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Happy Thanksgiving

At the Heart of Every Story

My favorite stories are usually intergenerational, like Andre Norton's Witch World series and Marion Zimmer Bradley's Darkover series. Then there's Anne McCaffrey's dragons of Pern and, my latest favorite, George R. R. Martin's Song of Ice and Fire series, which is all about family drama.

I don't think there is a more far reaching and intricately connected intergenerational science fiction series than Frank Herbert's Dune series, and his torch is now being carried by his son Brian. Even J. R. R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings and the stories set in Middle Earth had at the heart families, the short lived families of Hobbits, like Bilbo and Frodo with cousins, Merry and Pippin, and the ever faithful retainer Samwise Gamgee. The horse lords of the Riddermark and the immortal elves and their families and intertwined relationships made what was supposed to be a world changing adventure story so much more.

Science fiction and fantasy have always been my first loves because they take family to new heights and to the farthest reaches of the universe and the mind and remain always stories about families and family drama. Feuds and romance, war and faith, they are all in there. Without the smaller canvas (even when it spreads out in all directions) of family, adventure stories would just be stories of the moment. Add family, like the triplets born of a Witch who turned her back against the might of the ruling witches to fall in love with and marry a mortal man and still retain her power though she lost her jewel, and invest those triplets with powers and strengths (and weaknesses) of their own and a simple story turns into so much more, and so much less than just magic and mayhem. People are at the heart, the very core of fiction.

Where there are people there are families. None of can truly claim to have popped into existence without familial ties, even though those ties often bind, gag, and even strangle. Those ties can weave a platform that can boost us to the stars and the farthest reaches of imagination.

I doubt I can choose one writer or one intergenerational story that is the best or the closest to my heart, not with Marissa Meyer turning Cinderella into a story with so much breadth and family, both in stepmother and stepsisters and in a family on the moon struggling for power and ultimately control. Where would Cinderella be, and indeed Cinder, without stepmother and stepsisters? It's about family, the good, the bad, and the ugly. 

One of my first books, a gift from an aunt, was Heidi, and that was about family. Grandfather still angry at his son and regretting their fight before his son and daughter-in-law died before the beginning of the book when the aunt drags Heidi, a 5-year-old child, up into the alp to dump her on Heidi's grandfather's doorstep. And there is Peter and his mother and grandmother and Clara and her father, Herr Sesseman, and even the butler Sebastian, who was more family than Fraulein Rottenmeier, the governess who governed Clara and Heidi's lives. It was through Heidi's love and longing for her grandfather and the extended family of Peter, his mother, and grandmother that drives the story and gives the story such power and heart, so much power and heart I remember it nearly 50 years later with joy.

Sweeping tales of of stars and earth-bound adventurers are really just interesting stories without family and the complex and often puzzling power of relationships that makes good books great and give them the star quality that makes them last for a lifetime.

Where would Herbert's Dune series be without the vendettas and power struggles of the family houses: Atreides, Corrino, Harkonnen? The interconnected families of the Fremen and their cache of water to make Dune a planet of green and rain? How about Frank L. Baum's Oz series? Dorothy wanted to get back to her family and created a family of choice in Scarecrow, Tin Man, and Lion? And let us not forget Martin's sweeping saga of familial relationships with Stark against Lannister against Baratheon against the Dragons of the once great ruling family that culminates in Daenaerys Storm Born and her extended family of khalasar and slaves -- and dragons reborn into the world.

These are stories of war and strife and adventure, but they are also stories of families. How could they have touched so many lives and hearts without family at the center of all?

Choice and Blood

The family I often prefer is the family of my choice, the people with whom I have shared good times and bad and have become close to. Blood family can often depress and repress. And sometimes, like today, family is irritating and petty.

On Sunday, I wrote about a man who visited our home many times. Mom always said she thought he was a cousin but I called him uncle. He fired my imagination and stirred my tenderest emotions because he had survived the Bataan Death March. He was a POW in Japan until the end of WWII and I still remember the scars on his thumbs by which he had been hung up and tortured. I've met a few veterans over the years, and interviewed many more, and I am always amazed they can find humor in the most horrendous situations. Their humor, I was told once, was a way for them to shield their families from the horrors they knew and lived with every day of their lives, as Uncle Lacy lived with his horrors.

One veteran, a man who had served in the first group of the 101st Airborne gave me a copy of his memoirs. I still remember the humor that runs through the tale of freezing nights in foxholes in the forest and overturned jeeps and dead cattle among the tulip fields in the Netherlands. One part of his story is about how he found a bicycle while on patrol in Holland and pumping hell for leather to get to a local cafe where they were serving steak. I still smile when I think of him pedaling along the canals to get to the cafe for his share of steak past a bloated, bullet-ridden corpse of a cow in a field still smoking from tanks and vehicles that were bombarded with shells and gunfire. Everyone in his squad rode that bike past the same dead cow along the canal to the cafe to get a steak dinner, a luxury after weeks of living on cold beans out of a can.

Then I think about the puking runs during basic when their evil commander told his men there would be no run that afternoon before releasing them for chow, which turned out to be spaghetti and meatballs, a meal they tasted again after their punishing run up that suicide hill. The 101st was the best airborne group in the Army maybe because of the trials and tribulations they endured to be a part of that elite group.

Uncle Lacy wasn't part of the 101st but he was a soldier, an ordinary soldier, who was caught up in an extraordinary series of events, the high point of which was the Bataan Death March. Then, as now, I see him as a hero, just as I see the men and women who serve in all branches of the military who stand in harm's way for each and every American.

That was the point of my post on Sunday, not my relationship to Lacy Prater but my respect and honor for the men and women serving in the military and walking in harm's way. That is what brought out the petty perniciousness in one of my cousins and reminded me why I prefer my chosen family to some of my blood relations. She thought I was trying to steal a little of Lacy Prater's glory by calling him uncle and sharing that with other members of the family, including her son who has served several tours in Afghanistan and Iraq. She couldn't have been more wrong. I am not a soldier. Her son, Lacy Prater, and the sons of several friends are soldiers. My father was a soldier and served two tours in Korea, once during the Korean War and the second time during the Pueblo Incident. I know these people or know of them. I honor and respect them. They are heroes. They deserve so much more than I can ever give and more thanks than they will likely ever receive for leaving their families and their homes to serve in the military. My post wasn't about me; it was about them.

I remember Uncle Lacy every year at Veterans Day. I'm sad to say that I don't remember him every day. He deserves more of me and of us all.

Whether the war is popular or not, these men and women have chosen to serve in our stead and many have died. We should remember them every time we exercise our freedoms because they are the reason we still have those freedoms. I honor those veterans and all the veterans who have gone before, even though I wish their sacrifice had not been necessary.

Now and always, thank you, veterans, for walking in harm's way for me and for all of us. As far as I am concerned, you are the family I would choose.

Welcome to Hinckley, Ohio Chapter 3

I went back to work for the temp agencies that week to keep out of Mom and Dad's house (and out of Mom's way) as much as to earn some money while I was there. I didn't like being beholden to anyone, and I liked it even less when I was a one woman audience for Mom's diatribes about paying my fair share, which usually amounted to my fair share and a hefty portion of everyone else's. That's the way it was every time I came back to Columbus and ended up staying with my parents. I didn't mind helping out with cleaning and dishes and cooking. I didn't even mind paying my share of the groceries, but being stripped to the bone so I couldn't put aside enough money to get my own place was too much for anyone, and especially me.

It was the usual tug of war with Mom about getting out and doing things her way while under her roof. I'd rather get out from under her roof as soon as possible just for the silence having my own place afforded, even if the silence was punctuated by the the sound of children -- or in this case, one child, my eldest.

Mom had custody, as she reminded me constantly, but I had the responsibility of paying his way as well as my own. Nothing like having a leash with a choker chain fitted with sharpened spikes on the inside pointing at my jugular.

So I worked.

Caroline wanted to go back to Club 3 again and I had promised to meet Daryl, so I agreed to let her drive this time. I'd leave my car at the Bob Evans at Westland and she'd drive us there -- as long as she promised not to run out on me again.

Deja vu all over again. The stiff was at the bar nursing a draft beer and Daryl brought a couple of friends. One of them was Caroline's date from the previous week. He wouldn't be leaving with her this week; she had her eye on his friend. Caroline did like to diversify.

Everything about Caroline was friendly, even the way her belly kept jiggling like a flying jelly long after she had stopped laughing. In the back of my mind I kept hearing Mom tell me no one would want me if I was fat. Caroline had me beat at least three times and she never had a problem with men. They drooled all over her wherever we were. I just didn't get it, but then I guess it was my problem. It certainly wasn't hers.

Daryl was attentive and danced with me most of the night with the stiff cruising by every ten or fifteen minutes, eyes glued to Daryl's back as if he were wearing a target. When Daryl had to leave early because one of his boys ended up at the ER because of a broken arm, he took my backup ride with him. The way Caroline was acting, I was afraid to go to the restroom. I just knew I'd come back and she'd be gone with the pick of the night and I'd be phoning for a cab and hoping I had enough money to cover the cost.

No more drinks and no more bathroom, I told myself, but my bladder had other ideas. Sure enough, I got to the restroom in just enough time to avoid embarrassing myself and back to the table just in time to see the note Caroline left fluttering to the floor. The stiff picked it up and handed it to me.

"Guess you need a ride home," he said.

"You guess right." I thanked him for giving me the note and walked past him to the bar to ask for the number of a cab. The bartender pointed to the pay phone.

The stiff got in my way. "Excuse me, please," I said, but I was not being polite. It was the first warning before a game of grab, twist, and pull that would end with him clutching his jewels while I walked over his writhing carcass to get to the phone.

"I'd get out of her way," the bartender warned.

"I just want to help," the stiff said.

"Help yourself." The bartender threw up his hands. He knew stupid when he saw it.

Even though it had been a few years since I'd been to Club 3, some memories linger. That particular bartender had seen me down a couple of grabby drunks with more booze in them than sense. He knew enough to stand aside and let stupid take care of himself.

The stiff got in my way again. I hesitated. He was already injured with his arm in a sling and he was obviously too drunk -- or too stupid -- to realize he'd been warned. "Excuse me," I said rather pointedly.

"How about a ride home?"

"I have it covered as soon as I can get to the phone."

He stuck out his left hand. "Nick Sherwood."

A polite drunk. A stupid polite drunk, but okay. "Hi." I shook his left hand. "Nice to meet you. Thanks for the offer, but I'd prefer to pay my own way." And not your way either.

"Maybe I'm going your way."

"Hilliard by way of Westland shopping center."

He checked his watch. "I think the mall is closed."

I took a deep breath and counted to ten. Fixing a smile on my lips without too many teeth showing, I gritted out. "The parking lot is still open. Thank you, but, no, thank you."

"You can pay for the gas if it makes you feel better. I'll even let you ride in the back seat."

"With you up front. Somehow, without a meter running, I won't feel any safer, Nick." My mind supplied dick.

"Can't do much with a dislocated arm."

Would you like your other arm dislocated to match? I took another deep breath and let it out slowly. "Look, I appreciate the offer but I'd prefer to get my own way home."

Nick looked at me long and hard, without the usual roaming glance down to my breasts. "I'd really let you buy my gas. No funny stuff. Just rescuing a damsel in distress."

I couldn't help myself so I laughed. He was persistent and a bit abrasive, but his heart -- what I could see of it -- was in the right place. "I'm no one's damsel and I'm not in distress. Stranded, yes. Distress, no. I can find my own way home."

"Aww, let him give you a ride. He looks harmless," the bartender said.

At another time with me in a different mood, I'd have shot Jake the bartender a pair of laser beams right between the eyes, but the situation was ludicrous enough as it was. I could still call a cab and then call the police if Nick decided to give me any trouble, but he did seem harmless, if a little on the brick shy load of brains side of things. I could handle him if push came to shove. His wounded wing was on my side of the car.

"All right, but straight to Westland and no funny stuff. I'll tell you how to go."

Jake sniggered. "And how fast to get there, too," he muttered just loud enough for me to hear.

Nick didn't even finish his drink, which at the time told me he wasn't there for the booze alone. We walked outside and he tried to help me on with my coat one-handed. I had to give him credit for manners.

His car wasn't a car. It was a truck with a camper on the back. "Where's the back seat?"

Even in the dim sodium vapor light of the parking lot I could see him blush.

"It has a very wide seat."

Right.

He unlocked the passenger door first and offered his good arm in case I needed help climbing up to the seat. I didn't. He shut the door and duck-walked to the other side, got in, and started the truck. It fired right up. Points for good maintenance.

The cab was curiously devoid of the usual bachelor debris of fast food wrappers and nearly empty soda cups, the straws brown with a glue of saliva and cola. Except for a couple scraps of paper that looked like receipts, the cab was spotless. The windows were even clean on the inside, and there were no brown spatters that resembled dried blood, and no fading aroma of bleach. The only scents I could detect were faded pine from the pine-shaped air freshener hanging from the rear view mirror and spent sunshine and what seemed like spray starch.

The ride was silent except for my directions. He drove far too slow on the freeway for my taste. It wasn't as if the roads were bumper to bumper cars. There was the usual west side late night traffic and little else, but he kept to about 45 mph the whole way . . . on the freeway . . . with the speed limit posted at 55 and what few cars on the road zipping by at 60 and 65. I'm surprised the cops didn't stop us for going too slowly, but they were busy chasing down speeders drunk on the open stretch of highway under a glittering night sky.

When we got to Bob Evans, he stopped the car and started to get out. "I can let myself out. Thank you for the ride. I appreciate it." I opened my purse and counted out five singles.

"No need to pay me," he said, suddenly shy. "I just wanted to meet you."

I felt suddenly a bit ashamed of myself. All through this, I hadn't offered my name. "Jackie."

"Will you be at the bar next weekend? I'll have my sling off."

I couldn't help laughing. "I doubt it. I usually don't go out."

"You're not meeting your friend again?"

"Probably not. If I do, I'll bring my own car."

"Oh."

He sounded so disappointed. I knew he was interested since he hadn't buzzed anyone else either time I was at Club 3. I really couldn't afford to spend every weekend out. I wanted to spend some time with my son and I needed to work extra hours to save enough money to get a place of my own. Of our own since my son was with me. Provided Mom didn't play her usual game of puppet on a string.

"Maybe for one drink."

He brightened. "I won't keep you out late."

"One drink. Not one night."

"Right. I got it."

He waited while I got into the car, fired it up, and drove away. He followed me out onto Broad Street and up the ramp at 270, but didn't follow me home. He went back toward Grandview and I headed west to the Hilliard exit off 70. He could've taken advantage of the situation, but he didn't. Another point in his favor.

I might even show up next week and have that drink. Who knows? I might have two or see if he could dance. Anything was possible.  Anything at all.

Political Sidestep

One of the most frustrating parts of the past few months of presidential campaigning wasn't the name calling or friendships breaking up, but the constant blame game.

For the past four years, Obama has consistently blamed gridlock, transigent Republicans, and (mostly) President George W. Bush for everything that went wrong during his term of office. The economy was in such a mess because of Bush, in spite of Congress being controlled by Democrats, something that changed quickly after the first few months after Obama's election. Well, that and having forced a stimulus bill through Congress at light speed (D.C. wise) to make sure that Bush took the fall for the numbers since it was still fiscally 2008.

And there was so much more of the Obama Shuffle to go along with his world wide apology tour and snubbing of American allies. I've come to expect that kind of thing with Obama and his team of operatives and even considered not facing them down with facts and figures. I decided not to give in. Someone, even little old me, Cassandra of the 21st Century, needs to stand up and say NO in a frequently very loud voice.

Every time I wrote about the facts of what was going on in the government and in the economy, I was shouted down, called a moron (among other less polite names, like Repugnican or Republican, neither of which I am), and ordered to provide facts and figures that didn't come from Fox News. I guess they didn't read what I wrote because the facts and figures were there in the article or op-ed column, but they didn't sit well with the Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds crowd determined to hang onto their one shot at forgiveness for having had relatives or having known people somewhere along the ancestral roots that owned or transported slaves, or did their best to keep the blacks down. Obama was the way they proved to the world they weren't racist because they backed a bi-racial candidate for president and he won. As long as they supported him and continue to support him, even in the face of damning evidence, they would be absolved of their associations.

Let's forget about civil rights and the millions of WASPs that supported and marched with black. Let's forget that Obama said that his campaign platform wasn't about race, even though anyone who opposed Obama or disagreed with him must be a racist. How else could they not see the celestial light of wonder that shone through him as they chanted, "Yes, we can." I still cannot figure out what they can do, but I know what Obama has done and will now finish doing. The writing is on the wall. Cassandra has spoken and is once again ignored. Troy will fall and the burning stench of her fall will darken the sun.

Okay, a little over the top, but I'm making a point here.

I posted side by side facts about the economy when Bush left office and with Obama in office for four years and the responses were vicious from the Obama Choir. "After all," one of them said, "the president has nothing to do with the economy and the cost of living."

Um, what?

Memories of a car in every garage and a chicken in the pot flitted along my synapses. Presidential candidates down through history have promised things will be better (Obama certainly did, "Yes, he did.") and that the economy will bountiful along that rose strew path to prosperity.

Of course, the president has everything to do with the economy and the cost of living. His policies and what he supports and hammers through Congress create and maintain the economy. I guess it was a little too much to expect polite discussion and civil debate from people whose eyes are filled with the light that shines from . . . somewhere out in the world (the White House is too boring for Obama and his family) while he continues his apology tour . . . and the feeling of renewal that came when their sins were washed white as snow by voting for a bi-racial candidate, who identifies himself as black in spite of his very white mother and maternal family. No one should be allowed to take that away. They earned it.

They turned blind eyes from the truth, like America's AAA credit rating falling to AA and the deaths of two Navy SEALS in Benghazi, not to mention the death of the American ambassador, while they hoped that change had come to them and life would get better. Gas would be 30 cents a gallon once again and the American dollar would soar so that travel overseas would once again be affordable, even on a janitor's salary. America would remain the only super power keeping the lands and seas safe from terrorists and the Red Skull (or whoever is the bad guy this year -- I think it's Islamic jihadists) and people could relax and take care of their two cars in the garage, lavish vacations, and even more lavish lifestyles with a new laptop computer and iPhone every 3 months.

So, to my Democrat friends who still believe in Obamessiah and continue to shout with unrelieved fervor, "Yes, we can!" I say, you cannot have it both ways. You cannot damn Republicans or Centrists or Moderates or Conservatives or Independents on the facts and refuse to see the facts when they don't shine with benevolent light on the man you have mortgaged this country for.

Yes, the president is responsible for what happens in the economy as he piles on even more debt and sells government bonds to China and the rest of the world. Yes, Obama is responsible for the cost of bread and milk and gas because every time he grants a government contract to a foreign national company, he takes jobs away from Americans. Yes, Obama is responsible for the growing unemployment, for the hundreds of thousands of people who have stopped looking for work and no longer get unemployment compensation. Even though they no longer figure in the numbers and percentages of Americans out of work, they are still out there and still don't have jobs. Yes, Obama is responsible for the unprecedented increase in Welfare and food stamp recipients, among them military personnel and their families, and, no, their communities are not supposed to support these soldiers and their families; that is the government's job because the government hired them to protect and defend this country and our allies around the world.

I could go on, but I wonder if any of this is getting through.

Bottom line: Facts are facts. Number don't lie, unless you know how to cook the books the way that Slick Willy did during his two terms of office. At least Clinton did one thing, cooked books and all, and that is put out a budget during his 8 years in the White House. Obama failed to put out a single budget in his entire first term, a term he promised would be his last if he didn't fix the economy and repair the damage Bush had done.

Let me be one more to voice reminding Obama he didn't fix the economy and he worsened the damage Bush and his Democrat-controlled Congress did.

No, I will not be silent over the next 4 years. Get used to the idea that this writer does more than write books and humor and slices of life. This writer is also passionate about this country. I am a flag waving, Yankee Doodle Dandy of an American. I always have been. I still stand up when the national anthem is played and I sing out loud and strong with tears streaking my face. I am still stirred by songs like America the Beautiful and my heart beats loudly for "...purple mountains' majesty above the fruited plain." I need no one to absolve me for the sins of racism and slavery because I am a result of a melting pot of ancestry that includes Native American, black, and European in a cohesive package that has not forgotten the past but refuses to repeat the mistakes of the past with new mistakes in the present for a future worse than Nostradamus ever predicted.

I am an American and I will hold fast to my freedoms, however they may be eroded. This is one Cassandra the gods will not silence.

I see what you are doing and have done. Say it wasn't you, but I know and soon all will know . . . Yes, you did.

Perfect Storm of Ignorance

A couple years ago there were blizzards and record snow fall (at least since humans have been keeping records) and there have been hurricanes, like Katrina that decimated New Orleans and the coastal areas in the Gulf, and typhoons, and tornadoes, and all kinds of extreme weather. Everywhere I turn someone is wither howling about the End of Days and the Second Coming being heralded by the weather or creaming at nonbelievers that the extreme weather is the result of global warming and human intervention. It is all a lot of tempests in teapots. Someone is always screaming about the end of the world, either by god's or man's hand. It is inevitable.

What is not inevitable is any sign of reason. Extreme weather has been with us since the beginning when this planet was formed. If you want extreme, you should have been here when the world was nothing but volcanoes and magma and clouds of miles of towering ash clouds that reached to the heavens. That is extreme.

The most devastating Atlantic hurricane in the record books was in 1780 in Puerto Rico when 22,000 people lost their lives. I believe that was before the advent of cars and chemicals spewing into rivers, lakes, and the oceans eating a hole in the ozone. In fact, until fairly recent memory when the hole in the ozone was discovered over Antarctica, I doubt anyone can prove whether there was or wasn't a hole there before it was discovered.

The volcanic eruption from Mt. Tambora on Sumbawa Island in Indonesia in 1805 was more devastating that Krakatoa in 1883 and 52 times more destructive than the bomb that leveled Hiroshima. Notice that the volcanic eruption was before the time of human technology, cars, and man-made chemicals and was not born in a lab in Manhattan or tested at White Sands.

The devastation from Mt. Tambora had a profound effect on the weather in the United States with frost in the middle of summer and snow in June in New England, Newfoundland, and Labrador half a world away, termed the year without a summer in 1816. No cars, no chemicals, and no global warming, except for the warming trend that followed the nuclear winter which was the result of Mt. Tambora's devastating volcanic display.

Benjamin Franklin wrote a paper about the unusually cool summer of 1783 on the volcanic dust and sulfur dioxide in the atmosphere due to the volcanic eruption of Laki in Iceland. Franklin might have blamed it on man if he'd had our technology to track storms and prognosticate about the weather, but all he had was his intellect and the power of observation.

The great famine of 1315-1317 was theorized to be the result of the volcanic eruption of Kaharoa in New Zealand and the effects lasted for 5 years.

Unseasonal weather, crop failures, and famine from 535-536 could have been caused by a comet strike sending a veil of dust that blotted out the sun and cooled the earth, as Procopius wrote, but it is more likely that Rabaul in Papua New Guinea erupting was the cause.

Volcanic winter about 71,000 to 73,000 years ago was probably the result of a super-eruption of Lake Toba in Sumatra that deposited a record amount of sulfuric ash over the following 6 years that has been measured to be the highest level of ash in the past 110,000 years. The result of Mother Nature's temper tantrum at that time significantly deforested Southeast Asia and global temperatures dropped 1° C, reducing the animal and possibly human population and increasing continental glaciation. In plain speak, it was so cold the glaciers advanced across the European continent, making it so cold that animals and humans died in vast numbers.

I could continue with more statistics and history that encompass thousands of years of recorded history of natural disasters and extreme weather. What it all boils down to is that this planet has seen much worse natural disasters than Hurricane Sandy and more devastation that nuclear bombs and man's latest technological and technical innovations to make this world a more habitable place. What we seem to forget is that no place on Earth is safe to live. Where there are volcanoes, coastal shores, lands reclaimed from the sea that are still below sea level, beautiful alpine and forested slopes near dormant or sleeping volcanoes, verdant stretches above earthquake faults, and pastures and mountain tops in ancient paths of glacial advance, there is nowhere that nature cannot find us and destroy us. It is not god's will and it is not manmade global warming, but life on a turbulent planet constantly changing and reforming from within and without. Tornadoes, typhoons, earthquakes, comet and meteor strikes, glacial advance and retreat, and any number of natural disasters, like wildfires, will happen. If we choose to live here on this planet then we will be affected -- effectively destroyed and decimated.

The temperatures rise and they fall. Climate changes and levels of soot, sulfuric acid, volcanic debris, and sunspot activity on our big yellow sun and factors too numerous to count and fully understand will happen. The planet cools and the planet warms. How much humans have added to the mix is insubstantial compared to what has been thrown into the atmosphere from Mother Nature's latest temper tantrum. To claim human intervention as the major cause is understandable since people are too sophisticated to believe that some capricious deity is behind the destruction and upheaval, but that belief is as arrogant and superstitious as the belief that our actions have caused the gods to punish man for not saying his prayers or sleeping with someone else's husband.

We exist on a living planet that grows and changes every day. We may be convinced we know the causes of such extreme weather, but it is more likely we see and understand the tip of a vast iceberg, the bulk of which lies beneath the waters of our ken. All we can do is what humans have done since their first appearance on this world -- live through it and rebuild.

Welcome to Hinckley, Ohio: Chapter 2 | JM Cornwell | Blog Post | Red Room

Welcome to Hinckley, Ohio: Chapter 2 | JM Cornwell | Blog Post | Red Room

Muzzling Free Speech

Yesterday, I was  treated to censorship. I had been asked to write an Obama opposing viewpoint because the editor of the online magazine had seen some of my posts and wanted more balanced coverage (i.e., not all Obama praising). After three days, I wrote the post, which I posted here yesterday, breaking a 2-month hiatus from Facebook. While I worked, the op-ed column was taken down without letting me know until much later.

I asked what the complaints were and was told some readers and advertisers misunderstood what I wrote. I don't see how. What I wrote was as plain as plain English can be. What I found out this morning was that readers and advertisers called the ezine's offices to make their voices heard, meanwhile my virtual voice was silenced.  The editor apologized for putting me through "the battle" when all she wanted was to offer fair and balanced reporting. I guess fair and balanced at her ezine is Obama praise and no opposition.

Since ezines exist because of writers but are funded by advertising, I understand the editor in chief's actions, but what I don't understand is why he did not contact me and let me know.

I have hit against this particular brick wall a number of times. The first time was a profile I wrote about a woman who, with her family, spent World War II in a Japanese internment camp because her father refused to take an oath of loyalty. The newspaper struck my original lead likening the camp to concentration camps in Europe during that same war and turned it on its head, likening her stay in the internment camp to summer camp, which was more palatable to the advertisers. I did not like it them and I do not like it now.

Just because I understand why the editor in chief of The Celebrity Cafe killed my op-ed column does not mean I like it or that I do not realize I was censored in a country prized for its free speech. Speech is not free and I wonder if it ever has been. Loud, angry voices and money speak much louder than simple truths, facts, and figures, something I am very aware of on Facebook, and part of the reason I left Facebook. I came back because I feel that I have something worth saying and thought that my voice and my opinions should be heard, regardless of the opposing views. I do not engage in name calling or shouting down my opposition but I do civilly and respectfully disagree, often with facts and figures.

This country has become polarized and there is no middle ground where the quiet voice of truth can be heard. That is sad. This country was founded on ideals and beliefs that seem no longer apply and that is sadder still, especially when advertisers have the power to censor any voice that opposes them -- or speaks the glaring truth.

I can only hope that once this election is over and the ballots are counted sanity will return, but it is a faint hope after yesterday. I am a realist and I have been battered by this particular storm for too long to believe that we can ever return to fair and balanced reporting that is no longer censored.

If you'd like to read the original op-ed column, please feel free to do so.

The Only Choice America Can Survive | TheCelebrityCafe.com

The Only Choice America Can Survive | TheCelebrityCafe.com

Who will get your vote in November?

EDIT 10/25/12 at 6:41 p.m. MST:  I have just been informed that the original op-ed column listed above has been taken down because readers and advertisers at TheCelebrityCafe.com took my column the wrong way. I don't see how facts and figures can be taken the wrong way, but there it is. Good thing I saved the post on Red Room. You may read it there.

http://redroom.com/member/jm-cornwell/blog/counting-down-the-days

Review: The Midwich Cuckoos by John Wyndham

The Midwich Cuckoos has been filmed twice under the title Village of the Damned, but you will find very little of what made it to the movie in the novel by John Wyndham. As always, it is best to treat book and movies as two separate entities.

Having seen the movies and knowing (I thought) what the book was about, I decided to read it for myself. The book is long on philosophy and sociological meanderings and short on plot. Most of the story is told from an insider's point of view, a narrator that was part of the Dayout when Midwich was separated from the rest of the countryside by an invisible wall that rendered anyone entering its influence unconscious. The narrator and his wife, not allowed to return home, decide to make an end run around the police and military and find a way into the village only to be rendered unconscious. They are pulled out by the police and waken slowly and with few side effects of their ordeal by unconsciousness.

When the Dayout ends, the residents, having been under the influence of the effect longer, have some difficulty returning to consciousness and many are freezing. Some of the residents caught out in the open and subjected to the effects longest died as a result of exposure.

The narrator is friend with Dr. Zellaby, an author of philosophical and sociological examinations of mankind, and he is the first to realize that the pregnancies of young virgins and every woman able to bear children in the village a result of the Dayout. The military also have an inkling since they saw an anomaly at the center of Midwich during the Dayout when they flew surveillance. Dr Zellaby's wife is also pregnant, but it turns out she was pregnant by the usual means and her child is not one of the golden-eyed male and female hive minds born.

I won't waste too much time detailing the differences between the movies and the book. The essence is there, but none of the flavor since Wyndham's novel is long on exposition and short on action. Most of the action is explained and detailed by the narrator and through long -- and sometimes boring -- conversations with Dr. Zellaby.

A novel about being tied to a changeling, or cuckoo as the novel terms the children, able to force the "mother's" return when she gets more than 6 miles from Midwich is something that only a man would term science fiction, having never given birth to a child or been tethered to the child's demands for food, clean diapers, and attention. Many of the mothers, and indeed Zellaby's own daughter, leave their children behind for the town and military intelligence, who have taken control of the situation, to deal with. The rest of the story leads up to the death of a young man that nearly ran down one of the Cuckoos and the subsequent vengeance taken by townspeople and the Children, which leads up to the extermination of the last group of Children from the Dayout in Midwich.

The Midwich Cuckoos is an interesting story written at a time when the conventions of fiction were different. As I said before, the book is long on exposition and hearsay and short on action. Everything, aside from Zellaby's lectures, most of which are convoluted philosophical Mobius strips, is told second-hand, except where the narrator is on the scene. The ending leaves a bit to be desired, but there is a solid story behind the archaic conventions of storytelling. The novel is worn around the edges by newer and brighter tales of the same stripe but the heart of the story remains what happens when man is threatened by a new and different species that might supplant him -- fear, anger, and eradication. That part of the story still holds true and is worth the reading.

Welcome to Hinckley, Ohio

Chapter One

Death brings out the best and worst in people, especially when the death is in the family.

I met my husband's siblings when we all sat down in the attorney's office to discuss the dispostion of Nick's father's will. I already knew Larry; he and I were very close and had been since the moment we met. The rest of Nick's siblings -- Julie, Thom, and Maggie -- I knew by reputation and had a pretty good idea what they were about. I couldn't have been more wrong.

When I met Nick's father, his dad told me that I was marrying the wrong son. He was right, of course, but then he didn't know that Larry was gay either. That would have shocked the old man down to his cradle Catholic soul, especially since his wife Esther knew Larry was gay and knew how her husband would react. No amount of pepper in his food would change his attitude or Mr. Sherwood's mind about his queer son -- or his lesbian daughter come to that. Out of five children, the Sherwoods gave birth to one lesbian and one very gay Larry. In spite of Mr. Sherwood's beliefs, he was a good man and he would have come around in time, without the pepper in his food which was Esther's way of getting her own back when they fought.

I never met Esther, but I heard a lot about her from Mr. Sherwood, Nick, and Larry. I think I would've liked her even if she was a zealot, as are most converts to a religion. At least she loved all her children, if not equally, at least well.

I knew Mr. Sherwood a few months when he sent his children out of his hospital room and asked me to stay. I had no idea what he wanted, but he wasn't long in producing a small metal file box filled with 3 x 5 cards that were filled with names and numbers. Some of the cards were stapled together. The file box contained the details of how much each of his children owed on their inheritance, money Mr. Sherwood had advanced them for various reasons, from a down payment on a house to tuition and more, much more. Nick was the only one who had not borrowed on his inheritance and, according to Mr. Sherwood, was the one who would benefit most from his death. Mr. Sherwood quickly hushed me when I said he wouldn't die any time soon and he fixed me with a no nonsense stare.

"I know I'm going to die soon, and it can't come soon enough. I miss Esther and want to be with her."

What could I say? "I understand how much you miss her."

"Enough of that. Will you do it?" He pointed to the file box. "Will you stand up for me with the lawyer and make sure everything is done according to my wishes?"

"Of course, but shouldn't you get one of your children or your lawyer to handle this?"

There was that look again, the no nonsense stare.

"I have told the lawyer but I don't have the time to do everything that needs to be done. I want you to do it. If you're willing."

"Yes, I'll do what I can."

"Put that in your purse before they all come back. You'll have to fight them all to make sure Nick gets his fair share. They won't give in."

As much as I wanted to help, the idea of getting off on the wrong foot with my almost in-laws did not make me happy. I wasn't afraid of them, but I did want them to like me. It would be an uphill battle no matter what. I'd seen them going through Mr. Sherwood's home with stacks of cards filled with colored dots, a different color for each, parceling out his possessions and he wasn't even dead yet. A plague of locusts intent on getting every bit before they moved on.

Mr. Sherwood grabbed my hand, his thumb making soft lazy circles that sent shivers all through me. "Yes, I'll fight them for you."

"I still think you're marrying the wrong Sherwood. It's your choice, but I wish you'd take some time and think it over. You and Larry are perfect for each other."

I blushed, something I seldom did. "I love Nick."

"You love Larry, too. I know he loves you."

I smiled through the gathering tears and nodded. "It just wouldn't work out."

"Your choice," he said, pulling me down to kiss my cheek. "I wish I could stick around. I'd like to get to know you better."

Nick and his siblings came back into the room, but Mr. Sherwood kept hold of my hand. "I want you all to promise right now to abide by my wishes." All five of them nodded, murmuring yes. Nick was the only one who said loudly, "I promise, Dad." I didn't know that was the way it would always be -- and had always been.

Mr. Sherwood outlined what he wanted in his funeral and what he wanted done about his possessions and the will. Possessions they had already tagged with their big colored dots, none of which belonged to Nick.

Four of the Sherwoods groaned when Mr. Sherwood said Nick got the house free and clear and that the money they owed him from loans would also go to Nick. I didn't miss the daggers Maggie, Julie, and Thom sent Nick's way. Nick was oblivious, tears streaking his face and he stared down at his father's left foot where it stuck out from the covers. He reached down, his fingers brushing the side of his father's foot, a red blush creeping up his neck and flaming his cheeks.

Larry nodded immediately, but it took much longer for Maggie, Thom, and Julie to promise their father they agreed with his terms. I knew at that moment they would never follow through and the only ammunition available was in my bag, the truth that would force them to honor their promises. I didn't know how wrong I was or to what lengths the other four Sherwoods would go to stick it to Nick who, they felt, had had more than his share since he fell ill with spinal meningitis when he was still a child. I didn't know any of it at that time, but I soon found out the buzzards didn't only migrate to Hinckley, Ohio. A small family of those buzzards had descended to pick over Mr. Sherwood's carcass while it was still alive. They began at his home and soon moved to the rest of his life as it trickled away. They didn't mind waiting a few months. Those buzzards had caught the scent of death and waited patiently for the end.

Persuaded

Have you ever heard someone speak about a book or see a movie based on a book and wanted to read the original? I do. All the time. That's the case with The Midwich Cuckoos by John Wyndham, also author of Day of the Triffids, which I've already read.

I don't know if it's curiosity (mostly, what Beanie calls my nose problem) or lack of sales resistance. I prefer the former. Basically, it's like someone suggesting books and me deciding which ones I want to read. That's how I finally began reading Jane Austen and found I actually liked it. Before watching the BBC series with Colin of the wet shirt, I began reading Austen but just could not get past the ponderous language. Hearing it spoken gave it life and sparkle and I had to read the books, books I continue to reread year after year. Austen is a place of beauty and romance that still touches my old heart and I do so love the scene between Anne and the captain when he reaches out one very large gloved hand and she places her small hand in his. That is true romance. I see it every time I read Persuasion, which is why I suppose I also enjoy The Lake House because of the connection to Persuasion.

I have to admit that I am a bit surprised that the very wordy Wyndham Midwich Cuckoos is so very wordy and most of what I've seen numerous times in Village of the Damned has not occurred, except for the town going to sleep and anyone coming within its confines dropping off immediately. At times, the book puts me to sleep when Dr Zellaby goes on and on in his philosophical vein. There are moments when he makes sense, like when he told his son-in-law to take his daughter away from Midwich without their baby so she could escape the compulsion that comes over every woman of a Dayout baby/cuckoo when she gets six miles from Midwich, as if tethered by some invisible cable that yanks the mother back. Several more educated and scientific-minded women have already figured out they can escape the compulsion by leaving Midwich without the baby forced on them by the Dayout and leaving the baby/cuckoo in the care of the town without regret or second glances. Only one mother out of the entire population of child bearing females in Midwich had a normal baby, and that is Dr Zellaby's wife, Angela. She was obviously pregnant when the Dayout occurred.

At any rate, I am moderately enjoying the book, but I doubt I'd be reading it at this time if not for Mrs Fitzgerald's mention of the book to her brother-in-law when she was talking about how her midlife baby Jimmy kept her tethered to the house when she had one grown son and a nearly grown daughter. Having a baby at the middle of her life was not in her plans and, as much as she loved him, she was sick to death of being tethered to home with a newborn. She talked about how any woman with a Midwich cuckoo was compelled to return to the "nest" and how it had to be a man writing that kind of hell because a woman never would -- be tethered or find it fodder for a story. I had to read the book then and there.

Mostly, I've been pleased and fascinated by the books I've been recommended in this fashion, but there have also been some dogs. Still, I wonder how many people buy books, not because a friend mentioned them or because of being drawn by the cover art or the author's name, but because a television character or movie based on a book put the idea into their heads. How do you find the books you read for entertainment and escape?

Maybe Beanie is right and it all comes down to my nose trouble. Stranger things and all that.

That is all. Disperse.

Pieces fall away

Last night I received an email from Hoity-Toity forwarding news from Cutty. My ex-husband, Nick, had died. I thought at first he had died in the last day or so, but he had died October 8 and the obituary was printed in the local newspaper just yesterday. Nine days between his death and the obit and, what struck me as odd, the obit was bare info: where he lived, high school he attended, and date of death, along with his nickname, Nick. Nothing else.

The last I heard of Nick was over 10 years ago. He was living in Uzi Alley, a really bad section of Columbus on the east side, and working for a temporary service while chauffeuring around his girlfriend/fiancee/whatever in an old Cadillac she bought so he could drive her to various gambling venues around the country, which is why he was working at a temp service instead of a full time job with benefits. She was 20 years older than he and very wealthy, but kept him on a leash, a long leash, since she would not allow him to live with her. The woman had retired from publishing and loved to gamble (she'd have to getting into a relationship with Nick) and kept changing the date of their wedding about 5 times. I think it was the carrot at the end of an ever-changing long stick that kept growing like Pinocchio's nose during an orgy of lying. But that was 10 years ago.

Nick reportedly lived in North Linden near the same neighborhood he grew up in and there was nothing about how he died or how long it took them to find him after he died. Considering his penchant for strippers and unprotected sex with whomever he found in a bar or strip joint, I'd guess he died either of a sexually transmitted disease or a heart attack. He would've been 60 on October 27 but didn't make it.

A friend told me last night that he left a hole in the tapestry of my life because he died. I cut him out of that tapestry many years ago when it was apparent I could no longer live with a violent, unfaithful man whose only emotions were none and rage, usually accompanied by violence. He was rigid and abusive and really hard to get rid of. He was also whiny and blamed everyone for his problems. Nothing was ever his fault, like the time he beat me up when I was trapped in a chair behind a table on which sat a computer that didn't belong to me and the wall of the stairs behind me. The only reason he stopped hitting me was because his hand swelled.

Don't shed any tears for me. I got my own back not long after that incident when I proved to him that I was not his punching bag and that he had more to fear from me than I did from him. Of course, he hit me upside the head with a full can of spray starch one evening when he found out I was better at following him than he was of losing me. He ended up with stripes up and down his legs and his right shoulder dislocated when he tried to pull his belt out of my hands. I wasn't in control that night, but my rage was. I would've gotten away from him then but my dad and brother moved him in while I was out picking up new blinds for my new apartment. But that is all in the past. He's dead now and my feelings for him have been dead even longer.

I do wonder what happened to him and why his funeral is being held now. Was he murdered by an angry husband? Have his remains been autopsied or held by the coroner until cause of death could be established? Why is his funeral private and why did it take so long for someone to put it all together? I may never know the reasons or what happened to him, and maybe that is for the best. The last thing I need from Nick or his family is a feeling of wanting justice for wrongful death.

I imagine he died alone and it took a few days for the smell to reach the other residents and his body found. I wouldn't want that kind of death even for Nick. No one should die like that. All this speculation just incites my curiosity and that's never good when it comes to Nick. That's how I found out about his nastier habits and what a fish feeding frenzy was all about, but I expected nothing less from the man who preferred to spend his honeymoon playing militia. It was a fitting end to our wedding since our wedding dinner was spent sitting next to one of his old girlfriends, the woman who aborted his unborn child, and with whom he spent most of the dinner with catching up on old times.

Every day in little ways, the pieces of my life fall away.

That is all. Disperse.

Summer Memories

I didn't get much work done yesterday, not with the bloody nose and  the roofers making all kinds of noise. I did better this morning since I  slept in and they finished up their work and went their way without  waking me up. Tells me just how tired I was from yesterday's sturm und drang. Last night was a little better.

During  all the hullabaloo I talked to my Uncle Bob and to Beanie, who was busy  wrangling her fiance's kids going somewhere. Beanie got the beads I  sent for her Xmas ornament pattern I sent her weeks ago and Uncle Bob  wanted to tell me he got the letter I sent him in January about family  stories for a history of our family for my boys and their families. He  kept forgetting to mention it when he'd talked to me every other time he  called to let me know he got my letter.

Families are like that,  focused on their own families and letting the satellites of their  extended family get lost in the noise and busy-ness of everyday life.  It's all right. I'd forgotten I wrote everyone and he is the only one,  after 9 months, that has responded at all; and I wrote a lot of letters  asking for family anecdotes and histories. At least he called. That's a  point in his favor, but then Uncle Bob is -- and has always been -- my  favorite uncle. My next favorite uncle would've been Uncle Homer, who  was really a great uncle and Grandpa May's younger brother. That's a  story for another time.

I got a call from my cousin Ellen last night and we chatted. She finally finished reading Among Women,  which is a big thing because Ellen doesn't read much. She does read my  letters and has read almost everything I've had published, but not my  books . . . until now. She has a Kindle and really loves reading on  that, which is a good thing. Even better, she loved the book and asked  when the sequel is going to be published. I'm getting to it and will  have it done, along with 2 other books, soon. I don't have a specific  date since work and preparations for the holidays has taken a big bite  out of my free time.

Ellen had a surprise for me. Aunt Lois, her  mother and Uncle Bob's wife (it works out like that) gave Ellen a file  full of papers she had kept from Ellen's younger years. She went through  the bible school papers and old grade cards (oh, the horror!) and found  an old program from one of our beauty pageants. It was the year she was  Miss Iraq and wore the costume I designed and made for her.

Every  year, Hoity-Toity and I went to spend a month up at Uncle Bob's place  in the country and every year we put together a beauty pageant. It was  better than playing school with Cutty as teacher, believe me.  (The  nicknames were the way Uncle Bob, and Grandpa May, his father, thought  of us.) Cutty was just so bossy. Okay, it was Cutty's idea to have a  beauty pageant, and the year Hoggy's (that's Ellen) program indicated is  the first year we had the pageant in the 2-car garage Uncle Bob built.  We took it over, curtaining off areas for dressing rooms and a stage,  and did it right. It was a far cry from the cobbled together pageant we  had the first year when I was runner-up.

All during the month of  our sojourn in the country, we searched the nearby local dump for glass  bottles and jars (and the thickets for berries) to clean up and use as  prizes. It was a very big deal. Mom and Aunt Lois got into the spirit of  the thing and bought cocktail dresses and formals from Goodwill and  gave them to us for our pageant. I took one of the dresses, a bright  golden cocktail dress with yards of skirt, and made what I thought would  indicate an Iraqi national costume -- an I Dream of Jeannie kind  of harem costume. I was 9 or 10, so give me a break. Hoggy had long  honey gold blonde hair and I fixed her hair up into a high ponytail,  complete with a golden mini crown to hold her hair. Some of the dress  went to make a little bra and vest and the rest to make her sheer  bloused harem pants. Uncle Bob put his foot down when I was trying to  figure out a way to put a big jewel in Hoggy's navel. She won best  national costume that year, and I won Miss Universe.

Neighbor  girls, friends of my cousins, got into the act and some even had their  costumes and formals made for them while we cobbled together our own or  wore dresses from Goodwill. It was a very big deal that got bigger every  year until we stopped having the pageants. I suppose we stopped because  we were teenagers and didn't spend that month in the country any more.

Btw,  Hoggy is Ellen's nickname, which is short for Roadhog, and Cutty is one  of Laura's nicknames; the other is Gassy, for obvious reasons. Uncle  Bob nicknamed everyone. I was Pearl; Beanie was Dick Tracy or Dick; Mike  was Pickle; Aunt Lois was Hatchet Face; Bobbi Jean was Leaky or Black  (we called her the S. S. Leakybottom); Gayle was Shepherd; and I can't  remember if he gave Hoity-Toity and The Mushroom nicknames, but you can  see I've carried on the tradition.

Listening to Ellen read off  the names and events was a trip back to those times. Images of those  summers swam through my mind and reminded me how much fun we all had. We  had little spats and did the things cousins always did (like deviling  each other), but mostly they were golden days and star-filled nights  when we rarely watched television or sat still for more than a few  minutes unless we were making something for our pageants. To see us now,  you would never know we had been so close. I miss those days and that  feeling of family.

Uncle Bob asked me if I would eventually buy a  home up here and if I would ever move back to Ohio. I might buy a home,  but it will be here. I love the mountains. Even though I love my  family, some more than others, I doubt I could find a way to fit in with  them again, not like the way we were those summers as we busily put  together our pageants and scoured dumps and berry bushes. Some things  cannot be recreated. At least we have the memories, and there are a lot  of those, but I wonder what people would make of our homemade pageants  and the way we threw ourselves into the preparations. I guess it doesn't  matter, but I still wonder.

Bloody Roof Central

It only took 53 months to get it done but it is being done as I type this. My roof is finally being fixed. I can tell because there are men on the roof making noises with hammers and saws and I had to let them use the electricity in the house to run their power saws so they can cut out the bad parts of the roof. That means my last letter with the legalese and promise to contact state and local authorities worked. Or it could be that my promise to withhold rent and put it in escrow was the deciding factor. Either way, my roof is being rebuilt. Remember the power saws I mentioned. That means being rebuilt.

I've no doubt the landlord took the cheapest bid he could get but at least the work is being done and it is beginning to feel a bit warmer in here. Imagine that. Having a leaking roof does make a difference in how cold it gets in the winter. I might even be able to turn my office into a sitting room with a new HD flat screen TV after all and put in bookshelves and a big comfy chair and sit in here in the winter. I plan to put my office in the living room. Makes it easier to get the door when deliveries are made and someone knocks on the door so I will actually hear it. I can't hear knocking when I'm in the office in the drafty room with the holey roof.

This morning has been eventful for several reasons, not the least of which is a serious nose bleed, which is beginning to at last come under control. Time to up the intake on foods that contain vitamin K again. Of course, if I hadn't scratched my nose so badly when I blew it this morning I probably wouldn't have had the problem. It's so dry here that the usual post nasal drip turns to crusty dams of dried mucous that, when blown out, scrape the mucosal lining of my nose and hence the bleeding. It happens. I'm used to it happening, and it hasn't happened for years up to this point. The dry air just makes it all worse. Time to do the saline nasal spraying again.

That's the thing with life. Just when it seems boring and beyond banal, someone comes and climbs up on the roof, bringing helpers and friends, and begins tearing up the old roof and putting on a new one, and the shock creates a nose bleed, although truthfully, the nose bleed happened before the roofers arrived. It took a while to control.

In the meantime, anyone interested in a big old couch, glass end and coffee tables, and a whole lot of books?

That's all from bloody roof central. Disperse.

Review: The Age of Desire by Jennie Fields

When I began reading The Age of Desire I was immediately pulled into the narrative and into Edith Wharton's life, or at least the few years that are chronicled in Edith's words and Jennie Fields' prose. I was not prepared for such a journey, but it is a journey I am very glad I took.

I read several reviews and comments on the book, but was surprised by the vitriol hurled at Fields because she chose to write about Edith Wharton's affair with journalist, William Morton Fullerton, a man much younger than herself and a libertine, while she was married to Teddy Wharton. Their shock and anger were directed at Edith Wharton's infidelity and her treatment of her husband while he was ill. I admit, I was surprised that she could be so cold to her husband, but there are always two sides to every story, a fact that was not lost on Fields.

The Age of Desire is an accurate and very human portrait of a group of people -- Edith and Teddy Wharton, Fullerton, Henry James, and Anna Bahlmann, Edith's personal secretary, governess, and close friend. Fields uses Edith's letters and diary entries to good effect in creating a poignant and romantic interlude in Wharton's life, showing Edith's sexual and emotional awakening in her middle 40s and the seductive lure of a young man well versed in the art of love and the long con. Edith's first assessment of Fullerton was right on the money when she viewed him as a roue. She had no idea how deep Fullerton's perfidy ran and I doubt it would have saved Edith from falling in love with Fullerton or from becoming obsessed with him. Fullerton was, after all, a master of seduction.

Fields treads a fine line between accusation and pity in dealing with Teddy Wharton's depression and illness, both of which were made worse by Teddy's drunkenness and obvious lack of sexual experience. Teddy was an immature man who was kind and mostly harmless, but as his drinking got worse, his depression grew, and his actions in the face of his wife's infidelity became more pronounced, and nearly violent.

Fields' sparkling prose makes The Age of Desire the kind of book that transports the reader to the turn of the 20th century and evokes the time and place with subtlety and veracity. It is hard watching a literary icon like Edith Wharton show her feet of clay and yet Fields treats the revelations with a gentle touch and a poet's gift for illumination. Jennie Fields transcends the mundane by penning a sublime novel with wit and charm and not a little generosity in dealing with the foibles inherent in human nature.

I was captivated by the prose and enlightened by a glimpse into Edith Wharton's life and loves. Most of all, I was charmed by the enduring friendship between Edith Wharton and Anna Bahlmann. In essence, The Age of Desire, is about true friendship and the awakening of desire in both women.

Ice Cold Revenge

I have to say that Revenge is addictive. Who hasn't imagined or secretly planned a way to bring enemies down and make sure they stay down? In my younger days, I plotted and executed my share of revenge, but I certainly didn't have the resources of Amanda Clarke/Emily Thorne. I found out about the series yesterday when I finished watching season 1 of Once Upon A Time.

As for my own revenge, I remember one specific event. Since I had been married -- and divorced -- and had a different name from my family's, Dad thought it would be a good idea to get me a job at the company where he worked. He worked in accounts and I got a job, on my own merit, in data processing. We seldom saw each other and didn't take lunches together, but we did ride to work together. If anyone asked, we car pooled. That was enough of a story. But there was a girl I worked with that got fired after I started working in DP because I was doing all the work and she, for all her years of service, wasn't pulling her fair share. The fact that I also put together a procedure manual and streamlined their operations had nothing to do with her being fired and everything with me sucking up to the boss (can I just say, "YUCK!") and getting her fired. She was determined to see me fall.

She got lucky.

She happened to see my family and I at the Westland Mall and heard me call my father Dad. What else would I call him but Dad? She hightailed it to my boss and to the owner of the company saying that Dad and I were related (well, duh) and that I should be fired. That's not what happened. My father was fired because the company deemed me the more valuable asset. Dad didn't have a problem finding a job, but I had a problem with the woman that caused all the trouble. Revenge begets revenge.

My revenge took the form of setting her up for a big fall . . . right on her plastic enhanced backside. And I got pictures. This was many years before computers.

My friend bumped into her and bought her a drink, then dinner, then they started dating. It didn't take long for Miss Torpedo to drag him into the bedroom or to get out of her clothes -- in the dark. My friend got laid and she went to sleep, at which point he photographed her under garments, which included a plastic and foam butt enhancer. Had I been her, I'd have enhanced my boobs not my butt. He broke it off and the picture of her in her butt enhancer (he had a small pen camera, too) without anything else on (see what she missed by not enhancing her boobs?) were plastered all over the company billboards and at the neighborhood grocery store and her church.

I took maternity leave a few months later and after my maternity leave and vacation ran out, I tendered my resignation and went to work full time for my part time job. She was not rehired and I heard she moved to a different town to escape her shame, taking her butt enhancer with her.

I would have accepted being fired for being related to my father, but for Dad to get fired because of her vendetta with me was unacceptable. I'm not sure I'd do the same thing again, preferring as I do to confront people directly, but I would have protected my father, as I did when I offered to quit if they would keep my father on. That's how I found out the company considered me a more valuable asset. In street speak, they got more out of me than they were paying me. All of this came about because of her firing and my big raise -- 25 cents an hour. After I saved the company so much money when they fired the other 4 employees, you think they could've come up with a bigger raise. They were cheap for all their profits and property all over town, but the rich can be so cheap when you get right down to it.

Yes, revenge is seductive, especially when someone bad takes a big fall. Amanda/Emily's father asked her to forgive the people that destroyed him and set him up to take the fall for their misdeeds; Emily chose to get revenge. It's easy to forgive someone who hurts you, as it would've been had I been hurt, but much harder when the target ends up being family.

What have you done for revenge?

OMG!!

It has finally happened.

I broke the top 100 on Amazon's best seller list yesterday after Among Women was available for free.

 
 
When I went to bed I was at #8 on the contemporary fiction list and #97 on the fiction list. I just took a look and what did I find:

Product Details

• File Size: 478 KB
• Print Length: 234 pages
• Page Numbers Source ISBN: 1461031346
• Publisher: Creative Ink, LLC; 1st edition (March 7, 2011)
• Sold by: Amazon Digital Services, Inc.
• Language: English
• ASIN: B004R9Q7K2
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  • #1 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Fiction > Contemporary Fiction

I added the whole bit so you didn't think I was faking it. Since Among Women is free for Kindle until Saturday, I have strong hopes of hitting the #1 spot and maybe staying there a while. Even the UK is getting into it now because 88 copies have been downloaded for free, and that hasn't happened ever. I'm nearing 10,000 copies given away, but that means 10,000 more people might actually read and like (and comment) on the book and they might tell a friend or two.

That's the whole point of a giveaway, to get your book in front of people. I decided on a 5-day giveaway so that I'd have the best chance of hitting a much wider audience. If you haven't read Among Women yet or know someone who hasn't, tell them to get it free now. This is the last chance they will have this year -- and maybe forever -- to read the book. That is, before I publish Among Men the sequel, the next book in the Among series.

Get the book while you still can. Unlimited free copies available (it's digital) until midnight Saturday, 09/29/12.

That is all. Disperse -- AND READ.

Down the Dark Path

I've been a bit lax with regard to my letter writing lately, haven't felt much like putting pen to paper or words through the pen. I get into these dark moods and bury myself in books and other endeavors that don't require words. Silence is a big part of that

This morning I had to write to my landlord about the roof, including a printout of the laws regarding said roof and indicating a deadline for replacing the roof and the consequences of ignoring the deadline, which would be me putting my rent in escrow with the El Paso county clerk of courts until said roof is replaced. I'm giving him plenty of lead time, certainly sufficient time as outlined in the printout of the laws. I'm tired of being nice and expecting the landlord to do the right thing. Now is the time for serious action and serious consequences. Of course, that means I will have to find the county clerk of courts office and put my rent into escrow with them, but that shouldn't be too difficult. I've more than a month to get everything in order, and I will have everything in order just in case. I don't like surprises when it comes to such issues. Now all I need to do is decide whether or not to send the letter now or wait and include my rent check. I think now is a better choice.

I printed out the letter and envelope and got a surprise I liked -- for a change. The return address printed exactly where it should instead of being cut off as it was with the old printer. At least that is better than before, although I do miss the longer life of the ink cartridges with the old printer and the easier feed for faxing and such. I'll just have to learn how to fax with the new machine. It has an interface with my computer, both of which are HPs, and will require some manual labor on my part, but it's a small price to pay . . . I hope. Good thing I don't have to fax very often.

I do seem to be focused on minutiae more these days and letting the big things go. I haven't written much at all recently but that is about to change. I am bursting with words and stories and think it is probably time to let them go before I explode. Or not. I'm still undecided. I do enjoy cross stitching because there is a solid end in sight and it does come fairly quickly without too much fuss and very little editing, except when I get off a stitch or miscount. Those instances are happening less and less as I get back to near the level of proficiency I once enjoyed twenty years ago.  It has taken some time, but the effort is well worth it and stitching every day closes the gap between efficiency and inefficiency very quickly. I wonder if it would help my writing. I guess I'll find out soon enough.

Writing a letter to a friend was the first step on the road back to getting some books finished. There are end points in sight but the path between first and last words has been dark and full of dangers. Good thing I'm not the shrinking violet type (for long) and eventually I get back up on my feet and stark hiking, no matter how much it hurts at first. I'll hit my stride and the pain of disuse will disappear -- to be replaced by the pain of use. At least there will be accomplishment. That's something.

Now, where did I leave the Epsom salts?

That is all. Disperse.

I want . . . something?

When I think of wanting something, it's a vague sort of feeling. I wanted a piece of lemon meringue pie when my Aunt Anne told me she was having one for her bedtime snack. I didn't want the coffee she would have with it. Water will do just fine. I want a house of my own, but not with that burning, all consuming desire that I would give up everything just to have a house.

Now that I think about it, I wonder if there has ever been anything I've wanted with all the fervor and passion of my soul, something I wanted so much I would give up everything to possess, something that consumed my every waking moment, something I planned for and dreamed about and couldn't live without. Surprisingly, the answer is . . . not really. I am a product of Gram's teaching. She told me my wants wouldn't hurt me, and they haven't, not so much that it consumed me.

I think that's sad in a way, not to want something with every fiber of my being. I've had plenty of what I don't want over the decades of my life (far too much for my liking), but like knowledge and jobs (mostly) and being able to survive through quite a few difficult, and sometimes life or death, situations, I have led a charmed life.

Don't get me wrong. I've been down and out -- as down and out as you can get without dying. I've been homeless. I've had lots of money and no money. I've been stepped on, lied to, stabbed in the heart (more times than I can count), and treated like dirt (and not just by my family), but I've still managed to come out of whatever pile of poo I've been tossed into intact. What do I know from desire that leaves me panting with rage or excitement or even hunger that gnaws at the soul until there's nothing left but a burned out husk and ashes? Nothing. I feel a bit like the Jews. There's always tomorrow. I'll get through or I won't. Pfft!

There have been moments when I thought I wanted something so much I'd die if I didn't get it. I was 5 and 12 and 15 and 22. There are lots of those dramatic moments when you're young and full of passions and unrequited desires. I got over them. I didn't die, although there were times I was so low I had decided to cut off this mortal coil and move on to the next incarnation, but I'm still here. Something always kept me going, messed up my carefully laid plans, and left me stranded on this rocky shore.

I've wept heart sick over broken love affairs. I've raged against my family's inhumanity and casual disregard for me. I've been limp with exhaustion from storms of tears and barely able to drag myself through another pointless day, and yet I still don't think I've ever been utterly consumed so that I'd do anything, say anything, give anything to have my heart's desire, and I wonder if I'm blessed or if I've missed the emotional desire streetcar because I've been unsullied by life.

That is not to say I don't have my scars and my heartaches, but I survived, so how deep could they be? Nothing has killed me yet, although sometimes I wonder if my desire, my need to want something has been irreparably damaged. I want things, but nothing so much that I'm not willing to wait and work and save to get whatever it is I want.

I want a home of my own, some little cabin in the mountains where all I see is trees, the shimmer of sunlight or moonlight on the lake down the path, and land as far as I can see. I won't kill to get it. I'll save and look and plan and it will come. Whatever I want, no matter how long it takes, I manage to get it -- if I don't lose the desire for it along the way or the desire is replaced with something else I'd rather have. That's what I mean about not wanting anything enough.

Maybe I'm looking at this from the wrong angle. Maybe I have been that passionately desirous of things but age and time have worn down the sharp edges and taught me that if it's possible I'll have whatever I want with hard work and giving up the little wants. My desires are quiet things without ardent fervor and the sense of immediacy I felt as a child and a youth. I have been tempered by my experiences and taught that time can be friend as well as enemy. My sharp edges have been smoothed by the waters of life so that I no longer gash anyone who comes near. I guess it comes with age, that slow burning fire of desire and want, so that want is a gnawing hunger inside that will be soothed eventually, secure in the knowledge that the hunger will be assuaged and the want fulfilled -- eventually. I can wait. I've waited for so much and received what I wanted. This, too, will be added in the fullness of time.

Or it won't.

Life's a gamble, but the trail through the dangerous hinterlands is always interesting.