Power tools and summer fun....

When I was a kid, summer fun meant sneaking out to the garage to try and cut two-by-fours on the table saw in order to build a boat so we could float down the creek. Yes, I still have all my fingers and toes......amazing!

Being an older mom means...

you hit menopause at the same time your kids hit puberty.

Doogan's doo doo

Well, I must admit the first official comment on my blog was an articulate counterpoint to my rant on Mr. Doogan and the right to anonymous free speech.


I feel strangely exposed and fascinated that someone is actually visiting this place other than me. However, Gerbeel Haamster, if and when I find out we know each other: beware! I will be forced to buy you a beer for being able to state an idea and write coherently about it. We are the last of a dying race (refer to obituary for journalism posted earlier in this blog).

An Email to AK Representative Mike Doogan

Dear Politician Mike Doogan:

I was going to start an anonymous blog about issues relating to mental health, parenting, and politics. But now I see my concerns about being outed and therefore at risk to lose my job, relationships, and my good standing in my community are well-founded.

Anonymity is a double-edged sword. Astro-turfing is unethical. Trying to discuss high-risk issues while wearing a scarf to protect my identity is not. By publicizing the name of the AK Mudflats author, you have guaranteed this woman will suffer. You had the legitimacy and sanctioning of the Anchorate Daily News to share your opinions and get paid to do it. You made that contract with the public from a position of privilege and safety. Many of us don’t enjoy those same luxuries.

I could lose my job for writing about volatile issues. So, I stay silent as do so many others. AK Mudlflats just didn’t want to be a target in a conservative, let’s-throw-water-on-war-protesting-old-ladies-in-Soldotna world. Congratulations. What a legacy you leave. Creating fear for those who would share an opinion in an environment guaranteed to be hostile.

Should a woman protesting the Taliban be forced to put her face, name, and phone number on her subversive blog? I guess that would be ethical and prove she wasn’t an astro-turfing minion. But then, the debate would be short-lived, as she would be killed by her family in the most brutal, incomprehensible way possible.

Your morals are self-serving and your perspective narcissistic. Your ethics are fluid according to your politics of the moment.

Anonymous voices of opposition save lives and encourage discussion. It is one of the most democratic (and safe) ways of overturning cruelty and injustice. Thanks for shutting the door. I am sure our own Alaskan politico-jihadists who feel that targeting a dissenting opinion with prejudice is a God-given right are very happy with your point of view.

Anonymous – Not anymore. And I am sure [this email] will come back to haunt me. Make sure you save all these emails and keep a log of who to attack next.

Looney Tunes

So, I don't talk much about parenting the Lemurs. (See inaugural blog post for background on Lemurs.)

This is because I know nothing about parenting. Let me rephrase that. I know how to parent infants and toddlers. Unfortunately, (well not unfortunately, but...nevermind) I have an almost seven-year-old and a nine-year-old.

Let me explain. Every mother now understands that the child you birthed is not the child you keep. She changes everyday. You figure out what food, clothing, sleep schedule, toy, friend, and favorite color she likes on Monday, and by Friday she is screaming like Fay Wray in King Kong about the absolute horror of touching any of the previously mentioned, must-have favorites.

The end result is you never have the same child twice. It took me a while to realize that children grow up. Sounds incredibly naive and self-centered, which I am, but it has taken me nine years to realize that children are meant to change on a daily, if not hourly, basis. That is their job, that is why they were made, and that is the one constant of the universe. They are never the same person twice.

Now an adult is fully formed and on the downhill slide of the roller coaster of life. Our brains are done growing (a real handicap) and we are who we are, plus or minus a few life-altering growth experiences.

We are set in our ways, move in straight lines, and like to have things remain the same, at least when it comes to coffee and getting sleep every night.

Children are designed to generate a new life-altering experience every five minutes, usually with great fanfare, drama, and occasionally the risk of imminent death. This is designed to exponentially add to the amount of gray hair on a mother's head.

Now that I have realized children grow up, I am petrified. I don't know anything about ten-year-olds. And one almost seven-year-old is different from another. So not only does every child change, every child changes in her own way.

The things I learned from my oldest daughter have absolutely no application to the whims and whistles of my youngest. There is no manual for being a new mother because they are obsolete with each child.

So, I now live in the shadow of the unknown. My pediatrician delighted in telling me to "Get ready." when I was panicked about the physicial changes my nine-year-old daughter was suddenly going through.

I seriously thought it was a thyroid problem, she gleefully told me it was puberty.

I am not ready for this. I will never be ready for this. I just figured out the kids I've got and now I have to get ready for kids I can't even imagine. I have heard some horror stories from other parents...something to do with hormones, driving, and dating. I am not sure what they mean.

All I can say, is stay-tuned. It is nice that most mental health facilities seem to have internet access in the 21st century. It will make it much easier to keep up these posts when I check out on permanent, loony-ville vacation and try to become someone else, just to keep up with my children.

I am mouse, hear me roar

The sun is shining, the daylight lengthening, and the mice are invading the house like a wave of unstoppable crusaders sacking the fertile crescent 1000 years ago. The are making a pilgrimmage to the Holy Cracker Pantry and will not be denied. I've seen one distract the dog while 30 others sprint for the Pringles can under the girls' bunk beds. One of them (I call him Larry) seems to be the Houdini of trap springing. Despite the most succulent and exclusive chocolate I sacrifice to bait the traps, they get sprung without capturing a single, hapless victim.

I hear chanting at night, "Larry! Larry! Larry!" coming from the forced air heating vent under my bed. It sounds like Alvin and the chipmunks; if they were packing and had become fanatical members of a death-worshipping, chocolate-eating Jonestown cult.

I am worried, now. I can't find the can opener anymore and I haven't seen the cat for three days. Maybe I should get a snake. Maybe a bunch of snakes. That would be better than TV. Talk about a Reality Show. Eeeeeww.

Spring sprang right over me

The light returns and all we Alaskans do is grumble more. The stress upon our delicate circadian rhythms from Daylight Savings Time whiplash has us growling and huffing in our dens with a whole lot of cranky goin' on before we even get out of bed.

All we ever want is the return of The Light, and once it starts to shine, we scream, "It burns!".

Alaskans can't win when it comes to the seasons. It is always too much of something: cold, wet, light, dark (never really too hot, though. Darn.)

So we wait for our bio-rhythms to stabilize just long enough to get over the post-hibernation shakes, slather on the sunscreen and bug dope (insect repellent to the rest of the world), and get outside and do something, anything!, as long is it is NOT INDOORS.

We invented the phrase Cabin Fever, and the condition can be deadly - at least to brain cells.

In Alaska, Easter is better than Christmas. After Easter we can fish!

Death Match

A mother on welfare
Fights to survive
In the wrestling ring of bureaucracy
Clotheslined by paperwork
Choked out by indifference
Her soul fades
The match is rigged

Bones and Thunder, Part II

The economy erupts into violent destruction
Spewing the hot ashes of failed arrogance
Across the upturned faces of the holy

Freeze Unfrozen

A sad farewell to the Anchorage Freeze Project.

A perfect memory:

sitting in the center of the snow-carved labyrinth roasting hotdogs and making s'mores in the firepit with fellow city folk late one Sunday night and feeling at peace, in the center of the starry night.

Thank you for that moment.

Later that same day.....

I've decided I like to make decisive decisions.

Happy American Consumer Holidays!

Customer service has become an oxymoron.

Here is my latest letter to the editor of the Anchorage Daily News:

Dear store employee, all I want for Christmas is a little customer service.

I realize that we shoppers were put here on earth to pay your salary. I know you are doing us a favor just by showing up at work and keeping the cash register warm.

I understand that actually knowing your store and products is too much to ask. I mean, how are you supposed to know where things are and how they work?

I am sorry that my questions are a burden and I realize it is my fault I am too stupid to figure out where things are by myself.

As for greetings, I guess introducing yourself and asking me how I am doing is an emotional commitment that should only be made with a license from City Hall.

So, I wish you a Merry Christmas. I am sure you have always been the center of attention during this holiday. Forgive me for not recognizing it right away.

Don’t worry.

When you want a better job and come see me for an interview, I will remember how stupid I was that day when I came into your store and asked you for a little help.

I found this in the Wireless catalog at the link below.

I call it, "The Real Reason Garden Gnomes Are Disappearing"

This is the only way I will ever display a gnome in my garden.


http://www.thewirelesscatalog.com/

Apathy can die, at least for now

Obama and Palin have done the one thing deemed impossible for modern politics; they have dispelled voter apathy. People are actually participating in the democratic process. People are waking up and paying attention for the first time in too long.

Regardless of your politics or affiliations, these candidates have rejuvenated public opinion. Finally a majority of voters actually care about the outcome of an election. It's about time. I don't care who wins, as long as we all vote.

Time out

Out of time, time out, time to go, time to eat, time to sleep, time time time! What a strange little word when you really look at it. It drives so much of what we do, even when we are doing nothing; t. i. m. e. - four little letters that rule the world.