No Promise of Tomorrows

 One of the challenges of mortality is balancing preparing for tomorrow and living life today because tomorrow is never promised.

If I absolutely knew I would have no tomorrow, I would be home playing with my babies, doggies, soaking up every ray of sunshine, taking one last sweet shot of sex with my hubby. I would drop all worries and go for comfort and experience, squeezing every golden drop I could from the last rays of light, and feel gratitude for the life I have had. I'd tell my children "Tomorrow, we go home to Christ."

Somedays, as the world tilts more into making tomorrow less likely, you begin to question the drive we have to carry on, as if nothing unusual is happening. Especially when that drive seems to eclipse both the actual preparation for tomorrow and the living life today.

Why go to work, go to school, when it reduces my current joy nor prepares me for what tomorrow will most likely bring? Why are we so good at pretending that tomorrow will just be another today?

This is a collective pretending. If enough of us pretend, it generally works, unless a disaster of man or nature actually befalls us, today will lead into tomorrow and be mostly normal. But as soon as enough of us stop pretending, it will fall apart. The lack of pretending tomorrow is normal will actually allow tomorrow not to be normal.

This is a two-edged sword. We do need tomorrow to be different if we want any hope of having enough resources to prepare for the future if we want to forge it into a liveable shape, but we also need tomorrow to be the same enough that we can use our current skill set to get things done as we prepare for the future.

Therefore, I submit the following advice (to myself)

1. Carrying on is important, but not in the "everything is normal" category, it has to be a carrying on that is designed to create a tomorrow we can/want to have.

2. This requires a focus shift. Stop pretending. Willingly acknowledge that tomorrow ought to be different. Figure out how you want it different and make plans how to get there. Ideally, our leaders should be doing this on a local, state, national, and worldwide scale. They are failing because big business requires our collective pretending. Without large-scale leadership, you will have to forge the best you can with whatever community you can join with. Find that community. Start plans and prepare.

3. Accept that you might have work to bring in the money you need to prepare for tomorrow ( and yes, paying your bills counts here). While you are working, you may have to pretend all is normal to do your job, or maybe your job is help prepare your work for this future we want to forge.

Zero Tolerance Policies

 Zero Tolerance Policies are a failure of compassion and understanding, or are selectively ignored (And thus not actually a zero-tolerance policy)

Because of these two; the failure of compassion and understanding or selective ignorance, the policy fails, and breeds either hate and disrespect or a disrespect towards policy.

misreading 2020

 I saw a Christmas decoration of Santa peeing on a year sign of 2020. But I believe the sentiment is wrong. Not wrong like people don't get it, but wrong in assuming 2020 deserves to be peed on.

I think 2020  has given us a new perspective, of course in order to do that it had to seriously play with our old perspective, and perhaps that is what people don't like.

This year has several major challenges for those of us in the USA, and at least one or two for those of us world-wide.

We have the pandemic which I see as a challenge that has changed many ways things were done, has brought a new amount of tech in our lives. The pandemic has changed my life from one of running everywhere and eating 2-3 meals per day in my car to one where I am home, need to be home, to manage my kids on-line schooling stuff. (tech-love it, hate it). This summer I did massive amounts of gardening and loved being outside and watching plants grow. Using the produce also is fulfilling. Canning, drying, baking, freezing, it all makes eating a wrapped bar in the car seem kinda wrong.

Masks don't bother me. Sewing masks helped me feel useful to my fellow men. Wearing them makes me feel like I am respecting the life and rights of others, and research suggests it does.

Most of the social distancing doesn't bother me. In many ways, it helps me appreciate the interactions I do get with others, whether at the grocery store or stealing that hug from my mother. I do not mind wearing leggings all the time and not worrying about the PJs my preschooler refuses to take off. (I do worry about teaching him to wear clothes again, or finding out none of my pants fit anymore).

And I didn't really lose my job, it's there in some incarnation when I am ready for it (hehehe, maternity leave + on-line schooled kids) of course this made finances tighter, but there I am lucky and was just able to request the help I needed. I know many other people will struggle with this, but it is an opportunity to gain education or to hopefully find something better.

And that is one of the challenges of the pandemic is economic. Those who have money find that many local stores can not get things in that are selling because the factories have been shut down, or can't get raw materials in. I think it is opening many eyes to the challenges of long supply chains.

And of course, then there are racial tensions, the whites only notice it when it disrupts their daily lives or ends up on the news, even though it has been an underlying problem for hundreds of years. Being made aware is often not a gentle process. But the less gentle the process the more people may realize something is there.

And climate change marches on, bringing with it extreme weather events of all sorts. Apocalyptic scenes on the daily news. I realized as I was helping Ewan prepare a presentation on the Joplin F5 tornado in 2011, that no one says anymore that any single event can not be linked to climate change. It turns out it cans and has, since the outbreak of 2011 caused an increase in research and study. Basically, what happens as the arctic warms at 3 times the rate of the rest of the world this decreases the gradient of temps between the artic and midlatitude that causes the jetstream its stable course, so the jet stream ends up with big dips and curves and sometimes even ends up going longitudinally instead of latitudinally, that north/south movements locks the weather pattern in place and creates a longer front across the continent, bringing cold arctic air far south to bunch up with the superheated, moist air coming off the extra warmed Atlantic ocean and creating a perfect mix of stuff to produce strong storms of all sorts, and not just strong storms, but weather patterns that last for days instead of hours because the North/south jet stream patterns gets blocked into place. This blocking pattern also causes other weather to get locked into place- like the path of hurricanes this year, or dry - hot weather causing feeding the wildfires in the west.

And on top of all these fun things we have politics this year- oh yeah- a white house that has lied so often about so much that you know they have no clue what or where the truth really is, which makes it next to impossible to have a national response to any of the challenges listed above that we have faced this year. 

But the slowdown, that time to re-analyze instead of run. That time to focus on the really important- those things that truly matter when the rest of the world is upended- just happen to be the things that truly matter in eternity; Our relationships with God and our family (family can stretch to all the people we love). I believe that refocus change make 2020 one of the best years.

Edge of Extinction

Edge of Extinction

I push my poetry

out the window

flutter down

until caught

by a current of air

transposed into a butterfly

takes flight

3000 miles to Mexico

Covering Cacti

in colorful wings

global warming

pesticide use

bulldozers for trump's

 * W * A * L * L *

When Butterflies Die does poetry too?

Beauty of Life

Part of the beauty of our lives, 

is that we survive it all; 

the mistakes, 

the happenstance, 

other people's choices.

financial straws

Americans are going broke- in fact, most of them are broke, but rotating lines of credit allows them to still spend.

The only reason we have not faced the 1929 style crash are those ubiquitous credit cards. Meanwhile, we are still working 3 jobs just to pay the interest on those credit cards. How long will it take to break the vicious cycle of spending?
Spending makes us feel good and accomplished. We spend to hide the fact that we work ourselves to the bones just to sustain our lives and make the very few very rich.

Right now, healthcare/health insurance are major financial bloodsuckers. But most of us sally on, even though in the back of our minds we are wondering if we are going to pay the dentist or the pharmacist.

But yet the retail market is as strong as its been in 30 years.

What straw is going to break the camel's back? For many it has already been broken.

I suspect rising gas prices will impact us... but yet as oil prices rise, solar and wind and other renewables prices are dropping. So if you have the cash to switch over, it ends up being to your advantage.

Interesting puzzle . . .

Any insights?

Good, Bad or Ugly?

For Dana Boyd, blogging is about building bridges of understanding across the great gulf of the online world.

Every useful thing is a 2 edged sword. Most things can be as harmful as they are useful, that includes the internet. Dana tells a story about one awful Blogher conference. What a horrible thing happened when those in the audience instead of working towards building bridges, actively tore a live speaker down on twitter that was trending behind her on a big screen.

And hence we see the ugly side of social media, just in case speeches of hate or intolerance was not enough passed around on Facebook.

The most powerful use of blogging I have seen, which shapes my sense of the value of social media, was a vlog from the heart of the fighting in a city in Syria. It was a teen girl, describing the best she could what was going on. It was honest. It was raw, and it was needed to awake the world the awful situation we had allowed to develop.

Another powerful scene is social media is when 2 countries were preparing for war, but all over social media, notes of love and admiration were sent by individuals in one country to the other stating that they didn't support the war and had no desire to harm the others. This worked both ways and the governments had to back down from the full offensive action.

There is power in the tools of  social media. How are we going to use this power?

How does Politeness work in Social Media?

Questions to consider:

How does politeness interact with social media, blogs, vlogs and minimal space mediums like tweeting?

Isn't politeness the grease of the social clockwork?s this grease ignored entirely for reasons of shock/attention span or character space? Or did it evolve and change forms?

We know some of the evolution:
All caps = yelling
Terminal periods on texts and tweets seem severe, nay even aggressive. Crair says that line breaks are more effective than the humble period, and terminal periods are completely unnecessary and therefore if they are used, they hold a different meaning, that being one of "pissed."

What about things like  :), or ;p, Where do they come in for politeness? When and how are they properly used?

When does discussion get uncomfortable? or offensive?

Does proper sentence structure show respect to your topic?

Interesting Ideas in Digital literacy:

"Digital literacy is not about the skills of using technologies, but how we use our judgment to maintain awareness of what we are reading and writing, why we are doing it, and whom we are addressing."

Maha Bali makes a most interesting point that judgment and awareness are needed even as we are quietly sitting at home on a computer because now this time is spent connected to the world.

Wow- makes me want to snuggle up with a good book.

What do you think?

When Aliens Came (to eat my brain)

The aliens came to take my brain, last night as I lay sleeping.

I tried to ignore them, but at last I implored them to turn off the noise that was bleeping.

But then they said through a hole in their head, that it wasn’t my brain that they wanted.

They wanted a part, that wasn’t my heart and continued to pester me, undaunted.

So I turned on my light and saw in fright, that they were all gelatin blob-ish.

Green and all bluish, and shaped like a shoe-ish, almost a little bit glob-ish.

They were making plans to invade our lands, or at least all the oceans on Earth.

They wanted my gut, only a single piece they’d cut, to see what to them it was worth.

Then I saw,  that they felt the major flaw, on their part was being all photosynthetic.

They wanted to eat, they thought it a treat, but didn’t have the needed genetics.

So they’d be studying us, didn’t think it a fuss, to take a piece I would offer.

But they already had, up in their lab, a mouth, some teeth, and the epiglotter.

They ask if I’d mind, donating to their kind, a part of my lower GI tract.

So I had a choice, to give a voice to the part  they had come to extract.

What would you choose, were you in my shoes, to give to some strange blue-green aliens?

My stomach?, my liver?, my intestines? Oh dither, can’t they ask another mammalian?

I felt kind of attached, to my gut, almost latched to all the parts that I had inside.

How could I persuade them to utilize their brain stem? another answer to provide.

Can’t they instead, do what our ancestors did and become a microbe symbiont?

Search the oceans for examples, the choices are ample, and end this bizarre experiment.

But they wouldn’t be persuaded, so I felt a little jaded, an answer would have to be found.

The epithelium lining to the serous membranes combining, what choice would be good and sound?

Inside my head, I thought of what my teachers said about all of my digestive tract parts.

The stomach, the liver, the pancreas, I shivered, oh what could I live best without?.

The stomach is useful and serves a frugal, place to store my whole dinner.

It’s stretches so great, and I know my fate, without it I would be much thinner.

it secretes the acid that keeps bacteria placid, and starts the proteins dividing

The signals it sends tells when hunger should end, and for hormones it does ample providing

It churns the food, until it does extrude through the sphincter to the duodenum.

It has microvillus galore, and that is all for the absorption to be quite optimum

The border enzymes marches to break down the starches,

then the blood takes the sugars away.

The liver adds bile, and in a little while the micro chorions are conveyed

through the lacteals , which is ideal, into the blood they are delayed.

The pancreatic juices have so many uses, and are not to be ignored,

it adds bicarbonate, that coordinates, ‘til neutral pH is restored.

It also contains enzymes amaze, trypsinogen, chymotrypsinogen,

carboxypeptidase, lipase, nucleases and amylase.

But should I forget the pancreatic islets, for the importance they do play?

They send the hormones, it does it alone, helping your blood sugar stay level all day.

Insulin links with cells and we think, it helps load them with the glucose.

In the liver it sends a quiver, to get some glycogen produced.

On the other hand when glucagon from the pancreas does swell

the glycogen the liver made no longer there doth dwell.

When the small intestine has had it’s say,

it goes through the ileocecal valve and gets pushed away.

There is it met by microbial pets, and gets even further digested,

ions and vitamins and  water are all from there sequestered.

As it moves up and around it often makes sounds and gasses do depart.

and then  all the brown starts bearing down, and through my anal valve comes a fart.

About every half hour I feel the power, as the haustas does contract.

and if I don’t comply, it will get dry, as more water it does extract.

My rectum and anus is designed in the plainness of layers of squamous epithelium

the layers of skin is a strong and yet thin way to protect me from painful delirium.

My anal sphincter’s my friend and keeps me from offend-ing all of my nice underwear.

its voluntary control, keeps me on a roll until I find a bathroom somewhere.

The aliens were waiting while I sat there debating, all of the if ands and buts.

So I  told them that in the end,  a piece of me they are not going to cut.

for I had decided, they’d be better off guided to have the GI tract in whole

How it’s connected with blood and lymph vessels, would help them reach their goal.

and better yet, they needed a complete set to see how it all fit together.

So I will vow, you can take me now, in the finals week of this semester!

Unleash the Youth!

In the Book of Mormon there is a story about a group of people who buried their weapons of war and committed to peace. This was great until a big war came about. Then the people felt bad that they couldn't help fight to protect their lands and people, but their children had not made that covenant. So the young people, just kids 10- 16ish years old stepped up and created an army.

Untrained, and young enough to be fearless, they learned the art of war while protecting their people. In the larger army, these young people, what we would call tweens and teenagers (usually with a sigh, rolling our eyes), repeatedly stepped in and saved the older warriors. Over and over they had the energy and vitality to do what was needed doing to save the day.

In our fight to keep our planet inhabitable, in our fight for a better world, should we leave our young people in Jr. High? Or should we let them form an army of doers, designers, and  thinkers?

Are our young people not up to the task of saving our planet from us? Do we not need the help in redesigning our systems?

They have bodies stronger and more supple then ours. They have brains as fast as lightening, and  energy to do and lots of energy to do. They were born using computer technologies, and They are also free of the distractions of making a living.

WHY ARE WE NOT UTILIZING THIS GREAT RESOURCE?

We can trust them, they are un-jaded, they just need to be pointed in the right direction and given a few course corrections now and then.

They learn responsibility by having responsibility. They learn to do things by doing things. They have pure motives.

We need to trust them and watch them earn it and re-earn it 100 times over.  They will save the day if we let them.

unprofitable servant

I work for my mother, She's a rich exec, who sold 1 business and is dabbling in building another. Because I had a baby and the need to get out of the house, I offered her my talents before offering them to the wider community. She snatched me up to be her assistant.

In her employment I have done/been  many things:
1. A personal shopper
2. An event organizer
3.  A caterer
4. A cook/ kitchen prep
5. Accounting assistant
6. Genealogist
7. Researcher, scientific, social and misc.
8. Pet sitter
9. Writer, technical and other
10. Gardener, indoor and out.
11. Talk writer

I have help set up many things, websites, plant water filters, slide shows, events.

But  mostly, I bring her grandbaby over.

However much I do for her and "earn. (she pays me enough to keep from looking for any other employment)" She always manages to turn around and just for fun buy me things, that I, with out her could never afford.

Overall, I feel like an unprofitable servant. I can never giver her more then she gives me, (Besides financial, I also get all sorts of sanity saving and emotional support, encouragement to continue pursuance of my dreams and just plain intellectual stimulation.) Add on that the normal mothering she has given me (like life and raising to adulthood, college ...ect). Gee, I guess I can never repay her for all. But I can keep trying.

The Nursing Culture

I have seen too much lately about rape culture. In the world were we live we have become obsessed with idea that breasts are sexual items and that the sight of them and make a man's hormones get the better of him. However, in my experience, the only person to go gaga at my sight of my breasts is my hungry nursing babies.

I have weaned 5 boys, and not 1 of them thinks anything of seeing breasts of a mother nursing her baby. To them it is just the way babies eat. Of course, I suspect in the right circumstances, where a girl is attempting to entice them (like on their wedding night) I trust that the right unveiling of the breasts will get the their male parts to stand at attention. However, even in those circumstances one would have to admit that the reason they stir feelings is that the ultimate role is that in nurturing the children created in that bond.

So anyways, my basic attempt here is to theorize that if people were used to thinking of breasts in terms of nurturing babies, then maybe, just maybe, they would be much less inclined to think of them as purely sexual objects. And that if we, as a culture, were used to seeing them used as natures intended purposes, then perhaps we might not think of them as objects, but as an integral part of motherhood, and nurturing.

Maybe, we need to re-throne motherhood to dethrone the sexualization of our culture.

but I will not forget thee

It must hard being the 7th child.
Once in a while, while juggling the needs of her six older siblings she has been forgotten. Once I got her all ready to go, put her in her car seat and then went to the parent teacher conferences without her. I didn't even remember I'd forgotten her until one if the teachers asked how she was doing. (She was safe at home with daddy and slept the whole time.) but it surprised me. Since when do nursing mothers forget their baby? I mean, seriously, our boobs ache when we go too long without them. 

Tonight is forgotten her again. She was asleep downstairs and I went to go to bed, forgetting to bring her up to bed until after I saw her bed empty. 

This is an amazing, happy, awesome baby that I have waited 7 kids to get- to forget her would be to ignore all my motherly longings since I started naming my future children when I was 12. 

Ah, how thankful I am that I have someone in my life who will never forget me.  

Isaiah 48:15
Shall a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb?  Yeah, they may forget, yet I will not forget thee.
Behold, I have graven thee; on the palms of my hands....

I always laughed before the punch line anyways.

After reading through a lot of my old posts (full moons can do that to you), I realized that I am technical writer who is attempting to write something humorous. But the harder I try at conveying humor, the more technical the details become, in hope that others can see the connections of what could have/should have or maybe possibly will happen and find the exquisite dead pan humor in the situations as they mostly didn't unfold. Many of the situations can be summed up in either your laugh or you cry, especially in the intense concentrations of theses events that are apparent in my everyday life.

In attempt to convey the intense emotions (that are locked away to be dealt with at some future time) of these situations, I have tried to show the moments that bring exquisite joy, pain, and weirdness to my life, often written near the moments for the rawness/freshness to be truly exhibited.

But the humor, the humor and little ironies, and the large ironies of life that I so enjoy can not be adequately recorded with out much time and contemplation given to each word and phrase of each post. It is hard to share the inner working of my mind in words. Perhaps I should take up painting great works of art that can only be enjoyed once I am long dead.

The greatest riches in life are
the laughter of children
and the child like wonderment at mysteries of the universe.

Serve Pancakes at my Funeral

When I die, serve pancakes at my funeral
only don't call it a funeral-
it should be a Celebration of Life
have balloon and music- a live band.

When I die, serve pancakes at my funeral
And have that band play polkas and waltzes, jazz and tango,
let the children dance,
and get dizzy showing off to you.

When I die, serve pancakes at my funeral
with enough real maple syrup
that you too join in the dancing until you are exhausted and delirious
and the world is spinning and you forget about why you are there and just enjoy being.

When I die, serve pancakes at my funeral
and talk about me, if you want
I will no longer get the hick-ups
but talk about you.
Did I make a difference in your life?

When I die, serve pancakes at my funeral
make sure they are freshly ground whole wheat
have peanut butter and applesauce to smear on them.
For desert serve them with blueberries and chocolate chips.

When I die, serve pancakes at my funeral
Cry, if you must, I'll miss you too
for the few remainig seconds we are apart
at least it will only seem a short time to me.

When I die, serve pancakes at my funeral
Serve the pancakes with a smile
a smile that says to everyone "I love you" and
"You are important to me."

For that is what I want to be remembered for.

Personal Selections of Knowledge

I know something you don't know.

In fact, my own personal selection of knowledge just about grantees that I know something you don't.

Luckily, most of the time, much of that is fairly irrelevant.

So, how fair is it?

In fact, on the internet, all that any one cares to post is now fair game.... and our personal selections of knowledge expand.... and expand to match our current curiosities.

Most of the time I attempt to post things things that I think others may want to add to their personal selections of knowledge. That is why I share recipes and good articles and interesting thoughts.... some times I post just to write something- in which case I am not really attempting to enlighten you, but just to chat.

What is really interesting though is when you are posting thoughts about things you really don't want those who know you to know. That is when you go to a blog that is mostly ignored and see if any one bites your bait.

However, I am really not expecting any one to have lasted this long reading this post that is about almost nothing at all, nor do I expect them to know that I am expecting.

FHE idea

By Pre Monson:

May I offer to you tonight six road signs which, when observed and followed, will guide you to safety. They are:

1. Choose good friends. Friends help to determine your future. You will tend to be like them and to be found where they choose to go. Remember, the path we follow in this life leads to the path we follow in the next.
2. Seek parental guidance. Your mother, your father, your family all love you and pray for your eternal happiness. Fathers, be an example to your sons. Show them the way to go. Walk with them in righteousness and faith.
3. Study the gospel. Develop a yearning to know the Lord, to understand His commandments and to follow Him. Then shadows of despair are dispelled by rays of hope, sorrow yields to joy, and the feeling of being lost in the crowd of life vanishes with the certain knowledge that our Heavenly Father is mindful of each of us.
4. Obey the commandments. Make up your mind to serve God. Learn His word and follow it. President George Albert Smith, the eighth President of the Church, counseled: “Stay on the Lord’s side of the line.”
5. Serve with love. Jesus was the epitome of service. It was said of Him that He “went about doing good.” Do we do likewise? Our opportunities are many, but some are perishable and fleeting. Brethren, what supernal joy you feel when someone recalls counsel you gave, an example you lived, a truth you taught, the influence you had in prompting another to do good.
6. Pray with purpose. Prayer is the provider of spiritual strength. Prayer is the passport to peace. Should we find ourselves in harm’s way, our power line is unbroken and undamaged—even to God, our Heavenly Father. He will help us if we will but give Him in our lives an opportunity to do so.

Why not to be quiet any more.

For a while I didn't speak out too loudly about this. I signed a few petitions but was afraid to really have my name associated as a voice opposed to the actions of our current government administration. I have 6 young kids. I could not risk the possibility of being branded a "dissident" and being hauled away from them.

But then I realized how could I not?

I would rather rot in Guatanamo bay for raising my voice in defense of Liberty then to raise my children in a world where we dare not speak aloud.

I would rather do what I know I should, then wish I had and see this country fall.

What is scares you more? This Land of America without Liberty and Freedom? or possibly being illegally detained?