Crossing the Great Divide

Election day

Traditionally, election day has not been a biggie for me. Oh, I vote, have in every statewide election since first becoming eligible since Fred Flintstone was on the ballot and we chiseled out our vote. Actually, it was 1974, and the election I voted in... ended up in a tie.

A tie. For US Senate.

Yeah, it was weird. Weirder still was what came next. After the recount dust had dissipated, a special election was to be held in 1975. Two days before the election, I witnessed, well heard... something I was not supposed to hear, a nice, direct glimpse into the doings of politics.

In the summer of 1975, I was employed as a maintenance person for a local tv station for the duration of my semester break. Make that the only maintenance person. The place was run down and filthy, nothing like the state of the art facility that exists today. I went in and busted arse for three weeks, cleaning the place up like it hadn't been in years... sort of like cleaning a centuries old frescoe in Italy ;-) (delusions of grandeur, it's my blog)

After this initial wave of cleaning, there was nothing else left to clean. There was a glassed in room in the front of the building, full of books, mostly novels. Actual news stuff, har! I'd make my daily rounds, taking all of an hour, and then retire to this room to read for the bulk of the day, until there was something else actually left for me to do, I'd do it, then wander back.

I recall reading Letters to the Happy Hooker (Xaviera Hollander) and recall one writer who got off on lightning. Impressive. Another was the autobiography (yeah, right) of Bo Belinsky. I recall him drilling a hole in a hotel room wall so he could watch Miss Universe, in the room next door, with his teammates. One idiot was so fired up, when she shut her light off, he shined a flashlight on her. Not a good idea.

I've digressed, again. Where was I? Two days before the special election, I wandered into the restroom off the lobby. Oops. Whilst in there, into the building comes the governor, Meldrim Thompson (who was to the right of everyone on the planet) the US Senate candidate, and maybe a few others. The station gm, a good guy, met them.

I'm not moving. No way. I will root right to this toilet, but I am not going out that door. They were literally feet from that door, like maybe 3 feet. Clear as a bell, I could hear them plot strategy. You say this, then your opponent will say this, and it will all be timed so you get the last say before the voting begins. Great. Station manager is plotting strategy with the GOP. And I'm definitely not moving.

After maybe a half hour, they moved onward and upward, and I got the hell out of there as fast as I could move, once pants were back around my waist. And fastened.

We've come a long way since then, haven't we?

Arnold Auerbach

I'm not certain if the usual readers of my blog know this name. One I know would know is preoccupied with family and studies, and refuses to go near a blog. Yes, that would be the redhead.

Arnold has been known to all of New England as 'Red,' and today, he left us.

Arguably the greatest coach in the history of basketball, gruff at times, Red knew and exercised long before it was fashionable, an approach to sports - make that people management - that was rooted in knowing the strengths and weaknesses of each person and personality. He knew some had to be pushed, some had to be stroked, and he cared about everyone that past through his employ.

The result was a team, the only pro sports team, to win 8 consecutive championships. It would have been more but for an injury to his star center, Bill Russell in 1958, prior to the 8 year run... else it would have been 10.

Red knew that human beings were human beings, and that they were not cattle, to be herded and forced to your will. Instead, he communicated on the level of each player with each player. He would go to Russell, whom he knew to be emotionally tough, arrange with him to use him as a target to his locker room rants, and then stage a chewing out in front of the team. Team would see this, see the best player getting his arse chewed, and that was their cue to know they all would be treated fairly.

As players retired, it was quite common for them to be seen around Boston Garden, calling on Red, someone they loved. In turn, Red loved them.

Whilst his players loved him, opponents were made crazy by him. Known for his cigar as sign of victory, opposing teams would see his stogie fire up, all the while knowing there was nothing they could do, his team was the best in the history of the sport. 

Growing up a basketball fan, albeit my Celtic interest coming at the tail end of their 11 in 13 run, it was fun to watch the master work his trade, even after retiring as a coach, taking to running the team from the office.

Russell and Sam Jones retired in 1969 after the 11th, and the team subsequently suffered through a losing season in 1970. It did not last long. By 1973, the Celtics were back, and but for a shoulder separation to John Havlicek, would have won another. No matter, this they did in 1974 and 1976, as well as 1981, 1984, and 1986.

The man is a hero of epic proportions in the city of Boston, and in fact in all of New England. This story will be prominent in our news over the next few days.

Goodbye, Red... and thank you.

Note... photo from boston.com

Triggered

A quick follow up to last night's post. This is more for the record than anything else...

The touching on memories sent me towards some shaking a bit later on. I forced it down, but it left me decidedly uneasy, but as is usual, my mind bounces back quickly, and am fine now.

What's weird is how quickly my mind suppress the offending memories, five minutes after the fact I could not recall. Posting beyond this point though... no, I prefer to stay away tonight.

Skittishness

There are some things I have trouble with.

These things usually come up expectedly, catching me unawares. Initially I'll start to run away, then my neurons, probably the result of aging, finally get their signals sent, and brain processes the new information. Result: "why?"

The first thing I remember doing this to me, was Goddess Lydia's goddess programme in iVillage. Talk of goddesses and such left me decidedly skittish, until it dawned on me one day to question and look at why. It was a new form of self examination for me, and probably came about from being locked into a time of selfishness and a total focus inward. Else, I'd have been distracted and it would have gone unnoticed and uncontemplated. This inward focus was not at all all glory, it led to many other huge issues...

but inward I looked and went. It happened with increasing frequency. Doris Day singing Que Sera, Sera (when I was just a little girl...) chased me from my computer and office. Denise could tell lots of stories of her suggesting something to me, receiving a diatribe in return, only for me to say yer right days later.

One good thing has come with this... I've gotten into the habit of taking a look at things that leave me skittish, and in many cases, taking them on.

Recently, Jodi Picoult's The Pact had me initially skittish. I faced this down, jumped in, and it was like stepping on a rake, spiked side up *thwannnnnng* between the eyes, first page; I persevered.

Now comes a request to consider returning to cl duty on iVillage after a 3 year hiatus. Brain: no way. Went to work with it being no way. Came home to no way. Within an hour, I was looking into cl'ing.

Why? Exactly. Why. Why am I skittish about doing so? Well, 3 years ago coincides with the culmination of all that went wrong, was wrong, with my life, it was all catching up to me... life change was about to force life change, this time for the better, and out I came, stronger.

So when I asked that requisite "why?" tonight, it pointed straight at my fear of those memories, my desire to keep them away... but the more I think on it, keeping them at bay is sort of admitting defeat. They are there, those memories exist, and better to reconcile them, better to face the fear they generate, than to run from them.

And I speak to the spiritual realm that guides me, the representative goddess, to... well, guide me. or at least give me the confidence needed to self guide. I'm going to give this a go. Going to stare down one more nightmare. Little victories by all appearance, and I'll take them.

So y'all can chuckle, roll your eyes, snicker, tell me why I'm nuts - you won't be wrong. Way I figure things, it's easy enough backed out of if it proves untenable for them or me. A debate board. Mebbe they won't want me, har!  If they do, more to follow.

The clock stopped at 23

20 October last would have been our 27th anniversary. One word: yikes!

20 October, 1979 was a warm autumn day. The entire respendlant in it's best finery, Mother Nature saw fit to not only turn out each and every tree in formal attire, she also put forth a temperature of around 80°, no small accomplishment on this day in this locale.

I did not write of this day on the actual anniversary, because well... I didn't feel like it. It's an honorarium to a failure, a lament and tribute simultaneously to memories made and ended. But I feel like writing on it now.

It was a looser time, more party oriented, we were after all a party generation. That day 27 plus years ago was no exception. Our wedding was to (and did) take place at a small chapel in Hudson NH (see accompanying pic) at 5 pm. Would I make it on time? Well, my best man (sounds weird now, eh?) was given a time a half hour earlier for his wedding so he'd be there on time, and since we were the best of friends...

I don't recall the earlier part of the day, which is curious, because there isn't much I remember of later in the day, either, other than both of us passed out. Small wonder.

In those days, my wheels consisted of a 1977 Toyota Land Cruiser (see da udda pic) a vehicle I loved and wish I still had. It was mustard yellow with white striping and such, a very sporty looking thing, wide flotation tires, and well, it would go damn near anywhere.

So BM (that's best man in wedding talk, not bowel movement) Dan and I head on out on the 21 mile drive to the chapel. With us was a bottle of Gavilan tequila (doubt they make it any longer) and we were passing it back and forth as we headed south. Yup, I was showing my intellectual prowess, and driving. It was a fun ride *cough*.

So we arrive, head on in, and we are waiting... and waiting. Now mind you, I was on time. Finally... she's a comin,' and one look up and I had to stifle a snicker. T always wore her partying on her sleeve, er um... her face. If you have met me, and many of you have, you know Casper and I are related. T isn't much better, after all, she is of Swedish descent. Anyway, her telltale identifier is red blotches on face and throat area... there were red blotches on her red and throat area, along with this sort of serious, damn, I'm feeling no pain, concentrative smiel on her face.

I knew that smiel. 

Later, I found out her relatives had emerged from their Vermont environs, and being a definite bunch of happy, friendly, partiers, they came down and partook of happy, friendly partying at her parent's home.

Well, she won that round.

The ceremony was performed by a minister who's name neither of us can remember now. He looked kinda like Mit Romney, though I am sure it was not Mit. I'm not even sure what religion he claimed to minister for. There was no way either of us would marry in a Catholic church and ceremony.

The rest of it all is now a blur, heck it was a blur as it happened. We had a great time. I know people who told me later they never partied that hard before, go figure. Several found themselves the next morning sleeping on someone's lawn, along with their vehicle. Fortunately, they knew the occupants.

There was no honeymoon, hell each of us was earning $150 a week, we couldn't do a whole lot. So we took a week off, and given the weather co-operated (Monday was 87°) we did day trips to exotic places like Hampton Beach.

It is this sort of memory I prefer to keep now, not the ones created in the early 21st century, for there is no reason to retain those. The earlier ones have reason to remain and predominate.

There is one other factoid that remains... years later, T told me the chapel is in fact a mausoleum... the people who bequeathed the town it's high school, and which carries their name... are buried underneath.

Needles Tuesday

It's Tuesday. And I'm tired.

There is nothing unusual about this Tuesday, nothing that separates it from it's sisters to the rear and to the front, it's just my busy day of the week, though that will change next week.

So given my weary state of mind, why not share my day? The day for me starts around 5:50 am, as my radio comes on with this brmmmm power up. I listen to the news cast, then around 6:10, it's one foot over the other, each out onto the floor, wipe my eyes enough in a rather feeble attempt to focus, blindly grab in the darkness for my robe and some undies, head for the staircase, then try like hell to make sure I take the normal route downward, and not the express.

It's on into the bath, a shower routine I've narrowed to about 7 minutes altogether, shampoo once, body wash twice, rinse with completely cold water, water off, dry, brush teeth, add soft & dri baby powder gel deodorant, undies, robe. Then it's up the stairs, contemplating what I will wear along the way, yet knowing I'll still stand and stare into the closet mindlessly.

Sure enough, this is exactly what I've done, pausing to switch on the light in the adjacent room to peruse the various skirts lying on the spare bed. Will one of those work on this day? Nah, not today... we'll go with those scrubesque olive green pants, the ones that tie around the ankle, bought a week or two ago at Banana Republic. Simple. White Russell Athletic long sleeved top. Find a white bra, socks that go reasonably well with the pants, put it all on, slip into my sketchers, and... oh, damn,brush that hair.

Now it's my 25 minutes of playtime. I set down to this infernal contraption, check my email, wander to various iV boards, then end with the usual cap to this home portion of my daily preperatory ritual, visiting a friend's private message board. I post my scattered thoughts, always written with no coherency, sort of like a gossip column structure, random thoughts routing from brain to keypad.

A look at the clock, time to go. And the commute begins, somewhere around 7 am. The drive northward takes about 45-50 minutes, taking less time going north than in coming south, as once off the interstate the lights are generally with me. I start into work immediately, start time really is only a formality. I might break around 10:15, definitely go for a walk at noon, and quickly down some yogurt thereafter.

Today, the second half of my lunch hour was spent putting the finishing touches on an excel worksheet that will sum and average various totals by week, month, and year. Heh, it works. Then it's back to my real work.

I break at 3:15, delve into the final pages of Fannie Flagg's latest, then leave at 4:00 for the hour and a half journey to the electrology institute. I stop for a sub, wolfing that down as I drive into Massachusetts. I ate too quickly, and it occurs to me that small sub was both too big, and not at all appetising any longer, as such turkey subs once were. We change. Or rather, I've changed.

I arrive around 5:35, the student impatiently awaiting my arrival. The same student who called me raye ann all last week. She asks me if she called me raye all last week. I say yes, but when you have needles in your face, it's kind of hard to say something.

After a quick restroom stop, it's onto the table, and needles begin to move in and out of my neck/throat area, insertions timed for somewhere around 12 seconds. Within minutes I'm being called raye ann again. Another student points this out. She apologises. I feel little, and doze off until right at the sleep barrier, where I skid to a stop. No snoring, pull my mind back from that edge.

She works nonstop until 8:10, cools me with witch hazel, then puts this antibacterial cream upon the worked areas. I pay the $30 charge, set my appointments, changing to Monday next week, and head home. I arrive at 9:00 pm, check the mail, and settle down. I'll play for a couple of hours, and set at 11.

The price of an inward focus

I've learned a whole lot of lessons the hard way over the last several years. The reason they were learned the hard way was simply because I'd fail to learn them the easy way.

Nothing complicated about this, folks. It only seems that way when mired in self created mess.

I've lived a whole lot of life with an inward focus. There was this latent inner pain of being wrong, and we tend to nurse our boo boos. Well, nurse I did, right through grammar school, high school, college, married and work life, through parenting, and business creation, until that inner focus applied enough pressure, like say... a magnifying glass setting something to burning... and the ensuing conflagration consumed me.

It's difficult to look backward at this, and it's a hellish balance of both trying not to be forever mired in what was, while trying to bring forward the lessons that *had* to be learned. Finally.

With that inward focus, I compensated, or over compensated, with a balm of empathy, of thinking myself capable of taking on the problems of everyone I encountered, and with a corresponding ability to save them. I was needy by needing to spend my time away from me and emersed in others. The more the former pushed, the more frantic and desperate the latter. Some of you watched it all play out, though you likely were not privy to the local manifestation of this inner war. Most of you know the sordid consequences.

Know it is a struggle still for me, this need to save. I am very attuned to the frequency of empathy, and expect I always will be. What I've tried to do is to build my life anew, and in such a way where I'm stronger inside and out, hopefully diminishing the pressure so that it is back to a healthy balance within and without, and not the wild extremes of 3 years ago.

There was so much selfishness then... not something I talked much on or would have admitted at that time, but my focus was on me, and what that focus saw scared me silly, sending me out to get away, to think the way to be strong was to be strong for others. A disastrous mix.

Looking back at my gender crossing, it was a totally selfish act. Completely. No regard for anyone around me. You cannot get more selfish than this. Yet, if I even tried to contemplate not having done this, I'll be a quivering pile of unshaped protoplasm inside of minutes. So the selfishness still is present, or does it simply guard what is? I prefer to think so, prefer to think there is no more damage to inflict, that there has been a reassertion of balance that will produce more worthy and human results from here on in.

Know it all scares me silly. I work very hard on my mental state, on making certain no one is harmed by any additional action of mine. I could not handle another person being harmed by my actions.

In my first year of high school, I took introductory German. The instructor was a rather husky guy, as I recall quite hairy, and he was eaten alive by us students. I was one of the more mellow students. There was one young woman who chased him around the class with a spray bottle of perfume. Another student took his rankbook and started looking through it. Students were openly cheating during tests. His desk was turned around. It was the sorriest exhibition I witnessed in school.

Knowing not whether this be true, someone told me he was a golden glove boxer in college. And a couple of years before, he struck a student. Thereafter, he lived in fear of himself, and any anger that might manifest within.

I know not the anger, but I surely now know that fear of self.

Critters and people and trees, oh my!

My mom remarked earlier on how we are putting up so many new developments in the area, animals have nowhere to turn or go.

It's an accurate observation, and it comes down to animals adjusting or perishing. Developers have no desire to bring homes into an area in such a way as to do minimum damage to the local environment and habitat, and perhaps we need to really take a closer look at finding better ways to meld a desire for home with a desire to respecting the homes of other animals.

When my old home was being built in 1984, we had moved out of a city apartment in May, this to move in with T's parents a half hour to the south. The intent was to save on rent whilst construction was underway. T was preggers at the time, and was due around when the home would be finished in August.

When we saw the property, we were immediately enchanted by it's rural yet close to city setting, a completely forested slightly more than two acre lot on which we would clear only enough of the trees for the home and septic system. The area was part of a major watershed & lake area which in turn supplied water for the city.

The trees on the property were predominantly hardwood, mostly oak, some maple, a few birch. Set on top of a small hill, or really... rise, the property sloped downward away from the then unpaved road, and about 250 feet from the road was an old New England stone wall, or at least the partial remains of one. We both have a fondness for such walls, and it was... perfect. Lady slippers, a wild orchid that is endangered and protected, were scattered throughout the two acres.

We were on the property virtually every evening, seeing what progress had been made on our home. Somewhere towards the end of June, we could see some sort of opening through the trees that did not look quite right. We walked down for a closer look...

and saw heavy equipment had begun ripping 100 year old trees at the rear of our property out by the roots, laid waste to them, this so they could take out the underlying gravel for fill around the remaining 8 homes to be built. We were the 5th of 13.

Aghast, I called the realtor who was handling the property. She was told by the builder's representative if they don't like it, we will sell it to someone else. Our eldest was due inside of two months. We are living with her parents, and our home... is now on a take it or leave it basis. We were in a major bind.

Over the coming month, we watched in horror as all of those beautiful trees, with the exception of a 75 foot swath behind our house, were wiped out. Gone as well was the stone wall, too late for me to raise hell with the state over it's pending demise. It's illegal to touch such things, but I didn't move fast enough.

On 12 July, upon my arrival from work, I was informed T was entering the hospital in two days, and in four days, our child, due 2 August, would be borne. That turned out to be a day too long. Wow. Wow. And a whole other story.

At the end of the month, I called the builder and asked him to re-cover. Please put topsoil on that sickening earthen scar you have created. He told me to go fly a kite, and about in those terms. Unfortunately, no state law existed to force such an action. A law was passed the following year requiring builders to do this, too late for us.

2 August, instead of the arrival of our first borne, brought closing time, and not the Leonard Cohen kind. We get to the bank (where closings were done in those days) and were immediately presented with a document to sign that absolved the builder from liability over the destruction of the property. We refused to sign, and were shuffled out of the closing and into a private conference room to hash it out with the builder's realtor.

For two hours we danced and proposed, cajoled and refused, until I finally told her I'd not sign the document, but would give my word not to sue unless the damage caused erosion that in turn washed out and damaged the property of others. Done.

It was so incredibly sad to see how that magnificent once a forest, once a field, again a forest, was scraped clean by this builder. Over the ensuing years, I threw every sort of plant and tree I could get my hands on into that area, and as a result, given it was quite wet with standing water 10 months out of the year in one section, it recovered nicely. Not to the heights of what it once was, such recovery takes a century... but to something nonetheless appealing in it's own way. There were cat tails, willows, maple, high grasses... the water area played occasional host to Canada Geese, and around it's periphery were my infamous peepers.

We have to be smarter in how we encroach upon nature. It's inevitable we will reshape it, but we can reshape in ways that are more productive than wanton ripping out and building. We've had bear, moose, fox, fisher cats, deer, etc pay visit over the years, and well.. they are part of the reason it was so kewl to live there. So long as they didn't join us for a beer.

Sleep

Sleep has always been a rather favourite past time for me, even when younger.

My sister, five years older, would try to roust me from bed for silly things like Christmas presents... "wake up! Wake up!" Huh? Whaaa? zzzzzzzzz... or she would attempt to convince me of the need to get downstairs to watch The Three Stooges, when my interest lie with Boomtown. Don't ask, I don't know.

OK, so I mastered the early rising for Christmas, and for that dastardly, egg laying, Easter Bunny. Of course, there was some methodology at work here... for events like Halloween and Easter, my sis knew I would only eat some of the candy, the vulture. (Just kidding, sis... but ya did know you would inherit that candy!)

Whilst I fought going to bed at night, once ensconsed between sheets, I did not readily surrender them. And as someone totally spooked by dark then, I developed a habit of sleeping with my head covered. Sometimes I still do this, it became sort of a means of comfort, like carrying a blanket around, and it still carries such comfort, at least on a cold night.

By my teens, like most that age, sleeping is what we did best. Noon? I'm not sure I ever made it that far short of being sick, but... 11 am? Yup. Of course, on the other end of the day... In college, we partied have the night and slept half the day. Major culture shock when college ended!

I have delved into sleep due to increased work hours. Since my commute is almost an hour, and since start time has been voluntarily set somewhere between 7:15 and 7:30, there is little time for snoozing between bedtime around 11 pm. I've come close to sleeping right through my alarm.

This morning, I discovered my mind has rather ingenious methods of getting the sleep it desires. Radio goes off, news is on, and I'm wide awake. I'm up, and into the bathroom, peeing, then ready to shower... until that morphed into grabbing keys from my father in law's trousers setting in the middle of his kitchen.. a serious clue I was in fact dreaming. I would have sworn to being wide awake, but nope. A quick glance at the clock showed me 10 minutes past the time I'd intended to rise.

I'm not falling for that one again.

Remembrance