A Different Perspective
“It’s going to be a great weekend! We’re expecting sun and temperatures of 85Β°F!” my Mom enthused, from Seattle.
“We’re expecting a great weekend, too,” I enthused right back, “the temperature will be down to about 85Β°F and it’s going to RAIN!”
We laughed. It’s all a matter of perspective.
“We’re staying in this weekend,” said one of my co-mother-in-laws. “When it gets like this, we just hunker down.”
“We went out to the beach!” I crowed! I wanted to see the waves, and when the temperatures go down and it rains, I feel re-energied!”
We laughed. She’s married to a man from the Pacific Northwest, so this perspective is not new to her.
What was not funny was when I had just started a load of laundry, and the electricity went out. Electricity goes out all the time, or from time to time, with frequent thunder and lightning storms, but this time it went out and stayed out. Without the ceiling fans going, it wasn’t hot, but it got stuffy. We have a covered and protected area outside, so we went outside and sat and watched the gusting winds and the flying rain beating down our tomato plants. Mostly, the rain has been drizzling down, but for an hour or so, it really battered and flew about. It’s just a normal small storm, though, nothing like it could be, nothing like Hurricane Irene, which devastated the East Coast last weekend.
And it was a good thing. We have hurricane preparations, but . . . sometimes we rob the Hurricane supplies, or borrow them, and forget to put them back. While it was still daylight, I wanted to check on candles, matches, etc. and I discovered the matches had been MISPLACED. I finally found them. I gathered candles, and checked the weather station on my radio that you wind up during electrical outages (it worked fine) and started a list of additional things I want to gather to have on hand in case the electricity goes out for any length of time. It’s good to be prepared. π
Electricity is back on now, adventure over.
Sobering Reading on Wealth
It’s a long weekend, Labor Day weekend, and Pensacola awakes to rain-sodden streets and forecasts of a rain soggy three day weekend (bad for hotels and restaurants at the beach who hope for a sell-out Labor Day) and high surf from off-shore storms.
The reading for today from James is equally gloomy. I always think of “Insh’allah” when I read it, because it probably has an equivalent somewhere in the Quran, and my Muslim friends say “Insh’allah” (As God wills, or If God wills it) when they state a planned event.
While we are not rich, we have a large homeless population in Pensacola, sleeping out under the skies in hidden camps, scrounging for food, often with a dog, seeking handouts, seeking scraps. They are a constant reminder, to me, of how comfortable we are, and how comfort wars with the religious spirit. When we are too comfortable, we often fail to keep our focus on God, and are distracted by our toys and interests.
(I told you this would be gloomy.)
On the other hand, I wonder how spiritual I would be if I were hungry, worried about getting enough to eat, worried about my safety sleeping out in one of the camps. I wonder if their community looks after one another, or if it is a brutal and chaotic life. I wonder how you can keep your mind on things of the spirit when the search for basic necessities takes up a large part of your life.
James 4:13-5:6
13 Come now, you who say, βToday or tomorrow we will go to such and such a town and spend a year there, doing business and making money.β 14Yet you do not even know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. 15Instead you ought to say, βIf the Lord wishes, we will live and do this or that.β 16As it is, you boast in your arrogance; all such boasting is evil. 17Anyone, then, who knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, commits sin.
5Come now, you rich people, weep and wail for the miseries that are coming to you. 2Your riches have rotted, and your clothes are moth-eaten. 3Your gold and silver have rusted, and their rust will be evidence against you, and it will eat your flesh like fire. You have laid up treasure* for the last days. 4Listen! The wages of the labourers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, cry out, and the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts.
5You have lived on the earth in luxury and in pleasure; you have fattened your hearts on a day of slaughter. 6You have condemned and murdered the righteous one, who does not resist you.
Neighbors Key to Survival
“Americans don’t know their neighbors” my dinner guest said, in response to my asking him what surprises him most in his visit to this country. “In my country, we all know our neighbors. It’s important to know your neighbors.”
I agreed, and quoted him this article supporting his view that I heard on National Public Radio, one of those ideas I hear so often on NPR because they cover news other news sources ignore.
Below is just a portion of the story, which you can read in whole by clicking on this blue type. Even better, if you want, you can listed to the story yourself by clicking on the “Listen to the Story: All things Considered” button on this same page.
When Hurricane Katrina struck in 2005, one victim was political scientist Daniel Aldrich. He had just moved to New Orleans. Late one August night, there was a knock on the door.
“It was a neighbor who knew that we had no idea of the realities of the Gulf Coast life,” said Aldrich, who is now a political scientist at Purdue University in Indiana. He “knocked on our door very late at night, around midnight on Saturday night, and said, ‘Look, you’ve got small kids β you should really leave.’ ”
The knock on the door was to prove prophetic. It changed the course of Aldrich’s research and, in turn, is changing the way many experts now think about disaster preparedness.
Officials in New Orleans that Saturday night had not yet ordered an evacuation, but Aldrich trusted the neighbor who knocked on his door. He bundled his family into a car and drove to Houston.
“Without that information we never would’ve left,” Aldrich said. I think we would’ve been trapped.”
In fact, by the time people were told to leave, it was too late and thousands of people got stuck.
Because of his own experience in Katrina, Aldrich started thinking about how neighbors help one another during disasters. He decided to visit disaster sites around the world, looking for data.
Aldrich’s findings show that ambulances and firetrucks and government aid are not the principal ways most people survive during β and recover after β a disaster. His data suggest that while official help is useful β in clearing the water and getting the power back on in a place such as New Orleans after Katrina, for example β government interventions cannot bring neighborhoods back, and most emergency responders take far too long to get to the scene of a disaster to save many lives. Rather, it is the personal ties among members of a community that determine survival during a disaster, and recovery in its aftermath.
When Aldrich visited villages in India hit by the giant 2004 tsunami, he found that villagers who fared best after the disaster weren’t those with the most money, or the most power. They were people who knew lots of other people β the most socially connected individuals. In other words, if you want to predict who will do well after a disaster, you look for faces that keep showing up at all the weddings and funerals.
“Those individuals who had been more involved in local festivals, funerals and weddings, those were individuals who were tied into the community, they knew who to go to, they knew how to find someone who could help them get aid,” Aldrich says.
My visiting guest was from Lebanon, where neighbors have relied on one another for years as civil unrest rocks the country.
“I am guessing we move more often than your family and friends,” I ventured. “You are right, it is harder to establish long-lasting neighborly relations here where people come and go more often.”
Actually, we have settled in a fairly established neighborhood, where many people around us have lived for years and years, some all their lives. But we have only been here a year, and it takes time to build strong neighborly relations. But we are aware that connecting with our neighbors and staying connected is important in a part of the country vulnerable to life-threatening hurricanes and other natural emergencies.
You can listen to the entire report in 6 minutes and 3 seconds here.
Making My Doctor Happy
“You can cheat, you know,” my younger sister told me. “Just don’t eat meat for the week before your blood test.”
No, I didn’t know that! But I forgot, so I put off my appointment and blood test for another week, but I forgot again. Oh well. I took the test, cataloging all my mistakes (too much sugar, too much salt, too much meat, too much processed food) and went to my appointment with a sinking heart.
My doctor looked happy. He was kind of bouncing up and down with a big smile.
“Look at these readings!” he crowed! “We don’t often see turnarounds like this! Have you been exercising?”
“Yep! Three days a week!” I responded.
“Your blood pressure has dropped substantially.”
He is right. I am supposed to take it daily, and I’ve watched it fall back to where it was in my twenties.
“And your cholesterol dropped to 166! That’s 45 below your last reading!”
Holy cow! And I didn’t even cheat!
Even better, my triglycerides level has improved to optimal.
What surprises me is I haven’t had any side-effects, or not much. I had been concerned I would have a reaction, but I don’t feel any different, I don’t feel more health conscious or virtuous or like I’m being careful. It’s kind of amazing to me that small doses of medications can make such a difference.
I am switching my sources, however. The last refill I got (free) from the Navy Pharmacy disintegrated in the bottle. Maybe it’s the humidity in summer in Pensacola, but I ended up sort of estimating how much powder would equal a pill and licking it off my palm rather than go back there – again – and have to negotiate for a replacement. They make me feel like some kind of cheat or druggie when I ask to get a refill early because I am traveling. The last time, I had to show my airplane ticket to prove I was refilling early because I had to travel. (!) Is there a big black market for blood pressure medication???
I’m still dancing on air to have my readings come back so good . . . without cheating, LOL. π
Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand
Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand by Helen Simonson
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
I loved this book. It follows all the themes I love – how convention blinds us, how our cultural assumptions make us unconsciously snobbish and leads us to hideous behavior, it is very cultural and also very cross-cultural. Major Pettrigrew is widowed, and his grief has made him old. At the beginning of the book, his life seems very dull and grey. It lightens as his friendship sparks with Mrs. Ali, a widow who runs a small convenience market in his small English village. They both love reading (of course I love that part!) and they talk books, and sparks of warmth kindle.
This book is also very uncomfortable for me, as Roger has a grown son who bullies his father. The book isn’t just cross-cultural, it’s cross-generational, and I see glimpses of myself in the boorish behavior of his son toward his father.
There are some amusing scenes, some wickedly insightful village-interaction scenes, some painfully introspective moments, and some truly grand moments when everything becomes clear and a person acts. For me, there was an added bonus in that as I read Mrs. Ali’s words, I could hear them so clearly, and she spoke in the voice of a dear friend. I could picture her, because I could see the sweet smiling face of a dear friend. It was like having a great visit.
<a href=
20 Pounds of Diaper
In Pensacola, there is a wonderful fountain at the foot of Palofox, at the turnaround, and it is the perfect place for a toddler on a steamy day. They have all kinds of spurts of water coming up. The water changes height and force, so it is full of surprises for the young ones.
Scandalous, I know, that we just let him wear the diaper, but they get SOAKING wet!
There are also big fat pigeons and swift little sparrows to chase, and even a big egret out coaching the fishermen and women, hoping for a handout.
At the end, as we were getting ready to go, we changed the diaper and it weighed about 20 pounds, all water.
The Value of the Trivial
“Be sure to use your full name, First, maiden and married, on your quilt labels,” our presenter instructed us.
Oh-oh. I’ve been lucky just to get labels on my quilts, and I haven’t used my maiden name at all.
“Years from now, if someone is trying to track you as a quilter, it will help to have your maiden name to distinguish you from other quilters who may have similar names,” she continued.
OK. So now I will include my maiden name. (For my Moslem friends, it is our custom to take our husband’s names when we marry. Some women don’t, but even now, the majority do. I know, I know, it seems backward to you, it is irrational, it is just the way it is. We also don’t have marriage contracts.)
At lunch with a long-time friend this week, she mentioned she still has her mother’s diaries. I suggested she offer them to a major university near where my friend grew up, to their historical collection, and my friend said “oh, it’s just daily weather, who’s sick, stuff like that.”
Stuff like that is just exactly what historians treasure. When I was at university, I worked for a time in the copying department of the library, and I specialized in the historical collections, many of which were from people who came west. The papers were fascinating – letters home, lists of supplies they asked to have sent West, to-do lists, old photos. The scraps of paper you and I throw away – there in the Northwest collection.
They become valuable, at least for historical research, for writing period fiction, for medical research – because we do throw them away, and so few survive.
Keeping up with this blog has become more problematic. I just don’t have the time in my life I used to have. My life is interesting to me, but now that I am no longer living in exotic locations, I don’t believe I am so interesting to others. My internal debate is whether or not to continue. I would let it go in a heartbeat and not miss the time, but . . . I think I would miss your feedback.
I’m not writing this for you. I’m sort of writing more for my own record-keeping, it’s why I include news articles and scraps of daily life (not my own) and all the oddities and irrationalities that catch my eye. I love having a place to store it all (this blog) and I love your comments, which can sometimes completely turn me around in point of view; you give me perspectives I hadn’t considered.
The point of all this is the ephemeral nature of our daily lives, and the records of our lives. There are things worth keeping.
I wish someone in Kuwait were doing oral histories on the older people who were living there ‘before oil’.
“Feels Like . . . “
AdventureMan is at a meeting, and I had been thinking lunch at the beach later today when he gets home. At “feels like 120Β°F,” I think maybe not the beach today.
Oddly, while the temperatures are high, it hasn’t felt like the worst days of summer. I have tomatoes growing again, so some of our nights must be going below 70Β°F, and with the recent rains, the roses are blooming again and the lantana in the former pool area (not our doing, the original owner) is going bananas. The bees are busy, and I am hoping they will fertilize the eggplant, so the plant I have been nursing all summer will not have been for nothing. It FEELS like Fall is coming, in spite of the temperatures.
On my Weather Underground home page, I have temperatures for Doha and Kuwait also listed. Doha, nine hours ahead, has almost the same exact temperature at 6 pm that Pensacola has at 9 am. God’s mercy is showing in Doha, cooling the evening for the Ramadan celebrations. π
New Generation of Readers
Nothing could make me happier. The Happy Baby loves books! When he was born, one of my sisters sent a box, full of almost every classic book children love to read. Since then, AdventureMan and I have been supplementing with all our own favorites. Happy Baby loves to sit in a lap and read a book, and he is also happy reading on his own.
He LOVES trucks and buses and cars, LOL, he is all boy:
This weekend the Happy Baby discovered heaven-on-earth – the Pensacola National Aviation Museum. He loves the cockpits, with all those buttons and levers and wheels. He only screamed when it was time to move on to the next exhibit.
I was babysitting the other day and they left us with the iPad, which he also loves. I thought I knew how things worked, but I was wrong. I didn’t know anything about Angry Birds or Zombies in the Garden, and he showed me. 18 months old. I just had to laugh. Already, I am learning from him!
Full Moon, More Babies, More Loonies
“Are you awake?” asked AdventureMan.
“Yep.” I answered.
“I can’t sleep.” he complained.
“Must be the fool moon,” I responded. (Update: I meant ‘full’ but that synapse failed to connect)
Maybe not so far from right – strange things happen when the moon is full. Emergency rooms are full, more babies are born and people can act a little loony. This is from AOL / Huffington Post:
Strange things seem to happen when there’s a full moon, especially in the hospital.
That’s where an incredible 45 babies entered the world last weekend in Sacramento, Calif., according to FOX 40. But some say the mini “baby boom” was no accident.
Throughout a period of 48 hours, doctors at Sacramento’s Sutter Memorial delivered 45 newborns– a possible record for deliveries in a two-day period for the city, stated hospital spokesperson Gary Zavoral. While some doctors joke that the high number of births could be attributed to the full moon, hospital officials hint that the speculation might not be that far out. After all, menstruation and ovulation more or less follow a lunar cycle, so why can’t childbirth be affected, too?
The theory of the lunar effect on births is based off the fact that the moon’s gravitational pull causes high tides. Since the human body is made up of 80 percent water, the pull is believed to speed along the childbirth process, according to Discovery Health.
However, several studies suggest that the idea of the lunar effect influencing the number or frequency of deliveries is just, well, looney.
In 2005, researchers from Mountain Area Health Education Center in North Carolina analyzed almost 600,000 births across 62 lunar cycles. The data were retrieved from birth certificates from 1997 to 2001. The result? No significant differences in the frequency of births across the eight stages of the moon.
Scientific data doesn’t put old myths to bed, though. The anecdote of the lunar effect is a longstanding one, and some medical professionals won’t deny that things get pretty hectic when the full moon is out.
“I think if you talk to anybody on the front lines of the hospital, emergency room doctors, labor and delivery, etc. itβs always like that on the full moon, everyone for some reason is really busy,” Matthew Guile, a doctor at Sutter Memorial, told Fox 40.
Recent Comments
ExpatAlien on What Country am I Living … intlxpatr on Yellowstone: Old Faithful to C… Michelle on Yellowstone: Old Faithful to C… Cathy on No Grown-Ups in Charge intlxpatr on Waiting for Snow Wikipedia Donate Button
Amazina
Early Voting in Florida
Here There and Everywhere 