the hug thing

hadn't seen it. simple. significant. strong.

Tags: free hugs = Powered by Qumana

half way to 18.

My baby turned 9 yesterday--that's where I've been.

Not every kid shares Buddy Rich's birthday.

Or his mood swings. Or his uncanny time.

You know me. An emotional amusement park sometimes. My kid. 9. So that's where I've been.

Between having a half-grown child and rescuing a stray puppy from the highway (and then having to give it back to the less than scrupulous owners), then re-inheriting two cats from our newly married neighbor who is moving back in with his ex-now-current wife--and did I mention I have re-decorated the hamster cages in pink and blue bedding, pink for mom and blue for the boys?)--life has been a river, not of news, but of heartbeats.

New life, old life, life moving.
At the speed of me.

At the YMCA a few days ago a woman had her newborn baby with her--precious tiny baby girl in pink. I said to her, "She is so beautiful," and then ducked behind the drape of the changing room to cry quietly.

Every now and then I remember that the ablation I had means I can't carry anymore babies. In my mind fact that we weren't going to have any more babies is completely unrelated to the fact that I can't.Part 1 does not lessen the grieving for Part 2. That's how estrogen works.

Driving past Jenna's school the other day I realized that her turning 9 means she is now halfway to 18, noticing how fast the first 9 years went, realizing that the next 9 will go at least that fast.

Will I make it? Will we? And then what? Where does my heartbeat go? Do I keep it? Or send it out from me?

Of all the layers to my identity, being my daughter's mom is the one I think about the most, where doing it right means every day is one day closer to being left. That little fact is not lost on me.

In my family, we have a hard time raising children to send them out into the world. We don't like letting go. We are smotherers, keepers, hoarders. It takes conscious reminding every day for me to keep from doing what I know.

Ah fuggit. I'm not sure this is making sense. I hear her downstairs now, laughing with her dad. They are watching a show. Her voice rises and falls--fits and jags--loud guffaws, she is nothing if not intense. I am re-amazed so often. heartbeats.

I had coffee with my mother today. Something I haven't done in 4 years.

Nothing is for sure.

Tags: mother, daughter, 9 years old, birthdays, parenting, children, blogging, culture, grief, starbucks = Powered by Qumana

BizBlogBoys - SacBee, you should know better?

I didn't go looking to do another post on why no women; really I was searching for recent business blogging articles to see what new is being said. Instead I found an article from today's Today's Sacramento Bee called Going to the Blogs, which does a cursory overview of business blogging--which misses the point of business blogging really, blogs aren't written by businesses (at least good ones); they're written by PEOPLE who happen to (maybe) work somewhere. In the business sense, blogging is most effective when it's the most meaningful, and it's most meaningful when human beings are connecting and building relationships (love.hate.lukewarm) as human beings first. Human connection = primary. Business relationship follows Human relationship.

Here's a nicely clueless quote from the author of Blogging for Business:

"More and more people are finding local businesses using the Internet," he said. "Blogs make your search engine popularity so high that you are suddenly ahead of your competition."

Sure. Let's boil it all down to SEO and call it a day.

NOT.

Aside from the cursory treatment of the topic in this article, which bugged me to begin with, I couldn't help but be bugged secondarily by the absence of women in the article. I'm amazed that the author didn't trip over the women bloggers in Sacramento and surrounding areas, not to mention the opportunity to do a phone interview as was done with Tony Perkins).

It's annoying. There are references and/or quotes to and/or from 10 men in the short article. And even if you want to play "Use the best man for the job" argument,  well, READ the thing. The article could use some... um... help.

Ask Toby Bloomberg to comment on business blogs, or Marianne Richmond. Ask Shelley Powers about where blogging has come and gone--maybe even be adventurous enough to bring up the 'women thing'. Find out how blogging is part of a larger picture when it comes to creation and commerce (wecommerce). Please try a little harder before you write another fluff piece on an overdone topic featuring talking man heads . Because that is just so 2005.

Tags: business, blogging, tech, PR, advertising, women, technology, marketing, Internet, SEO, wecommerce = Powered by Qumana

{posted first on BlogHer)

Torture Bill Haiku: Mad Kane Has Moved

Here's my haiku inspired by the disgraceful torture legislation:

Torture Bill Haiku

The Constitution
Was cast aside by Congress.
Hideous corpus!

Also, I want to let you know that I've moved my Notables political blog to Mad Kane's Political Madness.

Look Them In The Eye And Smile

I haven't posted here in ages...though I read the posting regularly. Bad, bad blog sister. But I've written something that I wish to share. Forgive me if I've overstepped.

For me, it started sometime in the mid 90s. A woman had been abducted from Parmatown Mall, raped and brutalized then murdered. Our local Karate studio.. the one right next door to my gym.. offered an all-day Saturday class for women of self-defense.

The biggest tip I learned: when you are walking anywhere, look each person you pass or see in the eye and smile. It's a way to remember their faces, and it can discourage a small-time thug from choosing you as a victim.

I've made this tip part of myself. When I am out and about, I look people in the eye and smile. Last year I wrote "The Culture of the Path":

There is a walking path in my town that runs the length of the street (about 2.5 miles). It is used daily.. and all day long.

BUT, most of the travelers practice a uniquely charming habit that has never been formalized. It's a variation on the standard practice of nodding when you pass someone on a p

The first time you approach a fellow traveler each person
1. makes eye contact, smiles, then
2. says "good morning/afternoon/evening".

and here's the really unique part:
because most of us walk part way up the path, then turn around and return to our cars, we often pass some of the same people a second time. and the common practice here changes:

1. make eye contact and smile again...
2. say "have a good day, now".

It's a very subtle way of acknowledging all around that "I see you, and though I've seen you and greeted you earlier today, I will likely not see you again today."

Simple. But a whole lot of sub-text exists in these phrases. And a lot of respect.

Now all but the dullest reader will see that travelling a path is an easy allegory for moving through life... How many different ways do we pass by each other?

In real life... driving on the freeways, standing in line at a store, sitting at nearby tables in the coffeeshop. Online, we might be reading blogs, making comments, reading the same mailing list. We interact in casual ways in all these situations.

All fraught with chances for misunderstandings... or ripe for finding commonality.

How can we as a SOCIETY develop habits/guidelines/methods of interaction that acknowledge each person in an inclusive way? How can we build a "community of the path" on every path in life?

Again, it demonstrated the importance to a society of looking each person in the eye and smiling.

These past three weeks I've spent time in a nursing home and time in assisted living. Many folks, to stave off boredom and loneliness, sit out in the hallways or in the lobby. Their affect is quite passive. So I again made it a point to look each one in the eye and smile as I passed them by. And like the culture of the path, I said "good morning/afternoon" to each.

Suddenly folks would sit up a little straighter; their was life in their eyes and looked once again like members of the human society. At the MILs hotel, they are beginning to recognize me; we have small interactions when I pass through.

So my suggestion for everyone along whatever path you find yourself travelling: make eye contact and smile.

hanging in a jar

For I once saw with my own eyes the Cumean Sibyl hanging in a jar, and when the boys asked her, "Sibyl, what do you want?' " she answered, "I want to die."

I thought of this quote today because my 90 year old mother has been crying a lot lately, and when I ask her why, she says she wants to die. Like the mythic Sybil, she's in some kind of stasis -- neither really living nor finally dying. She spends most of her days walking around her rooms -- walking and moving objects and dropping used kleenex like breadcrumbs. While she walks, I sit, busying my hands with crocheting. I'd rather be reading, but I don't like being interrupted when I'm reading, and she interrupts frequently --

...where is my money? ...where is my brother? ...are you my mother? ...where are my glasses? ...where are the men? ...are you going dancing? ...is it raining?..... ..what should we have for supper? (this last asked an hour after we had supper)

If I run over to my computer to check email or such, she is in her doorway, calling "Elaine....Elaine!" I'm stuck an audio clip from The Graduate.

Back to Sybil. Several years ago, I blogged a piece about Sybils and such that I still like and am reprising below. Interesting enough, while googling for additional information about Sybil, I happened upon a wonderful blog that I had never seen before. It is written by a woman who is indeed a kindred spirit. I will have to find the time and go back to read more of her posts, many of which echo my sentiments exactly.

Meanwhile, here's my old post about...

Cybill Sibyl Symbols

I am an old woman with a deck of cards

A witch, an Amazon, a Gorgon

A seer, a clairvoyant, a poet.

I have visions of becoming and

I dream in female
--(Barbara Starrett, 1974)

I adored the character that Cybill Shepherd played in her '90s sitcom. Raunchily relevant in menopausal splendor, she laughed a lot --mostly at herself -- loved largely, and dreamed in female. The Lady of Situations.

Sibyl is another gut-grabbing female, one I first encountered the first time I turned to the first page of T.S. Eliot's "Wastland." (I still have verses from that epic endlessly looping through my brain: Madame Sosostris, famous clairvoyant/ has a bad cold nevertheless/ is known to be the wisest woman in Europe/ with a wicked pack of cards. Here, said she, / is your card, the drowned Phoenician Sailor (those are pearls that were his eyes. Look!) / Here is Belladonna, the Lady of Rocks, / the lady of situations.)

*****************

For I once saw with my own eyes the Cumean Sibyl hanging in a jar, and when the boys asked her, 'Sibyl, what do you want?' she answered, 'I want to die."

The quote which prefaces T.S. Eliot's "Wasteland," "NAM Sibyllam quidem Cumis . . ." is taken from the Satyricon of Petronius Arbiter, a Roman of the first century B.C.E. The Sybil is a prophetic character who, when granted a wish by Apollo, asked to live for as many years as there are grains of sand in a handful. She forget to ask for eternel youth, however, and is confined to a bottle so as to prevent her body's disintegration..... The Sibyl, then, is a bit of a paradox: she strove to live eternally yet ended up in constant danger of decay and pain. Her quest for eternity was a failure that Eliot finds terribly important yet terribly dangerous. His goal is not to end up like the Sibyl, but to free her. (quoted from a link that is no longer active)

Cybill and Sybil, symbols of women with strong voices -- strong with meaning, with intention, with visions of constant becoming -- with guts full of female dreams and hearts used to surviving great tides of sorrow. A lot like the many women bloggers I know and love.

The road I drive into town is edged with farmland. During first days of autumn, I pass so many signs of endings -- fields of corn stalks the color of caramel; acres emptied but for the baled rolls of hay; wayside strips of sunflowers, heads bowed low with their burdens of shedding seeds. I am, these days, envious of endings.

Taking Care and Care Taking and getting away

Ahh -- Elaine finally got away on vacation. I'm glad to hear it. I can feel the autumn air - and time passing - in her post:

Sunday was a deliciously fattening breakfast at the newly opened Cheescake Factory in Albany. It's amazing how much has changed since I moved a year ago. New mcmansions being built where the nursery was where I used to buy my plants; the strip mall where I would hunt for bargains at TJ Maxx, empty.

And we are changing, too, as each, in her own time, reaches retirement age. Four of us had careers with state government, so our pensions are better than most. The other two are worried that they will never be able to retire, since their work histories are different. One, for example, works for the post office. Her retirement pension will be only $7000 a year.

Tags: kalilily time = Powered by Qumana

Dealing Effectively with Energy Vampires

I already wrote a really long post on my own weblog on this subject, so I'll try to be brief here as an overview. If you find the idea useful and interesting you can learn more about how to apply it by reading the full post on my blog.

Basically the idea is that the only way energy vampires are a danger to you is if you decide that you need to stop them from taking your energy. If you want them to not get your energy, you have to either sheild yourself from them (which takes energy to do, so is still exhausting) or get away from them (which can be difficult in many situations and lead to a life of isolation for a really sensitive person, since most people are energy thieves at least part of the time).

Yet even for a super-empath like myself there are ways you can "feed the vampires" that actually will energize both you and them.

There are 4 key understandings necessary before this is possible: 1) you have to let go of the idea of a world of separate beings who are supposed to each get only what they have earned, be punished when they get something for nothing, and be rewarded when they somehow "earn" any joy they receive; 2) you have to also let go of the idea that the only energy available to you is that to be found within your own separate body and energy field; 3) you have to recognize that all energy is just energy. There isn't bad energy you need to be afraid of and good energy you can allow in. There's just energy; and 4) you must be willing to help people meet their needs even when they are utterly incompetent at knowing what their needs are or at pursuing them in mature, non-violent ways.

If all of this sounds like something you are willing to do... check out the full article at http://www.indigo-ocean.com and also consider picking up a copy of The Ever-Transcending Spirit by Toru Sato, which introduced me to the idea of allowing the energy theft to take place, which I had never considered before. Most of the rest of these ideas you won't find in that book (no infinite source of energy, etc.), but there are a number of other really valuable ideas that are also in the book, plus the general idea of energy exchange and ways of lifting one another up is fleshed out much, much more thoroughly, and productively so.

The Unbalanced Ratio

Lately, I've been following an interesting conversation over at ScienceBlogs. In The Pipeline Problem, Chad Orzel, a college physics professor, argues that the lack of women in the sciences is not his fault. Sure, there are sexist pigs in every field, but he implies that the problem lies primarily in the grade school years where girls are discouraged from going into the sciences by disinterested teachers and peer pressure. Suzanne Franks posts a rebuttal: one cannot pin all the blame on elementary and high schools. Even university professors must shoulder some of the responsibility--their lectures may be turning young women off or their faculty ratio may not be so great. More subtly, they may not even realize that they've only invited male speakers to a seminar or show only pictures of guys on their recruiting website.

Although Orzel is a bit naive in his views (how can he be really sure his colleagues are not doing any harassment?), both do bring up good points. Science on a university level can be intimidating even if all the male professors are Very Nice People. Being a minority is both alienating and lonely and many people, whoever they are, cannot handle that kind of isolation for very long. I went to a science-oriented university as an undergraduate--less than 30% of my graduating class was female. It was not due to the admissions process, which was fifty-fifty, but the critical point when prospective students visited campus that severely skewed the ratio.

Elementary, middle, and high school weren't better--although, I wouldn't say the problem was with male teachers as much as with female teachers with low expectations and an ill-hidden distaste for the sciences. Physics teacher? She didn't think we could do the math. Biology teacher? She didn't believe in evolution. Chemistry teacher? She blabbed about how great her sons were instead of teaching orbital theory. With all that negative stimuli during my formative years, one could wonder how I retained any shred of love for science at all. I'm pretty sure none of my female classmates from high school have. They all wanted to become lawyers or psychiatrists or political activists or artists.

(Cross-posted at Syaffolee.)

Walking to Cure Crohn's and Colitis

My brother and his family are walking to raise money for the Crohn's & Colitis Foundation of America. As you may remember, I wrote that my nephew was diagnosed with Crohn's earlier this year. As you also know--if you know anyone with Crohn's--it is a difficult and painful disease. My nephew has been quite ill. There are medicines that help ease some of the symptoms, but as of yet, no cure. So they walk.

Their family goal is to raise $500. They are up to $120. I would appreciate your help in blowing past their goal.

CCFA Facts...

CCFA was founded in 1967:

Today Crohn’s and colitis affect more than a million Americans.

Approximately 30,000 new cases are diagnosed each year.

Each year, more than 100,000 children suffer from inflammatory bowel disease.


Dollars raised will go toward:

Summer camps for children with IBD

Information and education for 1.4 million patients and their families

Support services and research programs

Nearly 81 cents of every dollar CCFA spends goes directly into research and educational programs.

================

I'm off to donate now.
Thank you.

Tags: Crohn's Disease, Colitis, Crohn's & Colitis Foundation of America, Cure, Illness, Family, Philanthropy = Powered by Qumana

Possessed

A wise and tremendous post by Tish, full of so much that rings so true that I am not sure what pieces to show you. Every daughter and mother should read this post:

There's more to it though. As I was reading Ed's response to my comment, I was reminded of my Mother. She often talked of me and my sister as Her Children. We were never really adults. And The Future was always about how she would be getting old, who would take care of her, what illness would take her over, how she was going to die and did not want to die alone. Our lives were, in some way, about her death.

I know all of this has had a very profound effect on us both. I see it in my niece and nephew and all their problems...and I see it in myself. There are few days that go by where my mother's pain does not come in to my consciousness--sometimes out of guilt that I am living my own life. Some of this is out of anger--anger that she couldn't be the kind of mother I wanted, anger at my grandmother for being so abusive towards a small helpless child who did not ask to be born, and anger at the secrets that wrapped us in crippling shrouds from which none of us could escape.

Tags: mothers, daughters, illness, dysfunction, psychology, trauma = Powered by Qumana

What about advertising?

So far, Blog Sisters has not accepted ads, nor have we had a business model around advertising. Hell, we haven't had a business model around anything. This isn't even a business. And lord knows I'm no model. But I digress...

Those Google ads at the top? I don't know how to turn them off or I would. I went into Blogger and looked--everywhere I think--and there doesn't seem to be a way to dismantle them. I found a way to make them smaller. That's something.

For the record, I have not made enough from Google ads to make up for even the first year of hosting this site, where I paid BloggerPro and Blogspot the highest amount available for the most space and bandwidth--$120 if I remember correctly. That was in 2002. And I never even got a Blogger hoodie when Google bought Blogger. Again, I digress.

I pay for the domain www.blogsisters.com each year, which forwards to this place. Now the hosting is free, so that's something. Not a hoodie, but something.

So what have I made? Since 2003, on this blog and allied, I've received one check from Google for about $100. That means we are averaging, $33 a year.

Let's hit the islands!! (Hee hee.)

I'm saying these things because the net isn't like it used to be. You might not trust me. Or you might. The rush to monetize sites is at an all-time high. I want to assure you, I haven't done that here. And I don't plan to do that here.

I want us to have a place with no strings attached, to say whatever, however, to whomever, within or without reason. To play and to scream. To clap and claw. To tidy and to vomit. To come and go without obligation. To stop by on your way to. 

This was one of the first places for women bloggers to come together and write.

If that's all we do, we've done so much.

Tags: advertising, community, blogging, tech, pr, marketing, blog sisters, google, blogger, web2.0 = Powered by Qumana

Maybe This

Maybe this community is the one where women have nothing to risk or to gain but voice.

Maybe that's the most powerful commodity there is.

Tags: women, feminism, voice, blog sisters, web2.0, marketing, PR, tech, visibility = Powered by Qumana

Blog Sister Helen Jane...

...has a load of gerunds, and the most beautiful Husky I've ever seen.

Tags: husky, gerunds, busy = Powered by Qumana

Don't Swoop Your Ass in at the Last Minute and Minimize This Woman

Cross-Posted on Allied.

-------------------------------

Melinda's post on the conference hubub of last week pisses me off.

To take writing like I've done over this last week on the topic of male-only and nearly-only conferences, and to dumb it down to my post about getting your ass on Skype, does me a disservice. And I've worked too hard and am too long in this field to be done a disservice without speaking up about it.

Just for the record, you might want to check out the following if you're here looking for that Skype post. These are Other Things I Wrote Before The Topic Showed Up On BlogHer:

*********************

The Biggest/Smallest Prick Award - wherein I call out by name the makers of some of the stupidest comments of the week.

Your Balls Are In Your Court - wherein I tell me who are my friends and colleagues, Fuck You, for endorsing a conference with (formerly--before we spoke up) 53 men and 1 woman.

Unfuck Stowe Boyd - wherein I tell how a real man might respond to a Fuck You from a woman.

Crunchnotes Comments - wherein I push back against the organizer of Yet Another Men-Only Conference with zero help from the ladies.

MORE LINKS inspired by this discussion over the last several days.:

  The Twelve (or so) Step Program for Conference Speakers and Organisers  

There's been a lot of talk the last few days about Office 2.0, a conference that brought gender inequality in technology to a new low. Fifty three speakers and one woman was the original unpleasant statistic, and a few people got very ...
posted by suw.charman@gmail.com @ 5:00 PM

  What not to do when organising a conference  

I was reminded of Dr. Ellen Weber article on performance lately, when I read some news coming out of the office 2.0 conference. Remember you’ll get what you ask for, and no more. The article talks about if you don’t have a metric to ...
posted by mgilmartin @ 7:41 AM

  Listening to Shelley Powers about women in tech  

all noise all the time: vive la difference"—vive la différence ars longa, vita herring Recent posts by Tara, Shelley, Jeneane, Denise, and Madame Levy -- though all are not talking about "the same thing" (whatever that is) -- make it ...
posted by chuquet@googlemail.com @ 2:01 AM

  vive la difference  

vive la différence ars longa, vita herring. Recent posts by Tara, Shelley, Jeneane, Denise, and Madame Levy -- though all are not talking about "the same thing" (whatever that is) -- make it painfully clear that there is still a ...
posted by clocke @ 12:01 AM

  Technology Changes How We Do Things  

Not. What. We. Do. Wanna better world? Be better people. Paying attention yet? Of course you're not. That's okay. We've got the rest of eternity. Hey, that's why it's called Groundhog Day.
posted by @ 7:37 PM

  88 Lines About 44 Bloggers  

It's a slow weekend in the blogosphere, so I thought I'd do another mock opera. With apologies to the Nails, here we go. You'll need to listen to the song while you read (it will stream from my blog, if not via the feed). ...
posted by @ 7:18 PM

  The Babes of VoIP  

by Phil Wolff. Ken Camp makes a call to Women in VoIP to gripe about the few females at internet telephony conferences like those run by Jeff Pulver and Rich Tehrani and Tim O'Reilly. In the last episode, the Office 2.0 conference had ...
posted by pwolff@dijest.com (Phil Wolff) @ 5:35 PM

  Whew?  

In the midst of the brouhaha over it the gender-exclusive politics over at the Office 2.0 conference, it occurred to me that I will be speaking at a conference this coming week, too. I hadn’t given the matter much thought before, ...
posted by AKMA @ 8:42 AM

  Why it is important to speak up  

This week, there was a big hullabaloo over the upcoming Office 2.0 Conference. The short story: the conference was dominantly male speakers, only one woman. The organizers were initially unclear as to a) why this was a problem and b) ...
posted by Susan Getgood @ 11:17 PM

  Where Are The Women: A Marketing Problem with a Marketing Solution

*************************

And for the record, Part Deux, I don't consider myself a "feminist," because I have known too many self-identified feminists to inflict harm on women as they wage war against the forces they seek to undo in the name of women. I don't know what kind of "ist" I am -- I think I don't need a label -- but understand that I won't be quiet for a man; I won't be quiet for a women; I won't be quiet for anyone.

Thank you for stopping by.

SKYPE: jeneanesessum (no "s").

Tags: conferences, web2.0, blogging, tech, PR, business, Marketing, Advertising, Feminism, Gender, Women, Mother = Powered by Qumana

Bigger Than Life

I don't watch "reality" shows because I have enough real life around me every day, thank you. I don't watch the "American Idol" or "Rock Star" type shows either because they're all just so much hype, and that's why I am late discovering this generation's cross between Janice Joplin and Tina Turner.

Her name (it really is her birth name) is Storm Large, and she's got an angel's face atop a 6 foot Amazon's body and a voice than ranges from raunchy rap to melodic musings, but I like her rap stuff best of all -- she's better than any of the big guys out there.

I guess she got eliminated on the Rock Star Supernova show. But she's still playing out in Portland, Oregon, where they just love her.

Don't miss her in-your-face performance of her own original song, Ladylike. Watch it here.

Her own website is down because it's been innundated with traffic and the webserver she's on couldn't handle it.

I don't know her, never met her. She's a generation behind me, but I think she's way ahead of any other female in today's music world.

I used to fantisize about becoming an "old lady rapper." This is my "old lady rap:"

Old Lady Rap-Back

you don't see me
not really with
my angles softened
my curves
gone to middle thick

I see that your gaze
doesn't stick
on my face
lined with time's tricks

I know you got it
rough never enough
you think that's new?

I grew this tough skin
long before you
rode through streets and sin

and as for fuckin'?
I was mouthing it
long before your sorry ass
passed its first gas

I know the words but
I make a choice
of voice
that says more
than you
think
you know

Obviously, no competition for Storm Strong.

TheGoodBlogs and Blog Sisters

You may notice that some of your posts are being featured on TheGoodBlogs site. They asked if the could help us raise the visibility of the women writers who belong to this community and I said, "Hell yeah!" Or it sort of went like that.

Check out the sidebar widget--it lists posts from many of the active members of Blog Sisters who are writing their hearts out here and on their own blogs. With TheGoodBlogs, you can promote writing from community members as individuals across blogs. What you see on MY thegoodblogs widget are the most recent posts from our active member blog sisters from their own blogs--how cool is that? Goes WAY beyond technorati faves. TheGoodBlogs lets me tell you which blog sisters are writing new posts on their home blogs.

I've put the blog sisters widget on my blog, and Elaine has put it on her blog, and other sisters are asking, can I get a TGB widget? And I am saying, YES! Just email me at jeneane DOT sessum AT gmail DOT com.
Let's get this old hangout humming again. It was about voice then and it still is. you, us, voice. okay?

Tags: thegoodblogs, the good blogs, community, web2.0, tech, blogging, promotion, business = Powered by Qumana

Political Haiku, etc.

Wow, I haven't posted here in a long time! Well it's time to catch up a bit. Since my last visit here, I've posted a variety of political song parodies, limericks, and haiku at my Notables political humor blog. In fact, just today I posted 3 political haiku. You can find my Ode to ABC here and my The Rumsfeld Trap here.

Also, I've recently launched a second blog, devoted to my non-political humor. I hope you'll check it out.

looking back and forth

I was one of the first Blogsisters that Jeneane recruited, and there was a time I posted here frequently. That was when I had time to read and ruminate and write. That was before I became the caregiver for my 90-year-old increasingly demented mother.

If you're like me, you don't like to think about being 90 and alone and afraid and at sea in a world totally out of your control. I watch my mother become a child again, and I wonder if I will follow in her physical and mental footsteps. I wonder if my daughter will take care of me when I'm a child again.

It's not fun to think about those things. I can only hope that, since I take better care of myself than my mother ever knew she should, the path I go down to old age will be less frightening.

So, my sisters, I remind you to take your vitamins and your calcium and prescriptions for keeping your bones strong. Dance, and do puzzles, and read, and court those joyous moments. My mother didn't do any of that, and so at 90, she has so very little worthwhile life left in her.

I hope that at 90, I will still be posting here at Blogsisters, looking for inspiration, conversation, and even some healthy confrontation. It can't hurt.

9 months of gestation in 20 seconds

http://www.pressnall.com/gestation_project/ This guy took a series of photos every other day as his wife was pregnant with their first child. How cool to watch the pregnancy bloom!

Useful Service, Cool Job

I just learned of a really cool company called The Welcome Committee that helps people who are moving to new locations do so with the minimum level of stress. They provide what they call Location Counselors/Concierges who do things like ordering dry cleaning services, finding day care centers, giving directions, offering "insider tips" and also offering some emotional support to the new residents. What a great service and what a great job!

I have moved so many times (NY to NC to RI to MA back to RI to CA to .... well you get the idea) and each time I went through such ordeals trying to find my way around. It was also lonely, stressful and overwhelming trying to figure out the simplest things. You basically can't optimize, can't try to find the "best" anything, and must just settle for ticking things off your endless "to do" list. If I had had help like this each time I moved I would have been soooo much better off. And I definitely would have been willing to shell out a couple hundred bucks or so for that assistance (what I'm guessing it might cost to use this service, after you sign-up and pay your Concierge for a few hours of help).

I'm probably pretty settled where I am now, so don't need anything like this anymore, but what a cool job also. If ever I can clear a few things off my plate of standing committments I might try to become one of their Counselor/Concierges. The idea of getting paid $40 an hour to help people learn what I had to learn through trial and error sounds like rewarding work, and taking someone out for coffee as a part of my "job" sounds totally fabulous.

Good job Welcome Committee. This is something that truly adds value to people's lives.

PersonalDNA

My PersonalDNA |

Be Sure to Keep an Eye on BlogHer.Org This Weekend

The BlogHer conference begins this evening, so keep an eye on the BlogHer site for links to live blogging, IRC Chat, and more.

Blog Sisters in the Pittsburgh Tribune

A very nicely done article in the Pittsburgh Tribune on women and blogging that quotes yours truly, as well as the BlogHers who were kind enough to give a nod to their Blog Sisters. The article discusses how blogs have helped women find and exercise their voices.

You may wonder if some media training isn't in order for Mrs. Sessum, as she reveals before God and clients the imminent loss of her uterus and her penchant for X*anax. It's not every day you get THIS kind of publicity!

"If life were supposed to be orderly, then my house wouldn't look like it does and my kid wouldn't have open paints and blendy pens all over her floor, and I wouldn't have to take a half of a zzzzanax as I mull over the many possibilities in the weeks and months ahead."
-- allied.blogspot.com, by Jeneane Sessum, as she contemplates an upcoming hysterectomy

w00t!!

Tags: Pittsburgh Tribune, Blogging, Women, Blog Sisters, BlogHer, Good Writing, Tech, PR, Gonzo Marketing, Worst Practices, Cluetrain, Gluetrain = Powered by Qumana

Family Sues for $200K in Losses over "Ugly Bride"

I am stunned and horrified by the following story and I'm wondering what can be done to protest something of this sort....I don't give a darned if this kind of thing goes on in India where I don't vote and don't have a voice. But you can bet that I give a lot more than your average rat's ass that this frivolous and hateful lawsuit is being persued in Hampden (Massachusetts) County Superior Court The following is a reprint from Masslive.com because you will not believe this story unless you read it with your own eyes:

Family Sues over "ugly bride"

SPRINGFIELD - Arranged marriages are an ancient tradition in India, but when a Belchertown family went there to meet a bride-to-be and judged her too ugly for the groom, they chose a 21st-century solution. They called the wedding off, and the groom's father is now suing for damages.

Vijai B. Pandey, 60, filed a lawsuit in Hampden Superior Court last month against friends who tried to arrange a marriage between his son Pranjul K. and their niece. The Pandeys, after spending money on long-distance calls and airfare, found her much too homely.

When the Pandeys saw the bride in New Delhi last August, they were "extremely shocked to find ... she was ugly ... with protruded bad teeth, and couldn't speak English to hold a conversation," Vijai Pandey stated in the lawsuit. The woman's complexion was also cited for the broken engagement.

Pandey's civil complaint against Lallan and wife Kanti Giri of Boyds, Md., seeks $200,000 in damages, and charges them with fraud, conspiracy and violation of civil rights, among other claims resulting in emotional distress.

Lallan Giri, an anthrax expert who has spoken at major scientific conferences on anthrax vaccine safety, said only, "We plead not guilty, 120 percent," when reached last week. Giri referred questions to Springfield lawyer Mark J. Albano, who refused comment.

However, the Giris' former lawyer, Matthew R. Hertz, said the conflict doesn't belong in court, and Pandey mischaracterized the original plan. "It was more of an informal 'would you like to meet her' ... no money ever changed hands that would require reimbursement," said Hertz, of Solomon, Malech & Cohen in Bethesda, Md.

Nimai Nitai das, president of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness of New England in Boston, said he hears occasionally of Hindu families seeking reimbursement for marriage arrangements gone awry. "In the U.S., sooner or later, everything winds up in court ... but I've never heard of a lawsuit about this," he said in a recent interview.

Arranged marriages among Hindus remain "very common," Nitai das said, adding that Westerners hold misconceptions about the practice, and marriages aren't planned before a child's birth.

Indian law sets a minimum marriage registration age of 18 for men and 21 for women. However, registration only became mandatory this year, following a decision by India's Supreme Court in February. More than third of brides in India are married before age 18, the Christian Science Monitor reported in May.

In parts of India, contracts are still written, Nitai das said, with stipulations including the bride's dowry. However, in modern Hindu society, arranged marriage means "the families are much more active in the planning," than typical Americans, he said.

When the Giris initially proposed a marriage between Pranjul K. Pandey, 37, and their niece, the Pandeys pointed out that Pranjul was handsome, personable and spoke English, and asked if the young woman was "equally beautiful ... and a good match," Pandey's lawsuit states.

The Pandeys were assured that she was comparable, and would learn English. The Giris agreed to compensate Vijai Pandey "for everything," if their niece was found unsuitable, Pandey wrote.

The Pandeys got a photo of the potential bride, but "couldn't tell much" from it. Nonetheless, they became "heavily involved by long telephone calls to India," and sent money for the woman's passport, anticipating her move to the United States after the wedding, court documents state.

A trip to India last summer, by Vijai Pandey's wife Lalita, their daughter Pramila, and Pranjul, was to finalize Pranjul's marriage, according to the lawsuit. The Pandeys arranged for the Giris' niece, her mother and sister to travel to New Delhi from elsewhere in India, but after an Aug. 22 meeting, called the marriage off.

Vijai Pandey asked the Giris for the compensation they promised, because they knew all along that the young woman "was homely and unsuitable and no match for Pranjul," he wrote. The Giris declined to give Pandey money, despite his phone calls to them last September, and a fax in March.

Nitai das said brides don't have to be pretty for arranged marriages to succeed. "I have seen some very handsome men who are happy with somewhat homely women," he said. Although Nitai das doesn't know people involved in the lawsuit, he said the plaintiffs may have been "reacting to ... the misrepresentation," about the young woman.

Lallan Giri is an executive at Emergent BioSolutions Inc. in Gaithersburg, Md., and Pandey, for reasons not fully explained, named the company as a defendant. Pandey is also suing Hertz and his law firm. Hertz sent Pandey a letter in March on the Giris' behalf, which was "extremely malicious," Pandey wrote.

The document was a standard "cease and desist," letter, Hertz said.

The Pandeys and Giris had been friends since 1979, when the Giris lived under "extremely humble," conditions in Amherst, the lawsuit states. Later, when Lallan Giri's career advanced and the Giris moved away, problems arose. "He started show-boating, boasting ... with (a) BMW, (a) Mansion, and acting as a big shot in a different class," Pandey wrote.

The Giris, Pandey said in the suit, made "innumerable, uninvited ... and imposing visits" to his Belchertown home, and used his computer for personal and official business.

In a brief phone interview, Pandey said he is a retired environmental engineer. He was once an Amherst insurance agent, according to newspaper archives.

In 1991, Pandey was sentenced to nine months in jail following a conviction for bank fraud in Springfield's U.S. District Court. In 1994, convictions from the 1980s, for larceny and leaving the scene of property damage, were overturned in Northampton District Court, and all charges dropped.

Pandey, who filed suit against the Giris on his own, has initiated several civil complaints since the 1980s. Defendants included Western Massachusetts judges and lawyers, an insurance company and others. Many cases were dismissed, and some were settled.

What can be done?? I do not want our courts to be taken up with something that is not only cruel and hateful but has nothing to do with life in the United States. As I said, if anyone has any ideas, email me (tishgrier@yahoo.com) or post a comment...

The Spice-Box that saved me

When I set off to graduate school in the US, the Internet had not yet taken over the world. I actually spoke to people to gather information about life in America in general and my destination, New Orleans, in particular.

I was delighted to find a woman whose son was an undergraduate at the university I was headed to. "My son had some problems initially with the food, but you should be fine. You are a girl, no?" she said to reassure me.

Biting back my foolish but proud claim that I would be as useless in the kitchen as any son of hers, I focused on the issues at hand. What was the weather in New Orleans like? Did I have to drive around? Was there public transportation? Food, in fact, was my last concern.

A recent food essay from the CSM. Read it, if the topic of Indian food interests you and if the CSM hasn't archived it yet.

Tabloid Times

I have several new limerick posts including these:

Tabloid Times
"Are Bill and Hill still having sex?
By that question, the Times seems perplexed..."
Tabloid Times is continued here.

Ode To Rep. Jefferson
"Rep. Jefferson seems to have stashed
90 grand in his freezer - cold cash..."
Ode To Rep. Jefferson is here.

Sleeper VEEP
"There once was a GOP VEEP
Who in meetings fell soundly asleep..."
Sleeper VEEP is continued here.

Frist And Hastert Rediscover The Constitution
"Frist and Hastert don't care if the Bush administration invades the privacy of ordinary citizens. Nor do they seem bothered by the Executive branch's brazen power grab, evidenced by Bush's "de facto veto" signing statements, Congressional oversight avoidance, and sundry law breaking. But just let the Justice Department mess with one of their own, by raiding his House office, then suddenly Frist and Hastert whip out their long forgotten copies of the Separation of Powers clause..."

Frist And Hastert Rediscover The Constitution is continued here.

Great article on women, visibility, blogging++ - BlogSisters kudos

What makes the women-online visibility issue as important as it is--to me anyway--is that men are still grabbing the lion's share of speaking and consulting gigs related to this space--BlogHer and other women-visibility-boosting outlets aim to change that:

...Together, they decided to stop talking about where the women bloggers are and create a place for women bloggers to read each other and be read by everyone. They built on the earlier efforts of women equally determined to amplify muted female voices such as Jeneane Sessum, the Atlanta founder of Blog Sisters.

"Blog Sisters and now BlogHer give women much improved visibility in a space that now has an economic component to it," Sessum said.

A GREAT article by uberreporter Jessica Guynn in the Contra Costa Times about women and blogging and BlogHer.

Ask questions now for the Tuesday roundtable with the BlogHers++. Cool!

Tags: BlogHer, women, blogging, tech, web2.0, business, PR = Powered by Qumana

White House Shakeup Song Parody and Limericks

I've written a song parody and a pair of limericks about the so-called White House shakeup. Here's a couple of verses from my song parody, The White House Shakeup Song, sung to the tune of Good King Wenceslas:

The White House Shakeup Song (Sing to Good King Wenceslas)
By Madeleine Begun Kane

"Bolten's cleaning house they claim.
He needs staffers brainy.
Upward polls are Bolten's aim.
Why not start with Cheney?

Many think that Don must go.
Rumsfeld's quite abysmal.
Dubya answers no, no, no.
Bush is just as dismal.

Miers may just lose her job.
Nearly was "Her Honor."
Andrew Card worked way too hard..."

The rest of my song parody and my two limericks are here, and my audio podcast version (with me attempting to sing my White House Shakeup Song) is here.

Private, Free Counseling for Rape and Incest Victims via KnowNow's RSS-powered RAIN Network

What is the "Rape, Abuse, Incest National Network (RAINN)"? It's a powerful new way for victims of rape and incest to get qualified help in a way that's become increasingly comfortable for young people -- online.

Here's the official information -- please pass it along to those you think might benefit from it.
The pilot launch of the Online Hotline will begin in May, with a national launch expected in September. For more info, visit www.rainn.org/programs/online-hotline.

------------

KnowNow Inc., a market leader in RSS content delivery and communication and notification services, today announced that it is providing application development services and its eLerts RSS solution to connect a victim with an available trained volunteer as soon as they need one, through RAINN’s newly announced secure online hotline. To ensure protection of each individual who has a query or a need to talk to a counselor immediately, the request is connected to one of RAINN’s trained volunteers quickly, securely and anonymously.

RAINN will launch the National Sexual Assault Online Hotline in the fall, which will be the web's first secure hotline service, offering live help 24 hours a day.

Given that calls to the national telephone hotline continue to increase (the free hotline helped up to 137,039 people in 2005, up 44% in the last three years), research and observation are finding an increased reluctance among young people to use the phone. Since 80% of rape victims fall under age 30, adding an online way to communicate is a critical component to making the program a success.

In addition to KnowNow’s RSS solution, RAINN is partnering with other key technology players to make this a reality in the fall, including AOL, Verisign, Accius and McAfee.

How It Will Work:

One click will take users from rainn.org to the Online Hotline. There, they will anonymously request help and be connected to a trained volunteer for live, one-on-one support. The user's screen will be as clear and intuitive as instant messaging, so there's no learning curve. Sessions cannot be traced back to a user. No record of the session or user remains after a chat reinforcing privacy and confidentiality, so victims know that when they reach out, it remains anonymous.

A Pair Of Limericks For A Six-Pack Of Generals

My latest is "A Pair Of Limericks For a Six-Pack Of Generals." Here's one of the limericks:

War Against The Generals
By Madeleine Begun Kane

Some Gen'rals say Rummy must go.
So I'm guessing they're traitors and foes.
Soon we'll hear that they're pals
With bin Laden, et al.
Or much worse, that they're Democrat bro's.

My other limerick about the Generals is here.

Phone Buddies Community

I just became the community manager of an amazing emotional support community for women called Phone Buddies. (I'm also a participating member myself.) The basic idea is that you trade peer counseling sessions with other women, so each woman gets free counseling. There are 6 different types of emotional support techniques taught to community members, so it isn't just your everyday chatting, though it also isn't professional counseling either. A lot of the time I just need someone to talk to in a way that is really helpful -- not therapy and not just venting either.

There are a lot of really cool things about it actually. You don't have to give out your last name so it's totally confidential. Stuff like that. Anyway, I'm telling other women about it because I'd really like to see the community grow. The more women that participate the more Buddies we all get to exchange sessions with.

The website is at http://www.phone-buddies.com so check it out for yourself. I think it's amazing. I told my mother and sister about it and they're excited too. I love helping people and I could really use a stronger support network myself. My company has done a lot of cool projects, but I think this is probably going to be the coolest of all.

17 years ago today 96 Liverpool fans died needlessly. Let them never be forgotten.

Yoga's growing US popularity attracts cash

Yoga's growing US popularity attracts cash

Good article...good points.

As always, in everything I do I strive to maintain a semblance of balance in my days, in my work, in my personal life. Often it's a struggle because I am simply too busy. There is too much going on. I take on too much. Biting off more than we can chew. That's the danger I see with Yoga as well. While I desperately want to preserve my integrity as a teacher and promote the 'true' aspects of Yoga - I want to be successful, I want the program to grow and horror of horrors I want to make money being a Yoga teacher.

But last night, when the person who used the room before me, left behind dry erase markers and an eraser I decided to use it to actually 'teach' the class a 'lesson' not just movements but about the underlying principles that help govern Yogis/Yoginis: the Yamas and the Niyamas. As I was writing on the board, putting up the words and definitions, I noticed on the other board an 'erased' drawing of the human body complete with arrows pointing to the various parts and joints and then to the right of this 'ghostly' remainder of the body was an erased 'OM' symbol. I was suddenly overtaken by joy and I began to remember why I teach this practice to others. I re-traced the 'OM' symbol and went out to gather my class....

I think I am going to make it through everything that modern/materialistic society has to throw at me.

Clueless

I grew up in a loving household in which education was prized. I attended Smith College, where women's minds are taken seriously, and got a fantastic education. I spent my junior year in Paris. I loved France, the French language, the people, everything. Upon graduation from Smith, I asked a distinguished French professor to be my mentor, and he accepted. I applied to, and was accepted at the Sorbonne.

Instead of going to France, I married a man I had been dating, who had started slapping me around early in our relationship. I lasted over 30 years before I got out. And I can't even give myself credit for leaving. My eleven-year-old son had to run away from home and get the police involved before I woke up and realized that my life was not normal.

So what's with that? How does a woman who's been told all her life that she's powerful, she's intelligent, she's capable, fall into such a trap? And not have a clue that she's even doing it?

And if a woman with all the obvious advantages can make such poor choices, what must it be like for the millions of women who didn't start out so lucky?

Ode to the Leaker-In-Chief

I dedicate this poem to our Leaker-In-Chief:

Ode to the Leaker-In-Chief
By Madeleine Begun Kane

"The latest revelation
In the Scooter Libby case,
Is that when it comes to leaking,
Georgie Dub is quite the ace.

Those weren't aberrations
When he ordered up those leaks.
Bush betrays his office daily... "

The rest of my Ode To The Leaker-In-Chief is here.

Famous One-Eyed Kitten to Go on Display

Famous One-Eyed Kitten to Go on Display

Wonder how many people are going to flock to see this?

Duo of Tom DeLay Limericks

I've written two Tom DeLay limericks. Here's one of them:
Ode to the Bugman
By Madeleine Begun Kane

Tom's speech was jam-packed with some gems.
His withdrawal he blamed on the Dems.
It seems Streisand and Moore
Forced him out the House door.
Has the Bugman been sniffing his chems?

You can find both Tom DeLay limericks here.

"And They Cook, Too"

And They Cook, Too

A Blogger Cookbook Fundraiser for
Doctors Without Borders

Compiled and edited by Ginger Mayerson and Kathy Flake

Graphics by Tild~

Illustrations by Carol Colin and Robin Riggs

From the introduction:

Last year on October 8 an earthquake, measuring 7.6 on the Richter scale, hit Kashmir, the northern part of Pakistan. Being a native Californian, I know that’s no small cheese. Unfortunately, by October 8, 2005, I was tapped out from Katrina giving and could not give to my favorite charity, Doctors Without Borders, also known as Les Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF). There was no doubt in my mind that MSF would be on the spot, doctoring in Kashmir, then and even now, and around the world wherever they are needed, as usual.

And so, partly out of guilt, but mostly out of admiration, the plan for this cookbook fundraiser was born. Now, I don’t cook very much and my basic culinary philosophy is "Shake it out of the box and eat it." However, I very much admire people who make an art of cooking and even make it look fun. I also read a lot of blogs, all kinds of blogs from all over the world: political, art, culture, whatever, and I noticed many of these bloggers posting recipes. Sometimes I’d print them out and put them in my very neatly organized, but seldom consulted three-ring Recipes binder. Every now and then I’d think how nice it would be to have all those online recipes in a book format... And an idea began to take shape..

Ads for this cookbook fundraiser are starting to pop up on blogs all over the reality-based portion of the blogosphere. Remember: this is a collection of recipes from PROGRESSIVE, LIBERAL bloggers!

See the Table of Contents and more...

...which includes the list of bloggers who contributed recipes and/or their time and effort in assembling this project.

As you will see, there are some pretty big names on that list:

Body and Soul, Majikthise, Mad Kane, The News Blog, Sadly, No!, Dohiyi Mir, Elayne Riggs, Agitprop, Pam's House Blend, and the list goes on...

CLICK HERE TO BUY A COPY OF "AND THEY COOK, TOO"

Please support the worthwhile cause of Doctors Without Borders by buying a copy of
"And They Cook, Too" today, won't you?

Thank you!

This entry also appears here.

Becoming Convinced

The realization is dawning on me that hosting the "Together in Spirit" radio show is as much about the all pervasive guru teaching me as it is about presenting the wisdom of my amazing guests to the listening audience. Each week I seem to come away with something that changes the way I approach my practice or that gives me new insight into what I am already doing.

The recent sequence of shows has been especially instructive. One week I spoke with James Twyman and came away with renewed clarity that it is only the switch from ego-perception to divine-perception that can ever free us from our habitual creation of a world that seems filled with suffering. Trying to train the ego to create an experience of heaven on earth is like trying to train a tree to fly.

The next week I had two Enneagram experts come on and they affirmed that the ego creates what they call stories, and that I also think of as filters, to interpret the world it sees and that it is these filters that distort our understanding of reality and cause us to live some distance from our true selves. (Different people have different habitual filters, which the enneagram describes classified into 9 personality types.) Once again, it is the ego causing us to experience samsara instead of nirvana, not any quality in our external situation, and its key role is distorting perception so that we perceive and interpret according to its beliefs instead of having a direct experience of reality and getting to learn from that.

Now, as I prepare for the appearance of Byron Katie on the show this coming Tuesday, this understanding gathers still more power over my perception. Each time I have a guest coming on I spend a considerable amount of time familiarizing myself with their work. I have been reading both of Katie's books and have listened to recordings of her workshops, as well as trying the process called "The Work" on myself. I not only had some valuable and freeing realizations as a result of this, I also have experienced a shift in my perception.

I could go back through experiences with guests from previous weeks also. I have learned from each of them. I highlight these last three simply because it is now that I feel the full momentum of this process shifting my actual state of daily perception. I have long been exposed to the ideas I relate above, but for the last couple of days I have truly felt an identity of "true self" as myself, while witnessing the filter of ego as it functions without any aggression towards it, but also without being taken in by its stories.

I also have lived within this experiential reality before, but this is the first time it feels integrated within the development of a deeper state of understanding. All other times it seemed more like a gift of grace -- one that suddenly descended upon me without any rhyme or reason and that left, whether after a day, a week or a month, with just as much mystery.

Doing this show, which I first embarked upon as a way of gifting others, has become a huge blessing in my life. Of course, that should be expected. What we give to others is what we gift to ourselves. Just nice to have it confirmed once again -- and nice to share it as a reminder to you as well.

I just hope the show's sponsor is equally pleased with how things are going. The current season ends on May 9 with my interview of Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche, the head of the Shambhala buddhist lineage and publisher of the Shambhala Sun magazine. Not sure where it will all be heading by that time.

Childcare Survey for BlogHer

The BlogHer group is currently investigating childcare options for the conference in July. If you think you'll be attending and have thoughts or needs on childcare, PLEASE PLEASE take this survey so your ideas/concerns/requests can be taken into consideration.

I know at SXSW, it was a blessing to find Grandparents Unlimited of Austin, who connected us with a great lady to care for Jenna during our Sunday panel, and then during the two parties we attended in the evenings Sunday and Monday. At the same time, we got to enjoy meals together, swimming together, we took her over to the conference where she experienced part of the Cluetrain panel and spent three hours building a Lego city--all wrapped into two days plus. She loved Austin, riding the trolly, and it was a great experience for her.

For me, attending BlogHer is tied to having access to childcare. What are your needs? Take the survey and let us know.

THANKS!!

Tags: BlogHer, Conference, Childcare, Survey = Powered by Qumana

Re: The Muppets

I recently completed a multi-part story about loneliness, love, coming out, heartache and redemption. It's a bit of a roller coaster and it wasn't always easy to write but in the end, it's an uplifting (I think) tale.

Please check out Re: The Muppets to share in my journey from a lonely and confused young girl to a woman who found strength in herself and the love, comfort and support of a remarkable group of friends.

It took me a while to finish and at times I wanted to quit but I received so many amazing and encouraging comments and emails along the way. It turns out my personal experience with debilitating sorrow and heartbreak isn't all that unique in this amazing community of ours. For me, this experience has been a deeper testament to our power and resilience.

Thank you for the opportunity to share.

AXINAR'S: The Great South Dakota Sex Strike

AXINAR'S: The Great South Dakota Sex Strike

From a fellow comrade who took this from another brilliant mind....

Think about it...

Say it with me now....'Lysistrata'

When Someone You Love Has More Secrets Than You Want To Kno

What happens when you marry the person of your dreams, and everything appears to be hunky-dory....and then you find out that he/she's hiding something...like that maybe he or she is gay....

The NYTimes has a story today on what happens when gay men marry straight women--or what's now being called the Brokeback Marriage phenomenon:

. . . an estimated 1.7 million to 3.4 million American women who once were or are now married to men who have sex with men.

The estimate derives from "The Social Organization of Sexuality," a 1990 study, that found that 3.9 percent of American men who had ever been married had had sex with men in the previous five years. The lead author, Edward O. Laumann, a sociologist at the University of Chicago, estimated that 2 to 4 percent of ever-married American women had knowingly or unknowingly been in what are now called mixed-orientation marriages.

Such marriages are not just artifacts of the closeted 1950's. In the 16th century, Queen Anne of Denmark had eight children with King James I of England, known not only for the King James Bible, but also for his devotion to male favorites, one of whom he called "my sweet child and wife."

Other women include Constance Wilde, Phyllis Gates, Linda Porter, Renata Blauel and Dina Matos McGreevey, wed respectively to Oscar Wilde, Rock Hudson, Cole Porter, Elton John and James E. McGreevey, the former governor of New Jersey.

Although precise numbers are impossible to come by, 10,000 to 20,000 such wives have contacted online support groups, and increasing numbers of them are women in their 20's or 30's.

On the whole these are not marriages of convenience or cynical efforts to create cover. Gay and bisexual men continue to marry for complex reasons, many impelled not only by discrimination, but also by wishful thinking, the layered ambiguities of sexual love and authentic affection.

I'm glad that The Times did not devolve into the gross, ubiquitous generalization that gay men marry because they need a "beard." Nope. Sometimes the men don't even know they're gay until later on:

"These men genuinely love their wives," said Joe Kort, a clinical social worker in Royal Oak, Mich., who has counseled hundreds of gay married men, including a minority who stay in their marriages. Many, he said, considered themselves heterosexual men with homosexual urges that they hoped to confine to private fantasy life.

"They fall in love with their wives, they have children, they're on a chemical, romantic high, and then after about seven years, the high falls away and their gay identity starts emerging," Mr. Kort said. "They don't mean any harm."

These men want homes, and children...they want that Suburban Dream that all of us want. They want to be upstanding members of the community, they want their marriages to last. They, truly, do not mean harm.

Men do many things to deny their homosexuality--they compartmentalize it, go on the 'down low' (as Oprah likes to say), they even go to pro-dommes to be punished for their feelings while indulging in activities their bodies crave.

Sexuality is very, very complicated. Intimacy is very, very complicated. We can't just compartmentalize it away, and hope that our Higher Natures will carry us thru to do The Right Thing at all times.

We are, after all, human. With feet of clay. Bound to fail. or at least fall over...

But the article has a couple of serious flaws. It never deals with men whose marriages end because their wives discovered they are lesbian. That happened to a couple I knew back in New Jersey--friends of my ex-husband. He ended up with the kids. Not because she was a lesbian, though...because she really didn't want to care for them. Who knows exactly why she felt that way. But it was, I'm sure, sad for both of them...

And I remember, when I was a kid, the couple that lived across the street. My mother hated the woman because she had a lover. Turned out that her husband, who she divorced, finally, when her daughter was old enough to understand, was gay. Geri and Paul had worked out an arrangement--they had separate sex lives--that worked for a time. But who knows what happened there. Maybe her lover wanted to marry her after years of being the Other Man. Maybe her husband wanted to have his own lovers at his house rather than catting around...

Who knows? None of us knows.

Now, I can hear young friends of mine, in their 20's and 30's saying "that's right!Dump his ass! He might come home with AIDS!" But dumping a person one loves isn't always easy. And someimes women marry gay men who don't know they're gay for the women's own reasons:

Mr. Kort, however, said that women should look deeper. "Straight people rarely marry gay people accidentally," he wrote in a case study of a mixed-orientation marriage published last September in Psychotherapy Networker, a magazine for which this reporter is the features editor.

Some women, Mr. Kort said, find gay men less judgmental and more flexible, while others unconsciously seek partnerships that are not sexually passionate.

That, apparently, was the case of Cole and Linda Porter, who were devoted to each other, not just because he was gay, but because she had her own issues with sex and preferred to live with a man who did not demand that from her.

Women, too, compartmentalize. For their own reasons. Women sometimes want the affection more than the sex.

Yet sex is easy for some of us--and Love is difficult. Sometimes love, without sex, or sex dwelling separate from the love relationship, is far easier to deal with, and to understand, than that messy combination of sex/love/marriage/baby carriage.

We all have our reasons for staying with a person--reasons many times others outside of our relationships are not entitled to know. We all have our reasons for forgiving someone for not being Perfect. We all have our reasons for staying with someone, and staying in a relationship that might not be the Whole Enchilada that we are brought up to believe every relationship is supposed to be--because maybe there's a part of that Enchilada that is far sweeter and more comforting than soldiering on alone, and waiting for Mr. or Ms. Wonderful.

And maybe it's just that, as we get older, we understand that sex/love/marriage/baby carriage are a phase of life, that it's not all of life for ever and ever until death do us part as those vows say. Maybe we understand that marriage, as it is constituted by both Church and State, is a social contract; and that the heart and sex organs can't be reigned in forever and ever under such an enduring and legally complicated contract.

Paulette Cormack, a teacher who lives in Napa, Calif., has been married to her husband, Jerry, a retired city planner, for 36 years. For 34 years, Mrs. Cormack said in an interview, she has known that although she and her husband are sexually active together, his erotic desires otherwise focus almost exclusively on men. "It's not easy, but I truly do love him," Mrs. Cormack said.

Mr. Cormack is now involved with another married gay man, and Mrs. Cormack has had extramarital relationships. Neither has explicitly discussed this with their son, who is 25.

They remain intensely committed to each other. Last year Mr. Cormack nursed Mrs. Cormack through four months of treatments for cancer of the fallopian tubes. She eventually made a fully recovery.

"What is intimacy?" pondered Mr. Cormack, as the couple sat in a coffeehouse in Berkeley, Calif., after watching "Brokeback Mountain" with others in similar situations.

He added: "I am totally committed on all levels to Paulette. I felt so intimate with her when I was caring for her during her cancer treatments — to me, that's a stronger expression of love than whether I'm having anonymous sex with a man."

How we live, how we love, can be trivialized and called things like "Brokeback Marriage" but the thing is, we cannot understand the nature of another couple's relationship. And, for most of us, we can't even judge our own--because we might not know the true nature of our partner's deepest, darkest needs.

Because maybe, out of fear of losing us, they can't tell us.

We can rest our minds in certitude, in a self-righteous "I know my partner better than anybody" mindset-- but, truthfully, life has taught me that we can never be certain of some things about our partners. And, sometimes, perhaps, it's the unconditional love and devotion, devoid of the heavy words of the marriage social contract and mandatory weekly sex, that is, in the end, what holds some couples together.

Nothing, and no one, is perfect. That we love, and are devoted, is sometimes perfect enough.


(crossposted here)

Sisters of the Blogosphere,

I am so honored to have been interviewed by Yvonne Divita of Lipsticking: Smart Marketing to Women Online and so I wanted to share it with the Blog Sisters.

Yvonne is one of the amazing contributors to E-Women Online Tactics, the report I recently launched that is a compilation of the Internet Marketing Strategies by female online marketers.

Yvonne and I met online and we have been corresponding regularly ever since. One of the most wonderful aspects of having a blog is the new connections that I’ve made virtually. I have had the opportunity to develop friendships with people who I never would have met otherwise. I am so happy to be meeting so many inspiring women bloggers like Yvonne.

Here’s part of her introduction to the interview:

"This week, I chose Wendy Maynard of Kinetic Ideas… a blog with great ideas, and wonderful pictures. Wendy and I met via the blogosphere - and we became fast friends. I admire her upbeat, chatty writing, and the gems she shares with others, on marketing, on branding, and on connecting. I learned some new things from this interview, I think you will, too."

I think you will get a big kick out of the interview and you will LOVE Yvonne’s blog if you've never seen it, so click here to see the whole thing.

Have a wonderful weekend!

Wendy Maynard
Kinetic Ideas

NPR : The Abortion Debate Through a Son's Eyes

NPR : The Abortion Debate Through a Son's Eyes

Just something thought provoking to share with all of you....

Feelings...good, bad, indifferent

It’s hard to know what to focus on when my mind seems so scattered...

All my training, all my study of the disciplines that should help me (yoga, meditation, deep relaxation, visualization) seem to fail when I need them the most.

I can help students, most of them are perfect strangers to me, but I can’t seem to help myself and the more I try to *relax* the further out of reach the ‘peace of mind’ seems – there’s a detour on the path of my own tranquility.

My seated practice has suffered mainly because I’ve been in so much pain I can not sit – my neck, my shoulders, my knees, my hips – I feel like I’ve become an old woman before my time...I creak, I crack, I pop and at once I am frustrated as well as sympathetic to some of my students with similar physical ailments

I just feel like the days blur, I am going through the motions and I don’t even have a clue – numbness just takes over...

Last night I was at dinner with my friend, Mr. C and I got to talk to him about how I feel - like I have always had to be strong and I am tired of being expected to be that way ALL THE TIME – even most of the time...why isn’t it OK to stop, to not fight? Who is this fight for, me? Who is it ever for? Is it selfish of me to want to just stop?

Once, when one of my dearest friends was faced with a serious illness (she had colon cancer and they missed some of it when they removed it and they did no radiation so it spread to her bones – awful just awful) – she was being treated with chemo, well chemo is toxic, very toxic and most of us are affected by that but it was nearly fatal for her – she was being poisoned and she had to be hospitalized and the things she was going through at the time were just horrendous and I remember one phone call early on where she called me crying and began talking about how she wanted to die – really wanted to – she needed to talk about THAT feeling with someone because her kids just would not listen to her – she wanted to talk about her own funeral. It was (and still is) one of the hardest conversations I have ever had to have with a friend, but I listened, why? Because I OWED her that much – she was my friend – she was my sister at heart and with that conversation it dawned on me and I’ve never forgotten that we have to remember it’s OK to live with those feelings too – it’s OK to ALLOW your loved ones let go – the ONLY reason we don’t want them to ‘give up the ghost’ as it were is purely selfish on our part – we will miss them – we don’t want them to leave our universe…not realizing that they will always be with us, in our hearts, in our minds, in our intertwining of spirits that makes us all a part of something bigger...something sacred and joyful...something that can never be taken away.