March 31st

I did it. I officially finished the dress. Well, except for hemming it, but gosh, that's easy. (The pictures are in the wrong order.)

The zipper!

The front.

What it was supposed to look like.

Making the midriff.

Putting together the bodice.

In other news, Keith is going to officially re-inlist sometime soon and today went and talked to his first sergeant about different placements. We weren't expecting it, but it appears that some of them come with bonuses, which would be awesome, if it pans out. I've learned to never count my chicks before they hatch when it comes to the Army and money.

None of them involve moving back to CO, which I briefly had a passionate burst of hope for.

I have a new phone. It's a Samsung Solstice. As you may remember, I sent my trusty Motorola Razor through the wash. It was a sad day. I liked that little phone; I felt very professional and important when I flipped it open so briskly, it slipped so easily into my back jean pocket.

But alas, even a dry rice bath did not revive it. Keith seized the opportunity to change up our entire cell phone MO. We cancelled my T-Mobile account, which I felt sad about. I had mostly good experiences with them and had a customer loyalty rate of unlimited anytime calls for about fifty five dollars a month, with tax.

Instead, he added a line to his AT&T account, a company I am suspicious of. During his deployment, I had to handle his bills from that company and I was horrified at how they were nickle and diming him.

However, all his friends and family have that company, so now I do too.

Keith also decided that he needed a new cell phone and ordered the Tundra, a cell phone so hardy it could be flushed down the toilet, sent through the sewer systems and show up in the Atlantic ocean still receiving calls and streaming live TV for the benefit of the clams.

And I have this Solstice thing. It's a touch screen and built for doing all kinds of exciting, multifunctional multimedia stuff. Frankly, it's out of my league. I mean, it came with an instructional computer disk, in addition to the instructional booklet, which in the solstice's case is a very thick little booklet indeed. One wrong touch and I'm launched out into the World Wide Web at astronomical cost to myself.

I miss my battered, gun metal grey Razor.

March 29th

(Written yesterday and then Keith surprised me by coming home for lunch and it didn't get published.)

I forgot all about the fact that it was Palm Sunday yesterday. I miss the pomp and circumstance of that sort of structure, the way it weaves all the seasons together with religious meaning.

Today I logged onto my old blog and found I'd gotten some new followers, even though I haven't written on that blog for...half a year, I guess. Two of them are young Army wives going through a deployment. My heart goes out to them.

For as long as Keith is stationed here, he'll be outside the deployment cycle. If we'd stayed in CO, he'd be actively preparing for his third. We already know we're moving to GA sometime this fall though. The Armour Center is being transferred there.

This will seem like a strange little interlude in our life, when we look back at it. I'll forget the look of this house, the steep wooden stairs to the cellar with a full load of wash and the morning sun through the kitchen window. We'll move on into the heart of Southern Living and here the moss will grow deeper in the damp back yard. Other people will come and go, many other Army wives.

I'm looking forward to the move; we haven't lived here long enough for this to feel like home. Though as the spring comes on, it does get more and more beautiful. The forsythia are in bloom now, and with the daffodils, the landscape of green is frothed over with exuberant yellow blooms.

When Keith retires and we have our forever house, I am going to plant me some loads of forsythia bushes, all along the drive way and under trees and I'll have lilacs as well, huge banks of lilacs and the children will play in the little shady spaces underneath, on the cool packed earth.

But for Georgia, I hope we find a rental house that has a fenced in back yard and a two car garage. Such things, we have learned the hard way, are essential for the Indiana household.

I have loads of laundry to wash and the house to clean. Scraps of cotton like casualties from the sewing battlefield lie strewn across the dining room table and limp upon the floor. Dog hair has drifted up against the baseboards. Ladybugs lie on dusty side tables and windowsills where they gave up the ghost and the couches have disappeared under a mountain of digiprint gear. Empty tin cans march drunkenly across all surfaces where their sergeant has left them, smelling the sickly sweet smell of tobacco leaves and spearmint.

I need a second cup of coffee.

March 28th

What a strange feeling; March is almost over. You know that movie, "The Bucket List"? I'm not sure that I have a large list of things I want to do before I die, but I feel the need, as I get older, to simply live as honestly and deeply as possible.

This morning, I made blueberry pancakes with turkey sausage and orange juice, the girls underfoot, pointing their inquisitive snouts toward the source of the delightful smell. It's a dark and rainy Sunday and there were deer out in the woods, sniffing around in the fallen leaves.

Deer have this unearthly beauty, this wildness about them. They come and go almost silently, they lift their heads with fluid grace and watch with dark, unfathomably eyes. We see them sometimes leaping across the golf course in packs, turning suddenly to this side or the other.

Yesterday Keith and I went to a platoon picnic. I was completely dreading this. We arrived around three to a small, charming house in a little neighborhood off of the highway. It was a sunny, bright day with a cool wind blowing. The hostess was busy chopping tomatoes and so laughingly offered me her left hand to shake.

I liked her immediately, like, in that very moment. I recognized a kindred soul, a completely sincere and eccentric soul who had come to terms with herself a long time ago with good humor, though there remained a slight edge of defensiveness, just enough to highlight how much her forthright grace had cost her.

I sat at her kitchen table drinking ice water and laughing, just laughing, at her stories. I couldn't tell how old she was, she seemed my age, but she had an equally delightful teenage daughter. Both of them were very talented story tellers and with perfectly timed gestures and inflection, their tales came alive. I wonder if they know how good they are.

My nerd flag flew high and joyful. There was no effort to the conversation. I have never met such friendly, open people.

We stayed for hours, I met all the guys. They all shook my hand and called me by my married name; they called Keith "sergeant," which jolted me a little each time to hear it. Whenever I called him Sweetie, there would be this little pause, as everyone waited to see if Keith would bristle manful at this. He doesn't. He called me Kitten and would come creeping up to me with a little grin, to grab me by my waist and get kisses.

The guys got exuberantly drunk and played corn hole. A few got brave and had shy conversations with me. One was undergoing reconstructive ear surgery from an IED explosion; he was cheerful and wry.

I hope and hope and hope that my hostess will become a friend. We'll see. Maybe it was just a fluke, how we clicked. I still remember thinking I had clicked with Keith's staff sergeant's wife in CO and later knowing that she had talked me down to Keith later on. That kind of burned me; I don't trust my friend making instincts quite so much anymore.

My sewing has ground to a stop. I reached the zipper, tried it, botched it, undid it and left it. But I'll be damned if I give up now. Once I put the zipper in, I'll have completed all the steps. The dress bodice is inside out, all the seams have been ripped out and redone at least once, strings dangle here and there, the gathers are a little off and it's three sizes too small.

But, I will have made a dress. And as soon as I do, I'm going out, buying a new pattern of the exact same dress, cut that one out to fit a size ten and starting all over again. That one I'm determined to be able to wear.

All that stands between me and victory is a zipper. Not for long, my friends, not for long.

On Saturday, Sarah Palin spoke to a gathering of ten thousand people in Nevada. Ten thousand people. On the campaign trail, Obama drew 11,000 in Las Vegas in '08.

I read an article about a pro choice woman who was mourning the fact that health care passed at the expense of the pro choice rights. I read the comments; every single comment but one was pro life. I was stunned. Three or four of the women who commented said that they had been very liberal and pro choice until they had their own children, specifically until they had seen their babies through the three dimensional ultrasound pictures or heard their baby's heart beat.

There continues this controversy over "hate speech," stirred up by Democrats. It's so frustrating. Public conservatives have been the object of hate speech by the Left for as long as they've been speaking publicly. It crosses the political spectrum, it's nothing new.

And this business of people at the Tea Party rally using the N-word when the Democrats walked through them to vote on health care...I have seen the videos, more than one, of that walk. If people called that word several times as was reported, why wasn't it captured on the videos?

Because if it had been captured, we would have seen it on the news thousands of times by now, as Andrew Breitbart pointed out in his article. He's offering ten thousand dollars of his own money for any evidence that anyone in that protest actually hurled that word at the politicians.

The opposition to the health care bill is not rooted in hate or racism. Democrats want to portray it as such because it discredits the Tea Party movement and by extenstion, any American who expresses criticism of their policies. I'm sure that there are racists and violent extremists in this country, of course there are. But to say that those aspects define the Tea Party movement is, first of all, inaccurate and secondly, cowardly. Why not debate their politics instead of impugning their character?

I venture to suggest it is because the Democrats know their policies are largely indefensible.

Their strategy appears to be two pronged, smear the opposition and church up their health care fiasco. We are shortly going to be subject to some of the mostly heavily funded, feel good propaganda ever as the Democrats attempt to sell their faulty health care bill.

Despite all the money that will be poured into advertising, selling the bill going to be is hard, as the bill is already costing American companies money and didn't actually drop pre-existing conditions for children as they had said it would, which now they are scrambling to fix. Apparently they hadn't actually read the bill. Go figure.

In light of this, it must look so much easier to portray Americans who oppose this bill as hate filled racists ready at the drop of the hate to explode. It's a sad, new low for our politicians in Washington.

March 25th

I'm continually amazed, to be quite honest, when I log on and see that people are still choosing to read my blog, even when I go on and on for days about politics in an undeniably amateur way.

I keep wanting to return to my older style of writing and tell you all about how the sewing is coming on, and how the daffodils are sprung up around everyone's mailbox and how I finally made fresh salsa from scratch. But the political times of the day feel so pressing to me and I'm overflowing with thoughts on the matter, which I find I must vent in this blog.

I've been considering, for example, why our Bill of Rights reads in the way it does. No where in there does it state that as Americans we have the right to any commodities, anything that is bought or sold on the market, such as health care, education or housing.

Why? Was this an oversight on their part? If so, should it be fixed now? What happens when it becomes the government's responsibility to provide a commodity to all of its citizens?

In contrast, I can't help but think of the Soviet Constitution and how within that document, commodity after commodity are ensured to them by their government. Was this what ultimately led to its downfall, the starvation and deprivation of its citizens?

Just lately I have finished reading "The 5,000 Year Leap." This is a most excellent and very easy to understand book about the founding principles of our unique and marvelous system of government. The following starts from p. 116:

Those on the receiving end of the program may think this is very "just" to take from the "haves" and give to the "have nots." They may say, "This is the way the government provides equal justice for all." But what happens when the government comes around and starts taking from those who count themselves "poor"? They immediately declare with indignation that they have "rights" in the property the government gave them. The government replies, "WE decide who has rights in things."

The power given to the government to take from the rich automatically cancelled out the principle of "guaranteed equal rights." It opened the floodgate for the government to meddle with everybody's rights, particularly property rights....

The American Founders took a different approach. Their policy was to guarantee the equal protection of all the people's rights and thus insure that all would have the freedom to prosper...

What happened in America under these principles was remarkable in every way. Within a short time the Americans, as a people, were on the way to becoming the most prosperous and best-educated nation in the world...They were also the freest people in the world. Eventually, the world found that they were also the most generous people on the earth...The key was using the government to protect equal rights, not equal things. As previously mentioned, Samuel Adams said the ideas of a welfare state were made unconstitutional:

"The Utopian schemes of leveling (redistribution of the wealth, or social justice) and a community of goods (central ownership of all the means of production and distribution), are as visionary and impracticable as those which vest all the property in the Crown. (Those ideas) are arbitrary, despotic, and, in our government, unconstitutional." (Wells, Life of Samuel Adams, 1:154)
-The 5,000 Year Leap, by W. Cleon Skousen

So, it was not a mistake at all. It was very intentional. The Founders knew that in providing Americans with the right to their own private property, their right to fail as well as to succeed, as opposed to the right to the things themselves, they were guaranteeing us the most liberty a government can and the best chance at ultimate success and prosperity.

And it worked. We have the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness; or to make it specific to today's pressing issue, to the pursuit of health care on the free market. The government does not have the right to take over this market and to provide it for us, as they see fit at any given moment.

Yes, by keeping our right to the pursuit of a commodity, we risk not getting it. We risk failure. But I feel that is a far lesser evil than surrendering my liberty, my control and passively awaiting the delivery of that commodity from the government who has taken control of that aspect of my life.

Another words, I would rather risk failure than risk the loss of my liberty.

March 24th

I was horrified to learn today that some in Congress have been at the receiving end of death threats. Naturally I was horrified that this happened at all, but a large part of my horror was that those extremists who are threatening to use actual violence will be used to discredit the entire bulk of patriotic, law abiding citizens who are determined to fight this bill.

We have available to us many different avenues of protest as Americans, the first of which is the voting booth and equally powerful, the written word. It is there that this revolution must take place and no where else. It must be a culture war of ideas and of words. It cannot be of any real violence or things will become unthinkably worse.

There are extremists in any party, who attach themselves to any movement. But those extremists should never be allowed to define the group or to carry any actual sway.

The passage of the bill violated the traditions of our representative government and as such can be, I feel, identified as tyranny. The outrage and the feeling of frustration is real and to be expected. But as Americans, we are not helpless or forced into violent avenues that other nations may find themselves in. We have the ability, in November, to peaceably vote those Congressmen out of power and to vote in those who will actually respect the will of their constituents.

I have no doubt that this is exactly what will happen and that Americans, left, right and center, will turn their backs on those that speak of violence and give them no place. We will, I'm sure, acquit ourselves with honor this fall.

Along with that, I read something on RealClearPolitics this afternoon:

"...to paraphrase (and with the deepest apologies to) Winston Churchill on the occasion of the fall of France in June 1940:

What House Minority Leader John A. Boehner has called the Battle of Capitol Hill is over. I expect that the Battle of the Electorate is about to begin. Upon this battle depends the survival of a nonsocialist America. Upon it depends our own American way of life and the long continuity of our institutions and our history. The whole fury and might of the media and the Democratic Party must very soon be trained on the electorate.

If they can stand up to the coming propaganda, America may be free, and the life of the wider free world may move forward into broad, sunlit uplands.

But if the voters succumb to those seven months of blandishments and deceptions, then free America -- including all that we have known and cared for -- will sink into the abyss of a new Dark Age made more sinister, and perhaps more protracted, by the lights of perverted science.

Let the public therefore brace itself to its duties, and so concentrate its mind on the true facts, that if the American spirit of freedom and dignity last for a thousand years, men will still say, "This was the American voters' finest hour."

As I said, apologies to Winston Churchill for borrowing and abusing his immortal words on the fall of France and the beginning of the Battle of Britain.

And yet, for us, now and here is where we must battle for our freedom. Not, pray God, with bullets, but with words and ideas."
-Sunday's Socialist Triumph, by Tony Blankley

Darn right, Mr. Blankley... and Mr. Churchill, in a manner of speaking.

March 23rd

I would prefer to go back to my usual blogging style, I have lots of cute, blog appropriate fodder to use, but I'm too caught up in the politics right now.

In case it wasn't clear, I am actually not an expert on politics. (No! You gasp. Say not so!) I'm a newby and also one afraid of conflict. This makes my relationship with conservatism a rocky one. I look longingly over the fence into the liberal side and wish for their social acceptable stances, their mutually assured support systems, how everything is like an echo chamber that catches up their beliefs and values and bounces it around, from news outlets to pop culture to moral relativism, which is like everyone in a circle nodding their heads and saying gravely, "I can respect that," whatever it happens to be.

Oh, and Jon Stewart. I really envy them Jon Stewart, he's so darn likeable.

Growing up conservative was like living through something from Tolkien, where all the Elves are leaving Middle Earth, robed and lamenting, the glories of past days never to return. The country, I absorbed, was going to the dogs. Only a few of the faithful remained, to fight a losing battle against the hordes of mortal men and orcs. We were Rome, on the cusp of the Fall.

I've gone through several changes in thinking since then, naturally. There was the stage where I debated fiercely and was a total nerd. There was the stage where I pretended not to be conservative. I was a jelly fish, adapting fluidly to my environment, listening to the liberals all around me-friends all-and nodding my head, being part of the morally relativistic support circle-"I can totally respect that."

And there there's today. I quote from an article I read this morning at RealClearPolitics:

"A terrible thing happened to America on Sunday, March 21, 2010.

The country took its biggest step ever down a road diametrically opposed to its original intent of keeping the state small so that the individual can be free and great.

Therefore, in this unprecedented crisis of values, this is what needs to be done:

1. Know and teach America's core values.

We got to this point solely because over the past few generations, Americans have forgotten the values that have made America distinctive and great. Even the "Greatest Generation" failed to communicate them.

In a nutshell, they are what I call the American Trinity: "In God we trust," "Liberty" and "E Pluribus Unum." The left has successfully made war on all three -- substituting secularism for God and religion in as much of American life as possible; substituting equality (of result) for liberty; and multiculturalism is the opposite of "E Pluribus Unum."

2. Recognize that we are fighting the left, not liberals.

Conservatives and centrists are no longer fighting liberals. We are fighting the left.

Liberalism believed in American exceptionalism; the left not only does not believe in it, the left opposes it. President Obama, when asked if he believes in American exceptionalism, replied, "I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism, and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism."

Liberalism believed in creating wealth; the left is interested in redistributing it.

Liberalism believed in a strong defense. The left believes in cutting defense and a strong United Nations.

3. Democrats should be referred to as Social Democrats.

This is not meant to be cute, let alone as a slur. But calling Democrats Social Democrats is an effective way of reminding Americans that there is no longer any difference between what is now known as the Democratic Party and the Social Democratic parties of Europe. When the Democratic Party returns to its roots as a liberal, not a left-wing, party, we will happily resume calling the party by its original name. However, since no Democrat can cite a significant difference between the Democratic Party and the SD parties, there is no good reason not to use the more accurate nomenclature.

7. Acknowledge that we are in a non-violent civil war.

I write the words "civil war" with an ache in my heart. But we are in one.

Thank God this civil war is non-violent. But the fact is that the left and the rest of the country share almost no values. The American value system and the leftist value system are irreconcilable. If the left wins, America's values lose. If American values prevail, the left loses.

After Sunday's vote, for the first time in American history, one could no longer confidently believe that the American system will prevail. And if we don't fight for it, we don't deserve it."
-It's a Civil War: What We Do Now, by Dennis Prager

I love the clarity in this article. This cultural civil war is no longer between liberal and conservative, it's between the Left and the independents, conservatives and traditional liberals on the other. It's a battle for the soul of America.

I have come late to the party, I suspect many others as well. But I agree with him: if we don't fight for our country, through education, and participation, we don't deserve to keep the Republic that was handed down to us and we will most surely lose it.

I can no longer sit in the comfortable, morally relativistic seat, nodding my head and listening in. Between the Left's vision of America and my own, where I stand with the Founders of this country, there is no common ground. I can respect their passion, their own sense of patriotism, but it's either their government or my liberty.

Or, in the words of Patrick Henry, which he said on this very day in 1775. This is not the whole speach. Read the whole thing.

"No man thinks more highly than I do of the patriotism, as well as abilities, of the very worthy gentlemen who have just addressed the House. But different men often see the same subject in different lights; and, therefore, I hope that it will not be thought disrespectful to those gentlemen, if, entertaining as I do opinions of a character very opposite to theirs, I shall speak forth my sentiments freely and without reserve.

"This is no time for ceremony. The question before the House is one of awful moment to this country. For my own part I consider it as nothing less than a question of freedom or slavery; and in proportion to the magnitude of the subject ought to be the freedom of the debate. It is only in this way that we can hope to arrive at truth, and fulfill the great responsibility which we hold to God and our country. Should I keep back my opinions at such a time, through fear of giving offense, I should consider myself as guilty of treason towards my country, and of an act of disloyalty towards the majesty of heaven, which I revere above all earthly kings."

"The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave. Besides, sir, we have no election. If we were base enough to desire it, it is now too late to retire from the contest. There is no retreat but in submission and slavery!"

"Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty, or give me death!"

-Patrick Henry, March 23rd, 1775

March 22nd

I woke up today to a different America; one in which the relationship between citizen and government are profoundly different.

One of my oldest liberal friends asked on facebook where all the anger was coming from. It's just health insurance, she said. She compared this health reform bill to Social Security and Medicare, as the Democrats and the President have been doing for quite some time.

The very comparison can explain some of the anger; both Social Security and Medicare had pipartisan support and large public support by the time it passed. The only thing bipartisan about this bill is the opposition. Think about that for a moment. Democrats and Republicans both stood against it and yet it passed.

Contrast that to one of the most disturbing images I've seen in a while; the phalanx of Democrats headed by Nancy Pelosi tightly gripping a large, ceremonial hammer, a fixed grin in place, as they forced their way past ordinary Americans, who were begging them not to pass the bill, who had kneeled in the grass, who had turned out, over and over again to protest this bill and had turned out one last time. The majority of the American people stood against this bill and it passed.

If this were merely about health insurance, then of course the intensity appears out of place. Clearly this is about more than health insurance, it's about the mother of all culture wars. It highlights the difference between those Americans who still stand along with Thomas Jefferson-

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness," and those who say-

"We hold these truths as they are taught to us, that all men are created equal and should have equally, that we are endowed by our Government with certain Rights, among which are Wages, Housing and Affordable Health Insurance."

But why not have both, both unalienable rights and equal things? Because in order for the government to ensure that everyone has equal things, like afforable health insurance, they have to take from people who have and give to people who don't. By giving the government the power to bestow, we have also given it the authority to take. We have traded our liberty for things.

When Social Security and Medicare were put in place, the political landscape was very different from today. Government programs, especially in the case of SS, were a novelty. Today, they clutter the entire landscape. Government is involved in almost everything we do, it oversees almost every endeavour and takes money from us at every turn. We are reaching that point where what the Government is taking from us is overwhelming what good we can see in return.

Do I want people to have access to good care? Of course I do. Am I just fine with the fact that some people go bancrupt because they get cancer or some other disease? Of course not. I'm not a monster.

I've been thinking about this for a couple of days; why it appears so easy to be liberal. They're easy positions to take.

Who wants to save the Earth, for example? What, everybody?

What if in order to save the Earth, you'll have to pay ten to twenty percent higher energy bills? What if the science isn't settled and the Earth might be simply in a natural swing, one which dwarfs the effect humanity has on it? What if cap and trade bills have failed already in Europe and are ready made for political corruption?

But we all still want to save the Earth; we all live here.

We all want life to be fair, but what if in order for life to be made fair, we must give more of our money to the government? What if in return it means the government now sets the guidelines for what is fair, who gets what, how much health insurance, for example?

If the American people had moved away from individual responsibility and liberty and were ready and wanting a nanny government to hand out to us our portion, then there would be nothing much left to say. But much of the outrage is due to the fact that we are not ready. In fact, we are moving away from such government. I have looked at my pay checks and saw the increasing portion of hard earned money that got sucked up into the vortex of a massive, chaotic and dysfunctional government.

In fact, I have a brilliant idea. What if the government simply gave me back all my taxes? I could pay cash for any health care needs I might have. My doctor would lower the price of my health care because he doesn't have to pay a portion of what he gets to the insurance company and to the overhead it costs him to manage all that paperwork. Even more significantly, he doesn't have to raise my costs in order to make up for what he loses through Medicare reimbursements.

Everyone gets quality care at a better price and doctors gets more profit, which they can in turn invest in their business, either more learning, better technology or more staffing. I would purchase only catastrophic health insurance, it would cover only those terrible things that no one can ever believe would happen to them, but sometimes do. Accordingly, it would be affordable, because it's not covering anything else.

I'm sorry I keep going on and on about this; believe it or not I have have edited this and cut out a great deal more of my heated ramblings on the subject. I think ultimately that the Democrats have won this battle, but they have in the same stroke lost the war. To quote:

"Sure, they may get the votes to pass the Senate bill tonight, but ultimately they will be defeated. A representative democracy cannot long endure a political class that is so out of touch with the populace. In some respects, what happens tonight is almost beside the point. The politics are set. Some Democrats are deluding themselves that they can put this behind them and somehow survive in November. They are most assuredly wrong...

"...A victory for ObamaCare tonight, it will spark a public revolt that will wipe clean the progressive agenda for at least a generation. In battle, it is critically important to have clarity; to understand the fight you are in. If the Democrats pass ObamaCare tonight no one will have any doubts about the battle ahead. So, my political instincts say, “Bring it On. Let’s sort this out once and for all.”
-Obamacare: To Pass or Not to Pass, by Mike Flynn

Hell yeah.

March 20th

Today I cried while sitting in front of the TV. Some commercial played a clip of Ronald Regan saying, "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!" and the tears just poured down my face. Look what's happened to our country since then: crushing debt, vast unfunded entitlement programs, a lingering recession and a wobbling, jobless recovery, an juvenile President who has thrown honesty and honor to the side in pursuit of one of the worst bills ever to pass through Congress simply to prop up his wavering Presidency and a Congress riddled with vice, greed, lies, sexual misbehavior and that appears set on passing a bill into law without a vote, in blatant disregard to our Constitution.

I have spent the last couple of days feeling just incredible outrage. It is entirely possible to reform health care without this bill. Every time I hear a Democrat saying some version of "The debate is over, it's time to cast a vote for health care or for the American people," I want to throw something at the TV. Preferably a rotten egg.

The debate never even frickin' started. There were no market based solutions considered. There was no upfront talk about what actually causes the high price of health care, about the distinctions between health care reform and health insurance reform, or why we purchase our insurance from employers and how that impacts price and how separate states have state mandated coverage and how that impacts price.

There was no debate. There was fear mongering, there was impassioned speeches, there was number twisting, there was shifting focus from various imagined evils, first doctors and then insurance companies. There were closed door deals right out the gate, when the President himself cut a deal with Big Pharma.

It stinks. The whole thing stinks on ice. When and if this passes, for the first time the United States of America will force Americans to purchase something as a prerequisite for citizenship. How is that compatible with a Republic?

They will expand the IRS to keep up with the new amount of paperwork necessary to penalize us for not purchases insurance. There will be a vast expansion of bureaucracy, there will be years of regulation writing, there will be increased taxes, there will be endless haggling over financing, there will be waste and fraud.

I keep wanting to end this on a positive note so I can go on and talk about other things, but I just can't seem to. The only thing good I can think of is that the country is actually turning away from this progressive path. I hope that despite the addictive qualities of entitlement programs, the growing awareness of the cost both in personal liberties and in economic growth will continue to sway the American people away from this course and back to a more traditional, American way of governing.

I think that the November elections will be the first indication of this movement. Also, we are simply reaching a point where we must reform the entitlement programs or face economic ruin. There's no more leisure to push the consequences off until another day.

Sadly, the other thing I want to talk about is also annoying the crap out of me and that would be sewing. It's also probably equally boring to read about; my apologies.

So. Yesterday, after ripping out the shoulder straps a total of four times and the entire upper bodice seam twice, I gave up and called it a night. Over night I had an epiphany which allowed me to finally put together the entire bodice and shoulder straps this afternoon.

Shortly thereafter, I entered into a very confusing discussion about under stitching with Mom. Hours later and after some serious mutual googling for diagrams, light dawned over marble head and I went ahead and stitched the seams to the lining of the bodice from the inside.

Now I realize that I should have cut out the lining for the midriff pieces as well, from my dwindling supply of left over fabric scraps. Great.

I knew sewing a dress would be vastly different from sewing pillows and curtains, but seriously. It's no wonder clothes cost a lot. And Project Runway? That show now blows my mind.

March 19th

Helpful hints on learning to sew:

1. Read the instructions.

2. Re-read the instructions.

3. Sit down and really ponder those instructions.

4. Follow the instructions.

Am I having a wee bit o' trouble? Not this girl. I do feel thankful that I have a nice sharp seam ripper close to hand, since I've had to re-sew about every seam I've made. Two left bodice sides, nicely sewn? Check. Forgot to cut out the entire bodice lining? Check. Who's thankful they thoughtfully ordered a quarter yard more fabric than the pattern called for, just knowing something like this would happen? You betcha'- me.

Today, I have only to rip out the incorrectly basted shoulder straps, re-bast them and then get to work doing sewing the bodice lining together and then onto the bodice. That probably will take me the entire day.

*It is really fun though. There's just something so satisfying about working with one's hands, to produce something functional. Provided I can actually wear it when I'm done.

*The above statement has since been modified to "GAAAAAAHHHHHH!" as the entire shoulder straps placment is wrong, must be taken out, replaced and resewn.

Ok, I said I would never do this, but damn it, I'm just too curious. Who is reading me from Ashland, NH? I know my friend from Florida, I know my family in MN, and dear mystery Rochester, faithful as always. I know Concord, NH and Manchester NH and various other NH locals (Yay for representing the Granite State, people! Live free or die!), but Ashland? Whoever you are, welcome.

In other news, I've been watching this very amusing show on BBC America called You Are What You Eat. This petite little blond woman in her late fifties insults and cajoles her nutritional prisoners into drastically changing their truly horrific diets for an eight week period.

For one thing, it's given me a whole new vocabulary, ie, I went to the shop for some fruit and veg, but the taters were absolutely minging. Wanker. I couldn't eat chips or take aways anymore, but I dropped one stone! Etc.

Secondly, I love seeing the huge displays of what people ate in one week, which is used to shock the nutritional prisoner into submission. It truly is horrific looking. It makes me feel better about us Americans. Our diet is not so bad after all. We may put cheese on our fries from time to time, but across the pond they put gravy on them and call them chips. And chips they call crisps even though they're just Lays and Pringles. They also appear to be addicted to Indian take out ("take aways," as they would say.)

Then, suddenly, they are introduced to things like celery. The hostess of the show appears to be very fond of celery. The display of fruit and veg...er, vegetables is very attractive and never fails to give me a ping of guilt-when was the last time I ate an avocado or aduki beans?

Not only do I watch that show, but I then listen to "How Clean Is Your House?" (the answer to this invariably being, "It's a complete and total wreck, thank you very much") while sewing, popping into the other room to catch the scenes of breathtaking household horror that is the before of the show. The show stars these two cleaning divas with extravagant rubber gloves who putter around England in a little car looking for the most disgustingly dirty houses possible and then shaming their owners into changing their filthy habits. They also sniff stuff they should never, ever sniff.

Anyway, the combination of these shows has left me with this lingering feeling that England is comprised of binge drinkers stuffing their faces with take aways, chips and Yorkshire puddings in the midst of piles of debris, dust and dog poo. Good thing I'm fond of English literature with their delicate descriptions of the country side in spring, Edwardian social mores and quiet, contemplative Anglican vicars to balance all this out.

March 18th

Warning: Political rant up coming.

I am so disgusted. This is just going to be a straight up ranting post, one I have tried to avoid writing for quite some time, mostly because I thought with the election of Scott Brown in MA that the health care debacle was done.

Oh, but no. No, it's not. That was simply the point at which the heath care debacle began a steep descent from the stinking sausage factory of shitty bill making to previously unheard of depths, sewer depth, lawless, extreme depth. To pass the bill without an up or down vote on it? Because they don't have the votes to get it to pass?

If the Supreme Court does not strike that down immediately, I swear. If it passes, I swear to God I'm going to make a four by four feet sign and put in my yard. I can't even stand looking at my President in the face. I tried to watch the interview with Bret Baier and I couldn't watch it. I stayed in the kitchen making fruit salad and swearing at the TV every time Obama went over his tired old talking points, stammering and stormy faced because Bret kept trying to get a straight answer out of him. Good luck with that.

Today Obama's rating crossed for the first time, today more people disapprove of him than approve. Naturally, since he's full of crap.

How can this be? How can a law that remakes one sixth of the economy and redefines our entire way of life be allowed to pass without a freakin' vote?

I've never, ever had a political bumper sticker on my car. There will be one now. I've never, ever given money to a political cause. Oh, I will be now.

And I know I won't be alone. If this bill passes, there will be one of the greatest up risings the American people have ever experienced. It will sweep like a tide over the November elections, it will rise up in 2012, if there is a man of honor to be at the forefront of it.

That's the sticking point right there. Red, Blue or Purple, I don't give a crap anymore. Bart Stupak has more honor than many Republicans for sticking to his prolife stance despite the incredible amount of pressure he and his family have been suffering from. They've had to disconnect their home phone, his wife doesn't even leave the house.

Give me a man with some honor, who respects the freakin' process, the rule of law. It's there for a purpose. It's there to prevent people with extreme agendas from upsetting the balance of this country. If any politician thinks they are escaping the bullet this November by allowing the Deem and Pass procedure to move this bill into so called law, they are mistaken.

There. I feel better.

And I was having such a nice day too. It's sunny for the first time in three days and so I put into motion Operation Early Riser and it was marvelous. My neighborhood felt like a completely different place, as though I had walked into a picture. There was silvery frost still in the shadows and glistening on the grass. All that moisture caught the long falling, early morning light. Everything shone and glittered, the houses looked as through they were paper cut outs against a canvas background, the sky was Robin's egg blue and the lawns of the golf course were saturated green. From every side came bird song, from above and in the bushes, from far away and right at hand there were trilling and singing and whistling and the long, low notes of the Morning Dove.

Best of all, there were no golfers.

I have cut out all the pieces of the dress I've been working on and started last night to sew pieces together. (Basting is hand sewing that's used to tack two pieces together temporarily, I figured out.) It was momentous, that first seam. For one thing, it didn't make any sense to me, the way they were supposed to connect. However, after I went ahead and in blind faith made the seam, it fit together perfectly.

It's part of the fun of it. I can't see how it's all going to come together, but each step illuminates the next one. I don't come naturally to spatial concepts, so forcing my brain to work in that area is refreshing; there are many an "a-ha!" moment.

I'm making myself complete some housework before diving back into the sewing, so I'm off to do some Hoovering, as the Brits would say.

March 16th

I watched Intervention last night (which generally is not a good idea) but this time it just made me so thankful for every good thing in my life. When it was over, I went upstairs where my husband stated that he loved and cherished me as though I were his little Lamborghini.

It turns out that the original platoon sergeant did not go onward and upward. He is merely attending a school which takes him out of the game for a few months. Essentially, my husband and his peer are expected to jointly run the platoon.

Anyone who has had any kind of management experience will know in a heartbeat what a stupid, stupid proposition that is. It burns me, frankly. It sets them both up for failure, especially with the information flow. Also, the Army intentionally builds up the bonds between the men and their leader, so that they can form a cohesive fighting unit. But how does that work if one day their platoon sergeant is my husband and the next day it's another sergeant? It doesn't, that's how.


But that's just the way things can be in the Army. The Army will do what it thinks is expedient for the situation and everyone sucks it up. Their ability to suck it up is a mark of their manhood, I often think. A favorite pastime of my husband and his friends is to exchange horror stories as though they were scars.


When it has been very bad, Keith will sometimes tell me part of it. Naturally, being human, I feel the urge to share from my wealth of wisdom and dispense advice. I quell this impulse immediately and absolutely.

The fact of the matter is, I have no idea, my perspective from the civilian world doesn't match up at all. A million times I would have given him the wrong advise. I just keep my mouth shut and listen. I get lots of compliments for doing this, which makes it worth while. I mean, it's not easy to restrain myself from giving advice, since I personally know all. grin.

I have unwrapped the dress pattern and I have just a few questions. What the hell is basting? What's a nap? How on earth did I think I could possibly do this? It is insanely complicated and the pattern was markedly as Easy Stitch 'n Save. Easy my ass.

I did, however, wash and dry the fabric, so I feel all professional. I guess there is nothing for it but to jump in and try. I've already given this dress up as a learning experience, I planned all along to make two, the first a monstrous Frankenstein of a dress attempt and the second an actual piece of clothing.

March 15th

Sometimes I feel stretched thin by the rate of my healing. I cracked open the rotten egg and now, as fast as I sop up the putrid stuff that pours out, more comes. I really am in the thick of it, this is what happens during the healing process. I wasn't sure what was coming, as you may remember from prior posts, I just knew something was. It surely has arrived.

Yesterday I had a whole blinding series of revelations on the way up into Indiana. Sometimes I would turn to Keith and say something, or just catch his eye so he wouldn't be alarmed by the otherwise intense silence beside him.

My mother had a dream last night; she dreamed that she and I were hunting monsters. We were in a dormitory in the night, amid rows of sleeping children. From somewhere in the dark we heard a bone chilling growl.

We knew a living monster was near at hand and we were terrified. But despite the terror, we went down the rows of children, throwing back the sheets to look. In the very last bed was a very small child and when we threw back the sheet, there was a monster writhing on the bed and sheer horror of it woke my mom up.

And that is exactly what I am doing. Despite the bone shaking terror, I am throwing back the sheets to find the monster. Because I have the courage to do this, my own children will be free from even his shadow. My mother could not help but pass on the bad beliefs her abuse had taught her, but now she and I will break the pattern of shame and fear. It won't be carried on to the next generation.

In the meantime, normal life goes on as well. I have made a coleslaw and am in the pursuit of a good chicken wing recipe. I bought a dress pattern, celadon green cotton and thread, a zipper and hooks and eyes. So I am ready to tackle the next step in my sewing hobby.

Operation Early Riser so far has been a no go, but mostly because it was the weekend and this morning it was dark and gloomy and I lost an hour of sleep due to the time change. Maybe tomorrow it will be sunny.

March 12th

This morning I awoke to find that The Fog had descended. I can't remember ever seeing fog in CO, so I had forgotten the impact of seeing tree tops across the road eaten away by the dense, swirling stuff.

I'm having the usual trouble transitioning from intense blogging to regular blogging. Talking about the weather is always a good start.

Oh, hey, speaking of a good start, I got a pay as you go phone recently and while I was waiting for it to be authorized, the store clerks and I were standing around in an increasingly awkward silence. Normally I tune this out and stand there like stone, immovable. This time around I thought, hey, why not just try something for the fun of it?

So I said, "So it looks like rain..." and immediately the two clerks leaped into conversation with me like race horses bursting out the gate. Apparently, many people are like me in that they wish to be sociable, but are waiting for the other person to make the first move and it doesn't matter how mundane the first move is.

I also figured out if dogs were allowed on the golf course or not. I've been increasingly desperate after a serious of unfortunate walks on the roads alone. These walks included such entertaining occurrences as: Meeting The Neighbors, Death By Dog Leash and the Dead Squirrel Incident.

None of the roads connect to any other, so walking on them is nothing less than walking up and down a bunch of dead ends. At one point Lynn jumped up on me, as if in doggy intervention, as we turned away from the tempting golf course yet again, do it its being inhabited.

"Why, mommy? Why?" I was sure she was asking, her eyes searching mine.

When we reached the golf course yesterday there were no golf carts stopped on the slopping hills, no men at their leisure roaming about. I thought maybe I could make a break for it on one little path, so I could make at least a lopsided loop back home.

We were nearly in the clear when an older guy on a golf cart caught us out. My heart sank. I knew I couldn't live in the suspense any longer. I didn't want to be yelled at by irate retirees, even though this one had only waved at me.

There was a housing associate truck parked on the side of the road and I walked over to it. As it happened the old guy in the cart was there as well, maybe to point me out as a flagrant Golf Course Rule Abuser. Nevertheless, I went up to the truck and hailed them.

"My landlord has said I could walk my dogs on the golf course, but I never see anyone else doing this," I confessed. "It is really OK to walk the dogs on the golf course?"

"No!" quipped the old dude, immediately.

"I can't tell you that you can't," clarified the Golf Authority, a young man in a maroon polo shirt, the housing association badge sewn on.

What it boiled down to was they couldn't stop me, but nobody would like it and people might hit me with golf balls. OK, I exaggerate. But he did keep going on about the risk of getting hit with one, which made me wonder if he was hinting at something.

He did recommend that I walk during the early morning hours and impressed upon me the need to always clean up after my dogs. I showed him the plastic bags protruding from my jean pocket.

So, now I know. I'm going to try and go for the walk as soon as I wake up, before even taking a shower. I think this is going to work out for the best anyway, since it's already hot enough in March to feel like summer to me. I can't even imagine what it's going to feel like in June. Deathly, I imagine.

I'll let you know how Operation Early Riser works out. In the meantime, today Keith is bringing some of his men to the house to grill out T-Bones and chill. This will be the first time I've met any of them. Keith has been officially the Platoon Sergeant now for about a week; the guy he was shadowing has moved onward and upward. It's kept Keith quite busy. Last night, he was twitching in his sleep and kept hitting my pillow, causing me to wake with a start. So I shook him awake and asked him to roll over.

"I told you where those forms were!" he cried in frustrated response. "Do I have to do everything for you guys? Go down to the S.O.S. building and bring up the A-90 forms like I told you to do."

Poor guy, even sleep is no break from work! (By the way, there is no such building or forms and when this morning I told Keith what he had said, he laughed out loud. Funny for him! I had to keep pleading with him several more minutes before he finally rolled over in a huff.)

March 10th

My hunny is upstairs in bed, sleeping after CQ duty. I do so love to have the husband in house.

I love his wide, solid chest and his jutting chin and his going to the mailbox each time he gets home and the way he wanders down the driveway, sorting through it as he gets to the door, the red dirt all over his boots and ACUs.

I feel like I've lived so many different lives. I wonder if this is what's like to get older. Mostly I don't remember, but then I'll get this vivid sliver of a way I used to live, a view from a window that's strange to me now or the smell of the coffee I used to always drink on my days off, back when I was a manager and rented a small apartment in western Denver with a room mate. Did I do that? Was that me?

I did do that. And I used to take a much younger Lynn for walks around the suburban paradise that is Highland's Ranch, CO and wonder at the sea of roof tops stretching out for miles around me in the hot sun of a late afternoon, and the glass towers of the Tech Center in the distance. All those people all living so close together and yet it was so quiet I could hear the wind in the grass of the park.

I had a huge breakthrough internally last week. It was no accident that I had a recurrence of post memory symptoms right around the time I've been actively trying to get pregnant, no accident at all. In fact, I think my anxiety actually caused the irregularity of my periods. It threatened the last internal stronghold that my abuser held over me.

Abuse is about power as much as it is about gratification of desires. It is about the power to crush and dominate. I thought I had walked out from under that, and I had. But there was one piece remaining, buried so deeply it felt like memories waking up. But it wasn't memories, it was a self conception, a piece of myself that had felt the imprint of the abuser so heavily and without recourse that the rest of myself had quarantined it as though it were a repressed memory.

All my life I've quarantined it. Only in the last few years did it come up from time to time and each time I savagely thrust it back down into the dark. But the active pursuit of pregnancy made it impossible to go away and so it set off this horrible internal chaos. I had to face it.

I can't over express the kind of courage it takes to face down the internal dark. The body and spirit repress memories because they know that keeping those memories out will cause horrible, crippling damage. Therefore, releasing them or even going anywhere near them can feel life threatening.

But experience taught me that once released into the light, the thing loses its power. That's what EMDR does. It takes the person back to the moment and they relive it, but without completely losing the present. They learn to reframe that moment in the light of who they are now.

And that's what I had to do with this piece of myself. I had to release it from the oppressive dark. In doing so, I released a flood of shame, horror and guilt; all those feelings that are intimately associated with being sexual used. But again I have had experience with that, and was able to allow those emotions to pass right through, to not hold on to them and above all, to not fall into the trap of giving them any powers of self definition.

This is hard to do, it takes a lot of practise and outside encouragement at first. It's what I meant when I said that my mom and I had commanded the pain. I had to have this internal conversation over and over again, as the emotions welled up and then dissolved again.

And through it all I experienced the most incredible healing. A great rush of warm, strong maternal feeling welled up in me, so sweetly and naturally and until then, unknown to me. I opened my arms to it; I felt an almost physical pain at my own longing to give birth to a child, to nurse them, to cuddle and nurture and love that child. For the first time, I experienced confidence in my own mothering instincts. I would not be stiff and withdrawn or full of shame.

This is an organic process, so the healing grows each day but that moment was a major turning point for me. It is a triumph of the power of life; over evil, over damage. It makes me think of this verse:

"The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy.

I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly."
-John 10:10

March 9th

I have a window open! It's the only one with a screen, otherwise I'd have many open. Unfortunately, now the girls can hear the neighbor's dog and they have been engaging in doggy turf wars ever since; I'm guessing the rules are whoever barks the loudest and most continuously wins.

This is the fourth day of sunshine in a row. I almost don't know what to do with myself. It feels like summer; the sun was hot on my back at nine thirty this morning when us girls went out for our walk of poop-o-rific places.

Unfortunately this good weather has brought out the golfers! I had completely forgotten that the golf course was actually a public place for the enjoyment of a sport. It felt more like my own private park where I could imagine I was a figure of great romantic possibility, out in the wind and snow on the open fields with my elegant dogs.

Enter reality: I am an interloper with two poop producing, poorly behaved dogs who are entirely capable of dragging me across the green in pursuit of a squirrel, no matter who might be teeing up at the moment. Picture me teetering off balance with the leashes of two large maniacal dogs in one hand, a plastic bag in the other, in a very unflattering pose and yelling while all around me small white balls fly. Maybe it'll still be quiet on week day mornings. I'm hoping so, because my dogs and the sport of golf just do not mix.

Keith had a day off yesterday, the first one in a while. It was so needed. When he came home, the sky was still light, the sun still shining. It was mild enough that we would sit out on the deck while the burgers grilled and watch the sun sink down between the trees. There were hawks circling against the deep blue sky.

The next day we made hash browns and south western omelets and then helped our old friends from CO move on post. They had rented a house, but their utility bill was astronomical, close to five hundred dollars. Yeah. So they were pushed to the top of the waiting list.

I remember when Keith and I were first together how uncomfortable I was around the couple, nervous and awkward. Now they feel almost like family. I'm down right fond of them.

We followed them on post, taking this lovely, winding back road through some real, down home Kentucky landscape. We passed church after little church, many with the congregation still grouped around the steps or the cars, chatting in the sun, holding Styrofoam cups of coffee and wearing suit coats or dresses that billowed a little in the wind.

I didn't realize how much housing there was on post. I understand how people could live the bulk of their entire lives in there. The neighborhood was quiet and peaceful looking, the house was a one floor duplex, with lots of windows and doors and big rooms. It was nice; it made me think of a 1950's house, it had that kind of simple charm.

And then I came home and washed my cell phone with my jeans. It didn't survive. Also, our renter tried to set up an allotment with her pay and it didn't go through at first and therefore did not get sent to the property manager and from thence onto us.

The first of the month pays the mortgage and the rent on this house, so the rent we get from her is what we live on until the fifteenth. I tell you what; it made Keith and I both incredibly grateful once more that we found a renter for our CO house.

Well, I guess I should go see if the golf course is free.

March 6th

Well, the verdict is in...I'm officially a crazy person.

Just kidding! Though I did try and make coffee this morning without adding any water, so...

There's something so anxious making about sitting in a therapists waiting room. What guilty secrets will be pried from one's dark little soul in the next few minutes? I sat with my purse in my lap, reading all the inspirational posters that liberally bedecked the walls.

"Success!" announced one. "What's behind your anger?" darkly questioned another.

I could hear a garble of indistinct voices from one room, only half hidden by a small noise maker. It sounded intense, whatever was happening. Eventually the door burst open and three people tumbled out. With a jab of sheer terror I recognized my soon to be therapist: she was horribly young, very direct and intense.

No way, I said to myself. No way in hell is that going to be my therapist. I prefer the round, motherly types. That's exactly the type I had before. Ah, Denise, my old therepist! With her cups of tea, plush, deathly quiet office and warmly curling auburn hair.

But there was no escape.

The first therapy session is all about getting to know you and all the wonderful things that went in to making you you. This can be completely exhausting and time consumming. Every time I recount my colorful past I wonder briefly how I survived. Even the therapists, who have heard it all and then some, get wide eyed as I go from episode to episode.

"Gird your loins," they write on their pad, or their own particular version of the sentiment.

I should be more serious for a moment though and say that others really have had it much, much worst than I. Some people's abusers were their own parents. Every time I think of these people and the strength it must take to heal from that, it shakes me to the core. I, on the other hand and due to the grace of God, have parents who are my strongests and most intuitive supports in the healing process.

During the getting to know you process, I got to know my therapist as well. She is exactly my own age, married and trying to get pregnant. She's down to earth, accepting and positive and I like her. I like the idea of working with a therapist without the authority figure element.

Unfortunately, she's never used the internal family systems model of therapy. I used this model almost exclusively with my other therapist and with great success. Also, she isn't qualified to use EMDR, which is an excellent mode of dealing with trauma memories. She's mostly focused on behavioral therapy. These are some fairly large draw backs.

On the other hand, I'm not in the same place that I was three or so years ago. I may or may not need EMDR, since I have no idea at this point if I'll be triggering any memories. If so, she said she would refer me to someone who specialized in this technique. It would be strange, I think, to jump from one therapist to another at that point in the therapy. Usually it's very intense and takes a few weeks of preparation before starting EMDR. So it might be awkward and counterproductive. Or it could work, or I might not even need it. Hard to say.

Still, I left the office with that familiar combination of incredible relief and that particular light headed exhaustion that comes from not eating and digging around in the past. Right off the bat, she knew and empathized with exactly my fears and emotions around pregnant and motherhood; her matter of fact acceptance and assertion that almost everyone with an abuse history has similar struggles was so liberating. That alone was worth going for.

So I guess I'll stick with her and use a more goal focused behavior model of therapy and see where it goes. She said she will read up on the IFS model. Since that particular model is self led and because I'm experienced in using it, it's possible that all she would need to do is have the general knowledge enough to guide me when I get stuck and stay clear when I'm going full steam. If anything changes, or if memories are triggered, we can reevaluate. All in all, I feel pretty good about the whole thing.

March 4th

I'm in love with life this morning. It must be the sun.

The housing association decided this morning to send a guy around with leaflets asking people to rate the association restaurant. His visit to our house timed exactly with the moment I was standing on the other side of the front door, with the girls, talking the most ridiculously embarrassing dog talk to them. And not quietly either. After all, I didn't think there would be a random dude on the other side of the door.

"Are we gonna go potty? Is that what we do in the morning, Wooby-do? Wooby doing! We girls are gonna go potty! Potty in the morning!"

Suddenly, into this gush of high pitched warbling there came a rustle of papers thrust into the side of the door jam and the girls broke out into frantic barking. I was a little stunned at first. Could there be someone on the other side of the door? What just happened? I looked out the window and yes, there was.

He gave me a weird look as he backed rapidly up away from our house, going for the safety of his car. I gave him a little lopsided wave, as though to reassure him that I wasn't completely batty, just a nice little housewife who hadn't had her coffee yet.

I don't think he was reassured. And us girls did go potty in the morning, because that's what we do, right doggy woos? Who needs to talk to someone other than canines all day long?

Not me.

My therapy appointment is tomorrow and I don't want to go. I feel fine, thank you. Actually, I do feel worlds better than I did a month ago, when I made the appointment. But resistance to therapy is a well documented and perfectly natural phenomenon and darn it, I'm going. Anyway, it's just an introductory session. Nothing scary.

As you can see, I've decided to blog about this. I've thought about whether or not to for the last few weeks, on and off. It's risky. People might think I'm crazy. I'll certainly be making myself much more vulnerable this way.

On the other hand, blogging creates this incredible sense of clarity, that sense of altitude that my father was talking about. And I feel I'm an old pro at the making public of private thoughts in this forum. Lastly, I feel like going to therapy has this kind of stigma about it. Only crazy people go, or people badly broken. It's a sign of crisis.

That can be true, actually. People rarely go to get help until something tips them over the boiling point, until they just can't take the status quo anymore. That's what happened to me the first time. The unknown is always frightening and there's the very real possibility that therapy will make things worse before they get better.

But for all that, it can be so incredibly helpful, life altering in fact, to go. Therapists are nothing more or less than an ally in a very human struggle. The relief at the end of the tunnel is dazzling.

So I'm going to write about this whole process this time around. Maybe not the whole process. I suspect there will be things I won't ever blog about. Most of it I will.

Speaking of blogging and altitude, I've felt this sense of true peace regarding children lately. Whenever a sense of anxiety (because it's out of my direct control) or a sense of time passing hits me, I pray for God to take care of my children, born or unborn, until the time comes when I can hold them. This settles my soul right down.

Other things I love this morning:

Fat free coffee house inspired creamer.

My husband wearing a loaded pistol strapped to his thigh when on duty. (I admit, I'm a blood thirsty little heathen.)

Sunshine.

The fact that the birds of Kentucky seem to be convinced that it's the middle of June and not March. If this is what it sounds like now, I can't wait for later. I won't need an alarm clock.

Not having to wear a coat outside.

Colorado. I'm not there anymore, but I love it still. One of the bloggers I follow PCS-ed there and sometimes blogs about how wonderful it is and recently put a pictures of herself up, standing in what I think is the Garden of the Gods. Ah, Colorado! How I miss thee!

And now it's time for us girly-woos to take their walkie-poo. Wooby doing!

March 1st

I use commas too much. That's what comes of my re reading old posts, a thing I should not do because I end up squirming with discomfort at the many errors held therein.

Keith is much better and off at work this morning, probably for the entire day. Fortunately, the worst thing that happened to him is that they signed him up to teach a class to the entire platoon without informing him. Hello, Monday morning!

If anyone has ever wondered, in a passing thought kind of way, how salsa might taste cooked, I have found out. The answer is pretty darn good.

You might be wondering, Why would I cook perfectly good salsa? Well, I'll tell you. It all happened because I tried to make salsa from scratch, using cans.

I know, I know. But there are recipes for it, on allrecipes.com and the reviews weren't horrific, in fact, people seemed to like it. And as it happened, I had mistakenly bought two cans of Rotell diced tomatoes with lime and cilantro, instead of with chili peppers.

Figuring I would have to use them sometime, I thought, what better use for Rotell diced tomatoes with lime and cilantro than in a salsa? I'll bet that's what they were made for. In they went, with another spare can of Mexican spiced stewed tomatoes that I had chopped up, chopped onion, a can of black beans, a half can of corn, garlic, dried cilantro and some cider vinegar and salt.

If you're thinking that's disgusting, you're right. It totally was. And it made a dauntingly large amount. I poured the slop into a storage container and put it on the bottom shelf of the refrigerator, where I could conveniently forget about it until it became chemically altered, at which point in time throwing it away would become an upstanding, housewifely chore, instead of a waste of food.

Until last night, when Keith declared he would like some chili and it occurred to me that there really is very little difference in substance between that and salsa. Both have tomatoes, onions, garlic, and beans. Cook, add ground beef and voila, I would have transformed salsa slop into gourmet chili and earned myself a little halo of excellence in housewifery along the way.

When I explained the plan to Keith, his reaction was a tad discouraging.

"When you tell a man he's going to the dealership to buy the Corvette of his dreams, you don't get there and tell him he's gettin' a Ford Focus, woman!" he declared, horrified.

I remained undeterred, merely assuring him that if he didn't like it I would make the regular chili. This provided me with even more incentive to more forward with my program of food redemption.

Step one: pour slop into pot on medium heat.

Step two: thaw a pound and a half of good ground beef.

Step three: pray to God you are not going to now waste an entire pound and a half of good beef on bad salsa.

Step four: pour a lot of sugar in to cut down on the horrible vinegar fumes emanating from the heated salsa slop.

Step five: add in the cooked, drained ground beef, the rest of the can of corn which has remained unused in the fridge and might as well get thrown in, why the heck not? It also was going to be wasted anyway, I mean, who eats a half can's worth of corn? Why do I save this stuff? Why can't I just own up to the sorry truth of food waste and throw it away before it goes bad?

Step six: stir, take deep breath...

And voila! I had made a chili with a surprisingly complex, sweet and sour flavor with a hint of lime that complimented the richness of the beef. Keith ate several bowls of it, with ketchup. But then he eats everything with ketchup.

So now, I'm trying to think of a title for this culinary masterpiece. Salsa Chili? Cilantro Chili with Yellow Corn and Lime? Sweet and Sour Black Beans?

Whatever. I earned my halo.