Will It Succeed?

WARNING! The following post will be deemed overtly negative and cynical by a majority of readers.

I was reading a transcription of the speech of Oct 6 made by Naoimi Klein to the Occupy Wall Street protest in this week’s Nation magazine when I was once again struck by waves of despair. OK, not anywhere near that dramatic. If you have been following reports on the OWS protests, you may know that electronic sound amplification equipment is forbidden (more on that later). In response, the protesters have been utilizing what they call the Human Microphone - the speaker shouts out their speech in small bits and the crowd repeats them in unison so that all might hear.

That said, Ms. Klein opens her speech with, “I love you.” She goes on to praise the protest, highlighting what she feels that have gotten right this time, separating it from the many “failed” protests of the past. She ends with, “Let’s treat this beautiful movement as if it is the most important thing in the world. Because it is. It really is.” (gag)

I really want to believe that we still have a chance to save this republic. I am highly doubtful that we can. What we are witnessing is a return to business as usual. After a post World War II aberration in which our economy flourished as we rebuilt the rest of world that was destroyed, we are returning to a capitalist status quo. For a generation or two there was enough trickle down cash to make significant improvements in the lives of the middle class. It didn’t take long, however, for the other nations to catch up and surpass us.

We are left now with no real manufacturing base which means no real employment for our shrinking middle class. A friend of mine recently posted a pic on Facebook (she is a small business owner): “We offer three kinds of service: Good - Cheap - Fast You can pick any two. Good service Cheap won’t be Fast. Good service Fast won’t be Cheap. Fast service Cheap won’t be Good. Of course, we want it all - good, cheap, and fast. Corporations took their manufacturing overseas where labor is good, cheap, and fast, leaving our unemployed, formerly middle class workers in the dust - but, hey, we can still buy our stuff dirt cheap at WalMart et al.

This is why consumer capitalism has been so successful. It has allowed enough of the working class to rise up to the middle class and buy enough frills that we have turned a blind eye and allowed the rich to rob the system…truly trickle down economics at its best. Now we are starting to grumble and moan as we are forced to give up more and more of the frills and we see more and more of us sinking back down to a lower rung on the economic ladder.

Madpriest commented on a thread on his blog about wanting a society in which everyone is provided enough income to maintain a reasonable standard of living. However, that’s the rub. We in the West, even at our worst, are so far beyond where most of the Third World poor exist. I look at the people in my life - large homes, relatively cheap resources (water, electricity, etc.), multiple vehicles, multiple televisions, multiple computers, multiple bathrooms with indoor plumbing…

For all the good intentions of the OWS protesters, they are still demanding a Western reasonable standard of living - something that has to be denied to the vast majority of the rest of the planet in order to continue. I don’t believe that we are really ready to redistribute wealth on a global scale. The lives of the middle class and much of the lower class would have to become much simpler.

In blog posts and articles about the protests, writers repeatedly feel the need to emphasize that they are not protesting success or luxury…one writer wrote (and I paraphrase) “It’s not like they expect us to live like the Amish.” Yet, that is exactly what needs to happen (IMHO).

Am I suggesting that they should all pack it up and go home? No. I am glad to see the 98% finally waking up from their slumber and calling for change. It is a beginning.

However, Naomi Klein also links the protests to Climate Change and this is another kettle of fish. She says, “The point is, today everyone can see that the system is deeply unjust and careening out of control. Unfettered greed has trashed the global economy. And it is trashing the natural world as well…What climate change means is that we have to do this on a deadline.” I am one of a quiet minority of people who upon reading the science has come to the conclusion that we’ve already missed the deadline.

Nothing we can do can reverse what has been set into motion. Nothing. The negative feedback loops are already in play. The arctic tundra is no longer frozen and is releasing thousands of years of built up green house gases into the atmosphere. The melting of the ice sheet is allowing direct sunlight to warm up the oceans - dark water absorbs the solar heat whereas the ice reflected it.

Studies have suggested that even if we cut our carbon footprint down to zero it would take over fifty years for the planet to begin to recover. We can’t even get ourselves to a significant reduction in our carbon output, let alone bring it to zero.

Rather our politicians continue to argue over the cause of the climate change. We argue over what kind of light bulbs we should be using in our homes. We complain about expensive gasoline and high heating bills. We think that if we recycle all our Western consumer waste all will be well. Folks, we’re rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic (I LOVE that expression).

I don’t believe that we will necessarily suffer the consequences in the near future. Perhaps we won’t begin to really experience Baghdad in the Midwest until I’m old enough to miss the Social Security checks I used to think I’d have. The real beneficiaries of this will be our children and grandchildren. They will be the ones who have to grow old in the age of Soylent Green.

Folks will argue no doubt that “but we have to do something!” That is so classically liberal. We love nothing more than good theater to keep our denial going strong so we can get up in the morning and get out of bed. And so we slog our way through “airport security” when we travel believing that it is really keeping us safe. We carefully recycle the tons of garbage we generate purchasing are prepackaged, processed, so-called “food.” We dutifully buy those atrocious fluorescent bulbs. We do all those things so we don’t have to face the fact that the party is over.

And so I follow the protests and dream. For now the Corporate Powerbrokers will allow these protests to continue under carefully controlled conditions. Should they ever really begin to threaten the status quo they’ll be shut down right quick.

One Of These Things...

As I sat down to write this post, my mind wandered a bit and reminded me of a completely unrelated episode that seems to fit hand and glove with what I intended to write.  A few weeks back I was in Chicago for my 30th High School Class Reunion.  I expanded the weekend into a full week so that I could visit with friends I haven't seen in quite awhile.

A few weeks prior I contacted Carolyn with whom I've been friends for about twenty-three years.  As it happened, one of the days I suggested we spend together was Rosh Hashana, so she nixed it up front.  I thought about it, and in light of my recent reading and in recognition of the many years of our friendship, I suggested that I attend services with her if she didn't mind.

She pointed out that it wouldn't be like a regular Friday night service.  I asked how it would be different and she indicated it would be longer and with more singing.  Sounded good to me.  I explained how our Easter Vigil service can go on for hours.

I was struck by the similarities more than the differences.  This being one of the "big days" - like Christmas and Easter for Christian churches - they have to plan for three to four times the regular attendance.  The members who had planned the service were watching to see that people were in the right places at the right time.  Key readings from the Torah were shared.  All in all I can say I enjoyed myself.

I must admit that I thought about the Holocaust.  I looked around me at the hugh space filled with American Jews and wondered about their families, thought how in a different place and time they would be targeted for who they were.  I sat there, quite possibly the lone goy, and thought about being the outsider.  Much of the service was in Hebrew and the folks around me knew enought to at least be able to sing along regardless of whether or not they understood the exact meaning of the words.  Later at the brunch afterwards one of Carolyn's friends explained, "It's just like for you when the church used Latin."  I chose not to point out to her that in recent times only the Roman Church had used Latin in there service, but being raised Roman Catholic I figured she was close enough and I understood the point she was making.

The folks that had gathered for brunch were all members of this congregation.  It was like sitting in on a Coffee Hour conversation where the movers and the shakers are gathered.  They began to discuss ways in which to engage these extra folks who show up for the High Holy Days, get them to come around more often the rest of the year.  They began joking about having special material for when both of the spouses were actually Jewish..."No, not to worry, your Jewish-Jewish marriage is welcome here...we're not all mixed marriages."  Apparently they have a significant number of couples in which one of the couple is not Jewish.  Perhaps then I was far from being the only Christian in the service earlier.

The other episode from my past that came to mind involved a day I spent on the far South Side of Chicago.  I was working with this woman who had never ventured as far north in the city as she had to come to work at Children's Memorial Hospital in Lincoln Park.  She had planned a barbecue at her house and I agreed to come on down.  In fact, I agreed to come down early and help her get ready.

I took the train down from the Loop.  She met me at the station and we ran some errands.  The entire time I was the only caucasian.  For the first time in my life I experienced how it felt to be the other, the outsider.  It was an important experience that I have not forgotten.

I pause before typing this next bit...I feel the need to explain that it was a perfectly normal experience.  I did not feel threatened.  The folks around me were not hostile.  Yet the very fact that I feel the need to explain this belies the subtle racism that permeates the dominant culture.  Perhaps you think I'm being overly sensititve or overly politically correct.

When my mother was working on her PsyD she took a class on racial issues and psychotherapy.  The course was taught by this awesome woman, Samella Abdullah.  Early on in the quarter she announced a practical assignment.  Each student was to go to a community event where they would be the outsider.  They would then be expected to write about their experience.

My mother ended up talking to me about this assignment.  I said, "Yeah? So what?  She's not telling you to go to a Housing Project at midnight on a Saturday.  Go to a church service or something."

What we didn't realize then was that she expected the students to bring news of this assignment back to their friends and families.  In the days that followed, she questioned the students to see who had done this and every last one of them had.  She then asked about the responses they got from their friends and families.  My mother was the only student in the class who reported that her family member wasn't shocked and thought it was no big deal.  All the rest had horrified friends and family - "How can she make you do that?  How can she put you in danger like that?"

And so I pause as I acknowledge my need to explain that I was treated just like everyone else that day I visited the South Side.  As if you wouldn't assume that that was exactly how things would be.  I'm not sure how much of that is my own latent racism that I struggle with or an assumption of the same on the part of some of my readers.

Samella also once said that she would take an outspoken, bigoted conservative any day over a typical white liberal.  She felt that at least with the one she knew where she stood fromt he get go, whereas the liberal truly believes that he is not racist, unaware of all the subtle racism that permeates.

Wanting desperately to not be racist, understanding the evil of racism, doesn't cleanse us of it completely.

Jesus and Mo

Click here to go to Jesus and Mo web site...

I had the pleasure of actually sitting down and visiting with a cyber friend who I only knew tangentially in high school.  We visited for a bit at our 30th reunion a few weeks back.  He asked what I was up to and I mentioned that I was reading The Source by James Michener.  He then said, "Why?!?"  Russ is a Political Scientist who specializes in the Middle East.  He was clearly not impressed that I would be reading this less than scholarly work of historical fiction.  I was quick to respond with the other related titles I was also reading and explained that Michener's book was like an outline to point me in other directions.

The Source tells the history of this small local in northern Israel.  For once he doesn't start with dinosaurs and early animals, but begins the ancient history (9000 BCE) with human characters.  The book then follows this locale in typical Michener fashion through many eras where descendents of the original characters live out their lives.  What follows is a nicely laid out history of the various battles for the land - Asyrians, Babylonians, Romans, Byzantines, Crusaders, Islamic Turks, etc.  The town is rebuilt and destroyed over and over again.  The residents are butchered or exiled or sold into slavery time and again.

Recently on OCICBW, Jonathan AKA Mad Priest made some strong statements about Islam.  It is clear from his argument that he sees a strong historical connection with war fare that is inherent in Islam from the beginning.  In particular, he cites the devastation of the Eastern Christians as an essential example of this connection.

To what extent I will ultimately agree or disagree with Jonathan will be dependent on further reading.  However, what I have seen so far tells me that all the major powers wrought significant destruction upon the residents of what ultimately became the State of Israel as they sought control of the territory.

Each group dragged its religion along with its army and imposed this religion to varying degrees on the local survivors.  Quite often the Hebrews paid the stiffest price.  This alone indicates that the warfaring violence of Islam is not unique for this period of history.

Both Michener's book and The First Crusade by Thomas Asbridge show in graphic detail the horror of what became known as the First Holocaust as tens of thousands of European Jews were butchered by the Crusaders heading off to the Holy Lands to fight the infidels.  Once in Islamic territory the crusaders frequently murdered other Christians because of how they were dressed and their physical characteristics - they assumed they were Muslims.

If we are to condemn Islam for the actions of it's Holy Armies, it would seem that we should also condemn Christianity - both Western and Eastern.  However, as I said, I have much reading to do before I come to a more solid conclusion.

Yes, Mohammed began to gather up converts to his new understanding of the monotheistic faith in Mecca, and once he was exiled to the city that became Medina, he fought valiantly with his growing army to centralize his power and the power of what was to become Islam.

Jesus had no army.  I understand that.

However, neither man sought to invent a new religion.  Jesus of Nazareth sought to introduce Judaism 2.0.  It was only after his death that it was eventually rebranded as Christianity 1.0.  Similary, Mohammed thought he was selling folks on Monotheism 3.0 initially - for in Islam both Jews and Christians are held in higher esteem than mere pagans as being Children of the Book and descended from Abraham.  Mohammed believed that they had gone astray and his revelations were to purify the traditional, historic monotheistic faith.

Of course, Christianity was not a significant political power in the Mediterranean region until Constantine decided to name it the offical religion of the Empire.  Christianity went from persecuted and powerless to top dog overnight.  Yet that power shrunk significantly with the collapse of the Roman Empire and the invasion of the barbarian (pagan) hordes.  Over time those peoples were converted to Christianity.

As Pope Urban II sought to consolidate power in Rome with the Papacy, he responded to a request for help from Byzantium with the call for the first Crusade.  The ruling class, knights and such, existed in a political reality that called for repeated violations of their Christian faith.  The near constant warring and killing and fighting created a powerful dilemna for these men.  The Pope's call in which the act of crusading would grant them penance and allow them to go straight to heaven.  An entire generation of nobility stopped their internecine European conflict and channeled all that violent energy on the Holy Lands and the infidel.  Political power and religion finally merged for Christianity.

Mohammed, on the other hand, needed to carve out territory from the beginning so the presence of stories of conquest and military victory in Islamic history is not surprising.  There was no Emperor ready to convert his Empire over with the single stroke of a pen.

As Islam flourished as a political power, the role of Caliph served as head of state.  This is not that different from the Orthodox Church where the Emperor of Byzantium was the head of the church.  Even in the Roman West, the struggle between kings and the Pope for ultimate power was played out over and over.

Jonathan has made it a key point that "Islam" depended on violent conquest from the beginning.  I find it hard not to separate the church from the state...  My reading so far has also shown that overall Islamic Overlords were much more tolerant of the existance of other faith traditions in their lands than were the Chrisians. 

Just last night as I read a few more chapters in A Case for God by Karen Armstrong, I learned about the forced conversions of the Jews by Isabella and Ferdinand.  Many chose exile to Portugal, until Isabella and Ferdinand forced Portugal to do the same.  Then, with the creation of the Spanish Inquisition, those same converted Jews were suspect because they were forced...nice logic that.

All this is not to deny that there is a dangerous, fundamentalist form of Islam out there.  I am not willing, however, to condemn the entire faith until I have done my homework.  Peace.

Wrong Way?

I felt like I had so much to say yesterday after not blogging for so long.  I want to spend a bit more time on this wrong worship vs. wrong God idea.  I briefly reference the Nicene Creed in which we state the "We believe in one God..."  It is quite common amongst many Christians to acknowledge that we are all talking about the same God, particularly amongst the Children of the Book - the three main Abrahamic faiths, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.  A goodly number of us would argue that even the other faiths of the world are all pointing to the same divine essense - the words we use, the traditions we follow, the way we pray, may seem different but that "all roads lead to God."

Yes, there are some fundamentalist and evangelical folk who take a very literal only through Christ hard line.  It is likely that there are fundamentalists in most faiths who believe that they alone are right.  These are the folks who would argue WRONG GOD over what I am calling Wrong Worship.

I am not suggesting that Wrong Worship means "incorrect worship."  Perhaps it might be better to think of it as wrong for us...or in the case of the Ancient Hebrews, wrong for the Jews of YHWH.

Those Canaanite Gods, Ba'al in particular, were still a group of humanity trying to understand the divine - the great, all encompassing Being - and how that Being interacted with them where they were.  Even the Canaanites though, imagined a greater, more removed abstract God, the Prime Mover, the Creator - they called this God "El."  Ba'al was the God who was closer to home as it were.  Not exactly an "Incarnation" but God reaching out and touching them.  The God who lived in the place with them.

The Ancient Hebrews also struggled with this - understanding the greater Being (YHWH) and understanding how that Being comes down to interact with us in our limited physical lives.  The Exodus reading this past Sunday concerned Moses arguing with God about staying with the Hebrews and making his presence known.  YHWH agrees to stay close but essentially tells Moses that at best humanity will only see the vapor trail of God's presence...his backside as it were...that will be the closest they will be to seeing God.  Besides he tells them that to look on the face of God would be more than their frail human bodies could handle.

Even in Christianity, as we struggle to understand the Trinity, we are essentially struggling with understanding the divine Being (God the Father) and how God interacts with us here in the mere physical realm (God the Son)...however, rather than a monolith housed pagan God or a vapor trail of YHWH we got Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ and the Holy Spirit.

The chapter I am currently working through in Karen Armstrong's book, The Case for God, has opened my eyes.  We are not meant to understand the Trinity, it is a paradox to meditate upon.  As we sit in church and say our communal prayers, we are to remind ourselves continuously of the inability of mere human words to adequately express what God is.  All those times we trip up on phrases where we feel need to cross our fingers or simply stop and let others say the words because we slip into a too literal mode of thinking.  Those are the very moments when we can remind ourselves of the inadequacy of our words...and the silence that follows is a recognition of the divine within us.

In fact, that one tricky word in the Nicene Creed -- Believe -- didn't used to mean what we say it means.  I believe the Latin word is credere and "believe" is a weak translation.  A more appropriate definition that doesn't appear to mean "take as the literal Truth" is apparently along the lines of trust or put myself in trust of...we trust that their is one God, we put ourselves in the the trust that there is one Lord, Jesus Christ...  This wording isn't about swearing on the Bible that this is the Truth, the whole Truth, and nothing but the Truth...it's a subtle difference, and, remember, we're not meant to understand the Trinity...it's a paradox that reminds us of our inability to adequately express in mere words what we are not able to understand.

Just like the God of Exodus telling Moses that we mere humans cannot survive looking onto the face of God, (to quote Jack Nicholson/Tom Cruise:  You want answers?/I want the truth/You can't handle the truth!)  Or as a posted on Facebook as a status update, quoting from The Case for God, "...get beyond simplistically anthropomorphic ideas of God and experience the divine as a transcendent presence within."  Peace.

A New Beginning

If you are at all familiar with the Old Testament, I want you to think a moment about the various tribes of people encountered by the Ancient Hebrews. This is my question…when you think about these other tribes do you think they have the wrong God or the wrong way of worshiping God? This is what you, living in the 21st Century, think - not what they or the Ancient Hebrews thought, nor what the writers of the Old Testament thought.

Mad Priest posted the following at OCICBW regarding the Jews and YHWH. I started seeing these comments from liberal minded folks who leapt right into criticism of how God “WAS” back then. I realized that otherwise sensible, progressive minded folk were taking a rather literal view of things. How do we get from understanding that much of Genesis is better understood as mythology than as history to judging God by how YHWH is presented in later Old Testament stories? --stories composed and eventually written down and then revised by divinely inspired men trying to understand their relationship to YHWH and express that relationship with the limitation of human words.

It was while thinking about this that I formulated my question.  I believe we have been encouraged to think that they had the wrong God. For example, remember the “Golden Calf” from The Ten Commandments with Charlton Heston?  Most of us would describe that scene, and the portion of the story it represents, as follows: Moses is gone up on the mountain for a long time and the wandering Hebrews begin to get twitchy, eventually losing control, gathering up their gold and forging a sacred cow to worship in place of YHWH (I.e., the wrong God). This cow god allows for them to act like they’re at a frat party - at least in the movie. In the end, there’s Hell to pay…

However, I believe that those confused Hebrews as well as the other tribes were not following the wrong God but, rather, were wrong in their style of worship.

I am working my way through a Great Courses series on the “Old Testament,” taught by Professor A.J. Levine. She explains that all the other religions of the time saw their Gods as being very much connected to place. They believed strongly in monoliths that marked sacred mountains or locations where their Gods resided. The Ancient Hebrews, however, believed that YHWH was always everywhere with them.

Professor Levine suggests that what really occurs while Moses is up the mountain is that the people begin to get anxious and question this new way of thinking about the presence of God. In creating the Golden Calf they are not making up some new deity so they can have a big drunken orgy and to hell with Moses and YHWY. Rather they are reverting to an older way of worship - they lose faith in what they have been doing and create an idol in which their God can be satisfied and come down and live with them in a physical place like the other tribes’ Gods.

Once I heard it expressed this way, the entire Golden Calf episode made much more sense to me. Further, I believe the issue is wrong worship, not wrong God.  After all, every Sunday we recite, "We believe in one God..."

And with that thought, I reintroduce my blog. I have hinted over the past few months that I want to use my blog as a tool to mark my spiritual journey. To that end I have been reading and gathering up future reading (fancy way of saying “bought more unread books”). I am inspired by cyber friends who blog with a spiritual focus. I also have a desire to flesh out this secular monasticm - this hermit lifestyle - I value so much. Part of my future studies will include a better understanding of The Rule of St. Benedict in the hope of writing my own “Rule” for my Hermitage.

Brother John up in British Columbia is a brother with the Community of St. Aidan of Lindisfarne and his new home in a more rural section of Vancouver Island has been named St. Cuthbert’s Cottage by his Order. Perhaps some day I will christen my log home with a similar new name.

I purchased The Rule of Benedict: A Spirituality for the 21st Century by Joan Chittister as a promising introduction to the Rule.

Late in the Summer I read Mary Called Magdalene by Margaret George. I had picked up this copy from the $2 rack at my local bookstore. They wheel out this old style library cart in front of the shop every day and it holds what can be called “less than remaindered homeless” books. Yet two of the more interesting books I’ve read recently came off that rack, and now too my cyber sistah Maria has picked up a copy of God Among The Shakers upon my recommendation (it speaks to our mutual secular monasticm).

Margaret George’s book, more than anything, forced me to think about how all the main characters from the Gospels were Jews. We get so caught up in our Christianity sometimes that we minimize or forget about Jesus’ Jewish faith.  We have blamed the Jews for crucifying Christ - as if he was this Christian outsider.

There was significant overlap between Judaism and the early church - for many years Christianity was looked about as a sect of Judaism. All this ruminating over our deep connection guided my reading. I finally dusted off my copy of The Source by Michener, as well as cracked open a few other titles that have been patiently waiting on my shelves for a number of years now: The Gift of the Jews by Thomas Cahill, The First Crusade, and The Oxford History of Byzantium in particular.

Well, I suppose this is long enough, and it has sat on my computer waiting for me to find some wireless zone to actually post. I look forward to reading your comments. Peace.

UPDATE:  It's so much harder to edit on the fly.  My apologies to Brother John, but now the post reflects the correct info.

Last Day

I had my follow up appointment with the doctor today to review the lab work and x-ray. The other testing was negative - no Lupus, no Rheumatoid. I have the genetic marker B27 which is consistent with the Spondylitis diseases. My brother also has this marker. My diagnosis is Undifferentiated Spondyloarthropathy. After two plus years of questions, I finally have a diagnosis and a treatment plan.

Prayers can continue as I now need to wean off the prednisone over the next six weeks. If all goes well, the pain will not recur and will be controlled with my new medication - methotrexate. All the swelling and moon faced crap should recede. My blood glucose should improve and I should be able to get off the mega amounts of insulin I am presently requiring. Hopefully some of the weight I've gained back will also drop off. The doctor even indicated that I may not need to remain on the methotrexate if the pain eventually goes into a remission, but that would likely be some time down the road.

Fortunately methotrexate is relatively inexpensive and has a generic version. I do not have good drug benefits even though I work in health care.

The rest of the day was wonderful. Just got back from a messy cheeseburger dinner at Outback Steakhouse. Packing up my belongings for an early start to head home in the morning. Peace.

Day Of Rest II

As I do not have to return to the doc until tomorrow, today ended up being another day of rest. Once I realized that I had been up from 4AM until past midnight, it made sense. The humidity was down significantly and Lisa had a plumber coming to fix the water problem so it was just as well. I spent the day reading and relaxing. I managed to take Frankie for a short walk.

I started on the new medication today - methotrexate. I will take it once a week. As of now, I am feeling a bit "off" but it could just be that I am very relaxed and a bit hungry waiting for Lisa to get back from an errand so we can go to dinner.

Indian food again tonight - would be so nice if we had a restaurant in Marquette - it's my favorite ethnic food. After dinner, off to see the final Harry Potter in a nice big, modern theater - also something lacking at home.

Tomorrow's appointment is at 3PM. My visit will wind down to a close and I will gladly head home on Friday. It is a nice break to deal with a single dog instead of the whole pack but I do miss the girls. Peace.

And It Looks Like We Have A Winner...

So the day started out very strangely... I awoke to use the bathroom for the third time at around 4AM local time (I've been waking up between 5 and 6 AM at home lately so no big surprise). I figured I relieve myself and go lay down again for another hour or so only to find Lisa up on the sofa in a panic because she had water pouring from the ceiling in the basement.

Careful assessment of the situation lead me to believe that something was up with her central air. I got on line and learned all about evaporators and such and once we had some idea of what was likely occurring she began to calm down but we were up for the duration at that point.

So we hung out until about quarter to seven before heading over to Mayo for my "7:30 AM check in." While waiting the gal at the desk went over to talk with this lady. All HIPPA regs aside, we were able to eavesdrop and I'm hearing her tell the lady that she could come back on Thursday but they were all full today. Both Lisa and I were worried that I'd get the same spiel as an add on to the schedule. However, my situation proved to be very different than hers.

The gal explained to me that I needed to just sit tight and see if there were any cancellations and that there was a physician ready to see me this morning if there were no cancellations. I settled in to complete the information they needed and then began to read. I was actually called back within the hour.

The doctor was a very nice, clearly knowledgeable, older American doctor (truth be told, he could have been Canadian). Nothing against foreign trained doctors, but culturally it was comforting to be able to just be myself and be understood. He reviewed my medical records, listened to my history, asked some pointed questions and essentially came to a diagnosis there on the spot.

My one younger brother has been living with an auto immune disease for many years now. He has Ankylosing spondylitis. I'm not going to do any fancy links on this post so you will have to Google it yourself. This particular brother and I over the years have often been mistaken for twins despite a six year age difference so it comes as no surprise that we are having similar medical issues.

In any case, his illness tends to focus more on his spine. According the the doctor, he believes that I have a variant of spondylitis though in my case it is affecting the extremities and the connective tissue at the joints rather than the joints themselves. Apparently there is a genetic marker for the AS and we are testing to see if I have that. We are also testing once again for Rheumatoid and Lupus. Apparently most Lupus testing in the country right now is fairly worthless, so there is a small chance that my previous tests were false negatives. However, he thinks that with my brother's illness his first diagnosis is likely the correct one.

Those of you who have asked if this is good news or bad, with the presence of hand and foot pain, there were three likely major illnesses that I could have been stricken with - Lupus, Rheumatoid, or Scleroderma. None of these illnesses were a good match to my symptoms and none would have been very nice to have to deal with long term.

The present treatment plan he is prescribing will involve a rapid wean off the prednisone over the next six weeks and begin on weekly methotrexate tomorrow. The long term issues with methotrexate therapy have included liver issues. However, they have apparently learned that the real issue is fatty liver issues in conjunction with the med. Monitoring the fatty liver situation apparently is addressing the traditional complications. This is not a bad long term prognosis considering some of the other illnesses.

Lisa and I were living the premises by noon. After two plus years of this, I had an answer within three hours more or less. He indicated I could head home today. I explained that I was prepared to stay the week so he scheduled me in for a follow up on Thursday so we could go over the results of the lab work. I should be heading home to Michigan then early on Friday.

I am feeling a profound sense of relief. For over two years the doctors all wanted to lump this on the doorstep of the diabetes. For over two years I put up with chronic low grade pain and loss of function in my hands because the local rheumatologist agreed with this assessent. To his credit the Mayo physician explained that their response was not completely out of line given that men who present with a sudden high out of range glucose level can have significant pain issues with their hands similar to my symptoms. Where he breaks with them is that those symptoms do not respond to steroids and I had two episodes where the symptoms had completely resolved with steroids over the past two summers. For him that would have indicated something else was going on.

Thank you all for your prayers and concerns. I will still need them now as I wean off the prednisone, something that I fear will be a bit of an emotional roller coaster as my adrenal glands are dragged kicking and screaming back into play. I will be so glad to have my sugar levels get back under control so I can eat the occasional ice cream. If I am brave I will take and post a photo that shows just how puffed up I am right now so as it disperses I can see the difference.

Tomorrow will be another day of rest. Lisa and I have plans still to see the final Harry Potter movie, go have a good steak dinner, eat Indian at least one more time, and now just enjoy our visit. The A/C repair man will be here either later today or tomorrow but in the mean time she has a window unit in that is keeping the house cool. Peace and love to you all.

Day Of Rest

Given the change in time zones I was awake at 4:30 AM. Crept around until Lisa woke up - thankfully she leaves for work before 6AM. Eventually made it back to bed and slept in for a few hours. That essentially set the tone for the day. Heat index here above 100. No real desire to prowl, shop, etc. so I essentially stayed in bed all day. I would get up and nibble in the kitchen, read and doze. I think I needed the rest. The house has been nice and cool and Frankie has been good company.

I would take him out to the back yard and just feel wiped out from 10 minutes of this humidity. I am simply not used to it anymore having lived up north for thirteen years. Late in the day a front passed through and lessened the heat and humidity. Hopefully, it will stay milder now. My appointment begins at 7:30 in Rheumatology where I will pick up a pager.

Dinner tonight was sushi! The joys of a bigger city mainly involve food. Now I'm just relaxing - all those naps will probably keep me up for awhile. Peace.

Safe Arrivals...

Travel day went off with only some minor hitches. Up at 6AM and started packing - remembered everything but the baby gate. Dropped the girls off at the Pet Sitters Kennel - they have their own "suite" and will be allowed to run around the office space as well as their time out in the yard. I hope Skittles wasn't too traumatized being dropped off like this so soon after her arrival (she's only been with me now for four months).

Met my friend Kim from Jr High/High School for lunch in Wisconsin. We haven't seen each other in over 30 years and had a lovely two hour lunch. We could have talked even longer. I look forward to visiting with her again soon. This was a nice way to break up an eight hour drive and make me rest.

The worst of the trip was the car air conditioning kept fading in and out - both temperature and fan speed. I must get that looked at one of these days. As a result it was back and forth between wide open windows blowing warm air and bouts of nice cold air.

On arrival we rested for a bit and then zipped off to my favorite Indian restaurant for a bite. Now I'm just relaxing and getting ready for bed. Tomorrow will be a day of rest. My appointments don't begin until Tues. Peace.

And The Adventure Begins...

I haven't blogged much this summer. Back before Memorial Day, I suffered what can only be called an auto immune crisis of some kind. I was in the Emergency Room twice with severe difficulty walking and using my hands due to escalating pain. I have been dealing with this pain on a low grade, chronic level for over two years, since just before my blood sugars went out of whack as well.

My physician was able to get me a referral to the Mayo Clinic with an expedited appointment. They would see me in 8 weeks which is much quicker than the usual 4-6 months or no referral at all (a year and a half ago they wouldn't even give me an appointment).

The time has finally come for my appointment. I will leave in the morning and head off to Rochester, Minnesota, where I will stay with my good friend Lisa who happens to work there. My actual appointment will be some time on Tuesday. I will receive a beeper at 7:30 AM and they will page me when they can squeeze me in and get me started on their intensive assessment treadmill.

I have survived the summer thus far on very large doses of prednisone which has kept the pain away and allowed me to be functional and keep working. I finally bloated up and look a bit like John Candy - all jowly and swollen - "moon faced" is the technical term for this condition from steroids. I have been fortunate in that my overall mood has been one of peace. Prednisone can really mess you up emotionally - make you act crazy - whereas I have been exceedingly calm.

I hope to post regularly from Minnesota to keep anyone who is interested informed of what is happening. Prayers will be welcome as always. Peace.

The Name Of The Rose...

Alright. This post will be my attempt to explain the concept of Trinity in my own humble way as we move into the week past Trinity Sunday. Now I am no theologian and perhaps there will be serious flaws discovered in what I have to say, so please be kind.

To get started I want to introduce a few concepts in order to make my point. Let's start with the image with which I opened this post. I did a search on "three atom molecule" and as it happens that is an illustration of ozone. Let's call it it a God molecule though, shall we? The molecule is God - the three atoms are the Trinity - one and three at the same time.

Next I would direct you back to the title of this post, borrowed from the Umberto Eco's first novel. Apparently the true meaning of this title is not known. The book is a mystery set in the middle ages at a monastery in Italy. What I recall from Professor Elizabeth Dipple's class in college was that title might refer to the debate over universal concepts vs. physical objects. My philosophy is a bit weak, but the idea is that a universal rose exists in the ether and that all roses are but reflections of the universal rose and that if I ask you to imagine a rose, you are tapping into that universal rose.

Borrowing from that idea then, I want you to think about the various ways in which that rose might be "real." There would be that universal perfect rose. Next there are the roses that we imagine in our minds - can we think of them as being real (regardless of them being physically present?). Are not our thoughts real? These imagined roses may be a form of memory of physical roses. Finally there are the physical roses that you can see, touch, and smell.

So this is my thought on trying to explain the Trinity. Imagine that there is a universal Larry out there - this universal, perfect Larry is the equivalent of "God" as it relates to the Trinity. Now let's break down Larry into the components of the Trinity. There is my physical being sitting here typing away at my computer. Those folks around me can see me. They can touch my flesh. They can engage me in conversation. Yet these people around me do not understand the entire me through this physical being. They do not fully grasp the universal, perfect Larry. This is the God the Son third of the Trinity. Even my family and friends who have known me for years, those who would recognize this physical being in their presence instantly, do not fully know the God/me - the complete me.

Now let's consider the Larry that exists in the minds eye of all the folks who know me. In my mother's mind there is an image of her eldest son. Is not her image a real image? Now living hundreds of miles apart - this Larry is a more real Larry for her than my physical body. Or consider the many cyber friends I have who have never seen my physical body, never stood in my presence. I am a disembodied voice, words on a computer screen, digital images only. Am I no less real in their minds? Yet these mind images of me scattered around the globe are distinct in many ways from the physical me. Let's think of this as Larry/God the Spirit.

Finally, I myself carry an image of myself in my own mind. This is the me that lives in my head and never quite translates to the physical world. It is the part of my that always stands alone. The part of me that cannot be completely revealed for we can never really know what it feels like to be another person. This "head" translates to Larry/God the Father.

Each of these three Larry's compliments the others. The physical Larry can try and relate the "Father" Larry to the world either in person or through the Spirit Larry. All are pieces, however, of that three atomed molecule - "the universal Larry."

This is how I came to have a slightly better understanding of the Trinity. What do you think?

I Is A Freecycle Convert...

Freecycle...have you heard of it? What an amazing idea. I'm simply hooked.

The concept behind Freecycle is that rather than toss away usable goods, you log into your local freecycle network and let folks know what you have to give away. Similarly if you are looking for stuff, before you run out to your local box store and buy some cheaply made Chinese-kill-the-environment-made-with-toxic-crap item, someone in your network may have what you need sitting in the back of their garage or basement.

I have done an amazing job over the past decade of shedding my pack rat tendencies. However, there are items that clearly have value that I simply do not need, but to throw them out hasn't seemed right either. Case in point, my dad bought a new smoke a number of years ago and brought me his old one which has sat in my porch for years now.

I joined my local group - set up as a Yahoo group - and posted a "TGA: smoker." This lovely young couple was so excited. I'm sure they don't have a pot to piss in. As they were leaving, they saw my beat up old Weber grill on the junk pile and asked if they could have that as well.

Then I saw someone looking for a pet rabbit. In the heat of my illness, the animal care was beginning to be overwhelming. Thelma and Louise are beautiful creatures, but I wasn't getting much rabbit love back for all the work I was putting into them. I have been thinking about finding them a new home for months, but was afraid if I simply put up a notice at the feed store, some kid would talk her parents into them and they'd end up killed by the family dog or escape or simply get sick and die (rabbits are tricky as prey animals - they are near death before you notice they are sick).

So I contacted this guy and asked him if he has had experience with rabbits and he started to list about four different breed types that he'd raised over the years. I found them a new home. When he came to pick them up, he arrived with his boyfriend who nearly wet himself using the "we" pronoun to emphasize the nature of their relationship. I so wanted to look him in the eye and say, "Cool it, sister, you're preaching to the choir..." I hope to make friends with them. They are little babies at the university - or at least Austen is. Older mentors are important in my humble opinion. Relationships need lots of potting soil to spread their roots. But I digress.

I have a few other things up for claiming right now and hope to empty my basement by the end of the summer. Should my mother be reading this, "Not to worry, mom, not giving away and family heirlooms."

I highly recommend you check it out. Anything we can do to begin tearing down this consumer culture that is destroying us and our environment. Peace.

From St. Laika's...

A Reading from the commentary of St. Ephraem on the Diatessaron

The Word of God is an inexhaustible fountain

Lord, who can grasp all the wealth of just one of your words? What we understand is much less than what we leave behind, like thirsty people who drink from a fountain. For your word, Lord, has many shades of meaning just as those who study it have many different points of view. The Lord has colored his words with many hues so that each person who studies it can see in it what he loves. He has hidden many treasures in his word so that each of us is enriched as we meditate on it.

The word of God is a tree of life that from all its parts offers you fruits that are blessed. It is like that rock opened in the desert that from all its parts gave forth a spiritual drink. As the Apostle says, "All ate the same supernatural food and all drank the same supernatural drink."

He who comes into contact with some share of its treasure should not think that the only thing contained in the word is what he himself has found. He should realize that he has only been able to find that one thing from among many others. Nor because only that one part has become his, should he say that the word is void and empty and look down on it; but because he could not exhaust it he should give thanks for its riches. Be glad that you were overcome and do not be sad that it overcame you. The thirsty man rejoices when he drinks and he is not downcast because he cannot empty the fountain. Rather let the fountain quench your thirst than have your thirst quench the fountain. Because if your thirst is quenched and the fountain is not exhausted you can drink from it again whenever you are thirsty. But if when your thirst is quenched the fountain also is dried up your victory will bode evil for you.

Be grateful for what you have received and do not grumble about the abundance left behind. What you have received and what you have reached is your share, what remains is your heritage. What, at one time, you are not able to receive because of your weakness, you will be able to receive at other times if you persevere. Do not have the presumption to try and take in one draught what cannot be taken in one draught, and do not abandon out of laziness what you may only consume little by little.

(Click on the title to be taken to the St. Laika's page to hear this reading in the service)

...Got Some 'Splainin To Do

On a lighter note, I mentioned in the previous post that I had to lock Zoe in the bedroom during my first trip to the Emergency Department. I said that I knew I would suffer the consequences or some such statement. What follows is the latest "I Love Lucy" episode in my life with my neighbor and friend Heidi.

As I said, I managed to get down into the basement to lock up the dogs, but in the confusion, Zoe snuck back upstairs. I wasn't going to be able to do another round trip so I simply locked her in the bedroom. Now Zoe is a bit of a piddler and hysterical pooper. I was fairly sure I would come home to some kind of minimal mess in my bedroom. She didn't disappoint me.

After traipsing back and forth across the hospital campus in order to retrieve my new meds, I finally made it back home Monday evening. I managed to get the dogs outside and even managed to get down to the basement to feed them (they would not have let me rest until their bellies were full). Sure enough, Zoe had left some turdlets on the floor by the bed and had piddled on some dirty laundry. I figured I would deal with it when I could. The window had been left open all day so there was no obnoxious smell in the room and bending down to clean it up was not an option.

At the last minute, Frankie decided to take off and I thought, "Well, dog, you're on your own, I have to go lay down." I struggled to my bedroom, phone and urinal in hand, and collapsed. After catching my breathe I zipped off a text to Heidi (Ethel to my Lucy). Oh, yeah, in the midst of all this I was watching her airedale and had to bring him home that morning before heading to the hospital. So I texted her, "Please help. When will you be home?"

She called me back immediately and said she had just gotten home and would be over shortly. I told her Frankie was outside and to see if she could round him up when she got here and to use the kitchen door. I then just tried to relax and wait.

Abby the Cat was perched on top of The Kitteh Tower and I had thought nothing of it. However, once Heidi arrived all Hell broke loose. I had not believed that the cats would be more afraid of other humans than of Skittles-the-Mighty-(almost)-Cat-Killer... I was very wrong.

All I could hear was extreme chaos as Heidi and her daughter inadvertently spooked Abby sending her flying off the tower to an awaiting Skittles below. A rapid chase around the great room apparently ensued. Would Abby simply make a break for the safety zone of the basement? NO! She decides to head for Papa's bed and dives beneath under the headboard.

Now up until that moment I had a wooden bar stool at the headboard on which was a nice halogen reading lamp. Skittles comes flying around the corner and proceeds to launch herself through the legs of the bar stool and wedge herself half way under the bed, sending stool and lamp flying through the air and crashing to the floor. Minus one reading lamp.

Heidi and her daughter try to get the dog out of the room. Of course, I already realize that I will have to get up again because I will need to get the cat out of the bedroom if I will have any rest. I'm lying there, glasses over on the dresser and so blind as a bat. The constant struggle to remove Skit from the room is occurring just out of arms reach.

First I tell Heidi that there are two pill bottles on the bathroom counter that I need - antibiotics and pain pills. She goes to retrieve them amidst the insanity and comes back with three bottles and begins to hand them to me (remember I am without glasses and blind). Unfortunately the lid was not on my pain pills and as she hands the bottle it slips and my pain pills go flying all over the bedroom.

Now Heidi is scrambling to pick up all the pills so the dogs don't nab them. Tylenol is very bad for dogs and the narcotic portion isn't much better. I am stuck in bed trying not to lose my temper. Heidi stands up and declares she's recovered them all - ten. Ten? I had already taken one and thought they had only given me ten. I hold the bottle up close to my blind eyes and see that they have given me twelve. One is still missing. Heidi looks again and declares that she cannot find it.

She asks what else needs to be done. As I realize that I will have to get up now anyway to remove the cat AND find the missing pill, I suggest that there's really nothing more, but she does manage to remember the dog food downstairs (thank god). So I have her go down and bring up all the dog food and dog dishes so that I will not have to do the stairs again in the near future. She also puts out cat food for the cats.

While she is doing this, I manage to get Skittles locked in the bathroom and other dogs out of the bedroom and close the door. I begin to try and coax Abby out from under the bed. No luck. Heidi comes back upstairs and I thank her and send her on her way.

I begin to realize that I will have to get down closer to the floor. I pause and gulp slightly. OK, pillow onto the hard tile and slowly ease myself to my knees and then down to my elbows. Knees and elbows are still relatively pain free at this point. Sure enough, Abby is sitting pretty and I eventually manage to ease her out.

Once she is out I see the missing pill back behind where she was hiding. No way to reach the pill in my current position. Without thinking that my phone is across the room, I ease off the pillow and stretch out onto the floor. I end up having to use the pillow to swipe the pill out from under the bed. Now I have the pill and I am lying flat out on the floor with hands and feet/legs that are not really functional and only then wonder how I am supposed to get up.

I imagine myself lying there for hours in my own urine and figure out a way to gradual breathe through the pain and get back up on my knees. Funny thing as I do, I start to smell dog poop. Remember there was no odor in the room when I got home. This could only mean one thing. Yes, I had laid down and squished the little turdlets. In fact, as I manage to get completely up off the floor I have one smeared across my thigh. Using more dirty laundry I wipe off my leg, carefully put the pill into the bottle, recover the dogs, and, once again, collapse in bed.

At this point, and this is the really important point, I am faced with a choice. I can burst into tears in pain, frustration, and anger and curse my fate or I can get Kate on the phone and tell her the story and have a good laugh at the total ridiculous nature of life. I choose the latter.

And the appropriate coda to this story is that on Thursday I once again had to lock the dogs in the bedroom when I took off for the hospital via ambulance. Once again, Zoe did not disappoint and there were two small piddle puddles on the floor. I called Kate and said that at least this time I would not end up rolling around in dog shit. After getting off the phone, I took care of running/feeding the dogs, gathered them up into the bedroom and collapsed on the bed. As I rolled over, I could feel something cold and hard under my back. Yes, it would appear I ended up rolling in it one more time as Zoe had left a little present for me in bed. ::sigh::

Ending Radio Silence

It has been a very long couple weeks and I have been rather quiet about what has been going on. My parents left for vacation while the crisis hit and I did not want to spoil their vacation, so I kept quiet but for a few select friends. My folks have been regularly on Facebook while they've been gone, so the decision to maintain radio silence, as it were, has been a good one. They return tomorrow and will know what has been occurring by tomorrow afternoon.

You all may know that my health has been messed up for a good two years now. I started with pain in my hands followed very closely by a skyrocketing blood glucose. Not long after that the pain in my hands spread to my wrists and upper arm joints and began in my feet and spread up my legs. Not long after that I began having carpal tunnel syndrome in both wrists.

Over the past two years I have been seen or followed by a rehab doc, a rheumatologist, a neurologist and his NP, an endocrinologist, a neurosurgeon, and an infectious disease doc. I finally changed primary care physicians last February to a gal who is much more on top of things than my previous doc. This was prompted by an abnormal thyroid lab.

I leapt at the possibility that maybe my whole problem was thyroid related (pain, that is). The Mayo Clinic site listed joint pain and stiffness, as well as carpal tunnel syndrome, as possible symptomology of hypothyroidism. However, my new doc concurred that, though I am heavy and sedentary, my diabetes didn't seem to fit the pattern and that both the thryoid and diabetes were part of a bigger autoimmune picture.

Mind you every last one of those docs I listed wanted nothing more than to declare me an overweight American with diabetes and lump the chronic pain at diabetes' door, ignoring a strong family history of autoimmune disorder in the male line in my family and the fact that I had an unusual syndrome (Sweets' syndrome) about 8 years ago, which usually hits women over 50. As that didn't fit me, one of the other categories of Sweets' patient did, namely that it can be a precursor to autoimmune disease.

Everything changed very quickly the weekend of May 21st and 22nd. My pain had seemed to be incrementally worsening in the days leading up to this weekend. By Sunday, I was having severe difficulty walking due to the extreme pain in my feet and legs. My hands were also beginning to curl up again. I nearly went to the Emergency Department that afternoon, but talked myself out of it, preferring to wait until speaking with my docs in the morning.

By Monday morning I was in fairly bad shape. My primary care doctor's office wasn't helpful. I couldn't get past the phalanx of front desk help to ask my doc a question. In the end, this was beneficial (because I was going to try and get a script for steroids out of her). I called the neurology office next hoping to speak to the NP when she came in at 9AM. Two hours later at 11AM I gave up.

I managed to get Skittles and Lola downstairs, but Zoe snuck back upstairs. By this point, doing stairs was exceedingly painful and probably unsafe, so I simply locked her in the bedroom knowing I'd suffer the consequences later. Frankie, of course, continued to have free reign of the place.

I hobbled into the Emergency Department and was offered a wheel chair, but as I was already at the desk, I declined. The receptionist than instructed me to go sit down and wait until the triage nurse came to get me. I took one look at the chairs over there and decided I wasn't sure I would be able to get up out of the chair once seated. I turned to the gal at the desk and said, "I think I'll take that wheelchair now."

Long story short, I had a raging bladder infection and an Emergency Room doctor once again willing to suggest my pain was simply due to the diabetes and would improve as the infection improved. They handed me my prescriptions and sent me on my way, forcing me to "walk" across the entire hospital campus to the pharmacy and then walk back to the emergency parking lot.

I spent the better part of the next few days in bed with a urinal by my side, avoiding transferring out of bed as much as possible because standing/walking was horrible. I had been unaware of my bladder infection, assuming the frequency symptoms were due to a new neurology medication I was frantincally trying to titrate up (I could no longer take the neurology medication that was working as it was non-formularly and the "drug benefit" ::snort:: people finally turned down the doctor's request for authorization). The bladder symtoms were improving but the pain was not.

By Thursday, May 26th I returned to the Emergency Department by ambulance no longer able to do stairs at all and barely able to get out of bed and that with excruciating pain. Further my hands/arms were getting bad and I was beginning to have pain up my back/neck and into my right jaw. The PA in the Emergency Department ran some repeat labs and declared my problem was obviously autoimmune. I had skyrocketing C-reactive protein levels even as my infection was clearing. I received some IV steroids and then was sent home with some pain meds and some prednisone.

By midnight Friday, the prednisone was not controlling the pain. I took my Saturday dose at 4AM and waited until daylight to start making calls. In the end I had to apply my own medical knowledge to make it through the holiday weekend until my follow up appointment on Tuesday of this week. It was requiring 120 mg a day of prednisone (divided into two doses) in order to function.

I have had tremendous support from friends - my long distance friend Kate was on the phone with me multiple times a day to ensure I was hanging in there and coaching me along with regard to finding help etc. My neighbor and friend Heidi, picked up dog food for me, carried all the dog stuff upstairs from the basement, and brought me dinner every night. My friend Barb picked up groceries for me. Georgie and Mary came over to make sure all was well with the cats and the fish. I even managed to find a home for the bunnies in the midst of this (I'll blog more on that later).

My doctor obtained a referral for me to Mayo Clinic in Minnesota for 8/2/11. This occurred in a single day and, believe it or not, they are expediting things to get me in (8 weeks is actually fast apparently). I am relieved and scared and grateful and frustrated and everything else in between. Please keep me in your prayers.

Skittles particularly has been a blessing. It is her nature to be always by my side (except when she is in kill the kitteh mode). She is very affectionate despite her agressive nature. Fran is aware of how much I have appreciated her doggy kisses and her cuddles. More in a bit. Peace.

Where The Wild Things Are...

Sorry for the delay in blogging again. Things have been rather hectic of late. Skittles safely arrived ten days ago. The integration plan my dad and I put together worked like a charm. After a peaceful few weeks in the suburbs of Chicago, Skittles had adjusted to the real world again and made a good friend in my folks' Airedale, Winston. In fact she had gotten so well adjusted she was starting to guard their house against workmen and squirrels. She slept most nights in bed with my folks and Winston. When they went out, she had free reign of the house and didn't get into any mischief.

On Saturday, March 19th, she traveled from Chicago to the Upper Peninsula. There is a lone official rest area on this trip just south of Green Bay. All the Shell dogs have visited this rest stop and left their offerings and so Skittles continued the tradition. Upon arrival, my dad put her on the leash and walked her around the road for a bit. Eventually we let out the other dogs so the sniffing ritual could begin. There was no tension between them at all.

During my dad's visit, she slept with him, but almost immediately I began to feed her with the other dogs. When it came time for him to head home, she handled the transition without any problems at all.

She is extremely obsessed with the cats. As I posted on Facebook the other day, I am learning that it is not so much when will Skittles get bored as when will the cats remember that they are in charge. I make sure they have ample room to escape the canine frenzy. We are making slow progress.

In the midst of all this, Frankie got rather ill. He started to vomit that Saturday night and wasn't right for a few days. By Monday night, something was clearly wrong and I brought him to the vet first thing Tuesday morning. He was very dehydrated. He ended up spending the night and the next day there. My concern was the similarity between his symptoms and Cosmo's symptoms just before he died. In the end, the vet decided that Frankie must have eaten something that has floated to the surface courtesy of the Spring snow melt. He's doing much better now.

Not long after Skittles made it to the U.P., her Olga past away in New York. To what extent she was holding on to see her safely here, we will never know. Her spirit watches over us all now and I'm sure she approves. Peace.

A Bigot Is A Bigot Is A Bigot...

There is a news item being shared on the social networks regarding yet another tragic murder. In this case an elderly man was murdered by his younger companion. The companion placed some stones and batteries in a sock and beat his friend to death. When questioned, he stated that the man had made a sexual advance and so he stoned him to death like it says to do in the Bible. The progressive religion haters have latched onto this one, cleansed the story of some important details, and posted it as further evidence of the evil nature of religion.

The hatred and vitriol of these anti-theists - their rabid fundamentalist attitude - their bigotry is as bad as the extremists from the opposing side. Yet, we progressives and liberals just smile and nod while these very angry individuals spew their rhetoric. I find it so ironic that folks who would otherwise savage someone for their racism or sexism see no problems with their own bigotry.

They either make blatant, sweeping generalizations about "religion" that apparently lump us all together from Gandhi to David Koresh. If not, then they make broad statements about Catholics, Baptists, or whichever denomination is the target of their ire.

Imagine if individuals from around the world thought this way about the United States... Let's see...the United States is evil, therefore all it's citizens are evil. Hmmmm, starts to sound a bit like how the terrorist organizations think. Another approach would be the leadership of the United States is evil and what Americans believe about themselves and the role they play in the world is evil and filled with hate, therefore all it's citizens are evil. Once again, smacks of how the terrorist organizations see us.

In the sad case above, if one searches out the facts of the story beyond say the glib little piece put forth on AlterNet, one would learn that the victim has fought a lifetime battle with developmental issues that had initially left him institutionalized. He was determined to live an independent life and had done so. His companion, the murderer, was a younger man that he met when he was hospitalized in a psychiatric facility and invited him to be his companion.

In all likelihood this individual is schizophrenic with religious delusions and paranoia. When placed in a proper context, it doesn't work quite as well as another proof against religion or the Bible.

Atheists show such a total lack of history and understanding when they stand up and shout out their attack on religion in all its varied forms and practices. I particularly love it when they apply the rules of science to relgion to "prove" that religion is false, ignoring the fact the religion and faith ISN'T science. It's like faulting your grandmother for not being your grandfather because she doesn't have balls.

I stayed out of one rather hateful conversational thread today on Facebook only to stumble into another. ::sigh:: Peace.

Are They Giving Skittles Coffee?

Too Much Of A Good Thing?

This was the spokesman for the Heart Attack Grill in Arizona, Blair River. He recently died at the age of 29. He tried to capitalize on his size in a manner similar to the way Jared of Subway fame has capitalized on his weight loss. In either case, our cultural obsession with indulgence was the engine driving their popularity.

We often think of our Puritan roots in terms of our warped approach to sexuality. As I thought about this young man's death, I began to ponder how our puritan roots have shaped our attitudes to all manner of indulgence.

For example, the state with the highest per capita of on line subscriptions for pornography is Utah. In other words, the state most under the influence of the Church of Latter Day Saints, which takes a very restrictive and limiting view on sexuality, harbors this guilty secret.

Those are the operative words - guilty secret - I believe that is the key to the titillation that factors into so many of our indulgences.

I followed a link suggested by a Facebook friend to a NY Times article that referenced a 2007 study in which they found that feeling ok about indulging oneself lead to less of a binge. The participants were told this was a taste test survey and were instructed to eat donuts. One group was told that they shouldn't feel bad about eating the donuts as all the participants were doing so. They were all then asked to participate in an additional taste survey involving a large bowl of candy. Those who were encouraged not to feel bad actually ate less of the candy than those who were not.

Of course, the whole conclusion of this study was that the secret to losing weight was to cut yourself some slack and give yourself permission to indulge. I mildly objected to the implication that big was still equated as bad. However, the overall conclusion was rather interesting and contributed to my thoughts tonight.

Think about binge drinking. I look back and cannot reasonably explain why I drank that way when I was younger. It makes no sense. However, I think that when we consider the behavior in light of Mormon porn, maybe we are onto something, namely that when something is forbidden or "sinful" and we are likely to harbor guilty feelings, we indulge all the more.

Think about how we relate to food. How much of our enjoyment is tied up with the guilty pleasure tango? Perhaps we dive into that box of cookies all the more because we felt guilty putting into our shopping cart, felt guilty again as we placed at the checkout, more guilt as we unpacked it (maybe even hid it up in a cabinet for later), and finally once we ripped into that box, boy were we ready to indulge!

Let’s consider the seven deadly sins…not sure of the list? Think of that rather frightening movie, Seven, in which individuals are murdered by a serial killer because of their guilt. Gluttony. Greed. Sloth. Vanity. Lust. Envy. Anger.

Essentially no indulgence is to be tolerated. If you enjoy your food, your money, your relaxation,
or your sexual activity too much, you are committing a deadly sin. And just how much is too much? There is no answer and so deep down we question ourselves…do I have the right to enjoy this?

If you’re liberal, the script is easy - with so much suffering in the world, how dare I…with so much hunger in the world, how dare I…with so much trouble in the world, how dare I…

If you’re conservative you see it all as sin anyway, so you already see it all as forbidden fun.

So where I am going with all this? Well, let’s go back and look at our spokesman, Blair. Being completely honest, on some level, for even a split second only, did you not think “well, of course, he died, just look at him…” I know I did. Inherent in that thought is a judgment - he was guilty of a sin - he got what he had coming to him.

Yet that very manner of thinking reminds me of something I read recently after Charlie Sheen made an anti-Semitic rant about his shows producer. There was a joke from the 1930's, "Hitler was making a passionate speech in Nuremberg and shouted to the crowd, "Who is the reason for all of Germany's problems? The Jews and the bicycle riders!" To which, one man turned to the other and said, "Why the bicycle riders?" We make similar responses when we pass judgment on individuals over their health issues.

We have been taught that corporations can sell us the answer to any problem we may face. We have been taught that if you do everything exactly the right way, you can avoid all health problems. If you maintain your weight at the right level, if you exercise the right amount, if you eat the right foods in the right portions...you can live forever! This feeds right into our Puritan way of thinking - if you live the right way you can go to Heaven!

The problem, of course, is that we really cannot control our biological destiny. Science continues to prove that more and more of what we face is due to the genetics we have inherited. A friend of mine was recently diagnosed with osteoporosis and she was devastated. In her mind, she was doing everything correctly - she is nearly an ascetic when it comes to food and portion size - she is militant about her approach to exercise. So how could SHE develop osteoporosis?

I see people that are so adamant in their belief that they will diet and exercise their way to perfect health - they are so pious about it. God forbid they indulge. When they do, the penance they assign themselves would make the Holy Father proud.

Which gets back to my whole point about indulgence. What if a wizard came along and said to you - "I can guarantee you live to be 150! All you need do is give up all physical contact with other humans and eat nothing but plain oatmeal" Would it really be worth it then to live to 150? I hope that every last one of you says "No."

Is it really worth giving up all delicious treats, by which I mean abstaining or feeling so guilty when you do indulge, in the hope of adding a few years to your life? Is it really worth sacrificing hours every week with endless exercise rather than lounging a bit on your sofa, watching some completely silly television show, having a pillow fight with your children, because you believe it will make you live longer?

By the way, studies have repeatedly shown that all this healthy living and exercise doesn't improve life expectancy. "Based on available information, physicians' recommendations about exercise should not include the possibility of increased life expectancy." Here's just one example.

I'm not suggesting we should give up trying to maintain a reasonable weight or that we should superglue ourselves to our couches. What healthy living does affect is quality of life. However, we all have our own ideas about what gives a life quality - in my case, I need a healthy amount of peace and quiet to just think and ponder, to read books and journals, to watch movies. I'm a big boy. I have health issues. Has my weight and activity level given me diabetes? Perhaps on top of a genetic trigger, yes. However, my dad is an equally big and equally sedentary man and he does not have diabetes.

I struggle with our Puritan heritage all the time. I drift into feelings of self recrimination. However, more often than not I allow myself to indulge and I am mostly successful at keeping the negative thoughts at bay. Peace.