Do you ever feel that the stars are lined up against you? That you can’t win in your own life? That God has it in for you?
I have to say, that I have felt that way on more than one occasion. On more than one occasion a day on bad days.
I often feel like I’m between a rock and an electric place
Photo Credit: comandoxtreme.xtgem.com
Some days I know that God is out to get me. But I never really thought there was anything I could do about it. I mean, I’m me, and God, well, God is God. He rules.
Right?
Well maybe not. Because you see, an Israeli man has filed a restraining order against God. True story! Because sometimes, God is abusive. And if God can’t be nice, He needs to keep His distance. At least 300 feet away — that’s the usual distance abusive men must respect.
According to the DailyKos, today Ted Cruz reached a new low in trying to get the GOP nomination.
Perhaps it is only fair, since Donald Trump recently brought up the fact that news* articles have stated that Ted’s seriously crazy dad, Rafael Cruz, was involved in the Kennedy assassination.
So Ted hit back, as Daily Kos says:
Candidate Ted Cruz, making his final appeal to Indiana voters (before his campaign officially goes down in flames), said of Donald Trump:
“… he’s proud to be a serial philanderer. He talks about his battles with venereal disease as his personal Vietnam.”
To his credit, Ted Cruz’s facts are more reliable than Trumps, as Trump did make the comment in a 1997 Ted Stern interview. But still.
I keep thinking there will be a point in the quest for the GOP nomination where I won’t be left speechless by the crassness by the politicians involved.
“A haircut will make you feel better, Lease,” my niece, Jen, said as we wandered the mall. We were together in Florida to organize and attend my dad’s funeral. It was December, 2000.
For reasons I still don’t fully understand, my brother Bob, who was Dad’s primary caretaker at the end, was insistent.
“Dad wanted to have Bobby Darin’s Mac The Knife played at his funeral,” Bob insisted. So in the days before YouTube, Jen and I were on a mission, looking for a CD of the song. It was no easy feat, let me tell you, finding that recording.* Record stores were fading, and the stock held by the few remaining didn’t include too many hits from 1958. Jen and I were getting tired and frustrated.
But Jen was right, I looked awful.
My hair is my best feature and always has been. It’s strawberry blonde, thick and curly. It does what it wants to do, which is good, because I don’t like to fuss with it. And I always let whoever cuts my hair do what they want with it. It always looks better than when I tell the expert what to do.
Into the salon Jen and I went.
Mellie, the hairdresser I ended up with, was young — 19, she said. Her hair was black and pink, and she wore thick makeup and brass hoop earrings the size of hula hoops.
I looked at Jen skeptically.
“It’ll be fine,” she reassured me. Of course, she wasn’t getting her hair cut.
I told Mellie to trim my hair, that I was going to a funeral and needed to be presentable.
“How about …” Mellie started talking about different looks. But really, I didn’t care.
“Whatever.”
When she finished, she twirled my chair around like a playground carousel.
“There you go! You look … sassy!“
She’d given me the ugliest hairstyle I’ve ever seen — Jennifer Aniston haircut from friends. Cut short in the back, with long sides. It’s not a nice look on a human.
John and Jacob hadn’t been able to get to my Dad’s funeral — there were no flights available. John was gentle when he saw my new do, though. After all, I was grieving. A month later when I had all my hair cut off to get rid of the stupid style, John said “I was really surprised to see you with that style. You looked like Cooper [our English springer spaniel.] Long curly bits around your ears and nothing in back.”
Yesterday I had my long hair cut to chin length. When he was done, my longtime hairdresser Ric, who has never given me a bad cut, spun my chair around and proclaimed:
“Elyse, you look sassy!”
Shit.
*****
* We were, happily able to find a recording of Mack The Knife:
I’ve been explaining to Duncan for weeks, that starting today, April 27, 2016, he is a grownup dog. That means no more stealing shoes (always mine), no more stealing socks (usually Jacobs and always dirty), and no more poop eating.
Because today is Duncan’s 2nd Birthday.
Oh GROW UPPPPPPPP, Duncan!
Duncan in Jacob’s Man Cave
So far today, he stole my boot, lunged for a pile of horse poop — Mom was too fast for you today! — and stole a clean sock from the basket as I took a load of laundry out of the dryer. Dogs are gross.
You may have seen this before, but I tried to write something new about my sister Judy. And, well, this piece really just sums up who she was better than anything I’ve come up with since.
She’s been gone now for 16 years. Not a day has gone by since that I haven’t wanted to talk with her, laugh with her, or, alternatively because she was my sister, smack her. There really isn’t a relationship like you have with a sister. Even long after they are gone.
*****
Today, April 22, is Earth Day! It’s the Anniversary of the very first Earth Day. Here is Walter Cronkite’s report on the first Earth Day, 1970:
It would also be my late sister Judy’s 64th birthday.
Whoever made the decision to turn Judy’s birthday into Earth Day chose wisely. Judy was a born environmentalist and recycler.
On the first Earth Day, Judy was a new, very young mother who believed in saving the planet. She was the first “environmentalist” I ever knew personally, and well, I thought she was nuts. There was a recycling bin in her kitchen for as long as I can remember. And this was back when recycling took effort. She believed in gardens, not garbage, and she made life bloom wherever she was.
“I’ve got kids,” she’d say. “It’s their planet too!”
But years later, Judy took recycling to a whole different level when she helped people recycle themselves. In the 1990s, Jude, who was then living in Florida, began working with the Homeless, assisting at shelters. Then she actively began trying to help homeless vets food, shelter and work — to enable them to jumpstart their lives.
When she died in early 2000, the American Legion awarded her honorary membership for her services to homeless vets. A homeless shelter was named in her honor. So she’s still doing good works, my sister is. That would make her wildly happy.
Jude also gave me the Beatles. So it is very appropriate that they wrote a song for her.
You see, the night the Beatles were on Ed Sullivan, it was MY turn to choose what we were going to watch. And we were going to watch the second part of The Scarecrow of Romney Marsh starring Patrick McGoohan on the Wonderful Wide World of Disney. My four (all older and MUCH cooler) siblings were furious with me. But I was quite insistent. You might even say that I threw a Class I temper tantrum over it, but I wouldn’t admit to that. But hey, I was seven. And it was my turn to choose. Fair is fair, especially in a big family with only one TV.
Somehow, Judy talked me out of my turn. She was always very persuasive. Thanks Jude.
FiftyFourandAHalf 