The squirrels are circling...

We have this little back yard, a typical lot size for this area, and a garden that expands a little every year. I remember our first summer here, now four years ago, and we were so proud of the garden we cultivated. Looking back, it was probably about 5X5, but to minds shaped through years of apartment-dwelling, it was an idyllic paradise, thick with basil and echinacea plants. We even had dragonflies and it made my heart swell with pride to see bees choosing our plants - our plants! - to pollinate. I felt like St. Francis, and I imagined myself a benevolent figure, extending my arm to the various flying, jumping and crawling creatures, a gesture to be read by them as, "By all means, please partake."

As this is our forth year, we have a learned maybe a little more about how to coax blossoms and fruit out of our little patch, and that little patch has grown a bit more every year, to the point where it now takes up about a third of our backyard. Last year, we could not get sunflowers to take no matter how hard we tried and I desperately wanted them: as soon as they'd grow a little, they would get unceremoniously beheaded by squirrels, who would leave chewed bits and sad yellow petals behind as something like looked like a warning to me, like something a mafia henchman would do. Why they were warning me, I don't know, and perhaps I'm reading too much aggressiveness into their feasting habits. Couldn't they be a little less greedy, though, and share a little with the goldfinches, bees and dragonflies? And did they have to be so violent?

This year, we started to see some fat stalks rise up out of our garden that we hadn't planted. "If I didn't know better, I'd think these were sunflowers," John said. But we hadn't planted any. Sure enough, within a couple of weeks, green, bulbous tops appeared at the ends and we counted over twenty sunflowers in our tiny garden.

Storms...

There were tremendous thunderstorms this evening and I sat in our sunroom working on an article, occasionally looking up to see the roiling black sky suddenly illuminate with a dramatic bolt of lightning. The tornado sirens were wailing, and my son was distressed: he is fascinated by natural phenomena, and he's terrified. He sought reassurance that a tornado was not going to rip apart our home and I tried my best. I told him that tornadoes like to form in rural areas, like where his dad grew up, where there's lots of space between buildings for it to bounce around and build up strength, not in our urban landscape of towering, solid buildings rubbing shoulders together. Cities are not fun for tornadoes, I told him. Mostly I was glad that John was home to deflect this to tonight. Ultimately, my son must have believed us that he was safe because he settled into just being mildly piqued by the whole thing.

I remember what it was like to seek reassurance from my parents during troubling times and, for the most part, come up empty. As a parent, one who seeks to leave the ghosts of my childhood traumas behind, I am often torn between wanting to provide my son with an iron-clad assurance that we will shield him no matter what fire-breathing dragons appear at our doorstep, and the knowledge that this is impossible. I would do anything for my child, but I simply cannot control if thunderstorms turn into tornadoes. All I can do is my very best if a nightmare should materialize.

Tonight, I am grateful for my home, the warmth of my family, the safety I enjoy that's so rare in this world. My thoughts are with those who do not share these privileges and who are so vulnerable to the storms of the world.

Shalom, everyone.

It's all about meme...

Since I don't have many blogging buddies yet, I figured that I'd send myself one of those annoying memes you can't help but read and then afterwards calculate roughly how much time you wasted that could have been used toward doing something productive, like saving the world. Since you aren't likely going to save the world in five minutes or less, you may as well read the damn meme. So sit back, relax, stop taking yourself so seriously, and enjoy my self-composed, not to mention utterly self-centered, meme. (As if blogging weren't the height of narcissism, I have to take it that one step farther.)

Introducing my Summertime Meme.

Favorite cold drink: That would have to be the perfect iced tea, which would have lots of ice, a lemon wedge, and must not be too bitter. As bourgeois as this sounds, there's not a lot than annoys me more than ordering iced tea at a restaurant and getting lukewarm, Lipton-y swill with a half a wussy 'cube floating in it. Pah. Mop water.

Favorite (locally grown) summer fruit: Tied between watermelon and blackberries. Has anyone tried the Michigan pawpaw? They're apparently a rare delicacy, but they taste like a cross between mango and banana custard. Or am I confusing this with the durian, another near-mythic fruit? In any case, pawpaws - how can you not love that name? - are supposed to be dee-lish but I haven't tried one yet. Imagine, a tropical-esque fruit from around these parts.

Favorite summer vegetable: Again a tie, this time between broccoli and eggplant. If there's something vegan with eggplant on the menu at a restaurant, even if the rest of it sounds like caca, I have to have it. That's how much I love eggplant.

Least favorite (locally grown) summer fruit: I'm so wishy-washy with these ties, I know, but this time I'm at least spicing it up as a three way (every frat boy reading this, yes, all four million, just got a mini-hard on with the word three way) tie: the Evil Melon Duo, cantaloupe and honeydew, which, really, I am lucky that I'm not dry heaving as I write their loathsome names. It's sad because they're cute names wasted on Melons of Nastiness. (Speaking of, guess who got a, like, fifty-pound cantaloupe in her CSA box this week? I'd just as soon eat a jackalope. John and my son better just make short work of it; I don't want that thing for days on end making my fridge all cantaloupe-y with it's stink-lines emanating.) The third would be the strawberry, sour and sandy to me, but really not worthy of sharing space with The Melons because at least it's tolerable as jam. I am still giving the strawberry the sideways glance, though.

Least favorite summer vegetable: That would have to stand alone: the watery, bland, disturbingly stringy when ill-cooked (and it nearly always is) bottom-feeder known as the summer squash, also known as yellow squash. I think that the flavor - or lack thereof - gets to me, but what really irks me is that you know when you have to go out to dinner once a year with all those family members who get on your nerves for someone's birthday or some such and you're just eye-balling your nearest clock whenever possible (that is, when you're not rolling your eyes at something stupid someone said) and there's no way in hell that these people you're dining with would ever be cool enough to pick a restaurant that had a semi-decent selection for a vegan family so you have to make do with whatever you can cobble together on the menu because you're already known as the Family Troublemaker and you don't want to make veganism look that challenging? Of course you know what I'm talking about. Anyway, these restaurants will always make some pasta with marinara and a side of limp-ass, boiled-to-death vegetables. And when they do, I guarantee it, summer squash will be the sickly star of the show. You'll shovel it in anyway just to not have to converse with these people. So summer squash is perhaps unfairly tied in with family issues, but, still, it's ick.

Favorite summer in memory: Probably that summer I met John, 1993. He was in between careers and freshly divorced and we just had so much fun. The most fun? Seeing the deliciously disgusting Vaginal Cream (Creme?) Davis at the Czar Bar on Division. A bacchanalian good time had by all! I also had a blast the first summer I drove off with this male librarian who wore skirts named Owl to the Rainbow Gathering. I was nineteen and amoral, which I found to be a fruitful combination.

Favorite childhood summer tradition: chasing fireflies every night with my neighborhood peeps. Summer was spent outdoors playing nonstop with occasional meal breaks. I wonder what sort of memories of summer our over-scheduled children will have.

Favorite contemporary summer tradition: chasing fireflies every night with my son.

Song that most reminds you of summer: There are two that really mean summer to me: Saturday In The Park by Chicago (I can't help it, that was popular when I was a kid) and anything from Bob Marley's oeuvre, except Redemption Song, which is certainly a late autumn song. (Also, that Turkey in the Straw song that plays on all the local ice cream trucks, all warped and lovely.) [John and I have a tradition each spring of remarking on the first ice cream truck sighting of the season. Also, the spookiest of the season, like when the hand-painted. dented-to-hell indies - cool kids to the Good Humor goody-two-shoes trucks - can be seen driving very slowly, or very, very quickly, down a side street in the middle of the night, the tinny recording playing all innocent-like.]

Favorite "thing" about summer: the feeling of freedom; being able to ride my bike all the time; not having to run from place to place to avoid freezing my buns off; no more layers; the sound of crickets and, yes, even locusts; the return of my garden; all that great, in season produce; seeing my son bike and splash and gallop about outdoors.

Least favorite "thing" about summer: mosquitoes and excessive heat. I'm a goth girl at heart and I have to protect my ghostly pallor.

And that's it!

Shalom, everyone.

Since last we spoke...

So, apparently, I have an avoidance issue with keeping this blog updated. (Least of which is my [admittedly tiresome and predictable] loathing of the "word" blog, but I should probably relax that schoolmarmish pursing of my lips and just go with the flow.) Honestly, in the craziness of my life and the maddening pace in which ideas and activities flow in and out of it, I had forgotten about this little corner of the internet that was all mine. I think that blogging fell out of favor with me originally because I was having problems posting, but it appears that I can again. I mean, how much more do I need to say on this topic? It wasn't you, it was me. Baby, I promise, I'll change. You'll see.

So, let's make with the update.

Since the last time I posted, I have written a novel, which felt a lot like I gave birth, though, thankfully, there are no diapers to change. (Though you might have to change mine when I start the publishing process, which you could interpret to mean that I'll be crying and behaving like an infant or I'll be so old, diapers will be necessary. I'll leave that interpretation up to you, but I am hoping for the former.)

What else? I am keeping up with the freelance writing and it looks like I'll be putting more of a concerted effort into that, especially in pursuing more of the Holy Grail: paying gigs! I am actually so haughty that I am seeking monetary compensation from my precious, painstaking prose. You bet your sweet patootie I am, and that is the latest gripe that's been putting the agitation in my swirling vegan feminist tempest: publishing bodies that don't pay but want to use your work to drive sales. (I'm not talking about websites, which for the most part do not pay. nor am I talking about any magaznes in which I've recently been published, which I adore.) What kind of effed-up voluntary serfdom is that? I mean, I understand and appreciate that we're all trying to get by after, lo, these last eight years of a glorious Republican economy that only smiles upon robber barons, but, still. There's something about the non-compensation of writers that strikes me as one-sided and quasi-abusive. Bah! (I swear, if you met me, you wouldn't believe that someone with such a sunny disposition could write such cranky posts.) Anyway, I can't pay the mortgage with free copies of magazines - I know because I have tried - in which I am published (which, seriously, is offered with a straight-face as compensation for publication) so I am seeking more paying jobs. Was it really necessary for me to be so verbose with that?

Also in the time between posts, we adopted a kitten my son named Clover. She is the cutest, sweetest little white-and-black bundle of feline goodness. I have never had a cat before. My mom, and all the females in her family, is petrified of cats, really, to the point of running in terror if a cat so much as licks a paw in her presence, so we were always a dog family. Later, I got hitched to this guy who has a raging cat allergy. Anyway, we're still hitched, ten years later, but now we've got a kid who desperately wanted an animal to love on. We do have a dog, Buster, a nearly twelve-year-old basset hound who, in defiance of all things basset, is aggressive and ornery and at a point in his life where he is not accepting applications for affection from a six-year-old boy. So we adopted a kitten named Clover and all is well. She is so darn lovable John's allergies were like, "We can't compete with this. Fine. Have a cat." Even Buster with his cold, dark charcoal briquette of a heart has to grudgingly admit that she's eminently lovable. (He just let me know that he's not admitting to anything and that I mistook his temporarily non-bilious behavior for acceptance. He's just laying low whilst he figures out next steps.) Anyway, yes, a cat named Clover.

Gosh, there's so much more. But I think that what I'll do is just update this more often so not as to flood my three readers (shout out to you, Jane!) with posts of Chaucer-like proportions. So stay tuned. There is much to say and comment on this world when you are a vegan, a feminist and an agitator.

Until next time...

Okay...

Is this thing working again? The last time I tried, it made me keep creating new passwords each time I wanted to post something and then it still didn't work, so we'll see.

Blogspot got all funky on me...

I haven't been posting because I was simply unable to do so. I just flat out could not post. Today, though, I had the bright idea to change my password, getting in through the back door in a way, and the gods of the Internet smiled upon my feeble but earnest efforts. Yay, me! I don't have much to say, though, as I've spent most of the past few weeks working on The Novel and all of today, pretty much, cleaning up a four-year-old's barf. Even my dog puked today, a nice pile on the rug, which greeted me as I was on my way to the laundry machine with a freshly-besullied blanket. All this puke must be foretelling of something but I don't care to plumb the depths of my soul at this moment. And the dog puke, it's still sitting (piling?) there. It's gross to have unattended vomit, but none of us is in the room with it so I'm leaving it for John. John has been greeted at the door with all manner of disgusting chores that await him, from a stinking baby to an overflowing toilet, so I don't think the chore o' the day will be too traumatic. And, if it is, well, tough titties. I was looking forward to spending the afternoon at the library writing but children have a way of getting sick at the most inopportune times. In any case, my son was very sweet and mild all day, barely rasping out, "Mom, I need some water," with the occasional whimper all day. He's my sweet love, and when he's sick - pretty rarely, all told - I get to reconnect with that quiet, placid soul he was as a baby I had to care for, which is a nice change of pace (occasionally!) from his hyper-talkative, kinetic boy energy of today. If he's still sick tomorrow, though, we'll see how my mood sustains itself.

Boo! It's Nader. EEEK!!

I normally don't shy away from disagreeing in a friendly way with my friends on a variety of topics. Many of my friends are not vegan, for example, and that is something that I believe in to my core and I have a hard time understanding how anyone with strong social justice convictions, which all of my friends have, can disregard as it seems to me that the connections are undeniable. I do accept that our beliefs about what Carol Adams calls "The Other" are complex and not necessarily consistent or rational. We also might disagree about a variety of other topics, from what time a child should go to bed (our son is the rock star of the group, not ready to quit the non-stop party that is his life until around 9:30 or so, an hour inconceivable to those whose children go to bed when Denny's is still seating for their Early Bird Special) and other sundry issues, but for the most part, we are a pretty simpatico bunch. That is, unless someone should bring up the Name That Shall Not Be Uttered, that bugaboo of the Democratic Party and unholy scourge of anything decent and good, Ralph Nader. Truly, his very name inspires such a (at times) hysterical response among good and decent lefties that I have learned to keep my support of The Beast to myself, because that one fact of my life has threatened to derail otherwise solid friendships. I have been told outright that I was personally responsible for the war in Iraq and other Bush-era atrocities; I have had friends shake their heads in disbelief at my seeming naivety and selfishness. [Ignoring, perhaps, the Electoral College and the fact that Al Gore was all but guaranteed in my home state.] I have learned to feel out a person if she should bring up Mr. Nader so I can brace myself for the degree of vitriol that will be slung my way once my convictions have been brought to the light of day. I tend to not bring up my views on this particular subject unless it is clear that a friend wants to have a calm discussion because I have learned that it is almost too thorny a topic for even the most accepting of friendships to bridge. So I tend to quietly state my opinion and try to change the subject.

Yet I supported Nader in 2000 and am unrepentant. If he ran again, say, against Hillary Clinton and Rudolph Guiliani, you can bet your sweet patootie that I would be voting for Ralph Nader. Rather than attack me, though, I think a good question to ask is why would an avowed progressive vote cast a vote against a pioneering Second Wave feminist? Because Hillary Clinton is as anathema to me as a Republican - she gave her unapologetic consent to invade Iraq, after all, killing thousands of women, children, soldiers and civilians - and to me she is the personal embodiment of the ethical and strategic failures of the Democratic Party. In the same way that some liberals cannot look at Nader without the knee-jerk reaction of "He Stole The Election", I cannot look at Hillary Clinton, as well as the overwhelming majority of her Democratic peers, as anything but abject, worthless failures. They were the ones, by and large, who voted in support of the war. What is wrong with these people? Ralph Nader has been an outspoken critic of the war since before troops were ever deployed.

Leaving behind my general loathing of the Hillary Clinton and her fellow senators (with the possible exception of Dick Durbin, Obama and a few others), though, I have to ask, as I did back in the day: is a democratic system a unwavering two party system? Isn't my right a voter to vote for the individual who is most reflective of my core values? Were we too perilously close during the 2000 election to seeing a dynamic and true democracy in action (we didn't really as Nader was shut out of the debates and most of the public eye in a decidedly undemocratic fashion) and we scared ourselves with its potential for a true multiplicity of views? Ralph Nader was anti-war (Gore was not), pro-choice and possessing of a critical, sharp and passionate mind. He had a stellar reputation of taking on corrupt businesses and politicians no holds barred, his legacy is nothing if not admirable. How could I not vote for him? I had never had the opportunity of voting for someone so close to my own values and casting that ballot was a joyous occasion that I do not regret for a moment. I was finally supporting someone in the political world who I truly believed in and I felt like I was participating in a real democratic process for once. It was exhilarating.

The 2000 election was Gore's to lose and lose it he did. Putting aside Republican ballot corruption in Florida, which most certainly occurred, it was a razor-thin race. (Gore technically DID win, but that's a whole different topic.) The fact that after eight years of prosperity, eight years of relative peace, Gore could not win the election handily from that goon from Texas speaks volumes about the man and his ability to inspire the voting public. He didn't even carry his home state of Tennessee, for crying out loud. The fact that voters were (almost) as likely to support an executin', coke snortin', drunk drivin', National Guard desertin' ( I have to admire the Family Values of the Republican Party, once again) IMBECILE, well, the blame for that rests solely on Gore's shoulders. Again, that election was his to win or lose: all he had to do was bunt a little and he could have run home safely. Now, as I said, there was malfeasance in Florida and who knows where else, but unless we're talking about an epic fleecing of the voting public, it was a stupidly close race all things considered. Gore should have contested that much more vigorously given the fact that he technically won Florida and thus the race, but he didn't and GWB assumed the throne with all the grace of a robber baron who simply set his beady little eyes on something he wanted but didn't deserve or properly win: the presidency. I was heartsick and disgusted the way that the Supreme Court appointed him to office, with his basic argument of, "I want it, so everyone better shut up. I'm taking it."

This is all to say that I'm really wanting to see the Nader documentary that is out now, An Unreasonable Man. The thing that's complicated for me about Ralph Nader and pretty much anyone who would run for President (with the possible exception of Kucinich) is that he seems like someone I wouldn't like personally very much. Those same traits that make him so admirable, particularly his dogged, rigorous pursuit of what he believes is right despite what those around him thing, well, that could make him on the sociopathic side. Like even if you had been friends with him for years, it wouldn't deter him from ramming you into the ground if you did something he considered suspect or dishonest. That unwavering pursuit of justice would likely make him a difficult friend to have, especially if you have any inconsistencies, as most of us do. Still, I would not mind those qualities in a world leader. I am a believer in democratic principles: we need to demand that our politicians start living up to that degree of integrity. Does Hillary Clinton? If not, come 2008, I urge you to look elsewhere. Isn't that democracy in action?

The charges leveled against Nader seem specious at best. One such charge is that he's selfish. For not walking in lockstep with the Democratic Party? For articulating the sense of betrayal and discontent so many millions of voters already felt? For highlighting the corruptions and failures of the Democratic Party. No, that was his gift as an engaged citizen. The charge of selfishness itself seems to be a particularly "liberal" one: haven't we all been called selfish at one point or another in our lives for holding true to what we believed? It is an attempt at guilt-tripping someone for upsetting the status quo, pure and simple. Second, doesn't it seem like the qualities we claim as American traits, as well as the traits all Hollywood movie heroes embody, dogged determination and independence, the very same traits that were seen as flaws in Nader. It seems to me that we don't so much admire these traits when they are applied in real life. Second, the charge of megalomania seems confusing: isn't that a trait of any one who would run for leader of a nation?

So this is all to say that if you voted for Gore in 2000 and plan to vote for whomever the Democratic party nominates in 2008 because that's what you believe in your heart is the right thing to do, than go for it. But please don't hold against me the pleasure of engaging in true democracy and voting for the individual I hold in the highest respect.