Full Body Scan

I spend a good bit of time on airplanes - far more than I'd like, really, but since my only child lives over 1000 miles away AND since I have a ton of money invested in a home in his neighborhood, I find myself winging my way back and forth across the country with steady frequency. However that may soon come to a crashing halt.  After watching a news clip about the new TSA full body scanning procedures going into effect at an airport near you, this frequent flyer may just be grounded.

Here's the thing.

This business of some stranger being able to scan my entire body with a radiographic device that allows them to see me right down to the skin ~ well, that's just a complete invasion of my privacy and my civil rights as an American.  Oh sure, I can "opt out" (a phrase borrowed from bankers who use it to jack up the rates on your credit cards), which means those same strangers now get to "pat me down" in any way they see fit to determine that I'm not concealing explosives somewhere on my person.

I don't think so.

And don't give me the patriotic bit about the necessity of doing this to weed out terrorists.  I cannot believe that our government, with its sophisticated web of technology and security, cannot come up with a way to keep terrorists off of airplanes without violating the personal privacy of thousands of innocent, law abiding, tax paying citizens on a daily basis.  As Benjamin Franklin once said  "Those who desire to give up freedom in order to gain security will not have, nor do they deserve, either one.”

It takes a lot to rile me - to "get my Irish up" as my mother used to say - but this is an example of the kinds of egregious interference in my individual freedom that simply infuriates me.  It happens far too often in modern life - the government, the insurance companies, the banks, all filling our life with rules and restrictions supposedly designed for the  betterment of society but which simply end up punishing and diminishing the individual.

To borrow a famous phrase from an old film ~ "I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take it anymore."

Truly, I think the American people need to rise up (dare I even say Tea Party style) and refuse en masse to participate in some of these policies.  If only every person could declare the day after Thanksgiving, traditionally the largest travel day of the year, a "no fly day" in protest - think what an impact that would make on the airline pocketbooks.

And we all know that nothing influences the government more than big business and the bottom line.

Certainly not the individual  rights of the American people.

Keeping the Faith

A good friend is going through a difficult time right now, having some tough issues with her teenaged son.  She is such a dedicated mother, a hardworking, responsible, loving and caring person - it makes my heart hurt knowing how painful this must be for her. One of the hardest parts about these kinds of rough patches in life is the fear of the unknown.  We project our worst fears onto the future, seeing only that the bad times will escalate, that nothing will be resolved, and disaster will ensue and life will be irrevocably changed. We wonder how we'll have the strength, the wisdom, the patience to endure.  In the thick of it, when the heart aches and the soul is sore, it's impossible to imagine how anything good can come of the situation.

Coincidentally, our minister spoke about this subject on Sunday.  The "happily ever after" we all want for our lives doesn't come easily or right away, he cautioned.  There are always bumps in the road, some bigger than others.  It's hard to keep the faith, hard to believe that "all things work together for good," especially in the dark of night when sleep won't come and our thoughts are beset by fears of what might happen.

That's when we have to make the biggest leap of all and believe that on the other side of this fresh hell is a bright heaven, one that might completely surprise us, one that might be totally different from what we hoped for or dreamed about or planned upon.

But one that will be good if we let it.

That's what I believe will happen for my friend and her family.  I'm keeping my eyes on that prize for her.

I'm keeping that faith.  And I hope she can keep it too.

How about you?  How have things worked together for good in your life?

Cafe Writing: Thursday Threesome

“There exist only three beings worthy of respect: the priest, the soldier, the poet. To know, to kill, to create.” — Charles Baudelaire

Onesome — to Know: We all have certain truths that seem to live inside us, whether they’re born of faith or art. What’s one thing that you absolutely know in your bones? My bones tell me lots of things these days - like when its going to rain, when I've been sitting at my desk too long, or when I've overdone it with the weeding or bike riding.   They also tell me that we, as a people, need to care and respect each other more than we do.  It could solve so many problems if we all learned to live in harmony.

Twosome — to Kill: Are you the type who walks spiders out of the house in a glass, or do you see a bug and stomp it? While there's nothing of the entymologist in me, my tender heart extends even to members of the insect kingdom, so  I'm loathe to kill them.  Luckily my husband has no such compunctions, so he gets that job around our house.  What would incite me to violence?  Someone threatening my family, or my dogs (who are my family).

Threesome — to Create: What is your favorite creative outlet? What have you created lately? For as long as I can remember, I've loved making up stories and playing music.  I crave those things, just like I crave coffee in the morning or wine at night, the sound of the sea or the comfort of my husband's arms around me.  An hour at the keyboard - piano or computer - can dispel the cares from the worst of days.  It "feeds my soul" as my piano teacher used to say.

How about you?  What are your answers to the Thursday Threesome?   Join me on  The Patio for Cafe Writing.

As the World Turns

I always liked the title of that soap opera, even though I never watched it (I was a fan of the ABC soaps, back in the day, particularly All My Children).  There was something comforting about an image of the world turning slowly, day by day, inexorably completing its orbit, heedless of the machinations and peregrinations of all the inhabitants below. A conversation at lunch today called that phrase to mind.  One of my co-workers was discussing the vagaries of female hormones, particularly those of the female in her early 40's, on the cusp of that thing the docs are now calling "perimenopause."

"I swear," she said, "sometimes I feel like a totally different person.  My emotions are completely out of control, and I don't think I can stand it!"

Her words recalled my own experience of those days, when I often literally felt as if an alien demon had invaded my body and was about to make me do despicable things like murder my husband or run my car off a cliff.  As I relayed some of those memories to her, I realized how good it felt to have that all behind me.  I also realized how those years of unpredictable "bad days" had simply vanished without fanfare, as if I had crossed some miraculous finish line in a marathon from hell.

When I came home, my husband told me about a meeting he had today with his former boss, the one he's been doing contract work for pretty steadily over the past six months.  Apparently, there's some rather concrete discussion about hiring him back full time.  As he talked about this plan, I realized how bleak our world had seemed just over a year ago, when practically every area of our lives seemed to be under attack.  His job was gone, mine had changed into something I thought I would hate, we had no tenants for the rental house with the adjustable mortgage,  my uncle and aunt had died leaving me with their estate to clear up...on and on it went.  I thought about those days earlier this evening, when I read my son's blog and learned about some very upsetting events in his life this past week, knowing full well the frustration he's feeling right now.

But since those particular bad days of ours, we've adjusted to all the changes, things worked out, and our life is back on an even keel.  We've even allowed ourselves to consider that maybe Jim doesn't  need to go back to work full time, that this new arrangement is actually working out quite well after all.  Who would have believed it?  Not I.

The old world DOES turn, and sometimes we face the darkness but inevitably we come round to the light.

It's good to be in the light again...I wish the same for all of you :)

The Longest Day of the Year

It's definitely a gift to have a 25 hour day, even though technically we're just getting paid back the hour we lost last April when Daylight Savings Time went into effect.  Still, I always feel as if I've been granted that most supreme of all gifts - more TIME.

When my son was little, he looked forward to this day with the delight reserved only for Christmas and birthdays.  A child always filled with plans and ideas, there were never enough hours in his weekends to complete all the things he wanted to do.   He would awake at the crack of dawn on this momentous day, determined to eke every minute possible out of the day with one extra hour in it.

I still love this "fall back" day, even though it gets dark before I've finished putting dinner on the table.  I love looking at my watch and feeling pleasantly surprised by how early it is, something that happens with rarer and rarer frequency the older I get.  I love the sense of the day being elongated before me, like taffy pulled until it's thin and stringy.  I love the freedom of an extra hour to spend, like the twenty dollar bill you find crumpled in the pocket of your winter coat.

So what did I do with my extra hour today?  Was it the time I spent walking the dogs on a sunlit, windblown November afternoon?  Or the hour I fiddled around with my husband's new guitar, downloading lessons on Garage Band?  Maybe it was the hour I spent at my friend's church early this morning, playing in a "pickup" handbell ensemble.

Or maybe it's still to come, as I prepare to pour a glass of wine, light a candle, and settle into the corner of the sofa with my book.

Whatever it is (or was) I've been savoring all the hours of this day.  I hope you have too.

How about you?  What did you do with your extra hour today?