Doc, the former cosmetologist, cuts my hair in a 'slither'

I have asked Doc many times to cut my hair, but he would always slither out of it. I did not know he was going to cut my hair in a slither until he did it. I never asked him to trim any long ends.
Perhaps he did it because I had to take over his online finance when he did the wrong thing and cost himself a couple of hundred dollars in late fee fines. Or maybe he did it because I gave him such a good going over yesterday in the scalp department.
At any rate he saved me the hair stylist fee and more or less proved he really had been a cosmetologist in one of his former lives. And I do feel so much better for a hot summer in Phoenix. He did not cut my hair short as he does not think I look good scalped!

I am waiting for the green pool to turn blue

Here I am in my blue bathing suit waiting and the latest bulletin is that the pool 'is not stable.' Meaning it is only half way blue and on Thursday it will be checked again to see if the condition of the pool has stabilized. This is a very large pool and apparently all new pool help has to find this out, so hopefully it will not be closed more than it is open after being renovated from the dirt up. The heat is here with a vengeance so we are in need. The trick now is to run around the cool hall ways enough to get exercise to stay in our poor state of health at least.
I have been finding other tasks that needed attending. How can I put this delicately? I was taught as a child to do grooming on my mother. We daughters would be given a saucer of olive oil and a fine tooth comb and we would scratch her dandruff through and through. Then when we were old enough we came down with dandruff and not having handy dandy dandruff shampoo in those days those sisters most prone to it were generally scratched by my youngest sister Linda who was the best groom of all. Later when any of us got black heads or pimples she would throw in a good picking of those free of charge. She was always disappointed when people did not have black heads. I had bad skin which delighted her, and she would go on and on picking them until I would have to run to get away from her, yelling, "Enough, enough!" Some people were convinced that this ruined your skin but early on I went to a skin specialist who told me that picking a white head was the best thing to do for it as it would just surface again close to the same area. I learned from observing this was true. I was always glad I found that skin specialist.
Now Doc has dandruff that he claimed he never knew he had because he said women where he came from never did such indelicate things as try to scratch a man's dandruff by hand. He claims that because I rode horses I learned to do this. We never groomed our horses but I did have a pet pig who loved having his scales scratched, not unlike some humans.
I also bought Doc dandruff shampoo as he has skin very like mine, being dark blond with blue eyes. So after I had taken a fine comb to his scales I would have him give himself a dandruff shampoo treatment. I had not done a scalp treatment on him for several years, but he screamed just as loud as when I did it the first time. But since I could not go swimming I was bored and insisted on giving him the business until he was ready to throw me out of his apartment.
But I feel better. As you get older skin tends to worsen so I don't know if that is his problem or not but his face is even beginning to flake sometimes like he has been out in the snow.
Hmm, so then I decided to blog and having nothing better to talk about I thought I would throw out this information to find out if anyone else ever grew up grooming mother, sister? I always groomed my husbands and BFs too if I could catch them.
Are we weird or what out west? Doc claims he has only seen monkeys do this in the wilds and never humans.

The decline of the newspaper versus writing your own

I got a book from the library that is all about the decline of the newspaper, but my own theory way back was that you had to create a newspaper yourself in order to insure that in your lifetime at least you would never be without a newspaper and one where you would always be represented. Even when I was 20 years old I could see my thinking was not going to be represented in the current newspapers satisfactorily. This led to writing many letters to my sisters, until pretty soon a correspondence was going on between the sisters that went on for years and years, which could have been called a virtual 'newspaper'.
My grandmother Wilson was a great letter writer and kept a circular letter going between her sisters and brother for years. When the letter arrived each one would add more to it and send it on. When the letter got back to the first sender, that long circular letter was retired and a new one was started.
I could see that this was a newspaper with much news in it about the members of the families as well as outside news that might affect the family, and so modeling my own letters somewhat on my grandmother's at first, we were able to expand our coverage into writing about books we loved and much more.
Today the family newspaper still exists in the form of a family website on the internet as well as quite a few blogs. The 'old' sisters are all writing memoirs a copy of which will be sent to the others mostly in some sort of book form.
Doc likes to buy the daily newspaper in our city, The Arizona Republic. I read the Editorial page and peruse different news stories in the front page section, some of which I may have already seen in a story on the Internet. Doc being a cartoonist of sorts always reads the cartoons, and sometimes saves one for me to see. I used to be a big sports fan but my sport viewing has declined since Doc got cable. He does not like sports events and I save my evenings for meditation and preparing for my departure to the other world. Commercial TV watching as well as my activities on the internet were killing my eyes!
I save my eyes for reading biographies, novels, histories, etc. I usually get from the public library. The book I am reading about the decline of the newspaper came from the public library.
So I supplement whatever is available to the family writings and thus feel that no matter that happens in the newspaper world it is not going to hurt me very much, because I do not rely on the newspaper for the bulk of my reading!
Yesterday I lucked out and one of the books I got from off the free pay it forward table in the ballroom turned out to be fascinating. It was Franz Kafka's "Autobiographical Writings" and also called "I Am a Memory Come Alive." I will never again be able to say I don't like Kafka because his writings are so austere. I felt great sympathy for him after reading this book. It told in detail about his death from tuberculosis which was a hard one indeed. And he was also a prolific letter writer. Really, this book is an absolute treasure. I am trying to decide what member of the family would like it most as a Christmas gift, for there is no sense keeping an extremely good book around gathering dust once you have read it! Probably my son Raymond who is also a prolific writer would treasure it, but first I will have to send it to my sister Ann who I know will love it. My sister Margie just reported reading one of Kafka's novels, so she would probably also find it of interest.
I talked to my sister Linda night before last who is going to look for an autobiography of Celine, a French writer, she thinks I will just love. She lost it in her apartment but is sure she can find it! Celine was one of Bukowski's favorites. I loved one memoir of his called "Down and Out in Paris." He was working as a waiter in the bowels of a fancy Paris hotel, and I so related to his experiences there having spent ten years waiting table. I still recall his writing about dropping a chicken on the floor and picking it up and putting it back on the plate and serving it!
Great books have a way of surviving even when newspapers don't, but if you love the newspaper form you create your own to make sure you will never be without the basic newspaper!
I expand my readership through my blogs and videos but I personally think it is a mistake to try to go 'commercial.' Some writers have the luck to write something that might be published without compromising the work too much. If it happens, fine, but if that luck does not come, I say don't sweat it as long as your needs are being met with books, and newspapers you have helped create.
I share my love of books with my blog readers when my enthusiasm knows no bounds. I used to take my kids to the libraries all the time with me and they would check out their five or six books along with my own. I didn't have to coax them. They insisted on it. One of my favorite memories is of my son Dan about five talking to another kid outside the library who was about six who was a dinosaur book lover just as he was. They were discussing various dinosaurs. It was hilarious. Eventually they all became quite the readers. My oldest son Gary said that after he watched all the foreign movies in Blockbuster he started going to Barnes and Noble and buying books.
I think enthusiastic bloggers just naturally love to write, so they are following their bliss as Joseph Campbell says. And sometimes their enthusiasm is catching. I don't try to read more blogs than I comfortably can. If I stay on the Internet too long not only my eyes suffer but so do my legs from being bent and on the floor too long. I accept my limitations not only in reading but therefore in becoming famous. If you are living a balanced life you may not need to become famous. That might not even be what is best for you! If it comes about without too much stress and strain, fine, but I think striving for balance is for health. If we get out of balance with our endeavors it may be at our peril.
So I try to be a good friend to a few rather than a not so good friend to many more. And hope my limitations will be recognized and not held against me!

My friend Connie sent me the beautiful header above after I said that my favorite flower was the lilac.

I am going deaf and loving it! Huh?

Doc insisted on making this video today because he wants the world to know what a job he is having to get me to hearing center. He claims I only hear half of what goes on. He is very annoying as he asked me after every clever line, "Did you hear that?" If I say yes, he does not believe me and asks me what they said. I probably haven't been hearing everything for years because my hearing was never keen. I found that out when I tried to learn a foreign language. It also interferes with my ability to sing. Naturally my hearing has gotten a little worse over the years, but he is suffering over it a lot more than I am!

Terrible fatigue eases as a voice evokes the presence of God and you feel you are not alone in pushing the boulder up the hill to save lives

As I listened to the Ending Abortion telecast yesterday, along in the afternoon a man came on from New York I think, an activist whose faith had its origins in Catholicism, and his voice evoked the presence of God which I do not hear very often as this task of trying to end abortion has been so formidable even the churches have had a hard time focusing on it. His strength was so healing. The fatigue that I had begun to think was just a part of aging and was going to be with me now until I died began to ease. It had been making even the simplest task seem too hard to do. A couple of hours later it was gone for the first time in weeks! I felt I had had a miracle of healing I sorely needed. If the dedication in that man could do this for me, I thought, what can it do for one of the greatest and most difficult tasks this world has faced, ending abortion. Not only our country but many more have gone down the primrose path resulting in millions of deaths all over the world of the most innocent.
No woman has the right to choose a procedure that will harm another, most of all, the child she has been designed by nature to protect, but the focus has been on the rights of women and not on the rights of the fetus. I felt that many on the telecast were seeking new ways to persuade and reach hearts without harsh judgment, but love and understanding. Women have been vulnerable to those who have claimed their rights are threatened. Our rights are always threatened. Women have always had difficulty rising above the status of second class citizens. Which explains to me why legalized abortion got so many supporters among women with the idea of protecting their right to choose.
How painful it is to acknowledge that the path was lost through not acknowledging all that legalized abortion does. A pregnancy which can seem like such a burden taken away through legal means. How could something legalized be that wrong? After we have grown used to it, how can we fight to stop it? How can we instead embrace the child into this crowded world? Isn't that asking too much? Wouldn't it be better as we have been led to consider for those who have not even begun to live to die rather than all of us suffer a terrible decline in our standard of living with too many mouths to feed? Impossible!
How can we believe in a God who asks too much of us? We have to have faith. We have always had to have faith that God will provide. Do the right thing and and the way will open up.
God cannot grace us with his presence unless we tackle the job he asks us to do which is to save lives, to end the holocaust, no matter how difficult. Yesterday afternoon I understood that God can only live in righteousness. He cannot grace us with his presence when we are doing wrong. God is in the difficult. He is created by man doing the impossible.
The man who evoked the presence of God had given up his regular job to work full time as a pro life activist. He had felt his needs would be provided for if he committed himself to the job that needed to be done. How strong he felt. How inspiring. I felt a tear coming. I was not alone. This man had come to help push the giant boulder up the hill and he would not stop until the work was done. He was in the long haul to save lives.
God had called and some had answered. That was enough for now. There was still a great deal of work to be done, but after resting a few hours I would be up to a job, this little job of writing a message to inspire and help build conviction. God has blessed this movement. He will help those who have stepped forward to do what seems impossible now, but which must be tackled.

Am listening to the EndingAbortion.com live web cast now

I am going to be listening to the web cast throughout the day as I like to get as much new information as I can on how the fight against abortion is going. I just listened to a young activist who has done a lot. That's what you are hearing is what activists are doing and what they suggest you can do.
I worked my way to a blog and making videos in my protest years as letters protesting propaganda were just not being printed, so I had to find another way. I think just stating my beliefs from time to time in my blog and videos has proved to be the most effective in reaching people. I go back over my videos from time to time and see that they have always proved effective in getting people to watch. I have also watched a number of videos that have inspired me. I am going to embed the video I made again here as I have stated my case against legalized abortion. I will have more to report after I have listened to more of the web cast. The web cast will be available for some time for people to listen to in the future if they are unable to listen today. They made it an audio cast so it would be available to more people.


See EndingAbortion.com on my blog list.

Friday's News: green pool, great books, and headers

Don't you just love the jeweled broach header Connie sent? The new template allows the animation to show. She also made the graphic about the spirits. I love her boldness when it comes to my personality. Today is a good day to show this one and there will other times in the future, too. Tomorrow is the live web cast all day long Ending Abortion.com. (See my blog list) The spirits will be there for it is their dearest wish we end all forms of premature death on this earth. We had just got our life expectancy up until most families may go quite a few years before experiencing a death among their members. So why did we take the downward turn toward using death as a solution for a problem pregnancy? This is a primitive brutal solution in every sense of the word, and we also denigrated so many teachings that had been in place for years such as abstinence as the only sure way for teens to prevent pregnancy. We allowed some 'forward' thinkers to get the upper hand, but a violent solution is always a step backward in the end.
I also just got through reading probably one of the most compelling books of history I have ever read called Somme about the terrible fight England and other allies put up in France to take back Somme from the Germans in World War I. The book was written by Martin Gilbert, published in 2006. I was so stunned by the terrible slaughter of so many wonderful young men that I sent it off to my family to read. Anyone who reads this book is going to be that much more against war. I wish George Bush could have read this before he invaded Iraq. And to think the Kaiser was Queen Victoria's grandson, but his generals kind of over overrode all his objections to World War. They saw no reason they could not conquer all of Europe. Hitler even fought in this location, was wounded, and after healing, asked to be sent back to the front. I am sure that he thought when the time came he could do what had not been done as leader of the new Germany. He could conquer England as well as Russia! Thank God they proved to be his match, along with America in World War II.
But make so mistake, Germany started World War I.
I also finished Dreadnaught by Robert Massie which is a bigger and better battleship the navies started to build before World War I, only this book lumbered on for 900 pages. I was able to discuss this book with my navy veteran son who had heard of Admiral Fisher who so improved the English navy. I love a great historian. These guys are such workers. But I thank god for them, or we likely would not know a thing about the past.
I risked life and limb today to return books to the library and get more which will have to do me for some time. This trip in the blazing summer heat was a killer! I try to put off all journeys except those that are absolutely necessary until fall.
I was very disappointed to see a sign up saying the pool has to be closed over the weekend. It was slowly turning green, so it will have to be shocked. We have been instructed not to eat in the pool area as cigarette butts and food bits have been found in the filters! Always somebody to gum up the works.
I went into CVS Pharmacy and as usual was disgusted with all the black spots of gum on a fairly new piece of sidewalk in front of a busy bus station. Every time I look at American habits of disposing of their gum I think of Singapore where my navy son Dan went, saying it was the cleanest city he ever saw in his world travels, and if people throw their gum in the street they can be fined and jailed! Imagine! We have got so many slobs out of control we are gummed before we start. Do you throw your gum in the street? I don't. I don't even chew gum. But a heck of a lot of other people must.