Emma Marlow

I’m so sick and tired of political correctness. In this country, it’s politically incorrect to say anything negative about anyone except white men, fat people, blonds, southerners and Christians. I’m a spirit filled, over-weight, bottle blond from the deep-south! I have a target on my chest!

The political and social climate in this country is exhausting and I just don’t know why someone won’t stand up and say ‘enough’. Some minority is always getting offended and trying to make an example of someone’s poor judgment…demanding apologies and insisting on ‘their job!!’

Al Sharpton gets his black panties in a wad and everyone scurries to save their careers. Jumping through the hoops that the black community puts out there are ridiculous and exhausting and I’m just tired of it all. I’m not in any way saying that anyone should be rude and crude and degrading to any other human being but come on! What’s wrong with personal opinion and freedom of speech? If you think it’s un-acceptable for some guy to call a women’s basketball team that is predominately black: “Nappy ho’s” then don’t listen to his program or boycott the advertisers and let them know that you aren’t purchasing their product! The Al Sharpton politically correct Gestapo squad is getting tiresome and a bit scary that he and his cohorts are getting away with it. He and Jesse Jackson DO NOT represent the whole black community and history will see them as the “McCarthers” of our time.

Let’s take this ridiculous standard to the furthest logical conclusion: Rosey O’Donnell…a hetero-phobic cow, (Read Amos 4:1) looking for every opportunity to jump on any words or actions that would imply a negative response to homosexual behavior or their perceived “rights”…attacked Kelly Rippa for rebuking a guest on her show for putting his hand over her mouth while she was talking. It was clearly rude and disrespectful and Kelly was obviously offended. She attempted to lighten the situation by saying: “I don’t know where that hand has been” in an attempt to help all of them ’save face’ and make fun of a tense situation. Since Rosey’s mind went directly to the toilet and assumed that hand of her gay friend had been on his or someone else’s penis…she publicly rebuked Kelly. It was hetero-phobic and she got away with it. Do you know why? Because straight, heterosexual people are open game in this country.

Since on I’m on a roll and Rosie is up front…then let me mention her public and primetime comment about Christians…blaming Christianity for the ills of the world! She actually said Christianity was more dangerous than Al Qaeda. What was more disturbing is that her audience clapped. Why? Because Christians are open game…it’s completely acceptable to bash a Christian or conservative standards or opinion and no one balked.

Howard Stern can look at a centerfold and say: “Hmmmm…juicy cunt” on television and I can turn the channel or not purchase the items advertising on his show but no one complains that it’s degrading to women in general?

A black man can harass a professional comic during his routine and provoke him to rage but the white man grovels and begs Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton for his career when he uses the unholy “N” word during his angry response? Hey…party of five on the upper level….how about shutting up and letting the comedian do his job and if you don’t think he’s funny…drink your drink and be respectful of the white guy who is working down on the stage! I’m sure a grown up can be still for five minutes….no matter how bored or spoiled. Of course this doesn’t even begin to mention that a black comedian could be spewing the “N” word with wild abandon and the audience is allowed to laugh.

Forgive me if I’m using the “black” word in my writing here. We white people were told to use ‘black’ back in the sixties…remember the ‘black is beautiful’ campaign? Negro was out…black was in. Well…I’m told it’s “African American” now. What’s wrong with just being American or People? Should I insist that I’m called ‘Caucasian’ or Anglo-American? Or should I be offended that I’m not labeled as German-Irish American? Since America is the ‘great melting pot’ it’s hard to make a real distinction after we’re melted together. Separate but equal didn’t work when the white racists enforced it and it doesn’t work when the African American racists enforce it.

I just don’t understand it. Could we have Anglo Colleges for just white people? We have black colleges….that get federal funding. And what’s up with the Negro College Fund? Why haven’t they changed that name if it’s so offensive?

I’m in no way implying that African Americans shouldn’t be proud of their history and their accomplishments and they should teach their children perseverance and dignity of all races and religions, just as Jewish Americans and Italian Americans and Chinese Americans…..

I’m also not saying there hasn’t been injustices and hardship along the way….but for gosh sakes….they aren’t the only people that have had it rough! The Jews were in slavery for hundreds of years and there isn’t a lobby to get restitution from the Egyptian government! They aren’t teaching their children that someone owes them something because they are Jews!

The Al Sharptons and Jesse Jacksons are crippling another generation of black children by instilling a ‘you owe me’ attitude in them. The righteous indignation that fueled the movement for equality forty years ago has been tweaked into a political machine that has become increasingly destructive to the black community.

The Irish immigrants, the Native Americans, the boat people from Cambodia….the Mexicans looking for a better life today!! Let’s get real! Life is too short to keep your political sensibilities so fragile. The opportunities of this great country are still available to those that work hard and light a candle instead of demanding that someone else light it for you while you curse the darkness.

© Copyright Notice: Permission is hereby granted to make copies as long as Emma Marlow is properly cited/credited as the author.

My friend, Jill, called last week and asked me to attend a graduation from a class she’d been taking in Raleigh. I was honored and told her I’d love to go. She suggested, since it was so far away, that we meet for a late lunch and later I stay the night at her house and we’d spend the next day together.

I had a friend come get my girls to spend the night and my adventure began. I asked Jill what kind of class it was and she said that ‘she’d had her heart ripped out, twisted and stomped only to have the Lord put it back in a nice white box’…..

Wow! Says I….I want some of that!

We arrived at a large, professional looking building with The Legacy Institute on the front. The parking lot was full and people mingled and talked and hugged each other and introduced their old friends to their new friends. Jill’s daughter, Michaela was there and we met up with her friend Pat.

Michaela seemed to know what was going on and had that shiny animated look that many of the others had. Pat and I became increasingly uncomfortable and our eyes flitted toward each other, wondering what was going on. The graduates got name tags in yellow and their guests got name tags in purple. I’d never been to a graduation where I filled out a card with my personal information and had to wear a name tag before.

I couldn’t stand it anymore and asked Jill to speak to us privately and pulled her to a quiet corner. I asked her again what kind of class she’d graduated from and what was going on. She said she’d never graduated before from these classes and had no idea. I told her that she had to answer four questions before I’d agree to stay.

‘One’, says I….’am I going to have to eat the head off of a chicken?’

‘Ohhhhhhhh Emma’ she assured…..’nooooooo!! Don’t be silly. Not on your first visit!’

‘Two….is anyone going to have snakes?’

‘Ohhhhhhh Emmmmmmmma…….you make me laugh……of course not!!’

‘Three…..is there going to be hugging? Because I hate hugging and no one is going to touch me…right?’

‘Ohhhhhhhh Emma…..no one is going to touch you unless you want them tooooo!!’

‘Four and final question: Is this an Amway meeting?’
‘Oh Emma…I know you’re kidding……..’

I stopped her and made her look me square in the face and tell me honest to God that this is not an Amway meeting.

‘No! Of course not’, says she….

Pat and I were satisfied and we entered the large room full of chairs. We sat in the back and of course they jammed the people in and took out all the empty chairs and made us move to fill in the space. I’ve been in sales a long time and I knew exactly what they were doing and I didn’t like it a bit. Peer pressure is an effective selling technique and people will participate in things they wouldn’t do with space around them. Look at any worship service in a church. The group up front and in close contact is more likely to raise to their arms and close their eyes and cry than those isolated in the back.

A speaker spoke for a few minutes about our futures and what would we do if we didn’t have obstacles and what would those obstacles be? People yelled out “Money!!” “Kids!” “Job” etc while she wrote a list on a dry erase board. Then she said that those obstacles would still be in our lives five years from now and the goals we thought five years ago that we’d have now would simply be ten years further away….BUT!! The answer was right here folks…right here in River City…and it starts with T that rhymes with P that stands for POOL…POOL…POOL!!

Oh, I digress. The speaker was good….been there…done that.

Then the speaker announced that the graduates were going to leave the guests and have their final session and we schmucks were going to stick around and have a taste of the freedom-making program that has made our friends all shiny and sparkly. All those with yellow name tags were to leave and we were assured that they would return in twenty minutes. I grabbed Jill’s wrist in a death grip and told her I wanted the car keys. She tried to pull away and I didn’t loosen my grip. I was serious.

Jill left to go to wherever they took the graduating class and I didn’t see her again for two and a half hours.

The staff came away from the wall and began hauling away all of the unused chairs and shifted people further and tighter toward the front of the room. I whispered to Pat…”.we’re touching strangers…I don’t like this!”

The speaker shared her testimony of how lost and lonely she was back when she got her doctorate at Harvard and day in and day out she’d do research on chicken embryos’. I whispered with a note of panic to Pat: “Oh geez….there ARE chickens involved!” She giggled and told me to hush. I whispered….”aren’t chicken embryo’s called eggs?” She bit her lip and looked away.

It was like a church service with testimonials of change and happiness and fullness of joy…..of the staleness without the Lord and finding truth and light and the American way and never being the same….but she didn’t find it with Jesus…she found it at the Legacy Institute.

Now, for many folks that would be crazy enough, but I’ve been around the bend a few times and if I can sit in a room full of midwives that breath back into mother earth the energy we took from her that day and moan ‘and mode it be’ or some such weirdness…than I can sit and listen to someone spout the freedoms of the Legacy Program. I mean…God’s principals work. Positive attitudes and positive thinking and not dwelling on the negative works….with or without Christ. Treating people the way you want to be treated works. Living simply and loving deeply and laughing loudly works. God’s Word won’t come back void…no matter what headline it falls under. Christians certainly don’t have a monopoly on love. The Word says that a heathen wouldn’t give their child a scorpion when they ask for a fish…or give them a stone when they ask for bread.

Let’s just say I’ve learned to chew and spit. I can take things and sift them through Scripture and apply it to my life…..you know…as long as they don’t invade my space and get personal….and hug me or something.

About that time the speaker said that we were going to break up into triads and dyads. Now for those of you, like me, that didn’t know what that was…that means we were going to break up in groups of two and three. We couldn’t be with anyone that we knew before and each group had to have one graduate of the course and was now a trainer. Those people rose to their feet and they were peppered throughout the room…wearing purple name tags.

So…they looked like guests and they acted like guests and they smelled like guests and they wore purple name tags like guests and they were among us and we thought they were guests…..BUT THEY WERE TRAINERS!! They weren’t purple name tagged people at all!!

I saw the horror and fear in Pats eyes and I could give her no comfort because I was horrified and fearful too. I ended up sitting with a small framed man in his sixties. He wore a suit and tie and was well groomed. He reminded me of Barney Fife. We were told to touch knees. Pat looked at me and started laughing. “HE’S TOUCHING ME!!” was written all over my face.

The first instructions were to look deeply into the other person’s eyes…the window to the soul…. and tell that person with my eyes who I am and where I’ve been and where I’m going. Then I was to see in his eyes where he’s been and where he’s going. The speaker asked if we’d made an opinion about that person by the way they looked or their clothes or their gender. I thought, “Well…he’s a waffle…I wonder if he can see in
my eyes that I think he’s like breakfast food?”

If that wasn’t uncomfortable enough….Then the speaker said that we were suppose to tell the other person in forty five seconds, if we could have a magic wand, where and what we would be doing in five years. I was completely stumped. I had no idea. I didn’t have a clue even where I’d be living next week and I’d been in limbo for several years. I couldn’t see past getting out of that room and I wanted out in a real way!!

My dyad partner was instructed to encourage me for the forty five seconds while I was going to have to tell him my plans…..GO!! The room burst into noise and I leaned way back in my chair and Barnie Fife leaned forward in my face. I casually said that may-be in five years it would be nice to have a few of my books out there so I didn’t have to keep repeating myself and teaching the same things over and over…but I didn’t want anyone to know who I was or where I was. I said it slowly and with conviction. All the while he was leaning in and yelling at the top of his lungs in my face: “I BELIEVE IN YOU!! I BET YOU’RE A GREAT WRITER!! I CAN’T WAIT TO GET ALL OF YOUR BOOKS!! I’LL BUY EVERY ONE AND GET THEM FOR MY FRIENDS AND FAMILY!!! I BELIEVE YOU’RE A KIND AND WONDERFUL PERSON AND IT WILL BE A PLEASURE TO READ YOUR BOOKS!”

Well….I hadn’t been so shocked and uncomfortable since that evangelist decided I was going to dance for the Lord many years ago. I was pinned to the lunacy by my knees and couldn’t even do a little bunny hop out of the room!

Before I could get my bearings and composure, the speaker yelled stop and told us to tell our partner AGAIN our hopes for the future, but his time convince them while they respond in the negative. GO!!! I sputtered a bit and said again in the same casual voice that it would be nice if in five years some of my books were available to people so I didn’t have to repeat myself all of the time. This time he was in my face yelling: YOU CAN’T WRITE A BOOK! NO ONE WILL READ THAT GARBAGE!! WHO CARES WHAT YOU THINK!!!

My heart was pounding and the fight/flight mechanism was in full swing. I was either going to lung for the little weasel’s throat or run out of the room. I looked at the doors and two purple tagged wolves were standing in front of each of them. Then without time to get my heart slowed down, we were told to ‘go over the top’ and convince that person that nothing is going to stand in the way of the goal and tell them again what you’ll be doing in five years but this time your partner is going to ignore you GO!!!

The room exploided again into the din of people yelling. I said again that in five years I’d like to see my books published so I wouldn’t have to repeat everything over and over but I’d have to have complete privacy and do it without anyone knowing who I am. He yawned and looked at his watch and looked around the room.

Then the table was turned. It was his turn to tell me his goals and plans and it was my turn to yell encouragements, forty five seconds GO!! Then to listen to him for forty five seconds and insult and discourage him GO! Then listen to him and ignore him…. Forty-five seconds GO!

He jumped in my face and started yelling that he was going to be helping people in Washington DC with his adult daughters, blah, blah, blah. I didn’t care. I really didn’t care.

I thought I was going to applaud for my friend as she walked across a stage and graduate from something important to her. I came for the food, doggone it!! I didn’t know this man and I didn’t want his knees touching my knees and I really didn’t care what he was going to do in five years.

But, I am a good sport…if nothing else…..so even though I didn’t have a word to say to him, I smiled and nodded at him in a positive manner. I looked like Bob on the Enzyte commercials with that stupid grin. Then it was stop and go again and I was supposed to respond in the negative. All I could do is grin that same stupid grin but frown with my eyebrows furrowed…gritting my teeth trying to hold on for forty five seconds. Then it was ignore time and I fumbled through my purse while he shared his goals and dreams and a sadness washed over me and tears welled up in me. When the speaker yelled stop he asked me if I was alright. I told him no….that I would NEVER ignore someone or discourage someone when they shared their goals and dreams with me, if I cared for them or not and I resented having to do that to anyone…even a stranger.

He assured me that it was ok and that I had a big heart. I asked if I was allowed to leave to go to the bathroom. The two purple wolves moved aside and I went to the ladies room. A woman wolf followed me and asked if I was alright. I told her yes…that I just needed to pee and asked her if that was ok. I had had enough. The staff member was standing outside of the bathroom after I used the facilities and she escorted me back into the room. There would be no escape to the car.

When I returned to the room, the speaker was driving home the importance of the program and if we didn’t do this class we’d be in the same dead end spot we’re in now in five years and our only hope for freedom and light in our future was to sign up now and go through the program. Of course the three levels; basic, advanced and leadership were all available at the low-low price of $26.95. Its basic course is five days and nights…ending at midnight each night. Ahhh…sleep deprivation…that’s what cults do. It’s used as a means of torture and the Geneva Convention forbids it but it’s effective and breaks people down and allows them to do things they usually wouldn’t do.

The speaker continued…how important this is to finish….that we’re all doomed and lost and broken heaps of dog dung and life will keep us down without the skills she can teach us for the low-low price of $26.95! BUT WAIT! Tonight…if we sign up for the whole program in the next ten minutes…we could get all three programs for the ridiculously low price of only $19.95!!

Then I got a clearer picture of the prices. She said, “The person that brought you here tonight has been given a gift certificate for their guest for $695.00 but it can only be used tonight! Then I realized that the program was $2,695!! Not twenty six dollars and ninety five cents! Good grief…I’m in the wrong dern business!!

Barnie and his friends began the sales push….just what would it take to sign up tonight? What would get in the way? Money, kids, job, etc. Those things have to take a back seat…we’re doing this for them…it’s important that we get our goals and dreams lined up so we can be better people for our boss and our family and for ourselves! I let him finish his caring response to my future and I said that I had four children in Virginia that were homeless…that right now finding a roof to cover them was more important than my well being….but thanks. My kids are part of the trickle down dysfunction in my life and they’ve survived it for years and another year or so won’t hurt. It shut him up.

Three more people stopped me before I escaped the room wanting me to sign up for the course. I found Pat in the lobby and we hugged and I clung to her arm….yep…they’d done a number on me…I was touching!!

We looked for Jill and started to laugh about the weirdness we’d been suckered into. We agreed that we’d find Jill and pounce on her from opposite sides and yell: “INTERVENTION!!!”

We looked in the woman’s bathroom and I told her about being followed by one of the wolves with the purple name tag. I noticed on the back of the toilet that there was a nice basket with a few feminine napkins and tampons and tissue. There was also a Dixie cup with fresh ground coffee in it. I have no idea why it was there….someone may have just left it there. I slam
med open the door and yelled at Pat in the mirror, “DON’T DRINK THE COFFEE!!” We cackled and howled. A staff member came in and asked if we were alright…they could hear us laughing in the lobby. I told Pat that they just wanted to know which one of us was going to lay the egg!! See….there ARE chickens involved!!”

We found Jill and agreed to act nice and share in whatever joy it was that she’d found though we certainly didn’t get it.

On the way home I asked Jill exactly what she learned in those five horrible, heart wrenching days where her heart was ripped out and twisted and stomped and God put it back in with a nice white box?

She paused and tears welled up in her eyes and she tried to speak. She finally said that she’d spent her whole life being late…it was part of the Hispanic culture…that everyone was late! I told her that being Mexican didn’t have a thing to do with it…that home schoolers are all late too! She got a dreamy look over her face like something mystical and wonderful had happened to her and she was an ascended creature now….someone of deeper understanding and thought. She said that she’d learned that it wasn’t ok to be late all of the time. It wasn’t ok to make people wait….

I thought…dern…I could have told you that for twenty bucks and saved you a fortune!!

I whispered to Pat when we dropped her off at her house in the wee hours of the morning, “I’d have rather been to an Amway meeting!”

What’s up with Brittney spears? Like who cares? Well I only have one lousy channel on TV….Michael insists I know the news and weather so I’m not caught off guard. Anyway…sleaze TV on NBC is my cross to bear.

So Brittney shaves her head (makes sure the press can see in the salon and gets more painful tattoos. It’s no secrete that she hates herself. We’re all on some level of self loathing and self destruct. It’s the human condition without Christ.

She cried and said she wanted to be left alone. I don’t blame her. So, says I…why doesn’t she stay home and take care of her kids? There’s no news in that and they’ll leave her alone. I saw Liz Taylor interviewed and she was asked…as a child star herself…does she have anything to say to Brittney Spears? Liz said, “Well…she doesn’t have to party every night!”

My kids screamed, “That’s what you said.” Yep…Liz and me…great minds think alike. We’re both shocked that we ended up fat old ladies with bad hair, too.

My kids stood at my door and watched sleaze TV (entertainment tonight) and saw Brittney go berserk at those predators with cameras. She hit the car with an umbrella. I yelled at the TV: “Go for the windshield wiper!!! The windshield wiper!!”

I look for a spirit filled group that isn’t involved in the toxic faith movements’ horse and pony show. (If anyone takes off their coat and starts hitting people with it….I’m outta there!!)

I look for misfits. Churches where everyone has biological family (especially that go to that church) will never actually include an outsider in anything other than church functions. It’s lonely…so I look for other groups that don’t have family….they need a spiritual family….and so do I.

I look at the nursery program. If they are blackmailing folks to keep the nursery and everyone HAS to keep the nursery, or else…then there is something wrong with the very foundation of the fellowship. Remember that what we do with the least of these is how we are treating Christ.

I look for at least a few individuals (preferably in leadership) that see the calling as fishers of men…not aquarium keepers. They both work with fish….but one is hard, nasty work; getting their righteous fingers dirty in other peoples broken lives and the other is caring for fish in a controlled environment.

I look for a music program that doesn’t manipulate the emotions of the people. Anyone can be manipulated through music to believe the Holy Spirit is moving. How a fellowship worships WITHOUT the band is an indication of what’s really going on. The band should be a perk….a means to an end….a training ground for real personal worship. If it’s only an emotional high and the fellowship doesn’t fall into the same kind of praise during the services where the band is absent….then the band has failed the people.

And last but certainly not least….I check out the pot lucks. You can learn a lot about folks at a pot-luck. So far, in my vast experience over nearly 30 years…..the Holiness Pentecostals have it…but the Baptists are a close second.

My grandmother had a green pudgy parakeet and every morning for years she’d take off his cover and sing “Good morning Puffles.” One day Puffles sang “good morning Puffles” and Gramma nearly had a heart attack. Back then no one believed they could ever talk and we all figured Gramma was a bit off and wondered if we should call in an exorcist for Puffles. Gramma went to her grave swearing that Puffles talked to her that one time. Years later I read an article about some parakeets that talk and I made copies and sent them to everyone in the family. She was vindicated after her death.

When I am tired of making a point or arguing my case around here, I put my hand up to say “stop…talk to the hand…I’m not going forward with this” and I say, “Good Morning Puffles” in a sing song voice. My family knows that someday they’ll be sorry…I’ll be vindicated after my death!

Today I sent Cayah into Foolion to buy a bag of feminine napkins. We all scraped up our change and found three dollars. I hated it for her…I was getting boxes for moving in the back of the store. I would HATE to buy just napkins…I’d get thirty dollars in emotional spending to stack on top of the napkins so no one noticed. Not Cayah. She walked in there without a cart and picked up a bag and went to the check out. There were three open tills…an old lady, a young lady and a handsome teenage boy…that she completely missed. She’s got boobs but she simply hasn’t discovered the boys yet. (Emma dancing the snoopy dance on aisle four!!)

Anyway…she went right up to the shortest line…the one with the teenage young man and plopped those pads down and started digging in her purse for her cash. I remembered I had the change in my pocket and approached her. She saw me and said, “I got the kind with wings for me and got extra long for you since we didn’t have enough money for two bags…this way we can share…are you ok with that?”

I thought I’d die. I spun on my heel and walked out without saying a word.

Needless to say, by the time I was finished talking to her in the parking lot, my daughter has my deep emotional problems and will never comfortably purchase feminine products again. What’s the use in trickle down dysfunction if I can’t give it to my kids!!

The gangster-stupid fashion statement is a look that crawls all over me. When I was younger – - – if someone pulled their pants down so low that it crippled their ability to walk, untied their shoes and walked flat footed to avoid falling down or having their shoes flop off of their feet and cocked their baseball hat to the side – - – it would have been a joke! Stupid is as stupid does.

For a middle aged white lady to mention it will, in this politically correct culture, raise eyebrows. Well…I come from the old school where it’s rude to talk trash in front of ladies or good company and as an American, I can about say anything I want to, no matter who’s political sensibilities are incensed. I’m not afraid to say that the Emperor doesn’t have new clothes! You look stupid!

The industry that keeps promoting stupid and the culture that pays top dollar to look stupid deserve each other. People have every right to slump along with their shoes untied and their pants falling down with their underwear hanging out and their hat cocked sideways like a goof. They can even assume that a double portion of ‘bling’ actually legitimizes it’s from stupid to phat or bad or whatever bass-act-wards word they’ve twisted to mean something that it’s not this week.

But don’t expect this Mama to park my brain at the door and except it without saying, ‘get a belt, tie your shoes and put that hat on your head like you have some sense! You look stupid!!’

Ian (18) and I were talking in the yard yesterday. He had his baseball hat on crooked with the bill cocked to the side. I slapped the hat off and told him to wear it like he had some sense. He laughed and told me that he had it that way to keep the sun out of his eyes. Sure enough…the sun was coming at him and the brim had been keeping the sun out of his eyes. Okay….okay…that’s pretty smart – - – it just LOOKS stupid!

In this new house…there are smoke detectors everywhere and one of them blinks a red light at me. I told Michael that it’s probably taking pictures of me undressing and sending them to Germany. Someone will recognize me from an internet site. I’m only paranoid when there’s a full moon.

Cayah (15) tends to cook with a gusto and filling a house full of smoke is life on normal mode around here. I’m never surprised when the detectors take off and squeal their warning. A bit ago, the kitchen smoke detector took off with ear piercing shrills and all of the other detectors in the house responded! They were no where near the smoke but they took off! I’ve never seen that before…that’s pretty smart.

Cayah flapped a hand towel around the kitchen detector to fake it out to no avail. Unlike the smoke detectors at the condo at the beach where we stay sometimes…it’s smarter than that. She yelled over the din, asking if she could poke it with a broom handle like we did at the other house. I told her no. We all know what condition that detector ended up in…..poked to death for doing its job, poor thing!

The noise was deafening and we were laughing. Finally…all at once…there was quiet. I heard Cayah snicker from the kitchen….:” I bellowed through the house asking what she did to make them stop.

“I ripped their batteries out…dog gone them….” she yelled back.

So much for high tech smoke detection. I guess if the house burns down we’ll all sleep through it.

We had a beloved kitty get hit by a car this last Sunday. Boo Kitty. Found him in the middle of the road on the way to church in the rain. Dern it. He was such an old soul. It didn’t surprise me that he passed away young. It was obvious that he was way wise beyond his years. My other three kitties miss him. So do my kids. We had a full protestant service in the rain. Very fitting to have funerals in the rain, I think.

Pets are such an outlet for love. It speaks well of people that have pets. It’s brave to be willing to love something with such a short life expectancy. It says that love is worth it even though it hurts. It really speaks well of those that are willing to love again.

My mom passed away five years ago. I found out she was dead on the internet. Isn’t that sad? A friend sent me a sympathy card and I didn’t know who died. It’s not the worst mommy dearest situation I’ve heard of but it’s up there in the top ten. I don’t know what’s worse…loosing love or loosing the hope of love. Lost hope…now that’s a harsh journey.

I believe in heaven and I believe that through Jesus we can access that place. It gives me comfort to know she’s ok. In the presence of God she’s able to love now and she has a sound mind and we’re going to be alright on the other side. In loosing her I learned that hope is a person. All hope is Jesus. It makes me glad that she’s gone on to be with the Lord and she’s met up with her children and grandchildren that have gone on before her…and now there’s Boo. I know he’s ok tonight.

My kids went skating this week…the first field trip they’ve been on in over a year. They skate at walking tracks and around the house but the big rink was pretty new for most of them.

One of the dad’s asked me if my kids had ever been to a rink before. I pondered and couldn’t remember which ones had and which ones hadn’t. He mentioned that every rink in the country, as far as he knew…the people skated counter clockwise. Well…now…being a trivia buff…..a variable cornucopia of useless information….I thanked him for the tidbit for my file.

It wasn’t until after we arrived home and the children were complaining about the multiple blisters on their feet that I heard them say that they wished they started going clockwise sooner….so their feet wouldn’t hurt.

I asked them what they meant. They said that they decided to turn around and go the other way because their feet were hurting on the same side. It didn’t concern them a bit that they were scaring the puddin’ out of everyone else on the floor…three girls plowing their way INTO the traffic pattern. WATCH OUT!! THE MARLOW MOB IS COMING THROUGH!!

I’m going to find that father next month and tell him that I’m a bit obtuse…that he needs to be right out in my face telling me that my kids were going the wrong way on the skating rink!!

It reminds me of a time a gaggle of home school kids met at the park for field day. I yelled for them to make a big circle and they meandered and looked around in confusion. The mom’s had to go out and help them make a big circle. Making two lines was just as foreign to them… just as trying to make four teams, I had them ‘count off’…explained again how to count off and had to walk each kid through it because they just didn’t understand why they were number four and then after counting them through it, most of them didn’t remember what number they were! Surely every first grade teacher didn’t have to go through that! I guess someone had to teach them…it’s something I thought I was born with…but those home schoolers were as dull witted about it as anything I’d ever seen.

Home school kids don’t stand in line like public schooled kids. They know how to stand in line at Walmart but the concept of standing in line to go out of a door or to go into a door or to go to the bathroom or to get a drink is just Greek to them. That day I watched as a horde of sweaty, thirsty kids arrived at the one water fountain at the park. There was no first come, first serve, get in the back of the line…because there was no line. It wasn’t toughest and meanest got the water first either.….the smallest paying big brother tax on the side lines someplace hoping for a slurp. I was pretty impressed how civilized they were but there was no actual order to the process.

I started thinking about how many lines kids in public school stand in ….at least for the first six years of school. Like I said…line up for the bus, for recess, for going in from recess, for lunch…for coming back from lunch… for going back to the bus.. Then they go to junior high and there are no more lines. In real life…what is all that training in lines going to prepare them for? Michael said, “Well…there’s the un-employment line, the food stamp line, the Medicaid line….”

Makes me think.