I'm always happy when you don't write a 'real' posting, not because I don't want to read your wonderful words, but because it's a reminder to all of us to keep that balance in our lives.
Yes!! Brian, we all do our best to take care of those who depend upon us to deliver them the whatevers to do what they do. When the one we depend upon needs to just chill and regroup, well, that is just the way it is. I know you understand. Thank you for putting that out.
I agree. I've often asked people this question: "Who is most important to you?" Depending upon who I have asked, I get answers like "My child", "My husband", "My parents", etc., and I respond with "No, not really. The most important person in your life is you, because if you are not at your best, how can you be the best in interactions with others?"
I frankly do not know how you do it. Being a former academic myself (PhD in Comparative Medieval Literature from Columbia University) I cannot fathom the energy and intelligence you bring to us daily in addition to your full teaching load. . And yes, rest tonight with our thanks that you have not ceased in your good letters after the first 100 days of the Biden Administration. I support you and I thank you and I value you.
Carol, the doing is what is... The focus, the energy.... The regrouping of the pandemic just gave Heather a renewed focus to address the void. She nailed it. She turned it into something that we all needed and no one knew where to find it. We love her, we depend upon her. She understands and is there for us. Our Guru, our teacher, our professor....
I am an old fart. A student of history for over sixty years. I have no advanced degrees. I ended up just being the wacko engineer who spent forty years designing and building whatever the marine geophysicists or solar astronomers or, well, whoever needed a whatever to make whatever happen...
I am sure you understand... Heather is the center of my world these days...
I cannot fathom how she does it either. I think about this a lot. The hours, there simply should not be enough. There's clearly some kind of alchemy involved.
This retired professor knows well the fatigue so predictably a part of those last weeks! Know that on this Mother’s Day, my daughter and I, especially in line with the highest aspirations for her daughter—my granddaughter—celebrated your accomplishments, praised you for your knowledge, ability, and desire to communicate historical truth and its deeper meanings to persons at every level of interest! You are a woman among women, making history more accessible to others, and helping to ensure a better future for all.
The symmetry of Mary Oliver's poem is extraodinary. I just realized you can read the last half of each line straight through to the end of the poem and then the first half of the lines in the same fashion. [G]ood morning, Watch, now, in happiness.
Thanks you! She is extraordinary, isn’t she? As long as there are artists in the world who bring us beauty and joy, I remain hopeful for the human race. HCR and her readers inspire me as well.
Beautiful, TY Buddy. Heather take the week, we need you rested and fresh. Your voice is more important than any news outlet, specifically because you are a real voice in the trees! Sleep, recover, recoup and refresh. We need you on your “A” game as we take on those that would end our democracy! ❤️
Since Heather isn’t writing today I feel safe going off on a tangent. Actually, it turns out that the tangents are actually more interesting to me. I’m, what, three weeks into my experience of having male breast cancer and want to recognize the pervasive effect of this kind of thing on my perception. Somehow having the other end of the parenthesis defined even if it is still nebulas seems to affect everything.
I have always been an outlier and have never embraced the notion that what the greatest number agrees to is actually a solution. Instead it has seemed to me that what the greatest number can agree to is almost never an actual solution. I have also always been clear on the fact that most people are way too easy to manipulate. In my view these two combined facts doom a democracy. Ours, as I have learned reading Heather these past four months, has stumbled along haltingly addressing our problems but more often being controlled locally and nationally by the most persistent special interest group.
Capitalism on the other hand has always been the same. It energizes the world but doesn’t point it in a direction. Capitalism has no morals and in fact I would say that while it has the power to lift and create it ultimately results in long-term destruction of resource and the domination of the majority by the few. A bit of Marxism there I suppose.
Then, enter the Internet. The effect here IMView can be split into two directions. The first is good and revolves around the sharing of information. From its origin in the scientific community all the way to Face Book if the only effect was increasing the connectivity of individuals this would be a net positive. However, it turns out and this is something I didn’t see coming, that its more powerful effect is manipulation for profit. This is rooted in its seemingly generous and benign ability to allow everyone to have a voice, like my writing here and, yet what turns out to be the lasting effect so far is its ability to support lies. As we have learned, it is much easier and more powerful to lie big and to lie to a large number of people at the same time. Further, our social platforms have fed (profited) off of this by creating mechanisms whereby those lies can be spread (shared) so easily. Humans have essentially been in a popularity contest since the very beginning. We feel safer in groups so what ever allows us to feel that the quickest is unstoppable.
Solutions though, are not rare or obscure. There are many people who find them and try to bring them to notice. Having the medical record owned, possessed, and understood by the patient rather than having it possessed and controlled by a profit motivated service provider is IMView one such solution to the seemingly complex, endlessly expensive, industry that claims to have our health as its goal (a lie). It has profit as its goal and illness as its tool. Individual practitioners know this but the industry is not in the control of individual practitioners any more than our country is in the control of individual voters.
IMView Government also has solutions that are known at pretty much each step of the way but that do not come to the fore because they cannot be as popular as the lies. Groups, even this one, will express a multitude of opinions obscuring the underlying truth even as we pursue it. For instance, IMView, Biden’s belief that unlimited debate is good is a delusion, a lie one tells oneself, often based on past experience, which is no longer valid. That he can convince the opposition of anything at all by endless debate is the residue of that delusion, which spawns the secondary delusion that there is a hidden plan we don’t know about that will save us in the end. Having Cancer gives one a yearning for truth and insistence that it does exist and that it can be found, in fact, that it is here in plain sight. It just can’t be seen by a group that is self-involved in any way. Politics it seems is the very epitome of self-involvement.
The solution to Government? IMView, simply stop telling lies. I believe that every individual knows when they are telling a lie if they approach it not from the perspective of trying to anticipate or control effects but just simply asking themselves, is this a lie or a truth. Can politicians do this? As surely as any other human being. Can they do it and retain their power? Not in a culture of lies. Are the details of all the competing lies important? Not really says the guy with cancer.
IMView true solutions are, almost by definition, the providence of outliers because they are ideas and pathways that are not being followed. Unless you believe that we are on the right track as it is - or subscribe to the spiritual idea that it is always all happening just as it needs to happen. I can actually get with this concept at the individual level but if we extrapolate it to the whole of humanity I just see that there is a really large amount of suffering ahead and personally I’m going to wait all that out before incarnating again and I do feel sorry for my grandchildren.
Contraire-wise, I also believe that we as a species have been raised on the Earth for a purpose and that we do have a positive probability of fulfilling that purpose. I believe this purpose requires us to come together as a whole and think together as one being. Every circumstance gives us that choice but we apparently aren’t ready yet so we cling to individuality as if it will be lost otherwise. The lie that it is even possible to loose our individuality has been told for eons.
For some reason I enjoy writing in the mornings and having somewhere to post it. I suppose I could just reawaken my dormant FB account but until Heather kicks me off for being irrelevant I’ll click this button here. A while longer anyway. Reading the desperate and conflicted though may have to be curtailed.
Firstly, I offer you my best wishes in your current struggle. Fate is malicious and capricious - we are helpless to oppose it ultimately. I hope this part of your journey has a swift and happy resolution.
Thank you for this tangent. It is obviously the fruit of deep reflection and keen intelligence. It was brilliantly painted with broad and daring strokes. Very little that I have read in this forum has made me think more deeply. Again, thank you.
I want to set out on a tangent to your tangent, if I may. :) I’m not sure exactly where it will go, for it is an elusive, almost ephemeral thought.
You mentioned that Biden’s belief that unlimited debate is good is a delusion. On the surface, in these circumstances I think that unlimited debate serves no purpose and I’m sure Biden knows that too and is pursuing it to be sure he has checked all the boxes, as it were, and given his opponents less to get their teeth into. He is an elusive target at this point in his life, as the primaries showed.
But to shy away from debate is in general particularly damaging in these times. It is a given that such debate must be called out if it becomes ad hominem, must be entered into in good faith, and there must be recognition from both parties that alternate ideas need time to settle and cool before the other may subscribe to them in toto or with some amendment.
Failure to do this means a retreat into righteousness I believe and a resentment of the “other”. It hardens the arteries of the mind and creates social separation.
My contention has long been that the Internet has become the landslide that sweeps us away. For decades we have torn bit by bit at the social fabric that binds us, nurtured us, heals us, and yes, annoys the hell out of us at times. Bit by big we have become social isolates. We have lost the necessary humility to subsume ourselves in a group so that the good of the whole is maintained. That does not mean that one surrenders one’s independence of thought - I too by nature am an outlier. But as I age, I grapple with the paradox of being an outlier from the inside. The Covid crisis with its cavernous room for politicization of the most benign and simple life-saving nostrums has been an astounding revelation. My sister-in-law an 87 year old woman of little formal education but much wisdom put it best when she said in disgust, “People aren’t humble any more”.
We have lost all trust in government in these past decades. Our unions succeeded too well and have been brutally suppressed. Service clubs go begging for members. Church attendance is either minimal, or a front for political activity (although it seems to me from afar that the Black community has hung in better in this regard).
And thus atomized, we have become harder and less tolerant, although conversely, infinitely more fragile. We have the righteousness of conviction to be intolerant of the “other”. For if the other has some grip on the truth, then what reeds are left for us to lean upon?
Thus we have become easy pickings for the Internet. We are the product, sold impassively to exploiters at every turn. Our right to privacy is utterly a relic - in a quarter of a century no less. When we engage to defend the beliefs that are our shell, we are ruthlessly shredded by anonymous others with an unlimited store of vitriol.
What solution has presented itself? Virtually community, often in the smallest of niches. Here we can return to our womb of self-righteousness and feel whole again. Here we can offload our own vitriol to those who would dare “troll” the group. We indulge in the emptiest of calories and are bloated on them.
Social media is an almost unmitigated evil in my view. And it came at a time when we were most likely to be prey to it, a time of our most acute loneliness and isolation.
My cry is for *more* debate. Debate as endless as possible, but framed in the ways I listed above. It seems an impossible wish, as we cannot even find each other and are terrified to be humble.
Thank you again for making me think. There is so much that I agree with in what you took the care and time to express. Here’s to tangents!
Thank you Patrick and Eric for articulating your broad views of our current state. We are at an historical inflection point that will determine our future. It’s time to demand the best from ourselves first and foremost.
People who do physical labor as a livelihood, live in rural areas, go to church, work in service industries, immigrants and people of color have long been dismissed as less than. Trump understood this and spoke directly to them in language they understood. He vilified the elites and the status quo that had long ignored or demeaned them. We surrendered that space to him and now here we are more divided than ever.
Someone mentioned a lack of humility as our problem today. That is certainly part of it. I propose we radically change our language to eliminate derogatory names and characterizations. It will require spiritual, emotional and linguistic rigor. We all stand at this fragile precipice together. We will survive or perish together. Love or hate are the only choices.
Addressing social media is crucial, if we are determined to lift America out of the abyss. Exposing its business algorithms, informing the public of its manipulation and regulating its control are part of the job.
Attention public education, including civics courses, modes of research and curriculum aimed at critical thinking are urgent.
Gun control has to be part of the country's commitment to the health and safety of our society.
The country's safety net has been drastically reduced over past forty some years. Strengthening it again as the Biden administration is attempting is another aspect of the USA's rebirth.
Passing Biden's Infrastructure Plan, without major changes, the For the People Act and raising the minimum wage would be transformative. There are several other important plans in the hopper, but it will be herculean effort to get these three passed in the next year and half.
Fern, Diane and all of the previous posting Gentle Men....You have all made excellent comments and solutions while I've been tapping out my simple-minded post. My one fear is that, to paraphrase Dumbledore from the Harry Potter movies, .....the time is coming when one must choose between doing what is right or doing what is easy. I find too many of the people around me who seem to choose the latter. For gosh sakes, we are living through a pandemic where people refuse to wear a mask to protect themselves or others. Or get vaccinated.....we have "miles to go" before we can sleep. That being said, I know I wouldn't find a more intelligent, creative, critical thinking group of people than those assembled here by Dr. Richardson. But how do we engage the broad swath of citizens who are satisfied with the current state of affairs?
Wow Fern! Sorry to be incommunicado. The Universe (and you) gave me my starting point. I am going to boro council in my town hopefully along with a group of 20/30's young people who were canvassing in my neighborhood to form a new Democratic Progressive Committee. The election is on June 4th. I am on the e-mail list. In the meantime, I have 2 local municipalities I am investigating for progressive contacts. These 2 groups have an active online presence I hope will be very helpful. I have another area to investigate. In our town's last boro council election, we had 2 women run under the Black Lives Matter Party. I want to plug into everything I can that is local and established if possible. But I am especially excited about these 4 young candidates working from the grassroots up in my town. I told them about LFAA. They have intelligence, youth and energy on their side. I also have the name of 2 local journalists who I think would be willing to write about progressive activities. But, and there is ALWAYS a but, I am going through a new episode of 2 chronic illnesses (inoperable heart condition and spinal cord injury with a dash of chronic depression tossed in) I live with everyday. Both are getting worse and keep me confined to my house much of the time. Yesterday was a very bad day. My husband was furious at me for 'doing too much' while he was debating whether to call 911! But, I am still very excited and have this incredible 'jump start' with these young kids. So, being homebound, I'm still here and enthusiastic about the future in my section of 'Heatherton!' I haven't given up. With your ideas I am moving forward with partners the Universe is bringing literally to my door! How kool is that! Thank you for all of your wonderful suggestions. I am so grateful to be given a road map.....still walking down the road, albeit much slower than I would like. It seems like some LFAA'ers are dealing with health issues that they have recently written about. I love to see my dr's face when I show up for a scheduled appointment........its like OMG. You're still alive! (I'm 64) 2017 was supposed to be my exit point! Best wishes to you. Please be safe as NYC opens up again. My husband and I have decided to continue mask wearing in NJ, even though I rarely go out. I envy you all the delights of NYC! For starters, time for a play! xobr
Thrilled to hear from you. If you can, look for my post on the forum today with link to NY Time’s front page article about young grass-roots political organization. I’m occupied for next 5 hrs., so will respond more properly later. In praise of your shining spirit! I echo your husband’s love and concern.
br, Your alarm is justified. I neglected an area of rebirth which may be a crucial link to Americans. Local newspapers, for the most part, have disappeared. Journalists are literally trying to find buyers for the few that remain (outside of hedge funds and other such entities). What about schools of journalism, tapping Mackenzie Scott ( Bezos' ex), Melinda Gates, Soros and other's, along with government funding for local papers and most importantly with a robust online presence. The combination of news, local events, sports, entertainment, weddings and obituaries could be very exciting projects for the renewal of local news, including some of state and national coverage. What do you think? It is a matter of casting terrific team of journalists, internet stars, salespeople, advertising whizzes, PR specialists and famous personalities to create mockups and sell The People's Column; The Town Herald; KNOW IT ALL (looking for attention getting names) in markets to be decided.
Fern, your response got me Excited!!! I just returned home from a trip to see my new grandson. Our normal morning paper had 'gone missing'.....unfortunate because along with Dr. Richardson's LFAA, it was the start of my personal news cycle. It is a Gannett publication, which had pages from USA Today and World News and opinion pages. I fought hard for it to remain a weekly carrier of legal/real estate/county/and local legal information a few years back. My state representative heard from me and others frequently and our local paper was saved. I am excited by your ideas of moving this 'vehicle' forward. The online presence, of course, is very important. Our neighborhood recently lost a friend to covid who would have jumped at the opportunity to sign on. He kept so many of us aware of what was happening in our town. I've got some serious things to think about now. And my husband is the Wizard of IT! He has put together more than a few local newsletters in his time. If the resources are available at a sustainable level, I think even my very politically divided town could find events that would give them common ground on which to meet on other issues. It is amazing how much more hopeful I feel after your input. Personally, I like KNOW IT ALL! in homage for my recently lost neighbor. Strangely enough, another neighbor has been in professional advertising for 40 years. I know of local columnists who write for the recently 'dissapeared' paper newspaper. You rock!!! TY Fern!
br, Your response thrilled me. I think we have to place this idea very carefully with people that can carry if further, have ties to talented and skilled practitioners, along with topnotch connections. An idea such of this can be frittered away. I'm going to be busier than usual for the next few days. My good connections have grown past their prime and or faded away. Let me know when you would like to communicate again. I do have a few good people I can talk with; they are not top bananas but may be helpful. To a bright local news future!
You point out what I am trying to say. But in our best sense through polls of the entirety of the public will all these plans are approved of by the majority of Americans. Thus it should not be a 'herculean' task to get them done. The fact that they are a huge task is evidence of the underlying problem. Why are they difficult to get passed? Why is this the truth we are living rather than the truth that democracy is majority rule? We all may articulate this reason differently but that it is difficult is likely agreed upon.
To relate to your other post. I think having a Cancer diagnosis shortens the term of patience that one is able to hold. And I'm not saying that being an outlier brings you closer to truth I am saying that the center, by its nature, continues the present whatever that is at the moment and to deviate from that toward solutions for present problems makes you an outlier. I'm not saying that all outlier positions are truer.
Patrick, Thank you for this dialogue. A majority of Americans favored the Biden's Covid Relief Package. The democrats passed it by using an uncommon tool, budget reconciliation, which can only be used with very limited, circumscribed, type of legislation. Not one Republican voted for it. Other bills that I mentioned are also popular, but the Republicans are committed to stop Biden's agenda. We'll see how else the Democrats can get other legislation through, including elimination of the filibuster. The Republicans are what makes the effort of passing legislation so herculean. Since Reagan the Republicans have engineered the system to transfer the country's wealth to the rich as well as to rule the country while being very much in the minority.
all completely true three is another central fact. Their best and biggest tool for this take over has been the lie. Now they are so accomplished at it that "truly", anything goes. Yet, has president Biden openly accused the senate minority leader of lying? Of fostering his agenda of supporting the rich by lying about the effects of his obstruction? I haven't heard those words from him myself. Yet, I believe they are true.
My understanding is that much of the Senate during Biden's time ran on custom and a pretense of politeness which has now been completely flushed. I'm sure he sees that but I don't get why he isn't more forthcoming about it and why he feels the need to burn time proving it yet again.
I wan't to agree with you and correct what I now see as a miss- statement. Debate I believe is good in all its honest forms. For me, what I see happening in the Senate is actually the end of debate justified by the lie that it is taking place. I'm a filibuster advocate, in its old unnamed form when it meant being physically present and talking, not reading a book to occupy time but actually talking about the issue at hand. I don't think that can honestly be done indefinitely, perhaps a long time but not indefinitely. Therefore I don't actually believe unlimited debate is real because as some point everything has been said and the talk dissolves to repetition. At some point a vote has to happen. I wish we could mandate a vote on every bill proposed and this notion of killing it in committee or by the will of the speaker was done away with. I don't think it actually takes long to vote if it is not combined with grandstanding for the news. They have plenty of time IMO to vote on every bill.
I also believe as a side or under note in the notion that every bill should be able to be read in an hour or so. The notion that it has to be thousands of pages long and reference countless other laws I just feel is the legal equivalent of medical jargon. Of course, I also believe the courts should hold responsibility for upholding the spirit of a law not the letter. Outlying again. thanks for your comments.
'...we have become harder and less tolerant, although conversely, infinitely more fragile. We have the righteousness of conviction to be intolerant of the “other”. For if the other has some grip on the truth, then what reeds are left for us to lean upon?'
Eric, I hope you do not mind that I repeated your lines above. They were as a blinking sign in our minds, although not as well put.
Thank you Patrick Munson of NC ... I am Chuck Legg of NC ... I too have been suffering health crisis recently which has led to depression which is something I also have long struggled with ... I just got up after a long night of tossing and turning, nightmares. profuse sweating, physical discomfort and conflicted thinking ... believe it or not, your clear view of truth, as you wrote this morning, is exactly the elixir I needed ... sort of hair of the dog, I suppose .... I might just share it with a select few fb friends who would understand, if you wouldn't mind ....
Feel free to share. I'm not feeling depressed exactly as yet. I feel depression is one of the most difficult maladies. I know they will recommend hormone treatment for me which has a good possibility of causing depression. Not sure I'm going to take it regardless of the odds. Good living.
Thanks Patrick - I did share it with one very good friend ... it sparked a discussion which lasted all morning and into this afternoon between me and her ... again, I'm so glad you wrote it ... it was a kick start to be sure ... I agree with what you said in the original at every point and suddenly I knew there was another sidekick in the universe ... it wasn't just me ... I'm always glad when Heather takes a day for sanity and she even does that with a message of good cheer and a beautiful pic... you keep right on publishing your conflicts and thoughts ... we're listening .... best of luck with your health challenge ... you deserve it ... and I promise to keep seeking truth right along with you ... bs take a hike ...
ps - I particularly resonated with your discovery along your path that the internet, FB, etc. is a mixed blessing ... double bladed sword despite my initial thoughts that it would free our communications not complicate it with crass manipulations and further lies ...
Chuck, I also have depression. From the deepest part of me, I wish you a quiet mind and merciful, restful sleep. I rejoice you have those precious friends who understand. Keep them close. Be well, be safe, be at peace.
As an Outlier, you may credit that position with more advantage in truth telling than it merits as a general rule.
Are all outliers the same? Is group census usually suspect in you mind?
Joe Biden has not called for 'unlimited debate' as you claimed.
People who currently do not have cancer may be as interested in searching for the truth, the best sources from which to find reliable information, research and fact checking as some of those who do have it.
Do you have any basis for thinking that people with cancer are more or less interested in the truth than others?
While you feel sorry for you grandchildren given the failures of human beings, it also sounds as though you haven't lost all hope in the 'positive probability of fulfilling' our purpose on earth.
Perhaps, these questions will stimulate more elaboration on your 'tangent'.
We look forward to knowing how you feel. If this comment of yours is a sign of that, good going, Patrick.
Buddy Poland, Your photo struck me with its beauty and intensity. Just finished watching the Marvin Gaye documentary, an artist who felt 'What's Going On' and then replied to subscriber Christi's personal story. It has been an emotional night, so the light of your photo is demanding for my tired eyes. Thank you. Thank you, too, Heather. I am thinking a lot about the American people. It doesn't feel comfortable to group us together these days. People seem to be attached to a number of different realities, more than the two divergent ones, and violence is making a strong showing. More of this another time. Sleep well.
I got SO much from the Marvin Gaye story! I’ve got to find his CD, settle into his vision, which I feel was akin to John Lennon’s, but coming from the tortuous black experience sixty years ago. Om my goodness, we have a long way to travel, but the vibe now is that most Americans realize this journey ahead of us all. I loved watching my brothers and sisters, albeit I’m a lot more pale, and privileged .....
The CNN special on Marvin revealed that “What’s Going’ On” questions ... the plight of our Earth. I never realized this. In this link, the video backdrop and Marvin’s voice beautifully shows this reality of our common ground - the Earth. Thanks TPJ
I remember saving up my meager allowance to buy my first '45'(?) single record. Marvin Gaye! Of course. Such great music with more meaning than I could understand at that time.
Thanks Fern. Oh, the karmic wave of life. When will we be able to come together and share the bounty, the promise and the dream. All the same global wave of "causes and conditions" (well, I believe so; then this thought is gone, but my perspective remains)
How does one, or how do I, BEST share my karmic conditions of privilege. How do I answer, “What’s goin’ on?"
Rest well, HCR! Happy Mother's Day and thank Buddy for the splendid photo. 🌷(My daughter finished entering her students' grades this afternoon and is working on next fall's syllabus, she's a happy camper to be heading into summer!)
Morning, Daria!! Today's photo is up there with Buddy's best, I agree. Seeing this one, it occurred to me I've always been a tree-hugger even before hugging trees wasn't cool! Congrats to your daughter for clearing the way for a happy summer!
Good morning, Lynell! Buddy's photos are always a delight to see. Yeah, I think a lot of us are tree huggers from way back! We'll be visiting our daughter this summer and are SO EXCITED! We haven't seen her since December 2020. Have a great Monday!
My mother died at 91 in 2015, her own decision once the final illness came. She lived a great life, helped countless others, and never lost interest in people. I see it as a chance to wish Happy Mother's Day to the whole world. HMD, everyone!
I'm always happy when you don't write a 'real' posting, not because I don't want to read your wonderful words, but because it's a reminder to all of us to keep that balance in our lives.
Very good point, Brian.
Yes!! Brian, we all do our best to take care of those who depend upon us to deliver them the whatevers to do what they do. When the one we depend upon needs to just chill and regroup, well, that is just the way it is. I know you understand. Thank you for putting that out.
I agree. I've often asked people this question: "Who is most important to you?" Depending upon who I have asked, I get answers like "My child", "My husband", "My parents", etc., and I respond with "No, not really. The most important person in your life is you, because if you are not at your best, how can you be the best in interactions with others?"
Wise words Richard! Ty!
I agree.
I frankly do not know how you do it. Being a former academic myself (PhD in Comparative Medieval Literature from Columbia University) I cannot fathom the energy and intelligence you bring to us daily in addition to your full teaching load. . And yes, rest tonight with our thanks that you have not ceased in your good letters after the first 100 days of the Biden Administration. I support you and I thank you and I value you.
Carol, the doing is what is... The focus, the energy.... The regrouping of the pandemic just gave Heather a renewed focus to address the void. She nailed it. She turned it into something that we all needed and no one knew where to find it. We love her, we depend upon her. She understands and is there for us. Our Guru, our teacher, our professor....
I am an old fart. A student of history for over sixty years. I have no advanced degrees. I ended up just being the wacko engineer who spent forty years designing and building whatever the marine geophysicists or solar astronomers or, well, whoever needed a whatever to make whatever happen...
I am sure you understand... Heather is the center of my world these days...
I cannot fathom how she does it either. I think about this a lot. The hours, there simply should not be enough. There's clearly some kind of alchemy involved.
Thank you, Prof B. It's really quite simple: HCR cuts down on her goof-off time. We all have some, and some more than others.
"Everything [in war] is very simple. But the simplest thing is difficult."
-- Carl von Clausewitz
Well said, Carol!
Happy Mother's Day to you, Heather! You deserve an early night, especially tonight! Your flock bleat with joy when you look after yourself.
What a magnificent sky! Buddy captures them to perfection! A huge thank you to him for sharing his glorious photos.
Happy Mothers day! You cared for us all this last hard year and democracy is better for it
This retired professor knows well the fatigue so predictably a part of those last weeks! Know that on this Mother’s Day, my daughter and I, especially in line with the highest aspirations for her daughter—my granddaughter—celebrated your accomplishments, praised you for your knowledge, ability, and desire to communicate historical truth and its deeper meanings to persons at every level of interest! You are a woman among women, making history more accessible to others, and helping to ensure a better future for all.
I have to say that, not only is she a woman among women, but she is a woman among men! She is near the pinnacle for all of humankind!
Here here!
One of my favorite Mary Oliver poems:
“Why I Wake Early
Hello, sun in my face.
Hello, you who made the morning and
spread it over the fields
And into the faces of the tulips
And the nodding morning glories,
and into the windows of, even, the
Miserable and the crotchety -
best preacher that ever was,
dear star, that just happens
to be where you are in the universe
to keep us from ever-darkness,
to ease us with warm touching,
to hold us in the great hands of light -
good morning, good morning, good morning.
Watch, now, how I start the day
In happiness, in kindness.”
And good morning to you, MaryB of Pasadena!!
Thank you Mary for reminding me of Mary Oliver’s poetry! It’s a great one.
The symmetry of Mary Oliver's poem is extraodinary. I just realized you can read the last half of each line straight through to the end of the poem and then the first half of the lines in the same fashion. [G]ood morning, Watch, now, in happiness.
Thanks you! She is extraordinary, isn’t she? As long as there are artists in the world who bring us beauty and joy, I remain hopeful for the human race. HCR and her readers inspire me as well.
Absolutely!
Sometimes your short posts along with Buddy’s photos are just what I need. Thank you for taking time for yourself. Sleep well and rest.
And I can't help but notice that she always takes time for us as she takes time for herself.
Ginger, spot on! Buddy's photos always make me wish I was an early riser. Today's one is stunning.
Beautiful, TY Buddy. Heather take the week, we need you rested and fresh. Your voice is more important than any news outlet, specifically because you are a real voice in the trees! Sleep, recover, recoup and refresh. We need you on your “A” game as we take on those that would end our democracy! ❤️
Amen Mr.Cooper!!!💖
Whew. Relax. You can save democracy on Tuesday.
lol
Since Heather isn’t writing today I feel safe going off on a tangent. Actually, it turns out that the tangents are actually more interesting to me. I’m, what, three weeks into my experience of having male breast cancer and want to recognize the pervasive effect of this kind of thing on my perception. Somehow having the other end of the parenthesis defined even if it is still nebulas seems to affect everything.
I have always been an outlier and have never embraced the notion that what the greatest number agrees to is actually a solution. Instead it has seemed to me that what the greatest number can agree to is almost never an actual solution. I have also always been clear on the fact that most people are way too easy to manipulate. In my view these two combined facts doom a democracy. Ours, as I have learned reading Heather these past four months, has stumbled along haltingly addressing our problems but more often being controlled locally and nationally by the most persistent special interest group.
Capitalism on the other hand has always been the same. It energizes the world but doesn’t point it in a direction. Capitalism has no morals and in fact I would say that while it has the power to lift and create it ultimately results in long-term destruction of resource and the domination of the majority by the few. A bit of Marxism there I suppose.
Then, enter the Internet. The effect here IMView can be split into two directions. The first is good and revolves around the sharing of information. From its origin in the scientific community all the way to Face Book if the only effect was increasing the connectivity of individuals this would be a net positive. However, it turns out and this is something I didn’t see coming, that its more powerful effect is manipulation for profit. This is rooted in its seemingly generous and benign ability to allow everyone to have a voice, like my writing here and, yet what turns out to be the lasting effect so far is its ability to support lies. As we have learned, it is much easier and more powerful to lie big and to lie to a large number of people at the same time. Further, our social platforms have fed (profited) off of this by creating mechanisms whereby those lies can be spread (shared) so easily. Humans have essentially been in a popularity contest since the very beginning. We feel safer in groups so what ever allows us to feel that the quickest is unstoppable.
Solutions though, are not rare or obscure. There are many people who find them and try to bring them to notice. Having the medical record owned, possessed, and understood by the patient rather than having it possessed and controlled by a profit motivated service provider is IMView one such solution to the seemingly complex, endlessly expensive, industry that claims to have our health as its goal (a lie). It has profit as its goal and illness as its tool. Individual practitioners know this but the industry is not in the control of individual practitioners any more than our country is in the control of individual voters.
IMView Government also has solutions that are known at pretty much each step of the way but that do not come to the fore because they cannot be as popular as the lies. Groups, even this one, will express a multitude of opinions obscuring the underlying truth even as we pursue it. For instance, IMView, Biden’s belief that unlimited debate is good is a delusion, a lie one tells oneself, often based on past experience, which is no longer valid. That he can convince the opposition of anything at all by endless debate is the residue of that delusion, which spawns the secondary delusion that there is a hidden plan we don’t know about that will save us in the end. Having Cancer gives one a yearning for truth and insistence that it does exist and that it can be found, in fact, that it is here in plain sight. It just can’t be seen by a group that is self-involved in any way. Politics it seems is the very epitome of self-involvement.
The solution to Government? IMView, simply stop telling lies. I believe that every individual knows when they are telling a lie if they approach it not from the perspective of trying to anticipate or control effects but just simply asking themselves, is this a lie or a truth. Can politicians do this? As surely as any other human being. Can they do it and retain their power? Not in a culture of lies. Are the details of all the competing lies important? Not really says the guy with cancer.
IMView true solutions are, almost by definition, the providence of outliers because they are ideas and pathways that are not being followed. Unless you believe that we are on the right track as it is - or subscribe to the spiritual idea that it is always all happening just as it needs to happen. I can actually get with this concept at the individual level but if we extrapolate it to the whole of humanity I just see that there is a really large amount of suffering ahead and personally I’m going to wait all that out before incarnating again and I do feel sorry for my grandchildren.
Contraire-wise, I also believe that we as a species have been raised on the Earth for a purpose and that we do have a positive probability of fulfilling that purpose. I believe this purpose requires us to come together as a whole and think together as one being. Every circumstance gives us that choice but we apparently aren’t ready yet so we cling to individuality as if it will be lost otherwise. The lie that it is even possible to loose our individuality has been told for eons.
For some reason I enjoy writing in the mornings and having somewhere to post it. I suppose I could just reawaken my dormant FB account but until Heather kicks me off for being irrelevant I’ll click this button here. A while longer anyway. Reading the desperate and conflicted though may have to be curtailed.
Firstly, I offer you my best wishes in your current struggle. Fate is malicious and capricious - we are helpless to oppose it ultimately. I hope this part of your journey has a swift and happy resolution.
Thank you for this tangent. It is obviously the fruit of deep reflection and keen intelligence. It was brilliantly painted with broad and daring strokes. Very little that I have read in this forum has made me think more deeply. Again, thank you.
I want to set out on a tangent to your tangent, if I may. :) I’m not sure exactly where it will go, for it is an elusive, almost ephemeral thought.
You mentioned that Biden’s belief that unlimited debate is good is a delusion. On the surface, in these circumstances I think that unlimited debate serves no purpose and I’m sure Biden knows that too and is pursuing it to be sure he has checked all the boxes, as it were, and given his opponents less to get their teeth into. He is an elusive target at this point in his life, as the primaries showed.
But to shy away from debate is in general particularly damaging in these times. It is a given that such debate must be called out if it becomes ad hominem, must be entered into in good faith, and there must be recognition from both parties that alternate ideas need time to settle and cool before the other may subscribe to them in toto or with some amendment.
Failure to do this means a retreat into righteousness I believe and a resentment of the “other”. It hardens the arteries of the mind and creates social separation.
My contention has long been that the Internet has become the landslide that sweeps us away. For decades we have torn bit by bit at the social fabric that binds us, nurtured us, heals us, and yes, annoys the hell out of us at times. Bit by big we have become social isolates. We have lost the necessary humility to subsume ourselves in a group so that the good of the whole is maintained. That does not mean that one surrenders one’s independence of thought - I too by nature am an outlier. But as I age, I grapple with the paradox of being an outlier from the inside. The Covid crisis with its cavernous room for politicization of the most benign and simple life-saving nostrums has been an astounding revelation. My sister-in-law an 87 year old woman of little formal education but much wisdom put it best when she said in disgust, “People aren’t humble any more”.
We have lost all trust in government in these past decades. Our unions succeeded too well and have been brutally suppressed. Service clubs go begging for members. Church attendance is either minimal, or a front for political activity (although it seems to me from afar that the Black community has hung in better in this regard).
And thus atomized, we have become harder and less tolerant, although conversely, infinitely more fragile. We have the righteousness of conviction to be intolerant of the “other”. For if the other has some grip on the truth, then what reeds are left for us to lean upon?
Thus we have become easy pickings for the Internet. We are the product, sold impassively to exploiters at every turn. Our right to privacy is utterly a relic - in a quarter of a century no less. When we engage to defend the beliefs that are our shell, we are ruthlessly shredded by anonymous others with an unlimited store of vitriol.
What solution has presented itself? Virtually community, often in the smallest of niches. Here we can return to our womb of self-righteousness and feel whole again. Here we can offload our own vitriol to those who would dare “troll” the group. We indulge in the emptiest of calories and are bloated on them.
Social media is an almost unmitigated evil in my view. And it came at a time when we were most likely to be prey to it, a time of our most acute loneliness and isolation.
My cry is for *more* debate. Debate as endless as possible, but framed in the ways I listed above. It seems an impossible wish, as we cannot even find each other and are terrified to be humble.
Thank you again for making me think. There is so much that I agree with in what you took the care and time to express. Here’s to tangents!
Thank you Patrick and Eric for articulating your broad views of our current state. We are at an historical inflection point that will determine our future. It’s time to demand the best from ourselves first and foremost.
People who do physical labor as a livelihood, live in rural areas, go to church, work in service industries, immigrants and people of color have long been dismissed as less than. Trump understood this and spoke directly to them in language they understood. He vilified the elites and the status quo that had long ignored or demeaned them. We surrendered that space to him and now here we are more divided than ever.
Someone mentioned a lack of humility as our problem today. That is certainly part of it. I propose we radically change our language to eliminate derogatory names and characterizations. It will require spiritual, emotional and linguistic rigor. We all stand at this fragile precipice together. We will survive or perish together. Love or hate are the only choices.
Addressing social media is crucial, if we are determined to lift America out of the abyss. Exposing its business algorithms, informing the public of its manipulation and regulating its control are part of the job.
Attention public education, including civics courses, modes of research and curriculum aimed at critical thinking are urgent.
Gun control has to be part of the country's commitment to the health and safety of our society.
The country's safety net has been drastically reduced over past forty some years. Strengthening it again as the Biden administration is attempting is another aspect of the USA's rebirth.
Passing Biden's Infrastructure Plan, without major changes, the For the People Act and raising the minimum wage would be transformative. There are several other important plans in the hopper, but it will be herculean effort to get these three passed in the next year and half.
Fern, Diane and all of the previous posting Gentle Men....You have all made excellent comments and solutions while I've been tapping out my simple-minded post. My one fear is that, to paraphrase Dumbledore from the Harry Potter movies, .....the time is coming when one must choose between doing what is right or doing what is easy. I find too many of the people around me who seem to choose the latter. For gosh sakes, we are living through a pandemic where people refuse to wear a mask to protect themselves or others. Or get vaccinated.....we have "miles to go" before we can sleep. That being said, I know I wouldn't find a more intelligent, creative, critical thinking group of people than those assembled here by Dr. Richardson. But how do we engage the broad swath of citizens who are satisfied with the current state of affairs?
Ah, there you are br, with your question and my answer. I hope that you are still around. Look forward to hearing from you.
Wow Fern! Sorry to be incommunicado. The Universe (and you) gave me my starting point. I am going to boro council in my town hopefully along with a group of 20/30's young people who were canvassing in my neighborhood to form a new Democratic Progressive Committee. The election is on June 4th. I am on the e-mail list. In the meantime, I have 2 local municipalities I am investigating for progressive contacts. These 2 groups have an active online presence I hope will be very helpful. I have another area to investigate. In our town's last boro council election, we had 2 women run under the Black Lives Matter Party. I want to plug into everything I can that is local and established if possible. But I am especially excited about these 4 young candidates working from the grassroots up in my town. I told them about LFAA. They have intelligence, youth and energy on their side. I also have the name of 2 local journalists who I think would be willing to write about progressive activities. But, and there is ALWAYS a but, I am going through a new episode of 2 chronic illnesses (inoperable heart condition and spinal cord injury with a dash of chronic depression tossed in) I live with everyday. Both are getting worse and keep me confined to my house much of the time. Yesterday was a very bad day. My husband was furious at me for 'doing too much' while he was debating whether to call 911! But, I am still very excited and have this incredible 'jump start' with these young kids. So, being homebound, I'm still here and enthusiastic about the future in my section of 'Heatherton!' I haven't given up. With your ideas I am moving forward with partners the Universe is bringing literally to my door! How kool is that! Thank you for all of your wonderful suggestions. I am so grateful to be given a road map.....still walking down the road, albeit much slower than I would like. It seems like some LFAA'ers are dealing with health issues that they have recently written about. I love to see my dr's face when I show up for a scheduled appointment........its like OMG. You're still alive! (I'm 64) 2017 was supposed to be my exit point! Best wishes to you. Please be safe as NYC opens up again. My husband and I have decided to continue mask wearing in NJ, even though I rarely go out. I envy you all the delights of NYC! For starters, time for a play! xobr
Thrilled to hear from you. If you can, look for my post on the forum today with link to NY Time’s front page article about young grass-roots political organization. I’m occupied for next 5 hrs., so will respond more properly later. In praise of your shining spirit! I echo your husband’s love and concern.
br, Your alarm is justified. I neglected an area of rebirth which may be a crucial link to Americans. Local newspapers, for the most part, have disappeared. Journalists are literally trying to find buyers for the few that remain (outside of hedge funds and other such entities). What about schools of journalism, tapping Mackenzie Scott ( Bezos' ex), Melinda Gates, Soros and other's, along with government funding for local papers and most importantly with a robust online presence. The combination of news, local events, sports, entertainment, weddings and obituaries could be very exciting projects for the renewal of local news, including some of state and national coverage. What do you think? It is a matter of casting terrific team of journalists, internet stars, salespeople, advertising whizzes, PR specialists and famous personalities to create mockups and sell The People's Column; The Town Herald; KNOW IT ALL (looking for attention getting names) in markets to be decided.
Fern, your response got me Excited!!! I just returned home from a trip to see my new grandson. Our normal morning paper had 'gone missing'.....unfortunate because along with Dr. Richardson's LFAA, it was the start of my personal news cycle. It is a Gannett publication, which had pages from USA Today and World News and opinion pages. I fought hard for it to remain a weekly carrier of legal/real estate/county/and local legal information a few years back. My state representative heard from me and others frequently and our local paper was saved. I am excited by your ideas of moving this 'vehicle' forward. The online presence, of course, is very important. Our neighborhood recently lost a friend to covid who would have jumped at the opportunity to sign on. He kept so many of us aware of what was happening in our town. I've got some serious things to think about now. And my husband is the Wizard of IT! He has put together more than a few local newsletters in his time. If the resources are available at a sustainable level, I think even my very politically divided town could find events that would give them common ground on which to meet on other issues. It is amazing how much more hopeful I feel after your input. Personally, I like KNOW IT ALL! in homage for my recently lost neighbor. Strangely enough, another neighbor has been in professional advertising for 40 years. I know of local columnists who write for the recently 'dissapeared' paper newspaper. You rock!!! TY Fern!
br, Your response thrilled me. I think we have to place this idea very carefully with people that can carry if further, have ties to talented and skilled practitioners, along with topnotch connections. An idea such of this can be frittered away. I'm going to be busier than usual for the next few days. My good connections have grown past their prime and or faded away. Let me know when you would like to communicate again. I do have a few good people I can talk with; they are not top bananas but may be helpful. To a bright local news future!
You point out what I am trying to say. But in our best sense through polls of the entirety of the public will all these plans are approved of by the majority of Americans. Thus it should not be a 'herculean' task to get them done. The fact that they are a huge task is evidence of the underlying problem. Why are they difficult to get passed? Why is this the truth we are living rather than the truth that democracy is majority rule? We all may articulate this reason differently but that it is difficult is likely agreed upon.
To relate to your other post. I think having a Cancer diagnosis shortens the term of patience that one is able to hold. And I'm not saying that being an outlier brings you closer to truth I am saying that the center, by its nature, continues the present whatever that is at the moment and to deviate from that toward solutions for present problems makes you an outlier. I'm not saying that all outlier positions are truer.
Patrick, Thank you for this dialogue. A majority of Americans favored the Biden's Covid Relief Package. The democrats passed it by using an uncommon tool, budget reconciliation, which can only be used with very limited, circumscribed, type of legislation. Not one Republican voted for it. Other bills that I mentioned are also popular, but the Republicans are committed to stop Biden's agenda. We'll see how else the Democrats can get other legislation through, including elimination of the filibuster. The Republicans are what makes the effort of passing legislation so herculean. Since Reagan the Republicans have engineered the system to transfer the country's wealth to the rich as well as to rule the country while being very much in the minority.
all completely true three is another central fact. Their best and biggest tool for this take over has been the lie. Now they are so accomplished at it that "truly", anything goes. Yet, has president Biden openly accused the senate minority leader of lying? Of fostering his agenda of supporting the rich by lying about the effects of his obstruction? I haven't heard those words from him myself. Yet, I believe they are true.
My understanding is that much of the Senate during Biden's time ran on custom and a pretense of politeness which has now been completely flushed. I'm sure he sees that but I don't get why he isn't more forthcoming about it and why he feels the need to burn time proving it yet again.
I wan't to agree with you and correct what I now see as a miss- statement. Debate I believe is good in all its honest forms. For me, what I see happening in the Senate is actually the end of debate justified by the lie that it is taking place. I'm a filibuster advocate, in its old unnamed form when it meant being physically present and talking, not reading a book to occupy time but actually talking about the issue at hand. I don't think that can honestly be done indefinitely, perhaps a long time but not indefinitely. Therefore I don't actually believe unlimited debate is real because as some point everything has been said and the talk dissolves to repetition. At some point a vote has to happen. I wish we could mandate a vote on every bill proposed and this notion of killing it in committee or by the will of the speaker was done away with. I don't think it actually takes long to vote if it is not combined with grandstanding for the news. They have plenty of time IMO to vote on every bill.
I also believe as a side or under note in the notion that every bill should be able to be read in an hour or so. The notion that it has to be thousands of pages long and reference countless other laws I just feel is the legal equivalent of medical jargon. Of course, I also believe the courts should hold responsibility for upholding the spirit of a law not the letter. Outlying again. thanks for your comments.
'...we have become harder and less tolerant, although conversely, infinitely more fragile. We have the righteousness of conviction to be intolerant of the “other”. For if the other has some grip on the truth, then what reeds are left for us to lean upon?'
Eric, I hope you do not mind that I repeated your lines above. They were as a blinking sign in our minds, although not as well put.
I am honoured. Thank you Fern.
Thank you Patrick Munson of NC ... I am Chuck Legg of NC ... I too have been suffering health crisis recently which has led to depression which is something I also have long struggled with ... I just got up after a long night of tossing and turning, nightmares. profuse sweating, physical discomfort and conflicted thinking ... believe it or not, your clear view of truth, as you wrote this morning, is exactly the elixir I needed ... sort of hair of the dog, I suppose .... I might just share it with a select few fb friends who would understand, if you wouldn't mind ....
Feel free to share. I'm not feeling depressed exactly as yet. I feel depression is one of the most difficult maladies. I know they will recommend hormone treatment for me which has a good possibility of causing depression. Not sure I'm going to take it regardless of the odds. Good living.
Thanks Patrick - I did share it with one very good friend ... it sparked a discussion which lasted all morning and into this afternoon between me and her ... again, I'm so glad you wrote it ... it was a kick start to be sure ... I agree with what you said in the original at every point and suddenly I knew there was another sidekick in the universe ... it wasn't just me ... I'm always glad when Heather takes a day for sanity and she even does that with a message of good cheer and a beautiful pic... you keep right on publishing your conflicts and thoughts ... we're listening .... best of luck with your health challenge ... you deserve it ... and I promise to keep seeking truth right along with you ... bs take a hike ...
ps - I particularly resonated with your discovery along your path that the internet, FB, etc. is a mixed blessing ... double bladed sword despite my initial thoughts that it would free our communications not complicate it with crass manipulations and further lies ...
Chuck, I also have depression. From the deepest part of me, I wish you a quiet mind and merciful, restful sleep. I rejoice you have those precious friends who understand. Keep them close. Be well, be safe, be at peace.
As an Outlier, you may credit that position with more advantage in truth telling than it merits as a general rule.
Are all outliers the same? Is group census usually suspect in you mind?
Joe Biden has not called for 'unlimited debate' as you claimed.
People who currently do not have cancer may be as interested in searching for the truth, the best sources from which to find reliable information, research and fact checking as some of those who do have it.
Do you have any basis for thinking that people with cancer are more or less interested in the truth than others?
While you feel sorry for you grandchildren given the failures of human beings, it also sounds as though you haven't lost all hope in the 'positive probability of fulfilling' our purpose on earth.
Perhaps, these questions will stimulate more elaboration on your 'tangent'.
We look forward to knowing how you feel. If this comment of yours is a sign of that, good going, Patrick.
Buddy Poland, Your photo struck me with its beauty and intensity. Just finished watching the Marvin Gaye documentary, an artist who felt 'What's Going On' and then replied to subscriber Christi's personal story. It has been an emotional night, so the light of your photo is demanding for my tired eyes. Thank you. Thank you, too, Heather. I am thinking a lot about the American people. It doesn't feel comfortable to group us together these days. People seem to be attached to a number of different realities, more than the two divergent ones, and violence is making a strong showing. More of this another time. Sleep well.
I got SO much from the Marvin Gaye story! I’ve got to find his CD, settle into his vision, which I feel was akin to John Lennon’s, but coming from the tortuous black experience sixty years ago. Om my goodness, we have a long way to travel, but the vibe now is that most Americans realize this journey ahead of us all. I loved watching my brothers and sisters, albeit I’m a lot more pale, and privileged .....
Oh, mercy mercy me
Chorus of angels
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0WxgeYXCjM8
The CNN special on Marvin revealed that “What’s Going’ On” questions ... the plight of our Earth. I never realized this. In this link, the video backdrop and Marvin’s voice beautifully shows this reality of our common ground - the Earth. Thanks TPJ
I remember saving up my meager allowance to buy my first '45'(?) single record. Marvin Gaye! Of course. Such great music with more meaning than I could understand at that time.
Where was the documentary? I’m a big fan of his music.
CNN, produced by Don Lemon.
TY. I’ll find it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=57Ykv1D0qEE
"Morning, we make it...before we see you take it."
https://genius.com/Marvin-gaye-inner-city-blues-make-me-wanna-holler-lyrics
Thanks Fern. Oh, the karmic wave of life. When will we be able to come together and share the bounty, the promise and the dream. All the same global wave of "causes and conditions" (well, I believe so; then this thought is gone, but my perspective remains)
How does one, or how do I, BEST share my karmic conditions of privilege. How do I answer, “What’s goin’ on?"
The question, the feeling/force of it carries you forward. You are open.
When next you wake: Morning, Fern!! Stay strong...we (I) need you!
So good to see you, Lynell, and I need you, too. It's a new week. We'll see daylight in the coming hours.
Agreed.
Love love the photo!
Rest well, HCR! Happy Mother's Day and thank Buddy for the splendid photo. 🌷(My daughter finished entering her students' grades this afternoon and is working on next fall's syllabus, she's a happy camper to be heading into summer!)
Morning, Daria!! Today's photo is up there with Buddy's best, I agree. Seeing this one, it occurred to me I've always been a tree-hugger even before hugging trees wasn't cool! Congrats to your daughter for clearing the way for a happy summer!
Good morning, Lynell! Buddy's photos are always a delight to see. Yeah, I think a lot of us are tree huggers from way back! We'll be visiting our daughter this summer and are SO EXCITED! We haven't seen her since December 2020. Have a great Monday!
YIPPEE!!
Morning and Happy Mother's Day, Daria!! Are you up early or late? I expect Lynell in VA will be up and commenting soon.
Morning, TPJ!! I'm up late, but not late for anything that needs doing. Wishing you a pleasant week!
Good morning, TPJ! Thank you for your good wishes. HCR posted early so I actually saw it before I went to bed!
My mother died at 91 in 2015, her own decision once the final illness came. She lived a great life, helped countless others, and never lost interest in people. I see it as a chance to wish Happy Mother's Day to the whole world. HMD, everyone!
Your mother sounds like a tremendous human being. 💕
A very special mom!
Beautiful photo. Rest well.
Beautiful! Rest well, Dr. Heather! 💜 We are so grateful for you and the enormous effort you put into these Letters.
The sun rises on all. Not all can see the sunrise.