A Little Better Every Day

Well, I took a shot of Nyquil last night, which is something I hardly ever do. I dislike putting chemicals into my body which might be harsh, but last night I was desperate to take something which I knew would knock me out. I needed a good night's sleep; yesterday I was so tired I felt dizzy and lightheaded throughout the hours. I was unwilling to go through that again today. I'm happy to say that the Nyquil did its promised job and I feel a little bit better today. I'm still a bit lightheaded, due to the congestion in my head, but I feel a little better than I did yesterday and much better than I felt the day before that. I feel like my body should be healthy enough to be able to tackle this thing; I have on my side the fact that I don't smoke, am not overweight, and eat a reasonable healthy diet most of the time (occasional visits to McDonald's notwithstanding). Possibly the worst thing about feeling ill is that it takes away from my creative flow. I haven't felt like painting this week; I feel like anything I put onto the canvas will be coming from such a muddled place that it won't be good. I don't believe I can focus the way I need to when my head feels like it's swimming on air. Maybe I'll try a bit today. I do have some butterflies which I cut out of construction paper; I'd planned on painting and decorating them with my daughter yesterday in honor of it being the first day of summer (Summer Solstice/Litha) but we ran out of time. Maybe today we'll do that. At least it's something creative, and I get to do something fun with my little one, who is all too easy to bore these days!!!! I hope everyone else's day is blessed and healthy. Y

I'm Very Sleepy

I wish I could curl up into a little ball right now and go to sleep. For hours. I went out last night to meet up with some friends for the surprise birthday party of a really good friend who decided not to attend. Apparently, the party was a surprise and he wasn't in the mood to be surprised. The girl who organzied the party was to'd but what can you do? I had fun hanging out; my daughter came with me and ate some spaghetti, and I called D this afternoon to wish him a happy and told him I loved him even if he didn't like surprise birthday parties. All night long I felt pretty good, if not a little bit speeded out from the cold medicine I'd taken earlier. I went to bed with nothing more than a mild headache and was awakened at 3:30AM with a SCREAMER of a sinus headache. WTF????!!!! I downed more cold medicine but it helped only marginally. I tossed and turned for the rest of the night and am now afraid to take a nap for fear that the headache will return. Even now it's lurking in the background, waiting evilly to pounce. I feel like my every thought is swimming through a sea of green ooze; I can't wait to feel better. I conducted a bit of online research yesterday afternoon and discovered that, yes, sinus headaches can be related to pollution. This somewhat supports my theory that the root of our ills is growing in the soil of South Florida. Today I met not one but two people who are moving back home within the next day or so. I wish that we could get out of here. I want a real pizza and some Boston attitude RIGHT NOW. Please. With a little bit of sugar on top.

Blahhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I definitely believe there is a link between illness and geographical location. My husband, daughter, and local friends have been sick WAY too much over the past year or two; more than friends and family who live in other locations far from this place. About three weeks ago N developed a horrible headache that wouldn't go away. Ibuprophen wouldn't kill it; the only medicine that seemed to temporarily relieve the symptom was Benedryl. At night he took Niquil, which knocks me out for half the next day as well as for the night. Finally, he went to a doctor, who advised that he had a sinus infection and prescribed medication. Two days ago I woke up with the same headache and today I feel terrible. I'm trying to nurse it away using natural remedies but fear that I too will need to make a trip to a doctor's office to rid myself of this latest evil. I'm so tired of constantly battling various forms of illness. It seems like it must be bad for our immune systems to be constantly having to fight off this virus, or that germ. Here's the rub: I went online and discovered that the area we live in is one of the dirtiest in the country. This area which is supposed to be so desirable and is so expensive to buy in is horrible for one's health. We live near a train station, I-95, a few marinas, powerlines, and a main road, not to mention the fact that we have a huge Outdoor World across the street from our development. I want to move away from here to someplace healthy so badly that I'm praying for some miracle to happen that will allow us to do so. Everyplace possesses its own ills, but I think that here in Broward County we have more than our fair share, and the constant heat doesn't help; I think viruses and germs thrive here since there is never any chill to kill them off. Is this paradise????

Happy HNT

Sorry, but I'm too tired and lazy today to take a picture and upload it to my computer. No HNT for me today. I took Bebe to the park this afternoon only to spend about fifteen minutes there before the rains came. First, the air became very cool-usually a sure sign of an impending soaker. That isn't enough to make me run, because a small shower can be withstood. Soon, however, the skies darkened, the rumble of thunder sounded ominously, and I saw two flashes of lightning. That was enough to send me scrambling; lightning in Florida is a highly dangerous entity not to be trifled with. So, on homeward, where we got stuck in the car briefly due to the major downpour that began just minutes after we got into my car at the park. As I type, the skies are blue with a few fluffy white clouds drifitng past, and the sun is shining gloriously. We need the rain and so are blessed by its coming but I do wish we'd left the house sooner. I felt bad leaving so quickly; my daughter did NOT want to get off the swing! My mood as of late has been very positive and good. I've been avoiding things and people that drain my energy, which includes television shows that make me feel yucky after watching them (due to excessive violence, etc.) and people who are physicic/emotional vampires. I've also been avoiding watching the news any more than once per day because usually at least one story will depress the hell out of me. Also, I've been using my ability to visualize in great detail to try to create some positive change in my life. So far, so good. Each day is a new one with new challenges!

Number 11

On a cue from my good friend, the Keyser's, website, I did this bloggie thing and here's what I came up with. Like the Keys, I believe this to be just a fun thing, since there isn't enough information collected for numerology to be a possible way of determining who I am as a person.

***Your Life Path Number is 11***
Your purpose in life is to inspire others
Your amazing energy draws people to you, and you give them great insight in return.You hold a great amount of power over others, without even trying.You have the makings of an inventor, artist, religious leader, or prophet.
In love, you are sensitive and passionate. You connect with your partner on a very deep level.
You have great abilities, but you are often way too critical of yourself.You don't fit in - and instead of celebrating your differences, you dwell on them.You have high expectations of yourself. But sometimes you set them too high and don't achieve anything.

What Is Your Life Path Number?http://www.blogthings.com/whatisyourlifepathnumberquiz/

It is kind of crazy accurate in some respects. I am an artist, I am extremely passionate in my relationships, and I tend to connect with people, my partner and other select people, on a very deep level. I've had employers who would tell me everything about their lives and then tell me they had no idea why they felt so comfortable telling me everything; they just felt like they could trust me. I've always thought that was kind of cool, although sometimes people have told me things I wished they wouldn't have! Ewwww. As far as celebrating my differences, I used to be self conscious about my eccentricities, but not so much as of late. I feel I'm no better and no worse than anyone else, and who cares what people think? I have to be true to who I am.

Peace.

Ah, The Sunny Month of June

I found this picture at the Nicks Fix web site, a pretty cool site dedicated to all things Stevie, whose music I've loved for many years. I was reading a peice about her today and came across a statement she made about how she didn't want to have kids because she knew that her creativity would suffer for it; she wouldn't be home to raise them and had no desire to go to PTA meetings. That made me think about my own creativity and the concessions I have to make due to my own familial obligations. It is true that, as a Mom, my time is largely taken up with the responsibilities of taking care of a home, raising my daughter, and worrying about both things. I fit my creativity in also, but I've only been managing to do that as of late, and that was because I finally realized I was slowly going insane. I can't selfishly immerse myself in my art for days at a time, but I can make time during the day to devote to creativity, although I have to choose just one avenue of creativity down which to wander each day (which is why I haven't been blogging as often as previously I was). I don't see myself as a conventional Mom, though. I've tried and tried to do the Mommy group thing, mostly for the sake of my daughter, but most of the time I'm not feeling it. I'd rather take her to the park or somewhere else on my own; she still meets other kids and has fun, and I don't feel compelled to make small talk unless I come across someone interesting who I actually want to talk to, and that does happen fairly often. I've met some cool women at the Mommy groups, but I must admit that overall the meet ups aren't something I particularly enjoy. Maybe if I could find a local Mommy group with some witchy pagan chicks I'd enjoy it more; who knows? As far as the PTA thing, I want to be very involved in my daughter's education; I've even considered homeschooling because I don't like so many of the ideas presented in public schools. I also like the idea of my daughter attending a private school that allows the kids to be creative and incorporates visual art and music into the curriculum in more than in an aside sort of way. The problem with private schools is that they cost a huge amount of money, and I'm not sure we'll have that option available to us. As far as homeschooling, I don't know if my daughter will thrive as much if she's learning from me, and if she'll have trouble adapting later, say, if she decides to go to college. I think having some sort of outside education is important; it allows for kids to spread their wings a bit. I will need to learn more about the pros and cons of homeschooling before I will consider it as a serious option. Hubby isn't too hip on the idea anyway. I don't have an image of myself as the stereotypical soccer Mom; I don't want to lose who I am, I don't want to lose my edge or the funky part of my persona just to seem more normal to other parents. I do know that when it comes to my daughter, I am constantly striving to be a better person for her sake, to be a good example, to overcome my fears, to step outside my usual rhelm of comfort in order for her to have fun and meet other kids. I don't see that I have to make a choice between being a Mom and being an artist, but it is definitely more challenging to be both of those things well. It's not impossible, though, and sometimes the struggle makes me want to fight all that much harder to be terrific at both.

Finally, Some Peace Within!!!

Happy HNT!!!! This is an old picture, but what the hell? I didn't feel like posting anymore face shots of myself; I think I've indulged in that ego filled endeavor enough over the past few weeks and need to step back from it. I feel great today, despite having a million things to do of the obligatory nature. I have managed to paint for two days in a row and receieved a wonderful compliment from my husband last night with regard to the portion of the painting I worked on yesterday and the day before, as well as with regard to the painting as a whole. If I can keep plugging like this I should have the whole peice done before long, having preserved my sanity in the process. When I paint, I feel whole. When I don't, I feel very out of sorts. It does something to my spirit that nothing else can do; it gives me something that nothing else can. I'm not sure how that works-maybe it's just a matter of doing what it is I'm supposed to be doing, in some spiritual sense. I don't question it; I just try to go with it. Creative inspiration rocks!!!! My dream is to one day have a house with a barn of some sort out back so I can have a studio on site. Right now, I have an office/studio, which is much better than what I had before, which was a corner of the living room. Some day I would love to have a studio area set apart from our house, with walls that my daughter can write on and where people can leave comments like in the subway station-a place totally devoted to creative impulse. That would be a real slice of heaven!!!

A Fine Harumph

Okay, I know I've posted about this before, but it's a recurring subject for me, and one that came up again last night. About eight years ago, I got into a very intense relationship with a guy I'd met through the world of tattooing. I was apprenticing (sort of) at a tattoo shop here in South Florida and he walked in with another girl (who he later split from-nothing serious) and I was smitten almost immediately. He was completely clean and sober but still kind of crazy and I was attracted to him wholeheartedly, in a way I hadn't been attracted to another person in a very long time. (For some reason, the lyrics for Foreigner's "Dirty White Boy" are going through my head right now, but I'll push them aside for now...) I was so screwed up back then, mentally, emotionally, even physically (I wasn't taking the best care of myself back in those days and was in the middle of a self destructive streak) but he saw something good in me and soon after our first meeting we got together. We were inseparable for almost five years. This man really helped to put me on the right path. No, he PUT me on the right path, although I was willing to go there, being tired of feeling miserable and drowning my life away in a sea of Tequila and Samuel Adams. We had good times and bad times but, through it all, I remained madly in love. It was as though we'd been together in another life; I just couldn't get him out of my system, even when the relationship took a downward turn and things started to go very bad. He was a biker, heavily involved in a motorcycle club and I grew up around bikers and loved them, but with him it happened almost overnight. He bought a Harley and then suddenly he was hanging out with bikers, and then, BOOM, he was involved in a club, and then he started getting this macho edge (even worse than the one he'd already possessed) and I was okay with that to a point, except for the fact that my life was beginning to be swallowed up in his. It was choking the life out of me; he didn't want to make any compromises toward the things I wanted but expected me to give up everything for him. I've just never been the kind of person who can be stifled like that indefinitely. I was and am a free spirited soul; I don't do well with too many restrictions. I need to feel like my own person because, well, I am! Anyway, in the end game, he got involved with a chick like half my age. This girl is in recovery but I don't think she was even of drinking age when she came into the rooms. Word had it that he was running around with her for about a year before we split up. Big ouch. I'd been weighing the pros and cons of the relationship myself, and had developed a crush on a guy friend (who is now living in Denver and knows who he is), but I never stepped over the line of faithfulness, regardless of how unhappy I was becoming in my existing relationship and how attracted I was to this other person. I was devastated when J made the decision to end our relationship and devastated even further when I found out about the cute, young chickie he decided to move into our apartment about two weeks after I moved out. Adding to my dismay was the fact that he'd threatened every guy with whom we had mutual contact, so that everyone was afraid to ask me out for fear of receiving a head pounding or worse. Oy. Anyway, my whole point to this diatribe was that since he and I still travel in some of the same circles, I have occasion to see J and chickie together now and then. They have a beautiful son and seem to be happy and I'm happy for them. I'm very happy in my own life and glad for the way life turned out. I love my husband truly, madly, deeply. Still, when I see them together, or even when I see just her alone, I get this feeling of discomfort in my belly. I don't know what it is or why it comes, but it was there when I saw her at a birthday party I took Bebe to for the son of a mutual friend of ours, and it was there last night when they both attended a talk that I also went to. It's not a wretched, violent feeling (that wouldn't really be in my nature anyway), but just a feeling of not wanting to be around to watch them. Maybe it's the feeling of having been wronged in a very intense way. Maybe it's just mistrust (when people do things to you that are slightly underhanded, sometimes the reaction is to avoid having further contact for fear of being hurt again). I can't pinpoint the exact reason for my distaste, I only know that I wish it to leave me. I suppose, over time, the feeling will fade. Anyway, there's no law that says I have to want to hang out with either of these two people. Maybe, eventually, I'll get my lifelong dream of being an artist in California and N and Bebe and I can get out of here and start someplace with no old memories of exes and past lives. Until then, it's one day at a time, conquering my inner demons and pressing on with love.

A Goodbye to a Friend

Yesterday was a little bit of a sad day for me, but also a little bit of a happy day. I really saw just how much our memory lives on through the good deeds we've done, and through those things which we've left behind that can continue to help inspire and heal other people. I've met many people through my journey of recovery; some have been deeply caring, sensitive, real people and some, well, no so much. Amy "Turner" Tunick falls into the first category. She was one of those people whose very presence made you feel happy. She wrote a weekly peice called "The Feel Good" column for the Sun Times here in South Florida; I used to grab the paper just to read her column; often that's all I would read in the paper, since I rarely have time these days to read a paper from cover to cover! Her column focused on positivity and hope, even throughout her fight with pancreatic cancer.

Yesterday my family and I attended a book signing for Feeling Good-Even Through Cancer which Amy was working on and which was released postumously. Her Mom and best friend were there to sign the book, and the event was attended by her friends and family, and anyone else whose lives were touched by this wonderful woman who wished to come by, buy her book and socialize a bit. I was only able to read a few passages while I was at the event. When I first picked it up and saw her picture and began reading I couldn't hold back the tears. I knew Amy before she got sick; I'd talked with her a little bit about her hopes and dreams for the future, and I felt heartbroken that some of those dreams (ones that came true for me) could not be realized for her. She was such a sweet, talented, kind person that it's still difficult for me to believe that she is no longer on this side of the veil between the worlds. After I got home, however, I thought about all of the amazing things she had accomplished in her life. She moved to LA as a young woman to pursue a career in acting and was involved in the show biz industry for many years. She loved animals and supported at least two causes for dogs that I know about. She wrote her column every week, a writing that touched so many people. She was a vegetarian. She championed for pancreatic cancer research when she got sick; she didn't just lay down and accept the prognosis that was given to her (many pancreatic cancer patients don't live past three to five months), instead facing her illness head on and doing everything within her power to beat it. She tried to remain optomistic and retained her sense of humor, even when the going got rough. Even when the outcome seemed to be turning bleak. I believe it was this inner strength and determination, and her attitude of positivity and hopefulness and action, as well as having a good spiritual base, having some phenomenal doctors and the prayers offered by many friends and family members, which enabled her to live for 32 months, much longer than her doctors probably originally thought she would.

Amy inspires me. I awoke this morning with a sense of gratitude such that I have not had for quite some time. I feel able to go forward and follow my own dreams, I feel that they are possible because I see what she accomplished in her life; I see how she never gave up hope, never stopped trying. I see how little time we all really have in this world and how precious that time is.

Sometimes, though, it's still hard to believe that she is gone from us. I guess, in some sense, she isn't gone from us, at least not one hundred percent. She is still here, cheering us on, leaving us her legacy of kindness, optimism, humor, and hope. Thanks, Amy.

The Ups and Downs of Parenting

I think that anyone who is a parent will be able to identify with how difficult it is some days to feel like you're doing the best job you can. Not a good job, or an okay job, but the very best job. Most days I feel pretty good with regard to my parenting abilities. My daughter is the center of my world, and I stay at home to care for her. We go to the park, cook, do craft projects here and there, go the museums for kids and adults both, as well as do the daily errands of life, which can be turned into fun excursions, occasionally. Still, some days, like yesterday, I'm tired, don't feel completely well, and feel like a colossal failure. And, I don't feel like a colossal failure because of how our whole day went. Our day was alright. We read stories, went out for awhile to run errands, played with her toys for a bit. I had work to do for N, so we didn't get to run around outside as much as I'd like for her to do, but we went to the park every other day this week, so a day off isn't something I feel too badly about. No, I felt like a failure because when I came home last night at almost 10:00 p.m., after going to a badly needed meeting, the house was a mess and Bebe was still up and was very cranky because she was, by then, overtired. Daddy didn't put her to bed, for some reason, and by 10 she was beside herself. I was way too tired by last night to have the kind of patience I usually have and I found myself feeling resentful that the house was a mess, there were dishes in the sink, and the garbage was filled to the brim, almost overflowing the banks of the trash can. As as result of being tired and of suffering from major anxiety as a result of some fears I have with regard to our economy and the slowdown of the construction industry, I was cranky last night as well. I didn't say anything nasty, or do anything evil, but I didn't behave in the way I feel like I should as a parent, who is supposed to be one hundred percent supportive and loving and patient all the time. It's amazing how having a child and feeling a love for that child which we never previously knew could even exist can make us want to stretch ourselves to inhuman lengths, to be more than we think we can be and to reach even further still past that point. Each time I fell in love I thought, with progressive intensity, "Yes, this is what love is. Now I get it." After I gave birth to my daughter I understood what love was on a whole new level. It's so hard to live up to what I want to be for her sake. And so worth every minute spent on the effort.

All of this said, I feel that not enough attention is being paid to the subject of Madeleine McCann, who has been missing since May 3rd. I see all sorts of headlines on Yahoo's front page, and not one of them mentions this little girl. Because I have a daughter close to her age, the subject really rips at my heart. Please check out this website: http://www.bringmadeleinehome.com/.
I pray for her and her family that she is brought home safely. This is such a scary and horrible thing; I pray they find her safe and sound and catch whoever took her.

The Crazed Artist Within

As of late, I've been trying to use only my own photographs for this blog, but since I can't go to Jackson Pollock's studio and ask him if he minds me taking a quick snap of him at work, I had to settle for a picture I found online. When I first saw Jackon Pollock's work, I have to admit that I didn't understand it. I liked some of it from an aesthetic point of view, but I didn't understand the meaning behind it. Almost all of my artwork has some sort of symbolism to it, even my portraiture. Because I didn't understand his artwork, I delved into some biography of the man himself. In doing this, I began to at least understand the place from where his art came and I could relate on some level. Pollock was a man who suffered from depression, who, like many of us, tried to find some way to combat his inner demons through the use of alcohol. From what I've I read, he began painting as a means to force back those demons, as a way to become healthier within. Van Gogh also used to say that painting was something he had to do. It was what allowed him to breathe, to exist in this world with some small measure of peace and sanity. Considering the outcomes of both of these artists' lives (Van Gogh committed suicide and Pollock was killed in a drunken car wreck), one might not think that either acheived peace or sanity through their art, but I think that in some small way they succeeded, at least for awhile. I relate to them; I try to achieve peace within in much the same way. For an artist, there is only so much life to be drawn out of recovery programs and spiritual pursuits. If that sounds sacriligious to some, I apologise. It's my sincere belief that G-d gives all of us a purpose in this world, and if we're not pursuing that purpose we won't be capable of finding that deep contentment and inner peace that following the purest parts of our hearts and souls can lead us to. I've been feeling so out of sorts. I've written about this many times in the past, but I continue to write about it because I've yet to be able to find the time for my own creative pursuits and my sanity suffers for that. I live my life with a fair amount of normalcy, because I have a strong spiritual base and follow a program of recovery, but my soul feels bruised. When people tell me that there isn't time for my artwork right now I can't accept their opinion. When they tell me to wait and be patient I know that they don't understand the mind of the artist-the ever running machine that is our brain, the flood of ideas constantly rushing at us, wanting to be thrown onto a canvas, the photos that beg to be taken, the words that plead to burst forth onto paper. There has to be time for that, because in doing those things we find our deepest peace, and through that we can relate to everything else more easily and lovingly. That's what I want-that deepest peace and contentment-so that I can be my best when I'm out in the world and so that I can give as much as possible outwardly, whether it's through my art or just through a kind word or a gentle touch.

Happy HNT

No HNT for me today. I feel too blechy to even contemplate contemplating some part of my body to post online. I have a shot of my belly avec belly ring but it was taken before I lost more baby weight and I will refrain from posting that here. I thought I looked good back when the picture was taken, but since I've lost more weight now I think I looked a bit pudgy podgy in that shot. Not that a little pudge is bad; I just have issues when it's located on my own being. America Ferrera? Sexy as hell (you've gotta see her outside of the "Ugly Betty" show, which I actually have never watched). Me? No. It's funny how sometimes despite our own concepts of beauty we sometimes still bend a knee to what the general public percieves to be beautiful. Hence, we hold ourselves to different standards from those which we expect others to keep. There is something so wrong about that, and yet I still fall into the trap. The most evil traps are those which we can plainly see but still dive into headlong.

Anyway, it's that time of the month and I feel horrible. There should be some cosmic law that states that once a woman endures the trials of pregnancy and childbirth she will get a break when it comes to the monthly visitor. I feel worse now than I ever did before I got pregnant; every month there are two days when I'm rendered barely competant to leave my house. During those days, the crayons come out for my daughter and I move as little as I possibly have to, housework and paperwork be damned. Of course, the only two options to having a "monthly" are being pregnant, in which case I would feel considerably worse and for a much longer period of time, or going through menapause. Since I experienced the famed Hot Flash while I was pregnant and know its evil, I have vowed that when the time comes for me to experience the joys of menapause I will be taking whatever drug is deemed safe to take to combat its unpleasant side effects. In any event, I'm not sure why I felt the need to come online and kvetch about the inner workings of my body today; call it lame performance art. Or something.

The Power of the Written Word

I was struck today with the true, deep down understanding of how fragile life can be; of how each waking day comes with no guarantees and of how important it is to make a difference in the present moment, if making a difference in the present moment is possible. I was also inspired as a writer and as an artist and I hope that inspiration will stay with me and will drive me to make some positive and much needed changes with regard to my creative life.

This morning, over coffee, I read a short story about a woman named Julia Campbell. She was a writer, a teach, a Peace Corps volunteer. She was murdered while hiking in the Phillipines, where she'd been doing volunteerwork helping the Phillipine people, by a man who claims he did not mean to kill her. Apparently, he was angry over an argument he'd recently had with a neighbor when Julia bumped into him and he flew into a rage. No matter the reason for her death, a void will now exist where her life once was, although the work that she accomplished, the caring, courage and committment she displayed in her life will be remembered by those she helped and by those who love her. She will live on through the good she did in this world, and she will remain an inspiration to those of us who, thus far, have only dreamed about having the courage to reach out to others in the way that she did. I stumbled across her blog after typing her name into the computer because I wanted, after reading the magazine article, to know more about who she was. After reading several of her posts, I prayed that the blog I was reading did not belong to the same woman whose life had been so suddenly ended. A peruse through comments left under the last passage she wrote confirmed that it did.

So, I'm left with the feeling that what we do with the time we have is very important. If we want to write, if we have that passion, then probably there is some purpose out there waiting for us. If we feel a fire in our bellies to paint, to create, to love, to help others, there is a reason G-d ignited that fire. To ignore it is to deny the very purpose of our lives. Even if following our dreams is sometimes daunting, even if being a creative person sometimes causes us pain, even if helping another person means suffering through some discomfort on our side, it's extremely important to keep moving in the direction of those dreams, of stoking the fire within. Of making life really matter.

WTF?????

I was driving home today on the way back from a morning at the park and our daily trip to the supermarket for suppertime fixings when I noticed a police car parked at the entrance to a nearby trailer park. I thought it seemed strange, since his lights were on and he wasn't sitting there to tag people for speeding. As I approached our development, I noticed a line of cars waiting to get in, as well as another line of cars leaving. When it was our turn to enter, I saw a sea of police cars and realized that no one was being allowed into the development, even to go home. The cop I spoke with advised that the area was being locked down because they were looking for someone. Judging by all of the police vehicles, both marked and unmarked, the person they were looking for was armed and considered dangerous, so I was semi happy to leave them to do their jobs, although I silently lamented the frozen yogurt melting in my trunk. A trip to McDonald's (we'd been heading home to eat lunch when this incident ocurred) and one hour later, we returned home to find yet another line of vehicles waiting to get into the development. I shut the car off, turning it on periodically to use the air conditioner, and decided to wait it out, since I had noplace left to go and was aggravated enough at that point to go in there and catch the guy myself. Never underestimate the damaging capacity of a locked down fold up stroller!!! They can be deadly, I swear! Apparently, they'd either caught the guy or given up, because they finally let us back in. I think I heard one of the officers say that they'd gotten him-we can only hope there isn't some crazed maniac still running around the streets of South Florida. What am I saying??? Of course there are many maniacs running around the streets of South Florida!!! After a shooting incident at a North Miami Burger King recently I didn't even feel safe taking my daughter to lunch at Micky D's today. It's insanity. Makes me want to move to the woods of Maine and buy me a shotgun. It would just be so boring, though....

Whatta Day

I had great plans for this afternoon which were sidelined when I walked out of the supermarket at around 2:15pm. I was in the driver's seat, about to push my car into gear, when this guy who was talking outside his truck on a cell phone called out to me that my front tire was flat. What?!!!! Urrrrrrr.. So, I got out of my car, and, sure enough, my left front tire was as flat as a pancake. The strange thing was that prior to going to the supermarket I'd stopped at a kosher deli and the same truck was parked next to me there, so alarm bells started going off in my head. I don't know if that's a sign of the times we live in or just a sign that I watch too much television and am now highly paranoid, but I was very nervous when I opened my trunk, half expecting that he was going to shove me into it or something. All he did was take the jack and very calmly walk over to my dead tire. Phew!!! But I was still paranoid. After arguing with the lug nuts (the tire was brand new and the mechanics had used power tools to affix it to my Kia) for awhile, we finally managed to get them loose, with him pulling on them and me jumping on the tire iron. It must have looked hilarious, because my daughter was howling with delight in the back seat of the car. This poor man, dripping with sweat (did I mention that it was around 86 degrees outside today?) put the spare on my car, lowered the jack and then promptly informed me that the spare was also flat. He offered to drive me to the gas station to put air in it but I was still paranoid, even after all of this, and besides that I had the baby with me, so I called my husband and he called some of his guys and they came and got the tire to have it fixed while I took my daughter to get something to eat (we hadn't eaten lunch yet and were both starving and cranky by this time). It turned out that the valve had gone bad in the tire, which was why I couldn't find any nails or tacks or glass stuck into the rubber. So, now it's 6pm and I'm just getting around to doing my hair, which looked REALLY bad due to the fact that I knew I was going to do it today and so didn't wash it this morning. We are meeting some friends tonight to watch the Red Sox game at a local sports bar/restaurant so now I'm going to have to really hustle to be ready in time. Why is it that I always seem to be in situations where I have, despite my best intentions, to rush around like a maniac to be on time getting someplace??? Anyway, I have to be grateful. If this guy hadn't been in the parking lot by my car I wouldn't have been able even to change the tire, and if my husband didn't have guys working in the area I would've had to wait for much longer for him to show up and probably would not have been able to have gotten the tire fixed today. And that's my story for today.

Signs of Intelligent Life on Our Planet???

Okay, maybe I'm going to sound a little bit petty with this post, but a few days ago I was browsing blogs at another blog hosting site. I came across this one particular blog on someone else's page and the person's icon looked fairly interesting, so I clicked on the picture. When I got to her page and looked through it I found it to nothing more than just a lot of semi sexy pictures of her posing on logs, bending over in lacy pajamas, etc. with little cutesy comments like, "Hi, everyone!!! Have a nice day!!" Don't get me wrong; I know that people blog for different reasons, and, as well, people check out blogs for different reasons. I'm sure that she has many an appreciatory fan out there, just waiting for her to post yet another semi naked picture with a message underneath telling them to "have a great day". Indeed, she has probably helped more than one person to do just that. The thing that got me about the site was that she had something like 80,000 hits!!! Maybe it's just me, but I couldn't figure out for the life of me why this person would have so many viewers enthralled with her page. If I posted more pictures of myself in compromising pictures with cute little captions underneath that basically said nothing would I have 80,000 hits on my blog site? It's not going to happen; it's just not my style. If anything, I'd have to post something sarcastic beneath the pictures. There are bloggers out there who post hot pictures but have something to say as well, and I think that's great (I'm thinking of Stealth, in particular). I understand why they get so many hits-they're beautiful and intelligent; they have both outer beauty and inner substance. Has our world gone so far down the tubes that all people care about is getting a cheap thrill online? Does anyone want to think anymore? Perhaps I'm just being egoistic. It's not like my site is so damned interesting that everyone should be checking me out. I actually have quite a few friends at the other blog hosting site, too, so I guess I should stop kvetching about not having 80,000 checks into my page. Still, though.....

Pondering the Holy in Everyday Stuff

I've been reading this really great book called "Judaism for Everyone" by Rabbi Shmuley Boteach and it's been making me think a lot about how I express spirituality in my own life, as well as how seriously I take my own religion. I love the way Rabbi Boteach interprets biblical scriptures, and how he says that suffering isn't something we are obliged or even expected by God to take without fighting. In fact, "Israel" means "to wrestle with God" and God expects us to rail against suffering when we see it. There was no suffering in the garden of Eden, so therefore suffering must be something that we should not see in a utopian world, which is what we are supposed to experience when the messianic era arrives. Conclusively, we should all alleviate suffering where and when we are able to do so, since that's a beautiful thing in God's eyes and maybe something that will hasten the arrival of the one who is supposed to help the world to usher in an era of peace and harmony (in Judaism, the Messiah is believed to be a human being like any one of us, rather than an angel or some sort of God figure). This book has been causing me to reflect a lot on how I live my life, and on how by participating in the Jewish rituals of everyday life, I can bring myself into a more spiritually grounded place. By practicing kosher eating, for example, I enable myself to experience the spiritual in the everyday act of nourishment. As well, I am performing a mitzvah says, "See, God? We love and care about you. I'm doing something to bring myself closer to you. Please notice this and look favorably on humanity." I do this as part of a community of people who are also doing this, which brings me not only closer to God, but also closer to the Jewish community as a whole and to the Jewish community of the past, including my relatives who survived the Holocaust. This is not to say that I have become a master at kashrut. I have not. Mostly, I've been practicing some of the dietary restrictions of kashrut when cooking in my own home, by not mixing dairy with meat and that sort of thing. It's a very small step but big changes start with small steps and big changes made all at once can often be so daunting and overwhelming as to cause the changer to give up the challenge when the journey has barely begun. I guess it's like losing weight; people who lose a few pounds at a time tend to keep the weight off for life, while people who shed a large amount of weight quickly tend to gain it back plus extra. Slow and steady work is what brings about lasting, positive change. I suppose that when I stopped chemicalizing myself I began to have a deeper need for spiritual meaning. I've always been curious about God and I've always searched for the spiritual among the activities of everyday life. I never could access the true meaning of it, though. Now, in sobriety, I can finally begin to feel what it's about and to really need it in a true and less selfish way.

Happy Manic Monday!!!!!

Today wasn't actually too manic of a Monday for me, which is unusual. We had a great day, in fact. I took Bebe to the park in the late morning and we spent an hour or so running around like crazy, up and down the slides, ladders, stairs, and ramps. It was very windy and a bit chilly here today so my daughter lost interest in swinging on the swing after about four swoops back and forth. I opened my computer to news of the Virginia Tech shootings and have to wonder what is wrong with the people on our planet. It is frightening to think about being the victim of such a crime; those people didn't do anything to this madman, yet they had to be the object of his psychosis. They did nothing to bring about the fates that befell them; they were just going about their day, when suddenly the gates of hell clanged open. I am reading a fantastic book right now called "Judaism for Everyone" by Rabbi Shmuley Boteach. I'm learning so much about my faith, about my religion, about this awesomely cool heritage to which I am heir. In the book, Rabbi Boteach talks about the violence in the world, about the lack of spiritual grounding suffered by so much of the populace. It's a great book that, even in the early stages of reading, has helped me with some recent life situations. I love that my spiritual path can do that; it guides me when I don't have a clue as to what direction I should be going in, when I don't know how I should be reacting to a particular situation or to another human being's actions. For a long time I felt such a conflict with being both Irish and Jewish, but I feel like lately it's all coming together. I feel like that conflict can be okay; I can be both and embrace both wholeheartedly. I recently read an interview with an author who expressed a similar conflict in being both Jewish and from Yorkshire, England. She said that conflict has been a positive issue as far as her writing is concerned, and I can see where that tension could be a great driving force in my own artwork. Anyway, all is peaceful at this end of the computer and I'm grateful for that.

Post Sick

Hooray!!!! Both Bebe and I seem to be getting over the cold/sickness we've been suffering under for the past few days. I got sick on Sunday, the day we came home from Disney, and Bebe has been sick for about a week. Whatever the bug is, it doesn't seem to be very hearty (thankfully) but it kicked me in the head on Monday and I spent most of the day lying around the house. By Tuesday I had no choice but to motivate myself into action and keep moving until it was okay to stop (which, for me, is at around 9PM). In the midst of being sick I managed to get my latest newspaper article written and sent out, complete with interviews. Hopefully the editor/newspaper owner likes it and will include it in this month's paper. I dropped the ball recently and forgot to re-order our business checks. I realized this today when I used our last check to write out a bill. I don't know how I didn't realize that we were out; I could've sworn we had another box floating around somewhere. Oy vay.

Post Seder

We had the first night of Passover at our house again this year and I spent the past two days in the depth of preparations. I'm so tired today that I had trouble waking up this morning and have felt groggy and stupid all day long. I can barely think! I basically spent two days in the kitchen for long stretches of time with only one screw up (my matzoh balls fell apart the first time around and I had to make them again-argh!!!). The night of celebration and friendship was well worth the effort put in. We had just three friends over, and only one of them is Jewish, but it was a lot of fun; better for the small crowd, actually, since we all had a chance to really talk. Lots of yummy food, lots of comaraderie, not much sleep! Today was very screwed up time wise because of my lack of energy, but it's okay to have days like that now and then. I must say, though, that I'm looking forward to curling up in bed with a good book and probably falling asleep before I've read three paragraphs.