Take Time Out
Take some time out (I did, so my taxes still aren't done) to get on Anita's site and tell her what you would do to make the world better if you were give a budget of a trillion U.S. dollars. (I guess she stole the question from Kuro5hin,but I didn't see it there so I'm glad I saw it here.)

Of course, I like my answer, which is:
After I publish my daughter's novels and make sure my son has enough money to live on the rest of his life so that he doesn't have to work, I'd pay off my debts. Then I would hire the best minds to figure out how to take over the world's economy so that we could make sure everyone has the resources to meet at least the first two of Maslow's hierarchy of needs and then had meaningful paid work and access to other resources that enable them to accomplish the rest -- and that includes high end computers with high speed internet access and free blogs for everyone. And if there was anything left over, certainly little red sports cars for everyone who wants one.

If you haven't commented on Anita's site, comment here.

What occurred to me as I was looking through the list of Maslow's needs was that bloggers probably have had the whole list met, and that's why they have they luxury of and resosurces to blog. People who can afford computers and internet access generally, probably have had at least 6 of the 8 needs met. If you didn't link to Maslow's list (above), here they are, in brief:
1) Physiological: hunger, thirst, bodily comforts, etc.;
2) Safety/security: out of danger;
3) Belonginess and Love: affiliate with others, be accepted;
4) Esteem: to achieve, be competent, gain approval and recognition;
5) Cognitive: to know, to understand, and explore;
6) Aesthetic: symmetry, order, and beauty;
7) Self-actualization: to find self-fulfillment and realize one's potential; and
8) Transcendence: to help others find self-fulfillment and realize their potential.

So, I'm wondering just what percent of the world's population has reached that "self-actualization" level and how many have actually gotten to "transcendence." I know that there are many many many, many, and still many, more still struggling to get the very first one taken care of. So what am I doing still sitting here blogging? I guess I haven't yet reached transcendence.

Death, Taxes, and Slogging Blogger
I've already blogged about death. Today it's taxes. It's always Slogging Blogger.

I hate doing taxes, especially because of the small craft business I have. (So I hire someone to do them for me, but I still have to get all the figures figured out.) I hate accounting and I hate math. I got through Geometry in high school just fine, but I never really got Trig. As a matter of fact, my Trig teacher told me that if I were going to take any more courses from her, she wasn't going to teach them. I managed to get out of taking any more math in college by taking science, which I liked a lot better. In an email conversation I had with Jeneane, she suggested that there are so few females joining in the complex and often technical blogging conversations for the same reason many females have math phobia. What are those reasons? Well, I have my own perspective on that!

Well, I always find ways to make it through the math. But there's nothing I can do about Slogging Blogger. I guess it's just becoming much too popular. There's gotta be a way for Ev to make some money on this! (I did my part -- got the Pro.)

Back to the taxes.

To Dance or Not to Dance
Every Sunday evening there's a ballroom dance being held somewhere near me, and I used to go to all of them -- in addition to dancing somewhere else at least once during the week. I just got back from one of these Sunday dances, and I'm wondering if it's time to let that part of me go. It just doesn't seem to be fun any more; I'm not sure why, and I need to think that through more. How do you know when it's time to let go of a part of your life that has always been a part of your life. Dancing has always been my exercise, my social life, my hobby, my time to have fun. But it's not really fun any more and I don't know why. One of my favorite lines (because it's true) is "The reason I like ballroom dancing so much is because it's the one place in my life where I enjoy turning over the lead to a man." Maybe my apathy about dancing these days has something to do with the male-female dynamics that are such a basic component of dancing with a partner. I write a monthly column for a regional dance magazine about -- well about whatever I feel like writing about. The last two months my columns have been about "following" and "connection." Maybe I just don't feel any "connection" with any of the guys I dance with. Maybe it's that there are now quite a few younger women who are good dancers and who are getting the good dance partners. ( And I'm the one who used to be one of the better young female dancers! ) Maybe I am just (psychologically) feeling my age. Maybe my blog is not the place to muse about this. Maybe I'd better just go to bed. Damn.

Another Reason Why I Love My Kid So Much And Think He's So Cool
He is totally honest in what he feels and what he writes. I want to give him a big physical hug, only I can't because he's across the country from me. So I have to resort to this virtual one.

The Company of Women (Most Pisces)
Anita's blogroll includes a sub-section of Piscean bloggers (all of which at the moment are women), and that section includes me. So, it's no surprise that she just beat me to blogging a piece that took the words right out of my head. The only thing I want to add is that, having been a 8th grade English teacher who taught grammar and related stuff, I like Dennis Mahoney's Write a Better Weblog. I still remember the concerned discussions we (policy staff of the New York State Education Department) had about the deterioriation of language as reflected in IRC, emails etc. From what I have experienced, I think that blogging is taking the use of language in a wonderful new -- and upward -- direction.

But back to Piscean women. While I find astrology fascinating and often weirdly accurate, my more logical mind prevents me from letting go of my skepticism. However, it's interesting to note that I am good friends (we have a "group" and meet at least monthly) with five other women whose birthdays fall between February 16th and April 6th, with me somewhere in the middle. Now, that doesn't make us all Pisces, but we're pretty close. The really interesting fact is that the "group" started out -- a decade ago -- much larger, as a "Women's Forum," sponsored by a singles organization to which we all belonged. (I still do.) I facilitated the forum, often at my apartment. The six of us ultimately broke away and formed our own circle, and we didn't realize until afterward how close our birthdays are. We continue to go on vacations together, and we have helped each other weather illnesses, including cancer (not me); relationships that happened and then dissolved (including me); and family tragedies (the recent wake I went to). We've also celebrated together the good things in life -- the births of grandchildren, professional promotions, the highs of new love affairs, and the pleasures of this company of women.

It's too bad that we don't see many men having the benefits of such extended support. (Although many men have been on the other end of our group's rituals to empower one or the other of us to break painful emotional ties to one or another of those men. Hee. Hee. Cackle. Cackle.)

Hey, I love you guys, but as you know, women our age (51 through 61) and education (B.A. through J.D.) are about as likely to find a suitable mate as we are to get shot by a sniper. But blogging is a really good diversion, and menopause is a really good excuse.

So Glad I Saw Her!
I haven't watched much of the Olympics, but I did have my tv on late enough last night to catch Sarah Hughes' amazing skating performance. That was as close to floating on air as I've ever seen. There's no doubt in my mind that she well deserved the gold medal. And I was equally impressed with her mature ability to express her feelingsverbally and in front of a camera and a global audience. What a remarkable girl!

When we reveal our weaknesses, we show our true strength. That’s the parodox of being human. – I heard that today watching "First Wave" on the Sci Fi channel.

And that seemed to go along with what Geek Icon Andrea Roceal James blogged the other day:

I specialize in not specializing in anything. I've already blogged complaints about having too many things to be interested in. I wonder maybe if I'm too eclectic sometimes. There have been times when I've seen it as a weakness. For now, I consider myself simply an aspiring Renaissance Woman. Besides, Jeneane Sessum's powerful articulateness is hard to equal, no matter what gender you are.

I like this gal, Andrea. She reminds me of a (much younger) me. And I like Anita Bora because she’s “authentic.” She doesn’t try to impress, and in not trying, she does.

I sure do know what it’s like to have so many interests that you don’t really have time to focus on any one. My ex-husband used to call me a “dilettante” – a term he deemed derisive. However, like Andrea, I have always considered myself a Renaissance Woman. Sometimes I know just enough about something to make me dangerous. But mostly, I think I come out a strong B+ in just about everything I get myself into.

I hope that I’m smart enough to defer to minds like Jeneane’s and Mike Sanders' when it comes to articulating the cultural dimensions and implications of this blogging phenomenon. And smart enough not to compete with Marek and Mike Golby when it comes to their ability to “take off” verbally in blogland on just about any subject.

Andrea’s blog reminds me that I need to remember to be ME and to go where my interests lead and not be swept away by the tsunami brains of the Alpha Folks. And I really have to learn how to store images and files on my server so that I can get my stuff out there. Like, did you now that I have a small “craft” business (called Sass&Chic) and make my own designs: the “Spiral Shawl” and the “Adjustable Indestructible Hat.” I recently quilted an amazing jacket for myself, and I get the biggest kick out of taking old clothes and remaking them.

I long ago decided that, when the “revolution” comes (that’s the one that’s going to supress America into a new dark age), my skills are going to be very valuable as our economic system collapses and we are forced back into bartering::
-- I can remake almost any pieces of old clothing into something funky and attention-getting
-- I know how to cut hair
-- I can take whatever’s in the refrigerator and turn it into a really fantastic meal

Of course, that dark age isn't here yet, so I’d better spend some time on this server business. And then maybe I can do what Richard Cody is doing and get a poetry page up for myself.

A Little History

Thanks to Mike Golby's pointers, I have been reading recent posts and related comments on burningbird’s and wonderchicken’s (and, of course, b!X’s) sites about our current government’s, again, inept handling of relationships with other countries – this time, Korea.

In her post, burningbird asks: I wonder when Ashcroft will decide that weblogging is anti-patriotic?

And in the middle of the ensuing discussion/comments Rogi makes one statement that terrifies me.
But if i'm going to say what I think then I'll do it somewhere else, like, uh, Switzerland or something. Not here on American weblog territory. I'll do something sometime soon and point you to it from my deep bunker.;)

I remember a time when, while it was sometimes dangerous to physically go out and protest and make one’s political stance and opinions known – and known personally and LOUDLY – we did it by the thousands – the hundreds of thousands. Most of you reading this would have been toddlers or maybe pre-teens during those times, or maybe even still, as they used to say, a “gleam in your father’s eye.” (I always hated that phrase; it gives all credit for blatant sexuality to the guy!)

We were in our twenties and thirties, some even older. The Viet Nam War angered us, humiliated us, tore our hearts out. We protested as our situations would allow. My (ex) husband created anti-war theater pieces and supported the protests of the college students on the campus where he taught. I was a stay-at-home mom with a toddler (b!X) and his sister Melissa, who was around 8 or 9, so my protests were limited. One of our favorite family stories was about my sewing up huge a pseudo-flag made of candy-striped material with a big star-studded peace sign appliqued in the corner. I hung it from a tree on our property that faced the main road. All of the other houses in our rural neighborhood had their American flags proudly posted in response to the President’s request for all citizens to put out their flags for the Labor Day weekend.

Within an hour, my neighbor across the street was on the phone yelling at me about that “thing” I had waving in their faces while her husband cursed “those Commies” etc. etc. from the background. I explained what it was and that I had the same right to hang it up on my property as she had to display Old Glory. And then I followed through on my plans to take the kids down to visit my parents, who lived 150 miles away. The next day, we got a phone call from my husband (who didn’t come with us) saying that when he got home that night, he found my peace banner torn into strips, rolled into balls, and tossed all over our yard. While he had thought that my hanging the banner was like waving a red flag into front of a bunch of already-crazed bulls, he was really pissed that someone (probably a neighbor) actually would come up and destroy what was on our property when no one was home. He wrote a letter to the (then) Hearst newspaper defending my right to do what I did. They published it in a box in the center of the Opinion page. And for weeks after we got phone calls telling us that “they were coming to get us.” Nothing happened.

If someone were to do that today, what do you suppose would happen?

Of course, history documents much more vocal, well-attended, and explosive protests during that time. The point is that those in my generation felt obligated – and free enough – to stick their faces out there and open their physical mouths. I’m not saying that there weren’t unfair arrests and trials among the leaders of various movements. But I am saying that even innocuous people like me felt the need to take a public stand.

Now just about all of the stands are virtual. And we are all afraid that even that is going to get us into trouble.

Remember, b!X, when we marched on the Pentagon to protest our government’s involvement in Guatemala? That hot summer day among those thousands and thousands of banners and signs and sweaty chants for justice and peace? You were only about 9 years old and you got a bloody nose just before we got to the Pentagon, and dozens of people appeared with ice and kleenex and advice on how to stop it. And we sat in the shade on a little hill to eat our lunches and wait to see if that other bunch really would “levitate” the Pentagon, as they promised they would.

What are the chances of that happening today? (Not the levitating – the actual marching by the thousands, openly and vocally demanding a change in the decisions and actions of our political leaders.)

And I also remember, b!X, when, during the Gulf War, you bussed down from Albany -- and your sister went from New York City after marching there first -- to protest in Lafayette Park. And she rounded a corner, and there you were, drumming on an upturned plastic pail. I still have the picture she took of you displayed proudly on my wall.

After I heard about my cousins' kids, I wrote:

Desert Storm: A Family Scapbook

Someone’s son huddles
gravely under desert rain.
restless as his heartbeat,
he waits for signs in the sky
to turn the taste of metal
in his mouth to blood.

Someone’s daughter,
leather jacketed, baseball capped,
takes her place in U.N. Square,
lights a candle against the wind, and
joins her voice to the hymn
that pulses like blood
through the streets, through the night,
through the weary dreams of men
reduced to war.

Someone’s daughter runs
from classroom through snow,
stuffs her duffle to bursting
with camouflage and conviction,
prays for the chance
to set the skies ablaze with truth.
At the table of her father’s house,
she waits for orders
and watches the colors of dawn
melt like blood into sand.

Someone’s son
boards a bus at midnight,
sheathed in a confusion of
army surplus and disbelief.
He joins the dawn in Lafayette Park,
seeking solace – if not answers –
in the steady drum,
the solid hands,
the strong songs
of sons and daughters
refusing to bleed
for the dreams of weary men
reduced to war.

I was feeling a little bad about myself but I just rolled down my bloglist and now I don’t

All day today I thought about the things (not necessarily such nice things) that I’m having to admit to myself about myself as a result of becoming a blogger:
1. I am more competitive than I thought I was
2. I really DO want to be famous (or at least a little famous)
3. I DO care what people think of me (at least some people)
4. I like to start new things but I’m not used to persevering
5. My ability to organize and keep things straight in my head is even worse than I thought (How the hell does everyone remember where they read what they read so that they can go back and lift the good stuff out for links?)

On the other hand, folks like Andrea whom I hadn’t heard of are finding my blog and liking it. And, from them, I learn all kinds of things I’m glad to know. I found out from his blog that Richard Cody writes truly fine poetry and he has been published on various web sites. I hadn’t thought of doing that with my own stuff. So now I am – at least thinking about it.

Folks of whom I have heard continue to blog perspectives that force me to keep re-examining concepts that I thought I was through examining. Mike Sanders’ blog is one of those that always throws so much at me that I would have to spend all day and night at the keyboard to be able to work through all of the sparks in my own head that his words ignite.

This particular one of Sanders' has been smoldering in the back of my mind: Almost all the reasons given for blogging seem to be pragmatic. It is no big surprise idealism is dying, but with all the individual expression in blogging, I hoped we would see some more burning embers.

Actually, I long ago realized that I wasn’t going to change the world. I also realized, however, that I could change little pieces of it, and I could affect the people with whom I come in contact. Mostly, though, I have all I can do to hold fast to the place in which I want to stand based on my ideals and values. My dream has always been that, if there are enough people of heart and hope, of conscience and compassion, and if there were a way for them to somehow connect with each other, there really might be the possibility of generating a sea change (as in the “hundredth-monkey concept).

And I suspect that, despite all of the “individual expression” we see in blogging, underneath it all is that same ember burning – we all want the world to change for the better. How do we know but that blogging might wind up being the catalyst for such a change. Of course, Marek, bless his convoluted Polish soul, might be able to do that all by himself. But just in case he can’t, what we can do is keep blogging.

Warning for the Snifflers!
I've lost track of all of the bloggers I've read in the past week who are down with colds, flu, sinus stuff. And that includes, you, Jeneane! Check out the alert regarding products that contain Phenylpropanolamine. These include certain Alka Seltzer, Dimetap and a whole bunch of other stuff that I know that I have sitting in my medicine chest. The danger of phenylpropanolamine was circulated as an Urban Legend, only this time is a true one. Don't take that next pill until you check out the list.

The First Casualty of War is the Truth
“Though planting disinformation against hostile nations is a longtime tactic in military information warfare, the new Pentagon office wants to broaden the mission into allied nations in the Middle East, Asia and even Western Europe, ….”

NBC news tonight pretty much reported word for word what The Nando Times had posted online.

“Critics fear a backlash from allies. They also worry that false information released to sway people in foreign countries will be picked up and spread back to America by international news organizations.”

Somebody ought to clue in Brig. Gen. Simon P. Worden, head of Dubbaya’s shadowy new Office of Strategic Influence (read: Ministry of Propaganda). Bloggers would have it spread, analyzed, discussed, refuted, and ridiculed long before international news organizations had time to get the OK to make any kind of statement.

Oh Well, At Least I Tried
Well, I've been informed by www.cyberseniors.org that they are cancelling their efforts to have a kind of online discussion with volunteers choosing topics and facilitating. I had signed up to do one on "Being the Filler in the Sandwich Generation." But they cancelled that one aspect of their site. They're still based in Portland, Maine, and offer all kinds of on-site programs, including computer literacy. "If I had a million dollars...." I would get up to speed on how to do web sites and really come up with an interactive web site for seniors. Meanwhile, I'll just keep on blogging.

Another "This Is Why I Love the Web"
I just picked this up from the Wild Wolf Women of the Web Listserv. Totally irrelevant but fascinating fact:

As the clock ticks over from 8:01PM on Wednesday, February 20th, 2002, time will (for sixty seconds only) read in perfect symmetry. To be more precise: 20:02, 20/02, 2002. It is an event which has only ever happened once before, and is something which will never be repeated. The last occasion that time read in such a symmetrical pattern was long before the days of the digital watch (or the 24-hour clock): 10:01AM, on January 10, 1001. And because the clock only goes up to 23.59, it is something that will never happen again. Neat, huh?

Sense Remembering
It's 41 degrees in Albany, New York today, so I took my mom out for a rather slow walk around our building, then left her to sit in the sun while I picked up the pace in an effort to lower my most recent blood pressure, cholestrol, and weight readings. The air is deliciously crisp; meandering breezes play softly across my face; the sky beams bright blue, the sun a winter warm. As I close my eyes in sheer pleasure, I have a clear sense memory of lying in my 1940 baby carriage with that gray oil-cloth cover that went from my feet to my chin snapped in place so that only my face is explosed. I love the way my nose and cheeks feel cold while the rest of me is toasty. I drift in and out of a light sleep, with the faint sounds of children playing, trucks rumbling, mothers chatting. All is right with my tiny world. I hope that it feels like that when I die.

This is Why I Love the Web!
In addition to all of the misinformation and lies that might be circulating out there, there are people who know the truths and take the time to correct them. For example, a comment from Gary proved to me that Billy Connolly DOES use the web. And now I also know who Billy Connelly is. Because I didn't before.

And people like Anita keep us connected to the things that are REALLY important.

Oh Hell, Why Not

David Weinberger’s JOHO is a great site that I read but have never linked to. Same goes for Steve Himmer’s, Doc Searls’, and AKMA’s, the last of which includes those guys (and more) in what he calls “The Usual Posse.” I will continue to wonder why, besides Jeneane Sessum, there are not more such powerfully articulate females blogging into the current important verbal excursions into the unknown.

The other day, David blogged something that was emailed to him by Vergil Iliescu:
In Billy Connolly’s biography, written by his wife Pamela Stevenson, she notes that Billy doesn’t use the internet because the people who do are “the kind of people you wouldn’t talk to in a pub anyway” (or something like that, I’m quoting from memory).

In truth, the bloggers I’ve "met" – in addition to those I just mentioned -- are JUST the kind of people I WOULD want to talk to in a pub -- even though, more truthfully, I probably would have only hung around the edges of their conversation, listening and feeling intimidated. Well, I might have moved in a little closer after my first bourbon. I might even have tried to insert a small word of my own into the density of it all, although I don’t think I would have succeeded.

Their kind of meandering and meaningful, complex and creative verbal exercises work on the web because there’s enough empty space and time out there for their larger-than-life personas, their mega-metaphors, and their massive energy surges. They could never be contained in any one pub. And so, without the internet, I would never have had a chance – or the courage -- to insinuate myself into such intricately connected monologues. Keeping up with them, though, is something else entirely. (pant….pant…..wheeze….wheeze)

Ooops, I Did It Again

After my ritual morning roll in the blog, I find myself in the shower humming “Ooops, I did it again…”

I did it a few years ago, when on a whim I submitted some of my poetry about the mythic Lilith (Adam’s first wife) to a book on that subject being put together by the Jewish Women’s Resource Center in New York City. It was advertised as a publication written by Jewish women, and I’m not even Jewish. But eventually I find two of my pieces in Which Lilith: Feminist Writers Recreate the World's First Woman, nestled in among some major and intimidating prose and poetry, including an introduction by Naomi Wolfe. I’m the only writer represented who isn’t Jewish.

I seem to have a pattern of signing up for leagues that are way beyond my own.

And so I find myself now in the deepest of uncharted spaces – not swimming with sharks, but rather with mermen, sea sprites, mysterious bloggods big banging out a new universe and sucking me into to wordpools way out of my depths. What have I done in blogrolling so brazenly into this hierarchy of hyperbole, this maelstrom of metaphors, this mad mad mad mad mad mad whirl?

Which Lilith, indeed. Which Jeneane? Which Marek? Which Gary? Which Mike?

What I'm Cooking
I like to cook but I don't like to clean up after. (I cook dinner every night and eat it with my mom.) Anyway, my "fear of blogging" friend was supposed to come over and have supper with my mother and me this evening but she had to cancel. So, mom and I are sharing homemade cream of chicken and broccoli soup, honey whole wheat bread from Montana Mills, and a mixed green salad with this great dressing that I just improvised made of (I don't really measure) a healthy tablespoon of frozen orange juice concentrate, a scant tablespoon of apple cider vinegar, some ground up sesame seeds, some ground up walnuts, and less than a half cup walnut oil -- oh and a clove of minced garlic. I put it all in a blender. You sort of have to add the amount of oil to your own taste, but I think this is close. And I think I'll take the few homemade pierogi that we have leftover from Christmas out of the freezer and have those too. Eat your heart out, girlfriend!

The Last About Losses
Gee, I don't want to get everyone too maudlin -- I managed to get Mike going really good -- but his piece motivates me to say this last thing.

There is a poem by Theodore Roethke that I want read at my wake (well, I don't really want a wake; I want a real bash, with music and everything). Do you hear that bix? The poem is the Fourth Meditation from his "Meditations of an Old Woman."

Anyway, I went and dug up the book I have with that poem in it. Bix's dad gave me a Roethke's collection Words for the Wind soon after we met in college. His note to me in the front page says October 31, 1960. It seems like several lifetimes ago. We split when bix was 4 or 5. So much lost.

Here's the beginning of the Roethke's poem:
I was always one for being alone,
Seeking in my own way, eternal purpose;
At the edge of the field waiting for the pure moment;
Standing, silent, on sandy beaches or walking
along green embankments
Knowing the sinuousness of small waters:

and later on

Was it yesterday I stretched out the
thin bones of my innocence?
O the songs we hide, singing only to ourselves!
Once I could touch my shadow and be happy;
In the white kingdoms, I was light as a seed,
Drifting with the blossoms,
A pensive petal.

and it ends with:

Is my body speaking? I breathe what I am:
The first and last of all things.
Near the graves of the great dead,
Even the stones speak.

I love it! I BREATHE WHAT I AM: THE FIRST AND LAST OF ALL THINGS.

If you don't know Roethke, read more of his stuff at http://gawow.com/roethke/poems/.

I Like This Local Columnist
Diane Cameron has a column in our Sunday newspaper that I always read. Today's is about propaganda.

She says:
We like to think, of course, that "they'' do propaganda while "we'' do public education, but sometimes there's a very fine line dividing information, public service, propaganda and even the "news.''

Having been a writer doing "public education" on the topic of education for many years, I really like this article.

Saturday Night Ramblings
I sat with my mom tonight and we watched "Dying Young" on tv. My mom is sure not young; she'll be 86 on Monday. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see her nestled into my couch, this tiny woman who daily is sort of compressing toward her middle. I have to keep taking the hems up on her slacks and finding ways to let out the waist bands. I think to myself -- she is dying. She's not sick, but she is old. She is just waiting for it to happen. And I am here waiting with her.

We are all dying. From the moment we're born we begin to die. Tonight I think about that, the wake I went to the other night, my life as an undertaker's daughter, living above the funeral chapels as a kid. Our lives are bound to cycles, circadian, seasonal, menstrual....and all of the minor and major violences that go along with the process of everything always dying.

l remember a time in my life -- actually not that long ago -- when not having a date on Saturday night and admitting that one didn't have a date on a Saturday night -- was DEATH! I obviously have embarked upon another life's cycle.

When I turned 50, I threw myself a big party and invited lots of friends. At one point I made them each stand up and say something nice about me because I'd rather them do it then when I could enjoy the compliments rather than have them do it at my wake. I loved hearing the funny and nice and irreverent and kind and outrageous things they said. And then I had a friend who's into shamanic stuff do a ritual for me to symbolize my entrance into a more "wise" time of my life. Well, nice try. I'm still waiting for that time to come.

I live surrounded by people who are waiting to die. Oh they're not just sitting and waiting -- they play pinochle and bridge and billiards; they go for walks and sit and chat and complain a lot; some even still drive -- although most of them shouldn't. The apartments are upscale and there's a new town park being built right next door. Maybe if I were 80 I wouldn't mind living here. There are even small community garden "plots." I wrote a poem about the one I had last summer. It began "They gave me a garden the size of a grave..." Actually, it wasn't as depressing as it sounds. I went on to write that "I filled it with raucous reminders of sense.............."

And I guess tonight I sit here trying to make some sense out of all of this. And all of this blogging over the past few days in connection with Marek, Gary, and Mike about what this is all about. There's energy being created here, energy to power new cycles, maybe new poems. And there is no violence. There is a lot of heart.

Don't Call Me Madame
I had a interesting reaction to Gary Turner addressing me (in a comment) as Madame K. I remember the first time a store clerk called me "Ma'am," and I turned around to see if there was some other lady he might be addressing. There wasn't. I know that I make a point of my age (I'm on a quest for "elders" among bloggers), but, in truth I prefer to be thought of as just one of the blogger gang. Aunt Owwee did put me on to someone older than I am -- Ava at From The Edge, and I'm adding her to my blogroll.

OK. So now I'll start making my incredible chicken soup. Yes Sir!

Time to Link to This
Every other blogger I know has linked to this great "Blogger Manifesto" that Chris Pirillo posted a while ago and has recently edited a little. But I'll bet some of my non-blogger friends who check my site every once in while might find it interesting as well, so here it is in kalilily time. Actually, I don't egosurf (#10) because I don't know how, and I would have other names in #12. But otherwise, yeah.
1. Life is uncensored.
2. My blog does not capture the full me.
3. Judge my thoughts, but not me.
4. If you don't like what you see, look elsewhere.
5. I love talking about my life.
6. I love writing about other people's lives.
7. I will post whenever I feel like posting.
8. I don't have to blog every meme.
9. You don't have to agree with everything I say.
10. I egosurf Daypop, Google, and Blogdex nightly.
11. I share what I want to share.
12. I like linking to Dave, Doc, Evan, and Cam.
13. Blogging is theraputic.
14. Pictures of myself are not obligatory.
15. I visit every site in my blogroller regularly.
16. I won't post for the sake of posting.
17. I have a life outside of blogging.
18. I have registered my blogging tool(s).
19. I may criticize other bloggers, not harass them.
20. I have the right to revise a post.
21. When blogging becomes a chore, I'll quit doing it.
22. I've given something back to the blogging community.
23. If I want to complain about something, I will.
24. If I want to praise something, I will.
25. I am not the best blogger on the planet.
26. I don't have to explain myself to you.

My Morning Cup-a Blog
When I get up in the morning, the first thing I do is turn on my computer and check my email and blog comments. I guess that's a pattern leftover from my former office job, where I also used to spend some time in the a.m. checking in with everyone and starting topical discussions that we would continue throughout the day. That's another activity that blogging has replaced. It was very frustrated this morning when Blogger wouldn't accept my posts -- threw my whole day off. I actually got some dusting done, which I had to do because my allergies are giving me terrible sinusitis. (Are there people out there who actually dust regularly? I don't even vacuum regularly!)

It's Gotta Be A "Guy" Thing
Violence is what comes to Gary Turner's mind when he thinks about the web. Guys just seem to like pissing contests. Set 'em up; knock 'em down. I don't seem to see much affinity for violent metaphors from Meg Hourihan, or Anita Bora or Jeneane Sessum or any number of other female bloggers' sites that I discover in my energetic linkings. Back in the 80s there were all kinds of studies being done about the difference between the way the two genders communicate and work. Guys tend to compete; gals tend to cooperate. Guys prefer to line up the pieces; gals want to see the configurations, the relationship of one piece to the others. So for many of those of my gender, the web is this immense cooperative venture, this mother of all networks, this amazing set of sticky threads worthy of Arachne herself. So piss away, you guys. We'll just keep spinning.

Actually, I'm knitting -- this amazing sherbet-colored striped bunting for my soon-to-be grandson. No violence there.

Fear of Blogging
I’ve mentioned several times that I keep looking for bloggers in the more senior generation, and I’m not finding any/many. Earlier this evening I was telling one of my friends about the joys of blogging, and she expressed great concern that I am letting my name get out onto the web. She won’t even order anything online for fear of having her credit card – and her identity – stolen. She believes that everyone online out there is lying about who they are and that I am putting myself at great risk. I couldn’t convince her otherwise. So now I’m wondering if older folk tend to believe all of the negative hype and are convinced that it’s all porno-freaks and potential rapists and that’s why they’re not blogging. (Actually, it’s probably because they just aren’t geeky enough.) So, my goal is to become the oldest living blogger in bloggerland. That is unless there is no such person as Mike Golby and he's not really across the globe somewhere, and whoever he is is outside my building right now preparing to take my credit cards and sell me into white slavery.

Awake After A Wake
I just got home from attending the wake of the mother of one of my best friends. The woman is dead at 73 from ALS and dementia. I’m only a dozen years younger.

It's a Bird! It's a Butterfly! It's CYBERMOM!
Hee hee. My fantasy come true!

(Except that I feel that I've ridden out of obscurity on my son's coat-tails. He's the real blog-king in this family! Ya' know when someone gets an award, they thank their Mom etc.? Well, I owe it all to b!X, bless his too-often-broken heart!)

Here Kitty, Kitty, Kitty, Kitty.....
So now we're cloning kittens. (b!X beat me to posting this story)

Whaddya think of that, Anita?

From Enron to Piper
As far as I'm concerned, the story in Piper Kansas about student plagiarism just shows how far we've come in this country from having any sense of ethics, any concern for what's fair and right.

Now, what would have happened if the kids in Piper had the tools to be able to do their projects on a weblog. They would have understood how to hyperlink and easily give credit to the source of their information. While it's easy to steal others' ideas and text via the Internet, it's also easy to hyperlink/credit the source. Every kid should be schoolblogging and learning the ethics of information sharing.

An Addendum to the Names Post
I meant to mention that you should read how Aunt Owwee got her name.

Wow! Words As Lethal Weapons
Hmm. Here I was, innocently slobbering verbally over Leonard Cohen's lyrics and the next thing I know, my ramblings drift out into cyberspace and spark a hot disagreement between Mike Golby and Marek J. -- both of whom I have a great deal of respect for. When our words are the only indication of what we really mean (there's no obviously sly wink of an eye, no friendly punch in the arm, to communicate other intention), as they are in online communication, we'd better be careful how we load up our sentences if we really don't intend any harm. Hmm. So this is what happens when butterflies hyperlink?

The Naming of Things
I finally figured out how to change the name that come up after my posts -- from kali lily (which really should have been kalilily, which has been my email name since I've had email) to my actual name, Elaine. By now, I'm scattered over various blogrolls under names ranging from "bix's mom" to kalilily to kali lily to Elaine Frankonis, which is my whole name. What's in a name, anyway?

b!X was not born b!X. He had a given name and a nickname. Somewhere along the line he became Slowdog. Then, Baby-X, which got contracted somehow into bix, or as he prefers it, b!X. Or else theonetruebix.

My daughter and son-in-law have chosen Alexander William as their son's name. They'll call him Zander (as in Buffy's sidekick) or maybe Lex. And someday he'll choose what he wants to be called. Maybe I'll call him Zanderbill.

And what will he call me, as my first grandchild. His other grandmother already has some grandkids and they all call her Grandma. My mom has been Nanny to my kids. Maybe I'll go for GranElaine, which, no doubt, he will shorten to Granny. Or maybe not. There are some very funny stories about how kids distort the names their grandparents want to be called, and those weird names stick.

There are all kinds of sites about naming and names. This one's interesting: http://www.namenerds.com/. And there are 525,000 names listed on http://www.kabalarians.com/ and you can get a free brief analysis of your name. This is what it says about my name:

The name of Elaine creates a friendly, sociable, charming nature, but causes you to be too easily influenced by others. While you find it easy to meet and mix, and can appear agreeable and compromising in conversation, you can become dogmatic and forceful if pressed too far. Others learn that you cannot be told what to do and you seldom change your mind once it is made up. You prefer situations that allow a degree of independence, but are reluctant to take on a demanding work-load or responsibility. In a position dealing with the public, you could do well because of your friendly personality, interest in people, and desire to please. When asked, you are able to give others good advice that you would probably not follow yourself, but must guard against being too opinionated in controversial matters. The physical weaknesses due to this name centre in the fluids of the body and the senses of the head, causing headaches, eye, teeth, or severe sinus conditions; also, kidney or bladder weaknesses.

Actually, that's pretty on target, including "severe sinus conditions."

Yes. Yes. Yes.
Marek's blog sometimes reads like a lyrical prose-poem. And I just love what he wrote to Mike Golby:
I am guilty of idealism.
The sun has not set on my aspirations.
The poets and artists of this planet will not be quiet.
"Democracy is Coming to the USA." It's coming from unlikely places: South Africa, Ghana, Poland, Chile or any other forgotten nation on this planet.
The new mythology is being born.
Small pieces loosely joined may not be so loosely hyperlinked. The butterflies of the world are hyperlinking to each other's voices and writing themsevels into existence. That existence persists because it's being indexed and cached and linked to on thousands of servers. I wonder what the tipping point will look like.

More Benefits of Blogging
There are several women on the Wild Wolf Women of the Web listserv who write poetry. So we have started a private blog to share and critique our stuff. How else would we, who have much in common but are based all over the planet, be able to get together and help each other pursue our love of words and creative writing. That's why I'm so intrigued with the idea of having kids in school use weblogs as one of their learning tools.
I'm still thinking about how to use weblogs to link "senior citizens," who often feel too isolated -- but that will have to wait until the poetry one gets rolling.

Famous Blue Raincoat
That has to be my favorite album of all times. And my favorite line (from the title song) is "I see you there with a rose in your teeth --just one more thin gypsy thief.." And it's how it's sung by Jennifer Warnes that makes it sound so great!

It was such a warm feeling to see my first born carrying her not-yet-born first. Left her and her husband with bags of frozen home-made pierogi (three different kinds) and all kinds of other comfort foods from her childhood. They are having a boy. Alexander William. My grandson. Who would've ever thunk it.

I'm Huffing and Puffing...
...trying to keep up with my various lives. My mother and I are going to visit my (pregnant) daughter and son-in-law outside of Boston tomorrow. She's finally feeling "up" enough for visitors, and we've packed the car to the roof with foods and other stuffs. I remember when my mom and dad used to do that when they came to visit me and my family when I was married, even though we could well afford to buy all of it on our own. Oh well, that's one of the traits I inherited from my mother that I don't really mind.

I finally got (apparently via Germany) the Famous Blue Raincoat CD I ordered a while ago -- Jennifer Warnes singing Leonard Cohen. One of my favorite albums, the tape of which I used to have and lost in one of my many moves, I guess. Now I can play it on my way tomorrow.

Stumbled up Aunt Owwee's site. Not only am I psyched to have found a blogger more my age, but she has links to some visually stunning blogs, e.g. In Search of a Soul and Sweet Aspirations. Sigh. I so envy people with such visual talents.

I have been in touch with Daniela from livingcode.com, and she has shared some of her poetry with me. I responded deeply to her imagery, and have made myself a promise that, next week, I will send her some of mine.

Since I don't ballroom-dance up a sweat like I used to (when I was out doing that three or four nights a week), I've started taking a NIA class on Thursday evenings. Much more interesting than Aerobics and just as aerobic. the movements are a little yoga, a little Gabrielle Roth, a few ballroom steps -- and best of all, all done to George Michael's Older-- which somehow seems crafted to be danced with NIA. I've been trying to find a copy of the CD and can't seem to.

Son b!X is preparing for his big move out of the dangerous slum in which he now lives. I can only hope that all goes well.

It was like Spring today in Albany NY. Took my mother to Sam's Club, where we bought huge bags of grapefruit and oranges to take to pregnant Melissa. I figure that you can't have enough fresh Vitamin C.

Am overwhelmed with more than 75 posts a day from the Wild Wolf Women of the Web listserv. I'm trying to remember why I re-subscribed.

Pointed to this by a former colleague:
ANGERED BY SNUBBING, LIBYA, CHINA SYRIA FORM AXIS OF JUST AS EVIL. Hee. Hee. It's worth reading the whole thing.

Arrogance vs. Self Esteem
I'm totally taken with Mike Sanders invitation to think about self esteem, self control, self appraisal and arrogance.... and having fun and living purposefully.

Earlier this week, he cited an article in the NY Times Magazine entitled The Trouble with Self Esteem. According to that article:
Last year alone there were three withering studies of self-esteem released in the United States, all of which had the same central message: people with high self-esteem pose a greater threat to those around them than people with low self-esteem and feeling bad about yourself is not the cause of our country's biggest, most expensive social problems.

It seems to me that self esteem is essential to being able to survive in a society that's in the control of madmen. You have to believe in the strength of your own virtues to help you live "purposefully" and even have a little fun. It's when self esteem degenerates into arrogance that you have the threat alluded to in the Times article. And we have no greater example of this than our own Asses of Evil. Michael Moore's rant pretty much documents the current manifestation of that evil arrogance.

So, if you are a truly virtuous person, and you find yourself living in these times in this place, it seems to me that your self-esteem is your precious lifeline to sanity and whatever joy you can find each day. And there's where blogging really helps. I think that it helps all of our self-esteem. We can say "every day, I put my truth out there, and everyday, someone reads my truths." One of the blog stickers (which I haven't gotten around to putting on here yet because I still have figured out how to use my server to put them on) says "I blog, therefore I am." As soon as you have a reason to say -- and believe --" I AM," you have some fuel for your self-esteem.

The people who have given up are the people who feel bad about themselves -- and they usually do so because evily arrogant others have given them the message that "they ARE NOT..." in so many ways and for so long that they have come to believe it. And so they become victims. And arrogant people always seem to blame their victims for the resulting social and economic problems.

Moore's Rant
Take a look at Michael Moore's "Open Letter to the President." It's awfully long, and it's awe-fully packed with enough indictments of the man in question to get him kicked off his soiled throne in a hurry. This letter needs to appear on the front page of every newspaper. But we know it won't, so how about a link on every blog?

More on Choices
Mike Sanders wonders about "the failings of today's generation given all the choices they have in careers and what have you. That might be part of the problem. When we can focus so much on the outside, we tend to avoid thinking about our internal state. What we do and what we have is a less painful focus than who we are."

I am assuming that I, at age 61, am not of "this generation." Actually, I and many of my friends have spent -- and still spend -- a great deal of time looking inside to try to figure out why we do what we do. Or how what we did affected the people around us, including this generation. In our younger days, we didn't have the range of choices that complicate lives today. But we still had external pressures and expectations -- many of the same ones that this generation has. What's different now, I think, is that the external pressures are magnified by the advertising media, which cleverly and convincingly continues to submerge this generation under layers and layers of unrealistic expectations.

What's different about some of us from my generation, though, is that we believed Joseph Campbell when he adivsed us all to "follow your bliss." I took the time and paid a therapist an awful lot of money to figure out what my bliss was. And it wasn't being rich or owning a lot of high-end stuff. And so I tried to teach my kids that competition does not lead to true satisfaction and that having to prove you're better than someone else is not what gives you self-esteem. And, most of all, I encouraged them to figure out what their bliss really was and to follow it. So I have contributed to this generation one ex-actress turned writer, techie, wife, and future mother and one geek, activist, ranter -- well, even I'm not sure how to categorize theonetruebix.

Now, when I look at Mike Sanders list of virtues, I figure they each have more than half of them. And, of course, I have almost all of them. (Does that mean I have high self-esteem or that I'm arrogant?)

Speaking of Fetuses
The other day, my pregnant daughter emailed me a sonogram of my grandchild. You have to understand that when I was pregnant they didn't have that kind of technology. Now they can even tell you if there might be something wrong with the fetus in case you choose to abort. Talk about ethical issues! Early on, I had long conversations with my daughter about those kinds of choices. I didn't have those choices and in some ways it was a lot easier not to have them. This is a incredible complex world this baby is going to be born into.

TV or Not TV
Anita bemoans the time that tv takes from doing other fun things. I remember when we didn't have a tv. I mean I remember when no one had a tv. And then I remember gathering with my cousins in front of a big cabinet just to watch the black and white pattern on the tiny 9 inch screen. Now, I guess, I watch a lot of tv in the evening because that's the time I can finally sit down and relax and work on a current knitting or crocheting project. I watch to escape, but the programs I watch -- even though they can be classified as prime-time soaps -- usually deal with issues that I want to think about. Tonight, for example Family Law dealt with the ethics of allowing a mother to have labor induced so that stem cells from her 6 month fetus could be used to save her 10-year old son's life. (I also watch Buffy. Heh.)

Stitches in Time
I get the stitches in my finger and hand taken out on Wednesday. I've been able to type OK but I haven't been able to do any crocheting on the vest I was trying to make for my mother's 86th birthday on the 18th. But I should be in shape to start working on the baby bunting for my grandchild so that it's done by July. And I also sent away for a pattern for a Winnie the Pooh. I remember that b!X had a terry cloth Pooh with whom he was never without for the first couple of years. My mother has very bad arthritis, and the cyst taken off my middle finger was related to a bone spur (also taken off) on the first joint, which is the result of arthritis. And arthritis is inherited. One of the not-so-great stitches that knit our generations together. I often ponder about which of my kids' vices and virtues they inherited, which my nurturing (such as it was) is responsible for, and which are totally theirs for whatever reasons.

NOW I Understand!
I got this from a former colleaguewhere I used to work.
For those of us having a hard time understanding this Enron thing .. .. ..
Feudalism: You have two cows. Your lord takes some of the milk.
Fascism: You have two cows. The government takes both, hires you to take care of them and sells you the milk.
Communism: You have two cows. You must take care of them, but the government takes all the milk.
Capitalism: You have two cows. You sell one and buy a bull. Your herd multiplies, and the economy grows. You sell them and retire on the income.
Enron: You have two cows. You borrow 80% of the forward value of the two cows from your bank, then buy another cow with 5% down and the rest financed by the seller on a note callable if your market cap goes below $20B at a rate 2 times prime. You now sell three cows to your publicly listed company, using letters of credit opened by your brother-in-law at a 2nd bank, then execute a debt/equity swap with an associated general offer so that you get four cows back, with a tax exemption for five cows. The milk rights of six cows are transferred via an intermediary to a Cayman Island company secretly owned by the majority shareholder who sells the rights to seven cows back to your listed company. The annual report says the company owns eight cows, with an option on one more and this transaction process is upheld by your independent auditor and no Balance Sheet provided with the press release that announces that Enron as a major owner of cows will begin trading cows via the Internet site COW (cows on web).

Heh.

He Has My Vote
SiliconValley.com reports on Colin Powell at the World Economic Summit:
U.S. Secretary of State Powell seemed most animated when he talked about the causes, namely finding a way to cure the conditions of hopelessness and rage that fuel people who have nothing left to lose. Powell, once considered an afterthought in the Bush administration, may still be on the margins there. But to people outside he has become a major political leader. I would vote for him for president.

So NOW Will I Have More Fun?
Today I am a blonde, sort of.
I went to the hairdresser's yesterday to get a trim and get my hair lightened because the stuff I put on made it much to dark and much too red. So, the result, which is not what I expected, is that I now am a blonde with red highlights. I could tone it down, and maybe I will. But, for now, I think I'll give myself the experience of being a blonde. I might even like it.

Like Gloria Steinham, I lost track of my real hair color years ago. I'm sure by now there's lots of gray, and I'm just not ready to look like a grandmother, yet, although I will become one for the first time this July.

Sounds Like a Good Idea to Me
From Working Assets:
As governor of Enron’s home state, Texas, and then later as a candidate for the White House, President Bush was at the front of the line, both in terms of receiving political donations and dispensing political favors. Indeed, Enron and a number of its executives contributed more money to Bush over his political career than anybody else — over $550,000! Less than a year later, Enron’s bankruptcy and the final disintegration of its stock price wiped out the company retirement savings of hundreds, if not thousands, of Enron employees. Tell President Bush to donate his $550,000 to funds, such as the Enron Employee Transition Fund and REACH, that benefit the company’s former employees and provide relief to low-income consumers in California who can’t afford to pay for their basic energy needs.

Frightening Symbolism
This from bix:
In an act of symbolism that makes me positively woozy with cynical delight, Papa Ashcroft has ordered that the semi-naked statues of the Spirit of Justice and the Majesty of Law be covered with drapes.

If he doesn't want to be photographed in front of a statue of a semi-naked female form, why doesn't Ashcroft just stand somewhere else and make his speeches from somewhere else in that room?

The powerful symbolism of covering up/hiding/ignoring the Spirit of Justice and the Majesty of Law at this dark enough point in our government's history is truly frightening. The subconscious (or maybe not-so-subconscious) motives of our power-brokers are seeping through their tight disguises and warning us what they are really trying to do. The shroud of censorship is steadily being wrapped around the not-yet-cold body of American democracy.

(And yes. I'm managing to figure out how to type with nine fingers. You can't keep a dedicated blogger down!)

the look of one hand typing
well. the surgery on my right hand went fine, but i can't use it to type. i feel like archy.

using my mouse left-handed is also weird.

i'm freaked over my son's last bunch of blog posts about the gun shots. he's got to get out of there.

Politicians as Scoundrels
An interesting site about politicians who have been in trouble or disgraced. It lists more than 300 politicians starting from the 1700s. Of course, these 300+ are only the ones who were caught. Makes me wonder if, to be a successful politician, one also has to have a bit of the scoundrel in one's personality. Having worked as a writer at the New York State Legislature for a couple of years in my youth, I would say that, from I have seen, that is usually the case.

Getting The Finger Fixed
Tomorrow I'm going to have some out-patient surgery on the middle finger of my right hand. I'm having a bone-spur and associated cyst removed. The doctor says I have to keep the finger raised for a while after, and I'm imagining driving home giving everyone the finger. I also imagine that it will be one-finger typing for a few days. That means short posts.

How Terrorists Are Made
Interesting column by Thomas Friedman in today's newspaper says:
Look at the biographies of many of the key hijackers or al-Qaida agents: Mohamed Atta, Ziad al-Jarrah, Marwan al-Shehhi, etc. It's the same story: He grew up in a middle-class family in the Arab world, was educated, went to Europe for more studies, lived on the fringes of a European society (many in Belgium), gravitated to a local prayer group or mosque, became radicalized there by Islamist elements, went off for training in Afghanistan and presto -- a terrorist was born. The personal encounter between these young men and Europe is the key to this story

The story seems to reinforce the importance of bringing up children to be curious about the big world around them, to help them learn how to seek out and analyze information, to appreciate diversity and the Golden Rule, and to truly seek to know their own minds and hearts. Bringing kids up in a narrow, restrictive, "protected" environment only makes them less able to deal with all of those things they never learned about when they find themselves lost among all of those "infidels" and "heathens" and "non-believers."

Another Draft?
This is from the Center on Conscience and War --
New legislation, HR 3598, has been introduced by Rep. Smith (MI) and Rep. Weldon (PA) that would require all male citizens and residents to be conscripted into the military for a period of 6 - 12 months between their 18th and 22nd birthdays. There would be few deferments and exemptions. Conscientious Objectors would be required to go through basic training in the military, although they would be exempted from weapons training. After military training they could be reassigned to perform civilian service. See the Center's site for more details.

The Center on Conscience and War sees the bill as very extreme and asks those of conscience to write to their legislators opposing the bill.

Town Web Site Censored and Closed Down
These are the first two sentences in an article in todays Albany Times Union newspaper:

A community Web site formed to advertise this town, famed for battles in the American Revolution, has evolved into a heated debate over free speech. The site, http://www.stillwaterny.org, was temporarily taken down Friday by Supervisor Paul "Butch'' Lilac, who objected to a public message board forum started up by the webmasters he appointed last year. The forum invited users to post their opinions on an array of issues.

I wonder how long it's going to take for the spirit of open communication and debate that is at the heart of the Web -- and of a true democracy -- to take its rightful place in the minds and hearts of the American people. It is soooo discouraging.

My Current Free Will Astrology and how it fits

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): Writing in the New York Times, Nick Gillespie praised the way cartoon rabbit Bugs Bunny teaches kids "powerful, subversive truths from which adults try to shield them." Among the lessons: "smart alecks have more fun. . . . mocking authority is often the right thing to do. . . . tortoises beat hares (especially when tortoises cheat) . . . and . . . a sense of humor is the only way to make it through. . . ." Bugs' approach to life will be especially useful for you between now and February 15, Pisces. It won't be enough, though. You'll need many other subversive truths as well. I'll even go so far as to say that this is the season of subversive truth.

Since over the next month or so I am making a major investment in helping my son set up a web design business (as well as a new life) for himself, trying to situate myself as an over-60 blogger (of which there are too, too few) in a world mostly populated by bloggers young enough to be my kids (and maybe even grandkids), and trying to keep my sense of humor as I deal with my 86-year-old mother, I will heed that advice.

Comments
I have just inserted a link so that readers can make comments on my posts. MUCH THANKS TO ANITA, again, for pointing me in the right direction!!

Shedding Light on the Burrows of Blog
--for my nonblogger friends who might be checking this site:

There is a great article about Meg Hourihan who was one of the founders of what became blogger.com. This is how the article explains the original idea for a "weblog" or "blog":

A blog consists primarily of links to other Web sites and commentary about those links. Having a blog is rather like publishing your own, on-line version of Reader's Digest, with daily updates: you troll the Internet, and, when you find an article or a Web site that grabs you, you link to it -- or, in weblog parlance, you "blog" it. Then other people who have blogs -- they are known as bloggers -- read your blog, and if they like it they blog your blog on their own blog...... Most of the new blogs are, like Megnut, intimate narrative rather than digests of links and commentary; to read them is to enter a world in which the personal lives of participants have become a part of the public domain....

There also is a partial transcript of a panel "Journalisms New Life Forms" that provides answers to questions that many traditional news purveyors and news consumers ask about the value of using weblogs for disseminating news. One of the comments I like is one offered by Rusty Foster, founder of Kuro5hin: In the early American colonies...all the newspapers were essentially Weblogs -- paper Weblogs. They were one guy working in his basement and printing out new editions whenever he had something to say. There is a kind of full circle evolution going on here.

One nation, under blog.

These Young Whippersnappers!
Anita Bora posts a link to this interesting story about a young former CEO who takes a McDonald's counter job and then writes an essay about it that winds up being widely circulated on the web.

I find what all of these young techies are doing really unbelievable. They take risks that my generation would never even consider, and I am intrigued by all of their energy and daring. In many cases, they don't have families to support, so they can take the gambles of experimenting with the commercial possibilities of technology and then wandering off to do something like work at McDonald's. It's such a different world from my twenty-something era.

It is a brave new world, but in a much more exciting and positive way then that phrase originally meant. Now if only my son could find place in it that would pay his bills........

Color me....what?
Here's another personality test for you: Colorgenics. I found it linked from the Fleeting Thoughts blog. This is how I came out:

You are trying to establish yourself and make an impact despite the fact that everything around you seems to be against you .. putting up barriers .., but don't be unduly concerned ... you have the right ideas and come what may, they will soon be manifested and appreciated.

You are a true extrovert, frivolous and outgoing. You need to feel in control of any situation. If matters are not proceeding according to plan you tend to get extremely irritable and perhaps become difficult to live with.

You are a rather inhibited sort of person. This could be the result of your upbringing or of your schooling, whatever. You are able to obtain satisfaction from various forms of physical or emotional activity ...but all in all- you are inclined to be emotionally withdrawn. As a consequence of this you find it difficult to sustain any deep involvement.

Whatever you strive to do, something always seems to be holding you back. There is no subterfuge in you. You are a clear thinker and all you demand from life, in a relationship, is a partner whom you can trust and with whom you can, together, develop a foundation of trust based on understanding. You are your own person... and you demand freedom of thought ...to follow your own convictions. You have no interest in "two-timing" and all you seek is sincerity and "straight-dealing".

You are trying to build up your own position and you resist all external influences. You insist that you are your own person and you will not tolerate any outside interference. Decisive and proud, you are true managerial material...

Yeah, pretty close.

Food for One
Since I temporarily don't have to cook a nutritious dinner every day because my mother is out of town visiting my brother, I can revert to my eclectic eating habits. Yesterday, I had guacamole and corn chips for dinner and some Pepperidge Farm Geneva cookies -- the rest of which I am munching while I check out my fav blogs. Maybe I'll just add some stir-fried peppers and onions to leftover rice and make that today's dinner. Then I'll open the Milano cookies. I think that if I didn't have to cook well-balanced meals for my mom, I might lose the weight I would like to lose. On the other hand, given the Pepperidge Farm cookies, maybe not. I wrote the following last summer, before I discovered the shadowy burrows of the blog.

Two Kinds of Days

1.
She reports each day
on the color of her feces,
the progress of microscopic eruptions
along her thinning skin.

Each day she revels again
In the sad injustices of her past,
re-tells her ragged history
with the same unhappy endings.

I know that the pain in her spine is real.
Each day it infuses her memories --
reminding, rehearsing, repeating
the cycles of a life lived
too empty at its core
to ignore life’s chance miseries.

2.
A chubby woodchuck
in the middle of an empty parking lot
stops to watch me walk in circles
around a June afternoon
awash in dandelion seeds
and gently dappled sunlight.

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

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

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

Changing Realities
I'm copying this from Anita Bora's site because it relates, in a way, to how one might change the reality one lives in. What if you believe that you CAN live in two realities at the same time -- switch in and out like we do with email identities? Seems to me like that's a good survival skill.

By changing your belief, you change your expectations
By changing your expectations, you change your attitude
By changing your attitude, you change you behaviour
By changing your behaviour, you change your performance
By changing your performance, you change your life

A Little Freedom!
I took my mother down to my brother in New Paltz, where she will stay for a few days and give me a break. So, last night I took a long soak in sea salt and lavender and today I'm going over to have dinner with a friend and help her set up her computer.

She and I went to see A Beautiful Mind the other night. Both the movie and the story are exceptional. It made me wonder how many schizophrenic people there might be out there with all kinds of potential, but they are lost in this other reality. It's amazing to me how John Nash was able to find a way to separate his two realities even though he continued with an awareness of both of them. It also brought to mind something Daniela Bouneva Elza from livingcode.ca emailed me last week. She said:
There is this idea I wrote about on my weblog some time ago, that reality is consensual. If enough people believe something to be true it becomes so. So again I wonder where and who defines reality for us, because I do not see people getting together to do it for themselves?.

The whole notion of us each living in our own reality is something I've been wrestling with for some time. How does someone who does not live in the majority reality survive? I'm not just talking about schizophrenics. There are lots of people who just see things differently. They wind up unemployed/able and spend their lives wondering why they are locked out. Does that mean that they will continue not to thrive unless they buy into the majority reality? And what if they can't seem to do that, even though they are on the verge of being homeless and starving? Should they be getting therapy? Take meds? It seems that for survival, one must somehow be able to survive in the majority reality. It's very upsetting.

I remember once reading that, as an astrological Capricorn rising, I have my feet on the ground and my head in the sky. In some way, it often seems like living in two realities at the same time.

My Free Will Astrology Horoscope
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): Alice finds her way to Wonderland by falling down a rabbit hole. Dorothy rides to Oz on a tornado. In C.S. Lewis's *The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe,* Lucy stumbles into Narnia via a portal in the back of a large clothes cabinet. In the sequels to all these adventures, however, the heroes must find different ways to access their exotic dreamlands. Alice slips hrough a mirror next time. Dorothy uses a Magic Belt. Lucy leaps into a painting of a schooner that becomes real. Take heed of these precedents, Pisces. A threshold will soon open into a fascinating alternative reality you've enjoyed in the past, but it will not resemble the doorways you've used before.

Well, I'm ready!

The Ongoing Battle for Delilah
I have to say that my daugher Melissa is a real scrapper. She's taking on Highbridge Press for cancelling the publication of her book for a very lame reason and has a lawyer on their tail. They are getting uncomfortable, and if she keeps it up, I'll bet they have no choice but to come around. (Or pay her off; either way, it's OK.) You go, grrl.

Cyberseniors
Well, I've launched myself into the world of seniors online by hosting a page at Cyberseniors.org on "Being the Filler in the Sandwich Generation." Doing so is forcing me to learn some HTML, which I never knew before. So, that's good. And I'm thinking that if the experiment goes and I get some interesting stories, maybe I can collect them for some bigger publication. Ya' never know.

Why Are There Are No Women
Now, I'm new to this blogging thing, but as I link around to check out the Alphas in the various philosophical discussions going on the functioning of the internet in general, and blogging in particular, it seems to me that there are no females pack leaders. I read somewhere (?) that there are even more females than males using the internet, but apparently we don't do it for the same reasons. I see lots of female-founded blogs, but I haven't run across any (yet) that get into the kinds of heavy discussions as Doc Searls or Christopher Locke. Half the time I don't even know what these guys are talking about.

But I am fascinated with how this blogging thing works. And so my next task is going to be to add to my Blogs of Note some of the cool sites that I've stumbled on in my blogworld travels. But that's for tomorrow. The Nyquil is kicking in.

Well, I guess I really don't know why there aren't more women taking the lead in all of the technical, economic, and philosophical discussions about internet issues. I know that I don't because it often seems like so much mental masturbation. I'd rather be doing some creative cooking or knitting or sewing. Or reading. Or ballroom dancing. Or even just freeform blogging. Or maybe, with the time I have left in my life, I don't want to spend it trying to understand and analyze the incredible complexities of those issues, important as they are to how our society of communicators is going to continue to evolve.

But, You go, guys! Boop oop a doop.

Friday Nite Funk
Figured I'd touch base before my Nyquil kicks in. Another January, another sinus infection.

Watched "Dark Angel" and am realizing how much I miss "Nikita," although "Alias" at least tries. But "Nikita" had everything -- dark exotic music, a female lead who really was the equal of the men, including getting beat up periodically -- to say nothing of those sensuously disturbing "Michael" eyes.

So, what's an aging feminist like me doing fantasizing about such cartoon characters? Well, back in the forties and fifties, all there was were Wonder Woman comics. I mean, granted, Brenda Starr and Katie Keane were smart and had careers and all that, but only Diana Prince got a chance to kick ass, well sort of. There must be a part of me that stayed stuck in adolescent arrested development.

I also remember that "The Snow Queen" fairy tale was my favorite. Gerda (I think that was her name) actually was the hero of the story and got to have the adventures and save her little male friend. Not like that wimpy Cinderella. Or at least not like the traditional wimpy Cinderella. My former husband, a writer of the well-produced A Tale of Cinderella created one with a lot more spunk, but she's still not tough enough for my taste.

I was also a big fan of Xena, at least early in the series. I wanted to be her a few Halloweens ago, but decided that, while I'm not in bad shape for someone my age, I'd be better off as Betty Boop -- who, I believe was way ahead of her time. She flew airplanes, lived alone, had a career, ran for president, dressed sexy, had all kinds of adventures etc. etc. back in the forties before no more than a handful of women were doing those things. Boop oop a doop.

I Disagree
Bix has responded to my perspective on journalism with And I think the dictionary is wrong. The idea that any presentation of "facts" can be without interpretation is one of the dangerous myths of journalism.

Well, then, let me explain my position further: I think then, that those who are using certain words need to come to an agreement about how they define these words.

The pages of any newspaper contain any number of stories that are objective and simply-put-forward facts. That's also true of radio and tv news programs. Perhaps this should be called "reporting."

Then, perhaps, there's another level that can be called "journalism" that contains the perspective of the reporter.

And then, again, there's still another level that is "commentary," and that is where the writer conjectures, supposes, opinionates etc.

It seems to me various people are calling it "journalism" when they really mean one of the other two categories.

I find that discussions that don't lead to any conclusions go in circles because the discussees are using their personal definitions for the words they are using. I ran into this a lot in the field of education. Until there are accepted definitions of terms (and that's why we have dictionaries), while discussions are always interesting exercises in writing and thinking -- they aren't really productive. I remember that when I used to write "white papers" for the State Ed Department, I often began with a definition of terms, so that when discussions ensued, the real issues would be addressed and we wouldn't be stuck with each person arguing about something different based on his/her own definition of a certain word. It's amazing how much time was wasted because there were so many conceptions of what "arts-in-education" means. Once we stated what definitions we were using for specific terms, it was easier to move forward with discussions of the real issues.

For deep communication and change to happen, eveyone has to be using the same language -- or at least agree on the meaning of the fundamental terms being discussed.

Now, This Is Too Much Fun
I don't know how I got to this guy's site, but if you click on his site map and go to his Playthings, be prepared to lose track of a good deal of time. You can spend all day exploring this incredible site. Love it!

Journalism vs Commentary
Hmm. I haven't read all of the discussions filling up lots of blogspace lately (I follow some of them from bix's Blog Roll), but I think maybe there needs to be some clarification of what "journalism" is in contrast to "commentary."

The dictionary defines journalism as writing characterized by a direct presentation of facts or description of events without an attempt at interpretation . That requires objective and fair reporting of facts and events. Now, granted, we don't have enough of that these days, but that's a different and the more substantial issue.

Commentary, on the other hand -- which is what most of the blogs and (I think) too many supposed journalists provide -- is personal reflection and comment on what has been put forth by what is supposed to be good, honest "journalism." Personally, I tend to read the editorial/commentary/perspective pages of a newspaper immediately after I read the puported facts on the front page. First I want to know what's going on. Then I want to know what others think about what's going on. And finally, I can go off and think about all of that myself and come to my own conclusions or speculations.

So, good thoughtful and/or creative and/or critical and/or riotous commentary is what people like me need to mentally gnaw, to viscerally digest, and eventually, to turn into commentary of our own. (No shit.)

Love Those Arts
This evening I went with some friends to an exhibit at the Arts Center that

...brings together cutting-edge contemporary art and the industrial heritage of New York State’s Capital Region in a conceptual Call-and-Response based on the premise that both art and industry involve invention and problem-solving as a means of getting from initial idea to final product..

It wasn't at all what I expected, and, as I expected, it reminded me of how exciting it is to stretch one's awareness outside the box. For example, one installation, based on the artist's exploration of the Watervliet Armory (which, I believe, is the oldest continually functioning armory in the country), is a metal two-dimensional topographical construction of Tolkein's Middle Earth, with a street map of 1940s Berlin sort of etched into the surfaces of that construction. It's all suspended upside down from the ceiling, with arcs of chains hanging down that are supposed to simulate the trajectories of bombs.

While, intellectually, I barely "understood" many of the other installations (even when I read the artists' explanations) I certainly responded to them on a totally non-analytical level. Each visually deconstructed the essence of its "industrial partner" and, through the alchemy of art, rendered it mythic. The magic of art. Love it!

Getting the Hang of It
So, OK, I can't import images into a Blogger blog. If I ever get my web site done, I can play with them there. So it goes.

I found a site based in Portland, Maine for cyber seniors. I'm trying to figure out how I can get involved with them somehow. Except I also have been checking in on various blogs listed on the schoolblogs site, and I'm remembering just how stimulating it is to be involved with the learning of young people. Actually, I remembering when b!X lived at home and all of the information I used to absorb just from being around his world of constant exploration. I'm going to do some of my own further reading into those current blogs and then get in contact with some of those people. For example, Laura Shefler, whose sketches -- and more -- are full of such creative energy.

But first I have to go and have my All One vitamin shake for seniors and then take my 85 year old mother out grocery shopping. And then I'm going to iron on some "embellishments" on the black t-shirts I wear for non-formal ballroom dancing .

Meanwhile, I'm waiting to hear how my newly pregnant daughter, who lives outside of Boston is doing, 'cause she's been so nauseous that we haven't been able to get together for the holidays. So, as soon as she's up to it, my mom and I will drive out to Jamaica Plain to visit her (and her husband, of course; he's a mother-in-law's dream).

I'm Psyched
I remembered how to insert a new link in Blogs of Note. Now that's progress.

So my next challenge is figuring out how to insert an image. I guess that means I have to bug bix again. Hey, that's one of the things geeksons are for, right?

I started to put together a web page a while ago (altho' I never finished it), since I learned the basics of FrontPage at my former job. I even designed and maintained an internal staff web page and took the first shot at a web page for my former department, the New York State Office of Cultural Education. It's been redesigned since, but at least I had the experience of getting them online for the first time. I like to take on new projects that force me to learn. Hence, blogging. I just wish I could find other cyber-curious sandwich-generation retired people to link up with. Who knows. I'm still new at this.

So This Is How It Works!
Well, thanks to schoolblogs.com, I'm getting the hang of how this blogging is supposed to work. They link to me; I link to them. That's a start. Now I have to go in and figure out (again) how to add a link in my Blogs of Note list. I'm finally on a learning curve, slow that it is.

Just Another Day
So, with Leonard Cohen's new CD in the background, I scroll through hundreds of blogs in the Blogger directory, scanning for any that might deal with a life in process for more than five decades. This seems to be a world populated by the young and the infantile. There are exceptions, and while many of these seem to be involved in dense and worthy online bloggersations about the process and worthiness of blogging, I'm still convinced it all needs to be a lot more ubiquitous than it is to be important. There are a whole lot of us older folks out here who find it hard to get the hang of it all.

But it all takes up so much time!! Don't these people sleep? Don't they have to take care of anyone but themselves? Do they read anything that's not up on a monitor? Do they live on take-out?

Leonard Cohen is getting old. But he still writes great lyrics. So, where's his place in all of this? Where's mine? And does it matter anyway?

Can't find my Jennifer Warne's "Famous Blue Raincoat" album, speaking of great lyrics. Damn. This year I have to organize all of my stuff. Stuff. Stuff. Stuff. Stuff. Stuff.

May the lights in the Land of Plenty, shine on the turth some day. -- Leonard Cohen

Resolutions
So, here are my New Year's resolutions:
1. Stop bugging b!X about finding paid work.
2. Get out of the apartment every day, even if it's just for a walk around the building.
3. Start doing a personal "Thursday's at Borders" so that I can start to build a new routine for myself. (And I can pick up Metroland and see what's going on around town and actually sit down a read for an hour or so.)
4. Finish editing cwyln's Moya and Michael's novel.

While there are lots of other things that I also should do (like give away all the "work" clothes that I no longer wear), if I can do those four things I probably could change my life for the better.

This is not what I always envisioned my retirement would be. LIving across the hall from my 85-year-old mother so that I can take care of her might be a noble thing to do, but it doesn't allow for my life as I would like it to be. And, given that I don't believe in reincarnation or heaven, this is the only life that I'll ever have. If I choose to play caregiver and do something good for someone else, I need to figure out how to also generate the kind of excitement and stimulation in my life that I always managed to generate before. I need input so that I can again have some creative output.

OK. Emily Dickenson managed to be creative within the confines of some very narrow personal space. Nope, that's not me. I need to engage with a larger world. I hope that there will be still time for me to do that.

Here's hoping for new life in my New Year.