!

 

Freegan -- Strategies for Sustainable Living Beyond Capitalism

 
It's a new movement -- and it's sweeping across the country.  Honestly, I rarely see these sweeping movements, and believe me, I look.  And I don't see this one catching on anytime soon in this area because I think it could only support a small group, and that's no sweep.

What is it?  Freegan.info

Well, it's really dumpster diving, which is a term I came across when I worked at Moms Online.  Those women were really the pioneer Freegans -- and their goal was to stay at home at all costs (or at a big time reduction of cost) to raise their little angels.   They would go to dumpsters outside of department stores, or anywhere, really, and paw through and take out the "good" stuff, and either take it home to use it or sell it.

Freegan is just the yuppiefied word for dumpster diving -- sounds far more chic, don't you think? 

Now these are intelligent people (hence the new name, those mom's just didn't give a damn!) and I just don't understand why they don't come up with another system.  Right now they comb the streets of New York City (this particular faction of Freegans) and paw through garbage outside of markets and bakeries and take home the food.  Yes, the food is packaged and in perfectly good shape, but why don't they create an underground food system?  Why don't they pay off someone who works at the store to package the food in say a cardboard box and leave it at a set time so they don't have to deal with the other garbage?

The reason that the stores throw out the food (as opposed to say feeding the poor) is because it is easier and then there are so many rules and regulations to donating food and it's all on you (like you would have to transport it to the shelters, etc.) so in pure American wasteism, the food is tossed.  And it's not gross, ruined or even expired.  Some of it is often days away from expiration -- one has to assume that they just got in fresher food and had to toss the other stuff for shelf space.

IT'S INSANE.

So these Freegans don't spend their hard-earned money on food, they search for it in the trash.  And they furnish their homes with the stuff they find in dumpsters, etc.  It doesn't gross me out, particularly, I just don't see why they don't look a little deeper.  Now they know what kind of food is thrown away -- and they themselves can't use it all either, it's that much.  So why aren't they coming up with a way to distribute it to those that aren't savvy enough to dumpster dive, ahem, I mean become a Freegan?

That is the part I found most disturbing.  But then again, they've obviously contacted reporters so they are trying I suppose.  And when you check out the freegan.info website, apparently they don't keep their spots secret, they tell anyone who wants to know where they are obtaining their free food, and run tours and groups to show people where to go.  Also on the website is a dumpster directory!  

I wonder if I have the nerve to go check out the dumpster behind the local supermarket!  The idea fills me with pure disgust mingled with sheer curiosity with a smidgen of excitement!

Now I am beginning to see why my mother wanted to know if the FBI could track my blog!!! HAHAHAHA.

No, seriously!  :)