New Job??

It is still hard for me to believe, but I am actually applying for a new job. This is really big for me, the first being that I haven't officially applied for a job in over a decade. My last two positions were obtained when two different friends of mine who work in management in my field asked me if I was interested in job positions that they had open at the time. Looking back, I am really quite thankful that my last two jobs were so easy to obtain, especially the first one as I was a new mother to a two-year-old and infant twins. My brain was no where near the level that it should have been to actually interview for employment.

Another reason that this is a big step for me, is that this is a full-time position. I have been working part-time and very part-time or not at all since the birth of my children. Going back to work full-time would be a huge change for me. I know that I am ready for it and can make it work if the position is right for me.

Lastly, this is huge because this is the kind of job that I really want. I was going to apply for this kind of job sometime in the future, when everything was right and it was the perfect time to do so i.e., meaning that I wouldn't get rejected. Because this is probably the only kind of job that I would leave my current position in order to take, I am filled with anxiety about not getting it. Of course, even though I am qualified I am sure that there are a number of other people who will be applying who are qualified as well. I guess that the important thing is for me to get my name out there and have my resume on file. If this doesn't work out, hopefully something in the future will.

All in all, this would be a dream move for me. I don't want to talk about it much more or I am afraid that I will jinx my chances. Here's to a lot of prayer and keeping my fingers crossed.

On Getting Kicked Out...Part 2

After further reflection on this disturbing issue, did I mention that I tend to be obsessive? I have decided that I have a theory regarding why I was kicked out of the Psychedelic Furs show, I shouldn't be too upset though as I did get to see the whole show albeit from afar.

Here is my best theory thus far. We, meaning my immediate family and all of the grandparents, had spent the day downtown watching a long ballet performance in which my oldest daughter was involved. Afterwards we all went out for a two hour Italian dinner that was truly yummy. My husband had brought a change of clothes to head over to the show, I had not. We made a twenty minute stop at Nordstrom Rack and I grabbed jeans and a shirt so that I didn't have to wear the nice dress that I had spent the day in. Considering the time and money being spent I couldn't very well purchase new shoes and a new purse. Consequently I was stuck carrying my daytime purse into the show. I didn't want to remove only what I needed and leave the rest in the car because of the area that we were parked in. So my purse was cumbersome. I like to attend shows in Converse tennis shoes. Suffice it to say, for this show I had nicer shoes on with open toes, not great considering the venue. I had also been drinking water, probably too much water and alcohol and I had to use the restroom a lot.

My theory is that with my big purse and frequent trips to the bathroom I somehow looked suspicious. The security people probably just wanted me out so that I would stop doing whatever it was I was doing. If they had pursued any suspicions with me they would have had to call the police and then things get more messy and public and that is why I think that they wanted me out and wouldn't tell me why. Maybe they started to realize that they were wrong, but it was too late to go back. That is my best theory so far and one that I feel comfortable with, so maybe I can stop obsessing for now.

On Getting Kicked Out....

Last night I went to see the Psychedelic Furs with my husband and a small group of friends. It was a great show and the band really sounds no different than they did in their heyday in the 1980's. Everything went fine until I got kicked out of the venue. I would love to know what I did to get kicked out, but I don't, and it looks like I probably never will and this annoys me greatly because I am obsessive and want to know the reason behind the injustice. Did I have too much to drink? Yes. But, I was done drinking and planning to meet my husband up near the stage in order to get a better view of the band.

Before meeting him, I had a quick stop-off to the bathroom. I was in the process of washing my hands in the bathroom sink when a female employee asked me to step out with her and I bewilderingly obliged. It looked like we were headed to the door and I began to feel a bit panicked and in my panic I stopped on the stairs to ask why we were going outside. At this point I saw a friend of mine from our group and frantically waved her over. She came and two male bouncers told her that I needed to get off of the stairs and that they had told me to get off of the stairs and number of times and I wouldn't. "Huh?" I was only on the stairs because I had been asked to leave the bathroom, without time to dry my hands I might add, and I seriously wanted to know what was going on. As the bouncers were threatening to "carry me out" I went out with my friend and she said that she would go and find my husband.

Now I am out on the street in front of the venue. Fortunately I could still hear the music and even see the band. The bouncer than proceeds to tell me that I need to leave and that he will call a cab for me. Again, "Huh? What the hell!" I have a designated driver, my husband, and I tell him that my friend is in the process of trying to locate him. By the time he comes I am seriously angry and belligerent. The bouncer then tells my husband that he won't answer any of my questions because I am being belligerent. I told myself that I would not swear at the bouncer and would not make any physical or verbal threats and I did not. The bouncer didn't want me there, but I had done nothing wrong and I was planning to "watch" the rest of the show come hell or high water. As I was not threatening in any way it would have had to be the bouncer who needed to make to first move and quite frankly I don't think that would look too great.

My husband went back inside for a bit and then came out to stand on the sidewalk with me which was nice, at least I had company. The bouncer remained quite upset that I wouldn't leave and kept barking things at me like "step away from the door" even though it was an exit, I wasn't in front of it, and no one was leaving. It seemeded as though these paper doll power plays on the part of the bouncer were misguided attempts to goad me into reacting. Whatever, by then I had lost interest and just decided to take what I could get from this evening gone south.

The venue was the Sodo Showbox in Seattle near the Mariners Stadium. I think that the bouncers must have been bored that evening. There were a number of them milling about on the sidewalk and no other member of the public was outside, not even smokers, except for me. Maybe they were lacking in excitement. I would still love to know why I was singled out though and why I was approached in the bathroom, that really boggles my mind. All in all a really bizarre evening and not the kind that I hope to repeat anytime soon.

Stealing Time

June has been my month for stealing time, for myself that is. I have purposely said 'no' to most things not already on my calendar unless it was something really, really desirable like going to see the Sex and the City 2 movie at 10:00pm last night. That may sound frivolous, but Sex and the City has always been a frivolous indulgence of mine. I got addicted to the series re-runs soon after the birth of my twins, frankly I needed to get lost in a reality that wasn't mine. Reviews aside, there were definitely some aspects of this second movie that I liked better than the first one, namely that the characters in version two were all at a place that I could relate to either presently or at some time in the not-so-distant past.

In addition, June has also been the month for some get-up-and-go in the writing department. I would love dearly to share my recent writings on my blog, but I am currently helping a friend piece together a memoir about her crazy life this last year and the information is a wee bit too personal to throw out to the public at this point. Just today I thought of two writing exercises that would help me blow some more creativity into this project, now if I can just accomplish one of those, maybe I will post it.

Exercise is going well. I am on a new program and trying to quit snacking and eating things that shouldn't go into my mouth. Cutting down on alcohol consumption and getting more sleep (baring last night's adventure) have also been high on my list of "to dos" as part of this summer kick-off.

School is out. This means that mom's taxi service will be taking a break and maybe we can even spend some afternoons at home! How blessed is that proposition! I have some vacation time coming up and we are planning to go on a ramble with not clear destination in mind. Frankly I am tired of planning my life and managing schedules for everyone else in my household. It will be fun, at least that is what I keep telling myself.

The best thing of all-I finally completed all of the yard work that I had set out to do this spring. Now maybe, just maybe if the weather quits with this rain with sun breaks the weeds won't come back.

Why Portugal should Win the World Cup

New Voices

The other night parents at my children's elementary school were treated to the annual talent show. The talent show has become something of legend in our school community. No act is turned away, as long as they get their permission form in on time, acts must be performed within the time limits of 30 seconds to 1 minute and 30 seconds, and best of all, no lip sync is allowed! My kids have been jumping in to perform dances, skits, class songs, etc. for several years now. Out of the 60 something acts presented, we can always be sure that at least 3 of them will present with some actual talent. The rest is all about getting up there and having the courage to perform on stage in front of your classmates and their parents.

This year, there was a surprise at the end of the talent show in the form of a new vocalist, Lucy Horton. A video clip was shown of Lucy singing at the school talent show 11 years ago when she was in first grade. After the clip, she came out and treated the audience to a performance of one of the singles on her new CD. Lucy graduates from high school this year. I don't know what her post-high school plans are, but I really like her voice, and what a great thing for the future generation to aspire to!

Check her out at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/LucyHorton

Here's to Great Friends!

When I take the timeto stop and reflect on what wonderful friends I have, I can't help but feel overwhelmed with good furtune. The other night a friend of mine in my neighborhood threw an awesome party. It was so awesome in fact that her recently laid off and moved back home twenty-three year old son had the date circled on his calendar as a date when he would be spending the night at his sister's apartment, away from his version of hell, a party thrown by his mother for her friends! We ate food prepared by a local hobby chef, drank Bazooka cocktails, we danced and later in the evening the theme song became "I am not a Whore" by LMFAO. After this fun filled evening, which ran far too late for a "school night," I began my self reflection on my fortunate friendships, not just in my neighborhood, but in places throughout the world. If there is one gift that I hope to pass onto my children, it is that ability to choose great friends and keep them close, no matter how far the distance. Here's to great friendships!

Three by Dove and One by Quijada

My eldest daughter and I went to the ballet last night. We had great seats. She takes ballet and I thought it time for her to see something more cutting edge than "The Sleeping Beauty," "Swan Lake," or "The Nutcracker." Those are all good ballets to watch when done well, but it was time to mix it up so to speak.

Ulysses Dove was an independent choreographer who combined modern dance and ballet flawlessly in my opinion. The first Dove vignette entitled "Vespers" was based on memories of Dove's grandmother and the women that she worshipped with in a small wooden building. The dance was modern and balletic at the same time and involved quite a bit of balancing and coordinated dance movements using wooden chairs as props.

The next dance entitled "Red Angels" used only four dancers, usually on-stage two at a time, and clothed in red leotards. Dove chose red for this number because for him "...the angels of the senses are red." Thrilling and athletic with a bit of the demon vs. angel thrown in. My only complaint, it was too short.

"Serious Pleasures" was the last dance performed. It was described in the program as "a merciless battle between spirit and flesh." I should add, layers of sexuality that thankfully went over the head of my ten-year-old. This may sound odd, but the set and dance moves were part underground gay bar and S&M dungeon, but in a pleasing and aesthetic way although I know that must be very difficult to imagine.

Victor Quijada is an artistic director and choreographer mostly of hip hop and to see hip hop and ballet combined was quite an original experience. The stage was "stripped." All of the staging curtains were up, exposing behind stage lights, ladders, scaffolding and such and the dancers wore street clothes. The stage began to curtain towards the end of the dance and was fully curtained when the dancers moved off of the stage.

I am one of those people who is really moved by certain types of artistic expression. Often I am moved by different kinds of dance. Generally I am moved in some way or another by artistic expression in any form as long as it is well-done.

The Olympics, Here Again

I have been staying up late, too late. When the Olympics are on, my latent inner sports fan seems to kick in and I can't get enough. The skiing this year has been particularly interesting for me to watch as I recognize much of the landscape in and around Whistler and even recognize some of the runs that I have skied on, not going over 100 miles per hour, however. I am loving the ice dancing. Another skating event that I enjoy is speed skating and the fact the two of the competitors hail from a small town just south of where I live. I have always been partial to ice skating. When I was young I took ice skating lessons for a number of years, I was never in any competitions, but I still enjoy watching and doing ice skating. I also like to support local talent, it makes the whole event more personal. We seriously thought about getting tickets to an event or two and heading north, but despite the close proximity of the events this year, the price of accomodations remains out of reach. I was offered tickets to one of the women's snowboarding events, but the logistics of travelling to and from were exhausting to calculate, so here I sit at home enjoying the games from the comfort of my own couch.

What is food and what isn't?

I heard this question proposed on the radio the other day while driving to work. It is part of a new government program that would tax non-food items. One of the defining features of "food" is that it contains flour. Therefore some candies will be taxed and others will not, funny huh? The guys on the radio really got into it. They said that the deli food at grocery stores must surely be taxed as deli food is a "luxury food" item and is prepared and served by others, almost like a resturaunt. They thought for sure that a whole chicken sold in the deli would be taxed. An employee from a local grocery store deli called into the show and informed them that whole deli chickens were not taxed, but fast food items such as corndogs, Chinese food, jojos and such were indeed taxed. The DJ's thought this in consistency was humorous and they concluded the following:

"If you can't eat it with your hands while driving and texting then it isn't taxed."

Growing Old Gracefully

As much as I have tried to avoid the bustling crowds this Christmas, I have found myself in crowds on several occasions. Usually when I am being pushed and bumped along in the midst of a calm crowd I just try and go with it. If I happen to have children in tow, I try to hang on to them and have them hang on to me and hope that none of us gets separated. Here in our neck of the woods we have a nightly event called "Snowflake Lane." It takes place on the main thoroughfare that runs through the small city in which I live. My kids love it and each year it has grown in musical variety and characters in costume. First the costumed characters, drummers on stilts, and snow princesses make their rounds through the crowd. Then the bands of drummers come out and take their places on miniature stages to belt out some holiday tunes. The whole event ends with a glorious fake snowfall.

This year, my oldest daughter was quite taken with the costumed Rudolf and she really wanted to have her picture taken with him. When we first saw Rudolf I did not have my camera ready and he was gone before I had a chance to get it out. We had staked a place near the front along the crowd-lined street when she spied Rudlolf again. We quickly darted through the few people behind us to snap a picture, leaving my younger two children in our "spot." This only took a moment, but somehow in this short span of time, the area between my daughter and I and my younger two children had some how filled up with people. I felt the panic of a crowd closing in between myself and my kids, they were near a rather busy street and even though they know how to stay safe, I still wanted to get back to them.

I politely began to edge my way through people. For those of you who don't know me, I will take this time to mention that I enjoy seeing live music. I always wear tennis shoes to shows and I can often get to the front of the floor in a general admission show by moving through the crowd in a manner that would not be considered "polite." So this polite edging was quite a feat for me, I was trying to set a good example. Well, the first somewhat elderly gentleman was having none of that. He wasn't going to move. Fortunately, he was rather large and my daughter and I squeezed by him with some ease. Then there was the woman in front of me, probably in her early sixties, and I said quite politely three times, "excuse me" and she just stood there in front of me refusing to move. We really had no choice, I had to move around her and as I did she exclaimed, "What do you think you are doing!" "Well, uh, I don't know trying to get to my kids," I said with a sarcastic smile. I wanted to say more, but decided to drop it.

This is something that I have noticed of late, women in a certain age group who seem to feel that politeness and public consideration of others is no longer something that they need to do. I have a few theories about why this is so floating around in the old brain pan, but the one that makes the most sense to me is that many women spend too much of their lives giving to others and not enough giving to themselves. By the time they reach late middle age/early old age, they have had it and they are going to look out for number one the rest of you be damned. Maybe other people don't notice this, but I have and I know why, it is because I do not want to be like that. So from this day forth, I am going to practice being polite and I am going to remember to take good care of myself so that I have the emotional bandwidth to carry out this resolution.

Act of God

I saw the documentary film, "Act of God" last night. I actually had a difficult time following the sequence of stories in the film. Although there were some pretty spectacular images of lightening, I did not like the music used to narrate the film, it reminded me of fingernails on the blackboard. What brings me to write about this film viewing today is, it got me thinking about the randomness of life. Some may call this randomness "acts of God," others may refer to it simply as "chance." I consider myself to be somewhere in between. Yes, I believe in God, but contrary to the views expressed by some of the people interviewed in the film, I don't think of disaster (natural or otherwise) as a blessing or something to be considered good in any way. I also think it is somewhat dangerous to view a lightening strike that kills people as something considered to be "good," because it keeps the people still alive from going through the grief process. The film focused on stories about lightening strikes in South America, Cuba, France, and the United States. The participants in South America definitely had a more "this is God's will" view of lightening induced family deaths. I think of these lightening strikes more as chance rather than acts of God.

In the South American deaths, the young people who died had climbed to the top of an unsheltered hill knowing a storm was going to strike. In doing so, there was definitely a chance that they would be struck by lightening. In two of the American stories the participants were in areas of the country where thunder and lightening storms are not uncommon and were also outside in fairly unsheltered areas. If we take these examples away from lightening and look at the randomness of life in general, I think much of it leads to chance based on choices (knowing or not) and behavior that affects the outcome. I don't think of God necessarily as a puppeteer controlling our lives minutely from above.

Are these deaths sad, yes, all death by any means I think of as sad. One thing that we have to come to grips with in our humaneness is that we all have a finite time on this earth and this is something we can't change or control. Sometimes death comes early and sometimes late. I guess, overall, that I just didn't really see the "act of God" connection to the stories presented in this film. I would have gotten much more out of it viewing lightening scenes and actions narrated by beautiful music.

Humane Society Walk

My oldest daughter, two of her friends, and two parents participated in this walk today and it was a fun event all the way around and for such a good cause! We don't own a dog, but our neighbors were nice enough to share theirs with us during the walk. Only later did I find out that we could have registered to walk a shelter dog, maybe next year. Terrific weather, terrific day, and terrific turn-out. When I last looked the Humane Society had raised over $90,000.00 from this event.

Drinking Our Way Through Seattle

Last night I went out, spur of the moment, after a very long day, for both of us, with a friend in order to celebrate her birthday. We were talking about blogs, the Julie Powell blog specifically, and we wondered what kind of blog we could create and decide to add our idea to my existing blog. The idea being to drink our way around town. Now, this does present a few challenges as we really don't get out all that often. But, it has been decided that when we do and we enjoy the product, I will blog about it.

Stir Martini Bar was where we found ourselves last night. In addition to a wonderful food menu, Stir also serves up some pretty fantastic drinks. They use excellent vodkas which, needless to say, go down more smoothly than many other vodkas out there and makes it easier for one to get up and go to work the next day. Here is a list of the drinks that we sampled:

Bellevue Blue: Belevedere vodka, Bombay Sapphire gin, and Blue Curaco
Baby Shea: Titos vodka, Lillet, Orchard Apricot and lemon juice
Purple Flower: Sapphire gin, St. Germain, Creme de Violette, and Lavender soda
Sake 75: Pearl Plum vodka, Sake, sparkling wine, and lemon sour
Pink Fizz: rum, Triple Sec, muddled orange, lemon and cherry, Grenadine, and Sprite

For Dessert:
Drinking Chocolate served with a homemade marshmallow (I am going to have to try this at home. Last night's marshmallow really helped me see the value of going homemade)
Chocolate Martini-standard mix

Pretty luscious fare I know, but it was her birthday after all!
The other great thing about the evening is that most of it was spent during after-hours Happy Hour and the drinks were less than half-price.

What I did Last Night

Part of the evening involved watching this man perform shirtless, yummy! I love girls night!

The Greatest Show on Earth

We went to the circus last night. The Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey "Greatest Show on Earth" circus and it was fun. Now I am a self-described "non-circus" person with the exception of the acrobatics that make my palms sweat and those were spectacular. What surprised me the most is how much I actually enjoyed the animal parts of the circus. The horses were gorgeous and the performing dog show was, in many ways, similar to the one that we saw in Sea World San Diego a few years back and I really enjoyed that.

All in all the only downer part of the evening was the group of sour faced protesters stationed at the main entrance and the fact that the circus wasn't actually held under a big top, but that is a different story. Since reading "Water for Elephants," I have been entranced with the notion of the big top. Also, I am old enough to have seen an actual circus under a big top and *sigh* I do miss those old fashioned things. Anyway, back to the protesters. I am given to understand, after completing my cursory Internet search, that the law suit that RBBB circus has managed to keep out of the courts since 2000 is indeed going to court. This suit involves alleged mis-treatment of the elephants.

On many levels I do consider myself to be an animal activist. But I think protesters, even a small group of them, at the circus is ridiculous. I realize that many of them have never travelled outside of the U.S. and been to countries where elephants are used as domestic labor and often treated very cruelly. It is certainly easier to station yourself outside of the doors of a commercial event in your own hometown rather than deal with the abuse of international animal trade. I get that.

But, in my humble opinion, the circus has gone quite P.C. since the big top days of old. What benefit does it give them to mis-treat their elephants. I might add, that at $60,000.00 per year for maintenance, these elephants are a huge investment for the circus. Like I said, I didn't expect to enjoy the elephants, tigers, horses and such as much as I did. I thought that I would be sitting in my seat thinking how much nicer it would be for these animals to roam free, not that they ever could, being too domesticated, at this point mind you.

At any rate, perhaps, probably, maybe there has been more recent elephant abuse in the circus. That is not up for me to answer. I know that the protesters at this event had a picture of one elephant and held posters proclaiming that this one elephant had been beaten to death. If that is true, than of course it is a damn shame. But their evidence was sketchy and limited and seemed a bit fabricated to me. It also disturbed the children and not in a good way. The animals on the floor inside of the event were beautiful and treated well during the performances.

Yes, people have come to enjoy animal free circuses. I am a fan of Cirque de Soleil. I did mention that I enjoy palm sweating acrobatics did I not? But as a sometimes old-fashioned American, I would I think miss the animal portion of RBBB circus. How many decades has this circus been around?

I hope that the outcome of the upcoming trial is fair. And if circus training practices need to change, than change they should and this may mean animal free RBBB circuses in the future. In the meantime images of painted elephants in India with numerous scars and limited nutrition will come to mind when I think of animal mistreatment, not the stunningly beautiful creatures that I witnessed at the circus last night.

School is Back in Session, Drive Safe!

This is my daughter doing her safety patrol duty at our local public school. Last week, during the first week of school, there was an accident that occurred near the school and thankfully not near a crosswalk where children are patrolling. The cause of the accident was lack of attention and speed. Please remember to drive carefully in school zones. If you need to go through a school zone on your way to work and you are late, take another route. If this accident had occurred a block later than it did, a child could have been seriously hurt.

Reord Heat in Seattle...Makes me want to Rant

I admit that often I tend to be a bit behind the times in regards to current news, so it just so happens that I missed this one when it happened. That would be the breaking news story about the mother who allowed her nine-year-old son to ride the subway alone. She supplied him with quarters, subway tokens, a subway map, and an extra $20.00 for emergencies. This was a well-thought out and prepared plan that mother and son worked on together. The boy really wanted to ride the subway alone, his mother thought that he was ready, so one sunny Sunday afternoon last spring he set out on a short subway ride by himself. The mother said that she just knew, only the way that a mother can know, that her son was ready to do this. Do I know exactly what she means about "knowing?" You betcha, mothers usually do, which brings me to the point of this post.

The flack that this mother received was incredible. One of the reasons that I probably missed this in the "news" is that she was asked to appear on daytime television (to receive said "flack" by parenting specialists and members of the general public) which I never watch. I have noticed that most parenting specialists exist primarily to tell parents what they are doing wrong. You can now google "worst mother" and this mother will appear.

Today I scanned an interview with her one year after the event. The interview pretty much said that she and her son had no regrets and that she would do the same thing again. My question is, "What kind of society have we become when a mother like this is considered to be the worst mother in the country?" Is she worse than mothers who starve or beat their children? Is she worse than mothers who drink or take drugs into oblivion and leave their children in squalor and neglect? Is she worse than the mothers who allow their children to be molested by staying with the offender? I have very good friends who just went through a termination of parental rights process in regards to their two foster children and it seems to me that mother (she lost her parental rights) is more typical of what I would expect in regards to the "worst mother" nomination.

Yes, society puts enormous pressure on mothers to be more than themselves and sometimes to be more than human. It seems like well-educated mothers who are trying to prepare their children for society are easier to target than the truly horrible mothers because other people can feel justified by comparison, "Well, at least I don't do what SHE did to my children?" I also don't like the rush to judgement in this particular case because our society is so overly safety conscious and so over-protective that we allow the kooks, nutcases, and media to control our lives. Children are not being prepared to live in the world.

A friend of mine and I just had this discussion last week. We both believe in giving our children experiences. Sometimes those experiences will turn out well and sometimes... not so much. The point being that we allow our kids to do things like experience the unsafe wilds of nature. We were hiking with our children and had to caution them when we got too close to a real waterfall. In the media experiences that most children have, the characters do things like go down a rushing waterfall on little more than a raft, so some children might not know that you can't do that in real life. I think many children are not even allowed near real waterfalls because this would be considered too unsafe. Of course it is much safer to sit home blitzed out on video imagines and shoving Doritos into ones mouth, child obesity rates are soaring, how does this prepare them to be functional/healthy adults?

As a society we let the media scares dictate our parenting. Our kids stay indoors getting neurological "highs" from playing video games and watching plasma T.V.'s. Our kids by and large don't get enough experience of the real world. Would I send my nine-year-old child alone on a subway if she was born and raised in New York City, probably not, but then she is not mature enough or ready for such an experience. She might be ready for other experiences though that will help her grow into a responsible adult and as a parent it is part of my job to pay attention to the teachable moments in the lives of all of my children. I am a responsible and educated parent, much like the New York subway mom and just because I will probably allow my children to experience some things independently before they reach college does not make me a bad mother, knowing your children and working with them to navigate the treacherous path to growing up does not make anyone a bad mother.

Great Wine on a Budget

The wine that keeps Troon Winery in the Applegate Valley of Southern Oregon going. Great taste and great value, I just may have to order some.

Jacksonville Historical Cemetery

I must admit that I like cemeteries and not just on Halloween. I am not so fond of new or overly manicured cemeteries, I prefer older cemeteries, ones where the dead have withstood the test of time. Today I visited such a cemetery, the Jacksonville Historical Cemetery in Southern Oregon. I haven't been here for quite sometime. This is a cemetery that house dead folks from the War of 1812 through the Gulf War. There are large family plots, unmarked "potters field" graves, and old headstones that are quite literally cracking at the seams.

The ambiance is peaceful. Indeed I am not the only person to feel this. There is a small interpretative center with guest book, I noted that more than one cemetery "guest" observed a peaceful atmosphere in this cemetery. This is a cemetery where one might observe the term "killed by Indians" on a number of headstones. Then there are the mother, father, son, daughter, baby plots with no names. It is easy to think that "back then" human life wasn't as valuable as it is today, after all people had so many children. The ornateness of many of the infant, toddler, and child headstones make me question this assumption. It seems as though people grieved much for their lost little ones back then, much as they would today.

This cemetery is housed on 32 acres. It is divided into seven sections, six of which represent religious or fraternal organizations: Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Catholic, Independent Order of Odd Fellows, Independent (German) and Improved Orders of Red Men, and Jewish. The seventh and largest section is the City of Jacksonville's portion which includes a Potter's Field.

Some of the more notable stories include those of Regina Dorland-Robinson (1892-1917), William Green T'Vault (1806-1869), and Mary Ann Harris Chambers (1821-1882). Regina Robinson was a promising young artist who committed suicide at a very young age, William T'Vault was a newspaper editor who died in the Smallpox epidemic of 1869, and Mary Ann Chambers held down the fort during an Indian attack on her homestead, she died later of natural causes. One could learn the whole history of an area, a history that would be much more interesting than what could be found in a textbook, just by following the stories of the dead.

I think that John Lieshman sums up my feeling about cemeteries the best, "A cemetery tells the history of its people, and through its people, the history of its town."