Just Got Some Amazing New ClipArt for My Collages

My new clip-art rocks!  One example...

The Singing Newspaper Man and Being Happy

We have an assortment of odd characters on our little island.  One of the regulars is our newspaper seller.  Every morning, come rain or come shine, (most of the time around here you can guess which one we usually get) there he is, an extremely tall fellow wearing a pack of newspapers and walking from car to car in the line for the ferry plying his wares.  I used to think he was humming gibberish as he went along, but recently my husband was with me, and he has an uncanny ability to understand what seems to others to be nonsense...I remember years ago when we lived in a small town and had a business space in the downtown, and there was this young man who had cerebral palsy and could only grunt and jerk his arms and legs around to communicate.  He would try repeatedly to make the rest of us understand what he was trying to say, then one of the shopkeepers would say, "Somebody go get Jeff!"  And my husband would come down and listen to the grunts and squeaks, then say, "He wants a hamburger," or "he wants to know if you have a job for him." (that job incidentally was usually sweeping the sidewalk in front of one of the shops for a dollar or two...my boss owned a gift boutique that only sold angels, and one day Pee-Wee [our nick-name for him before anyone knew his name] accidentally knocked off a ceramic angel figurine and stood there stricken, weeping profusely at what he had done...after that, he was pretty much relegated to sweeping the sidewalk...) One day my amazing husband even took Pee-Wee home, and he lived about 10 miles out of town, off a country road.  Later Jeff told me along with a group of astonished friends that Pee-Wee gave him directions.  Incredible.  But again, as usual, I digress!  So this particular morning waiting for the ferry, the weather was cold and drizzly, and after a gloomy winter here, I was feeling particularly sorry for the newspaper man.  Heck, I was feeling sorry for myself!  I also had two dollars in my pocket, a rarity most days.  I started to feel guilty.  Here he was, every morning, walking with his heavy bag of newspapers, trying to make a living, cheerful as could be, like he didn't have a care in the world.  And now I realized, as my husband pointed out, he wasn't humming "dum-de-dum-de-la-la-la," but he was SINGING.  It went something like this, "New York Times, Seattle Times, paper please......"  That did it.  "Roll down your window and buy a newspaper," I told my husband.  We did.  I still haven't read it.  It's a little tiny wisp of a thing actually, as nearly all printed newspapers are anymore, and the news is all depressing anyway.  Actually I would have rather have had the New York Times, but couldn't bring myself to hunt for another 50 cents and pay $2.50 for a newspaper, when I could look at the news on the internet for free.  Besides, as my husband pointed out, it was more a charitable donation than a purchase.  Or as I'd like to consider it, an investment in a quickly vanishing way of life....Sing on, Mr. Newspaper Man; you have reminded me what a gift life can be.....  

The Truth is Not Popular

I've spent pretty much the last four decades wondering why the truth isn't more popular.  As a matter of fact, it's not just unpopular, it's downright despised.  Try to find a better way to empty a room or enrage any number of people present than to speak the truth.  I've had to learn this the hard way.  As a small child I was always asking my parents "WHY?"  The way things were supposed to be seemed fairly straightforward, rational and sensible to me; I just couldn't understand why other people had such different ideas about it.  As a pragmatic, practical person of principle, I have always felt a strong need to "defend the truth," or at least make sure people were aware of it.  After all, it sets you free, right?  Well......., not exactly.  Maybe in the long run, but in the immediate future it just gets you in trouble; it can even get you killed.  Look what happened to Jesus, Joan of Arc, William Wallace, and any number of characters on the Twilight Zone.  My therapist keeps trying to convince me that truth is relative.  She is not having much luck, although she has finally gotten me to consider that it is somewhat changeable.  As I have grown older, I can see that what was true for me at one stage in my life is no longer true for me now.  We change.  The world changes around us.  I still believe however that there are a few (notice I said FEW) absolutes.  I've been accused lots of times of what they call "black and white" thinking.  This means "either-or" scenarios, or not allowing there to be any "gray areas."  I admit I'm much more comfortable with the idea of things being either this way or that way, but at this stage of my life I now see this as my own attempts to put life as we know it into tidy categories for my own sense of comfort.  While there are principles that if we come to understand and live by them WILL make our lives easier, and I would call those "truth," any well-meaning individual, no matter how hard they try, can never force another individual to "see the truth."  Why?  The most obvious reason is that we all resist hearing "the truth" because we've already got a "truth" that we like just fine, thank you very much.  At worst, this is called denial, and leads to all sorts of evils and personal suffering, and at best it's called knowing yourself, and what your values are, which is a good thing.  So after years of pointing out the elephant in the room during my stints in college, church leadership, local politics, working for a non-profit, a government agency, and in all the groups I have ever been a member of, I have decided that although the elephant may seem obvious to me, I cannot save anyone from being trampled.  Everyone has to see their own elephant.  Or something like that....    

The REAL Reason My Vacuum Cleaner Wouldn't Suck

I have five cats, so I deal daily with copious amounts of cat hair.  A good vacuum is essential.  Did I mention that when I had dogs it was dog hair?  And the interesting fact is that I am allergic to both cats and dogs.  But I have always had either or both.  It is something I just deal with, just like my allergy to mold (I live in the Pacific Northwest for crying out loud) and dust (I'm an archivist and avid reader and lover of books).  I took allergy shots for five years but that is another story.  The most recent thing that has not been working at my house (and there are often at least two to three of these things at any given moment) is my amazing, wonderful German vacuum cleaner.  After checking the bag (it was not even close to full) and praying, "God, please don't let it be going out yet.  I believe in German engineering," I reluctantly pulled out the rotating brush to pull all of MY hair out of it, and noticed a little flap door on the bottom of the vacuum that had a compartment behind it that went up towards where the hose attaches.  It was plugged with all kinds of stuff, things not worth repeating....like things the vacuum was picking up were not getting through to the hose, and thus the bag.  AHA moment....maybe SOMETHING was stuck in that opening blocking things from getting through!  Hmmmmm.  Sticking my hand as far up inside there as possible, I felt something....something vaguely familiar.....spongey, rubbery...what the hell was that?  Then I got the flashlight.  It's orange.  No, it's blue.  No, it appears to be half orange and half blue.  Two pairs of pliers, a pair of scissors, and a pair of forceps we bought at First Monday Trade Days in Canton, TX later, it was out.  A foam rubber cat ball.  There's a lesson here, although I'm not sure what it is....

Watch Out for Pretty Harmless Looking Cat Toys....

See Related Story.....

Everything is Shrinking, Including My Brain.

First it was the automobiles.  They get smaller and smaller.  Then computers, cell phones, etc.  Has anyone out there besides me gotten totally frustrated trying to text on those tiny keys????  Then the NEWSPAPER.  It is like the size of a birthday card now!  The newest and most disturbing trend is GIRL SCOUT COOKIES.  They are virtually HALF the size they used to be.  And not half the price, alas.  At some point they will be about the diameter of a quarter.  And cost more than they do now, to be sure.  What kind of planet do we live on anyway?  One where things constantly get smaller, evidently.

Even my brain is shrinking.  And I can tell.  I thought at first it was due to stress and depression.  You see, that's been proven.  I turned up some interesting proof on the Psychology Today website to confirm my worst fears. A new research study has uncovered the genetic mechanism underlying these brain changes.  You see, depressed brains are more fragmented.  I KNEW my brain needed defragmenting, just like my hard drive, the size of which, is also diminishing.  We have an external hard-drive now that is the size of a deck of cards, although don't be impressed; I am fairly sure there is one now that is the size of a matchbox...But I digress.  In the study, conducted by Professor Richard Dumin and colleagues from Yale University, scientists compared the genetic makeup of donated brain tissue from deceased humans with and without major depression. (NOW I know what I can do with my brain when I am finished with it....) Only the depressed patients’ brain tissues showed activation of a particular genetic transcription factor, or “switch.” Scientists hypothesized that in the depressed patients’ brains, prolonged stress exposure led to disruption (due to this switch) of brain systems involved in thinking and feeling. Depressed brains appeared to have more limited and fragmented information processing abilities. This finding may explain the pattern of repetitive negative thinking that depressed people exhibit. (It explains A LOT more than that.) It is as if their brains get stuck in a negative groove of self-criticism and pessimism. They are unable to envision more positive outcomes or more compassionate interpretations of their actions.  

As for stress, things called glucocorticoids, or stress hormones, damage brain neurons.   The stress response activates a brain region known as the amygdala, which sends a signal alerting the organism (you) to the threat, releasing short-term hormones like cortisol which prepare the organism (again, you) to sustain “fight or flight” and fend off an attacker. But with long-term exposure from stress that is not life-threatening, these hormones appear to cause brain neurons to shrink and interfere with their ability to send and receive information. In animal studies, under chronically stressful conditions, glucocorticoids such as cortisol can remain elevated for long periods afterwards.  And any middle-aged woman out there also knows that cortisol makes you fat around your middle. Nice little bonus there. 

Research in both mice and humans has demonstrated an association between stress exposure (footshock in mice, life events in humans) and shrinking of the hippocampus – the brain center responsible for forming new, time-sequenced memories. Studies done of sufferers of PTSD have shown this to be true.  In another study, patients recovered from long-term major depression showed a 15% decrease in volume of the hippocampus, compared to non-depressed patients.

Major life stress probably also shrinks brain neurons in the Prefrontal Cortex (PFC), the brain area responsible for problem-solving, adaptation to challenge, emotional processing and regulation, impulse control, and regulation of glucose and insulin metabolism. In a studty of 100 healthy participants conducted by Dr Rajita Sinha and colleagues at Yale University, and published in the journal Biological Psychiatry, those with more adverse life events had greater shrinkage of grey matter in the PFC, compared to their less-stressed peers. Recent major life events, such as a job loss, make people less emotionally aware while life traumas, such as sexual abuse, seem to go further, in damaging mood centers that regulate pleasure and reward, increasing vulnerability to addiction and decreasing the brain's ability to bounce back.

Then there's menopause.  Had a look at Medscape Today's website.  Estrogen, it seems, protects brain neurons from oxidation, stimulates nerve growth, helps repair damaged neurons, and increases the concentration of vital neurotransmitters such as serotonin, dopamine, and norepinephrine. Postmenopausal women (that would be me) have been shown to exhibit a significant decrease in blood flow, and flow decreases further with time past menopause.  In studies, no significant decrease was attributable to aging alone. (Oh, great, another reason for brain shrinking.) Another study of 63 postmenopausal women before and after starting hormone replacement therapy demonstrated reduced impedance to blood flow in carotid circulation. (that's the artery in your neck that gets gunked up and has to be cleaned out.) Hot flashes, incidentally are related to this function of estrogen.  A hot flash consists of a sudden sensation of heat in the upper body, often followed by perspiration and a chill. Peripheral vasodilation, tachycardia, decreased skin resistance, and sweating have all been documented to occur during a hot flash. Though poorly understood, the episodes certainly originate in the brain.  It now appears that hot flashes are not merely symptoms of low estrogen levels; they may themselves lead to other neurologic problems. (no big revelation to those of us who have had the damn things...) In women without their ovaries, hot flashes have been directly correlated with memory impairment.  In addition, single proton emission computed tomography (SPECT) of healthy menopausal women revealed decreased cerebral blood flow during hot flashes. The greatest change occurred in the hippocampus, a center for memory and cognition. Regional patterns of cerebral blood flow during hot flashes resembled those characteristic of Alzheimer's disease. (Let's not even GO there...) Hormone replacement therapy  resolved the hot flashes and restored normal patterns of cerebral blood flow.  (This is nice, seeing as how after that study a few years back vilifying hormone replacement, no doctors are giving their patients prescriptions for hormone replacement therapy without a threat to their own lives, usually coming from those same patients...OR THEIR HUSBANDS.)

Based on this evidence, reproductive biologists have hypothesized that hot flashes contribute to degenerative or aging changes in the brain. Frequent vasoconstrictive episodes might lead to cerebral ischemia and free radical formation,  damage similar to that seen in the coronary arteries with plaque formation. (Ladies, it's not your high cholesterol or your stress hormones that's going to get you, it's your LACK OF ESTROGEN!) The population of healthy neurons might be reduced, particularly in the hippocampus, leaving the brain with impaired ability to tolerate the neurodegenerative processes of aging and Alzheimer's disease. (Damn, there's that nasty "A" word again...)  Even in healthy older women, brain volume begins to decline as estrogen levels fall preceding menopause. This atrophy occurs particularly in the hippocampus and parietal lobe, areas primarily associated with memory and cognition. A similar loss in brain volume does not begin in men until a decade later (around age 60), most likely because male sex hormone production declines much more gradually with age. In fact, because of aromatization of testosterone to estrogen, men over the age of 60 have approximately three times more circulating estradiol (This is estrogen, folks...) than women of a similar age.  (Is there no end to the unfairness of being a woman on this planet?...in 8 years my husband will have more estrogen than I do.)

In women, these cerebral changes may contribute to the frequent perimenopausal complaints of decreased mental clarity and short-term, verbal memory problems. Many research groups have found   a connection between hormone replacement and cognition, particularly in the area of verbal memory. For example, in one study of 727 postmenopausal women, history of estrogen use was associated with significantly higher scores on verbal memory and abstract reasoning tests.  (Finally, a light in the proverbial  tunnel!! Just imagine how bad my cognitive function would be now if I HADN'T taken those birth control pills all those years...)  

OK, I think I've proved my point.  Hormone replacement is NOT on my allowed medications list.  I have atypical hyperplasia in the breast tissues, which isn't cancer, but the cells aren't normal either.  They are just lurking there, waiting to mutate into something more ominous sounding than "atypical," like "malignant."  Estrogen would encourage them in that direction, so I don't get any.  BIG SIGH.  The depression is less debilitating than it has ever been, due to years of psychotropic drugs and cognitive behavioral therapy, but it has no doubt done some damage.  Stress is a part of life that you cannot avoid; only learn to handle in a more healthy way.  I'm working on that.  The baking powder fiasco aside, I can make it through this.  Crossword puzzles are supposed to help cognitive function.  Yeah, that's the ticket.  If I can find some that don't require an exhaustive knowledge of today's ridiculous pop culture to complete, I've got a solution.....I'll let you know how it works. 

Northwest News: If You Can't Keep Your Cat Inside Don't Get One.

Ok, here it comes, the rant.  I am a cat lover.  An animal of any kind lover actually, but cats have a special place in my heart.  I have always had a pet...dogs when I was growing up, and when I was first married.  

We had the wonder dog Jenny.  Jenny came to live with us when we were moving my husband into his grandmother's old house the summer before we got married.  I was still in school, but had come to help him settle in before the fall semester started.  Jenny was a pup of about 3 months, who lived across the street with the neighbors.  She was a funny looking, bouncy thing with huge ears like a rabbit and full of energy.  She came over to help too, and with the front door open to facilitate bringing in furniture, she waltzed right in like she owned the place. I remember my future father-in-law saying "Whose damn dog is that?"  I got a call from my now husband a couple of weeks later saying he had gotten a dog.  "Guess which dog?" I remember him saying.  The neighbors came over and said that she wanted to live with us and not them and would we like a dog.  She came with the name Jenny.  Oh God, how we loved that dog.  She was with us through thick and thin for our first 17 years of marriage.  She moved with us to three houses in the DFW area, corporate housing in a high rise in Marina del Rey and a tiny tract house in the San Fernando Valley, then up the coast to Redmond, Washington.  We had hoped she would make it until we bought our own place, but we lost her in April, and closed on our first house in November.  She had a companion named Joey, a little Shepherd/Eskimo mix that had less than a whole brain, but was as sweet a dog as you could imagine.  Joey left us 6 months after Jenny; not sure how to go on without her friend.

In the months before we left Texas for California we got our first cat, Miss Joshua.  Miss J had a male  name because, not having had cats before, we took my sister's word for it that she had gotten us a male kitten.  It is rather harder to sex a kitten than a puppy.  By the time we had her in for her first vet visit, the vet took one close look and said, "this is a girl."  Joshua she had been for 8 weeks, Joshua she would remain, with a "Miss" in front of it.  It just didn't seem fair to change things on her like that.  She loved tormenting the dogs.  They knew they could not show aggression against this cat, even though they had with strange cats in the past.  We had a talk with them, and they just understood.  And she took full advantage of that; chasing them whenever  they were inside the house.  They would look up at us like "What can we do, PLEASE??"  

After both of our dogs were gone, we were so heartbroken we just could not bring ourselves to replace them.  It never felt right to get another dog...not if it wasn't Jenny.  So we started getting cats.  We now have five.  We would have more if we had a bigger house and more disposable income for vet bills.  We realize now how cat-like Jenny actually was.  Cats are like people...five distinctive personalities, with moods, good, bad and indifferent.  Even their voices are different.  Miss J is gone now; she succumbed to kidney failure at age 14.  That was a brutal loss.  We still go weak at the knees when we see a lynx point grey cat with blue eyes.  There is an altarpiece on our living room wall with her portrait, painted by my artist husband.  She is immortalized.  

Then we have Pumpkin, the big orange male that Jeff brought home from the Safeway where a little boy was giving away kittens in a basket.  He made eye contact with me when Jeff brought him in the house that first day and my life has never been the same.  He is my "boy" and sleeps on my head every night.  He is being treated for the same disease that took Miss Joshua's life, but his kidney function is normal now thanks to our wonderful vet.  

Grizzly Bear and Monkey Toes came 3 years later to provide companionship for Pumpkin, since Miss J wanted absolutely NOTHING to do with him.  Or any other cat or human other than my husband and myself, to be honest.   They were litter mates from a cat rescue in Yakima, the offspring of barn cats.  We ended up with TWO kittens because we had the pick of the litter, and well, you guessed it...my husband picked one and I picked another.  Oh well.  It turned out to be a blessing because when you bring two kittens home they console each other and you don't get crying all night.  

After we lost Miss Joshua, Jeff was eager to bring another cat into our household, but I wasn't ready for nearly 2 years.  It was still painful when an acquaintance of mine rescued some kittens and asked me to come over for a look at them.  There was an orange one, she said, knowing how much we loved Pumpkin.  "I'll look," I said, but I won't promise anything.  After seeing Little Orange, I put the carrier down on the floor to let him get used to it before we had to drive back home.  His brother, a little black kitten, crawled into the carrier and plastered himself up against the back of it, and REFUSED to come out.  He wanted a home, damn it, and he had decided it was going to be mine.  I wondered, "Am I supposed to have this one too?"  So home with me they both went, and when I opened the carrier the Little Orange popped out, my husband said, "Oh!  He's cute!"  Then little Blackie tentatively stuck out a paw.  "There's another one!"  I wish I had thought to say, "How did that happen?"  But I just said, "Yes, there is.  And if you don't want to keep him, he can go back."  Blackie wrapped both front paws around my husband's outstretched hand and proceeded to lick it like a dog.  He was working it big time.  My husband responded, "Oh, we can keep this one too."  Who says cats aren't smart!? That marked the arrival of Howard Pyle (after the American painter) and Alphonse Mucha (after the Czech painter living and working in Paris), better known these days as Howie and Alphie.  

These five creatures have become such an integral part of our lives (just as Jenny and Joey did) that I cannot imagine daily existence without them. I know some pet owners may consider their pets more like a possession.  I do not share their view.  I wish that people who felt that way would not have pets at all.  I respect that some people, for whatever reason, do not like animals, and don't want to share their lives with any.  I respect (and identify with) those who love animals and couldn't imagine living without them.  I do NOT understand people who straddle that fence.  In addition, I might add that the people who treat the animal like a possession probably take better care of their other belongings (their car, their cell phone, laptop, etc.) than they do the pet.  Perhaps not.  In my family there is a tradition of not being able to keep up with one's possessions, but that may not be the norm.    But let me just say, owning an animal is a commitment.  You don't leave it when you move, thinking it will find a new home.  Jenny did, but she was an amazing dog.  Many others would just starve.  Joey would have; she did not trust strangers.  When they both went missing for two weeks when someone opened the back gate of our yard, she camped out under a parked boat the entire time.  Jenny, on the other hand, had already found her "next" home.  I felt guilty making her come back with us.  You don't refuse it medical attention when it needs it.  You treat it with dignity and respect.  It is a living thing, and you, as its owner, like it or not, have accepted responsibility for its well-being.  You have it spayed or neutered, because there are so many unwanted dogs and cats that are already being gassed by the thousands every day because it's either too much trouble or too much expense for someone to bother having a pet fixed so it cannot reproduce.  I don't care if you live out in the country or in the city; it doesn't matter.  Both places have their unique dangers to domestic animals, in the city it is being hit by cars.  Which brings me to my main point....

Pets are DOMESTICATED animals.  They are not wild.  Dogs and cats both like to run and play outside.  Of course they do.  But those of us who live in areas with dangerous predators, as we in the Northwest do, are responsible for our pets' safety.  Domesticated animals cannot defend themselves like a wild animal can, and why would we demand that of them in the first place??  It is unfair.  I wish I had a dollar to donate to the animal shelter for every time since I have moved out West that I have been talking to someone about their dog, or more often, cat that they "used to have" before something "got it."  Meaning the poor creature became food or a plaything to a wild animal, be it a cougar, bird of prey, raccoon (yes, I said raccoon), or coyote.  At best it is selfish denial to allow this, at worst, it is inhumane.  We are not at our best as a race to allow an innocent creature who relies on us for its care to suffer.  As I speak, I am thinking of a couple who live in our neighborhood; who are very nice, intelligent, educated people.  They are wildlife biologists who work with a non-profit foundation that is trying to learn more about and conserve the wild snow leopards.  That said, they put their pet cats outside.  Last time we spoke, they had lost one to an unknown wild animal, probably coyote.  Perhaps their thinking is that the domesticated cat is like the wild cat, and to keep it indoors is cruel?  This is not true, as any veterinarian will tell you.  Cats are perfectly happy to live indoors if you engage them enough.  And even if you have a cat who really, really wants to go outside (like some do), think of it in the same way as you do your toddler.  They might want to go play outside too but do you let them?  Use your brains people!  I just received word of a beautiful cat who lost her life in this way because the owner was in denial about the dangers of letting her go outside despite knowing better.  I know that for some it's the issue of a litterbox in the house.  For God's sake, then put the litterbox in the garage with a cat flap.  Or in the basement.  Or DON'T HAVE A CAT.  

It is perhaps most tragic that the person who brought my Howard and Alphie into my life is the same person whose own cat was just killed in this way.  Such is the paradox of this life... Please, you animal lovers out there, pass this message along, donate to your local animal shelter, and be a responsible pet owner.  

In memory of Bernie, Fritzi, Chloe, Roachie, Tic-Tac, Winter and countless others...