When I watched my fellow citizens torment the three stalled buses on a two-lane road, my maternal instincts questioned, “Don’t they know that there are children in those buses?”
An Operetta of Wine and Spice
Author’s note: This is a serendipitous story of wine, friends, daughter, and spices— a camerata (experimenting with art form) if you will. (The aria, “Song of India,”… Read more “An Operetta of Wine and Spice”
Fire Danger! Are You Pet-Evacuation Ready?
As seen in The Cambrian When the Colby fire near Glendora, Ca. exploded, I watched the sienna-tinted smoke plume darken a bright blue sky. I was about 250… Read more “Fire Danger! Are You Pet-Evacuation Ready?”
From the Last Vestiges of America’s Middle Class
My grandchildren have wonderful parents, a comfortable home, and a good education. It’s what Americans strive for. I don’t know if I will live deep into my grandchildren’s future, but I do suspect that their future will be much different from what I experienced.
While my life was imperfect, there was always hope and opportunity. The only thing that hampered my future, was my personal lack of confidence. But that is not the point of this post.
My upbringing was solidly middle class. Church on Sunday with a Sunday dinner served in the dining room on a clean white tablecloth. Homemade chocolate cake for dessert. I saw the USA inside a rolling Chevrolet. Fundraising barbecues. State fair on Labor Day. Clear blue skies. Smog was something new in Los Angeles: “It’s when the fog and smoke mix together,” the adults explained over beer and baloney sandwiches.
Political rallies with us kids dressed in red, white and blue. We were Democrats who picnicked at Disneyland with our Republican friends. We liked Ike. JFK a saint. When poverty and segregation lifted its ugly covers, Americans worked to change those wrongs. It wasn’t American to let this continue. The Civil Rights Act. The War on Poverty.
Tucked away from my world view, ideologues sited folly in this mid-century middle class well-being and common good. Meanwhile women unbound their mammaries, men grew their hair, citizens defied a useless war, and President Nixon got caught in a lie, and then kicked out of office. Denizens convened and swore that there was enough of this liberal crap running amuck in America. Values. Moral Majority. Loud mouth pundits. End tax. More guns. More crime and prisons. Fear. Loathing. Separation. Money for war. Nothing for education.
Unfortunately, for the now, and for who knows how long, achieving and maintaining middle class status in America is a fading dream. A recent New York Times headline, “Hardship makes a new home in the suburbs,” reviews the most middle of middle class regions, Los Angeles suburbs, where the possibility always loomed as bright as the California sun. Now some of the industrious sell goodies from their kitchens, and make just enough money to fill in where food stamps leave off. Food stamps? Yes. Former two-income households in newer tract homes fight for their dream regardless of low wages, jobs shipped to other continents, mounting bills, and a plutocratic gang of lawmakers who believe these citizens were not smart enough to reach the pinnacle of material wealth.
So, the woman featured in the NYT story who now makes popsicles to sell in parking lots, maybe bringing in $100 per warm day, earning about a $50 profit, is a slacker and unworthy of compassion and dignity, because the common good is a misnomer to a rising group of philosophical followers.
It wasn’t always that way for the popsicle maker. Three years ago, she and her husband lost their jobs. “We used to have a different kind of life, where we had nice things and did nice things. Now we just worry,” she told the NYT reporter.
Feed em cake! Twist the story. Falsify a new reality.
My head swirls with conspiracy plots, armed militia filled with questionable purpose, and the spin masters who toss about looming threats of Marxism, Hitler, Stalin, and firmly state that black is white, no matter how you look at it. And, oh yeah, let the free market fix it. The free market, however, is, now, another quaint and misused phrase funded by uber-billionaires that care-less for you, me, or the woman struggling to feed her family by making and selling popsicles after they took her job and sent it to Pakistan. She’s inconsequential, as are the men, women and children in Pakistan’s sweat factories earning poverty wages making stuff to sell in America and elsewhere. Profits are the point.
So I’d guess that my last sentence makes me some sort of socialist/communist/marxist. Balderdash! But that’s how some categorize one who looks from the heart and through the words of honored spiritual leaders. “Silly folk. Well meaning, but oh so wrong.”
It’s all temporary. But not really. How we live today will impact tomorrow. And this brings me back to my grandchildren.
I’m comfortable knowing that opportunity can be theirs because they have a leg up over the majority of their contemporaries. The trick will be assuring that they find their connection to the true riches in life: A healthy planet, understanding their heart and soul, and then take their education and make a stand that melds the good from both ends of life’s spectrum for the greater good of all through hope and opportunity.
Unaga, An Elephant Seal Pup, Learns to Swim
Northern elephant seal pups born in the winter, spend their first 4 weeks with their mothers in a harem. After 4 weeks and a gain of about 10 pounds per day from a birth weight between 60-80 pounds, the 300 pound pup becomes a weaner when its mother returns to sea. The weaners rest unit about March, a time when most of the adult males and females have returned to sea. In March these youngsters teach themselves how to swim and dive. About the time April rolls around, they, too, leave the beach for the sea. The next time they return to their birth beach is around September.
Visit my blog ,
Neptune 911 For Kids,
to learn more about the
Northern Elephant Seal
and the Oceans
Scrubbing with Plastic Microbeads
Plastics are in everything—including our personal care products like toothpaste, facial scrubs, shaving cream, shower gels, and toilet bowl cleaners. Up to 10% of these products can contain polypropylene microbeads for the “scrubbing” effect.
The tiny, often not visible microbeads are meant to wash down the drain, which eventually winds up in the ocean.
“Invisible Consequences of Mistaking Plastic for Dinner”
Now, I’m planning a family barbecue featuring fresh caught tuna. Yum! Healthy, low fat protein. Unfortunately that tuna may still have high levels of BPAs and PCBs (for starters) in its system. It all began with ten lantern fish that ingested plastic debris floating in their fave plankton cafe. A couple of hungry squid dined on the 10 lantern fish. The tuna that I’m covering in a tasty chili rub, ate those two squid.
Solar users, beware! You are the enemy
When a business’s sales figures drop on the graph, a savvy business owner seeks ways to reverse the downward trend. As a self employed person and/or business… Read more “Solar users, beware! You are the enemy”
Coldwater Creek In Hot Water
My cousin texted me the news this morning—heartbroken to see her favorite store hit s&*t creek—but wild for the upcoming sales.
Memoir Writing. Narcissistic or a Gift?
Featured in Vibrant Nation “Why do you feel compelled to tell everyone your story?” a friend asked after reading my memoir-in-progress posts. I was unsure if she… Read more “Memoir Writing. Narcissistic or a Gift?”
The Muse Pallet 