Cool cats, warm hearts

I have heard it said that people are either cat people or dog people. You either like the dependence of dogs, or the independence of cats, and never the twain shall meet. I think that is too limiting, because the world needs all kinds of personalities to be functional and interesting, and I am in favor of variety.

For example, I would hate to see a world full of people just like me. Oh, I know I have good points; I'm not a completely downtrodden individual, and I do know what I get right. I am kind, generous, straightforward, trustworthy - in a word, I am genuine. [I am not, however, folksy. Genuine and folksy are not the same thing, and I don't want any confusion on that.] I am just who I am, no facade, nothing false about me.

I am also quirky, introverted, prone to seeing the glass half empty (although I do generally temper that with relief that at least something is in there, so it could be worse. Just because I'm not Norwegian doesn't mean I'm not a stoic Minnesota Lutheran.) I am also a first class worrier. I am, in a word, me - unique, individual, inimitable.

While America does have the reputation for being a nation of quirky individualists, I don't think that is really true, and I'm not sure any country can survive if everyone isn't heading in the same general direction. Too much quirkiness makes you querulous, and who wants that laying around the house? Or the nation, for that matter?

But that's wandering a little far afield , I guess, which may be another one of my less stellar qualities. I wander, in case you hadn't noticed. Ritalin anyone?

To get back on topic, I have been the fortunate owner of a number of fascinating feline friends, all of whom have had their own unique personalities. I have had a diva, who considers the world her stage, and she is the star. I have had a cat who mistook himself for a divan, big, overstuffed, and pretty comfortable. My cats have all been unique, and they leave a void as large as any when they are gone, but not forgotten. So I thought I would reminisce about a few of my favorites, since I need a reason to smile today.

My first cat of my very own came courtesy of my big brother, of course, one Christmas when I was probably about eight or nine. He was so cute, little, perky, full of claws. He climbed the curtains and shredded the furniture, a thing of which my mother assuredly did not approve, and which would pretty quickly land him outside on the porch looking in. He was named with the regal moniker, Artaxerxes, a Persian king from the Bible, but of course, I soon tired of that. Art just didn't fit him, either, so he ended up going by Puss-Puss.

Puss-Puss was one big cat. I don't know if he was part bobcat or what, but his paws were enormous, and his head was about as big as mine. He would open his mouth to yawn, and I was always afraid he was going to swallow something vital. Like me. He weighed around 20 pounds at his young and healthy prime, although he wasn't prime too often, given his proclivity for fighting and establishing dominion over all the other cats on the farm.

I loved Puss-Puss for his willing ways. He put up with me hauling him around the yard like a stuffed animal, gripping him tightly under front legs and dragging the rest of him behind like an out-of-control trailer. He didn't confuse himself with a dog, he knew he was the king, but he did allow me to be the royal princess, and he tolerated such abuse as a loving child will hand out.

When he died, I was bereft, and the loss of my friend left big paws to fill. It was a long time before I found another cat that would step into them, and when I did. they were the dainty little feet of a cat who used up most of her lives in one fell swoop. Her name was Cleopatra. [Yes, there is a theme here. I have delusions of grandeur, just like everyone else. And by the way, in case you didn't know, Sarah means princess, so I'm royalty, too.]

As a young adult, I saved my little black royal cat from certain death, and she repaid me with many years of loving affection. She was not always a house cat, personal pet, and part of the family. Her story began as a barn cat, and she lived life hard. Once she was allowed inside both our house and my heart, she never had the slightest interest in going outside ever again. She knew where she had it good, and she was not going to take a chance on messing it up. So when the door opened, she ran in the other direction, hiding behind the furniture or under a bed to be sure she wasn't thrown out in the cold.

Before I rescued her, we had seen her around, but no one could really get close. She was a momma cat with kittens, and she was very protective, almost to a fault. She was first discovered by a former relative, and I must say, Cleo showed her perspicacity for judging the quality of human character right from the get go.

She had made her bed in the back seat of an antique car that my brother and my cousin had set out to restore - a project long abandoned, if not entirely forgotten. She was there with her kittens when this relative entered the machine shed, and the cat came flying out of her bed in blind fury, protecting her young offspring from the perceived threat. While the relative was all for getting rid of the cat permanently, I shared Cleo's opinion and thought she showed perfectly good sense, so I knew we were going to be friends from that moment on.

Cleo was initially fairly hostile toward anyone getting up close and personal, except me. I walked right up to her and petted her, and we were pals from then on. She didn't want to be picked up, but she loved affection and thrived on attention, and eventually she would come running when she saw me, knowing that some pleasurable moments were in store for her.

One day, she disappeared, and after five anxious days of worrying, she showed up again, a disastrous mess of infection and open wounds. We don't know what happened to her, but she was sliced down one leg, with the skin wide open to the bone, and her tail was broken in several places and sliced open as well. We suspected that she got up in the warm engine compartment of a car, and when it started, it got her, and somehow, she made her way back to me.

And I do mean she came back to me. I will never forget seeing her dragging herself toward me from under a bush, meowing pitifully, and then laying down at my feet, as if she knew help had arrived and she could just let go and give up. It was so touching and so sad, such trust that somehow, I would make everything all right again, when she was clearly beyond help.

I realized that she was a dying animal, and not wanting to cause her additional stress by taking her out of her familiar home, I took her up to the haymow in the barn to make her comfortable for the night, or what was left of it for her, at least. I brought her some food and some water, both of which she took slowly, but with grateful glances my way, while I petted her and talked soothingly to her. I went and got some antiseptic spray that was left over from the adventures of Puss-Puss, thinking that it might offer her some pain relief, if nothing else. I didn't try to clean her up or mess with her broken parts, because I feared I would cause her additional pain for no real benefit, and eventually, I laid an old blanket around her to keep her warm and left her for the night.

Imagine my shock when I came up in the morning, expecting a body, and found her alive and waiting for me right where I had left her. The food had been touched, the water had been drunk, and she was still hanging in there. It was obvious that this cat had a will to live, and she had entrusted her life to me, so I knew there was nothing else to do but take her to the vet. She may have been a farm animal, nothing special, not valued by many people, but she had entrusted her life to me, and I wasn't going to let her down.

After an operation to amputate her tail, drains hanging out from all her wounds, and dozens of careful stitches in her leg and back side, that cat began to heal. It was the most amazing recovery I've ever witnessed. I took good care of her, to be sure, watching her drains, changing the dressings, washing the wounds and nursing her back to health, but she had an incredible will to live, and she was grateful for everything I did.

Cleo and I had forged a bond, and when she had used up eight and a half of her lives, she came to me, and I had saved her. She knew it, I am certain. After that, she followed me around the house, where she had now become ensconced as yet another full fledged member of the family that was not my mother's idea. But she took to Cleo with good grace, and when I moved out and into my own apartment shortly thereafter, Cleo came with me to keep me company, and to be my constant companion.

Cleo was obviously a better judge of character than I was. When she met my ex, she didn't think much of him, despite everything he did to lavish attention on her. [I really should have paid attention to her astute observation that he was clearly up to no good.] He kept insisting on trying to make friends with her, sure that if he just worked hard enough, he would win her over. That resulted in one of the more humorous moments of my life.

I was quite sick in bed, and he stopped by to see if I needed anything. Cleo, as usual, ran to hide in the closet, and he chased her down. He grabbed her out of the closet and picked her up, whereupon she decided he had gone too far. She let him have it, meowing angrily and peeing on him right then and there. He dropped her unceremoniously, mad at her, and mad at me for laughing at the sight of him dripping down the front of his shirt. She was one up on me where he was concerned, that's for sure.

Cleo moved many times with us over the years, and was a well traveled pet. She lived in Minnesota, Iowa, Tennessee, and Kansas. She got lost in a bed in an Iowa hotel where we lived for 18 days while we tried to find a place to live, and she got into the air vents in Kansas when we left them uncovered while we re-carpeted the floors. She chattered her teeth every time she saw a bird, and she even put up, briefly, with a dog that was barely tolerable on a good day, and never seemed to lose her knack for being friendly to a fault, once she had adjudged you well.

We lost Cleo shortly after our last move into the house we now inhabit, when she lost her battle with the cancer that had rapidly ravaged her little body. It was a sad day when she slipped away from me in my arms, and I cried salty tears over her again, just as I had so many years before when I thought she was going to be gone too soon. But I knew that I had given her a wonderful life, and she would have nothing to complain about when she got to kitty heaven, and I was grateful that her final resting place would be one where I would live for many years to come.

We planted an apple tree over her grave, and it has given me a lot of comfort over the years to feel that she was a part of that tree that now shades and provides privacy for my house. I eat the sweet apples and am reminded of that sweet cat who chose me to be her savior, and in return, gave me so much love and trust in return. She taught me a lot about the power of grace, and what salvation really means, and she gave me a glimpse of what true spirit is about. When I falter, I can think of her trusting example, and I know that reaching out is the way to find a path out of whatever pain you may have. By trusting someone greater than yourself, you will find your own salvation, as well. Cleo was a gift from God, and I have no doubt that he knew what he was doing when he brought us together.

When Cleo passed away from us, I didn't want another cat again. I couldn't bear to get attached to another animal, only to have them die too soon. But that decision couldn't withstand the power of a little girl to beg and plead and demand the pet she thought she was entitled to have. So after too little time for me to heal, but a long enough time to appreciate someone new, we decided to add another member to our family, and we adopted Meow.

We started out wanting a kitten, of course, because everyone does. Kittens are cute and playful and fun, and they don't have a lot of bad habits that you will have to break. Somehow, though, when I laid my eyes on Meow, it was evident who was going to be my cat. There was something in the way she looked deeply back into my eyes that let me know she had claimed me, and I was about to embark on another journey with another cat who knew I had saved her, and was determined to be sure I never forgot it.

Meow lives up to her name. In spades. There isn't anyone who meets her that doesn't immediately say, "Oh, I see why you named her Meow!" She talks all the time. She is, in fact, the most vocal cat I have ever been around. She talks, she cries, she whines, she practically sings. She is never quiet. Meow is a cool cat on the move, as long as there is no one around that she doesn't know well, and she has a lot to say while she does it.

Meow loves meal time more than life itself, and starts anticipating her evening meal around nine o'clock in the morning. She meows, she whines, she looks angry with her tail swishing hard. Then she meows again, this time long, drawn out, like a train whistle as it flows away from you.

She has an ill disguised disdain for the dogs, whom she has clearly identified as a lower life form than herself, and has no time for their shenanigans. And yet, wherever they are, that is probably where you will find her. When they are gone, she is lonely and bored, with nothing to entertain her or to help her while away the hours. She looks around for them, wandering from place to place, and you can see she is wondering where they have gotten off to.

Meow is on a different schedule from the rest of the family. While the dogs are yawning and clearly prepared to head for bed at dusk, Meow is just opening one eye and deciding what kind of a night it is going to be. After a full day of sleeping in various locales, she is ready for the strenuous hour or two ahead which she will use for exploring, hunting, searching for the perfect ending to her meal time. Eventually, as all animals in our house apparently must, she ends up in my bed with me, often laying with one paw touching my face, or perhaps her entire body laying on me.

Interestingly enough, she seems to have some confusion over which species, exactly, she is a member. She often comes when she is called, and she follows me everywhere around the house, sleeping in whatever out of the way cranny she can find in whatever room I am in at the time. I am rarely out of her sight, making her one more in the long line of creatures that follows me everywhere I go in the house. [The last time I used a bathroom by myself was 1982, and I'm not kidding.]

Meow has a quirky personality. We attribute it to a hard life as a kitten. She was picked up off the street, but she is obviously a good cat by nature, because she is as docile as a limp potholder. She doesn't like to be held, vocal disparagment is sure to follow if you try, but she is otherwise a loving and attentive pet, who likes to be a part of the action, if at a safe distance.

Most important to me, she has never once missed the litter box. That is a first class quality in a cat, a five diamond rating for sure. She can be counted on to do the right thing, every single time, for which I am especially grateful. {And if you have to ask why I am grateful for that, you would have to have had a cat that didn't understand the concept of a litter box. One time taking care of business elsewhere, and you will warm right up to that litter box, rest assured.]

Meow's favorite game is called Hit the Dog. First, she will find a place to lay where the dogs won't notice her. A favored spot is the piano bench, which is a little higher than they are usually looking, given that they generally have their noses to the ground. She will lie there plotting and even practicing her swipe, waiting for her big moment. Then, obligingly, sooner or later, a dog will approach. As the unsuspecting victim walks under the bench, [and the anxiously waiting cat,] she will swipe her paw across their face. BAM. They never knew what hit them. They are confused, bewildered, gobsmacked, every single time. It is a never fail, sure fire guarantee of feline fun, and they play that game more or less every day.

The best story, however, took place when the smallest dog, TidBit, who has always been smaller than Meow, was a puppy. TidBit is a terrorizer, and he started to annoy Meow early on. He would chase her. He would try to entice her with a toy, hoping she would grab it away so he could grab it back and dominate her. Meow, of course, simply thought he was dumb, and would look at him with the sort of distaste you reserve for chicken that has rotted in the package in the back of the fridge because you forgot it was there.

One day, Meow was laying on the bottom step leading to the upstairs, when TidBit trotted by. I'm not sure what got into her, but apparently, she had reached her dog tolerance limit, and she let him have it. Her paw shot out like a bullet from a loaded gun and swiped across his body, sending him flying across the floor. He laid there a moment, clearly trying to grasp what had just happened to him, and why he was lying there three feet from where he started, without having planned the event. It was a crowning moment for Meow, and she clearly felt her work was done, because she slowly stood up, stretched, and stalked away, tail help high, and smug attitude radiating like rays of light from the sun.

These days, I am the Pied Piper of cat-dom. If I am so foolish as to go for a walk without a dog, [one of them lives for the chance to go on a walk, while the other one hides in terror at the very mention of a word that starts with w,] I will be sure to have a cat or two following me in procession, like so many ducks off to the pond. I feel like Dr. Doolittle sometimes, talking to the animals, and drawing them in like a creature celebrity, surrounded by the paparazzi.

My daughter recently got a fish from her boyfriend when she was having a bad day, and I am not allowed to interact with it. [Unless I'm cleaning the fish bowl, in which case, I am free to talk to it all I want.] When an animal comes into this house, it will be a matter of moments before it sizes up the situation and knows which side its bread is buttered on. And animals are not dumb. If you have the bread and butter, they will be your friend for life. They have priorities, and they are in the right order.

Cats are independent creatures, to be sure. But once you let one into your heart, they will be there to give you warm fuzzies forever. Or is that the cat laying on my face again?

99, 98, 97, 96...

I am a boring person. In fact, I am so boring that I have the unique ability to bore myself to sleep. It sounds like a dreadful affliction, I know, finding yourself so boring that you can't keep your eyes open, but there are some good points. As long as you're not behind the wheel at the time.

At 48, insomnia becomes a way of life. You toss, you turn, you read, you walk around the house, you get a drink, you visit the bathroom a time or two, but still no relief. This came as a bit of a surprise to me, because I never had a problem with insomnia until I was 40, when it became my constant companion.

Cartoons frequently show sheep passing overhead while the long-suffering insomniac lies helplessly, waiting for blissful slumber. Personally, I have not found sheep to be especially soothing. They bleat. They bang into each other. They smell weird. They run in all directions. They are disorderly, and they aren't very bright, either. I don't know about you, but that isn't restful to me. Reminds me too much of our government. And if that thought doesn't keep you up nights, then you are not paying any attention at all.

Do you suppose dogs ever get insomnia? Because I have never seen a creature that can fall asleep any time, any where, like a dog. We are in the middle of a walk, I stop for a minute to chat with a neighbor, and they are laid out cold right there on the sidewalk. It's an amazing talent. I am envious.

I am thrilled to report that several years ago I found the sure-fire cure for falling asleep, and it works like a charm every single time I use it. It is chemical free, and requires nothing more than my own brain. If only I could patent it, I would be a millionaire, and heaven knows, I want to be. The spectacularly simple solution? I bore myself to sleep.

You scoff, but I say, try it. What do you have to lose? Just how interesting are you, when it comes down to it? What do you do in a day? What do you think about? Do you read great literature? Do you analyze classical music? Do you direct an international corporation, or the American economy? I'm guessing not, or you wouldn't be reading my blog.

Most of us are, at the very bottom, relatively mundane, hum-drum Little People. Although we are important to the people we love, and who love us, and we may be important to our work place, even, we are the ones for whom the rules apply, and for the most part, we lead relatively simple lives. But in that reality lies the key to falling asleep, at least for me.

I am a fan of the English cottage mystery story. I have a copy of every book Agatha Christie ever wrote, which is an achievement, since she wrote over 80, some in an pseudonym. They are simple, yet teasing, and I have always admired her style and flair for the surprise. I used to think I could write a mystery, if only I put my mind to it, and that is where this little story begins.

I was sitting in the dental chair, undergoing a root canal, when the idea for a mystery story popped into my head. I was in great pain; I had once again waited far too long to have the work done. [Denial is a family trait that I have perfected. For proof, look no further than my wedding photos.] Anyway, at that vulnerable moment, I felt that endodontist was the right hand man of Satan himself. Which is when I had my revelation.

I felt murderous, which explains how I escaped my present by dreaming of a mystery in which a dental patient suddenly dies, the dentist gets blamed, but then, suddenly, out of nowhere, there comes a Columbo to investigate and a Matlock to defend the hapless dentist....

See what I mean. Every time I lay out the plot, I fall asleep. I have never gotten further than the barest outline, because the only time I think about this story is when I am fighting to lose myself in slumber. I think it has a lot of potential, but I'm afraid to flesh it out in the light of day, partially because I don't know where to go with it, but mostly because I don't want to lose my sure fire cure for insomnia.

Now, I am not saying that everyone with insomnia should write a story. That would be silly. I have a particular talent for writing boring literature, obviously. You need to find and go with your own talent, whatever that may be. If you are bored with math, do equations. If you get bored with the history of your day, think about it. Whatever bores you senseless during the day will probably bore you to sleep at night.

Okay, my work here is done. I have now saved the sheep of the world from the fate of jumping over your head each night as you lie awake cursing the darkness. After all, they have feelings, too.

Rights of passage....

I have recently been talking to a close relative who is suffering through the granddaddy of all rites of passage in the parenting experience; her only kid just went to college. Ah college. That heady moment when you are finally let loose to run your own life. You are 18 or 19 years old, you have years of life experience under your belt, you know everything, and you are probably doing most of your living on someone else's dime. Could anything be better?

Talking with her has reminded me of the reality that I have always had in the back of my head as I raised the two people I have brought into this world myself - my number one obligation as a parent is to make myself obsolete. What a dichotomy for us as human beings, to both grow our love and our distance from the very person for whom we have the greatest responsibility, and all at the same time. It is heartbreaking, and breathtaking, and a thrill ride like none other.

Of course, you don't start out the parenting road thinking you are letting go any time soon. The first time you hold that tiny little helpless life in your hands, you think to yourself, I am going to be the best parent ever. I will never yell at this little person, we will have the perfect relationship, I will be the uber-parent, better than any parent has ever been. Because, after all, I have taken notes about everything that my own parents got wrong, in addition to noting what they got right, so I can get it all right from the get go.

This lasts until the first time that kid cries uncontrollably no matter what you do, while you also try to make dinner and finish your work that you had to bring home because you were so useless on the job, due to worrying about said kid at the daycare you so casually selected before you laid eyes on him. Ah, the angst. Ah, the screaming. Oh wait. That was me. And the kid is still crying, because whatever you are doing isn't quite good enough, so you are crying too, because there really isn't anything else to do. At that moment, you find yourself thinking, WHEN does this end? I don't think I can stand 18 years of this.

That is the first moment where you consciously start letting go, although you don't realize it at the time. They say infants don't differentiate themselves from their mothers right away, it takes time for them to understand that they are separate individuals, apart from someone else. I think the same is true for mothers. Giving birth does not sever the psychological umbilical cord. That happens when you live life and have to deal with the consequences of the rash decision to have a child in the first place.

There are many rites of passage in our children's lives that we celebrate and document and photograph and videotape so we can relive it over and over again. This is an especially useful tool when they are 15 and driving you mad, in every sense of the word. Personally, I prefer Memory Lane to the fast lane of having a 15 year old girl in my house, and now that she is 16, I think she would agree.

There are other, less obvious, less known or noted moments when they declare their separateness, their independence, their selfness, when we can only hold our breath and hope that we have done our job well enough to let them go. I think it is those moments that are most difficult for us as mothers, and perhaps most important for our children, because if you have done the job right, you are hearing, "I don't need you any more," but you still need them, and you still want them to need you.

The first time I felt that assertion of self was one sorry Halloween when my son was a year old. He was only a couple months old his first Halloween, so that wasn't much to write home about, but I was ready and waiting for the second one. I had his outfit all picked out, it was an adorable one, with hat and the whole nine yards, and he was going to be the cutest tot on the sidewalk. Except that I forgot to consult with him, and he was not in the mood for any of it. He screamed. He cried. He squirmed. He threw himself on the floor. The low point was when I found myself sitting,very lightly, on top of him so I could hold him still while I forced this costume onto his angry little body.

My mother, who was watching in some amusement, I am sure, finally pointed out that an unhappy child was probably not worth the trouble, and perhaps I should revise my game plan, because he clearly wasn't going to give me the satisfaction of winning that night. I took a deep breath, looked at what I had been reduced to by my own desperate desire to create the perfect holiday moment, and learned the biggest lesson of my parenting life that night - I had it all backward. The child leads, and you are behind them shouting directions but you cannot control the way they ultimately go.

Of course, being the control freak that I am, I had to have reminders more times than I care to remember along the way. And I have two children who have been consistently pleased to provide them, I might add. Thanks very much to them for the humbling, by they way.

Going to kindergarten seems to be considered the rite of passage for the school aged child, but I think it's first grade. Suddenly, they are spending more time with their peers and their teacher, and you are relegated to their home life. You are still their main mom, the one person that is most important to them, but you are slipping. Suddenly they are seeing how other kids interact with their parents, and they are hearing new things. They pick up language even you didn't know, and they think about things you didn't realize they had heard about.

When my daughter was very little, she learned that children were working in factories in the third world, and that they didn't go to school. She was devastated by the Weekly Reader story, and she wanted to make a difference. So she went through her belongings [Charity Barbie saves the world. News at ten with Ken.] and held a garage sale to raise money to send to an organization that worked to stop the abusive practice.

She researched charitable organizations, she learned about the root causes, and she led the way to raising $100 for the children of the world to have a better life. That may not sound like much, but it made all the difference in the world to her, because she had done something about the problem, instead of just bemoaning the situation. I watched in awe, because I saw a little girl declaring herself a world citizen, and doing something to leave it a better place than she found it. I knew that she was taking another step away from me and into her own life, and I was proud, but felt that tug just the same.

We make a fuss as our children transition through school, making note of each new grade, and the biggest fuss of all comes when they graduate from high school. There is much talk of turning pages, new chapters, adulthood, but the next day, nothing has really changed. That change doesn't come until they go college somewhere else, and you wake up the first morning and they are not there. It isn't a moment that you photograph, it isn't even really something you talk about, except perhaps with a friend who is going through the same experience, but it is the moment you, as a parent, feel the pull on that tie that binds you to your child, and it hurts.

For me, that time came not in his freshman year, but at the start of my son's sophomore year in college. Although I certainly missed him freshman year, it was a hard year for our family as we adjusted to a totally different reality of divorce and single parenthood and a host of other changes, and that took the edge off missing him, I think.

His 20th birthday present was a truck full of furniture from Ikea for his new apartment, his first real home away from home, that he was setting up with his roommate. I will never forget the empty feeling in the pit of my stomach as I watched that truck backing away from me in the Ikea parking ramp, knowing that he was driving away into his own life, one in which I played a very reduced role. It was poignant, I was on the verge of tears, all these feelings rushing through me, when I had a small reminder that my role wasn't quite over. I heard a crunch, and looked up to see the top of the van wedged against the ceiling of the ramp. Uff da. It seems neither one of us was quite ready for prime time.

I don't know if it is easier to let the oldest one go, because you still have another one at home that needs you, but I suspect it is. However, I think that the second one is more independent, harder to manage, less tied, simply because there is less of you to go around from the start, and they have to hit the ground running just to keep up. Erin has always been my buddy, my sidekick, and she has always been the one pulling me, something that will probably continue into my senior maturity.

When she was little, all my pants were stretched out on the left leg because she was always grabbing hold of me to reassure herself that I was there while she experienced the world. She was the one who asked me to come to school for lunch, and she loved having me volunteer in her classroom. I was room mom for all of elementary school, except the last year when I went on strike, and I even was allowed to volunteer in middle school without a complaint.

She recently told me a funny story from school. Her psychology teacher was talking about helicopter parents in his classroom. He discussed what they are and how they behave, then asked the students in the room if any of them had helicopter parents. Erin was surprised to note that no one in the room raised their hand, since she knows many of those kids, and can verify that they do, indeed, have the aforementioned issue in their families. After a long moment, she finally raised her hand, to which the teacher responded with the question, "Do you think you have a helicopter parent?" She replied, "No, I think my mom has helicopter kids."

She is funny, of course, but she doesn't know what a compliment that was to me, and won't until she has a child of her own. It seems she doesn't realize how desperately I want to hold her hand, keep her safe from the hurts and the pain and the harsh realities of the life she will lead. When she has a fight with a friend, my heart literally aches for her, and when she is happy, the same heart soars. I can't bear to read comments on my son's column, because I can't stand to see someone cut him down [that's my job, don't you know?] The hardest sacrifice I make as a parent is to do nothing, and let them live their own lives, and they don't even appreciate it, because they don't know I'm doing it.

I feel for my cousin as she navigates this rough path, one that every parent experiences at one point or another. I know she feels like she has been handed the booby prize right now, and it hurts. I wish I could give her a crystal ball to see the future, because I know she and her child will grow a bond that is more than parent and child. The relationship ahead is that of a friend and advisor to each other, one which goes both ways, and is the richer for that change. That is not only a rite of passage, but a right of being a parent, one which is a blessing to both of you.

Engagement party

Well, the unthinkable has finally happened. It seems the American public has finally gotten off it's collective mental sofa and decided that perhaps it does matter after all what is going on in Washington. It may have been an unprecedented moment, one I haven't seen in my lifetime.

Americans have the attention span of a gnat, unfortunately, [or The Cowardly Lion on a bad hair day, for the very literary, this is an allusion,] so I don't hold out a lot of hope that it will last. That's not just because I'm a die hard cynic, although, of course, I am. But we have been down the yellow brick road before. Oz turned out to be just another city, and the wizard was a charlatan in a green suit, more interested in his toys than in the country he was supposed to be running.

Although the events of September 11, 2001 got our attention ever so briefly, we didn't pay attention for long. We haven't paid attention to elections, recessions, bad bills, bad policy, or bad politicians, either. We have watched corruption, greed, avarice, sexual misbehavior, and immature conduct on a scale not seen since the fall of the Roman Empire. And yet, we still have not cared enough to really get interested, much less involved, even to send an application to vote by mail in advance, because it's too much effort to find a stamp and it's not going to matter, anyway. What's one vote?

But in the last few days, the American public has finally awakened and used its power to force democracy into action. Our nation of shoulder shruggers has finally found something that made it worth taking our eyes off American Idol and focus instead on Wall Street, where the real drama can be found virtually any weekday all year long. Fortunes can be won or lost in a moment's time, and the denizen of Wall Street today can be the next country club prison inmate tomorrow.

I read today that the server for the congressional offices has been repeatedly overwhelmed in the past few days. There has been so much interest in the bill to bail out the Wall Street firms that they have had to put a traffic stop on the server to prevent a total collapse of the system. This is democracy in action, and my opinion is, better late than never. Welcome electorate! Nice to have you engaged. Please stay awhile, and join the funeral.

Ironically, despite the unprecedented level of voter attention in the presidential election this year, [which is not the same as actual interest, let us be frank,] the White House has not received the attention in this financial melt-down. It appears that at least some portion of the populace has finally recognized that the Congress does, indeed, run the country. The President of the United States is, in many ways, an everyman who is representative of us, but does not hold the purse strings, and it is, as always, the money that matters.

I have thought for a long time that we are a nation of dilettantes. We worship the reality star of the moment, not because they have any actual achievements, but because they are on television. They are famous for being famous, and they hold us mesmerized. We pay hundreds of dollars to watch people run up and down the football field, and in the case of the Chiefs, mostly lose.

I have been watching People magazine the last few weeks, out of curiosity to see what is engaging the interest of the American public. While the economy is melting down at an unprecedented rate, the big news on the cover of one of the most read magazines in the country is that Heather Locklear was arrested for a DUI. This is news? Really? I have some sympathy for her, suffering from anxiety and depression while living life in the public eye has to be an incredible strain on the nerves, but why do we care in the first place?

This is something that has fascinated me for some time now. The celebrity culture in America is so endemic, we don't even think about it any more. Celebrities are no longer famous for doing anything, they are simply famous for being... well... famous. We build people up so that we can tear them down. It happens over and over again, in politics, in Hollywood, and in our own lives. Hillary Clinton was the woman of the hour until she wasn't. Tom Cruise was the untouchable celebrity until he jumped up and down on a sofa like a toddler proclaiming his feelings for a girl half his age, and we couldn't wait to tear him apart. Our sports heroes are falling farther and lower than they ever have, while steroids and bad behavior land them in jail or in the morgue. Is there honestly anyone who would consider Paris for more than five seconds if her last name weren't Hilton?

I find this fascination with famousness alarming in its seductiveness. We have journalists who become the story because they are so famous they overshadow all else. It is rare that either Larry King or Bill O'Reilly interviews someone more famous than they, so are they really the backdrop, or are they now part of the story? When Anderson Cooper goes to New Orleans or Galveston or Iraq, are we more concerned about what is happening in the part of the world he is reporting from, or are we worrying about what is going to happen to him?

We have politicians so famous they become caricatures of themselves without even meaning to. Sarah Palin was recently parodied on Saturday Night Live, but what it made it unique was that Tina Fey used the candidate's own words to create the sketch. I think it could be argued that Jimmy Carter is a caricature of who he used to be, as is Newt Gingrich. I don't imagine most people could tell you a single Carter presidential success [Camp David Accords, Sadat and Begin, Nobel Peace Prize, ring a bell?] but everyone recognizes him for his Georgia accent and his ears and toothy smile. He has changed the world for a lot of people with his Habitat for Humanity work, and his traveling around the world to observe elections and work for peace [something he is a lot better at than being president, so he definitely should stick with it,] but people think of peanuts and his brother Billy as much as they do of the loftier parts of his life's work.

We have recently had the interesting experience in Kansas City of watching the latest American Idol, David Cook, win the whole pot at the end of the rainbow. His is a true American success story. He was a Good Kid in high school, playing in a band on weekends and participating in the school musical during the week.

He ultimately ended up in Tulsa, but came home to support his brother's bid for the American Idol audition in Omaha. On the spur of the moment, he entered the contest as well, and as fate would have it, his brother was knocked out, and David ended up in Hollywood on the world's stage. He handled it with a grace that was very becoming and spoke well of his mother, [as a fellow single parent, I love to see a success story,] and his fextended amily has been a pleasure to watch on the local news as they supported him and made him a real person. He seems, and appears to genuinely be, a nice young man, and it's impossible not to cheer for him when you have seen him go from nobody to someone.

But does it really make sense that he had more people watching his Idol finale than watched the final State of the Union Address of George Bush's presidency? [A disclaimer here, I didn't watch either one. I prefer to read political speeches in transcript, if I'm interested, where you can't get caught up in the moment and you read it for what it really says. Or doesn't say. And you don't want to know my opinion of reality television.]

I am closely associated with a celebrity. That's right. We are a celebrity family. See how that got your attention? Suddenly, where you were dozing off just moments ago, you are waiting breathlessly for me to expound on how I know someone famous.

The reality is, I don't. But my son, the fledgling journalist, is a celebrity on his campus. It has given him, and thus me, some insight into what a bona fide celebrity life must be like. The most interesting thing, to me, is not the random marriage proposals or the odd comments made by people who think they know him because they have read what he writes. What interests me most is the fact that people actually want his opinion on things so they can set their own opinion based on his. That is celebrity culture at its worst. Without knowing how he comes to his conclusions, without having thought for themselves at all, people make decisions based on the opinion of someone they know only through the newspaper, or worse yet, online.

The next time you are asking yourself why things are such a mess in this country today, think about where your own opinions come from. Do you find the facts for yourself? Or do you wait for your favorite talking head to give your position so you don't have to think about it too hard?

We had a very unique opportunity to see democracy, in the very best sense of the word, at work in our own capitol yesterday. I hope it wasn't a passing fancy, because we need people to engage for our democracy to remain viable. A government by the vocal minority is not democracy, it is oligarchy, and it is doomed. We, the people, need to demand less talking points and more action points. We need to be skeptical of those who tell us we don't need to know, or that it's over our heads. We need to demand answers to the hard questions, and then we need to hold people accountable for their words. I don't expect C-Span viewers to outnumber the American Idol faithful any time soon, but if you want to see the real action, watch the Congress try to pass a bill that will bail out Wall Street four weeks before a national election.

I'll bring the popcorn, you can bring the soda. Let's have a party and celebrate the rebirth of democracy.

Money is the root of all... opinion.

It says, in the Bible no less, that love of money is the root of all evil. Most people do not know the verse is written that way, because we usually hear it quoted as money itself is the root of all evil. I think that interpretation better suits our acquisitive society, a condemnation of the haves by the have nots. Speaking as a have not, I'm going to be honest here, I would love to have some money laying around to hate. I would settle for having money to pay my bills, which isn't a given in any particular month, either.

Like so many people, I have had a mid-life meltdown, a series of events that picked up the pieces of my life, shook them up, and dumped them back upside down on the table all out of order, and with scrapes and scratches to nurse as well. I would compare my life to the kind of jigsaw puzzle that has 1500 pieces that are all identical in shape. Although the pieces fit together and the puzzle made the correct size of square on the table, the picture was messed up and confused, leaving the puzzle unfinished and disorderly. It looked good from a distance, but up close it was, in a word, wrong. Untenable.

All of which changed when my ex, Mr. Stability, decided to go AWOL on our family life and start over again with someone else. Or someones else, since he started over before he even left, but that's neither here nor there, probably. Although it was certainly there when I filed for divorce, let me tell you. But I am a very forgiving person, and I have moved on. I am a very forgiving person and I have moved on. I am a very forgiving....

Over the last few years, I have made attempts to take my messed up pieces and put them back together in the right order, but I have found it to be a lot harder than I imagined. Things have not fallen into place the way I would have wished. Somehow, the picture remains a trifle messy, and the pieces still seem to be put together wrong.

The edges of my puzzle pieces are frayed, and no longer snap together tightly like they did when I was new and fresh. Too often, it seems, I cannot be certain that I have found the right fit. While it looks right, and the pieces fill the hole, the picture is distorted by the damage from being so unceremoniously shaken and dumped on the table that is my life. So I fit the pieces into place as best I can, hoping I have gotten them right. I am, however, a lot more willing these days to acknowledge that I may have them put together wrong, and much less reluctant to cut my losses and try again. Which may be a good thing, all in all, but is certainly a life lesson that was hard earned.

I think my experience of the last few years gives me some insight into the psyche of the person caught in the current financial collapse of our economy. It is difficult to see disaster coming. You don't want to face it, you run and hide in the closet and pretend that things aren't what they seem. You will do anything to stave off a reality that is more frightening than anything you may have dreamed in your occasional nightmares that would come in an unguarded moment, when you were vulnerable and worrying about the choices you have made.

Although they are not without personal responsibility, and thus must accept some of the blame, people who overborrowed and overspent were seduced by a culture that encourages greed at an unprecedented level, and it is difficult to throw stones out of the glass houses that most of us live in. I hear an astounding amount of vituperation being levelled at people who now find themselves in desperate straits, and I find I cannot join the cacophony of hate that seems to be accompanying it.

I have always been a strong advocate for personal accountability, and I do feel it's important to accept the consequences for bad decisions that you have made. However, I also understand that sometimes you don't see the end of the road, and a choice that looks responsible, or at least reasonable at the time you have made it may not, in retrospect, look so good. I understand how easy it can be to get caught up in the moment, the thrill of the new house or the new car, the vacation or the new wardrobe, and overspend. Even more, however, I understand how you make decisions based on the financial picture of the moment, never realizing how quickly that picture can change with a job loss, marital disaster, or medical crisis.

I believe that the desire to better one's circumstances, is an evolutionary mechanism to ensure that human beings will remain viable and thrive. It is that very aspiration to improve one's life station, often for the benefit of the people we love as much as for own edification, that drives us to work hard to get ahead on the job, and to buy the bigger house and the fancier car and the designer clothing in the first place. The desire to acquire goes back to Adam and Eve, and is an innate part of being human, God given and human driven.

I think our cultural identity is wrapped up in that reality. Americans are known the world over for the desire to have the biggest, newest, best, most of everything. While it is a cause of some scorn, both here and elsewhere, it is a scorn born of envy, for the most part, and not one of true derision. If it were, there wouldn't be a black market for all things American thriving most actively in the very places where America is most heavily derided.

I feel sadness and sympathy for the people who bought ARM's on the advice of loan officers and lenders who made something ultimately too good to be true sound genuine and possible. I see house after house with a "For Sale" sign in front of it, and I understand they represent the broken hearts and shattered dreams of people who once bought the American dream, and now find themselves outside the window fogging up the glass.

I have never been one to be overly critical of other people's choices. In the first place, it's just not in my nature. In the second place, I have made way too many mistakes of my own to allow myself the luxury of criticising others. I have always taken to heart that verse that says you should avoid pointing out the speck in the eyes of others when you can't see past the log in your own eye. I have enough logs to build a dam, and staying ahead of disaster keeps me fully occupied.

I find it interesting how everyone has an opinion on what needs to be done to resolve the current financial crisis. All are agreed, we cannot allow this situation to continue, because the entire economy appears poised for collapse. Personally, I don't know anything about economics, macro or micro. [I wanted to do something practical with my time in college, so I majored in English and religion. I can't tell you how helpful it has been over the years to have read everything that C.S. Lewis ever wrote, and better yet, to have forgotten all of it.] I'm sure there are plenty of theories to consider, and any number of advisors far more knowledgable than me to make the tough decisions.

What I do know is gained from my real life experience, and I offer it here freely as a gift. When you spend more than you make, you have a big problem.

Our country, individually and collectively, has been living on borrowed funds for as long as I've been alive and then some, and I think the chickens may be coming home to roost. Aside from the mixed metaphors, I suspect that the real solution to the current disastrous situation is not going to be found in spending more on companies that are doing less and less for their customers, although I surely would like to be their CEO, because that is where the real money is. I think, ultimately, the answer will probably be found in sacrifice and learning, as a nation, and as individuals, to live within our means, something that goes against the very grain of our 21st Century lifestyle.

I don't think it will be simple, and I don't think it will be quick. I think, as a nation, we are going to have to face ourselves and learn a new way to live. The Depression Generation is well versed in sacrifice and doing without. It may well be that we Boomers will have to turn to our parents, that Greatest Generation, once again, to learn from them how to live within our means, something they do very well, and we do not at all

We have become a throwaway, disposable society. We don't fix, we buy new. We don't repair, we don't restore, we don't recycle, and we don't reuse. We want more, we want new, and we no longer have an appreciation for what we have at hand. The old line, "A bird in hand is worth two in the bush," comes to mind. We need to learn to value what we are holding, rather than place our confidence in something that may not exist except in the eloquent words of someone who will take your money and fly away.

What is the answer, then, for the current economic crisis? I have no answers, and I sincerely hope that the people in charge know more about it than me. I have heard all kinds of opinions, that run the gamet from one end of the financial spectrum to the other.

On the one hand, we have our President and his administration originally advocating a full bailout with no strings attached, led by a former Wall Street power broker who is now in charge of the Fed. I am happy to note that I am not the only one who hears the alarm bells ringing, although it certainly is the only time in recent memory that both Democrats and Republicans in Congress seem to agree on anything.

On the other side, we have those who advocate doing nothing and allowing the free and open market to run its course, regardless of how much damage it inflicts on our economic system, and perhaps the very stability of our country itself (the inadvisability of which is another thing that has brought our warring leadership together.) I wonder if anyone else has the nagging concern that those are the people who will most benefit when the collapse occurs, and that their advocacy may be more on behalf of their own financial portfolios than on behalf of Mr. and Mrs. Main Street?

Where money is concerned, there are as many opinions as there are people, and I can only hope that the ones to make the decisions know more about it than the rest of us. I am baffled by the expressed opinion of The Common Man in the Street that they want to vote for someone who is like them - someone with whom they could sit on the front porch and have a beer, or whatever folksy portrayal the media has picked today. To that, I can only respond with bewilderment, because if someone like me, and probably like you, is in charge, we will be in trouble.

I don't know about you, but I want someone with a tremendous education, someone who has learned the theories and watched them in practice to see how they really work. I want someone who has experience in both business and government, so they understand, as a practical reality, what the government can and cannot do, and what that government intervention will ultimately do in the business world it is trying so desperately to help. I want someone that is the elite of the elite, someone so far above me in intellect and learning and experience that I cannot hope to have a coherent conversation with them. What I want is someone who has run a successful business, not run it into the ground, because anything less will land us right back where we are, but a few hundred billion dollars poorer.

I am a paean, insignificant in the larger scope of the world. My opinion is meaningless to those in charge, and isn't worth much to anyone else, either. But I hold in my hands the lives of two other people, and the answers that come today and in the next few days will affect the ability of those two people to live a life that is better than mine, to have a world that is stable and free.

We cannot afford to blow it, not because we deserve to be bailed out - we have been the problem, and we should pay the price - but because our future generations deserve to have the opportunities that this country was founded on. The United States of America were born with an ideal that all people were entitled to the rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. I hope that before our national leaders sign on the dotted line, they will remember that our future generations deserve the right to make their own mistakes and pay for them, even if it comes at our own cost.

Definiendum compendium

It has come to my attention that my picayune scribblings have, shall we say, addled, perhaps confused, or most likely befuddled, a certain segment of the readership of this little bit of nonsense upon which I endow all my wit and charm each day. To that end, a glossary of terms is herewith offered to accommodate the challenges faced by the less literate members of my public. [One could, if one wanted, choose a name at random here. Maybe Dave. I dunno, but I think Dave works really well right here in this spot. Not that there is a Dave out there that requested a glossary or anything. Because if there was, I would be the last one to mock and humiliate him with a public disclosure of his ignorance.] One can only hope that the level of alliteration amongst my readers will increase dramatically with the exposure, thus rendering the entire exercise worthwhile.

I am the kind of writer that works hard to fulfill the needs of all my faithful readers whose wives force them to listen to my bloviations at cell point. Thus, here you will find a transliteration of the words with which, I suspect, someone named Dave may be having the greatest difficulty.

You: Pronoun, meaning someone other than one's own self. I see why that's going to be a struggle, so perhaps we should move on and try something a little easier.

Humor: Noun, a type of interaction that tickles one's funny bone, if one is fortunate enough to have one. If not, then it simply makes your face look like you just tasted sour milk, but I'm sure there is no one in my reading public that would fit that description. Certainly not anyone named Dave.

Intellectual: Adjective, refers to someone who challenges their brain to higher level thinking. This does not mean sitting on one's deck overlooking a lake, although you do get half a point for reading my blog while you do it, since I work hard to keep things educational.

Virtually: Adjective, describes something that appears to be real, but it has not been confirmed. You could use this in a sentence, such as, I am friends with virtually every Dave who is married to one of my relatives. In this case, it is not clear what Dave I might be referring to, since no last names have been used, and I may have more than one relative married to a Dave. It's a common name, I have lots of relatives, could be anyone really, but if the shoe fits....

Prostrate: [Not to be confused with prostate, which is something that I will save for another time, although many men are prostrate with fear when they have prostate problems. But I may be drifting a little off task here.] Verb, meaning to throw oneself flat on the ground with the face down in submission or adoration. Thus, to once again use this in a sentence, Dave fell prostrate before my intellectual superiority. Of course, this is a just a random Dave, not anyone I know personally. But if I did personally know a Dave, I would certainly expect some prostration after having a whole blog post dedicated to him. I'd expect flowers, too. Alstromeria, daisies, purple, you decide.

Princess: Noun, meaning female member of a royal family. Certainly not a term that could be applied to any Dave I know. Although if it was, it would involve a shiny crown and a girl with a very smart mouth who is not me.

Presume: Verb, meaning that you take something to be the case in the absence of evidence to the contrary. Some people presume that they are important because they don't have anyone like me to cut them down to size. If you were named Dave, see how lucky you would be? While less fortunate people get to walk around with big egos fully intact, any Dave in question would be thoroughly chastened by my witty repartee.

Congratulations, you have now reached the advanced round of this vocabulary challenge, where I will define a couple of phrases that could have tripped you up.

Witty Repartee: Verb modified with an adjective. Witty is a word commonly associated with humor, and refers to something clever being said. Repartee refers to a swift reply, often in response to something witty. Thus, a witty repartee refers to an especially humorous exchange between someone who is intellectually superior and someone who is prostrate with envy over it. [Notice how I work in previous words for valuable review?]

Phasianidae hunting: Noun, verb. To transliterate, that means pheasant hunting. Which is accomplished by getting up at the crack of dawn, driving for an hour, walking endlessly all day through weeds and fields, only to show up empty handed at the farm of a mature relative who pretends she likes you enough to give you pie. And who, I might just add, has a lovely daughter that is just the teeniest bit resentful about it.

I am sure that I may have missed one or two words or phrases, for which someone who may or may not be named Dave may require further elucidation. I do not feel any responsibility for additional illumination, however. I reiterate, if you need vocabulary training to peruse my simple natterings, then you aren't even smarter than I am, which isn't something I would imagine anyone named Dave would ever want to admit publicly. But if he did, I would suggest he needs to get off the online blogs and into a library, where he can read Serious Literature and learn a thing or two. Not that I would ever make fun of someone named Dave.

I would never get that Lowe.