One Woman's War

A single mom who is an Army cook may face criminal charges after refusing to deploy to Afghanistan because she has no one to care for her infant son while she serves a year overseas. The Army requires all single-parent soldiers to submit a care plan for dependent children before they deploy to a combat zone, and Spc. Alexis Hutchinson had arranged for her mother to mind her 10-month old son, but that plan fell through at the last minute. Her mother kept the child, Kamani, for two weeks but felt overwhelmed as she already cares for three other relatives with health problems and also runs a day care center for 14 children in her home. She returned him to his mother a few days before her scheduled deployment. Hutchinson, who is no longer in a relationship with the child's father, was ordered to deploy on schedule even though she told her commanders that she needed more time to find another family member or close friend to help her mother care for her son.

She claims that her superior told her she would have to place the child in foster care and deploy anyway. The young mother was afraid that if she showed up at the deployment terminal, she would be sent to Afghanistan and her son placed with Child Protective Services, so she went AWOL. She was arrested by military police for skipping her unit's flight and briefly jailed while her son was placed in custody on the Army post until her mother could pick him up and take him to her home in California.

Specialist Hutchinson remains confined to the boundaries of Hunter Army Airfield in Savannah, Georgia. A spokesman for the airfield said that he didn't know what she was told by her commanders, but that the Army would not deploy a single parent who had nobody to care for his or her child. If true, then her superior is a shockingly heartless person who has no business supervising others. Jailing a mother for refusing to abandon her child represents cruel and unusual punishment and should not be tolerated.

While our armed forces fight for our country and its lofty ideals, it is important to remember that every country is made up of individuals whose rights must be upheld or the entire system fails. A nation's people are the nation. Military law says that soldiers must go where they are sent, which becomes the old question of the law versus the letter of the law: Do we uphold a law exactly as it is written without regard for its meaning, or do we try to determine what the law was meant to accomplish? When we obey the letter of the law but not its spirit, we are obeying the literal interpretation of the words while betraying the intent of those who wrote it, and those who live under it.

It is meaningless for a soldier to fight for freedom when her own child is denied the basic right to be cared for by a person who loves him.

The Mother Ship Has Landed

Tossing orange peels, coffee grounds and grease-stained pizza boxes in the trash is now against the law in San Francisco, and could lead to a fine.

The nation's most comprehensive mandatory composting and recycling law was put into effect last week. It requires all businesses, restaurants, and residences including apartment buildings to separate their garbage into three separate color-coded bins: blue for recycling, green for compost and black for trash. The purpose is to cut greenhouse gas emissions and send nothing to landfills or incinerators by 2020. Food scraps, plant clippings and other organic materials that go into landfills take up costly space and decompose to form methane, a greenhouse gas 20 times more potent than carbon dioxide. Seattle passed a law in 2003 requiring people to have a compost bin but, unlike San Francisco, it did not mandate that all food waste go in there.

Those who fail to properly sort their refuse will receive warnings which, if unheeded, will result in fines: $100 for individual residences and small businesses which generate less than a cubic yard of refuse per week, and $500 for larger businesses. I wonder who will be assigned the task of going through people's garbage to ensure that it is properly sorted. Maybe the Meter Nazis Parking Police could pursue second careers as trash investigators.

A June 2008 report by the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, a group focused on environmentally sound community development, said a zero waste approach is one of the fastest, cheapest and most effective ways to protect the climate. Garbage trucks take food scraps to the Organics Annex which is already processing about half of the city's food waste, more than 500 tons per day. The compost is then sold to Bay Area farms and vineyards.

"We hear a lot about climate change, and what we can do and should do, and what's happening in Congress," said Jared Blumenfeld, City Environmental Officer. "But people want to know what they can, practically, do every single day, and composting your food scraps is probably the single most effective thing you can do as a citizen in the United States today."

We have duly been issued our very own little composting bin which is a bit like a house pet because it's small, hungry, and hangs around the kitchen, although I haven't named it yet. The mother ship sits outside, waiting for all her babies to come home.

Die, Facebook, DIE

Have I mentioned lately how much I hate Facebook? None of the buttons works. For weeks I have been unable to accept a friend request from my cousin, whom I adore, or to send one to her or anyone else. I have tried repeatedly to block a couple of people I do NOT adore and FB keeps deleting what I type and stating that I have not blocked anyone. I am not even able to access my own friends list. Plus, my page has been taken over by someone with the same last name who is not a relative, and who seems to be obsessed with a Mafia Wars game which does not interest me in the least. So then people who are his friends, presumably, but whom I do not know comment to his progress in the game and my page does not feel like mine at all. He's a nice guy, but I feel as if I'm hosting a video game convention, and I am a pinball person. (Tilting is everything.)

I have thought the whole concept of Facebook was puerile, stupid and shallow from the start, but several people urged me to give it another chance. So I tried to get help, and after typing in "Other" twice to convey that my problem was not covered in their list of possible issues, I got a box where I could write what my problem was, which I did. Then I tried to deactivate my account, but even this didn't work because they kept telling me to type a security code which never loaded. Evidently, I'm a lifer. Facebook is like the Crips, the Bloods, or Ikea. Once you get in, you can never get out. Please send in the rescue dogs, an airlift patrol, a SWAT team, several sherpas and John Wayne. If none of this is possible, I would appreciate chocolate.

Everyone Wants My Body

Do I look like a goner to you? Today's mail brought an invitation to a cremation-- my own -- because "Death is what makes our lives so precious, exquisite and magnificent."

Oh.

I'm glad we cleared that up. I hadn't quite made the connection and tended to attribute all that precious, exquisite magnificence to life itself. I feel so stupid now.

"We offer basic cremation services because our clients are smart .... smart enough to know how best to choose a plan that fits their own agenda." Actually, my agenda does not include dying. I really want to know how everything turns out, so I believe that I will be best served by being here forever. That's basically a no-brainer.

Smart Cremation even has the nerve to quote Winston Churchill, although I doubt that esteemed gentleman was referring to funeral planning when he spoke these words: "Let our advance worrying become advance thinking and planning." It was during the Second World War, so I suspect he was strategizing how to keep England and her Allies free and non-German speaking.

This company is located in Washington State so I'm not sure how they intend to get my body up there to the raging bonfire, and aren't there laws about transporting dead people across state lines? Further, would they be taking the scenic route up the coastline, or simply loading me onto an airplane? When my mother died in Florida, we had her flown to New York for burial next to my father, who had been waiting for a very long time. Since I do not own a funeral plot and have never enjoyed burning myself in the kitchen, I see no alternative but to live forever.

Their stationery is decorated in a leaf motif. (Which is kind of a nice leitmotiv.) The letter itself has leaves along the sides that could be birch while the RSVP is definitely decked in maple. Is this a subtle way of telling me that they use woodfire in their ovens, like California pizza? (Hold the sprouts and pineapple.)

My cat's ashes reside in a Japanese urn on our mantel. Since I have three children, I would have to be divided among them if they couldn't agree on where to fling my remains, which brings to mind portioning out a chicken when they were young. Who would get the drumstick, and who the breast? White or dark meat? And how could they tell as one assumes that all ashes look alike? They shouldn't have to deal with Mom on a platter.

The ghouls good folks at Smart Cremation are awaiting my response. I hate to disappoint them, but they really shouldn't be taking anything for granted, like my demise. Nobody will be more surprised than I if I die, but I refuse to arrange for it because I know that what you focus on grows. And while I am growing older, I am not dead yet so any thoughts of disposing of my mortal remains are decidedly premature.

You Can't Keep a Good Souse Down

The following article appeared in the Duluth News Tribune:

DULUTH, Minn. A Minnesota man has pleaded guilty to driving his motorized La-Z-Boy chair while drunk. A criminal complaint says 62-year-old Dennis LeRoy Anderson told police he left a bar in the northern Minnesota town of Proctor on his chair after drinking eight or nine beers.

Prosecutors say Anderson's blood alcohol content was 0.29, more than three times the legal limit, when he crashed into a parked vehicle in August 2008. He was not seriously injured.

Police said the chair was powered by a converted lawnmower and had a stereo and cup holders.

Sixth Judicial District Judge Heather Sweetland stayed 180 days of jail time Monday and ordered two years of probation for Anderson. His attorney, David Keegan, did not immediately return a call for comment.

Let the good times roll!

So Many Fools, So Little Time

Walking home from the neighborhood grocery, I heard a man say "Hi!" I turned around to see a man on a bicycle who wasn't addressing me but a very attractive young woman walking behind me. He dismounted and wheeled his bike onto the sidewalk to walk with her.

"What's your name?" he asked.
"Nicole."
"Josh," he said, extending his hand. She shook his hand and kept walking.
"How was your day?"
"Not very good. I'm a teacher and..."
He finished her sentence: "The little rascals."
She continued, "my mother is sick."
"Did you have a good weekend?"" he asked her.
"No, I just found out my mom has cancer," she blurted. "I really have to go." She walked faster. So did he. Without missing a beat, he said, "What do you do for fun?"

At this point, "we" were at my corner, walking abreast. Nicole and I exchanged the kind of look women understand which cannot effectively be translated verbally, but which means, basically, "This guy is a jerk with the finesse of a moldy boiled turnip and I don't want him to know where I live."

It seemed obvious that she was only being polite because she was in shock from her mother's bad news, and because she is very likely a kind person as well as beautiful. I considered inviting her to my place as if we were friends so the guy would leave her alone, but with strangers there is always that hesitation since I couldn't know for sure that she wanted to discourage him. I would have liked to offer my sympathy and say something hopeful about her mother but hesitated to interrupt, no matter how it seemed. But I do hope that all you gentlemen out there, in a similar situation, would realize that this woman, and all women, exist independent of your amorous intentions. The jackass was so hot for Nicole that he couldn't even manage the basic niceties, which, strangely, might have given him a better chance with her. Even though I'm pretty sure he wasn't riding the bike for exercise, but for transportation.

Can you say "stupid," children? I knew you could.

No Shortage of False Prophets

I am deeply saddened that once again, Native American culture and spiritualism have been used for fun and profit, with horrifying results.

James Arthur Ray, author of "Harmonic Wealth: The Secret of Attracting the Life You Want" and other self-help books, runs seminars for which people pay thousands of dollars to hear business executives, fitness experts and motivational authors exhort them to achieve material success beyond their wildest dreams within the framework of New Age spirituality. I think that spending vast sums of money to hear people speak is the exact opposite of self-empowerment, but it seems to be paying off for Ray, who is probably worth billions by preying on the dissatisfied and gullible. Clothing material lust in the trappings of spiritualism is a brilliant ploy to gain the hearts and wallets of baby boomers, many of whom are aging 60's hippies, by enabling them to reconcile a bornagain desire for wealth with their former non-materialistic values. (In my view, there is nothing intrinsically wrong with money, only with its misuse to have power over others. And there is certainly nothing wrong with changing our beliefs over time; otherwise, what would be the point in still being here?)

On October 8th, Ray conducted a sweat lodge as the culminating event of a 5-day Spiritual Warriors retreat near Sedona, Arizona, which participants paid $9,000 to attend. Native Americans have done sweat lodges for centuries - I have participated in a few - but the purpose is cleansing, not profit. The sweat lodge is typically a tent with large heated stones in a pit at the center on which water is poured at regular intervals to create steam, similar to a sauna. It is a profoundly spiritual experience and has nothing to do with material gain. It is also carefully controlled in that people are allowed to leave through a flap in the tent if the heat becomes too intense. Normally, the sweat lodge holds no more than a dozen people at a time.

In this case, however, 64 people crowded into a 415-square-foot space during a two-hour period Thursday night. Ray led eight 15-minute rounds of various spiritual exercises and while no one was forcibly restrained, participants were strongly encouraged to remain for the entire time. According to the Yavapai, Arizona, sheriff's spokesman, there was no permit granted for the construction of the temporary wooden building in which two people died and many others were taken ill.

Kirby Brown, 38, of Westtown, N.Y., and James Shore, 40, of Milwaukee died after being overcome in the hut. Nineteen other people were hospitalized with symptoms ranging from dehydration to kidney failure. Ms. Brown was a hiker and surfer described by her family as being in top shape and the kindest person anyone knew. Mr. Shore was also in great physical condition and the doting father of three children. Both attended this event to continue on their paths of self-improvement as a means to better help others.

Ray has issued a statement through his publicist that says, "I am shocked and saddened by the tragedy that occurred at Spiritual Warrior in Sedona, Arizona, Thursday evening. I wish to express my deepest heartfelt condolences to the family and friends of those who lost their lives as well as offer my prayers for a speedy recovery for those who were taken ill." He has declined to comment further because there are "more questions than answers." He refused to speak with detectives on the fateful evening and left the state hours later. "He's interested in getting to the truth and will speak to the right people at the appropriate time," said his publicist. One can only assume that the appropriate time will be when he has concocted a story which exonerates him from any responsibility.

I knew there was a reason I was unable to finish reading his book and donated it to the library book store.