A POEM BY JUDGE DENNIS CHALLEEN

 My Firstborn Son Lives in a Small Box, a Cell

 

By Judge Dennis Challeen

We want them to have self-worth

So we destroy their self-worth

We want them to be responsible

So we take away all responsibility

We want them to be positive and constructive

So we degrade them and make them useless

We want them to be trustworthy

So we put them where there is no trust

We want them to be non-violent

So we put them where violence is all around them

We want them to be kind and loving people

So we subject them to hatred and cruelty

We want them to quit being the tough guy

So we put them where the tough guy is respected

We want them to quit hanging around losers

So we put all the losers under one roof

We want them to quit exploiting us

So we put them where they exploit each other

We want them to take control of their lives, own problems and quit being a parasite...

So we make them totally dependent on us

Gut Instincts........ by Julianna Rowe aka Diane Ogden

 

My friend and mentor always told me to make decisions using my "gut." You know, as in "gut instincts?" Well, it stinks alright because what starts in my head ends up like scrambled eggs or Humpty Dumpty that can't get put back together again....Or like a big ball of unraveling string. And we are all learning or have learned that what we think is what we get. Oh great, now I can think about how I can be put back together again, like Humpty or Scrambled Eggs. If made incorrectly without following the "gut instinct," some decisions could have those not-so-good consequences. Yikes...how to cut the ball of unraveling string that leads to the heart and causes heart strings, and those strings don't live too far from the poor "gut" that is trying to unravel the mess and come out with a clear answer.

Sometimes I don't do anything regarding a decision that allows life to decide for me...again, not-so-good, I have found out through trial and error. How much error can the mind and body handle? Pretty much from my experience. Not that I wish to experience such again. Letting life make my journey vs. mwah, that is!

 So, is my gut half full or half empty?  Or is my brain half full or half empty?  Don't answer that!

The Thorny Stem Keep the blossom Alive By Julianna Rowe aka, Diane Ogden

The Thorny Stem

I often work out of my car, so listening to Audio Books has replaced negative politics and talk radio. The last book was a true story by Richard Paul Evans called "Finding Noel." It wasn't hostile, but I cried while driving around the city for four hours while listening to that book. Well, one hour of it, anyway. Richard's Mother died. No one could find him; therefore, he missed her funeral. That was just the beginning of this four-hour story. Richard decided to end his life after losing his scholarship, his job, his fiance of four years, and then his Mother when a young girl came upon him in the middle of a snowstorm. Yes, he fell in love with her. Her name was Macy, and her Mother died when she was 6. The Father was a drug addict. Therefore, she was separated from her baby sister Noel, age 4. The prominent family adopted Noel, and somebody beat Macy constantly at her new home. Macy ran away, and a woman named Jo saved Macy from a shelter on Thanksgiving years later. (Sure, right, Thanksgiving!)

Richard talked Macy into finding her long-lost sister after he was hired to play guitar at the Java Junction, where she worked. To cut this short, Jo adopted Macy even tho she was an adult.  Jo died of Cancer....Noel found Macy.....they had each been given a Christmas Ornament from their natural Mother before she died, with Noel written on it. Noel accidentally broke hers while in college and found a letter from her real Mother inside telling Noel the truth that her adoptive family refused to do. The girls figured their dead Mother made the ornament break. I believe that. Richard found out his Father wasn't his Father while visiting his Mother's grave. Stu, the stand-in "Father," showed Richard a gravestone that belonged to his real Father and the man his Mother had loved all her life. He was killed in Vietnam and was an avid guitar player. (Go figure)

And that is why Stu never treated Richard very well. Ah Ha! Well, all ended happily....Macy and Richard married and had three children. What's my point?

My dream was to help children who needed love by adopting them. So I did that for a few years. In fact, both of my precious foster girls graduated, have had children, and are doing well.  People don't realize what these children go through, but I seem to understand.

At the end of Richard's book, he says we "fixate on the blossoms.....when it is the thorny stem that keeps the blossom alive." It keeps the plant alive only to get a few blossoms throughout its life. I say we are the same as the rose. We must learn to appreciate the everyday thorns because without them there is no life and no blossoms, ever.

Don't ya hate it when people try to give you a fast rundown of a book they just read!  Me too!

photo from NatashaP at www.flickr.com

I Ate Dog Food! By Julianna Rowe, aka Diane Ogden

 

While I was grocery shopping the other day, which is more like preparing for outer space travel considering the prices and choices versus the average pocketbook, I decided to buy a "can" of beef hash. God only knows why I did that because I don't eat canned beef hash. I eat organic foods and some Healthy Choice dinners and so on. But there it was this morning in the pan with the egg. Then the scent came rushing upwards (like at take-off) into all my senses, and those senses said, "Dog food!" I swear it smelled like the cheap cans of dog food I used to occasionally heat up for my dog Gracie Allen. Even her organic dog food smelled better than this beef hash smelled. So I made a conscious decision to attempt to eat it, thinking maybe it was purchased out of some beautiful hidden memory from childhood or one of the better minutes of one of my better marriages. Not! It smelled and tasted like lousy dog food, and I will never buy it or eat it again unless it is all there is to go with the bread we will get in the depression bread lines. 

Eeewww. Stop that talk!

Fruit Cake Lady! by Julianna Rowe aka Diane Ogden

 

My helper and I arrive at my Psychiatrist Client's home around noon. Upon arrival, we see she is home which never happens. You see we have never met her, she hired me sight unseen.
So in we go.... After all the greetings and more salutations, we comment on the wonderful aroma in the air. The psychiatrist says, "Mother is visiting (age 90) and making her famous fruitcake. If you are lucky you will leave with one, and if you are not you won't."  

My helper and I finished our work, all the time believing we might get to share the physical sense of said aroma. As I silently watched Grandma sitting in her rocking chair reading, and secretly wondering why she hadn't gotten up to wrap up those two mini fruitcake loaves for us. But there was time. Then I made it a point to tell her I was going to finish up the foyer on my way out. She said it was nice meeting us and we responded likewise. We left and quietly walked to my car....still in great hopes the old lady would hail us back to retrieve two wonderful fruit cakes. Instead, I looked at my helper and said. 

"I guess we aren't lucky huh?" 

My helper said. 

"Guess not!"  

All the time I was thinking about what a weird and wrong thing for a psychiatrist to say to us. Just in case Grand Mommie Dearest did not give us a fruitcake, which in fact happened! 

I know we are lucky anyway.... just thought the comment interesting. What would the shrinks shrink say was her reason? Wait a minute....you don't think that unlucky thing had anything to do with me forgetting to rinse the pan I made my ham and cheese omelet in this morning, do you? I took one bite and tasted Dawn dish soap. The dog wouldn't even eat it!  Yeh, that was a stretch.

Or, I better speak to that unlucky stream of words someone sent me and erase it from my Facebook just in case! No more losing fruitcakes for me. My guard is up! 

People can be so interesting!  One cannot take anything personally! Lucky me.

Observe Dont Absorb by Julianna Rowe, aka Diane Ogden

About thirty-some-odd years ago, I gave my heart to pull a family back together.

My mentor always told me to be an observer and not a participant! Obviously, I didn't listen. It doesn't matter the reason the family was torn apart, but it was. I forgave, gave, pulled, plugged, and lost most of myself on that darn journey, only to discover they wouldn't change at anything I did. Nope, not, nadda. Incredibly stubborn Germans and Norwegians, and then add some of the "dead people" generational cells that LOVE to carry on the crap....and that they do with magnificence. (Wouldnt want to give them too much glory) 

There came a time back then when I decided to divorce my emotions from all of them before my heart took a dive, and one of my kinfolks might try for the last win and bury me in the dirt vs. cremation as I had requested. That particular kin fed me things I was allergic to, so why wouldn't that specific person bury me in the dirt? That person would so that they could have a big luncheon dealie to show off. That's what Lutherans do, you know.  Big luncheons for the living after the dying.

Back to my point. D I V O R C E.....where is George Jones's wife when I need her! What was her name? It starts with L...no a T, Tammy Wynette.  D I V O R C E. Even though my divorce was a divorce of emotions, it still stood for a legal and final separation. My mentor told me that I should maintain decency and kindness when I got divorced.  She said, "Treat it like you would treat the Grocery Store Checker Boy!" With decency and kindness.  Most people can barely do that in everyday family situations.

I say dysfunctional families are more like an egg. They "start out ass-es," and they stay ass-es. If you read my blog posts, you know how I dislike the raw egg laying in the pan with that white milky umbilical cord waiting for me to eat it. I don't, and I won't! Family is the same! We start with the umbilical cord, and someone cuts it, but the spiritual milky cloudy (ghosts) still try to hang on and hang out! Some can let them go, some cannot, and some try to work around the darn things. (The Ghosts, I mean) I did that, and it didn't work. I did do something wrong. I tried too hard. I should have OBSERVED only and saved myself.

Today was another should have OBSERVED only day. I wanted to play like Marie Osmond and drive up the coast (we have no coast) until there was no end or I ran out of gas. It was a long day—lots of "Stinkin Thinkin" and a lot of Drama from the Mama like a soap opera. (Obviously, I absorbed) I like creativity, not so much drama.  I had a lifetime of it, and enough is enough.

I’m emotionally ready for:  "Paper or Plastic?" Easy peasy. 

It's a new day, a good day, because I learned to observe not absorb. 

Which Dating Site? by Julianna Rowe aka Diane Ogden

 Which Dating Site?  by Julianna Rowe, aka Diane Ogden

 My sister-in-law urged me to join a dating site, so I did.  She once told me to get a job selling insurance, so I did, and I was very successful.  She tells me all the time that I am not in charge. God is. Her Dad tells her that, so she passes it on to me. Not sure why because I know that.  Back to match.com, Silver Singles, E Harmony, and or OurTime.  So I filled out the questionnaire and answered everything as truthfully as possible without scaring anyone off, then submitted nine photos. 

The main photo is me with my hair in rollers.  I just had to do it.  The good pics were only a click away if the prospective man could handle the rollers.  And so, they did click away, that is. 

I met up with one fellow, certainly not a "gentleman," as he asked me what I would like, and I said, "Ice Tea," which, after two hours, I had never received.  No manners!  I almost forgot; one of the first things he said to me was, "Do you have to wear those glasses?" RED FLAG! Need I say more? And he wanted me to go snowshoeing in the woods.  I could borrow his sister's snow shoes.  Seriously?  No, thank you... If I couldn't get ice tea out of him, I am liable not to get back out of the woods with any help from him what-so-ever.  And fishing?  Nope, he should have friends by now, men who like to be quiet and watch a string hang in the water for hours.  I would be working on my 25,000 woman words a day and scaring the fish away!  

The next guy never stopped talking about the roller photo.  He didn't understand why I would do such a thing. First of all, he had no sense of humor. If he got 220 emails, he would also put up an ugly one first. But of course, I didn’t want to say that. He then told me I must not like adoration. So yes, I looked it up.  

Adoration: The act of paying honor, as to a divine being; worship. Reverent homage. Fervent and devoted love. And after ten emails with him, it was still under discussion, so, I deleted the "pretty boy."

I haven't given up, but so far, 85% of them want a slender, athletic body-toned woman.  Yet they look like they are about to deliver.  Twins that is.  Men!  They just don't care about what's under the boob....its all about the boobs.  I am not fat, and I have boobs and a heart under one of 'em that will continue looking for a nice fellow that will go fishing without me.  I'm just not that into it.  And the more I think about it, I might not be that into this dating site crap either.  Sorry sister-in-law, this is like too much work.       

But I am keeping the door open for a fellow who would like good conversation, laughter, a dance in the kitchen, wandering around the grocery store together,  dinner out on occasion, and a road trip to anywhere.   Rollers not included.