Amendment (Ani DiFranco)

Yeah, the leaked Supreme Court decision is bullsh*t, an insane power and control move, and they should all be ashamed of themselves.  I have faith that Roe v. Wade (a Constitutional right we've had for 50 years) will not be overturned.  I'm just Pollyanna-ish enough to think that, if 70% of the population believes in the right to choose, it can not, and will not, be taken away from us.  I refuse to imagine a world resembling The Handmaid's Tale.

In the meantime, I'm remembering reading an article decades ago (late-60s/early-70s) about The Jane Collective, and fearing yet feeling we may need to be prepared to resurrect it nationwide, just in case.  We worked too hard, we won't give up, and we won't go back.

Sunday is Mother's Day, and I am incredibly lucky to be able to say that all three of my children were *chosen*, because I had that luxury.  Every woman deserves a choice as to when, or if, they become mothers.

Backstory: I wrote last Friday about attending a livestream for Anna Quindlen's new book (Write for Your Life) a few weeks ago, and Kelly Corrigan was the moderator. I had never heard of KC, and was instantly captivated by her engaging personality, her fluidity of language, and her insightful questions. She mentioned being an author herself which, of course as soon as the virtual event ended, I had to google. I put all of her books on my reserve list at the library and, when I realized Glitter and Glue was about the mother-daughter relationship, I bought a copy for my daughter for the upcoming Mother's Day... and of course I had to read it first... 💞

It is indeed Feel Good Friday and, as is tradition, five items below of beauty, interest, and humor to brighten/enlighten your day/weekend/week.  Enjoy!

~ The 29 Best Last-Minute Mother’s Day Gifts:  Sure, it happens every year on the second Sunday in May. And, sure, every Rite Aid in the country has been teeming with cards, warning you about its impending occurrence. But, hey, we get it: Sometimes Mother’s Day sneaks up and finds us unprepared.

~  Otters:  Just a mom and her pup... 💜

~ Transcending: Words on Women and Strength:  Author Kelly Corrigan penned this moving essay about women's remarkable capacity to support each other, to laugh together, and to endure.

~ Anne Lamott:  Here is the annual Mother’s Day post, ONLY for those of you who dread the holiday, dread having strangers, cashiers & waiters exclaim cheerfully, mindlessly, “Happy Mother’s Day!” when it is a day that, for whatever reasons, makes you feel deeply sad.

~ Calm Mom Balm:  A soothing balm for those who nurture, made with flowers!

SONG:  Amendment by Ani DiFranco

BOOK(S):  Glitter and Glue... and Lift, both by Kelly Corrigan

POEM:  Right to Life by Marge Piercy

A woman is not a pear tree

thrusting her fruit into mindless fecundity

into the world. Even pear trees bear

heavily one year and rest and grow the next.

An orchard gone wild drops few warm rotting

fruit in the grass but the trees stretch

high and wiry gifting the birds forty

feet up among inch long thorns

broken atavistically from the smooth wood.

A woman is not a basket you place

your buns in to keep them warm. Not a brood

hen you can slip duck eggs under.

Not the purse holding the coins of

your descendants till you spend them in wars.

Not a bank where your genes collect interest

and interesting mutations in the tainted

rain, anymore than you are.

You plant your corn and harvest

it to eat or sell. You put the lamb

in the pasture to fatten and haul it in

to butcher for chops. You slice

the mountain in two for a road and gouge

the high plains for coal and the waters

run muddy for miles and years.

Fish die but you do not call them yours

unless you wished to eat them.

Now you legislate mineral rights in a woman.

You lay claim to her pastures for grazing,

fields for growing babies like iceburg

lettuce. You value children so dearly

that none ever go hungry, none weep

with no one to tend them when mothers

work, none lack fresh fruit,

none chew lead or cough to death and your

orphanages are empty. Every noon the best

restaurants serve poor children steaks.

At this moment at nine o'clock a partera

is performing a table top abortion on an

unwed mother in Texas who can't get Medicaid

any longer. In five days she will die

of tetanus and her little daughter will cry

and be taken away. Next door a husband

and wife are sticking pins in the son

they did not want. They will explain

for hours how wicked he is,

how he wants discipline.

We are all born of woman, in the rose

of the womb we suckled our mother's blood

and every baby born has a right to love

like a seedling to the sun. Every baby born

unloved, unwanted, is a bill that will come

due in twenty years with interest, an anger

that must find a target, a pain that will

beget pain. A decade downstream a child

screams, a woman falls, a synagogue is torched,

a firing squad summoned, a button

is pushed and the world burns.

I will choose what enters me, what becomes,

flesh of my flesh. Without choice, no politics,

no ethics lives. I am not your cornfield,

not your uranium mine, not your calf

for fattening, not your cow for milking.

You may not use me as your factory.

Priests and legislators do not hold

shares in my womb or my mind.

This is my body. If I give it to you

I want it back. My life

is a non-negotiable demand.

QUOTE(S):  “Raising people is not some lark. It's serious work with serious repercussions. It's air-traffic control. You can't step out for a minute; you can barely pause to scratch your ankle.” ~ Kelly Corrigan

"Yeah, that means all across the country, women in places like South Dakota or Missouri or even Texas will have the exact same abortion rights as women in Afghanistan under the Taliban." ~ Trevor Noah

Amendment (Ani DiFranco)

I had such a sweet, thoughtful post scheduled for today... but, in the last 48 hours, I am just more and more pissed off!

F*cking Texas and their f*cking abortion ban (which I now read is also being planned by Florida, Arkansas, and South Dakota).  I may have my head in the sand/been living under a rock, but I'd never before heard of a shadow docket.  I call bullsh*t.

What can we do?  What *are* we going to do?  This is unacceptable.  We worked too hard for Roe v. Wade to see it crumble like the spines of the Republicans who are behind this offensive and oppressive legislation.

“Our strategy should be not only to confront empire, but to lay siege to it. To deprive it of oxygen. To shame it. To mock it. With our art, our music, our literature, our stubbornness, our joy, our brilliance, our sheer relentlessness – and our ability to tell our own stories. Stories that are different from the ones we’re being brainwashed to believe.

The corporate revolution will collapse if we refuse to buy what they are selling – their ideas, their version of history, their wars, their weapons, their notion of inevitability.  Remember this: We be many and they be few. They need us more than we need them. Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.” ~ Arundhati Roy, War Talk

and...

“One by one the women step up

and commit the forbidden act

of biting into patriarchal thought

refuting it, smashing it,

discarding it and beginning again

in the very beginning when women

loved their bodies

named their gods

authored their lives

when women refused to surrender

except to life as it pulsated through them.

Women reminding us

there is nothing wrong

there never has been anything wrong

there never will be anything wrong

with woman.”

~ Patricia Lynn Reilly

It is indeed Feel Good Friday and, as is tradition, five items below of beauty, interest, and humor to brighten/enlighten your day/weekend/week.  Enjoy! 

~ First Look: Paradis Books & Bread, Miami’s Gamechanging Natural Wine Bar and Bookshop:  “It’s all an experiment."

~ A Simple 5-Step Process for Finding Peace in Times of Conflict:  Ever feel like you are living a life of chaos? Are you feeling overwhelmed and frustrated over these crazy past two years? When difficult things happen or conflict arises, it can be hard to feel peace.

~ Inviting Readers to ‘Dig Into the Whole Garden’:  Margaret Roach, a gardening columnist for The Times, wants readers to see planting and landscaping as more than outdoor decorating.

~ Spike Lee, Exultant at the ‘Epicenter’:  The filmmaker’s epic new documentary series, “NYC Epicenters 9/11-2021½,” is an alternately mournful and irreverent tribute to New York.

~ Could you wear a dress for 100 days?  When Emma Beddington took part in a challenge to wear the same dress for 100 days, she wasn’t expecting to feel the positive force of sisterhood alongside a few neat cleaning hacks.

SONG:  Amendment by Ani DiFranco

BOOK: On Freedom: Four Songs of Care and Constraint by Maggie Nelson

POEM:  The Nothing by Sarah la Rosa

Dark water

muddy water

groundwater.

Creativity is like this

swirling 

and circling

and thick.

There is no easy, clear flow

of sparkling oceans and singing rivers.

My muse comes to me in the mud--

that sacred mixture

dirt and dark water

that heals blind eyes

and draws toxins

from the skin and deeper organs.

The smell is pungent.

This is the artery of the earth

this is the tar-coloured pitch

that feeds the tributaries

flowing toward La Loba who gathers

to Kali who destroys

to the truths I'd rather avoid

inside of myself

about myself

in spite of myself.

One has no choice

but to face the Great Nothing

if one is to find

the Underneath River.

It is a gift, the nothing.

It empties us utterly

of falsity and the hollow stubbornness

that claims to be abiding strength of spirit

but drains us of genuine courage instead.

And we must be emptied

if we are to be fed the living water of spirit.

And so, what is one to do?

What is the solution

the course of action

while stranded in the desert?

Do you sit and conserve your strength?

praying that you live

through this painful dehydration

of the soul?

No.

Continue on

feel the burning sand 

between your toes

feel yourself melting

and merging

with the Great Nothing.

Sink

below

dunes and heat.

There you will find

a cool, dark place

that smells of ancient rains

collected on the ground

beneath your blistered feet.

The waters rise.

QUOTE(S):  "I write because it makes me feel like someone's listening - or I am finally listening to myself." ~ Unknown

"I have a soft spot for books by tough, radically honest women with an uncommon antenna for magic, language, and landscape." ~ Maggie Nelson

In a World of My Own (from Alice in Wonderland)

As I was out running errands last Thursday (and by running errands, I mean doing a drive-thru library pick-up of books I had on reserve), I looked in the rearview mirror and realized I resembled The Invisible Man (H. G. Wells' version, not Ralph Ellison's...  😎 )

 I desperately need a haircut (I've actually done some self-snipping a time or two with the problem areas) so, many days, I just throw on a headband that color-coordinates with my outfit and channel my inner Keith Richards.  Who gives a sh*t.  I don't venture out into the world often (except to the aforementioned library), and it's not like any of them know or care what I look like anyway, right?

In the last week, I seem to have made a very conscious decision to not only go down the rabbit hole, but stay there (go ask Alice...  ;-)  Back to feeling blah, weird, roly-poly-ish, and knowing I am not very good company right now, even for phone calls or Zoom or texts.  I honestly don't need cheering up; there is nothing anyone can do to snap me out of this funk.  It's all on me.  Lots of stressors, family and otherwise, that have left me frustrated and helpless.  As is often the case, allowing myself the benefit of the wallow usually works, until I can rise to my better self.  I'll get there, and thanking everyone in advance for their patience and understanding.

What I really need is a massage, which I haven't had since early-March.  I am a member of the Massage Envy wellness program but, because I have been so risk-averse for the last 3+ months, it doesn't make sense to take a chance (even though I totally trust my tried-and-true Karen!).  Despite my tendency to b*tch and shut down on a regular basis, my dear saint of a husband gives me a back rub almost every night.  His picture is next to the phrase "unconditional love" in the dictionary... 💓


SONG:  In a World of My Own from Alice in Wonderland (flip side:  Blink-182's Rabbit Hole)

BOOK:  Through the Rabbit Hole: Explore and Experience the Shamanic Journey and Energy Medicine by Jan Engels-Smith

POEM:  Fog by Alison Luterman

We don’t have snow here
but some mornings the whole world
is white and hushed and soft with fog
and whatever troubles we went to sleep
clutched to our thudding hearts
have loosened overnight and are dissolving
in mist. The regal hills
to the East have been erased
behind a cottony scrim, and people
appear to appear
out of nowhere in the dawn hush.
An old woman in mask and gloves
pushes her shopping cart
full of salvaged empties. A mother hauls
two babies up the street, one in a backpack,
one in a stroller. A man
with dreadlocks and headphones
cruises by on his bike,
no-hands. All of them
whoosh into the frame
and then vanish. Like the future, or the past,
or some other dimension, alive,
but invisible to us.

[Alison Luterman: “I feel a kind of mental fogginess creeping in as we enter week infinity of sheltering-in-place with no certainty about what the future holds—not that we ever had certainty, not really. At times like these it’s helpful for me to remember that there has always been mystery at the heart of life.”]

QUOTE(S):  "I'm a little hibernating animal. Anonymity is one of my favorite things. I mean, that's why I moved to New York when I was like 18, because there, there are just so many people that there's no one and you're just lost. You're completely invisible and I find that very liberating." ~ Ani DiFranco

"Bizarrely, I actually feel safer the older I get, like people will expect less from me, and I can become more and more invisible, yet more and more eccentric." ~ Marian Keyes

"I've always been a very sensitive person, and people tell me that if I'm in a certain mood, and I go into a room, my mood will permeate the room. It's not on purpose - I'd rather be invisible in those moments - but I'm really bad at faking how I feel." ~ Rooney Mara

This Bouquet (Ani DiFranco)

Yesterday was my two-year blogiversary... and I missed it - I'm known for being punctuality-challenged... but I even forgot my own celebration! Just goes to show how much in Overwhelmed Mode I really am - Calgon, take me away... :-)

So... what has happened here in the last year?

We went on an amazing family vacation in early-August, I was laid off mid-October and I was asked to contribute to Star Maker Machine about the same time (which went a long way toward saving my sanity) - I find myself blogging less but enjoying life more. My Word of the Year was Health - I'm not there yet... but each day is a conscious effort to move toward...

My mom's health continues to decline and I'm actually leaving this Tuesday to fly up to the Atlanta area to spend two weeks with her - one of my children (middle child R) moved out... right before another (youngest child E) came home from college for the summer. We had a family dinner last night (we aim for them weekly) and it was a joy - we're hoping all five of us can get away on vacation sometime in the next few months to re-create the Ft. Myers Beach memories of our past...

I cherish my friends: the forever (I'm still recovering from our four-hour lunch yesterday), the fairly-new (bring on the Day Ones!), the geographically-distant ("balloon man lives in it too") and everyone in between - to use a Cruise-ism: you complete me (ha... :-)

Every day continues to be a growth opportunity, as I find my balance, set my boundaries and re-frame my priorities - here's/cheers to another year of music and magic and mayhem, oh my!

SONG: This Bouquet by Ani DiFranco

BOOK: The Best of Inquiring Mind: 25 Years of Dharma, Drama, and Uncommon Insight by Barbara Gates, Wes Nisker (Editors)

POEM: What Have I Learned by Gary Snyder

What have I learned but

the proper use for several tools?

The moments

between hard pleasant tasks

To sit silent, drink wine,

and think my own kind

of dry crusty thoughts.

—the first Calochortus flowers

and in all the land,

it's spring.

I point them out:

the yellow petals, the golden hairs,

to Gen.

Seeing in silence:

never the same twice,

but when you get it right,

you pass it on.

QUOTE: "Work hard to improve your mind and body. Nourish your spirit. Do the things you fear." ~ Robin S. Sharma

32 Flavors (Ani DiFranco)

DailyOm
Lessons of Discovery
Instruction Manuals for Living
November 19, 2008

Depending on what stage we are in our lives, we can sometimes feel like we ought to know more about who we are or how to live. We may even berate ourselves for making the same mistakes, or for just not "getting it," whatever "it" may be. We wonder how our lives would be now, if only we had “known better.” During moments like these, it is important to remember that none of us are born with instruction manuals and that learning lessons is a lifelong journey.

Inherent to our being born is that we are here to observe, learn, and grow. Accompanying this is a built-in guarantee that there will be mistakes and misadventures along the way. And while it is only natural that we may sometimes become overwhelmed, especially when the lessons keep coming, it is important to remember that learning to understand yourself and your world is an ongoing and active process where the journey is more important than the destination. Every lesson is intended so you can become more of who you are. And as you grow through this self-discovery, you begin to create your own instruction manual. The "how’s" and "why’s" are yours to discover, and part of the beauty of being alive is that these rules are always changing.

If you feel that you would like to explore what your personal instruction manual may already say, then try writing down in order some of the significant events that have happened to you. It’s also important to take note of what you learned from each one. When you are done, you may be surprised to discover how much you are always growing, and that every lesson learned always informs the next. That being said, there is never any need to be hard on yourself or think that you should have it all figured out. We always know as much as we’re meant to know at that moment, and growing into our fullness is a process that unfolds in divine timing. You and your life are beautiful works in progress. Discover yourself and embrace your life’s lessons, and your instruction manual will create itself.

I am intending a low-key, quiet, reflective weekend - let's hope the Universe agrees!

SONG: 32 Flavors by Ani DiFranco

BOOK: Note to Self: On Keeping a Journal and Other Dangerous Pursuits by Samara O'Shea

POEM: The Other Kingdoms by Mary Oliver

Consider the other kingdoms. The
trees, for example, with their mellow-sounding
titles: oak, aspen, willow.
Or the snow, for which the peoples of the north
have dozens of words to describe its
different arrivals. Or the creatures, with their
thick fur, their shy and wordless gaze. Their
infallible sense of what their lives
are meant to be. Thus the world
grows rich, grows wild, and you too,
grow rich, grow sweetly wild, as you too
were born to be.

QUOTE: "People spend their work years trying to be successful and their retirement years trying to be relevant." ~ director of philanthropy, REI

Superhero (Ani DiFranco)

I'd prefer not to go into the significance of this song... but suffice it to say it has (or had) power over me, rather than the other way around - fear and helplessness, begone (ZAP, BAM, POW!).

Also wanted to add that years ago, it finally clicked that She-Ra is the feminization of hero - I love the concept... and use the term whenever I have the opportunity... :-)

SONG: Superhero by Ani DiFranco

BOOK: Fearless Women: Midlife Portraits by Nancy Alspaugh, Marilyn Kentz, and Mary Ann Halpin

POEM: by Jeannine Hall Gailey ~ Female Comic Book Superheroes

are always fighting evil in a thong,
pulsing techno soundtrack in the background
as their tiny ankles thwack

against the bulk of male thugs,
They have names like Buffy, Elektra, or Storm
but excel in code decryption, Egyptology, and pyrotechnics.

They pout when tortured, but always escape just in time,
still impeccable in lip gloss and pointy-toed boots,
to rescue male partners, love interests, or fathers.

Impossible chests burst out of tight leather jackets,
from which they extract the hidden scroll, antidote, or dagger,
tousled hair covering one eye.

They return to their day jobs as forensic pathologists,
wearing their hair up and donning dainty glasses.
Of all the goddesses, these pneumatic heroines most

resemble Artemis, with her miniskirts and crossbow,
or Freya, with her giant gray cats.
Each has seen this apocalypse before.

See her perfect three-point landing on top of that chariot,
riding the silver moon into the horizon,
city crumbling around her heels.

QUOTE: "When I dare to be powerful, to use my strength in the service of my vision, then it becomes less and less important whether I am afraid." ~ Audre Lord