I enjoy running (more like shuffling) around the house barefoot although my old feet have not only betrayed me, but demanded support, arch support. I also don't mind being asked to take off my shoes at other people's houses, I'm comfortable that way, but I don't care if guests or residents wear their shoes in mine. I'm all about comfort (ask anyone). I want my guests to do whatever is most comfortable for them--shoes or no shoes. My main reason for that is that I am running a home, not a carpet preserve. I know a carpet gets more dirty and worn when people walk on it in shoes. I want it to get dirty and worn. In ten years I will be tired of the carpet and want to replace it, but I am biologically wired not to replace anything until the old one is broken. Unless someone's boots are tracking in mud or manure, tracking in dirt is just contributing to the cause of someday getting new carpet. You're welcome.
Wood floors are very popular now but that doesn't solve the floor problem. Many people are so fussy about their wood floors you would think they have to be cleaned with platinum. Some of them are so protected with rugs you can't even see the wood much less get it dirty, like those (reportedly) beautiful wood tables that owners perpetually cover with pads or tablecloths. If no one will ever see the wood you might as well save your money and buy press board. But, to get off the table and on the floor, I prefer carpet. Our home didn't come with buried hardwood floors that just need refinishing; we would have to start from square (foot) one.
My daughter prefers to put wood and tile in the houses they remodel because they have two dogs and carpet, although/because the dogs love it, gets nasty in no time. But as we have seen in our rooms with tile, vinyl etc. the dog hair just rolls itself into fanciful clumps and hides under the furniture. It's still there and even more alarming in bunny size. I prefer carpet because, unless you have a heated floor, it is warmer. This is Montana. Warm trumps pretty. Yes, the carpet collects dog hair, but that just makes it warmer. When we bought carpet for our first home, a trailer (we were too poor to call it a mobile home) in Helena , we were smart enough to buy a remnant that matched the dog we had at the time. You can reverse this process if you are between dogs and match the dog to your carpet but you may have to avoid the more bizarre shades of carpet. You should probably do that anyway, no matter what the decorating programs or polite guests tell you, bizarre is ugly.
So feel free to walk in my house in your shoes--or even mine. The carpet is there for the comfort and convenience of the people in the home, not the other way around.
Sunday, August 14, 2011
Life--condensed version
I think everyone at some point in their life should have a dog. This is not just because of how good it feels to come home to someone who greets us ecstatically and adores everything we say and do, or even because talking to the dog doesn't seem as strange as talking to ourselves . People should have a dog because dogs show us life--the condensed version. Remember those Reader's Digest abridged books? They could fit three classic books in the amount of pages the author allotted for one. Dogs, in their brief span on earth, have a lot to teach us about life.
Thirteen years ago when our dog, Garth, was a puppy he followed us around like a . . .well, you know. When he was in his toddler phase and we took him for a walk he stayed close by our heels because that was where he felt safe, much like any preschooler. A couple months later when Garth was in his "teens" he ran ahead, regardless of what we told him. He was satisfied with occasional glances back in our direction just to make sure we were around somewhere. Sound familiar? This was followed by many happy years of companionship with our adult dog. That is the stage of life Reed and I are in now, enjoying our grown children.
But Garth is now in his late life stage. He has a hard time getting his hips off the floor. Sometimes he will leave a tossed chunk of food laying on the carpet rather than get up, a sacrifice that would have been unthinkable before. Garth is now stone deaf and has nearly lethal breath. The white on his muzzle is spreading to the top of his head. He has grown a bumper crop of fatty tumors. He still loves going for walks but lags further and further behind. When I wait for him to catch up, he seems embarrassed. He pants for quite a while after we get home and drinks a lot of water. I have begun to shorten our morning walks.
What have I learned from a non-English speaking teacher one fourth my age? Besides seeing 70 plus years of human life condensed into little over a decade, I have learned cleanliness is next to loneliness, not godliness. The companionship of a pet more than makes up for the hair. It is important to stop and smell the roses (and everything else) as we pass through life. The same old routine can be exciting if you have enough imagination (poor pattern recognition and/or minimal intelligence). Now that Garth is deaf and we both suffer from arthritic knees, I learn that the goodness of life is not about what we can do, it's about who we have. When Garth dies we will learn anew to grieve and move on to love again. A dog's love is not undying, but it is unconditional. If unconditional love is all we learn from our pet's condensed life, it is more than enough.
Thirteen years ago when our dog, Garth, was a puppy he followed us around like a . . .well, you know. When he was in his toddler phase and we took him for a walk he stayed close by our heels because that was where he felt safe, much like any preschooler. A couple months later when Garth was in his "teens" he ran ahead, regardless of what we told him. He was satisfied with occasional glances back in our direction just to make sure we were around somewhere. Sound familiar? This was followed by many happy years of companionship with our adult dog. That is the stage of life Reed and I are in now, enjoying our grown children.
But Garth is now in his late life stage. He has a hard time getting his hips off the floor. Sometimes he will leave a tossed chunk of food laying on the carpet rather than get up, a sacrifice that would have been unthinkable before. Garth is now stone deaf and has nearly lethal breath. The white on his muzzle is spreading to the top of his head. He has grown a bumper crop of fatty tumors. He still loves going for walks but lags further and further behind. When I wait for him to catch up, he seems embarrassed. He pants for quite a while after we get home and drinks a lot of water. I have begun to shorten our morning walks.
What have I learned from a non-English speaking teacher one fourth my age? Besides seeing 70 plus years of human life condensed into little over a decade, I have learned cleanliness is next to loneliness, not godliness. The companionship of a pet more than makes up for the hair. It is important to stop and smell the roses (and everything else) as we pass through life. The same old routine can be exciting if you have enough imagination (poor pattern recognition and/or minimal intelligence). Now that Garth is deaf and we both suffer from arthritic knees, I learn that the goodness of life is not about what we can do, it's about who we have. When Garth dies we will learn anew to grieve and move on to love again. A dog's love is not undying, but it is unconditional. If unconditional love is all we learn from our pet's condensed life, it is more than enough.
Me Time
It seems fast food commercials are trying to make us selfish: "Have it your way.", "Be good to yourself.", and now "Me time". I don't think this is a sentiment we need to encourage. If your me is anything like my me, 70 percent of the time is "me time" and that is only because for the other 30 percent we are asleep. That doesn't mean that I'm giving myself a treat (in this case, McDonald's iced coffee) on a minute by minute basis, but even when I am working or doing something for other people, I am still thinking about me. This is not an anomaly, it is the normal human condition. Ego centrism is present in newborns who may never in their lifetime learn the term. It is a good thing for babies to know and communicate what they want or they wouldn't survive infancy. The problem is we never really outgrow it. Having commercials reminding us to be good to ourselves is about as necessary as having doctors remind us to breathe and swallow.
I'm not a total narcissist. I work part time in home health as a caregiver--the real kind, not the marijuana kind. I enjoy my job because I think old people are the bomb, but that doesn't mean there aren't some for whom I wish I had a bomb, including one I shop for voluntarily. I enjoy sharing the hospitality of my home, especially the part where I get to feed people. Food is my love language. If you eat my food, you are accepting my love. I actually enjoy a pleasure more if I get to share it, especially with someone who might not have that opportunity otherwise. My conscious intention is to use my resources, especially time, for Christ but my default drive is set to "me time". So is yours.
God has given us many good things to make our time on earth enjoyable and it would be foolish and ungrateful refuse his gifts. So go ahead and give yourself that treat. But let's be honest, it's always Me Time.
I'm not a total narcissist. I work part time in home health as a caregiver--the real kind, not the marijuana kind. I enjoy my job because I think old people are the bomb, but that doesn't mean there aren't some for whom I wish I had a bomb, including one I shop for voluntarily. I enjoy sharing the hospitality of my home, especially the part where I get to feed people. Food is my love language. If you eat my food, you are accepting my love. I actually enjoy a pleasure more if I get to share it, especially with someone who might not have that opportunity otherwise. My conscious intention is to use my resources, especially time, for Christ but my default drive is set to "me time". So is yours.
God has given us many good things to make our time on earth enjoyable and it would be foolish and ungrateful refuse his gifts. So go ahead and give yourself that treat. But let's be honest, it's always Me Time.
Friday, August 12, 2011
Something More
There was more to him than the blond hair and long, red beard I noticed when I first met him that January day. More to him than the too slender build and pale complexion that made me think he had been a sickly child. He had more to share than the few sentences we exchanged on our long, first trip together when he gave me a ride back to college. In the months to come I would learn that he had the persistence to keep loving me in spite of numerous rejections, and in spite of me. So, in spite of myself, I began to return his love. There is something irresistible about someone who loves you.
It was not love at first sight, or second, or even tenth. There was more to it than that. And, having found something more, I have wanted nothing more.
It was not love at first sight, or second, or even tenth. There was more to it than that. And, having found something more, I have wanted nothing more.
My Heart to Break
Apart from being a victim of violent crime or weather, there are few things in life that leave you as vulnerable as loving someone. For that reason most of us station guards around our hearts to keep out all intruders. That is why I was both amazed and frightened to realize I loved one of my spare sons as much as my own children. I knew he would break my heart, not by his alcoholism or many other faults, but by leaving me. I knew from the moment I met Lance that he was the kind who walks away. Everything I learned about his life only made this more certain, but it was too late. God had bonded us together, it was too late to call the guards, my wall had already been breached. When he left our house for the last time two years and four months later, it was almost a relief. At least the waiting was over. I knew how to lose someone I loved, that was sadly familiar territory.
In God's recycling program experiences are never wasted. In October 2008 I came down with Grave's disease of the thyroid, on Thanksgiving Day Lance left, in mid December I had my overactive thyroid irradiated and in a one of a kind reaction to that, began writing poetry. By the time it became apparent I was not going to hear from Lance, I had poetry as an outlet for those feelings. I do not know the end of this story, nor even how I want it to end. God is the author. But I know that the God who did not waste bread, fish or a dying thyroid would never waste my love.
There is a Billy Joel song that expresses well the vulnerability that love entails. The first verses express his unwillingness to open his heart and be hurt, but recognition of the mistake of passing love by. The final verse of "And So It Goes" says:
So I will choose to be with you
as if the choice were mine to make.
But you can make decisions too
and you can have this heart to break.
And so it goes, and so it goes
And you're the only one who knows.
Whenever you let someone into your heart, you are giving them access from which to break it, but that pain is preferable to the deadness of never letting it be broken. That is why God has asked us to love so many so much. He can heal a broken heart, those with numb hearts will never see the need. The best consolation I have found when I have lost someone is knowing that I loved them as much as I could for as long as I could. And so it goes, and so it goes and God's the only one who knows.
In God's recycling program experiences are never wasted. In October 2008 I came down with Grave's disease of the thyroid, on Thanksgiving Day Lance left, in mid December I had my overactive thyroid irradiated and in a one of a kind reaction to that, began writing poetry. By the time it became apparent I was not going to hear from Lance, I had poetry as an outlet for those feelings. I do not know the end of this story, nor even how I want it to end. God is the author. But I know that the God who did not waste bread, fish or a dying thyroid would never waste my love.
There is a Billy Joel song that expresses well the vulnerability that love entails. The first verses express his unwillingness to open his heart and be hurt, but recognition of the mistake of passing love by. The final verse of "And So It Goes" says:
So I will choose to be with you
as if the choice were mine to make.
But you can make decisions too
and you can have this heart to break.
And so it goes, and so it goes
And you're the only one who knows.
Whenever you let someone into your heart, you are giving them access from which to break it, but that pain is preferable to the deadness of never letting it be broken. That is why God has asked us to love so many so much. He can heal a broken heart, those with numb hearts will never see the need. The best consolation I have found when I have lost someone is knowing that I loved them as much as I could for as long as I could. And so it goes, and so it goes and God's the only one who knows.
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
Lift Us Up Where We Belong
I have noticed it is in fashion for young women to display visible bra straps. When I was in high school it was perfectly acceptable to wear no bra, but a mortal embarrassment to have a strap showing. The braless look was especially popular among the young hippy girls but had the unfortunate, inevitable side effect of causing "the girls" to rest near the hips at a young age. Some of my U of M classmates had to bend over to fasten their belts. I have a friend who sells designer bra straps with lace, rhinestones etc. This is not a good idea for those of us who must wear industrial strength bras with their wide straps. People might assume that in a middle aged muddle we had somehow tangled our belt over our shoulders. I am not a pilot, but have lived among them long enough to know getting heavy objects off the ground requires a significant amount of lift, thrust and hardware. There's a reason you don't see a lot of rhinestones in a hardware store. Let's take that as a sign--a "Wide Load" sign.
Results Not Typical
I'm sure there is a rule of grammar somewhere that says not to start an essay with the word because, however now that I started with the phrase above, that rule no longer applies since it will be in the second sentence. Because we live in an age of litigation (brought on by an overabundance of lawyers, and the fact that the only elected officials capable of restraining them are also lawyers), we also live in an age of disclaimers like the title above. Disclaimers provide the legal loophole that protects a company from lawsuits if their product does not do what their advertising so brazenly proclaims it will. And as oxymoronic as it sounds, we also live in a age of gullible cynicism (or cynical gullibility if you prefer). On one hand some people are cynical enough to believe that there is a vast conspiracy among thousands of independent physicians, many of whom became doctors so that no one could tell them what to do (and to get paid to tell other people what to do) to hide the benefits of certain health products, on the other hand those same people are gullible enough to buy products proven only by anecdotal evidence.
The reason we believe that pills will burn away our fat, a special diet will prevent cancer or a topical cream will remove cellulite is because we want good health and looks--as long as it is easy. To quote X-Files, we want to believe. Advertisers know that given a choice between cheap and easy the public will choose easy. Advertisers choose easy also; producing scientific evidence for the effectiveness of a product is hard, finding someone willing to appear on TV in before and after pictures is easy. Slapping a "Results Not Typical" disclaimer somewhere on the ad is also easy. Their toned, cancer and cellulite free butts are covered.
Products which have been scientifically studied, even FDA approved, have even more disclaimers. The prescription drug touting its health benefits on one page of a magazine is followed by two pages of warnings of possible side effects--like death. Looking at the picture in the ad is easy, reading two pages of side effects is hard. Learning the name of the drug to ask our doctor for is hard enough, we can't be expected to read the small print too. Besides, if there is a problem, there are also plenty of ads from attorneys hunting for people who have been harmed by medications. Working to earn and save money is hard, suing your way to wealth is easy. Fortunately it is also easy to read this blog and reading it will make you smarter and better looking.
Results Not Typical
The reason we believe that pills will burn away our fat, a special diet will prevent cancer or a topical cream will remove cellulite is because we want good health and looks--as long as it is easy. To quote X-Files, we want to believe. Advertisers know that given a choice between cheap and easy the public will choose easy. Advertisers choose easy also; producing scientific evidence for the effectiveness of a product is hard, finding someone willing to appear on TV in before and after pictures is easy. Slapping a "Results Not Typical" disclaimer somewhere on the ad is also easy. Their toned, cancer and cellulite free butts are covered.
Products which have been scientifically studied, even FDA approved, have even more disclaimers. The prescription drug touting its health benefits on one page of a magazine is followed by two pages of warnings of possible side effects--like death. Looking at the picture in the ad is easy, reading two pages of side effects is hard. Learning the name of the drug to ask our doctor for is hard enough, we can't be expected to read the small print too. Besides, if there is a problem, there are also plenty of ads from attorneys hunting for people who have been harmed by medications. Working to earn and save money is hard, suing your way to wealth is easy. Fortunately it is also easy to read this blog and reading it will make you smarter and better looking.
Results Not Typical
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