for so many, the beginning of prayers answered

looking up, originally uploaded by McBeth.

The V is for vote

winds of change, originally uploaded by McBeth.

It might not hurt to take advantage of early voting by stopping by your local place where voting can be done (for me, it was the local town municipal building) and just get it done without lines, and in peace.

Knowing I took care of the important-est business I can now either pay attention or not for the next week.

Please vote.

they did it with bras, we can do it with bills

kd and mom, originally uploaded by McBeth.

Mom spent the better part (or worse, depending on how you want to fill that particular glass) of this past summer either in hospital or in rehab center following a full knee replacement and a (hello St. Mary's Hospital? Yeah, this one is for you...) a seriously ugly major medical error in having given mom meds that she was known to be allergic to, as in meds listed on the charts as big hairy no-nos. As in, meds the intake nurse and the anesthesiologist and the other nurse and those other people all talked with her about, both pre- and post-surgery. Each person who went over her chart with her talked about medication allergies and this particular one came up repeatedly in discussions. I was sitting there, people. She might not have remembered much through that month but I kept a handy little notebook into which I jotted down the particulars, including the name of the doctor who authorized the panic. Just for fun I think it'd be a hoot to have the individual who made that landslide decision and all the short-tempered staff we had to deal with following the breakdown be fed enough of whatever pills could induce psychosis so they also are able share in the heartfelt experience, the joy of being even more unwell and in way less manageable ways. Please don't misunderstand, there were some very very kind and patient staffers, particularly nurses, who provided care for mom and who took the phone calls from her children, and the repeated questions and the follow-ups and the follow-up follow-ups. I would like to thank you few for the work you do. You are underpaid and vastly under appreciated, and I want you to know I saw the support you offered my mother and my family is grateful to you.

I've heard that people can die by hospital error and frequently do, while hospitals still don't have to assume responsibility for making a person be dead. In fact, 18 patient safety indicators evaluated contributed to $9.3 billion excess charges and 32,591 deaths in the United States annually.

I think that sucks. Yes of course it's true that users and malingerers exist, people who want to swing from someone else's coin purse. But I just want to say here to the collective staff -and specifically, to the billing department, who probably only ever handles the credits and debits- at St. Mary's Hospital in Madison Wisconsin, who has been sending bills, including charges for the week of care they provided to my mother after they had to re-admit mom from a rehab center when she took that drastic allergic reaction downturn: My mother isn't one of those malingerers. She was merely trying to get healthier while in your care, and you broke her. After the insurance payments shake out she may have some out of pocket expenses for her first few days there, but as for the time and charges for the time following that mistake you made? You can eat that one.

She came out alive. You were lucky.

All this is to say, my mom is smiling and walking and is much more mobile with her new bionic knee. Not everything is easy to do yet, but not everything was ever easy to do. She's healthier, fitter, and looking sassy here on my brother's wedding day.

buttercups

snowdrops, originally uploaded by McBeth.

Pea gravel pellets
slap their open fists at the top of my head,
It’s impossible to do anything
but shiver life back into wet skin, I admit.

Five degrees’ warmth can
make all the difference in
today’s squalling
sodden wind.

Given conditions, I decide,
you would have to agree.

The brighter times,
when the swelling undertow of
buttercups drifted us toward one another,
to shake the apples
from the tree.
“They’re meant to be eaten”, you grinned.
There’s no harm in trying. Do you remember it?

That was a remarkable time,
Just before you bought me
the trip of a lifetime, that shiny
one-way ticket to the valley
beyond Coventry,
where it rains and rains
between fine moments.

When pressed, you’d admitted
your confliction,
spare though it was.
Disease ate at you
Like a plump caterpillar gorging,
wanting more and more after the
first lush taste on your tongue
of the underside of green.

Before the idea of you
and we dissolved like sand,
parenthetically between
the edges of my cupped hands
I leaned in to brush my lips against
the warmth of your cheek.

In this interminable downpour I surrender,
walking searching circles,
stepping a little closer to out there.
With each breath, each backward glance,
each prickling memory, scanning
for directions I seem unable to make
lead agreeably away,
toward anywhere.

None of the signs lead me away from you,
nor to, but I have an umbrella.
I will be fine.
If you’re ever able to find the field again,
bring me to the apple tree
dormant with her grief,
a bouquet of buttercups and daisies at her feet.
I will forgive you.

hearing things

creepy crawlies, originally uploaded by McBeth.

I have heard there are troubles of more than one kind. Some come from ahead and some come from behind. But I've bought a big bat. I'm all ready you see. Now my troubles are going to have troubles with me!

-- Dr. Seuss

inspection collection

leaf collection, originally uploaded by McBeth.

Nature will bear the closest inspection. She invites us to lay our eye level with her smallest leaf, and take an insect view of its plain.

-- Henry David Thoreau

our task is to embrace

where we go from here, originally uploaded by McBeth.

A human being is part of a whole, called by us the Universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings, as something separated from the rest a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circles of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.

-- Albert Einstein

don't skimp

whatsit, originally uploaded by McBeth.

Never neglect the little things. Never skimp on that extra effort, that additional few minutes, that soft word of praise or thanks, that delivery of the very best that you can do. It does not matter what others think, it is of prime importance, however, what you think about you. You can never do your best, which should always be your trademark, if you are cutting corners and shirking responsibilities. You are special. Act it. Never neglect the little things.

-- Og Mandino

barging my way through

twostep, originally uploaded by McBeth.

A ship is safe in harbor, but that's not what ships are for.

-- William Shedd

seeing things

north was not indicated on the map, originally uploaded by McBeth.

The distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion.

-- Albert Einstein

7. 14. 25. 5.

sunset in burnished gold, originally uploaded by McBeth.

When I'm worried or tired or sad or melty or feeling vulnerable I can sit still for hours, moving only my index finger to the 'refresh' button for inconsequential split-second updates on the number of individual image views of four consecutive pictures on my Flickr photostream. This can go on like that, with me unmoved, in that spot, for hours.

You would think there would be some ultimate reward for the devotional steadfast unmovingness, some personal satisfaction or reward, but if you did think that you would be wrong. The numbers stay the same. The numbers always stay the same. For hours and hours they will remain, unmoved,


Seven.
Fourteen.
Twenty five.
Five.

click.
click.
click.
click.

walk this way

you can fly, originally uploaded by McBeth.

There are no shortcuts to any place worth going.

-- Beverly Sills

cow magnetism

three cows, originally uploaded by McBeth.

I'm sure there must be all kinds of studies done on cows because, well, there are an awful lot of cows grazing around the globe right now so it'd make sense that if something exists somewhere, someone will start picking it apart to figure it out, including cows. But the one that recently caught my attention and a good deal of my chin stroking rumination time recently is this one. Someone wanted to know if cows responded to the Earth's magnetic North<-->South pull. So they found a way to start counting heads, researched it, and were pleased to announce that yes indeed, cows gravitate to the magnetic north.

We marked the cattle’s longitudinal axis by drawing a straight line with the Powerpoint drawing tools and estimated for each animal separately its direction to the nearest 5° by overlaying a circular scale with 10° steps.

I find this news not only fascinating, but deeply gratifying. All these years I've noticed this phenomena -and in southern Wisconsin there is ample opportunity for cow watching. I figured I was making too much out of it, or that I just kept seeing random occurrences and making up associations to suit myself. I do like making things up into far more fanciful compounds than they really need be. If I didn't, though, I'd get terrifically bored. But as it turns out this time I wasn't making anything up after all!

I'd love to see the extrapolated research on cow magnetism.

For instance, would it make sense, then, that if cows gravitate to magnetic North we could assume the cows would feel most natural, most comfortable pointed that direction? And if that's true, then would construction of the barns and milking houses based on the magnetic directional pull, specifically during those times the cows are standing to be milked or are eating, cause any difference in the milk production and the general contentment of the herd?

My mother tells me a story about old farming relatives, or it might possibly be farmer friends of my farming relatives. The specific 'who' is less important than the action, though, so lets agree not to pick nits about that one thing. The men of the family had to do something, go somewhere, be away from the farm for a few days, so the women of the family took over the outdoor chores, including milking the cows. The women sang while they worked, which the cows apparently loved, because their milk production increased several fold. There's another local guy, loveable salt of the earth musician farmer guy, who performs violin concerts for his cows. The cows have not written one bad review yet.

I'm not sure I can write a coherent explanation to express my impression, but might this magnetic pull on cows research might also support the argument for string theory and quantum physics? If this magnetic property exists in cows, then what other animals are similarly affected, and why does it happen? If it is true of humans then what might be the manifestations of a magnetic pull on us?

Next cow research I'll be scoping out will be evidence to support my theory that in every herd there will always be one cow evacuating its bladder or bowels when you pass by them at 55mph.

great and small

backseat driver, originally uploaded by McBeth.

Whatever I have tried to do in life, I have tried with all my heart to do it well; whatever I have devoted myself to, I have devoted myself completely; in great aims and in small I have always thoroughly been in earnest.

-- Charles Dickens

it could happen

oh please oh please, originally uploaded by McBeth.

You will never stub your toe standing still. The faster you go, the more chance there is of stubbing your toe, but the more chance you have of getting somewhere.

-- Charles F. Kettering

start creating

I'm melting, mellllting, originally uploaded by McBeth.

Begin doing what you want to do now. We are not living in eternity. We have only this moment, sparkling like a star in our hand-and melting like a snowflake...

-Francis Bacon

picture it

stand with your sisters, originally uploaded by McBeth.

An attempt at visualizing the Fourth Dimension: Take a point, stretch it into a line, curl it into a circle, twist it into a sphere, and punch through the sphere.

-- Albert Einstein

refinement

gilt, originally uploaded by McBeth.

I'd like to live as a poor man with lots of money.

-- Pablo Picasso

either you got it or you don't

queen of the fire ring, originally uploaded by McBeth.

I was always looking outside myself for strength and confidence but it comes from within. It is there all the time.


-- Anna Freud

hold them close

dana and scarlett, originally uploaded by McBeth.

A mother is the truest friend we have, when trials heavy and sudden, fall upon us; when adversity takes the place of prosperity; when friends who rejoice with us in our sunshine desert us; when trouble thickens around us, still will she cling to us, and endeavor by her kind precepts and counsels to dissipate the clouds of darkness, and cause peace to return to our hearts.

-- Washington Irving