Loss of Innocence

Please don't tell me, please don't tell me.......

In my younger days I always believed everything I read in the newspaper. In fact I had so much respect for newspapers I spent my career working for more than a few of them, either as an art director, graphic designer or writer, on staff or freelance. But then a few cracks in the armor appeared, revealing glimpses of how the executives at the top (and some of the reporters at the bottom) were manipulating things to sell more papers, thus rake in more advertising. My awakening was gradual, until one day I finally understood that newspapers are a for-profit business, not a public service. I consider that moment, somewhere in my mid-thirties, as my true loss of innocence.

Since then my habit is to remain skeptical of everything I haven't witnessed personally, which makes the act of reading a daily paper little more than a diversion to accompany breakfast. I do this despite knowing that it's far healthier to eat a meal without any distractions but rather to give full attention to what you're putting in your body. So it makes sense that one should give as much attention, if not more, to what goes into your mind, which means I can no longer read the daily paper. It's too risky, what with me being slightly nuts already, and even more so in the current climate of "fake news" being dispensed everywhere, even by the once respectable but now fallen CNN and New York Times.

So with all this free time I'm hoping to make more art. Shown above is my latest oil painting of South Freeport Road, a lovely backwoods road I travel several times each day. Seen here it is a late afternoon in early autumn when a big moon hung in the sky, even though it was not yet night.

Enough With the Munchkins Already

There's nothing like a good cry to start the day. That and a steaming cup of black coffee. Throw in a Lorazepam and some oatmeal and I'm good to go. At least that combo used to work, before things got so ugly out there. But lately I'm feeling I might need to add something to my morning mix, like maybe some earplugs and a paper bag over my head, you know, to drown out all the caterwauling.

What I don't get is why the heat is turned up so high concerning the election of Trump (now fairly old news), his impending inauguration (a legal matter and really none of our business), and the recent babbling of a Hollywood actress, causing all the little people to blow their tops on Facebook and throughout the media. Why not just relax and enjoy the show?

When I hear all the bluster I am most reminded of that scene in The Wizard of Oz when Dorothy is about to set off for The Emerald City. She plants her sparkly red shoes firmly on the yellow brick road, which is pretty damn easy to spot, we can all agree. And the instructions she's given by Glinda the Witch are as straightforward as Mapquest: "Follow the yellow brick road!"

A Munchkin helpfully pointing out the obvious to Dorothy.

So off Dorothy goes, that yellow brick road fairly glowing ahead of her, and yet after every few steps she takes one of those odd Munchkins pops up and shouts, "Follow the yellow brick road!" as if he's spouting pearls of wisdom. Dorothy ventures a few feet forward and suddenly there's another little Munchkin, again directing her to "follow the yellow brick road" like he just thought of it himself and wanted to clarify the situation. Meanwhile, Dotty's probably thinking, "Yeah, buddy, thanks for the tip but I got this."

That's how I see all those "helpful" Democrats who keep popping up every few feet and spouting all the same things, thinking they're helping to clarify the situation with their very own pearls of wisdom when really it's all just in their scripts and by now they've learned their lines well. In fact, so well that now everyone knows their lines: Trump's a racist, misogynist, Islamaphobe, xenophobe, pussy-grabbing, ignoramus, reality TV star, Hitler, gone bankrupt, what about his taxes, she won the popular vote. Did I leave anything out?

I don't know about you but I'm ready for a scene change. And I'm really ready for a new director. And enough with the Munchkins already.

What's Good for the Goose.....

Even scarier than "The Twilight Zone."

A dear friend of mine who I love and respect recently bemoaned the fact that six of Trump's cabinet appointees are scheduled to have confirmation hearings all on the same day. This is purportedly being done to speed up the bullshit process, but my friend and many others just like him see it as an "ultra-expedited" ploy to make proper vetting of the nominees virtually impossible, thus ushering in further evil to the already devil-ridden Trump administration.

I gotta say, he had me going there for awhile, not all the way to pulling my hair out but certainly duly alarmed. Until this morning, when I read the following in today's Wall Street Journal:
      "Holding five or more confirmation hearings on a single day has precedent; it occurred for both Presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush. Still, many Democrats say holding that many hearings at once  (Please see SENATE page A4)"

I saw no reason to read further. Can you blame me?

Another, Much Better, Donald

I hate advertising. Despise it, abhor it, detest it and all the rest of the words that mean the same thing. This may stem from my earliest days as a graphic designer when I actually worked in one of those windowless cubbies in an advertising agency in Washington, D.C., selling can't-remember-what to God-knows-who. Regardless or the origin of my dislike, I now mute all ads on TV and pay not the slightest attention to them in print. Naturally they don't work on me. Except for one.

Young Donald was special.

I should be embarrassed to admit it but I switched from Tropicana, after switching from Florida's Best, to Simply Orange juice, all because of Donald Sutherland's voice. As a longtime fan of the actor, I saw every film he ever made until those Hunger Games in 2014 and 2015 -- after all, I have my standards: I want him young and handsome and sweet, not a malevolent old tyrant orchestrating death. Without Young Donald I was bereft! His son Kiefer only poured salt in the wound, looking like his father but not nearly as special, and so I never watched his hit TV show about 24 hours or something like that.

Basically my life was totally and sadly Sutherland-less, until one day I suddenly realized, hearing a commercial I hadn't muted in time, that Donald was doing the talking! And he sounded so honest, so pure, so un-commercial-sellouty, that I ran right out and bought some of that juice and found out Donald was right: It really is simply orange juice, no additives or preservatives and not from concentrate, and it tastes like you are on a beach in Florida! Now I am a permanent customer, and I turn up the volume on those OJ ads.

Young Donald was the greatest! Here are some of his most memorable movies; if you haven't seen them, get started:
Klute
Don't Look Now
M*A*S*H
Invasion of the Body Snatchers
Ordinary People
Six Degrees of Separation
Max Dugan Returns
The Day of the Locust
The Dirty Dozen

Do You Even Lift?

"Let nothing upset you. Let nothing frighten you. Everything is changing. God alone is changeless. Patience attains the goal. Who has God lacks nothing. God alone fills every need." That's my mantra. I say those words to myself daily, several times a day in fact. Some days they calm me down. Others, not so much.

On those days I have an answer for everything. Like the fact that everything upsets me: The news, the foods I eat, the weather (it's fucking freezing here), my physical body, my sister in a nursing home, my dead cat Daisy who I still miss more than a year later. And, on some days, just about everything frightens me: War, hatred, politics, fainting in the supermarket.

And nothing changes: I still have high blood pressure (except when it's too low), I still live in Maine, people are still getting blown up for no reason. Okay, so maybe God is changeless, I'll give you that one. As for patience attaining the goal, I have no idea since I have no patience. I guess I don't "have God" since I lack a ton. And it almost goes without saying (I said almost) that He does not fill every need, or else I wouldn't lack a damn thing.

Well, this is turning out to be a bummer of a blog post so I'd better come up with a good ending, more positive or at least funny. One laugh at least. Okay, how about this: I guess should try to be more like my husband, who is truly a cockeyed optimist. He's happy if he dead lifts 350 pounds, or whatever is a good number to dead lift and whatever a dead lift is. He doesn't let those four crappy black kids who tortured a mentally ill white kid and posted it live on Facebook ruin his morning! No, he doesn't! After all, as he loves to point out in almost any situation, Hitler killed 6 million Jews and that was way worse.

I guess I'm gonna start dead lifting. Whatever that is.

You're Only As Happy As Your Saddest Child

I hereby offer my eternal thanks to Debbie Reynolds, the recently deceased movie star who died just one day after her daughter, actress Carrie Fisher, passed away. As the story goes, Debbie's last words were, "I want to be with Carrie." Not sure if I swallow that one whole, especially in these days of fake-news, but still it's not all that crazy to imagine.

Debbie and Carrie, happily alive.

Face it: Mothers and children have an unbreakable bond. You don't have a creature living inside you for nine months and then simply expel it without some little bits of connective tissue left behind. I mean, did you see the 1979 Ridley Scott film Alien? And that thing was only inside the guy for a couple of days. (Not that I'm suggesting children are monsters but you see where I'm going with this.)

I recently saw a television interview with Debbie and Carrie from a few years ago wherein Debbie tears up at the end, saying, "As a mother, I want to protect my child. Who will do that after I'm gone? I want happiness for my child. I want Carrie to be happy. I can't have that, and that makes me sad." Aha! So there -- it's not just me! My husband, a male of the species, constantly harps (yes, men can harp) on the subject of me being unhappy if my only child is unhappy, claiming that it's neurotic. I say it's biology and that he should stop nagging me (yes, men can nag) to "live my own life" and blah, blah, blah.

Let's be clear: Of course I live my own life. But as someone who is overly empathic, suffering when I hear about the suffering of others, it's worse when it's my own flesh and blood, and the only person who fits that description is my son. Sorry, but that's the truth, and for the first (and hopefully only) time in my life I will employ the trite saying which in this case is quite fitting: It is what it is.

So thank you from the bottom of my heart, Debbie, for chasing down your beloved daughter in Heaven. I trust the two of you are happy there, getting mani-pedis together and playing Canasta or doing whatever it is you Christian folks do to bond.

Take A Break

When I was young, I cut the bigger, older trees for firewood, 
the ones with heart rot, dead and broken branches, 
the crippled and deformed ones, because, I reasoned, 
they were going to fall soon anyway,  and therefore, 
I should give the younger trees more light and room to grow.

Now I'm older and I cut the younger, strong and sturdy, 
solid and beautiful trees, 
and I let the older ones have a few more years 
of light and water and leaf in the forest they have known so long.
Soon enough they will be prostrate on the ground.

"The Woodcutter Changes His Mind" by David Budbill, 

from While We've Still Got Feet: New Poems. © Copper Canyon Press, 2005.

How Trump Won

Let's all agree: Life is not fair. The expectation that it will be begins, wrongly, in childhood. Parents "ooh" and "aah" over their offspring no matter what. Ugly babies are not called out as such, not that they should be, you understand, since beauty is in the eye of the beholder (ha!), but still, it's crazy to set up expectations that will never be met anywhere outside the nursery. Or the nursery school.

I've told this story before but it sticks in my mind even though it happened a quarter of a century ago, and I believe it bears repeating. My son was four, and of course extremely beautiful, the most beautiful in all the land according to my husband and me. He was one of 24 toddlers in a co-op nursery school in an adorable town full of adorable children. I helped out one day a week, as did all the other parents.

One sunny day we were all outside, the kids playing in the yard, when Cindy, the teacher, blew her whistle to signal that it was time for Sally, a darling angel, to get off the tricycle after her allotted five minutes so that Blake, an obnoxious biter everyone disliked, could have his turn. Blake was mean and stubborn and naturally outraged, pitching a fit that Sally was still riding around the yard "on his time." Sally, oblivious to any trouble brewing that involved her, was enjoying the sunshine with a big smile on her face and exercising her little legs.

I suggested that Blake do something else for awhile, like climb the monkey bars or play in the sandbox or continue kicking Nathan in the stomach. Horrified at this blasphemous thought, Cindy insisted that each child get exactly five minutes on the school's one and only trike. "Otherwise it wouldn't be fair," she explained. "We don't want to show any favoritism." Well guess what: Nothing is fair and favoritism is the name of the game. (This, by the way, is how Trump won, in case you wondered.)

My point is, I have a disease called labile hypertension. My blood pressure goes way up and then it goes way down. Yesterday I fainted in the supermarket. Some mornings I won't leave the house for fear of having a stroke. It sucks. I hate it. Why me? But then I hear about a friend who is much sicker than I am, or another who is in perfect health and has everything, and I realize that it's all a crap shoot. I'm not really the most wonderful, most beautiful, smartest girl in the world like my mother always said.

I was kicked off that tricycle years ago and scrounged around for something else to do. I found it. Lately it involves being on hold with my doctor's office for long stretches of time, causing me to still wonder, "Why me?" It's just not fair.

Who You Callin' A Loser?

I recently came across the following comment about Donald Trump in a pissing match on Facebook: "Trump is such a LOSER. Live with it!" 

I was confused. Sure, Donald Trump has been called many things, most of which are not very nice words to call someone, but how can "loser" be one of them? I mean, the guy beat Hillary Clinton, the undisputed Queen of the Democrats who have been preparing for her coronation since the last presidential election, and is about to become our 45th president. He won the election, so doesn't that make him a winner, or does loser mean something else now, like bad means good and ill means awesome and gay has nothing to do with mood?

Suspecting that this was yet another example of how far behind the times I have fallen, beginning with my decision to not get a Twitter account several years ago, I fairly flew to the Urban Dictionary and found that "loser" now has many definitions, and hardly any of them pertain to coming in last. Here are just a few I found, some of which may or may not apply to our incoming president:

1. The top definition was "A dumb bitch who uses the wrong hand to make the "L" symbol on her forehead." So essentially, someone who becomes a loser while busy pointing out someone else as a loser. Not sure why it's a dumb bitch, though; couldn't this also apply to a male? Or even a transgender?

2. A person who has fallen off the social ladder, climbed down the social ladder, jumped off the social ladder, or just never bothered to climb the social ladder in the first place. (Definitely not Trump since he is clearly at the top of the ladder and has been for most of his life. He may have even built the ladder.)

3. Someone who generally sucks at life. (Again, not Trump.)

4. Really cool people who are unique. (Not Trump, but possibly me.)

5. A stereotypical term for one who doesn't fit into mainstream society, or is lacking friends. "Losers" are usually really funny, unique, or smart individuals who people refuse to befriend in fear that they themselves might be labeled a "loser." (Everyone I admire.)

6. A toxic person who, despite having many opportunities to succeed in life, consistently makes bad choices which result in professional and personal failure. They usually end up dragging everyone near them into the loser culture, which makes them toxic. The key to identifying a loser is the consistency with which they make bad decisions and their inability to learn from, admit to, and correct their mistakes. Narcissism and low self-esteem are hallmark personality characteristics of a loser.  (Hillary Clinton.)

7. Someone doomed to fail. (Uh-oh, do we have a winner?) 

Anyway, the thing to bear in mind, especially if you see yourself in one of these definitions, is that Albert Einstein was thought of as a loser when he was young, but was really just unique and slightly autistic. He ended up being one of our most revered scientists and everybody in the world knows his name. So there.

Why I Hate Virginia Woolf

Well here it is only the second day of what was just yesterday a brand new clean year without a blemish, spread before me like just-washed sheets on a King-sized bed, bringing to mind a hotel in the Catskills where I went as a young girl with my parents and grandparents, my grandmother a Polish immigrant and overwhelmed by its opulence, smelling fabulous and completely inviting, suggesting all manner of possible adventures to come, and now there's a big, fat black splotch on it already, almost through no fault of my own and despite my having actually done the very thing that has brought about its ruin, quite unintentionally I might add, or rather with only the best of intentions, and that was spending more than an hour, and at my age time is precious, last evening, reading Mrs. Dalloway, a novel by Virginia Woolf that somehow (wrongly I see now) I had decided was worth my time and attention; neither of which it is, or yours either, unless you have enjoyed this ridiculously meandering sentence about which nobody could care but myself, or in the case of Ms. Woolf, herself. It's little wonder she ended her life, whereas I still have mine and plan to enjoy it as much as possible, which means to Hell with reading Virginia Woolf, she of the enveloping dark headaches blotting out everything else and the voices in her head -- chiding, always chiding -- and the long face; instead I will find a cheerful author who has neither drowned him or herself nor shot him or herself or stuck his or her own head in the oven like Sylvia Plath did, and believe me her famous book The Bell Jar is no walk in the park either, and continue with my plan to read a book every month, just not any by Virginia Woolf, or in fact any suicidal author, and I find that to be a considerable relief. Instantly the day seems brighter!

A Proper Resolution

What a great feeling! So far this whole year I have not made one mistake. Now if I can just keep doing that for the next 364 days, 2017 will be a great year. Alas, that's unlikely, but still it's a good thing to keep in mind.

I have finally come up with a serious resolution, unlike the one I divulged recently to make pigs-in-a-blanket. It's not that I'm not going to make them, but just that it's hardly worthy of being called a new year's "resolution." But this one is: In 2017 I will read a new book every month. (Not newly published, just new to me.) That may sound like not much of a goal, but for me it's a biggie since I usually just keep re-reading books I love. I mean why not do something you know in advance makes you happy? This explains why I have read Edith Wharton's Ethan Frome at least a dozen times. But enough is enough, it's time to move on.

This month's book is Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf if it kills me, which it may judging from page one. And let's remember, Ms. Woolf drowned herself at age 59, possibly because her books were so boring and she had to write them. Anyway, I'm determined to make it all the way to the end, having never read anything by that esteemed author, and will then write a critique of it right here. Now it's off to the supermarket for those baby hot dogs.