It seems these days that every single holiday has a lecture meme that someone will post on Facebook or Twitter designed to tell you that you're not doing the holiday right. Except, not so much on July 4th. Sure, you'll see the "Keep Pets Safe" memes, and don't forget "Vets Don't Like Loud Fireworks" either memes, but nothing that lets you know that people died so you could have your tasteless barbecue!! Look at you, out there having fun and buying stuff at sales when you're supposed to be doing what someone else thinks you should be doing!!
My Dad's birthday typically falls on Memorial Day weekend, and sometimes right on the holiday itself, and this year he turned 80. We had a big family cookout to celebrate and I shared some pictures on Facebook for friends and out of town relatives. Then I got a few comments that people had died so we could celebrate. WHAT? Enough already.
From the shop or don't shop memes at Thanksgiving and the Merry Christmas arguments it feels like someone wants to attack someone else for how they celebrate each and every holiday and so they post their righteousness passive aggressively on social media. And, holiday or not, I feel like everyone, including me, post the passive aggressive memes. It's easy to see something and say "Yeah!! That's exactly what I think!!" and hit the share button. I still don't understand how people are leaving kids and pets in hot cars when there's a total meme scream going on with that one. How can you not know?
On July 4th though, that just doesn't happen. Having a barbecue? Like!! Love!! Oh, you're at the beach this weekend? Like!! Love!! While Memorial Day is the kickoff to summer, July 4th cements it in place. We're making plans for July 4th and asking each other about those plans and excited about each other's plans. Today is the day we really enjoy our freedom and that's the way it should be.
Me, I've walked dogs early to beat the heat and then I'm headed to the pool with a friend and then burgers at my parents' house to end the day. I hope you have a safe and fun July 4th and enjoy the lecture meme free holiday!
Tuesday, July 4, 2017
Friday, June 16, 2017
All By Myself
I'm leaving this weekend to go on vacation. I'm heading to California wine country to bike, hike and taste. I've signed up for a group trip where I am the only one who signed up, so it will just be me and the guide. My sister and I usually take trips together but last fall she told me she couldn't this year and so I thought, be brave, go on vacation by yourself. Every trip we've ever been on has always had at least one woman traveling all by herself and they always fit in with the group and they always have a good time, so I thought, why not me too?
I have flown all the way to Europe on my own to meet my sister or a cousin for traveling. It's kind of fun to land in Florence and know your sister's plane will be landing at any minute. This entitles you to say things like, "I'm meeting my sister in Florence in a week" and impress your friends with how worldly you are.
For the past few years my job has been challenging and so my sister has been the one to really pay attention to what our plans are. Since she moved back to the East Coast eight years ago I drive up to her house and we fly together. As long as my suitcase is packed and I get to her house on time, it's all good. This year however, it's just me. I need to know which hotels I'm staying in, and pay attention to the itinerary and get myself to the airport and back in time.
I hear you out there "Grow Up Lady!! Sheesh, people travel alone all the time!" Right, I know that. I'm a grown up, I can do this. It's just that it's the first time. I don't even have a young nephew with me to bounce my questions off "Did you see my sea pass?" "No, but maybe it's with mine" "What? You can't find yours either? Shoot, let's ransack the cabin again..."
I'm excited but I'm also a little nervous. The company I purchased the trip with always make sure their clients have a wonderful time so I think it's going to be great. It's just that, well, I'll be all by myself. I'm about to find out if I like traveling all by myself. If I do, I will definitely be going on more trips like this. I'm not even going to consider the alternative. Glass half full, right? Right!
I have flown all the way to Europe on my own to meet my sister or a cousin for traveling. It's kind of fun to land in Florence and know your sister's plane will be landing at any minute. This entitles you to say things like, "I'm meeting my sister in Florence in a week" and impress your friends with how worldly you are.
For the past few years my job has been challenging and so my sister has been the one to really pay attention to what our plans are. Since she moved back to the East Coast eight years ago I drive up to her house and we fly together. As long as my suitcase is packed and I get to her house on time, it's all good. This year however, it's just me. I need to know which hotels I'm staying in, and pay attention to the itinerary and get myself to the airport and back in time.
I hear you out there "Grow Up Lady!! Sheesh, people travel alone all the time!" Right, I know that. I'm a grown up, I can do this. It's just that it's the first time. I don't even have a young nephew with me to bounce my questions off "Did you see my sea pass?" "No, but maybe it's with mine" "What? You can't find yours either? Shoot, let's ransack the cabin again..."
I'm excited but I'm also a little nervous. The company I purchased the trip with always make sure their clients have a wonderful time so I think it's going to be great. It's just that, well, I'll be all by myself. I'm about to find out if I like traveling all by myself. If I do, I will definitely be going on more trips like this. I'm not even going to consider the alternative. Glass half full, right? Right!
Friday, June 9, 2017
Want to Save a Life?
As many of you know, I'm a dog foster. Several years ago I reached out to Dogs XL Rescue who I had adopted Alby from, to see what it would take to volunteer as a foster. All rescues are desperate for volunteers and so they called me back almost immediately. Right now Dogs XL Rescue is looking for people to become fosters. This is your chance to save a life by becoming a foster. Without fosters, rescues can't pull dogs from shelters because they have no where to go.
The screening process for new fosters is very simple, a phone call with a foster coordinator to talk about your lifestyle, where you live, and how many pets already live in your home kicks everything off. A call by the rescue to your vet to ensure all your resident pets are up to date on vaccinations and monthly preventatives (heartworm and flea/tick) followed by a home visit and you're up and running as a dog foster.
Dogs XL Rescue works incredibly hard to ensure that all of its dogs not only are adopted by the right family, but that they're matched up well with their foster before they get adopted. For example, if you have a cat, your foster dog will be cat friendly. Do you have small children? Your foster dog will be appropriate for small children. I live in a tiny townhouse without a fenced yard so all my fosters need to get along well not only with Alby, my only resident pet, but they also need to do well on daily walks. My townhouse also backs to a playground that is very active and kids ranging from toddler to teen race by my deck on their way to the swings and jungle gym. Therefore, my foster needs to be pretty kid friendly even though there are no kids in my house.
Our fosters live in all kinds of homes - apartments, townhouses, small and large single family homes, farms, on the water, in the city and in the suburbs. Some of our fosters have fenced yards and some don't. Some of our fosters don't have their own dog, they just love fostering. And some of our fosters have several dogs and cats and human babies. Some of our fosters work full time and some are retired. Some work from home and some head off to the office each day. In other words, there are very few restrictions to becoming a foster.
My number one rule for fostering has always been that it has to be okay with Alby. We had one dog that kept picking at Alby until he couldn't take it anymore. I called the rescue and we made arrangements for that guy to go somewhere else. The rescue can't always turn on a dime, but they are incredibly responsive and work hard to place dogs where they will do well.
The optimal situation for all of our dogs is that they be in a foster home until they are adopted. Unfortunately though because we're always short on fosters that sometimes means that we have to put dogs in to boarding. Our boarding partners are wonderful, Tecla's K-9 Academy and Dogtopia, and our dogs can be very happy there for short periods of time. Some dogs require a dog savvy owner though and it takes a little longer to find just the right person to adopt them and if there's no foster, they can end up in boarding for a longer time. While it's still better than a shelter situation, it's not great. Like I said, a foster home and eventually a permanent home are best.
We're a rescue so while we get awesome dogs, some of them do have special needs. Some dogs just aren't appropriate for a home with small children, or they can't be with cats or in rare cases they need to be an only dog. Remember, we don't like all people and some dogs don't like other dogs. We work incredibly hard to match the right dog with the right home. We're looking to make a lifetime commitment for that dog so that when they're adopted they're going to the home they'll be in for the rest of their lives.
Dogs XL Rescue pays for all food, preventatives and veterinary care while the dogs are being fostered. They supply the foster with a crate as well. There are also dog trainers who volunteer with the rescue to answer any questions around behavior and provide extra support to fosters who are new to rescue. In addition, when you're heading out on vacation, the rescue will arrange for a temp foster while you're out of town if your foster dog hasn't been adopted yet.
On average Dogs XL dogs are adopted within 2 weeks of arriving at the rescue. Some, like our puppies, are adopted almost as soon as we greet them for the first time, and some of our older dogs can be with the rescue a little longer.
Nothing is more rewarding than watching your foster dog head off with their new family. Yes, you love them and yes, you'll miss them, but knowing that they're one of the luckiest dogs on earth is a very happy feeling. So many dogs never make it out of the shelter. Dogs who get picked up by a rescue have hit the jackpot. The likelihood of them living an awesome life for the rest of their days is now very high.
If you've ever thought you'd get too attached and just couldn't give the dog up, I would say that at the end of the day the rewards of having saved a life and given so much joy not just to the dog, but to the family that adopted that dog as well, make it a lot easier to say good bye. Do some of our dogs end up getting adopted by their fosters? Yes. Have I considered adopting some of my fosters? Absolutely. Then I get an email from the adopters talking about how much they love their new dog, and how well the dog is fitting in to their family and that just makes me over the moon happy. Then I get an email from the rescue asking me if I'm ready to take on a new foster and I start looking forward to helping save the next life.
If you are a dog lover and have ever thought you wanted to make a difference, I would encourage you to click on the links I've embedded throughout this post for Dogs XL Rescue and consider volunteering as a Dog Foster. We'd love to have you and we and the dogs really need you in our life.
The screening process for new fosters is very simple, a phone call with a foster coordinator to talk about your lifestyle, where you live, and how many pets already live in your home kicks everything off. A call by the rescue to your vet to ensure all your resident pets are up to date on vaccinations and monthly preventatives (heartworm and flea/tick) followed by a home visit and you're up and running as a dog foster.
Dogs XL Rescue works incredibly hard to ensure that all of its dogs not only are adopted by the right family, but that they're matched up well with their foster before they get adopted. For example, if you have a cat, your foster dog will be cat friendly. Do you have small children? Your foster dog will be appropriate for small children. I live in a tiny townhouse without a fenced yard so all my fosters need to get along well not only with Alby, my only resident pet, but they also need to do well on daily walks. My townhouse also backs to a playground that is very active and kids ranging from toddler to teen race by my deck on their way to the swings and jungle gym. Therefore, my foster needs to be pretty kid friendly even though there are no kids in my house.
Our fosters live in all kinds of homes - apartments, townhouses, small and large single family homes, farms, on the water, in the city and in the suburbs. Some of our fosters have fenced yards and some don't. Some of our fosters don't have their own dog, they just love fostering. And some of our fosters have several dogs and cats and human babies. Some of our fosters work full time and some are retired. Some work from home and some head off to the office each day. In other words, there are very few restrictions to becoming a foster.
My number one rule for fostering has always been that it has to be okay with Alby. We had one dog that kept picking at Alby until he couldn't take it anymore. I called the rescue and we made arrangements for that guy to go somewhere else. The rescue can't always turn on a dime, but they are incredibly responsive and work hard to place dogs where they will do well.
The optimal situation for all of our dogs is that they be in a foster home until they are adopted. Unfortunately though because we're always short on fosters that sometimes means that we have to put dogs in to boarding. Our boarding partners are wonderful, Tecla's K-9 Academy and Dogtopia, and our dogs can be very happy there for short periods of time. Some dogs require a dog savvy owner though and it takes a little longer to find just the right person to adopt them and if there's no foster, they can end up in boarding for a longer time. While it's still better than a shelter situation, it's not great. Like I said, a foster home and eventually a permanent home are best.
We're a rescue so while we get awesome dogs, some of them do have special needs. Some dogs just aren't appropriate for a home with small children, or they can't be with cats or in rare cases they need to be an only dog. Remember, we don't like all people and some dogs don't like other dogs. We work incredibly hard to match the right dog with the right home. We're looking to make a lifetime commitment for that dog so that when they're adopted they're going to the home they'll be in for the rest of their lives.
Dogs XL Rescue pays for all food, preventatives and veterinary care while the dogs are being fostered. They supply the foster with a crate as well. There are also dog trainers who volunteer with the rescue to answer any questions around behavior and provide extra support to fosters who are new to rescue. In addition, when you're heading out on vacation, the rescue will arrange for a temp foster while you're out of town if your foster dog hasn't been adopted yet.
On average Dogs XL dogs are adopted within 2 weeks of arriving at the rescue. Some, like our puppies, are adopted almost as soon as we greet them for the first time, and some of our older dogs can be with the rescue a little longer.
Nothing is more rewarding than watching your foster dog head off with their new family. Yes, you love them and yes, you'll miss them, but knowing that they're one of the luckiest dogs on earth is a very happy feeling. So many dogs never make it out of the shelter. Dogs who get picked up by a rescue have hit the jackpot. The likelihood of them living an awesome life for the rest of their days is now very high.
If you've ever thought you'd get too attached and just couldn't give the dog up, I would say that at the end of the day the rewards of having saved a life and given so much joy not just to the dog, but to the family that adopted that dog as well, make it a lot easier to say good bye. Do some of our dogs end up getting adopted by their fosters? Yes. Have I considered adopting some of my fosters? Absolutely. Then I get an email from the adopters talking about how much they love their new dog, and how well the dog is fitting in to their family and that just makes me over the moon happy. Then I get an email from the rescue asking me if I'm ready to take on a new foster and I start looking forward to helping save the next life.
If you are a dog lover and have ever thought you wanted to make a difference, I would encourage you to click on the links I've embedded throughout this post for Dogs XL Rescue and consider volunteering as a Dog Foster. We'd love to have you and we and the dogs really need you in our life.
Sunday, June 4, 2017
Horrific, Awful, Nightmarish....
Updated 6/8 below
It was misting last Tuesday morning when I headed out for my morning walk with Alby. Another grey day to add to the many we've already had in May. I checked email on my work phone when I got back to see a message indicating that a coworker had died unexpectedly. The opening paragraph about his final days set off my radar that maybe he had died in some sort of freak accident, but there were no details. I don't want to use his real name in order to protect his family so I'll call him Ward since I don't know anyone with that name.
Ward had been arrested for possessing child pornography, his mug shot and arrest details appeared in his local paper and a few days later he took his own life.
Never in a million years would I have had any inkling he'd do something like this. Ward and I were not close. His office was down the hall from mine and we spoke some times about sports like soccer, or just in general office banter if we happened to land in the same meeting. Ward was a nice looking man, clean cut, smart and hard working. All week everyone in the office has been in a bit of a shock. How do we reconcile the man we knew with what he did?
Yesterday I binge watched "The Keepers" on Netflix. Once I started I couldn't turn it off. Unlike the movie "Spotlight" which came out in 2015, "The Keepers" goes in to more detail regarding the abuse that was suffered by the young women at Archbishop Keough. When I was finished watching I had a need to know more, see if there were any updates, and find out if Brother Bob had been identified. I started reading Tom Nugent's articles on Inside Baltimore. Nugent is a former reporter for the Baltimore Sun and he's written extensively on the Sister Cathy murder.
I may have read too much. If the young women at Archbishop Keough were living in a nightmare, the kids at the Catholic Middle School in Locust Point were living in hell on earth. I won't share the details, you can go ahead and read Nugent's articles on your own. When I was done I felt like throwing up.
I'm not Catholic, I'm not even a religious person, but I'm furious with an institution where so many of my friends and relatives claim a membership. Just like I was furious for the Penn State cover up a few years back. What kind of a world are we living in where young, innocent victims are sacrificed so readily? Over the years I've read the stories of the lifelong trauma victims of abuse suffer. Some of them are able to live fairly normal lives as adults and confront what happened to them, refusing to let the abuser have anymore power. Some though turn to alcohol, drugs and even suicide. They feel guilty for something that was never their fault, that was done to them, that they never asked for. They were just kids doing kid stuff when someone started them on this hellish journey.
"The Keepers" provides details that one of the abuser Priests had kept records of his victims, including photographs of half naked young girls. I wonder if Ward realized when he was buying his online child porn the nightmare that the kids in the photograph were living in? I'm not saying Ward looked at the Priest's pictures, but he did look at someone's.
When my Mom sent my brother off to nursery school in 1980 she told him that no one was ever allowed to touch him, ever, without his permission. At Show & Tell on the first day the kids were asked if anyone had anything they wanted to share. My brother stood up, "No one can touch your penis without your permission." We get a family laugh out of it, but what my Mother did was uber important. She also told him that if anyone tried to do that he needed to tell her immediately, no matter what. I don't think parents prior to that had any idea they should be sending their kids off to school with that warning.
When I was coaching soccer about 12 years ago, several parents always hung around to help out. Good. Never leave your kid unattended with an adult for long periods of time. If a parent was late picking a kid up after practice I never offered the kid a ride home. Instead, we'd sit waiting by the parking lot in plain sight until the parent finally showed. The kids all had cell phones by then too so they always called the late parent to find out where they were. Don't be the parent who picks their kid up late from practice. As a matter of fact, don't be the parent who picks your kid up late ever from anywhere. Especially in the evening when places are closing up and your kid might be all alone and easy prey.
I hope one day the Catholic Church, Penn State and other institutions who have protected themselves over their victims, come to realize and openly acknowledge the harm they've done. I hope that the survivors and their families find the peace they are seeking.
UPDATE 6/8
For anyone interested in gaining additional understanding on what's happening with the investigation in to the murder of Sister Cathy Cesnik, I suggest joining the Facebook group page, The Keepers Official Group - Justice for Catherine Cesnik and Joyce Malecki. On the sex abuse scandals of the Catholic Church, Alex Gibney's 2012 HBO documentary, Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God is very well done. Finally, Richard Sipe who is referenced in the movie Spotlight, and appears in The Keepers, also has his own web page discussing much of his research and linking to others who have been trying to get the church to do what's right.
It was misting last Tuesday morning when I headed out for my morning walk with Alby. Another grey day to add to the many we've already had in May. I checked email on my work phone when I got back to see a message indicating that a coworker had died unexpectedly. The opening paragraph about his final days set off my radar that maybe he had died in some sort of freak accident, but there were no details. I don't want to use his real name in order to protect his family so I'll call him Ward since I don't know anyone with that name.
Ward had been arrested for possessing child pornography, his mug shot and arrest details appeared in his local paper and a few days later he took his own life.
Never in a million years would I have had any inkling he'd do something like this. Ward and I were not close. His office was down the hall from mine and we spoke some times about sports like soccer, or just in general office banter if we happened to land in the same meeting. Ward was a nice looking man, clean cut, smart and hard working. All week everyone in the office has been in a bit of a shock. How do we reconcile the man we knew with what he did?
Yesterday I binge watched "The Keepers" on Netflix. Once I started I couldn't turn it off. Unlike the movie "Spotlight" which came out in 2015, "The Keepers" goes in to more detail regarding the abuse that was suffered by the young women at Archbishop Keough. When I was finished watching I had a need to know more, see if there were any updates, and find out if Brother Bob had been identified. I started reading Tom Nugent's articles on Inside Baltimore. Nugent is a former reporter for the Baltimore Sun and he's written extensively on the Sister Cathy murder.
I may have read too much. If the young women at Archbishop Keough were living in a nightmare, the kids at the Catholic Middle School in Locust Point were living in hell on earth. I won't share the details, you can go ahead and read Nugent's articles on your own. When I was done I felt like throwing up.
I'm not Catholic, I'm not even a religious person, but I'm furious with an institution where so many of my friends and relatives claim a membership. Just like I was furious for the Penn State cover up a few years back. What kind of a world are we living in where young, innocent victims are sacrificed so readily? Over the years I've read the stories of the lifelong trauma victims of abuse suffer. Some of them are able to live fairly normal lives as adults and confront what happened to them, refusing to let the abuser have anymore power. Some though turn to alcohol, drugs and even suicide. They feel guilty for something that was never their fault, that was done to them, that they never asked for. They were just kids doing kid stuff when someone started them on this hellish journey.
"The Keepers" provides details that one of the abuser Priests had kept records of his victims, including photographs of half naked young girls. I wonder if Ward realized when he was buying his online child porn the nightmare that the kids in the photograph were living in? I'm not saying Ward looked at the Priest's pictures, but he did look at someone's.
When my Mom sent my brother off to nursery school in 1980 she told him that no one was ever allowed to touch him, ever, without his permission. At Show & Tell on the first day the kids were asked if anyone had anything they wanted to share. My brother stood up, "No one can touch your penis without your permission." We get a family laugh out of it, but what my Mother did was uber important. She also told him that if anyone tried to do that he needed to tell her immediately, no matter what. I don't think parents prior to that had any idea they should be sending their kids off to school with that warning.
When I was coaching soccer about 12 years ago, several parents always hung around to help out. Good. Never leave your kid unattended with an adult for long periods of time. If a parent was late picking a kid up after practice I never offered the kid a ride home. Instead, we'd sit waiting by the parking lot in plain sight until the parent finally showed. The kids all had cell phones by then too so they always called the late parent to find out where they were. Don't be the parent who picks their kid up late from practice. As a matter of fact, don't be the parent who picks your kid up late ever from anywhere. Especially in the evening when places are closing up and your kid might be all alone and easy prey.
I hope one day the Catholic Church, Penn State and other institutions who have protected themselves over their victims, come to realize and openly acknowledge the harm they've done. I hope that the survivors and their families find the peace they are seeking.
UPDATE 6/8
For anyone interested in gaining additional understanding on what's happening with the investigation in to the murder of Sister Cathy Cesnik, I suggest joining the Facebook group page, The Keepers Official Group - Justice for Catherine Cesnik and Joyce Malecki. On the sex abuse scandals of the Catholic Church, Alex Gibney's 2012 HBO documentary, Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God is very well done. Finally, Richard Sipe who is referenced in the movie Spotlight, and appears in The Keepers, also has his own web page discussing much of his research and linking to others who have been trying to get the church to do what's right.
Monday, May 29, 2017
Somber Thoughts on Memorial Day
Since last November like many people, I've been processing through a lot of what our country is about and what we stand for and searching for truth. What is true about what I believe and what is not? Today is the day that we remember and honor, with broken hearts, those who died in service to our country. From the Revolutionary War to today's War on Terror, we have sacrificed the human treasure in our country for what we aver is a higher ideal - the fight for and the preservation of freedom.
This sacrifice means there are babies who will never know their fathers, children who will grow up without a mother or a father, and parents who will ache with the loss of their sons and daughters for the remainder of their own lives. This sacrifice means thousands of men and women won't be there to raise their children or care for their elderly parents. This sacrifice means that the men and women who gave up their lives will no longer contribute to our greater society. They won't cure cancer, they won't come up with a solution to climate change, they won't solve the next economic crisis, they won't teach in our schools or police our streets or run for elected office. Many of them have been cut down too young to have had a chance to leave a mark in this world other than the sacrifice of their life in a war.
In the last Harry Potter book, Dumbledore tells Harry,
"Do not pity the dead, Harry. Pity the living and, above all, those who live without love. By returning, you may ensure that fewer souls are maimed, fewer families are torn apart. If that seems to you a worthy goal, then we say good-bye for the present."
The older I get the more I feel the loss of this treasure and the toll it takes on all of us. Not just the sudden loss of a life, but the fact that we're honoring men and women who died because of a failure on the part of the living. War is the worst of human nature and we are way too eager to engage in it. We're not just asking for the sacrifice of your life, we're asking you to take lives as well. We're asking you to take part in something that kills the human soul. Perhaps we have no choice but to go to war, but we should never forget the totality of the cost to one and all.
The United States has been at war for nearly my entire lifetime. I was born in 1965 and a quick query on the internet reveals that we've lost more than 66,000 US Soldiers since then. The bulk of those deaths occurred in Vietnam, but the numbers for Iraq and Afghanistan are each already in the thousands. We no longer see the black bags lined up on the tarmac awaiting the last ride home with the bodies of our lost treasure resting silently inside. The American public doesn't actually like war and we don't like the consequences of war and so our government hides from us the awful truth and instead glorifies the battle and the pageantry and our weaponry. We see the soldier standing with the weapon heading in to battle, not lying torn to shreds on the ground, limbs missing and covered in blood in the aftermath.
It's not just soldiers who give up their lives in war, but civilians as well and yet we rarely if ever acknowledge their sacrifice as anything other than acceptable losses. The numbers of civilian casualties may number equally or higher to the number of soldiers lost, but their number also includes children from infants to teenagers. They will never grow up to become educated adults, have children of their own or provide solutions to finding peace in our time. They are the world's lost treasure. In recent years the United States has bombed a hospital in Afghanistan, slaughtered a wedding party in Yemen and killed an 8 year old girl in a drone strike.
We also ask for the sacrifice of the planet we live on. We have allowed poisonous chemicals like Agent Orange to rain down on our soldiers, on the local populace and on the land they occupy impacting generations to come, not to mention what we do to the wildlife. Soldiers bond with domestic animals (both dogs and cats) while they're serving their country and some try to bring them home and some leave those animals to fend for themselves once they're gone.
Nothing and no one is safe in the theater of war. Yet we sing songs about going off to war to kick some butt as if at the end we'll all just come back to the bar for a cold one and have a laugh. War is death. There is nothing to celebrate about war except when it ends and we can begin to pick up the pieces of our lives.
So on this Memorial Day we should gather and quietly honor those who have been lost to war, and we should remember not just the soldier, but all of the losses embodied therein and wonder what our future might have been if only.....Then we should demand to know why some wars are still being fought these many years later and how much more earthly treasure we can stand to lose.
This sacrifice means there are babies who will never know their fathers, children who will grow up without a mother or a father, and parents who will ache with the loss of their sons and daughters for the remainder of their own lives. This sacrifice means thousands of men and women won't be there to raise their children or care for their elderly parents. This sacrifice means that the men and women who gave up their lives will no longer contribute to our greater society. They won't cure cancer, they won't come up with a solution to climate change, they won't solve the next economic crisis, they won't teach in our schools or police our streets or run for elected office. Many of them have been cut down too young to have had a chance to leave a mark in this world other than the sacrifice of their life in a war.
In the last Harry Potter book, Dumbledore tells Harry,
"Do not pity the dead, Harry. Pity the living and, above all, those who live without love. By returning, you may ensure that fewer souls are maimed, fewer families are torn apart. If that seems to you a worthy goal, then we say good-bye for the present."
The older I get the more I feel the loss of this treasure and the toll it takes on all of us. Not just the sudden loss of a life, but the fact that we're honoring men and women who died because of a failure on the part of the living. War is the worst of human nature and we are way too eager to engage in it. We're not just asking for the sacrifice of your life, we're asking you to take lives as well. We're asking you to take part in something that kills the human soul. Perhaps we have no choice but to go to war, but we should never forget the totality of the cost to one and all.
The United States has been at war for nearly my entire lifetime. I was born in 1965 and a quick query on the internet reveals that we've lost more than 66,000 US Soldiers since then. The bulk of those deaths occurred in Vietnam, but the numbers for Iraq and Afghanistan are each already in the thousands. We no longer see the black bags lined up on the tarmac awaiting the last ride home with the bodies of our lost treasure resting silently inside. The American public doesn't actually like war and we don't like the consequences of war and so our government hides from us the awful truth and instead glorifies the battle and the pageantry and our weaponry. We see the soldier standing with the weapon heading in to battle, not lying torn to shreds on the ground, limbs missing and covered in blood in the aftermath.
It's not just soldiers who give up their lives in war, but civilians as well and yet we rarely if ever acknowledge their sacrifice as anything other than acceptable losses. The numbers of civilian casualties may number equally or higher to the number of soldiers lost, but their number also includes children from infants to teenagers. They will never grow up to become educated adults, have children of their own or provide solutions to finding peace in our time. They are the world's lost treasure. In recent years the United States has bombed a hospital in Afghanistan, slaughtered a wedding party in Yemen and killed an 8 year old girl in a drone strike.
We also ask for the sacrifice of the planet we live on. We have allowed poisonous chemicals like Agent Orange to rain down on our soldiers, on the local populace and on the land they occupy impacting generations to come, not to mention what we do to the wildlife. Soldiers bond with domestic animals (both dogs and cats) while they're serving their country and some try to bring them home and some leave those animals to fend for themselves once they're gone.
Nothing and no one is safe in the theater of war. Yet we sing songs about going off to war to kick some butt as if at the end we'll all just come back to the bar for a cold one and have a laugh. War is death. There is nothing to celebrate about war except when it ends and we can begin to pick up the pieces of our lives.
So on this Memorial Day we should gather and quietly honor those who have been lost to war, and we should remember not just the soldier, but all of the losses embodied therein and wonder what our future might have been if only.....Then we should demand to know why some wars are still being fought these many years later and how much more earthly treasure we can stand to lose.
Saturday, May 27, 2017
Weekend Rambling Thoughts
It's Saturday morning and my sister and her family will be hopping in their mini-van shortly with both their dogs and heading south to Maryland. I should be finishing up laundry and making beds to get ready for them, but I'm not. I'm engaging in what my sister and I refer to as 'self-sabotage'. You may remember it from your college days when you were working on a term paper. You can find all kinds of things to do and become thoroughly engrossed in but that. I recall someone asking how long it takes to write a term paper and the answer was, how long have I got?
I really need to walk my dog and then get on my bike for an hour. I have a trip coming up in June where I'll be on a bike a lot and I'm not sure my legs or my behind are up for the job. I managed to self-sabotage my plans for daily bike riding over the past few months with excuses like it's too cold, or it's too wet when in reality I just couldn't focus on the task at hand. Although, it was pouring buckets on Thursday morning and it was chilly so I'm going to say not going was legit.
Part of my problem is my laptop and all the social applications I just can't get enough of. I keep saying I'm going to break myself of my Facebook and Twitter habits but I can't. They're a total time suck. I also bought myself an Apple TV for the living room and my bedroom and I love surfing all my options. I love a good binge watch.
Also, much to my dismay, my heat pump/air conditioner decided this was a good time to say goodbye to the world. I worked from home yesterday while the new system was installed, but it meant I couldn't get to the laundry! Very convenient excuse. My laundry area in my basement has been on my 'to do' list for a while and so last weekend I had started to get it organized. When I first start I actually make more of a mess before the actual clean up starts. I need to create piles to figure out what needs to be trashed, recycled, given away, etc.,. Anyway of course the indoor unit is right there by the laundry area. I had to make sure the guys had room to work which meant moving some trash bags and stacking stuff on top of the washer and dryer, and then just staying out of their way.
Anyway, here I am writing a blog post when I haven't had the need to write about anything in a long time and suddenly this morning, with laundry looming and all the other things I need to get done, I'm blogging. Of course!! That's how self-sabotage works.
I have a lot of things I want to write about but one of them is just too taxing (Trump). I don't know about a lot of you, but I'm exhausted trying to keep up with the shenanigans of the current administration. I really need this long weekend of rest to think about nothing and just enjoy family.
My Dad turns 80 on Sunday and we're all gathering at my parents' house for a milestone celebration. Both my parents are doing really well and it will be a fun celebration. Hopefully we won't talk politics, not because we disagree but because it's just too depressing.
On Monday I'll be in a good frame of mind for the Memorial Day holiday. One thing that might help my motivation before then though is for the sun to come out. I don't know about you, but I've had enough of this gloomy weather to last a lifetime.
I think I just heard the buzzer on the dryer so I'll sign off and wish everyone a very nice holiday weekend.
I really need to walk my dog and then get on my bike for an hour. I have a trip coming up in June where I'll be on a bike a lot and I'm not sure my legs or my behind are up for the job. I managed to self-sabotage my plans for daily bike riding over the past few months with excuses like it's too cold, or it's too wet when in reality I just couldn't focus on the task at hand. Although, it was pouring buckets on Thursday morning and it was chilly so I'm going to say not going was legit.
Part of my problem is my laptop and all the social applications I just can't get enough of. I keep saying I'm going to break myself of my Facebook and Twitter habits but I can't. They're a total time suck. I also bought myself an Apple TV for the living room and my bedroom and I love surfing all my options. I love a good binge watch.
Also, much to my dismay, my heat pump/air conditioner decided this was a good time to say goodbye to the world. I worked from home yesterday while the new system was installed, but it meant I couldn't get to the laundry! Very convenient excuse. My laundry area in my basement has been on my 'to do' list for a while and so last weekend I had started to get it organized. When I first start I actually make more of a mess before the actual clean up starts. I need to create piles to figure out what needs to be trashed, recycled, given away, etc.,. Anyway of course the indoor unit is right there by the laundry area. I had to make sure the guys had room to work which meant moving some trash bags and stacking stuff on top of the washer and dryer, and then just staying out of their way.
Anyway, here I am writing a blog post when I haven't had the need to write about anything in a long time and suddenly this morning, with laundry looming and all the other things I need to get done, I'm blogging. Of course!! That's how self-sabotage works.
I have a lot of things I want to write about but one of them is just too taxing (Trump). I don't know about a lot of you, but I'm exhausted trying to keep up with the shenanigans of the current administration. I really need this long weekend of rest to think about nothing and just enjoy family.
My Dad turns 80 on Sunday and we're all gathering at my parents' house for a milestone celebration. Both my parents are doing really well and it will be a fun celebration. Hopefully we won't talk politics, not because we disagree but because it's just too depressing.
On Monday I'll be in a good frame of mind for the Memorial Day holiday. One thing that might help my motivation before then though is for the sun to come out. I don't know about you, but I've had enough of this gloomy weather to last a lifetime.
I think I just heard the buzzer on the dryer so I'll sign off and wish everyone a very nice holiday weekend.
Saturday, May 20, 2017
Love Is All Around
A little more than two years ago the rescue I volunteer with gave me a foster dog that had been rescued from a homeless situation. A woman was living in her car with two dogs and was having a very hard time of it. Izzy, the dog that came to me, had serious mange that was very expensive to treat and I believe her car mate did as well. I'm not sure who convinced the woman to turn the dogs over to a rescue, but she did, they were treated for their health issues, and both found wonderful new homes where they're thriving. When the woman was back on her feet again she inquired about getting her dogs back. Unfortunately, that's not how it works.
At the time I thought that giving up those two dogs was a great sacrifice but that the dogs would be better for it. Or would they? She certainly wouldn't. I know what the loss of a dog feels like after they've lived a long and full life with you, and I can't imagine the heartbreak of giving them up while they're alive because you can't care for them. Also, the attachment between dogs and their humans is two ways - we love them and they love us back. Who hasn't seen the pictures of dogs dumped at a shelter, head bowed and staring in to the corner, crying and wondering what is happening and not knowing where their beloved human has gone? Or the story of a dog chasing after a car that's just dumped it on a highway? My own dog follows me around the house when we're home together and wants to be in the same room as me. He can be off leash in safe spaces because he and I are a pack and he stays with me - I jokingly say we're a bonded pair. He loves me and I love him.
When I'm near kids who are interacting with my dogs I always make sure to share with them that dogs love. "Did you know that dogs feel love the same way that people do?" I'll ask the kids. They start to ask questions as they pet the dog, "Do you think your dog loves me?" and my response is "Yes, I think he does. Look at his tail wagging." Especially when I have a foster and the kids want to know why I'm not keeping the newest resident of our neighborhood, "Doesn't he love you?" and I say, "Well yes, I think he does, but he knows that we're working very hard to find him a family of his very own and he'll love them too."
Which brings me back to my original question, should homeless people give up their pets? There are plenty of people living on the streets alongside their pets and in a harsh world where there's little hope and little joy in every day existence, perhaps these pets make a real and positive difference. At least that's what Glenn Greenwald and his husband David Miranda believe. I listened to Glenn on DemocracyNow! talk about creating an animal shelter in Rio de Janeiro that will hire homeless people who love dogs to work there and I read his article about it in the online newspaper he founded, The Intercept. The people they hire will live and work at the shelter with their own pets while working to find homes for the many homeless dogs living in that city. They're hoping this shelter will become a model that can be replicated in cities around the world. I hope they're right. This morning I went to their GoFundMe page and made a $100 donation in support of this effort.
We're living in an incredibly chaotic world right now. Within all this insanity here is an opportunity for something real that can make a difference in many lives, both human and animal. I believe that like the song says, the love you take is equal to the love you make. Click on the links I've embedded throughout this post to hear and read about all of this first hand. We're one week away from remembering those who sacrificed their lives for war, and what better way to remember them but by building up the people and animals for whom they made that sacrifice.
 |
| Izzy |
At the time I thought that giving up those two dogs was a great sacrifice but that the dogs would be better for it. Or would they? She certainly wouldn't. I know what the loss of a dog feels like after they've lived a long and full life with you, and I can't imagine the heartbreak of giving them up while they're alive because you can't care for them. Also, the attachment between dogs and their humans is two ways - we love them and they love us back. Who hasn't seen the pictures of dogs dumped at a shelter, head bowed and staring in to the corner, crying and wondering what is happening and not knowing where their beloved human has gone? Or the story of a dog chasing after a car that's just dumped it on a highway? My own dog follows me around the house when we're home together and wants to be in the same room as me. He can be off leash in safe spaces because he and I are a pack and he stays with me - I jokingly say we're a bonded pair. He loves me and I love him.
When I'm near kids who are interacting with my dogs I always make sure to share with them that dogs love. "Did you know that dogs feel love the same way that people do?" I'll ask the kids. They start to ask questions as they pet the dog, "Do you think your dog loves me?" and my response is "Yes, I think he does. Look at his tail wagging." Especially when I have a foster and the kids want to know why I'm not keeping the newest resident of our neighborhood, "Doesn't he love you?" and I say, "Well yes, I think he does, but he knows that we're working very hard to find him a family of his very own and he'll love them too."
Which brings me back to my original question, should homeless people give up their pets? There are plenty of people living on the streets alongside their pets and in a harsh world where there's little hope and little joy in every day existence, perhaps these pets make a real and positive difference. At least that's what Glenn Greenwald and his husband David Miranda believe. I listened to Glenn on DemocracyNow! talk about creating an animal shelter in Rio de Janeiro that will hire homeless people who love dogs to work there and I read his article about it in the online newspaper he founded, The Intercept. The people they hire will live and work at the shelter with their own pets while working to find homes for the many homeless dogs living in that city. They're hoping this shelter will become a model that can be replicated in cities around the world. I hope they're right. This morning I went to their GoFundMe page and made a $100 donation in support of this effort.
We're living in an incredibly chaotic world right now. Within all this insanity here is an opportunity for something real that can make a difference in many lives, both human and animal. I believe that like the song says, the love you take is equal to the love you make. Click on the links I've embedded throughout this post to hear and read about all of this first hand. We're one week away from remembering those who sacrificed their lives for war, and what better way to remember them but by building up the people and animals for whom they made that sacrifice.
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