Telling tales

A stranger who obviously read my post about Imelda and her clueless husband sent me a link and I followed it to The Story of Stuff. It's not another version of George Carlin's A Place for My Stuff, but the story of a linear system. If you're not interested in the environmental side of the story, skip down to the Consumption tab and start from there. The video takes 20 minutes but it's definitely worth the time to get a good look at what American consumers are doing to the environment, the world and themselves. Don't worry. It's not one of those boring, Green Peace videos. One thing is certain, the stranger who sent it obviously got the message. Nice to know someone reads my posts from time to time.



Tomorrow is the winter solstice and my nephew Cody's 17th birthday. He's Beanie's baby. He's also a regular teenager who's doing all the things most teenagers who collected edged weapons, love fantasy and wear black and long nearly white blond hair do. I wish I could be there to give him a big hug and celebrate his birthday but I'm leaving on Saturday for mountain solitude for ten days. I met someone who wants to help me celebrate Solstice so I said yes and we're getting together to do the Yule holiday up right. Looks like this is the beginning of a really great friendship.

I also decided to send out thank you cards to all the people who contributed articles to the ham club newsletter. It was a last minute thought and my hope is that they will feel better about contributing next year and for however long I decide to keep editing the newsletter. Nothing like a little timely holiday graft. It goes along with the email I received from a major national magazine interested in publishing one of my articles. Hitting the big time is always a great present no matter what time of the year it lands in my lap.

This holiday season has been hard for my family because of Dad's death earlier this year and they don't seem to be able to muster up the energy or the enthusiasm to celebrate the way they did when Dad was alive. Dad would hate it that they're missing the holidays he loved so much, but they all have to grieve their own way. I miss Dad, too, but I don't feel like he's gone. I feel him close to me most of the time like he's been freed from the limitations of his body and can be wherever he's needed and wanted most, like earlier this week when I opened an email from a plant nursery.

The ad offered free upgrades to expedited delivery and discounts on holiday gifts. The magnolia was beautiful with its glossy black leave and creamy ivory petals so I clicked and followed the link. Magnolias, decorated miniature live Xmas trees, holly bushes and a gorgeous Xmas cactus that took me back thirty years.

Dad had just bought a Xmas cactus with beautiful yellow blooms. Eddie, my middle son, was about three years old and he wanted to give me pretty flowers for Xmas, so he plucked all the blooms off Dad's cactus. Dad caught him and went ballistic. Dad was even tempered and calm most of the time, but messing with his plants was grounds for slow torture and a long, painful death. Dad was afraid the cactus would never bloom again and I don't think he ever forgave Eddie. Two years went by and the cactus didn't bloom but Dad never got rid of the cactus. Then, one year at Xmas, the cactus bloomed with gorgeous yellow flowers and it continues to bloom even though he is gone. All the plants he loved and tended and cared for are still alive and part of him lives on in every one of those plants and trees and tales like Eddie and Dad's Xmas cactus.