Today I spent 5 hours going to an Italian Catholic funeral. I went with my husband and inlaws. I really wanted us to drive seperately so we could skip the meal and run some errands, but my husband and his siblings don't like their parents to drive places by themselves, and the brother who normally does that for them didn't want to go. So we did the deed. It was my husband's sister's husband's family. They are good people, and I sort of felt like the kids needed us to be there. I am a Scottish/Irish/English/Welsh Protestant, and I was the tallest woman there. There were about 3 men who were taller than me. I don't do the cross thing during prayers, which was done about 100 times throughout the funeral and dinner. I did finally figure out that you go to the left first when you do that.
When we got home, it was the most beautiful sunny day we've had so far this year. I cleaned out the duckling cage, and put the duckies in a bigger cage outside to enjoy the sunshine and a pie pan full of water. My husband put a bigger dog dish full of water in and took my "little" pie pan out. He discovered that when duckies are startled, they all get into the water. It was so funny, that we startled them several times. But when you put food in the cage, they get back out of the water.
Then I walked up on the hill onto the long ridge of our farm to dig up some cut-leaf (evergreen) blackberries to transplant near the house. I tried doing it last year, but they died. Someone in a forum told me that now was the time of year to do it, and that it was best to dig up cane ends that had tipped into the soil before they leafed. He told me how to tell the different kinds too, but when I got up there, last year's dried leaves were still on the cut-leafs, so it was easier than I had thought. I couldn't find any tipped ends. But I found several plants. I tried digging one of those up, but the tap root was HUGE, and went all over the place, and I ended up breaking it in several places. So I walked down into the woods on the other side of the hill, where coyotes and deer live, and 3 bad bulls roam when they get out. I was looking to see if I could maybe find a small wild dogwood tree to transplant instead. I didn't find one, but I had fun.
I didn't know it, but my husband had come up to join me, had found my bucket with the broken tap root in it, with the briar snippers and shovel beside it, and had gone into the woods looking for me. He never called for me. When I came out of the woods further along the ridge and walked back towards my bucket, I heard a lot of rustling in the woods, and I was sure that it was the big bull coming out to see what was going on. I was trying to devise a good escape plan in case it might chase me, but it usually doesn't chase people. But then I saw the whitish cowboy hat, and my husband emerged with my Newfoundland dog on leash. I asked why he didn't call for me, and he laughed. He thought it was more fun to find me his way.
We went over to the pasture side of the ridge and hunted there, and he found a great big cut-leaf blackberry bush with a bunch of canes tipped into the dirt, with nice, small roots. I snipped them off a few inches up the cane, dug them up and filled up my 5 gallon paint bucket with dirt balls with canes sticking out. Then I had to carry it back. My husband helped by carrying the shovel - he had the dog leash in the other hand.
When we got back to the house, I planted the blackberries in the far end of the garden, and some by the front porch, between the iris'. My husband raked the turned over dirt in the garden, while I dug some beds for the fruit shrubs I ordered. They haven't come yet, but I wanted to mix manure and dirt to get the beds ready. I have ordered paw paw trees, currants, gooseberries, red raspberries and rhubarb. I went to the manure pile in back of the barn and filled a wheelbarrow full of well-composted sheep/goat manure. The goats can never figure out why I'm taking their poop when I do that - they just watch and tilt their heads sideways. My husband had to help me get it up to the garden. After we got all the manure into the beds and the garden, I planted where he had raked. I planted greens (lettuces, mustard and watercress), turnips and radishes from very old seed packets. The mosquitos are very thick this year. I will have to remember to put some insect repellant on next time I work outside!
My daughter fixed kielbasa for supper while we worked. It was very good. Now there is Farm Bureau meeting tonight. My daughter is bringing the duckies back in. I'd better get out of these clothes and into something nice...to go complain about the state of farming in this country with some of the neighbors who still farm. It has been a good day.
Wednesday, March 30, 2005
Tuesday, March 29, 2005
Revolutionary War
I just finished reading "The Hornet's Nest," by former president Jimmy Carter. Every American History teacher should read this book. So should anyone fighting a war.
Wednesday, March 23, 2005
Ate Their Words
Normally this phrase is used to signify revenge at an extreme or an "I told you so," more mildly. I hope that some people in a chat room eat their words about human nature in this war in Iraq that has not ended; and that the peaceful side of human nature does indeed win out.
Using "In God We Trust" as a slogan in any war is profane to someone like me, who does not perceive the god of the New Testament as a war god. Unfortunately, having faith in the side of human nature that desires peace is not a popular view nowadays. It is even asking for trouble in a chat room where military people are recruiting trainees to learn interrogation skills. I keep getting booted out of that "Religion" chat room, and I don't know if it is an entity of Yahoo, or if I am pissing off the administrator. I kind of think it's the latter.
There is a weird mistrust in people who support the war against those who don't support the war, even if those people, like me, come from historical Quaker upbringing. Quaker principals were involved in the founding of our country, yet most Quakers opposed the Revolutionary War. Even if 50% of the American public are descended from Quaker roots, most of them don't know a thing about Quaker principles. People in the military start thinking I'm Muslim, or better yet a terrorist; or even worse, someone "misled" by communist infiltrators twisting my brain and my ideology. If they knew anything about Quaker history or beliefs, they'd understand something about me very basic. I'm just a Quaker. And when it comes to that of God in every person, I'm not a "pie in the sky utopian." I'm just very simply...right. Every human being on this planet has some good in them, and if you affirm the good, it will grow. You may not affirm the good enough to turn them from being a terrorist. But you can instigate change, however small.
On that premise, someday, those military buffs will eat their words - particularly if it truly IS in God that they indeed, do "trust." Because they will lay down those guns.
But if the vengeance and glutton for violence in them has been well fed, and they are closet atheists, they might just shoot me, or incite me to violence to prove their point, and their reality will live on.
But don't anybody to argue with me that this resolution would in any way be "good." May they eat their words, and enjoy doing so, if there is an iota of good left in their souls.
Using "In God We Trust" as a slogan in any war is profane to someone like me, who does not perceive the god of the New Testament as a war god. Unfortunately, having faith in the side of human nature that desires peace is not a popular view nowadays. It is even asking for trouble in a chat room where military people are recruiting trainees to learn interrogation skills. I keep getting booted out of that "Religion" chat room, and I don't know if it is an entity of Yahoo, or if I am pissing off the administrator. I kind of think it's the latter.
There is a weird mistrust in people who support the war against those who don't support the war, even if those people, like me, come from historical Quaker upbringing. Quaker principals were involved in the founding of our country, yet most Quakers opposed the Revolutionary War. Even if 50% of the American public are descended from Quaker roots, most of them don't know a thing about Quaker principles. People in the military start thinking I'm Muslim, or better yet a terrorist; or even worse, someone "misled" by communist infiltrators twisting my brain and my ideology. If they knew anything about Quaker history or beliefs, they'd understand something about me very basic. I'm just a Quaker. And when it comes to that of God in every person, I'm not a "pie in the sky utopian." I'm just very simply...right. Every human being on this planet has some good in them, and if you affirm the good, it will grow. You may not affirm the good enough to turn them from being a terrorist. But you can instigate change, however small.
On that premise, someday, those military buffs will eat their words - particularly if it truly IS in God that they indeed, do "trust." Because they will lay down those guns.
But if the vengeance and glutton for violence in them has been well fed, and they are closet atheists, they might just shoot me, or incite me to violence to prove their point, and their reality will live on.
But don't anybody to argue with me that this resolution would in any way be "good." May they eat their words, and enjoy doing so, if there is an iota of good left in their souls.
Tuesday, March 22, 2005
Kidnapped by Indians
It's a beautiful, sunny Tuesday. I just worked 4 days in a row - one afternoon, then 3 nights. I slept well last night. I can't decide what to do first.
I had not read a novel for a long time. A couple of Sundays ago, my daughter talked me into going to the book store at the mall. She takes a long time to pick out books. She bought two, and had one read in a day. I told her I was going to have to take her to the library instead of the bookstore. She claims, "There's nothing to read at the library!" That's 13 for you!
The book store is my favorite shop at the mall. Novels on Scotland and Ireland appealed to me, but in the end, it was Jimmy Carter's "The Hornet's Nest." What sold me was the good bit of attention to the history of Quakers in the south during the Revolutionary War, and the book hasn't disappointed me.
One day, when disillusioned with it being a man's world, I decided to see what was straight back my maternal line - mother to mother to mother, and on. Geneology has long been a hobby, although not a serious one. Quaker geneology is relatively easy, since the Quakers were anal about journaling and writing down their business. What I discovered was a story I'd heard before, but did not realize it pertained to ME. My grandmother's grandmother's grandmother was kidnapped by Indians in Georgia! I think it was the Creeks who kidnapped her. It is a true story not unlike the one in "Dances with Wolves." She lost the memory of her English language, and she married the man who rescued her. I am a direct maternal descendant. I think that is so COOL.
It made sense. My grandmother knew a lot of native plants and their uses. She was educated, and a well-liked nurse; a quiet Quaker, but very socially involved in things like the local quilting group. She was like what a grandaughter's grandaughter of someone like that would be like.
So when I picked up Jimmy Carter's book, and saw that it had extensive information about the relationship between the Creek Indians and the Quakers in the south, I thought, neato. He is a lot better writer than I thought he'd be. I've been working on reading the book in between my daily routine activities. It isn't quite as engaging as was "The Da Vinci Code," so I am able to motivate myself to get work done in between reading. I may read some today, and work outside some also. I need to pay some bills, do some cleaning, water the tomato plants... maybe clean out my gutters or dig a ditch...we shall see.
I had not read a novel for a long time. A couple of Sundays ago, my daughter talked me into going to the book store at the mall. She takes a long time to pick out books. She bought two, and had one read in a day. I told her I was going to have to take her to the library instead of the bookstore. She claims, "There's nothing to read at the library!" That's 13 for you!
The book store is my favorite shop at the mall. Novels on Scotland and Ireland appealed to me, but in the end, it was Jimmy Carter's "The Hornet's Nest." What sold me was the good bit of attention to the history of Quakers in the south during the Revolutionary War, and the book hasn't disappointed me.
One day, when disillusioned with it being a man's world, I decided to see what was straight back my maternal line - mother to mother to mother, and on. Geneology has long been a hobby, although not a serious one. Quaker geneology is relatively easy, since the Quakers were anal about journaling and writing down their business. What I discovered was a story I'd heard before, but did not realize it pertained to ME. My grandmother's grandmother's grandmother was kidnapped by Indians in Georgia! I think it was the Creeks who kidnapped her. It is a true story not unlike the one in "Dances with Wolves." She lost the memory of her English language, and she married the man who rescued her. I am a direct maternal descendant. I think that is so COOL.
It made sense. My grandmother knew a lot of native plants and their uses. She was educated, and a well-liked nurse; a quiet Quaker, but very socially involved in things like the local quilting group. She was like what a grandaughter's grandaughter of someone like that would be like.
So when I picked up Jimmy Carter's book, and saw that it had extensive information about the relationship between the Creek Indians and the Quakers in the south, I thought, neato. He is a lot better writer than I thought he'd be. I've been working on reading the book in between my daily routine activities. It isn't quite as engaging as was "The Da Vinci Code," so I am able to motivate myself to get work done in between reading. I may read some today, and work outside some also. I need to pay some bills, do some cleaning, water the tomato plants... maybe clean out my gutters or dig a ditch...we shall see.
Thursday, March 17, 2005
Spring Work
The sky was so clear on the drive home from work tonight, with the waxing moon high above. The past 2 days have been beautiful! Such an odd change to be at work in a hospital after a few days off.
Yesterday, I cleared raspberry canes from the flower bed beside the house, around outbuildings and under the sweet cherry trees. I made a big burn pile in the garden, where we burned some brush last year. I broke apart a big, old apple tree that had been laying in the brambles under the cherry trees and put it on top of the brambles. Then I took a mattox and dug up a few rotted tree stumps from long-gone fruit trees, to make the lawn easier to mow, and added them to the pile. We are going to have to have a cook-out now. I got the riding mower out, and mowed everywhere I cleared, plus over the asparagus beds. I can't believe how much better it looks! I was so busy the past 2 summers that everything got so overgrown, the place looked almost abandoned.
After that, Bruce and I drug used lumber from the ante-room (milk room) we disassembled with my brother's help from the barn last fall, that has been leaning against the barn and hay bailer all winter, up to the delapidated chicken house, and set up shop to pull nails there. The roof and 2 walls are the only good parts left of the chicken house. I removed the 3 windows that were still intact, and put them in the barn.
We ordered 25 Rhode Island Red chicks that will come in April. If that isn't motivation to fix up the chicken house or rebuild a new one, I don't know what is.
Well, this morning, after all that work, I found I could barely move to get out of bed. But I did, and I even made it through a night of work. I didn't know clearing brambles could cause that much aching, but Bruce reminded me that I had been dragging trees and stumps across the yard.
The problem with doing work like that is that you see how much more there is to do. For instance, I have not cleaned my gutters out for 3 years. There are small trees growing in them. The springhouse needs dug out. I stuck to the brush-clearing, but I did drag a ladder to the porch for the next sunny day. Maybe if those are sugar maples growing in the gutter, I'll transplant them...
Yesterday, I cleared raspberry canes from the flower bed beside the house, around outbuildings and under the sweet cherry trees. I made a big burn pile in the garden, where we burned some brush last year. I broke apart a big, old apple tree that had been laying in the brambles under the cherry trees and put it on top of the brambles. Then I took a mattox and dug up a few rotted tree stumps from long-gone fruit trees, to make the lawn easier to mow, and added them to the pile. We are going to have to have a cook-out now. I got the riding mower out, and mowed everywhere I cleared, plus over the asparagus beds. I can't believe how much better it looks! I was so busy the past 2 summers that everything got so overgrown, the place looked almost abandoned.
After that, Bruce and I drug used lumber from the ante-room (milk room) we disassembled with my brother's help from the barn last fall, that has been leaning against the barn and hay bailer all winter, up to the delapidated chicken house, and set up shop to pull nails there. The roof and 2 walls are the only good parts left of the chicken house. I removed the 3 windows that were still intact, and put them in the barn.
We ordered 25 Rhode Island Red chicks that will come in April. If that isn't motivation to fix up the chicken house or rebuild a new one, I don't know what is.
Well, this morning, after all that work, I found I could barely move to get out of bed. But I did, and I even made it through a night of work. I didn't know clearing brambles could cause that much aching, but Bruce reminded me that I had been dragging trees and stumps across the yard.
The problem with doing work like that is that you see how much more there is to do. For instance, I have not cleaned my gutters out for 3 years. There are small trees growing in them. The springhouse needs dug out. I stuck to the brush-clearing, but I did drag a ladder to the porch for the next sunny day. Maybe if those are sugar maples growing in the gutter, I'll transplant them...
Wednesday, March 09, 2005
Little Black Lamb
The last babe of the year has finally arrived today. Rosie had a little black girl. She is so cute, and so sweet. Rosie is the tamest people sheep we have, so the baby of course thinks people are just fine. It is such a relief to be done with it all!
The other two lambs, Sweetie and Cadbury, seem so huge now, compared to the new little girl. Geez, I don't want to sell any of them!
My big, fluffy, Newfoundland, Morgan, wants attention tonight. She follows me and lays down on the floor next to me no matter where I am. I can see why Sacajawia got so attached to the Newfie on the Lewis and Clark expedition, and took extra care of him over the Rocky Mountains.
There is a more than a dusting of snow tonight, and it is cold again - in the teens. I have to work very early in the morning, and ought to be getting to bed. All the animals are fed and bedded down for the night.
The other two lambs, Sweetie and Cadbury, seem so huge now, compared to the new little girl. Geez, I don't want to sell any of them!
My big, fluffy, Newfoundland, Morgan, wants attention tonight. She follows me and lays down on the floor next to me no matter where I am. I can see why Sacajawia got so attached to the Newfie on the Lewis and Clark expedition, and took extra care of him over the Rocky Mountains.
There is a more than a dusting of snow tonight, and it is cold again - in the teens. I have to work very early in the morning, and ought to be getting to bed. All the animals are fed and bedded down for the night.
Sunday, March 06, 2005
Conspiracies
I am sitting here, eating frozen blueberries out of an autumn leaf jewel tea custard cup trying to remember what it was I wanted to write about on the way home from work tonight. Oh, it just came to me... conspiracies. Our parents instilled in us a healthy Celtic sense of idealizing clairvoyance without calling it that. Combined with Quakerly meditative awareness on a more spiritual plain, the two leave a person in a state of psychic awareness that most in the surrounding environment don't have a perception of.
In a highly intelligent mind, this psychic awareness easily can lead to paranoia, to the extent of suspecting conspiracies in every corner. Conspiracies can be conscious, or subconscious on the part of their makers. They can even be somewhere in between.
I am of the belief that they don't exist on the conscious level as often as we think they do. As a result, the conspiracy can easily be disrupted without much ado. Such "conspiracies" are more properly called by Walter Wink's created entity, "the Powers that Be." If those powers are on a constructive path, there is no need to disrupt them. If those powers are on a corrupted path, they can be fixed, or disassembled and reassembled altogether. If one is going to do such a thing, it is best to bring it all to a conscious level on the part of everyone, and make clear why one thinks it is corrupted, and how one intends to fix it. This alleviates paranoia on everyone's
part.
Back to the psychic awareness/clairvoyance part...some people are of the opinion that this is not "real." I think that is psychic gifts are so abused. If one habitually puts one's self into a transe-like state in which items of importance are permitted to come forth in a safe manner, so that one see's whole pictures and whole Truths more clearly, the person doing so is bound to be aware of Truths that others are not aware of. To live in a responsible manner, a person needs to act on these Truths in a responsible way. One usually finds there are others who have come to discover the same Truths, and it is usually good to affirm them by sharing them.
Going to that plain requires submission of one's spirit. Few people are knowledgeable about how this works. Quakers know, and submit themselves to Christ. That way, it is all "safe." To open one's self to the spirits of their ancestors, all alone, might be quite another matter. Buddhists meditate, and so do yogi's. It is usually in these states when we "see" what is really going on.
So, in a sense, I don't think there is a such thing as a fully conscious conspiracy, usually.What we perceive as conspiracy is usually collective action based on collective fear. In such a corrupt conspiracy - the War on Terror for example - the collective fear needs to be addressed with education. The enemy needs to be redefined for the vague entity it really is - NOT Saddam Hussein, and NOT Osama bin Laden. To confront such a corrupted conspiracy is difficult, however, when it is a self-organized machine, elusive of all who are cogs within it - a machine that propogates its images that keep the machine running with such corrupt things as greed, money, fear and glutton for violence.
A constant, good fresh rain will eventually rust such a machine. It may take a long time. I have hope, and I can provide some of the rain.
In a highly intelligent mind, this psychic awareness easily can lead to paranoia, to the extent of suspecting conspiracies in every corner. Conspiracies can be conscious, or subconscious on the part of their makers. They can even be somewhere in between.
I am of the belief that they don't exist on the conscious level as often as we think they do. As a result, the conspiracy can easily be disrupted without much ado. Such "conspiracies" are more properly called by Walter Wink's created entity, "the Powers that Be." If those powers are on a constructive path, there is no need to disrupt them. If those powers are on a corrupted path, they can be fixed, or disassembled and reassembled altogether. If one is going to do such a thing, it is best to bring it all to a conscious level on the part of everyone, and make clear why one thinks it is corrupted, and how one intends to fix it. This alleviates paranoia on everyone's
part.
Back to the psychic awareness/clairvoyance part...some people are of the opinion that this is not "real." I think that is psychic gifts are so abused. If one habitually puts one's self into a transe-like state in which items of importance are permitted to come forth in a safe manner, so that one see's whole pictures and whole Truths more clearly, the person doing so is bound to be aware of Truths that others are not aware of. To live in a responsible manner, a person needs to act on these Truths in a responsible way. One usually finds there are others who have come to discover the same Truths, and it is usually good to affirm them by sharing them.
Going to that plain requires submission of one's spirit. Few people are knowledgeable about how this works. Quakers know, and submit themselves to Christ. That way, it is all "safe." To open one's self to the spirits of their ancestors, all alone, might be quite another matter. Buddhists meditate, and so do yogi's. It is usually in these states when we "see" what is really going on.
So, in a sense, I don't think there is a such thing as a fully conscious conspiracy, usually.What we perceive as conspiracy is usually collective action based on collective fear. In such a corrupt conspiracy - the War on Terror for example - the collective fear needs to be addressed with education. The enemy needs to be redefined for the vague entity it really is - NOT Saddam Hussein, and NOT Osama bin Laden. To confront such a corrupted conspiracy is difficult, however, when it is a self-organized machine, elusive of all who are cogs within it - a machine that propogates its images that keep the machine running with such corrupt things as greed, money, fear and glutton for violence.
A constant, good fresh rain will eventually rust such a machine. It may take a long time. I have hope, and I can provide some of the rain.
Friday, March 04, 2005
Surrounded by Tomato Plants
The weather forecaster was WRONG. It is SNOWING! AGAIN! It is going to snow every day, forever, and it is never going to go away. This morning, he said it would get just a little bit cloudy, but no snow; that the snow would stay to the north of us. But on the map, I saw this big huge front waving down from the Northwest, and his line drawn somewhere south of Cleveland. I told my husband when we had lunch at the local diner today, as the clouds were just coming in, that I bet that line would dip a lot further south. I should have gone into weather forecasting.
My husband told me that if people quit saying the weather man was wrong and giving their own forecast, that maybe he'd be right for a change; that people talking about other things happening might be making them happen. I asked him if that was a nice way of saying, "Shut up," and he grinned at me.
Yesterday I told my mom to tell my sister next time she called that I threw away her address. I said to tell her that if she wants a sister, she is going to have to BE a sister. She has not initiated contact with me for 3 years now, and she just complains when I write to her. So it's up to her now. (I don't think she wants a sister, so I've kind of resigned to forgetting about her). I did, in fact throw away her address so I would not be tempted months down the road to try to make amends without some effort.
I am surrounded by tomato plants. We went to Walmart today and bought more 4-inch pots, and a 50-lb bag of dirt. Last night I had bought more peat pots at Lowes. Today I transplanted over 64, mostly the yellow plum cherry tomatoes. I have no more window space in my living room.
My 15-yr-old son is now enrolled for next year in the local public school, and signed up for post-secondary option, provided he maintains a 3.5 GPA or above for the rest of the year. He will only have 2 1/2 years of college left when he graduates from HS. I got all the papers filled out, and took in the birth certificate, social security card, immunization records and visitation modification today.
My daughter's saxaphone is tuned up. She is going to shadow the director at the Towngate Theater in Wheeling for her Gifted and Talanted class, sometime in the next few weeks. I have been pricing plane tickets for Phoenix the past 2 days. I hope to get my nose into some paperwork tonight.
My parents want me to go to Full Gospel Business Men's Fellowship tonight for their dinner meeting, but I'm not going. I don't like getting singled out by his buddies to come up and get "slain in the spirit." Call me wayward. Maybe I'll give the baby goats their second tetanus boosters instead. I have to work the weekend, and this is my last free day for 3 days. So I'm going to enjoy it.
My husband told me that if people quit saying the weather man was wrong and giving their own forecast, that maybe he'd be right for a change; that people talking about other things happening might be making them happen. I asked him if that was a nice way of saying, "Shut up," and he grinned at me.
Yesterday I told my mom to tell my sister next time she called that I threw away her address. I said to tell her that if she wants a sister, she is going to have to BE a sister. She has not initiated contact with me for 3 years now, and she just complains when I write to her. So it's up to her now. (I don't think she wants a sister, so I've kind of resigned to forgetting about her). I did, in fact throw away her address so I would not be tempted months down the road to try to make amends without some effort.
I am surrounded by tomato plants. We went to Walmart today and bought more 4-inch pots, and a 50-lb bag of dirt. Last night I had bought more peat pots at Lowes. Today I transplanted over 64, mostly the yellow plum cherry tomatoes. I have no more window space in my living room.
My 15-yr-old son is now enrolled for next year in the local public school, and signed up for post-secondary option, provided he maintains a 3.5 GPA or above for the rest of the year. He will only have 2 1/2 years of college left when he graduates from HS. I got all the papers filled out, and took in the birth certificate, social security card, immunization records and visitation modification today.
My daughter's saxaphone is tuned up. She is going to shadow the director at the Towngate Theater in Wheeling for her Gifted and Talanted class, sometime in the next few weeks. I have been pricing plane tickets for Phoenix the past 2 days. I hope to get my nose into some paperwork tonight.
My parents want me to go to Full Gospel Business Men's Fellowship tonight for their dinner meeting, but I'm not going. I don't like getting singled out by his buddies to come up and get "slain in the spirit." Call me wayward. Maybe I'll give the baby goats their second tetanus boosters instead. I have to work the weekend, and this is my last free day for 3 days. So I'm going to enjoy it.
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