Big Girl Pants

of pottery and willow

today is the ninth anniversary of the most horrible attack against americans on our soil.  it's the anniversary of pottery and willow.  and there is no doubt that the heinous act our world witnessed on that beautiful tuesday morning has irrevocably changed our world forever.  i know that on that morning all those years ago my world changed forever.

i imagine it's much like those who survived a major illness or a tragic accident or a war.  when i think back on things that have happened in my life there is now a "before" and an "after".  and for me, no matter how wonderful a thing is that's happened since 9/11, in the after, it's never as wonderful as it would have been if it had happened before.

for a long time i struggled to grasp the enormity of the tragedy - to fully comprehend that what i witnessed when i stepped out of my shower on that fateful day was NOT a hollywood special effect.  to understand that my tears were for real people: mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, sons, daughters, aunts, uncles from all religions, all colors and all walks of life.  it was a tragedy that BEFORE i could never have imagined and now, after, i can never forget.

the pictures of the planes hitting the towers are strangely absent from the images being presented on television by the mainstream media.  they claim the images are inflammatory against those who practice islam.  but they're wrong.  we need the images - not only so that we who were old enough to truly bear witness to the horror committed remember, and not only so that those who weren't alive can witness it for themselves so that they understand how awful it was for our country and the world,  but also to remind those who did this to us that we remember WHAT they did and WHO they are.

with each passing year the accute pain that i experienced on that fateful morning diminishes just a little bit.  but my soul is still frayed and my heart is still broken - as it will always be.  and although i'm unable to say HOW the world would have been different had those men not boarded those four planes and crashed into the world trade center towers, or the pentagon or that isolated pennsylvania field, i know that it would be.

and while the attack of 11 september 2001 isn't still a raw, open wound, i am still tempted to fear what the future holds.  but i fight that fear each morning i wake to face the day.  i take comfort in the fact that i have my children and my granddaughter and both my parents and my sisters and cousins and aunts and uncles - all of whom love me and i love deeply in return.  i take heart in the friendships - old and new - christians, jews and muslims - and the uprising of patriots and conservatives around the globe. 

i have faith in the greater good that leads us forward to our future.  i know that we emerged from this national - no, global tragedy - stronger than we had ever been.  and even though we have recently faultered in our knowledge of our role in the world, i know that individually (and as a country) there are even greater things in store for us than we could possibly know at this point.

jeremiah 29:11 promises us that god knows the plans he has for us, plans to prosper us and not harm us; plans to give us hope and a future.  i trust in that scripture.  we also know through several scriptures that god either orchestrates or allows all things to happen to best glorify him.  i don't pretend to understand what god intends, i only know that although it was - and still is personal - i trust that god is in control. 

i'm still crying, but through my tears i see a time when i - and we - will surmount our pain and fears.  i see a time when others will join us in our steadfast resolve to rid the world of those who mean all who do not believe as they do harm.  i see a time when we will stop apologizing for our strengths and fortunes and use those strengths and fortunes, once again, for true good.

yes, it's still personal - but maybe, just maybe, i see a light at the end of the tunnel.  do you see it too?

do you remember? - redub

in 2007 i ran this post - given the stupidness of what's happening now, i felt it appropriate to run it again today.  a few things in my post should be changed - our current student is mongolian and i'm living in cali and not kc and it's been eight years now instead of six; but that's about it.  i still work from home and i still cry at the thought of those planes.  hitting the towers.  hitting our pentagon.  going down at the hands of those aboard to spare further horror in that pennsylvania field.

for those whom this attack was personal in 2001, it still is, it always will be.  and because it was personal to some very close to me, it's personal for me too.  i believe it should be personal for all of us.  i hope my readers agree...

______________________________________________________________________________________

do you remember?

i do.  so do our braves sons and daughters standing in harm's way around the world.  and so do the terrorists.

sitting here, working from home, watching the memorial services and it's all so fresh.  from the first moment of silence at 08:46 (EDT) to the last one at 10:20 (EDT) the tears just flowed and i couldn't have done anything to stop them had i tried.

right now we have an exchange student from the czech republic.  he's getting a unique perspective that he could never have received in europe.  it's [probably] highly unlikely he'd get this same experience with any other host family here.  from his surprise that we fly the u.s. and federalist flags everyday, the flying of the flag at half-mast today, he's been just one question after another.

we have exchange students every year and it never ceases to amaze me how skewed is their concept of free.  i can't help but think that our founding fathers would find what passes for freedom in our current reality, here in the u.s., to be unacceptable.  and yet, we are still the most free country on the face of the earth.

six years ago today, i stepped out of the shower to the image of the first tower burning.  moments later i watched, live, as the second plane crashed into the second tower.  it was then that i realized the first tower hit wasn't an accident.  we were truly under attack.

at the time, we were living in houston about six miles from nasa.  when the plane hit the second tower, i left to get my children from school.  no matter how irrational, i just wanted my children with me.  my oldest daughter, katerina, was waiting for me.  seems she "knew" i'd be coming as soon as they made the announcement at her high school.  no idea how she knew, but i guess i've always been neurotic about the safety of my kids.  my other two children, jesse and tatiana, were younger; they really didn't understand why mom and dad were so upset.  i'm not sure they yet have any idea.  kat gets it.  she remembers.

but honestly, i don't think that most people remember.  certainly the msm doesn't remember.  sure they remember that it happened, but not the significance of it all.  they don't remember the pain of realizing our innocence, as a nation, was gone forever.  they don't remember the horror of not knowing who it was or why or if more was imminent.  do you?

we don't see those video images on the t.v. any more - seems the experts are worried that viewing the destruction will breed anger and hatred.  apparently they are correct as islamist terrorists are seemingly using the videos for recruiting more jihad.  they remember.  they don't want you to remember. 

they want you to believe the conspiracists.  they want you to belive the msm and george soros and his moveon organization.  they want you to believe the talking heads in the democrat party.  they want you to believe that the war in iraq has nothing to do with the war on terror.

they know that if you believe the lies being passed off by these groups that you will be more likely to think we're safe here no matter what the "warmongerers" are telling you.  they know that if you believe you're safe that you'll be more likely to pressure washington to abandon iraq.  and maybe even afghanistan.  and maybe even ignore any dangers from iran, if it comes to that.

nearly 3000 people dead on our soil.  six years ago today.  nearly 5000 american service men and women dead in this war on terror since oif started more than 5 years ago.  many related terrorist plots foiled (worldwide) by our allies and our own country in the past six years. 

in the new tape released, today, obl says that the only way the u.s. will escape further wrath from the islamists is if we all convert to islam.  but don't look for this statement to change the dribble spewing forth from the defeatists.  don't look for them to admit that the terrorist hate us not because of our capitalism or any other reason than the fact that we are not an islamic state.  it doesn't fit their policy of cut and run, so look to even this statement being ignored. 

already, today, i am hearing claims that obl isn't the man in charge any more.  where before these same people were calling on the president to abandon iraq because the "real war" is wherever obl is, my guess is that these people will now start trying to make the case that there is no "real leader" and therefore we need to go back to treating the terrorists as criminals, not combatants.  this will be the new justification for abandoning iraq and not fighting any more.

i, for one, will never forget.  i will remember until the day i die that morning when my view of the world changed forever.  i will always remember the innocence of the world i grew up in, snatched from my childrens' hands before they even knew it.  i will remember, with pride, for as long as i live the brave souls on flight 93 who said "let's roll" and then did.  i will remember fear i felt wondering if my friend was safely out of the pentagon when flight 77 hit (thankfully she was late that day and parking as the plane came in). 

i will remember the horrors, the fear, the pain, the disbelief and the pride always and i will try to communicate that frequently to everyone i meet who does not remember.  will you?

do you remember?

i do.  so do our braves sons and daughters standing in harm's way around the world.  and so do the terrorists.

sitting here, working from home, watching the memorial services and it's all so fresh.  from the first moment of silence at 08:46 (EDT) to the last one at 10:20 (EDT) the tears just flowed and i couldn't have done anything to stop them had i tried.

right now we have an exchange student from the czech republic.  he's getting a unique perspective that he could never have received in europe.  it's [probably] highly unlikely he'd get this same experience with any other host family here.  from his surprise that we fly the u.s. and federalist flags everyday, the flying of the flag at half-mast today, he's been just one question after another.

we have exchange students every year and it never ceases to amaze me how skewed is their concept of free.  i can't help but think that our founding fathers would find what passes for freedom in our current reality, here in the u.s., to be unacceptable.  and yet, we are still the most free country on the face of the earth.

six years ago today, i stepped out of the shower to the image of the first tower burning.  moments later i watched, live, as the second plane crashed into the second tower.  it was then that i realized the first tower hit wasn't an accident.  we were truly under attack.

at the time, we were living in houston about six miles from nasa.  when the plane hit the second tower, i left to get my children from school.  no matter how irrational, i just wanted my children with me.  my oldest daughter, katerina, was waiting for me.  seems she "knew" i'd be coming as soon as they made the announcement at her high school.  no idea how she knew, but i guess i've always been neurotic about the safety of my kids.  my other two children, jesse and tatiana, were younger; they really didn't understand why mom and dad were so upset.  i'm not sure they yet have any idea.  kat gets it.  she remembers.

but honestly, i don't think that most people remember.  certainly the msm doesn't remember.  sure they remember that it happened, but not the significance of it all.  they don't remember the pain of realizing our innocence, as a nation, was gone forever.  they don't remember the horror of not knowing who it was or why or if more was imminent.  do you?

we don't see those video images on the t.v. any more - seems the experts are worried that viewing the destruction will breed anger and hatred.  apparently they are correct as islamist terrorists are seemingly using the videos for recruiting more jihad.  they remember.  they don't want you to remember. 

they want you to believe the conspiracists.  they want you to belive the msm and george soros and his moveon organization.  they want you to believe the talking heads in the democrat party.  they want you to believe that the war in iraq has nothing to do with the war on terror.

they know that if you believe the lies being passed off by these groups that you will be more likely to think we're safe here no matter what the "warmongerers" are telling you.  they know that if you believe you're safe that you'll be more likely to pressure washington to abandon iraq.  and maybe even afghanistan.  and maybe even ignore any dangers from iran, if it comes to that.

nearly 3000 people dead on our soil.  six years ago today.  nearly 5000 american service men and women dead in this war on terror since oif started more than 5 years ago.  many related terrorist plots foiled (worldwide) by our allies and our own country in the past six years. 

in the new tape released, today, obl says that the only way the u.s. will escape further wrath from the islamists is if we all convert to islam.  but don't look for this statement to change the dribble spewing forth from the defeatists.  don't look for them to admit that the terrorist hate us not because of our capitalism or any other reason than the fact that we are not an islamic state.  it doesn't fit their policy of cut and run, so look to even this statement being ignored. 

already, today, i am hearing claims that obl isn't the man in charge any more.  where before these same people were calling on the president to abandon iraq because the "real war" is wherever obl is, my guess is that these people will now start trying to make the case that there is no "real leader" and therefore we need to go back to treating the terrorists as criminals, not combatants.  this will be the new justification for abandoning iraq and not fighting any more.

i, for one, will never forget.  i will remember until the day i die that morning when my view of the world changed forever.  i will always remember the innocence of the world i grew up in, snatched from my childrens' hands before they even knew it.  i will remember, with pride, for as long as i live the brave souls on flight 93 who said "let's roll" and then did.  i will remember fear i felt wondering if my friend was safely out of the pentagon when flight 77 hit (thankfully she was late that day and parking as the plane came in). 

i will remember the horrors, the fear, the pain, the disbelief and the pride always and i will try to communicate that frequently to everyone i meet who does not remember.  will you?

a tribute to a life well lived

today marks the passing of a man i was honored to have known for the last third of my life.  scott allan bowron was 64 years old and passed this morning around 4am.  what he died is of little consequence; how he lived and what he lived for, that is what is important.

i met scott at a training class in florida for the software product that both of our firms represented at the time.  he arrived just a few minutes late and took the last seat in the room, next to me.  we spent five days together learning, talking and laughing.  by the end of the class i knew that i had made a friend - i just had no idea what that meant in scott's world.

while in florida for and in the class we discussed cooking - a favorite topic and past time of both of ours - and i was bemoaning the fact that where i lived in l.a. i was unable to find old bay seasoning.  and trust me, having grown up in southern maryland, the bay and its bounty - including that seasoning - was a big part of my cooking!  scott commiserated with me and that was pretty much it.  then, less than a week after the class ended and i had returned back to california, a package arrived at my office - it was two cans of old bay seasoning!

i know this seems a silly story, but it is really a great of example of who scott was.  when he knew what someone needed/wanted and he was in a position to provide it for them, he did.  no strings, no questions it would just show up.

since that time in florida, scott has been a constant presence in my life and the life of my children and husband.  scarcely a week has passed without telephone contact between us.  rarely have two days passed without personal emails being shared.  and he was the largest supplier of blond jokes to my inbox, too!

many hours were spent with scott in his condo in new jersey and on the porch at the lodge on square pond lake in shapleigh maine.  the lodge is a magical place where everything is serene and there are no strangers.  it is a place where love and food and relaxation abound.  it is a place that is totally and utterly scott.

in 2001, just a few days after 9/11, scott wrote an essay titled "after 9/11" and sent it to his friends and several his customers.  i had lost it when my email crashed a couple of years ago, but thankfully was able to get another copy of it from one of his customers.

it was an amazing article and one that i may post in full another time.  but for today i wanted to use some of his words to express how those of us who knew and loved him may be feeling.  i know it's an accurate description for me.

in his essay he was comparing his memories of the assassination of john f. kennedy and the attacks against our soil on 11 september 2001.  in this passage, he had just described watching the caisson for jfk pass and a particular serviceman who had been present:

"I have come to know, though, that neither I nor that serviceman I see in my mind's eye feel the shock and sadness of JFK's assassination to the depth that we felt it that dark November day.  From this, I am able to realize that the uncertainty and pain that you and I, our nation, and the world feel at this moment will diminish over time.  We shall never forget, but time will heal our frayed souls and fractured hearts.  I also know that my life, that serviceman's life, and the history of the world are somehow different than they would have been had JFK lived., although no one can say precisely how."

i know that he is right in all that he says here and it is accurate, also about his death today.  right now, the pain is raw, it is fresh and it hurts.  no matter that we knew he was going to pass in "days rather than weeks" as his oncologist warned us.  no matter that we've been preparing for this moment, this day for the better part of a year.  none of it mattered when i got the news of his passing this morning.

in response to the notice of his death sent via "lodge mail" for all "friends of the lodge", his (and my) good friend lee had this to say:

"We all experienced the love and magnificent generosity of Scott, a very extraordinary man. Isn't it totally in keeping with his nature to express that same love and generosity in death by donating his body in service to humanity. He had a special presence, and I'm confident that his continuing physical presence, his body, will be treated with dignity and love. At the internment service of a very dear friend/client who did a similar thing a couple of years ago, there was a wonderful feeling of thanksgiving and admiration as well as pangs of loss and finality. There will be no less than that for our Scott. And the memory of Scott's presence, his spirit, will live on in all of our hearts. We have a little pine tree baby from the lodge planted in our garden. It's both a bittersweet and a totally positive reminder of what was and what is. -with love to all, Lee

you see, in keeping with how he lived his life, scott has donated his body to science in the hope that by studying it there will be some help for others later.  he thought of others first always.

i know that much is uncertain now, however, if any of you are so inclined to honor scott's memory with a monetary contribution, please know that the money will be used solely for the perpetuation of the lodge.  if it is your desire to help, please mail checks payable to "friends of the lodge" to:

friends of the lodge c/o domus international
1919 piedmont road n.e.
atlanta, ga 30324-4116
usa

scott will be well missed.  but i do not mourn his passing so much as i celebrate his life.  he has left us with a beautiful daughter who will be our rallying point. she is his blood and a great tribute to him as well.  he has left us the lodge to gather at in remembrance of him and to move forward with those memories.  with the help of all of us (and others we may not yet know) the lodge will forever be scott's place.  and we will be with him there always through the love, the food and the beautiful sunsets.  i hope to see you there!

the voice of shaft and soul man silenced forever

by now i'm sure that everyone knows that yesterday afternoon isaac hayes - he of the voice of god - was found dead next to his treadmill by his his young son, his current wife and her cousin.

in 1969 hayes released the amazing and ground breaking album "hot buttered soul".  his style was completely different from everything else out there at the time.  he was behind soul moving from the over-the-top performances by the likes of little richard to emotional, heart wrenching and melodic songs with lavish arrangements.

in 1971 he wrote the entire score for the movie "shaft" (starring richard roundtree) and the rest was history.  in 1972 he performed shaft live at the academy awards and later t.v. guide named it number 18 in it's top 25 t.v. moments of all times. 

prior to getting his own record deal, the self-taught musician was part of a crack songwriting team with don porter.  with don he wrote several songs including "soul man".

yeah, yeah, yeah, you all know all this already.  but i wanted to share some of my own memories that are entwined with isaac hayes' music and the music that came after it.

growing up in small southern town, u.s.a. where the first year i was in school was the first year the schools were de-segregated there was, as i'm certain y'all can imagine, quite a bit of tension.  my parents were listening to the beatles and patsy cline and the rolling stones and, well you get the picture.  but the radio from the nearest big city was pumping out soul and rythm and blues.  well at least my radio was.

i remember my father asking me why i liked "that music" so much - he said the beat did nothing but make and keep people angry.  maybe so (i tend to think the same thing about rap now-a-days) but i was hooked.

when i was a kid we used to go to the naval base to swim and that was about 2 miles from our house.  we'd hook our transistor radios to the handlebars of our bikes ride up to the pool.  it was on one such trip that i heard 'shaft' and i was hooked. 

a few years later i heard 'stormy monday blues', but compared to 'shaft' this was something altogether different - it was the blues.  still my favorite type of music, bar none.

isaac hayes laid the ground work for disco for which i have forgiven him.  he also paved the way for the likes of barry white, teddy pendergrass and others. 

mr. hayes you will be sorely missed.

sad tidings to break my silences

today started out just like any other tuesday, but turned into a black, dark night within the space of just one phone call.  our very good friends' eldest daughter (preparing to leave for her senior year of college next week) committed suicide on sunday, her dad called to say.  mr. j was simply stunned speechless - no small feat i assure you.

i've written before of holly (not her real name) herein my blog.  in may she stood before me a beautiful, intelligent young woman heading to sierra leone to teach english and immerse herself in the local culture for 2.5 months.  the world was hers to take - but she was more concerned with what she could offer the world than what she could get from it.

after being in sierra leone just a few weeks, holly contracted both typhoid and malaria - seems she's one of the few people on earth for which the vaccinations just couldn't work.  of course, she was sent home - via a hospital in italy for a few days - to deal with her illness.

ever since she arrived home in june, holly has been horribly depressed and none were able to cheer her.  she was absolutely convinced that her life was a failure because these illnesses would deny her the ability to spend her life in service in third world countries.  of course she was wrong, but she could not see how full her life would be even if limited by these diseases.

as a young woman, in high school, i was required to read the bell jarby sylvia plath.  it was a book ms. plath wrote to about her attempted suicide and her life through it and after it.  it was a hard book to read, but when i received this sad news earlier today a couple of passages came to out of nowhere.  i had to find my copy of the book and find the words:

I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story.  From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked.  One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor, and another fig was Ee Gee, the amazing editor, and another fig was Europe and Africa and South America, and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and offbeat professions, and another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion, and beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn't quite make out.  I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn't make up my mind which of the figs I would choose.  I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet.  ~Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar, Chapter 7

and these also:

I saw the days of the year stretching ahead like a series of bright, white boxes, and separating one box from another was sleep, like a black shade.  Only for me, the long perspective of shades that set off one box from the next day had suddenly snapped up, and I could see day after day after day glaring ahead of me like a white, broad, infinitely desolate avenue.

  ~Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar

i wish that i could somehow go back to saturday and get through to holly how loved and needed she is in this world.  i wish that she could have seen how her death would ripple through the family and community of friends, especially for her little sisters and her parents.  i wish i had a time machine.

i know that none here knew holly or know her family, but i ask that each of you keep her sisters and parents in your prayers.  they have never been a family of faith so we need to all lend them some of ours.

i have been silent on my blog because i have been so busy.  but i know that this is where i should be venting, debating and sharing.  thanks for your support and caring.