dreaming of christmas

When I was little, Christmas was a magical time. Mystery and wonderful smells and my mother, uncle and even grandmother all happy and carefree. I would wake up really early on Christmas morning - and run into my uncle's room and jump on his bed until he woke up. Years later I learned that he hadn't gone to bed until 3 am, after assembling gifts and wrapping all of them as well. But there I was at 6 am, eager and ready to start Christmas! Because the rule was you couldn't go downstairs before 8 am, he spent the next two hours keeping me entertained - and letting my mom and grandmother get some more sleep. Luckily for me, he was a clever man and began the saga of Princess Paula (how ironic that the princess and I shared a first name) that kept me mesmerized for years. She was a strong, empowered young girl, who went around rescuing princes and dragons. When last heard, she was assailing a castle to free both an entrapped prince and his good witch mother from the clutches of an evil fae. Once my installment was done (it was continued at Easter, 4th of July and several other holidays - you couldn't leave a Princess hanging for a year, after all) we would go down, have breakfast and everyone would linger over their coffee until I was fairly leaping out of my skin. Then finally we would go into the living room and there would be a panoply of gifts and stockings and joy - right there permeating that room.

Over the years of course it all changed. My grandmother, then my uncle at the too early age of 63 and finally my mother all passed on. It's been 6 years soon since my mother died. Her last Christmas was spent at the rehab assisted living center where she went after her surgery. I took her Christmas dinner and we opened presents there, but it wasn't the same. It was 3 days after her 83rd birthday and I was really hoping she would be around for a lot longer, but it wasn't to be. I am crying even as I write this. Being alone in the world isn't always easy. I suppose it would be different if I were married or involved with someone, but that isn't the case, so it is kind of daunting sometimes. I've been lucky in having my cousin Paul around, but I know he isn't going to be here forever - he has a life and ambitions that he needs to pursue.

Since that time Christmas has been a struggle. Don't get me wrong, I know it's not about presents, or trees or any of the superficial things, but it has remained difficult to recapture that joy in my heart. I do try though - because it is the time of year when whether you are religious or celebrating culturally - everyone is a bit kinder, a bit friendlier, a lot more caring. I get to see friends and relatives - and this year my best friends were here and I was able to spend some time with them for a whole weekend! And my other best friends are coming for new year's. But I still yearn to recapture that early feeling of joy and happiness that was so meaningful to me as I was growing up. I hope and pray that it will come to me again.

This year has been especially tough - economically and emotionally. We are awaiting word that projects we have worked on for years will be funded and that we will finally be paid our commissions. This would be good since the economy has virtually eliminated the need for companies to hire writers. But Christmas is coming - a week from today - and I am still waiting for the spirit to infuse me as it did so long ago. I know it will but it seems to get later and later each year.

So I am writing this long missive to share with you all and wish you a Happy and healthy Christmas. And if you don't celebrate Christmas, Hannukah, Kwanza and everyother holiday I can think of. My heart goes out to all of you, who like me face the holidays without the family you loved. I wish you all warmth, anticipation, joy and above all hope. Hope is the reason for the season and love and really and truly, peace on earth and good will to all.

Chicago Tea Party Patriots aren't U.S.

My roomate and cousin Paul wrote this facebook note and I find it worthy to share with all of you. I know it's been a long time since I wrote here, but I promise to do better!

Catherina Wojtowicz and the Chicago Tea Party Patriots
By Paul T. Kraly

I'm at a loss to explain the actions of people at times. I suppose I'm one of those who feel that it's possible to find the good side of someone, if you dig far enough into their personality.

Take Catherina Wojtowicz, for example.

On her Facebook page, she appears to have a picture of a little girl as a ballerina. It's adorable, and obviously heart-warming, and begs to be fawned over much the same way we ogle puppies, kittens and occasional orangutans.

But as far as I can see, this is where the "cute" ends. At a recent town hall meeting of the now-infamous Chicago Tea Party Patriots to discuss the health debate, one unlucky observer of the event, Midge Hough, bolstered up her courage to stand up and be heard.

Because that's what you're SUPPOSED to be able to do at a town hall meeting.

Midge told the audience about her recent family tragedy. Her 24-year-old daughter developed a severe case of pneumonia and died within a few weeks. Her unborn child also died. She was upset because the health-care services she had hoped her daughter could receive were never implemented correctly, and she blamed the current conditions of health-care in America.

It's a horrible thing to think of. I would be devastated if I had lost a child, a parent, hell ANY family member or friend or loved one, due to the inability to get proper health-care. It's a sick, helpless feeling to WATCH your loved one slowly die in front of you.

Yet, inexplicably, Catherina Wojtowicz and her band of moronic "patriots" seem to think this is the perfect thing to LAUGH about.

(click on the title of this and see for yourself)

If that wasn't bad enough, Catherina Wojtowicz, the leader of the motley crew, claimed that Ms. Hough was lying, and was a pro-Obama plant that went around all over telling the same story, in an attempt to gain favor for the bill. When the newspapers cleared poor Midge of any fraud allegations, Catherina Wojtowicz was unapologetic. Instead she retorted that Ms. Hough's story was diverting attention away from the real matter, and that individual stories of tragedies were not important to the issue of health-care.

May I ask something of the patriots please?

Are you out of your freaking minds?

Individual stories of tragedies are WHY we need to discuss health-care problems int he first place!

Do any of you think for yourselves, without trying to follow this low-life Wojtowicz?

I know it must be a wonderful feeling to feel you "fit in" with something in your sad, miserable lives, but clearly you all must still think you're in high-school, teaming up on the class nerd after class and wrapping him in toilet paper. The same rules apply here. You're all so busy FOLLOWING one another, I don't honestly think a lot of you know what you're even protesting.

I'd lay odds that if any of you bothered to examine what the health-bill is, and what is actually going on, the majority of you would say, "Huh. I didn't know that."

Ignorance must be bliss to these people. But that is NO excuse for viciousness.

Tell you what. If you HAVE a legitimate argument that can explain your reckless, inhumane treatment of Ms. Hough, by all means, I challenge you to present it.

Right now. Let's hear it. Explain to me why you're all not feeling about ten levels lower than DIRT right now.

Explain why two senseless deaths are FUNNY to you.

Explain why a person doesn't seem to have the right to speak out, when you all seem to have YOUR rights to speak out.

And as for you, Catherina Wojtowicz, I've been watching you with some interest. I've read some stories about your exploits, including your association with Glenn Beck, and your open death-threat to someone for reporting on one of your other town-hall meetings.

I don't know if that ballerina in your profile is your daughter or not.

But I want you to think on something. Picture HER with pnuemonia, or Swine flu, getting weaker, and skinnier, and sicker, and falling apart. Her organs shutting down one by one, her hair falling out, her last words to you while she's lying there in bed, a crackling whisper in the dark, "Mommy... why me..." just before she slumps dead, and the steady line appears on the machines.

I want you to think good and hard about that.

And I want to know if you think that's a laugh-riot

A Perfect Moment

When I was about 15 my mother took me to Greece. It was almost a pilgrimage for her, as she and her dad had dreamed of taking this trip for years, but had never done so. We did all the usual things - sight see, went to Delphi, visited family and friends. We took a harrowing ride down to Mani where many of our relatives were still living. My mom even loosened the rules about my dating and let me go out with a guy Michali, who was in college and I think a communist. It was all rather exciting.
But the most perfect moment happened (and it took me years to realize what it was) on the island of Crete. We were spending several days on the island, seeing Knossos and other antiquities. During our travels, we met up with a Canadian family from Vancouver - a widow like my mother and her two children Thea and Tom. It was one of those great casual travel acquaintances that make trips so wonderful.
One evening, the kids (me, Tom and Thea) wanted to go to the beach and swim. We had been good all day, traipsing through museums and ancient sites, so our mothers rented a car and took us to a fairly isolated beach so we could all play in the water.
I don't know the name of the beach or exactly where it's located, but what happened next burned itself into my memory and soul forever.
It was late in the day, and the sun was starting its downward descent. Thea had gone to sit on the sand with our moms leaving Tom and me in the water. To our left was a cape and to our right the setting sun and the Mediterranean sea. There were ruins in the distance on the cliff and when the sun hit them they were illuminated with an inner glow. Those same rays hit the water and turned the waves to molten gold. Tom and I swam out as far as we could and lay across the waves looking at the golden sky. It was a timeless combination of amazing scenery, a boy and girl, the sun and the magic of the island.
I don't know what ever happened to Tom and his family. I only know that now, when I need to meditate or calm myself - I go to that isolated beach in Crete and remember that one perfect moment.

oops

Months and months and months have gone by since I blogged here - my bad. It's been a whirlwind of 18 hour days, ups and downs, and all sorts of things that have precluded my actually coming here to write a bit.

Hopefully, this summer will be wonderful and I'll have great things to report here.
Stay tuned and I promise to actually write more.

A New Dawn

I awoke this morning and despite the grim economic news, the war, the recession, the contempt of the world, with a sense of hope in my heart. Barack Obama was inaugurated yesterday and my entire mood has lifted. I watched obsessively as the crowds of millions gathered on the mall - as white, black, brown, yellow, red, young and old, rich and poor famous and unknown, stood together in the icy day and watched our country take a swift departure from 8 years of humiliation and anger. I heard him tell us that we are stronger than fear, than those who hate us and that instead of being ruled by fear as we have been for this past decade, we are to embrace hope.

FDR said the only thing we have to fear is fear itself. He was right you know. If we face the world fearlessly, and we roll up our sleeves and open our hearts, there is nothing we as a people can not do. And this is the man, with Joe Biden by his side, who can lead us.

The first years of a new century are always iffy. And GWB made them iffier, but now Barack Obama can truly guide us to make America great again - whole, powerful and a moral compass for the rest of the world. We can become the good guys again - after 8 years of being the bad guys. No more preemptive war, no more only the rich need succeed no more forgetting the rest of us.

It's time to put aside childish things - and the grown up in the White House is just the man who can lead us to doing it.

Happy New Year!!!

Boy have I ever been remiss!!! Caught a cold right before Christmas and only today ( my b-day, by the way) have I felt inspired to write anything at all.
We still have our tree up. I always keep it going as long as possible since it's so pretty. But to be quite honest, I am just getting excited about the inauguration. I know the world is in the toilet, but let's face it, George Bush, the enabler and a**hole in chief is gone two weeks from tomorrow.
May this new administration usher in civility, kindness and that old go getter attitude that the US was noted as having. I kinda miss that, let me tell you.

Any way

Happy New Year - May 2009 bring you all joy, happiness and prosperity!