MIA and this is a hoot!

I've been MIA for the past few months; helping out at the Bessemer Classical School, preparing Emma, 18, for college, and just generally missing my blogging friends.

I'm baaaack! I thought you would like this one:

How time flies

My eldest at 2 weeks old, being held by her late great grandmother, a long haired Taxman, with Taxman's mom and sister looking on. That particular sister is 26 and has two adorable children.  

You'll Never Get a Medal

Just put on your best saucy voice, dripping in sarcasm.
Or will I? A Girl Scout patch, maybe?

Rural Doctoring gets it. (Wouldn't it be a hoot if she was one of those who would ask why a woman would forego all the obstetrical accoutrements)

Athletes and adventurers talk about "peak experiences." I understand some people scale mountains, others jump out of airplanes, and still others get beaten to a pulp in extreme wrestling competitions--all in a pursuit of peak experiences: that sense of being more than yourself, better than your best.

Well, you're never going to catch me doing those things. As a well brought-up Asian woman, I will not jump out of an airplane, even if it is on the ground. I'm just a cautious person, so I thought I'd have to sacrifice peak experiences for a sense of safety. (emphasis mine)

Then--I delivered my first baby. I was a fourth-year medical student and I'd been waiting in the wings for weeks to catch a baby, and after it happened--after that new person slipped into my hands--I felt high for hours. Being at a birth is still a peak experience for me. Sometimes, I'll find myself watching a baby crowning and realize I've got a giant grin on my face.

And that is the birth assistant talking. Imagine the peak for the mother. Think about it... a blogger who spent 8 years of her academic life, and at least 5 years of her early career preparing for... and receiving a reward for being a participant in a mothers' experience. Wow. (For the record, none of my midwives "delivered" my babies: I did. I love them deeply and they are more a part of my life than any of the other beloved people I call "doctor.")

While natural childbirth may or may not be yours, I'll tell you what isn't my cup of tea. Taxman gets up in the freezing cold at 5 in the morning, dons compression underwear and spends a small mint on shoes that don't even look good, and runs 10 miles. On a slow day. HE has a medal, for coming in 5,924th place in the Mercedes Marathon, that he defies you to touch. (You are, however, highly encouraged to share your undying admiration.)

A Peak Experience.

Maybe the Taxman gets it. I know it makes no logical sense to pay my midwife thousands of dollars over and above what my insurance won't pay (and I teach logic, remember?); endure lasting, searing ridicule from the in-laws; questioning glances from the pediatrician... not to mention three days of labor and three hours of pushing one's fifth child into the world. The reward is a wet, eager-to-suckle, wide-eyed new human being whose needs only I can fill, and who provided a wormhole to infinity, however brief. That sweet newborn smell (not Johnson's Baby Lotion) is imprinted into my psyche.

For years, I got my birth high fix from doula-ing. Some of the children whose mothers I helped are my Facebook or MySpace friends. Like Taxman and his medal ("not made of anything special," per himself) only a few people really get it.

But hey, we have our medals.

I'd love to do something like this for girls

Timmy turned 15 just a week ago. He used to have a Mohawk, but his head is shaved clean now. In his long yellow T-shirt, on slender legs, and with arms flailing in unrestrained boyish glee, he runs and leaps joyfully between the rows of squash and tomatoes. He calls out to two visitors, comes smiling up to them, welcomes them, and greets them by their first names. He shakes their hands. His grip lasts several moments longer than one might expect. Timmy's enthusiastic chatter begins at once.
"I'm working over at the greenhouse with my teacher Sam," he says. "We've got new lettuce seedling to transplant today! Hal is planting some now. He's over there. See him? With his teacher Ashley! Come on! See what I'm doing! This will be the last planting for the fall crop. The cool weather is best for late lettuce, you know. And today is payday, too!" Timmy wipes a cascade of sweat from his forehead and face with his shirttail.

I'm convinced that everyone, particularly children, intrinsically need meaningful work, to feel respected by and respect others, a sense of community, and something for which to assume responsibility.

I think it is wonderful that the Kindle Farm School is creating this for at-risk boys. I'm familiar with Oak Meadow, the Waldorf-inspired curricula used be myriad homeschoolers and a handful of private schools, that Kindle Farm uses. I used to teach in a Waldorf school, where I learned to appreciate the value of memorizing good poetry, mastering a musical instrument, knitting, and art in early education. Because it tends to produce aware, self directed learners, I thought that it would be ideal to use as an educational intervention, and figured no one would do it because of the educational intelligentsia being what it is, and the cost (in Vermont, $22,000 per child, courtesy of the public schools).

We place a high value on helping our students to realize and express their own intelligence independently.
At Oak Meadow, we believe that excellence involves more than just academics. For students to realize their full potential, intellectual development must be balanced with self-awareness, critical thinking, social responsibility, and physical activity. The Oak Meadow curriculum encourages integrative thinking, participation in community activities, and exploration of the natural world.
Students have ample opportunities to express their creative faculties through essays, projects, and community service.

Back to Kindle Farm:

Under special-education law, these students are to be placed in "the least restrictive environment" for a chance to get their education when all else in regular public school has failed. For many of these students, this school is their last chance before residential treatment - or jail.

I have worked with pregnant and parenting teens, and one hundred percent of them are "at-risk" in one way or another. The majority didn't have their father, or any adult male married to their mother, in their homes. Many were left to fend for themselves after school, and aside from chores, given no real interaction with caring adults, found their way into trouble. Often, "trouble" included physical involvement with a wayward crowd, substance use as a substitute for the community, respect, and guidance that were missing in their lives. Their lives devoid of hope, direction, and meaning, they became sexually active. I would see the many programs that didn't work and thought, there must be something more. I'm not a therapist but this seemed obvious:

"So many kids come to us with anger issues," said Ashley O'Neal, a horticulturist. She interrupted herself to give clear and sequential directions to two boys who where harvesting celery. "We'll work together on this row first. Carefully remove the big stalks that crowd the new ones, which need light and space. Put the big ones-the ones we are selling-here on this burlap. Push the soil back in around the smaller ones. They still have some growth in them. Like this. Okay?"
Anger-management skills are absolutely required here," said Bob Bursky, the burly, animated, and energized director. "Those directions Ashley just gave help prevent confusion. She didn't just say, 'Thin the celery.' She taught a sequence those boys can follow. If a kid's confused, you have frustration. Then stress. Stress unrelieved brings the explosion. And a kid will predictably throw something, howl profanities, or, at worst, hurt someone else or himself. And that's how most of them got into trouble. It's our mission to catch it early on, before it escalates."
"Here they can learn to process anger before they explode," Ashley continued. "and we have to teach them how - for those times when there's no one around to help. On a job, unprocessed anger means disaster. And these kids are all going to have jobs someday."

The article didn't go on to give data on what became of Kindle Farm School students, but this makes complete sense.

During the mid-90's, Bob Bursky was a special-education teacher at the Brattleboro Retreat in an in-patient setting for youngsters with behavioral or addiction problems. While there, Bob envisioned another kind of program, recalled from his days at the Neve Ur Kibbutz on the Jordan River in Israel. There, in his early twenties (in fact a self described "troubled kid"), Bob found meaning in the rigorous farm work, close mentoring, and strong community ties of kibbutzim life. He foresaw a place for at-risk youth where the student-teacher ration would be such that teachers could work closely as personal mentors with needy students.

It has all the elements to give an at-risk child to succeed.

Schlafly: Where did Reagan Votes Go in '08?

Talk is cheap. This free-market libertarian would like to know.

Reagan's 1980 and 1984 victories were based on a coalition of three different groups. He attracted the fiscal-integrity/limited-government conservatives who had not given up since Barry Goldwater's campaign, the social conservatives who newly came into the political process to be active against the Equal Rights Amendment and abortion, and the Reagan Democrats (mostly blue-collar, Catholic and/or Irish) who sought a change from the stagflation of the Jimmy Carter years.

In 2008, the first two groups shrank because of lessened enthusiasm for the Republican candidate. Sarah Palin brought new life to the Party, but it wasn't enough.

Schlafly goes to to imply what Taxman and I have said all along. People in power are always thrown out when the going gets tough, but secondly, Republicans haven't been acting like Republicans, either for the past eight years or in this election cycle.

Neither Democrats nor Republicans offered any good solution to the challenge of a depressed economy, but John McCain was particularly insensitive. In the presidential TV debates before the Michigan primary, he brushed off economic questions by pontificating that manufacturing jobs are gone forever and workers should go to a community college and get retrained.

He repeatedly reminded voters that he is the "biggest free-trader" they'll ever meet, a line that may resonate with a few libertarian think tanks but is a poke in the eye to blue-collar guys whose jobs have gone overseas to Chinese working for 30 cents an hour.

I married into a family of union workers for whom this is a penultimate, if not the pinnacle. McCain's comments are more than an eye poke to hardworking families who have lost their jobs, health care, and retirement as of late. Admittedly, I'm a take-care-of-yourself-because-at-the-end-of-the-day-no-one-else-will (no matter what they say) kind of gal, I think these people deserve to have the promises that were made to them honored.

The young people who voted 2-to-1 for Obama were another group that Republicans lost in 2008. They are the generation that has come out of the public schools since they have been teaching political correctness, multiculturalism, diversity, William Ayers-style "social-justice," self-esteem and other nonsense instead of reading, math, and American history.

It's time for the conservative movement to restore parents' rights over public-school curriculum and not leave it up to the anti-parent, pro-diversity policies endorsed by the National Education Association.

Conservatives had the chance to dismantle the Department of Education in 1996, but cowtowed, and blew it. Big time. Those in higher education and those who employ workers directly out of high school know it, but I suspect that most still have their heads in the sand and believe that "our" public schools are somehow "different," or even "good" when up to 40% of college undergraduates need some form of remediation of basic skills.

The third group that Republicans lost in 2008 was unmarried women. By a colossal 40+ point spread, unmarried women voted for Barack Obama by 70-to-29 percent.

One explanation is economic: the women who cast off husbands look to Big Brother Government to support them. They vote for the party that promises more benefits from the Welfare State.

The other explanation is social: the feminists have carried on a 40-year campaign to destroy marriage and what they deride as the patriarchy. They want to replace it with a matriarchy.

In the 1970s, the feminists achieved unilateral divorce-on-demand from state legislatures, unilateral abortion-on-demand from the courts, and unilateral control over children in the welfare class by taxpayer handouts to women that made husbands and fathers unnecessary. ...

The United States today has 24 million children growing up in a household without their own father, and 17 million of those are in mother-headed households. Why is anybody surprised that the dissolution of marriage, depriving kids of their own fathers, and the widespread acceptance of matriarchy, produces eager supporters of Obama's promise to "spread the wealth around"?

I volunteer in two schools where I have the privilege of reading to, doing art with, and supporting children, many of whom are minority and fatherless. I have seen, firsthand, how young children, particularly sons, need their fathers in their lives, day in and day out. I am reminded of the value of a strong, mature father in the lives of boys, and am thankful that there are male principals willing to stand in the gap for these boys.

Overwhelmingly, the 50- and 60-something divorcees of the 1970s in my life, who are facing their golden years alone, voted for Obama.

If Republicans want to win future elections, they will have to field candidates who defend U.S. jobs, parents' rights in public schools, and the institution of marriage.

If there is one thing in which I take solace, I'm comforted in history: After Carter came Reagan. Maybe there is hope.

Do Animals Go to Heaven?

Of course that was the next question from the children.

Overall I am not sure about the theology of Guuideposts, but I'll be saying this at Spooky's funeral. I remember praying for Spooky in those awful moments of him looking into my eyes and begging God, who cares for the sparrow, to care for my cat.

Consider the story in Genesis of the very first covenant established between God and his people, made with Noah right after the flood. The clouds part and the world’s first rainbow appears. God tells Noah that he is creating a covenant “with you, and with your descendants after you; and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the cattle, and every beast of the earth with you; of all that comes out of the ark, even every beast of the earth.” God goes on to say that his covenant with “all flesh” shall never be “cut off”—a strong suggestion that animals will not be excluded from his dealings with the world. (This passage was an inspiration for “Rainbow Bridge,” an anonymous poem that has become very popular on the internet. It describes how when people arrive at the gates of heaven, the first thing they will encounter is their deceased pets.)

Then there’s Luke 3:6. “All flesh shall see the salvation of God.” Or Mark 16:15—a passage well-loved by that great friend of animals, Saint Francis of Assisi. The risen Jesus tells the Apostles to go into the world and “preach the Gospel to every creature.” Jesus filled his teachings with references to animals. His promise in Matthew and Luke that not even a sparrow falls to earth without God’s knowing it subtly but powerfully suggests what every grieving pet owner feels: God refuses to forget a single one of his creatures, no matter how small or seemingly insignificant.

What about the argument that runs: “Animals can’t go to heaven because the Bible says they don’t have souls”? Norm Phelps points out in his book, The Dominion of Love that the Hebrew term repeatedly used to describe animals in the Old Testament is nephesh chayah. Chayah means “living,” while nephesh is the Hebrew term for the force that animates the body—what Phelps describes as “the whatever-it-is that makes a person or an animal a conscious, sentient individual.”

A funny thing happened when this term was translated into English. In most English versions of the Bible, different words are used to translate nephesh chayah depending on whether animals or people are being discussed. In Genesis 1:21 and 24, for example, Phelps points out that nephesh chayah is translated as “living creature.” But in Genesis 2:7, where the term refers to people, not animals, it’s translated as “living soul.” The use of two different terms in the English translation completely blurs the fact that in the original Hebrew, no such distinction exists.

Why did the Bible’s english translators take such pains to use different terms for the souls of animals and people, when the Hebrew of the Old Testament repeatedly uses just one? Probably because they were concerned not to contradict Genesis teaching that humans alone are created in God’s image. But to acknowledge that animals have souls isn’t to usurp the unique place of humans in God’s creation-as the original Hebrew makes clear enough.

Of all the biblical passages that I ultimately discovered I could turn to for consolation, the most moving and compelling is the Old Testament’s single greatest passage prefiguring the Christian heaven—Isaiah’s vision of the Peaceable Kingdom:

“The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them.”

From Dennis Callen:

This is one subject the Bible is very clear about; death is an enemy of God. First Corinthians 15:26 emphasizes that, “The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.” Did God create the animals to die? No! Definitely not! Death as an enemy is only a temporary interruption of His plan.

In Ecclesiastes 3:19-21 King Solomon states that man and beasts (animals) have this in common, they both have bodies that return to the dust of the earth and they both have a spirit that survives death. He goes on to say that he didn't know if the spirit of an animal went to a different place than the man's did. In anothe place in the Bible when man was created he is called a living soul (Genesis 2:7), whereas animals are called living creatures in the King James Version of the Bible. Further examination of the original language shows the same word used for man and animals. They are both living souls.

Revelation 19 portrays horses and airfowl

19:17 And I saw an angel standing in the sun; and he cried with a loud voice, saying to all the fowls that fly in the midst of heaven, Come and gather yourselves together unto the supper of the great God;

at the Apocalypse. In short, I don't know if Spooky will be joining me in the Presence of God, but I do know God cares for him. And in that I am comforted.

From Around the Web

I'm not selling this stuff. Do not.... I repeat DO NOT click on a full stomach.

For the environmentally conscious, a free Target tote shopping bag. Terms and conditions apply.

This probably makes you laugh but

Do I Creep You Out | Funny Jokes at JibJab

this and the ubiquitousness Big Brother-esque-ness of Google totally creeps me out.

GOOGLE, continuing to work closely with government, claims it would keep individual user data confidential: "GOOGLE FLU TRENDS can never be used to identify individual users because we rely on anonymized, aggregated counts of how often certain search queries occur each week."

Google working with the government. Closely. How reassuring. Determining disease outbreaks based on internet searches, how scientific.

Fortunately alternatives are popping up like daffodils.

I'm glad I bake my own bread (occasionally) when I read stuff like this. If it has fur, whiskers, and a long skinny tail, it's probably a mouse. Bon Appetit!

If you have a daughter, read this before her next round of shots. Gardasil may help protect against cervical cancer but the tradeoff is, um, warts. Ew, yuck.

Corruption in Africa is nothing new: Tribal leaders sold their charges into slavery hundreds of years ago. This is just awful.

Sorious Samura shows how in Africa corruption has become normal and accepted, even though it's tearing the continent to pieces. Despite the billions in western aid poured in, Samura claims Africa is heading into oblivion: but it's not war, famine and disease strangling development; it's corruption.

Dispatches provides a sober portrait of how modern Africa really works, where the voiceless millions, living in poverty, have had their futures stolen by their corrupt governments, aided and abetted by the West.

This roundup courtesy of my pals over at www.alabama-moms.com.

I. should. have. honked.

“That we may end our lives in faith and hope, without suffering and without reproach, let us pray to the Lord.” -Book of Common Prayer



It's been one of those weeks that anything that can go wrong has. My cell phone bit the dust and I don't yet have another one. Monday I got lost and went ten miles to go three blocks in Bessemer... wouldn't have happened with my phone. I am heartbroken. I caused a living creature to die a horrible, grievous, torturous suffering death.

I ran over Spooky, the kitten I love. He was a sweet and snuggly kitty and let Caroline love on him and never hissed at her. Spooky had a nasty habit of snuggling up next to wheels of large vehicles and John moved him out from his spot before we were leaving this afternoon. I forgot to honk my horn to scare him.

I moved the van out of the carport and felt a small dull thud and saw the cat flailing in the carport like a fish out of water. I parked the van and ran over to him. I didn't see blood or a bone, and couldn't remember what the rule was -- did I move him or not? He was crying loudly, so I gently scooped him up, and fished for the right key, went in and called Scott. He said he thought the vet clinic on Hwy 11 was open til 9. Did they handle emergencies? He didn't know and couldn't tell me because he was in the BATHROOM. I imagined him fiddling with his fly one handed and listening to me freaking out.

I looked at Spooky. His belly was distended, his body was contorted into an unnatural twist. He lost control of his bladder and bowels. He arched his neck and opened his mouth and let out a soft, but gutteral howl. I was crying, praying, and hoping we could make it to the vet's at rush hour, and that they could help him.

We got into the van and I continued to talk to him and rub his face. We got about half a mile down hiway 11 when his little kitty tongue, which had turned a dusky gray, stuck up as he gave me another moan. Those sound like agonal moans, I thought. He's dying. His ordinarily tiny kitty pupils fully dilated.

Spooky, my sweet black kitty, who liked to sleep in my laundry, ate leftovers, and who would sit on my lap and purr for hours on end, died in my arms. I am sick to death that I caused any creature, particularly one that I love, such a horrible painful death. I could have honked. I. Could. Have. Honked.

I went back home and took the little shoebox that Fairlie had made for his home, and twisted his body to make it look like he was sleeping. I tried to close his little furry eyelids. I encouraged his sister and littermate to come and sniff him, but she didn't seem interested.

I changed clothes but still have cat pee smell on me and his little furry smell and feel on my hands. The other kids aren't home yet. I am kind of shocky and can't do anything but sit and type. It is like this shock -- no real FEELING yet but grief and sadness but it hasn't manifested -- just has to come out through my fingertips and nothing else really matters.

Only here becauseI don't dare fly it on my house

Reminiscing

This picture comes to us via the Tuscon Waldorf School

Thinking of Kristen's description of her kids' school as a hippie preschool.

I used to teach there, thirteen-and-some-change years ago. I loved the simplicity of the rhythm of the day, the sweet, simple songs, the healthy snacks, the enchanting poetry the children memorized.

One of Emma's (now 17) favorites, now loved by John and Caroline, by Rowena Bastin Bennett:

Down in the grasses
Where the grasshoppers hop
And the katydids quarrel
And the flutter-moths flop-
Down in the grasses
Where the beetle goes “plop”,
An old withered fairy Keeps a second-hand shop.
She sells lost thimbles
For fairy milk pails
And burnt-out matches
For fence posts and rails.
She sells stray marbles
To bowl on the green,
And bright scattered beads
For the crown of the queen.

Oh, don’t feel badly
Over things that you lose
Like spin tops and whistles
Or dolls’ buckled shoes;
They may be the things that Fairy folk can use,
For down in the grasses
Where the grasshoppers hop
A withered old fairy
Keeps a second-hand shop.

The book is back in print, for who knows how long. From this bibliophile: Buy it before it sells out.