Mentor

When we're young, we all imagine ourselves as grown up and can't wait to get there.

We demand people to treat us like adults, even try taking on parts of life that we're way too immature to handle...modern day rites of passage.

I wonder how much better our society might be if we had actual traditions to help through each stage of development.  Like Native American cultures.....or even like scouting. 

It's important to have good mentors for that sort of thing to work. 

Our society has them, and we sort of use them....to a certain extent.  I mean, I guess teachers are mentors, and the aforementioned scout leaders.....but there's still such a "flying solo" aspect to growing up in this country....computer games are mentors now.  Then again, we had television, so is there really much difference?

Good question.

For me, right now Fifty Five Is the New Mentor....same as the old one only with better reception.

25140

A moment in silent reflection for those suffering through the mine disasters in both West Virgina and China.

Amen.

My grandfather was a coal miner.  He came over from Ireland with his parents waaay back when.  They ended up in Scranton, Pennsylvania. James Joseph Murray, couldn't get any more Irish than he and his!
Anyway, he made it through the third grade then had to leave school to work in the mines....imagine that.
Imagine being a kid going deep down inside the earth with a pick-axe, a miner's cap and your lunch pail...working long, hard days back before breathing filters and safety regulations...Oh yeah! this was before Child Labor Laws kicked in, too. We kids don't know how lucky we've had it! 
 
Even though Grandpa only had that 3rd grade education, he went from working in the mines to a job at General Electric....moved his family from the "hills" to Philadelphia, where my mother met my dad.

Compared to the mine disaster and my grandfather's hard life, I got nothin' to complain about.....BUT!  (You knew that was coming, didn't you?)

Spent the better part of yesterday first frantically trying to find our completed, ready for final post production (adding the sound) video. It was just, suddenly...gone.
Just gone...somewhere lost in the maze of hard drive land-or worse!  So, then began the process of resigning myself to starting all over again. Oy.  That's okay....(sound of whimpering and licking of wounds)....the next one will be better. (sniffle!) And besides, I've learned a  lot in the process (sniff, sniff).
Onward to the next.

Thoughts go back to West Virginia....folks, we need to re-examine what we're doing....is coal really the only way? I know, I know...it's what we have, it's what we're used to...and besides, what about that carbon sequestering thing?  Great! Storing poison, living with garbage...not to mention leaving it around for our offspring to deal with.


Surely, we can think of some other way!

So for today, Fifty Five is the new25140...zip code of Montcoal, West Virginia....for the friends and families of those who died...for those who suffered in the mine, and for a glimmer of hope.  If we learn nothing else from our difficulties, let it be that no matter what- there's always hope.

4/20 Reprise

Looked at the calendar this morning for the usual What Day Is It And What Am I Supposed To Do reality check, and noticed it's only 8 days 'til my magic 55th b-day, but...even more important to me, it's only 14 days until April 20th...a very important day in the Medical Cannabis Community.

Oh, I know...we could go there about Hitler's birthday and Columbine and all that, but we're not gonna.  We're going to take this date and exorcise away all the evil demons with one great big cheer for cannabis! And for those of you who imbibe, accompany that cheer with a toke from your favorite delivery system!

Honestly, cannabis has been known since Ever Since...used for food, fuel and fabrics. Medicinally speaking, there's nothing like it for help with wasting syndrome, depression (yes...Sativa is wonderful for my depression), pain and so much more.

Glaucoma's eye pressure is relieved through use of cannabis. Headache sufferers find relief, too.

Its' seed oil contains high levels of amino acids, so much so there should be no reason for starvation in our world. Hemp Seed Oil also helps with regulating weight. Some people believe it helps with joint stiffness and overcoming morning sickness.

Anyway, I had a lot of first hand observation time...got the chance to see so many lives changed for the better through the use of cannabis AND interaction with other patients in a community setting. The two just seem to go hand-in-hand.

See, just handing a patient some cannabis and telling them to go off to some designated area to use it is wrong.  Part of what makes cannabis what it is is the addition of the creative and social element. Cultures all over the world have been familiar with it forever.

First Peoples (Native Americans....what ever is p.c. this week) understood healing as a total thing...involving more than just popping pills and waiting for something to happen.

Cannabis encourages healing through sharing, interacting not isolating. There are documented studies all over the world decrying the negative impact of isolation on an individual; compound that isolation with an illness or disability and one can see the downward spiral into harmful behaviors just waiting to start.

It is good that California wants to legalize cannabis. It SHOULD be legalized, should have been legalized....NO.  SHOULD NEVER HAVE BEEN MADE ILLEGAL.  But we don't have to quibble right now over what happened a million years ago.

What we DO have to accomplish is a PROPER legalization.  That means keeping in mind that not every person who uses cannabis is rich....and not every person who uses it does so for recreational purposes.

Some of us REALLY ARE patients.....poor patients at that.  We should not be made to pay taxes on our medicinal use....it's already too damned expensive.  And San Francisco needs to stop including cannabis use in with its' anti-smoking ordinances.  We settled that one back in 1999 with the exemption to Article 19F of the City's health code, allowing for smoking (yes, the "s" word) of medical cannabis inside nonprofit medical cannabis facilities.

It also means we stop interfering with international trade, start encouraging hemp production, release ALL Cannabis prisoners and begin retribution proceedings for all the losses suffered by those who've been persecuted and prosecuted through the years.

I know, "we don't have the budget for it."  Legalize the damn stuff and we will!

To my knowledge, that law hasn't changed, though it seems a lot of people at city hall have forgotten about it.'

Medical cannabis patients aren't patients, nor are they punch-lines for the latest "Cheech and Chong" comparatives.  They are people with real issues who've found something that works.  Would you joke the same way about somebody using an iron lung or AIDS/HIV meds or chemotherapy?

So anyway...here's to Cannabis! And here's hoping we legalize it the right way.

For today, Fifty Five is the New 4/20 Reprise...because April 20th DOES have it's good points, and I'm going to go explore one of them right now.

Life

We went to celebrate Easter with Jack's family yesterday, and it was wonderful seeing all the generations gathered together. It reminded me of the many celebrations we had as I was growing up, and I'll  admit to a bit of homesickness...it's been 30 years between East Coast Easters with my brood.

It rained hard most of the way home, so memory lane and melancholia took a back seat to co-piloting, my "job" on road trips.We took the long way home, going up the peninsula rather than across the bridge.  I'm sure we avoided a lot of the old "returning home"  Bay Bridge automotive congestion.

Wylie, our cat, was waiting at the top of the stairs when we got home.  "Meow!" he called to us from his perch on the newel post, "Where've you been? Where's my dinner? Pet me..NOW!" (Our cat gets a lot of vocal mileage out of one meow!)

So after hugging, feeding and playing with said kitty, I got a cup of coffee and got changed for bed.  Jack was already asleep, t.v. filling our room with its neon powder blue haze. I was wide awake; coffee usually took care of that; but,  my mind wanted to scan old memory banks....feel close to people I love...maybe even allow myself a "what if" or two, just for shits and grins.

We had so many cousins, nieces, nephews, friends and what-have-yous, no matter where we went to visit there was always somebody to be with and something to do.  Heck!  During the summer we had enough people for two teams to play softball down on my Uncle Dick and Aunt Emma's farm in New Jersey.

A favorite family memory is my mom running after the ball, yelling "I got it, I got it!" as she headed into the brush by the side of the road. "Dottie's in the bushes!" Aunt Anne cried out as mom disappeared from view.  I don't recall if she got the ball or not, but she definitely caught every bramble on her way through the thicket. 
It didn't matter too much who won or lost...I think the losers had to do the dishes or something like that...but it was great fun, and everyone played....even us "littleuns," like my brother Bob and I, who could always be counted on to strike out; except for the one time when I bunted and actually got on first base!

It's moments like Jack's family gathering that give me pause to wonder what life would have been like had I not left for California back in 1980. Would I have stayed married...had the standard 2.5 kids (aside from my birth son)...learned to drive...gotten a house...learned to be "normal?"  Would I have been any happier...would I still even be alive?

That last one is an important question...I wasn't doing so good mentally back then, and didn't have any prospects of doing any better mentally, job or otherwise...depression was about the only thing that I had in abundance, ...it helped me go crazy.

Of course I had and still have my family, who I love and always have loved so very much....but back then, I knew they couldn't help me.... how could they? I didn't know how to explain what was wrong...uh, hi everybody, don't mind me I'm just not myself today...hmmmmm.

Depression back then was still some "fringe" thing... something sexy for Phil Donahue to talk about. My depression was oceans deep and had several undercurrents...making me feel out of control, into my cups, under the gun and over the top most of the time. In the real world people were supposed to just tough up, grin-and-bear-it.

But in my case, trying to keep it together was making me fall apart. I tried to find local help, even after coming back from visiting San Francisco in 1978, but all anybody wanted to offer was group therapy two times a month for one hour...been there, done that...no thanks.

I was just supposed to go to California...plain and simple.

So, maybe in an alternate universe, I'd have gotten the white picket fence and matching puppies, minivan and garden club membership....but in this place on the space/time continuum, yours truly drew a different course.
For better or worse, it is what it is...not every choice was a good one, but they were all mine.

And you know what? With all its' ups and downs, good times and bad...I'm grateful and happy for what life continues to bring. I'm fairly sane these days; though depression happens it's no where near as paralyzing, or debilitating as it once was.  I've not lost time in quite a few years, have experienced my share of miracles and no longer fear the new day.


In light of all that, what can I say about Fifty-Five and it's being "the New?"
Oh! I know! Fifty-Five is the New Life!  Because there's still so much more livin' left to do!

Disappearing Act

Randi at Mesa Verde

Been thinking about our visit to the Grand Canyon  and Mesa Verde.

I remember while there, being mystified by the beauty....but more.

At Mesa Verde, there were times when I'd sit off by myself ......I could sense the old souls who used to walk those paths.....could hear them beating corn or stone while youngsters scampered about playing at hunting.

These people seemed to find a way to live in harmony, at least for a time.  What made them disappear? Where did they go?

What can we learn from what  they left behind?  What they didn't leave behind, too.

I worry about our country, our world, our species.  Are we doomed to become legends on the wind, like the Anasazi?  I wonder.

For today, Fifty Five Is The New Disappearing Act.....is our society destined for the same fate as the old ones on the Mesa?