Sunday, March 11, 2007

real women have....

Yes, I know. The expected subsequent word is "curves," and I was going to post about having an appointment tomorrow morning to sign up at "Curves for Women" so that I can get myself on an exercise program.

But that was before I checked over at a blog from Saudi Arabia written by an American woman who lives there. If you haven't found Sand Gets In My Eyes yet, you're missing out not only on some excellent writing, but even more important, on a perspective on that country that is both honest and personal.

Her post Is Phyllis Chesler Right? is infuriating because it's so honest, so correct (although not politically), and links over to an even more infuriating article in the Times Online by Chesler entitled How My Eyes Were Opened to the Barbarity of Islam.

Now, I have been a fan of Chesler since I read Women and Madness at a time in my life when I was both mad/angry and wondering if I were going mad/crazy. That book helped to launch me into the heart of feminism.

Just as I can't understand how savvy, smart women can tolerate the demeaning attitude toward them from the Catholic and other "Christian" churces, I have never been able to understand how anyone with an ounce of humanity in them keep finding excuses for the way women are treated in so many of the Islam-based cultures. I find it infuriating.

And so do Lori of Sand in My Eyes and Chesler of the long list of
publications challenging women to stand up and men to wake up.

I'm not going to quote from either of them here because both of their pieces (see third paragraph above for links) should be read whole.

I continue not to understand why the most "religious" people totally ignore the Golden Rule.

goldenrule.jpg
[cross-posted at Kalilily Time]

Sunday, March 04, 2007

Melbourne's One Day Mini Conference is a week away

We are in the final stages of putting together the biggest mini conference in Brevard County - Five dynamic speakers will give presentations and let you into their worlds. These people are scribblers,biographers, novelists, essayists, bards, poets, columnists, journalists, writers, authors, editors, and publishers - some are a little bit of each, while others specialize in one or two areas - but they are all writers. And each one is preparing to share with you, his or her unique knowledge of the writing industry, and how it can impact your life in a personal way.

Our team of volunteers have been working diligently to provide a fantastic experience for you, on the beach! We'll have a delicious lunch, snacks, and some tremendous goodie bags as well as door prizes and some amazing and amusing surprises.

This is a one day conference, you won't want to miss. If you haven't yet registered, you'll want to print out the form below and mail it in quickly.

If you have any questions, please email writermary@gmail.com

Thursday, March 01, 2007

Carnival Linkage

There are more carnivals than you can shake a stick at around the blogosphere, but I think the following will be worth the reading time of this blog's visitors. Scientiae Carnival #1 is over at Rants of a Feminist Engineer. It's a compilation of some thought-provoking posts on women in science and engineering.

Friday, February 23, 2007

Virginity Soap??!! WTF!!!

A blogger in Saudi Arabia tells of a scam that takes us back to the fantasies of men in the Middle Ages -- and in their middle ages -- when the virginity of their women was one of their prized possessions.

Read Lori's post in her blog, Sand Gets in My Eyes, where she reports:

According to Peaceful Muslimah, the soaps are indicative of a larger problem in the Middle East (and likely other parts of the world), where a woman’s virginity is her most important asset." Unfortunately in many Muslim societies, as well as non-Muslim underdeveloped nations, there is an extreme pressure brought to bear on women's chastity. As I recently discussed here, lack of chastity or even the perception of it can lead to fatal consequences. So is it any wonder that Muslim women are willing to go to extraordinary measures to maintain the appearance of the virginal bride on their honeymoon."

[snip]

I did some checking, and the soaps are readily available throughout the world, thanks in large part to the internet. The idea is that the soap’s astringents “constrict and tighten" , creating that coveted "look and feel" of virginity.

One manufacturer boasts their product is...."Used and enjoyed by hundreds of thousands of women in the Middle East and Asia, it has brought back youthful passions, rekindled sensual yearnings, and completely intensified sexual experience.”

Ha! What a lot of bunk!

Her entire post includes more links and info. It would be great if other Blog Sisters would post about this issue as well.

Cross posted at www.kalilily.net

Sunday, February 18, 2007

WHO are we?

Dear Blog Sisters, Wanted to let you know, I claimed our page over on squidoo, and anyone who wants to can go over and edit the page -- ADD your bio, links to your other blogs and websites, the stuff you care about. Have at it! Let me know how it goes. Much love, your fearless leader.

Monday, February 05, 2007

Spirits dance

I walk through the landscape in my mind…it becomes a stroll through memories, past, present, and future...

...always he is there...waiting for me, beckoning...

And we connect yet again...never missing a step…as if we had never been apart…and where we meet, our spirits intersect...there is beauty, there is joy, there is some melancholy as well...

I realise that he never left...that we have always shared...that we always will...that we will meet again in the next lifetime..and, remember again...lifetime after lifetime.

There is no hiding from this, there never was...we just drifted like snows, like sands shifting in the desert...yet, like the snow melting that returns to the earth, like the sands that shift but remain part of the whole terrain forever – we never really leave each other…we remain tied to one another...through life, through other lovers, through lifetimes past, present and future...

Always...

Laughter and Chocolate


This picture makes me smile so much! It's my young son - laughing and covered in chocolate on holiday in Southern Spain.

I am pretty new to the world of blogging and this site.

I live in a small and beautiful village in England, and I think a few other countries like the U.S., Canada, France and Australia seem much more comfortable with this medium. I have been finding my way around, and trying to make sense of the links and blogrolls and all that la-di-da - what has intrigued me is the way women are linking up and talking about really important and personal issues. I guess that's no surprise, we're pretty fantastic at that, huh? - but what an amazing idea, that we can do that globally and easily without the barriers of distance, nationality, colour, race or cultures.

I'm married to an American, who wandered across to Europe for the obligatory trip in his twenties, and stayed 15 years! In 2003, I was a single Mum to a 3 year old boy , working full-time as a Director of HR for an animal welfare charity. I found the love of my life on the internet! We flew to meet each other after 17 days of emailing, and in 36 hours knew we had found our respective soul mate and decided to change our whole lives around to be together. It was at this point the irony of life kicked in ,and the company he was working for in Europe posted him back to the U.S. for 14 months... West Coast at that... It was mad, but fairy-tale stuff - all-day flights to get to Las Vegas for 30 hours to see each other and then fly back to take my son to school... and I HATE flying... and leaving my son! Luckily I had moved to my parent's village, so he was quite happy that I take off occasionally - time to be spoilt at the Grandparents!!

Now we're trying IVF, and I'm deep in injections and hormone hell.

There must be so many of you out there, thousands of miles away, juggling the same challenges that I am (and many of you juggling much, much more)...Sliding into work wondering if you remembered to put your child's spelling book in his bag whilst rushing off the next meeting....Fitting the weekly shopping around lunch breaks and trying to fit in a million priorities... Flopping down on a Friday night having "survived" another week!! Great that those moments can be shared in this way - some of the blogs I've stumbled across have been fantastic - funny, heart-wrenching, witty, sad, optimistic - sometimes all in the same blog!
So I wish you a day like the photo of my son - laughing and with plenty of chocolate!!

Tuesday, January 30, 2007

Random thoughts of interest

So we have all heard; if a tree falls in a forest and no one is there to hear it, how do we know if it makes a sound....
Well if a blogger, blogs how do we know if there is someone out there reading if you don't post comments....
Now that I got your attention......
We blog for our sanity, therapy and to get feedback and help from our friends loved ones and anyone in an "ear-shot", but how do we get people to flock and respond....I have plenty to talk about and want to say...and I think the kindness- no i am counting the kindness of you kind sould to get me through the dark times, and the fun times....
I had a rough year last year with my dear friend dying, and life happening all around me while i stood there being numb, or trying to be, but it was a hard time to get through..and heck I am still getting through it. How can you get through a time like that.... I mean I got through it, but am more than still visibly shaken...
Then on to better time last year....right before that...finding true love. On March 5 to be exact, when the love of my life and I confessed our true feelings for one and other...completely and utterly out of the blue(I missed Resse Witherspoon exceptence speech on Oscar night, when the feelings where announced). And the winner is:....drum roll please.....ME! That was a thrilling and odd night to say the least..one that will be fun to tell the kids and the grandkids some day trust me...
Then this year I got to have a few highlights so far....The near completion of the remodeling of my apartment....meeting Tommy Lee, Dave Navarro, Dilana, and Toby Rand, and seeing (the ever so hot) Jenna Jameson *standing like 10 feet away* ..And all in the same night...the best part of this new year....Seeing my oldest and dearest friend that I haven't seen in 15 years at the same concert (SuperNova)..And it was so cool playing catch up and seeing her Sister and their husbands, it was surreal for sure..And yet it was like no time had passed at all.
the next stop for this year - My man comes home next month...I can't wait.
the furture is wide open and just waiting. And I am waiting to, for you my viewers. Let's play catch up...and talk and get to know one another. Share the good the bad and the ugly.
so please let me know your out...
Heck throw out a topic and let's see what trouble we get into.....
catch ya on the flip side...

Sunday, January 28, 2007

not keeping up with the Joneses

It's no surprise that while visiting in Massachusetts, I went to the shopping mall with my daughter and grandson. He had taken some money out of his piggy bank to buy himself a toy. And, of course, I had planned to subsidize some additional treat.

As we three strolled down the main mallway, we were accosted by a jovial gentleman with a microphone followed by a quiet guy with a news station videocamera. At first, I wasn't going to stop and be interviewed, but when my daughter heard that the interviewer was looking for a family of three generations, she opted to talk to him. And so I agreed to join in.

"You've heard of 'keeping up with the Joneses', haven't you," he asked and then proceeded to explain that he was interviewing people about how much they buy into that concept. And he was wondering how that changed over the generations.

I went first, explaining that, because my parents had been upwardly mobile and my mother very conscious of what she had in comparison to others, I rebelled against the stress of that lifestyle, opting to go into education -- which really doesn't pay that well. I think I said that I started out as a teacher because I wanted to contribute something to the world. While there was some truth to everything that cam e out of my mouth in that spur-of-the-moment monologue, the rest of the truths are even more relevent. But I never got a chance to get into all of that. So, instead, I sounded like a poster mom for "family values." If you read my blog, you know that I'm a far cry from that.

My daughter's brief statements also reflected only part of her truths. She said that she left the workforce to stay home and raise her son; that it was hard living on one income, but she felt it was worth it. All of that is true.

What neither of has had a chance to say, however, was that we were never interested in "keeping up with the Joneses" because we began our adult lives being more interested in following our dreams than making a lot of money -- her dream being acting and mine being writing. Ultimately, as it turned out, we chose lives that center around the people we love. I guess we are just not competitive enough to have gotten sucked into that "keeping up" rat race.

Relative to all of that, I recently read an article in The Week stating:

A growing number of new mothers are quitting their jobs to devote their full-time attention to their children. Is the traditional family making a comeback?

The article also includes these statements:

A growing number of companies are offering to let moms telecommute or work flexible hours to avoid losing them altogether. If employers had done this earlier, they might have avoided their current jam, says Joan Williams, director of the Center for WorkLife Law at the University of California, Hastings. Most mothers would prefer to keep working, she said, but are “pushed out by workplace inflexibility, the lack of supports, and a workplace bias against mothers.” In a recent survey, 86 percent of women said obstacles such as inflexible hours were key reasons behind their decisions to leave.

and

“At the height of the women’s movement and shortly thereafter, women were much more firm in their expectation that they could somehow combine full-time work with child rearing,” said Yale historian Cynthia Russett. “The women today are, in effect, turning realistic.”


As a single mother, I had no choice but to work. My daughter has a choice, and I have a feeling that her experiences growing up under my roof contributed a great deal to her making the one she has. And I think she made the right one.

(Cross-posted at Kalilily Time)

Wednesday, December 20, 2006

the anti-woman new Wicker Man

I saw the original Wicker Man in the mid-seventies. It was by far the most gut-clenching film I've ever seen. From here:
The Wicker Man is a cult 1973 British film combining thriller, horror and musical, directed by Robin Hardy and written by Anthony Shaffer. The film stars Edward Woodward, Christopher Lee, Diane Cilento, Ingrid Pitt and Britt Ekland. Paul Giovanni composed the soundtrack, a recording cited as a major influence on neofolk and psych folk artists.
The original Wicker Man film focused on an island population of pagans that included both men and women -- all of whom were engaged in determining what was to befall the "hero." I remember that the film was steeped in a ancient eroticism as the island population struggled to find their balance between all of those natural forces of opposites.

The new Wicker Man is devoid of male-female tension and eroticism of any kind; the pagan population is totally female (except for a few drones). The new version attributes only to women the chthonic spirit that the original movie rightly attributed to all people who followed the pagan ways. The unspoken message to us in these times is "watch out when those women take over" especially those females who find personal strength in the mythic histories of their gender. They are dangerous. They will destroy you.

The primal darkness in all of us is a powerful and dangerous force. The original Wicker Man captured that terrifying power. The new Wicker Man is a weakened and distorted version of what was once a truly horrifying tale.

(Side note: The star of the original Wicker Man was Edward Woodward. In the new version, the name of the "hero" is Edward Woodward.)

I don't know if you can rent the 1970s Wicker Man, but you can buy it here.

It's worth the price.

(cross posted at www.kalilily.net)

Monday, December 18, 2006

The Writer Ratio

People's perceptions of who reads what are definitely skewed. But what about authors on the publishing end? Do authors self-segregate into particular genres or do editors have some say in what kind of author get published?

I came across the Broad Universe Bean Count which has some very interesting statistics on how many women and men are published in the speculative fiction field. Of course, compared to the romance genre (where most men still work under pseudonyms or with female co-authors), science fiction and fantasy appears to be a bastillion of equality. But nonetheless, the numbers aren't that great. It's true that over the years, the percentage of women winning awards has gone up, but for most of them, the split is still not fifty-fifty.

Some other observations: Male reviewers prefer to review books authored by other males. The majority of stories in anthologies of speculative fiction are by male authors. However, is it possible that this is also a function of how many female speculative fiction writers are present in the first place? The membership of SFWA is not an accurate indicator of how many writers there are--you have to get published first before you can be a member. But according to Strange Horizons, about a third of their submissions were from female writers. I am very curious as to whether this is true or the exception compared to submission statistics to other magazines, agents, and editors.

And another question: Does the sex of the authors also influence what kind of readers are drawn to a genre? With the quality of writing being equal as well as the male/female ratio of writers in whatever genre--would this equalize the readership as well? Or will people still be too hung up on convention and formula to read a book for the story?

(Cross-posted at Syaffolee.)

Tuesday, December 12, 2006

The Museum of Kitschy Stitches

If you're searching for the perfect holiday gift, if you're having friends over a lot in the coming weeks and want a great conversation-starter, or if you just need to laugh until you're wetting your pants, check out The Museum of Kitschy Stitches: A Gallery of Notorious Knits, by Stitchy McYarnpants. Stitchy is the nom de plume of a Boston-area woman who likes to collect supremely tacky old knitting and crocheting patterns (mainly from the '60s and 70s). She illustrates a few dozen of them along with hilarious commentary in this book.

I saw her a couple of months ago at the local Barnes and Noble, where she was doing a booksigning. She'd brought along a trunkful of hideous creations collected from yard sales and ebay. I bought the book, and it's been generating an evening-ful of reminiscences every time someone has spotted it. At a book discussion I hosted last month, we spent more time discussing this than the book we'd all read. I brought it on a business trip recently and showed it to a female colleague in our hotel room. She insisted I take it to a dinner party hosted in the CEO's home to show his wife. It pretty nearly took over the whole evening.

Stitchy has a website: http://www.stitchymcyarnpants.com/
and I posted a blog entry about her booksignings, which has some pictures of Stitchy and of the treasures in her trunk: http://cicilycorbett.blogspot.com/2006/09/stitchy-mcyarnpants.html.

Tuesday, October 24, 2006

RAD

It's fall, colleges are back in session, and RAD classes are starting up all over. RAD (Rape Assault Defense) is a comprehensive self-defense course for women. The course teaches awareness, prevention, risk reduction and avoidance of dangerous situations, usually with hands-on training. A typical class lasts for five sessions and costs about $5 per session.

RAD is designed for women of all ages and levels of physical conditioning. Mothers frequently attend with their daughters; elderly women living alone attend. High-school and college women concerned about date rape attend. Women learn to recognize dangerous situations, and learn how to handle them. They engage in realistic scenarios with the instructors, practicing defense techniques. The education and experience give them power and confidence.

Classes are held in community centers, YMCAs, on college campuses, and so on. My state alone has dozens of locations. Classes are also offered for children and for men. To learn more about the program, or to locate a nearby center, visit www.rad-systems.com.

Friday, October 20, 2006

Nerve

I've been a member of Blog Sisters for quite some time and have enjoyed reading all of you but this is my first post. It's a double post from my blog today and I apologize in advance for that - I just felt like I wanted to vent to other women - to other mamas - in hopes of finding some good ol' female empowerment and support.

What better place than here?
**********

Over the last few weeks, I've been asked for updates on my "baby making" status. I anticipated this but have been surprised by how quickly I've grown tired of responding. I am now kicking myself for ever publicizing (in blog or casual conversation) that my husband and I are actively trying.

Update - I am not pregnant.

However, if mine and my husband's schedules ever synchronize and I become less stressed, I have confidence that it will happen for us.

The second irritating factor to this whole topic are the comments I have received from several people along the lines of:

Well, you're not 16 anymore....your body isn't going to just snap back the way it did!

[Really? I'm impressed that you think it "snapped back" at all.]

At your age, I bet you'll find that you have to really work to get the weight off this time.

[Well, then my four years as a certified personal trainer and nutritionist will come in handy.]

The sad fact is that my first response is to defend such statements with, "Actually, women on both my mom and my dad's side of the family have had children in their mid to late 30's and managed to recover their figure with little effort; genetically, most of us have nice shapes."

What I really want to respond with is, "Why is this even a discussion that you find important and appropriate to broach?"

I will openly admit to a level of vanity - one that I now consider to be fairly healthy. As a little girl, the way I looked drew a lot more attention than the grades I made or the way I behaved. Consequently, I learned to value this aspect of myself over others for a long time. Fortunately for me, however, I have since had numerous humbling experiences - to include childbirth - which have put things in a more balanced perspective.

In fact, when I posted a few months ago about my anxiety over trying to conceive, my body image was not among my concerns. I have no idea why others deem it as noteworthy.

Update - Should I get pregnant, I may gain a few pounds that, this time, don't come right off.

So fucking what.

If you REALLY want to send me into panic mode, remind me about how kids can wreck a home faster than a tornado.....

I'm far more obsessed with how my house looks than I am my ass.

strep n fetch it.

One of the things Jenna brought back on the plane was strep. soooo that's what I've been up to the last couple of days. Fetching tissues for her to spit in and tissues for noses and wet washcloths for skin that she says feels soooo hot mommy. And soup too. Don't forget the vegetable beef soup.

Amazing Omnicef. She's bopping around today, getting back to herself quickly, though nebby treatments have begun. Looks like ENT-ville again and the tonsil discussion. I hear it's outpatient these days, which is awesome. I remember going in the night before, then being wheeled into the OR and telling the surgeon I was going to throw up as soon as I smelled that ether. They said no you aren't; it just smells. I said yes I am, and I puked all over the operating table. They freaked out and sent me home. I had to go back to kindergarten WITH my tonsils and fess up to throwing up. A few weeks later we tried again. This time, no puking and byebye tonsils.

I'm hoping better things for jenna, like no problems if it has to be, and lots of ice cream. Please don't tell her that you really don't care about ice cream when they finally get around to giving it to you.


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Tuesday, October 17, 2006

how did we miss this??

Frank Paynter posted about it, and I'm embarrassed to admit that I didn't pick up on the implications until I read what he wrote. He begins his post with this:

This post is not about the grim and twisted irony of the violence of a school shooting in Amish country. Rather, I want to draw attention to the unspoken horror of the misogyny, the hate crime against the female gender that it represents.

Frank links to several female bloggers who posted vehemently and accurately about what seems to be an increasing number of hate crimes against females. He ends his post with this:

Misogyny is everywhere. It’s in the burka. It’s in the genital mutilation of so-called “female circumcision.” It’s in the Chinese infanticide of baby girls. It’s practically a human condition. Yet once slavery was a human condition too, and now, except for a few corporate monsters, some backwards nations, and the perversion of sexual slavery it has largely been wiped out. Can we make progress against misogyny too?

I wonder why we aren't all posting about how the status and safety of all of us females is consistently being eroded. Why aren't we mad as hell.

Wednesday, October 04, 2006

Tapping into the Ex-Employee Network

(first posted on BlogHer.org)

Betsy The Devine's post on the "Puff Club" Reunion flickr photos got me thinking about business. Yes, believe it or not, a baby reunion summoned thoughts of jobs past. Specifically about the companies I have left, or who have left me, over the years, and all of the reunions I've attended (and run like hell from, depending) in the ensuing decades. These are the events during which old employees -- and sometimes current employees -- get together to drink alcoholically and laugh hysterically until the wee hours. They remind you 1) why you are glad you don't work there anymore 2) how much you miss your old workmates, and 3) why you took smoke breaks every 20 minutes.

There is something to be said for reunions.

When I was relieved of employment (along with the engineering group and a couple other mid-level management stragglers) post-childbirth by one dysfunctionally enmeshed technology company in the 90s, we ex- and current employees were so inextricably linked that reunions happened weekly. As the ex-company grew at a faster rate than the current comapny, and our ex-work-force established a more effective communication network than the internal version, company news was transmitted faster and more efficiently to non-employees than it was to employees. This generally frustrates businesses, some of which put in place policies that discourage fraternization with ex-employees.

Here's a call for companies to do just the opposite. Rather than carving the line between your ex-employees and current employees in concrete, why not encourage -- heck, even sponsor -- regular reunions where past and present employees can get together for conversation, laughing, complaining, mocking, and the like. Instead of pretending that these get togethers -- and these conversations -- aren't taking place (because they are), embrace them. Stand unafraid in the crosshairs of where past and present employees cross paths. What do you have to gain?

1) You will create emissaries of good will, fueled by the ability to be honest.
2) You will show that you are defined by every human being who has entered your doors at one time or another.
3) Often the best talent is the talent that RETURNS to the organization after going elsewhere--you will keep in touch with them.
4) You will tap into the most effective local/regional grapevine available--your ex-employee network. It's already operational. Why not add your voice?
5) You will demystify the "outside" which generally seems pretty damn alluring from the inside.

It's like the cheese bra lady. Her best ideas--and creativity--will now be used outside of her former company. There is no going back for her former employer and its clueless decision to axe her because of her cheese-like non-dairy bra. However, inviting her to the next company reunion -- even honoring her, admitting the company's shortsightedness in a funny way -- might bring that business one step closer to getting a clue.

Or at least getting some laughs and head nods.


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Sunday, October 01, 2006

the hug thing




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


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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.


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Saturday, September 30, 2006

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.


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{posted first on BlogHer)

Friday, September 29, 2006

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.

Thursday, September 28, 2006

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.


peacock feather.jpg



autumnstrip.jpg

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.

Monday, September 25, 2006

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.

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Tuesday, September 19, 2006

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.

Tuesday, September 12, 2006

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.)

Sunday, September 10, 2006

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.


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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.



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Saturday, September 09, 2006

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.


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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.


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Blog Sister Helen Jane...

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


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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").

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Friday, September 08, 2006

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.

Thursday, September 07, 2006

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?


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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.

Wednesday, September 06, 2006

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.

Saturday, August 12, 2006

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!

Monday, August 07, 2006

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.

Thursday, July 27, 2006

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!!

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Wednesday, July 05, 2006

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...

Friday, June 09, 2006

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.


Wednesday, May 24, 2006

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.

Sunday, May 21, 2006

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!

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What to do with teenagers when roller skating gets old? SkyZone!

As the mother of a teenage daughter, figuring out activities that give ME a break, are nearby, don't involve computers and cell phones...