butterflyeffect’s Neighborhood

is she a disease? doctor is she awful?

is she to blame for the disorder that pesters her so? i ask again - is she to blame?

 

she drops bitter pills, one by one, onto her tongue each evening before bed

five in a row with tapwater

though she abhors them, she knows they're her buoy when she's sinks

and so completes the nightly ritual

 

i know her.

she is made of daisies, of liquid swirling skies of sunsets

of insatiable passion flowing through her mazes

with royal orchids bleeding

 

her eyes emerald

her soul beautiful  

 

At work, we've had a few issues this past month. In my capacity as a supervisor, I oversee a small limb of a giant being, and I was told that there were reasons some of these issues arose, that I couldn't understand them. I was given explanations for my concerns, and I understood. It didn't make the past month's issues any easier, but I could see that there were greater machinations in place.

One thing I've learned in the past few years--as I had my little bouts with mortality--is that job issues aren't truly important. I love my job, but it's just a job--it doesn't identify me.

I like to think that when we die, we get answers to truly important questions. I like to think there's some sort of greater machination in place, that life's ugly little knots truly are part of a beautiful tapestry.

A couple months ago, I wrote about my friend Sara's daughter Eliza, who was to undergo a heart-lung transplant. I requested that you pray for her, or send good thoughts, or healing light--whatever you do. There was a spot of infection on the lungs, so ultimately the transplant wasn't possible. So they went back to waiting. In the Universe's greater machinations, another child got the heart transplant, and a shot at a healthy life.

I guess I want Somebody to explain why. Why Eliza didn't get that shot. Why she lived 17 years, sick the entire time, and she came thisfreakingclose. Hell, I'd love to know why she was born sick in the first place. Sara and Bubba were two of my best friends when I was at FSU, and they were both awesome people, so why?? And why did Eliza have to die on Christmas Day?

Sara sent a beautiful e-mail, and I'll be presumptuous enough to reprint part of it:

Recently someone wrote to me and told me the angels were pulling Eliza toward heaven but she keeps defying them. Well, early this morning the angels won. But, as Aunt Mindy said, it was a heck of a tug of war. God gave her to us and He wanted her back. She is in His arms this morning.

Christmas is the day where Christendom celebrates Jesus' birth, and that God was given human form to live among us and save us and bring us peace. I guess I'd wonder why kids like Eliza are born to suffer. But while her body suffered, her mind and spirit were amazing. She uplifted everyone around her, and--as Sara said--"Eliza lived the fullest of lives; there was no child on the planet more loved and who KNEW IT!"

Maybe in the greater machinations, Eliza wasn't afflicted with a curse, but blessed with a gift. Maybe her death on Christmas Day wasn't a tragedy. Maybe the fact that a grieving mother can be so positive and grateful…maybe that's the beautiful, miraclulous tapestry made up of seemingly cruel knots.

Md. county council pushes casino plan ahead for Arundel Mills

By John Wagner
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, December 22, 2009; B01 

Plans to put a slots casino at a Maryland outlet mall moved far closer to reality Monday night when the Anne Arundel County Council approved zoning for the 4,750-machine facility, breaking a stalemate that threatened to sink the project.

With a 4 to 2 vote, the council gave its blessing to the proposed casino at Arundel Mills mall, which would be the largest of five slots sites authorized in Maryland and one of the largest of its kind in the nation.

Cordish Cos., the project's Baltimore-based developers, must still obtain an array of permits before breaking ground, and several legal and other challenges loom. But zoning approval had emerged as the biggest hurdle for the casino, which Cordish has said could open by December 2011.

The state awarded the company a slots license two weeks ago, contingent on the council's zoning approval. For months, homeowners from neighborhoods around the mall have fought the legislation, voicing concerns about increased traffic and whether a casino would erode the mall's "family-friendly" atmosphere.

But those concerns were trumped Monday by the promise of the revenue that slots could bring to the state and the county.

"We need this money," council member Tricia L. Johnson (R-Davidsonville) told a packed council chamber as she urged her colleagues to pass "a proposal right in front of us."

 ___________________________

In my opinion, this is one more way the government will be stealing money . . . this time from gambling addicts who can't resist the thrill. The losers of course are the families of those who will throng the malls to pull the handles of fate.  These slots will no doubt bring in organized and unorganized crime, attract youngsters and seniors who hope to make up for the money being stolen in their future medicare benefits.

Living in California, there are so many casinos on tribal lands, I can only hope the slots don't come to Carlsbad.

  

Nothing says Christmas like a Bundt cake candle.

This Bundt cake candle infuses your home with the sweetness and light we associate with this blessed season.

As its five wicks burn, they release into the air an aroma that returns fond memories of your grandmother gliding across the room on Christmas Day, silken lavender polyester robe trailing, drenched in cheap perfume from the 5-and-dime.

Amid a lifelike glaze mounds of cream-colored wax dot the monstrosity (possibly the creation of a Hollywood Wax Museum fellow who ingested three too many tabs of LSD in his youth) like samples emptied from the cosmetic surgeon's liposuction sac.

Garnishments of hard brown plastic balls replicating nuts nearly bring a tear to the eye, a nod to holiday sentimentality, detail and the prevailing presence of cheap Chinese goods in the American market.

Above all, you can rest assured that friends and family, upon viewing this one-of-a-kind candle cake, will shout: "Happy Holidays! And Good God! Where on earth did you find such a hideous contraption?!"

And you'll smile sweetly, if not demurely, and with a wink of an eye and finger alongside the nose like Santa Claus rise up the chimney (pretend if you don't have one) and answer: "At the Goodwill, for 99 cents."

Then like Blitzen you'll hasten toward the skies, three paces ahead of a spinning burning bad Bundt hurled your direction by your aunt (and quite the pitcher's arm she has) with a hollering command of "Get this damn gawd-awful thing outta my sight!"

(and to it a good night)

Ah, Christmas, when shineth the Spirit of Truth. Nothing bespeaks the holiday like the tackiest candle ever birthed on the face of the Earth, a Bundt Cake Gone Bad.

To all my loyal readers, bless you, and to the occasional drop-ins amused by the oddball and unconventional, all animals and to each and all every one a Most Merry Christmas.

May your holiday burn brightly. And badly with a Bundt.

happy holidays to my lovely neighbors and may I present to you:

Holiday Randoms:

--It's been a good one so far - except for some of the family getting sick and us having to dodge each other so as not to pass it around.

--My brother and his wife stayed with me for a couple of nights. He's seven years younger than me and still I think he's more balanced, conscious and respectful than so many men my age. (and he must have told me he loved me five times before leaving.) :)

--My girl (well,woman I suppose now that17 is rapidly approaching) is and always has been so amazingly thoughtful and thankful on Christmas morning. She never was one of those kids who just rip through everything in 30 seconds. She always gives me a gift from her first. Then she opens one at a time, spending time looking at everything carefully and thanking me after every single thing. I adore this soul.

--Tomorrow Sarah and I are finally meeting and hanging out. Excited!

--Making a Red Velvet cake today. Inner Child: "Kind of secretly wanted to make it in the shape of Jesus. Then when we cut it...well, you get the idea.  I don't think Jesus would have a problem with it because I'm positive that he has a wicked sense of humor. He has to. Look at us. Plus he loves me."

--Whenever something drops or an unexpected noise is made, my head hears a tune to the sound of it. This is bizarre I know.

--Baby and Mary played the parts of, well, the virgin Mary and the Baby in the Nativity scene.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fort heureusement nos amis ailés sont moins dépourvus que les sans-abris humains quand l'hiver pointe son nez car ils disposent d'un plumage digne du meilleur des duvets montagnards. Par contre le froid leur impose je suppose des dépenses caloriques plus importantes nécessitant une recherche de nourriture plus active. C'est en ces moments que les oiseaux d'ordinaire plus farouches se rapprochent des maisons.

Une bergeronnette grise s'est enhardie au point de venir picorer en terrasse sans que la présence humaine l'effarouche outre mesure. Le rouge-gorge habitué au casse-croûtes ne fait pas le poids devant cet oiseau au coup de bec vif qui n'accepte aucun partage.
Le rouge-gorge assiste en spectateur au festin de la bergeronnette.

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Xavier aka Rudolph

Pour la paix sur la planète Terre :
Il faisait froid dehors, il neigeait, le soleil se levait et sur les vitres se gravaient des messages universels d'amour et de Paix autour de la nativité: Joyeux Noël, Paix et Amour à tous les peuples du Monde.

For Peace on the Earth