When Old Dogs Die
September 17’08
I've always thought that Emily would outlive me,
for some reasons best ignored,but I must admit that my 9-year-old Heroic RottweillerXWolf/Shepard, is declining to bone cancer in her shoulder,
and lyme induced osteoarthritis in her hips. As usual, Dear Em is keeping me active providing Hospice.
She's being more macho than stoic, dontcha know, and plays her condition to the hilt, but I've noticed that she only cries or whimpers when she wants me to help her up, She seems exhausted but still has strength enough to hop with just a balancing lift on the sling. She's responding happily to palliative herbs and laughter, as we reminisce about our past together, before she goes. Shedding many tears that I'm learning to let go of more easily.Sobbing on the Web? Well, so what! She probably won't die today.
September 29’08
Emily has declined further since I wrote the above, and neither of us is so happily responding to the herbs. I just wish it were me losing the weight.
September 30'08
Got up this morning to tend to Em, and when I was washing her incontinent bottom, found maggots already feeding there. Came back in to wash my hands, and paced around in a daze, praying for strength to face the day, when out of the blue came an idea on how to release her...a plastic bag over her head, with a slip chain collar tight enough to close off air and control her. “Oh Kali!!!” I said out loud, “give me the guts to do this!” and She did!!! It was like I was in a trance, collecting the trash bag and collar, moving the lawn chair next to Emily who was laying under the Rosemary bush, singing Scheherazhad's Lullaby…"Sleep Donyazhad, sleep...close your eyes to what makes you weep. Early next morning, I'll tell you a story, if you like it is yours to keep." while I slipped the bag and collar over her head, and closed it snug. She took 5 or 6 breaths, blowing hard, while I chanted: go to sleep go to sleep go to sleep, until she threw her head up for one last gasp, said something to me in her singing voice, NOT her crying voice, and then went limp. I held her head up with the chain for 10 minutes, singing,
" Where are you going, my little one, my little one? Where are you going my own sweet one? Turn around and you're tiny, turn around and you've grown, Turn around and you are young again, with babes of your own." over and over. Took the bag and collar off, and imagined that she'd sung, "Release me, and never let me go." I DID IT!!! and I am proud that I could fulfill my duty to her. Not sobbing now, just a little weeping.
EMILY REDWOOD 8/4/99-9/30/08
Emily was being called back to the Womb
to serve the Goddess Kali,
but she didn't want to leave me,
so I had to take her last breath away,
and hold her till her loyal heart stopped.
She used her last bit of energy to raise her
head to me and say goodbye in her singing voice,
NOT the crying one.
Blessed Be. I've earned my Goddess name, finally.Thanx Em!!!
Saturday, December 27, 2008
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
2nd Saturn Cycle Retrospective
As I was approaching my first Saturn Cycle, I dreamed of being more than just an average housewife and mother. I wanted to change the world I’d been raised to fit into, the world I’d delivered my children into, to be one in which adventure and personal growth could be achieved without being ground down to a common denominator of passive acceptance and dumb luck. I didn’t want an ordinary life of raising ordinary children to become ordinary cogs in a system of ordinary sacrifice and struggle. I wanted to walk the shining path I saw before me, the path that led to real freedom, and the chance to make a difference; a path that my kids could follow without losing faith in their abilities to make the World a better place. Liberation was not so much a goal for me as it was a means to become unshackled from the expectations that chained me to a grist mill, the same chains that my children would inherit from an average discontented mother, if I didn’t make a radical effort to change the course of my life. Having no marketable job skills, and only marginal talents, I had no other choice but to leave my kids safely tucked with their father and his family, as I made the jump into the ruthless, dog-eat-dog, world of sexist, racist, classist society of strangers, alone, with no economic, marital, or political status, with nothing but my naked feminism, and my willingness to hold fast to the idea that I had an obligation to do whatever I could to make the world a better place for myself, my children, my fellow travelers, in this one life I owned. I almost didn’t make it thru the first two years.Leaving my family and sisters tore a whole in my heart, and I still weep when I remember the terrible loss, the awesome guilt, the horrible pain of knowing that I could never return to the fold that I had so drastically changed with selfish ambition and cold desire to become someone important enough to right the wrongs of an indifferent society. I was crazy with grief and the idiocy of believing that I could just volunteer my services to change the world, to heal the ignorant, to accomplish revolution of the social order, one person at a time. Suffice it to say, that I did get tutoring at the hands of the mental health establishment, which eventually convinced me that I had to learn how to make a living as something other than a revolutionary feminist, or die an unsung martyr to masochistic idealism. So I abandoned my attempts to infiltrate women’s centers and lesbian affinity groups, and took advantage of a displaced homemaker’s training program to become a member of the pink-collar labor market, as a nursing assistant in old folk’s homes. For ten years, I privatized my radical tendencies, complied to rules of behavior and dress codes, and actually learned to care about the needs of others. I loved the work, and it took me a long time to get used to being paid to do something I really would have done for just the satisfaction of being loved and needed. The paycheck gave me the freedom to make a home for myself and my community of misfit artists, and musicians, and poets, who did our living and loving, and world-changing, on the street, as guerilla thespians, and we did make a difference when we occupied the campus of Syracuse University to demand that they divest their stock portfolio of South African apartheid. We must have been one of the last straws, because very shortly after our movement hit campus, Apartheid fell, and we were all astounded further when the Wall fell in Berlin. My employment in nursing homes ended shortly thereafter, because I was arrogantly determined to make a comparable difference at my worksite by arranging to organize a Union presence, activities for which I got fired and blackballed. My co-workers did vote in the Union, and invited me back, but I was already suffering job-related wear and tear, so I left home again to join the Rainbow Family of deadheads and hipis. Only to find myself living in a Police State, where there is no free camping. I traveled in a Volkswagen, up and down the Californicated Coast, trying to make a home for my self and my dogs, only to be told that I am too old to be of use, and that I take up too much room, and that my grant-writing skills aren’t worth a salary, because the alternative culture is full of volunteers who are happy to donate their talents to the Cause.So I went back to a Mental Health Councilor, got diagnosed with depression, lymes diease, and osteoarthritis, and retired to the Desert with a nut check from Social Security, something I had always avoided like the plague because I thought it would damage my credibility as a writer. I was delusional thinking I had any.The irony of all the years I spent in Syracuse was that after hearing Karen DeCrow warn against the trap that was Women’s Culture, as she stepped down from the presidency of N.O.W. in Detroit, and after being barred from that culture on my arrival at the doorstep of her hometown women’s “club”, I was forced to gather beautiful New York men around me who could feel empowered by my Feminism, not threatened by it, and that we together could accomplish such a moral victory by making an ethical stand, and sharing a very certain pride of actually accomplishing real change. Karen must have been right, in her own way…Women’s Culture failed to get the ERA ratified, reproductive freedom is still a political football, and the politics of sexuality is clamoring for the bondage of marriage. Woman, as an independent individual is still shackled by trite convention, her dignity, security and pleasure still measured with the shortest stick.This one woman, however, has accomplished much, on any everyday basis, with the life and time allotted to me, and I do feel satisfied, justified even, that my choices have been good ones, and that if my children knew the woman I’ve become, they would be proud to call me Mother.
The personal IS political IS personal.
And it’s all been worthwhile.
As I was approaching my first Saturn Cycle, I dreamed of being more than just an average housewife and mother. I wanted to change the world I’d been raised to fit into, the world I’d delivered my children into, to be one in which adventure and personal growth could be achieved without being ground down to a common denominator of passive acceptance and dumb luck. I didn’t want an ordinary life of raising ordinary children to become ordinary cogs in a system of ordinary sacrifice and struggle. I wanted to walk the shining path I saw before me, the path that led to real freedom, and the chance to make a difference; a path that my kids could follow without losing faith in their abilities to make the World a better place. Liberation was not so much a goal for me as it was a means to become unshackled from the expectations that chained me to a grist mill, the same chains that my children would inherit from an average discontented mother, if I didn’t make a radical effort to change the course of my life. Having no marketable job skills, and only marginal talents, I had no other choice but to leave my kids safely tucked with their father and his family, as I made the jump into the ruthless, dog-eat-dog, world of sexist, racist, classist society of strangers, alone, with no economic, marital, or political status, with nothing but my naked feminism, and my willingness to hold fast to the idea that I had an obligation to do whatever I could to make the world a better place for myself, my children, my fellow travelers, in this one life I owned. I almost didn’t make it thru the first two years.Leaving my family and sisters tore a whole in my heart, and I still weep when I remember the terrible loss, the awesome guilt, the horrible pain of knowing that I could never return to the fold that I had so drastically changed with selfish ambition and cold desire to become someone important enough to right the wrongs of an indifferent society. I was crazy with grief and the idiocy of believing that I could just volunteer my services to change the world, to heal the ignorant, to accomplish revolution of the social order, one person at a time. Suffice it to say, that I did get tutoring at the hands of the mental health establishment, which eventually convinced me that I had to learn how to make a living as something other than a revolutionary feminist, or die an unsung martyr to masochistic idealism. So I abandoned my attempts to infiltrate women’s centers and lesbian affinity groups, and took advantage of a displaced homemaker’s training program to become a member of the pink-collar labor market, as a nursing assistant in old folk’s homes. For ten years, I privatized my radical tendencies, complied to rules of behavior and dress codes, and actually learned to care about the needs of others. I loved the work, and it took me a long time to get used to being paid to do something I really would have done for just the satisfaction of being loved and needed. The paycheck gave me the freedom to make a home for myself and my community of misfit artists, and musicians, and poets, who did our living and loving, and world-changing, on the street, as guerilla thespians, and we did make a difference when we occupied the campus of Syracuse University to demand that they divest their stock portfolio of South African apartheid. We must have been one of the last straws, because very shortly after our movement hit campus, Apartheid fell, and we were all astounded further when the Wall fell in Berlin. My employment in nursing homes ended shortly thereafter, because I was arrogantly determined to make a comparable difference at my worksite by arranging to organize a Union presence, activities for which I got fired and blackballed. My co-workers did vote in the Union, and invited me back, but I was already suffering job-related wear and tear, so I left home again to join the Rainbow Family of deadheads and hipis. Only to find myself living in a Police State, where there is no free camping. I traveled in a Volkswagen, up and down the Californicated Coast, trying to make a home for my self and my dogs, only to be told that I am too old to be of use, and that I take up too much room, and that my grant-writing skills aren’t worth a salary, because the alternative culture is full of volunteers who are happy to donate their talents to the Cause.So I went back to a Mental Health Councilor, got diagnosed with depression, lymes diease, and osteoarthritis, and retired to the Desert with a nut check from Social Security, something I had always avoided like the plague because I thought it would damage my credibility as a writer. I was delusional thinking I had any.The irony of all the years I spent in Syracuse was that after hearing Karen DeCrow warn against the trap that was Women’s Culture, as she stepped down from the presidency of N.O.W. in Detroit, and after being barred from that culture on my arrival at the doorstep of her hometown women’s “club”, I was forced to gather beautiful New York men around me who could feel empowered by my Feminism, not threatened by it, and that we together could accomplish such a moral victory by making an ethical stand, and sharing a very certain pride of actually accomplishing real change. Karen must have been right, in her own way…Women’s Culture failed to get the ERA ratified, reproductive freedom is still a political football, and the politics of sexuality is clamoring for the bondage of marriage. Woman, as an independent individual is still shackled by trite convention, her dignity, security and pleasure still measured with the shortest stick.This one woman, however, has accomplished much, on any everyday basis, with the life and time allotted to me, and I do feel satisfied, justified even, that my choices have been good ones, and that if my children knew the woman I’ve become, they would be proud to call me Mother.
The personal IS political IS personal.
And it’s all been worthwhile.
Monday, July 21, 2008
To: ALL You who know My Georgia Peach of a Pegasus in Macon.
She agreed to marry me in California, when I gave her a crystal pentagram ring, and she sent me a golfcart as, what I took to be, an engagement present. She also Promised to die in the Desert, eventually and always, Together with Me, in Our OLD Age.
She agreed to marry me in California, when I gave her a crystal pentagram ring, and she sent me a golfcart as, what I took to be, an engagement present. She also Promised to die in the Desert, eventually and always, Together with Me, in Our OLD Age.
heh-heh-heh, How's THAT fer Gossip!!!
Tuesday, July 01, 2008
Saturday, June 21, 2008
Subject:
Desert Green House Restoration Project,
Death Valley, CA. - Hip Forums
file:10 year plan, maturation and fruition by 2012.
Most of the misfits and outcasts(ie..hippies) whom I have known and loved over the last 40 years, have often as not, made a very satisfiying subsistance livelyhood just by working hard at being humane and happy...even when they've had to take temporary jobs in the service industries or production lines of corporate Amerika.
I've learned that Our Generation is a priveledged one, because We are the Ones whose meaningful work is to salvage the best of a collapsed social structure, BEFORE 2012 AD.
We have BECOME the Professional Class of the Coming New Age, so that we ALL can enjoy Our Decline of a Thousand Golden Years, and make it a Celebratory SwanSong of a Species. Viva la Revolucion!!! meanwhile, We CAN live on 'love', and raw sweet peas, if and when anybody wants to help restore a Desert GreenHouse to foodplant status>>>>bring us yer well-grown hip children to help. We could really use their talents....can he sketch out some blueprints? can she repair existing plumbing?luv and raw peas, Sage(local#4592)
Desert Green House Restoration Project,
Death Valley, CA. - Hip Forums
file:10 year plan, maturation and fruition by 2012.
Most of the misfits and outcasts(ie..hippies) whom I have known and loved over the last 40 years, have often as not, made a very satisfiying subsistance livelyhood just by working hard at being humane and happy...even when they've had to take temporary jobs in the service industries or production lines of corporate Amerika.
I've learned that Our Generation is a priveledged one, because We are the Ones whose meaningful work is to salvage the best of a collapsed social structure, BEFORE 2012 AD.
We have BECOME the Professional Class of the Coming New Age, so that we ALL can enjoy Our Decline of a Thousand Golden Years, and make it a Celebratory SwanSong of a Species. Viva la Revolucion!!! meanwhile, We CAN live on 'love', and raw sweet peas, if and when anybody wants to help restore a Desert GreenHouse to foodplant status>>>>bring us yer well-grown hip children to help. We could really use their talents....can he sketch out some blueprints? can she repair existing plumbing?luv and raw peas, Sage(local#4592)
Saturday, June 07, 2008
hkbtHillary 4 VP'08 because...
...she DESERVES to preside over the Senate as Marshall, Executive Liason for Barack's Agenda,and Queen of the Housewives/in fighting pitbull uniform, cleaning House.
The Dream Ticket represents the next 16 years,
over the Mayan rainbow.
Paradigm ShiftingY2K+8,ought12...etc.Butt...whatdoIknow? I'm just a white Feminist, Green Republican Absentee Voter, who is thrilled to write-in Obama's name on a Republican Ballot, like a subversive provacatour. heh-heh-heh
...she DESERVES to preside over the Senate as Marshall, Executive Liason for Barack's Agenda,and Queen of the Housewives/in fighting pitbull uniform, cleaning House.
The Dream Ticket represents the next 16 years,
over the Mayan rainbow.
Paradigm ShiftingY2K+8,ought12...etc.Butt...whatdoIknow? I'm just a white Feminist, Green Republican Absentee Voter, who is thrilled to write-in Obama's name on a Republican Ballot, like a subversive provacatour. heh-heh-heh
Wednesday, May 07, 2008
In Regards to The Reverand Wright
I was NOT offended by the Pastor's preaching the Golden Rule, and condemning a war-mongering nation's foreign policy, or by his reminders of our government's conspiracy against Us.
Jeremiah, this old piece from 1985, is hereby dedicated to you. It's really too bad and so sad, that the media did such a number on the trust between you and Barack. Don't worry! It'll get made better, later.
Cinco de Mayo/AIDS Conspiracy Theory
AIDS is iotragenic.
The human organism’s immune system has been seriously compromised and rendered ineffective in some cases, by the medical profession’s concerted efforts with generations of anti-biotics, primarily penicillin, which have become known to mutate the body’s natural response to infection, which then becomes resistant, progressively.
Can it therefore be said that if one is a chronic consumer of medical services, then is it likely that one is susceptible to encountering a fatal virus?
We are a dying Race. Folks are racing to die. The emergency rooms of Amerika are filled to overflowing with hurt and sick people. We are dropping like flies in a hard freeze, from cancer, pneumonia, murder, stress.
Would Big Brother want Us to notice the death throes of a terminal environment? Would Doomsday Announcements only cause panic and accelerate genocide?
Triangulations are possible to support a theory that there exists a conspiracy to camouflage the catastrophic consequences of a necrotic society, and to control the masses with medication, incarceration, and methodical moral fascisms.
The Church and State are in collusion to assign blame to the individuals who recreate, procreate, and aspirate toxic atmospheres: to alienate Us from each other in our intimate relationships; to keep us divided, under suspicion, and subdued.
The practice of modern Medicine has become a deathcult religion to govern and control the culture of Life, Freedom, and Health, for corporate profit.
The Church Fathers of the Dark Ages, murdered the real Healers at the Stake, and proceeded to declare Renascence to co-opt and redefine ancient sciences into patriarchal, monotheistic ritual terms of war. We can see how modern medicine has lowered the death rate, and raised the survivable birthrate, so can it be held responsible also, for the Population Bomb exploding our chances of mass survival? And can the HIV/AIDS pandemic be seen as the Medical Profession’s ‘final solution’ to the TOO MANY LEMMINGS Syndrome?
I was NOT offended by the Pastor's preaching the Golden Rule, and condemning a war-mongering nation's foreign policy, or by his reminders of our government's conspiracy against Us.
Jeremiah, this old piece from 1985, is hereby dedicated to you. It's really too bad and so sad, that the media did such a number on the trust between you and Barack. Don't worry! It'll get made better, later.
Cinco de Mayo/AIDS Conspiracy Theory
AIDS is iotragenic.
The human organism’s immune system has been seriously compromised and rendered ineffective in some cases, by the medical profession’s concerted efforts with generations of anti-biotics, primarily penicillin, which have become known to mutate the body’s natural response to infection, which then becomes resistant, progressively.
Can it therefore be said that if one is a chronic consumer of medical services, then is it likely that one is susceptible to encountering a fatal virus?
We are a dying Race. Folks are racing to die. The emergency rooms of Amerika are filled to overflowing with hurt and sick people. We are dropping like flies in a hard freeze, from cancer, pneumonia, murder, stress.
Would Big Brother want Us to notice the death throes of a terminal environment? Would Doomsday Announcements only cause panic and accelerate genocide?
Triangulations are possible to support a theory that there exists a conspiracy to camouflage the catastrophic consequences of a necrotic society, and to control the masses with medication, incarceration, and methodical moral fascisms.
The Church and State are in collusion to assign blame to the individuals who recreate, procreate, and aspirate toxic atmospheres: to alienate Us from each other in our intimate relationships; to keep us divided, under suspicion, and subdued.
The practice of modern Medicine has become a deathcult religion to govern and control the culture of Life, Freedom, and Health, for corporate profit.
The Church Fathers of the Dark Ages, murdered the real Healers at the Stake, and proceeded to declare Renascence to co-opt and redefine ancient sciences into patriarchal, monotheistic ritual terms of war. We can see how modern medicine has lowered the death rate, and raised the survivable birthrate, so can it be held responsible also, for the Population Bomb exploding our chances of mass survival? And can the HIV/AIDS pandemic be seen as the Medical Profession’s ‘final solution’ to the TOO MANY LEMMINGS Syndrome?
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Old Business
As an almost 60 year old Feminist Voter my issues go back to Sojourner Truth and Alice Paul, so I will cast My Vote this time for the Candidate most likely to use extraordinary Presidential Powers to Pardon Leonard Peltier, and Ratify the Equal Gender Rights Amendment, by Executive Order.
I'm betting that Barack is old enough to remember Leonard, young enough to remember that 18 year old men are still required by Law, to register for the Selective Service, and mature enough to have married a Feminist Woman.
Hillary has never been a Feminist, much less ever, even used the word.
21st Century EGRA: Equality of Rights, under American Law, shall NOT be denied or abridged, by the United States, or by any State, on account of Gender.
As an almost 60 year old Feminist Voter my issues go back to Sojourner Truth and Alice Paul, so I will cast My Vote this time for the Candidate most likely to use extraordinary Presidential Powers to Pardon Leonard Peltier, and Ratify the Equal Gender Rights Amendment, by Executive Order.
I'm betting that Barack is old enough to remember Leonard, young enough to remember that 18 year old men are still required by Law, to register for the Selective Service, and mature enough to have married a Feminist Woman.
Hillary has never been a Feminist, much less ever, even used the word.
21st Century EGRA: Equality of Rights, under American Law, shall NOT be denied or abridged, by the United States, or by any State, on account of Gender.
Tuesday, April 01, 2008
Friday, March 21, 2008
Thursday, February 07, 2008
Re: Boycott Ca. Land Management, Abort CLM contract w/Inyo DeathValley County
Hay, Robert! that's my 39 year old son's name. He's an alfalfa
farmer, biker/mechanic in Texas. small world, hey. Medford was pretty
dreadful when I stayed at the women's shelter for Christmas, one
year...and I saw Arnica's version of Applegate, but I started that
particular summer tour in Ruch...heh-heh-heh where I REFUSED to wear
a gathering bracelet. So, I hope the changes you speak of have been
good ones, or ones that can be made good. bye for now, i'm off to
look at yer pictures., ta-ta, Sage Pssst...The Old Spanish Trail is
still a two-lane road thru "downtown" @ the Post Office. where we
only get the exhaust fumes on the weekends from the "duners", whom we
try to slow down in passing by signs and street theatre, trade
circles, a la california home movie set. Hipi Propoganda Videos,
worth $10,000 on America's Funniest. We've invited Leonard Peltier
to come here for rehab when he gets out with a presidential pardon
from Barack Obama. The Corporation is still holding our baths
hostage, and We, the People of Tecopa and A.I.M. intend to occupy the
premises with a free reign.
Hay, Robert! that's my 39 year old son's name. He's an alfalfa
farmer, biker/mechanic in Texas. small world, hey. Medford was pretty
dreadful when I stayed at the women's shelter for Christmas, one
year...and I saw Arnica's version of Applegate, but I started that
particular summer tour in Ruch...heh-heh-heh where I REFUSED to wear
a gathering bracelet. So, I hope the changes you speak of have been
good ones, or ones that can be made good. bye for now, i'm off to
look at yer pictures., ta-ta, Sage Pssst...The Old Spanish Trail is
still a two-lane road thru "downtown" @ the Post Office. where we
only get the exhaust fumes on the weekends from the "duners", whom we
try to slow down in passing by signs and street theatre, trade
circles, a la california home movie set. Hipi Propoganda Videos,
worth $10,000 on America's Funniest. We've invited Leonard Peltier
to come here for rehab when he gets out with a presidential pardon
from Barack Obama. The Corporation is still holding our baths
hostage, and We, the People of Tecopa and A.I.M. intend to occupy the
premises with a free reign.
Friday, January 11, 2008
I am a 59 year old, Green Republican, a duly registered, absentee Voter, who hereby promises to vote for the Democrat who will promise to get the Equal Rights Amendment ratified, ASAP.
If neither Hillary or Barak mentions My Issue, I will write in My Vote to Draft Al Gore. My only compromise is that I'm tempted to vote for a sensible and articulate Black Man who could repair Our Image on the World Scene. The Clinton Soap Opera seems to me to be just too tacky for the 21st Century.
If neither Hillary or Barak mentions My Issue, I will write in My Vote to Draft Al Gore. My only compromise is that I'm tempted to vote for a sensible and articulate Black Man who could repair Our Image on the World Scene. The Clinton Soap Opera seems to me to be just too tacky for the 21st Century.
Wednesday, January 09, 2008
Since the last posting, AT&T has crashed my computer with an inappropriate software update, and I was forced to take a vacation from the Web for about six months. It was too hot a summer to drip sweat into the keyboard, anyway. Suffice it to say that We All had a very mellow summer just to spite the unusually continuous monsoon humidity.
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