The Shoeless Man

Yesterday as I drove through Walmart's parking lot late in the evening, I saw a man tiptoeing (literally) across the pavement. He looked a little rough - probably one of Oceanside's homeless - and he had on no shoes. It's pretty warm here in Southern California (as I keep reminding all my northeastern friends who are buried in snow drifts), but at night it can easily reach 40° F and that is no time to be barefoot. I actually circled the block and drove back through the parking lot to see if I could find him. I wanted to ask him if I could buy him a pair of shoes and socks. He had already slipped into the shadows tho, so my efforts were for naught.

A friend who shall remain nameless to protect the guilty thinks I'm nuts for handing five dollar bills to homeless people as often as I do, but my way of seeing it is if five dollars makes THAT much difference in my life at that moment, then I need to get my butt in gear and fix that problem. I may be unemployed these past several months, but I am not destitute, nor do I plan to be. If I can still afford to drink Starbucks and I have a place to sleep that night, I can afford to give someone with nothing a bit of my change so they don't go hungry - or perhaps shoeless. I have had times when $5 was a lot of money to me, and they sucked. I am grateful that is no longer the case, and I believe what you want more of, you give away. So $5? Is not a lot to spare to make someone's day.

Tonight I stopped at the grocery store to pick up a few items. This store was in the same shopping center I was at yesterday. My peripheral vision took in someone sitting off to the left of the door, but it was only after I was inside that my brain processed the image of shoeless feet. It had to be the same guy. When I came out of the store I looked for him, but once again he was gone. I felt like I had failed a test.

I had to go to Walmart for lightbulbs so across the parking lot I went. As I was walking in, out came the shoeless man. His manner of movement actually reminded me of an illustration in a Shel Silverstein book I once had.

No, he was not naked, nor was his beard that long. It was the hurried-ness (and shoeless state) of both man and cartoon that matched.

The Shoeless Man held out a steaming bag in front of him like a serving tray as he scurried by. "Good," I thought to myself. It must be food; at least he's eating. Since he was so intent on finding a place to sit and consume his prize, I didn't approach him. I went into the store and bought what I needed, feeling a little guilty for having yet another opportunity to speak to him and avoiding it consciously this time. I considered just buying the shoes and socks while I was in there and offering them on my way out, but how was I to know what size he was? Did it matter? Would he even accept my gift? It's one thing to help someone out that needs it, it's another to throw money away carelessly, especially when your income is limited.

Somewhere in the past I heard someone speaking about homeless people (or perhaps I read it, always hard to remember), and they pointed out that for many, homelessness is only temporary, but it is a very stressful lifestyle that holds no joy. When these people ask for a handout, they're not just looking for money but for some glimmer of acknowledgment of their existence. They long for something as simple as a kind word or a smile, or just to be treated humanely. They may be down on their luck, but they are still one of us and we could easily be in their position tomorrow. Most of us just rush by without even seeing them and if we do stop to hand them a coin or bill, our eyes pass over them with little or no emotion. Imagine how you would feel being so ousted from community. I think of this every time I see a homeless person, and those that I don't hand a five to, I at least offer a smile. The trouble is not all of them are honest, but that's another story.

As I exited the store, I saw my barefoot guy down the side of the building, still eating. He was picking apart a roasted chicken like he hadn't had food in a week, which could've easily been true. His animal-like mannerisms made me nervous, but I forced myself to walk up to him.

"Aren't your feet cold?" I asked, trying to sound friendly and open a conversation. "No." He mumbled, not even stopping the shoveling of food into his mouth. He glanced around but looked past me, not at me. His eyes were a bit crazy, but then I guess severe hunger will probably do that to you. His toes were crooked and rough, and his feet had a blue tinge, but it could've been the lights. Everything about him said he'd been on the streets for a long time though. Much longer than I thought. This was not someone who was just temporarily homeless.

I wanted to continue with my original mission of providing footwear, but I walked away without another word. I was scared and I didn't even know of what. Once I got in the car I thought to myself, "Well you didn't handle that very well, did you?" My ego tried to justify my flight, pointing out that he was clearly not all there and to continue a conversation with him may have even been dangerous, but something else in me said I didn't try hard enough. Sane or not, how was he supposed to infer from my singular, vague question that I wanted to help him out by putting shoes on his feet?

As I mentioned in a prior post, I've been reading Malcolm Gladwell's book, What The Dog Saw. This book is a compilation of favorite columns published in The New Yorker magazine over the past several years. One of the chapters is titled Million-Dollar Murray. Click here to read the original article on Gladwell's web site in its entirety. It's worth your time. (Read all of it - section two appears to be a different subject because it describes problems with the LAPD, however, it all ties together in the end.) The subject of the article is: Why problems like homelessness may be easier to solve than to manage.

The article starts by describing one particular homeless man named Murray. He was a stereotypical town drunk, and the cops arrested him regularly, but people loved him because he was a happy drunk and usually had a positive outlook despite his condition. In 2003, the police department decided to do something about the most chronic panhandlers in the area, and when they did the research adding up the cost of jail time and police reports, hospital stays and such, Murray was at the top of their expense list. As Gladwell's article states, it would cost Reno taxpayers a million dollars if they did not do something about Murray. And that's just ONE guy.

Gladwell goes on to describe statistics about the homeless issue across America, citing Bell Curve vs. power-law distribution principles, and explaining how homelessness does not follow a normal distribution as most people think. In Philadelphia, a majority of transient people are only homeless one or two days. The number of acute offenders is much smaller; Gladwell says specifically in NYC in the early 90s, only 2500 people were considered chronically homeless, but those are the ones with mental problems or physical disabilities, or like Murray, the incurable drunks.

He goes on to describe how some cities have found it more economical to actually SOLVE the problem of homelessness by giving the worst delinquents their own apartments for free - it doesn't seem fair, but in the long run it is actually saving the taxpayers money. But that's beside my point.

Standing outside of Walmart with other people looking on, trying to make a connection with a ravenous, seemingly slightly-insane person, I guess my fight or flight mechanism just said no, this is out of your league. This is one of the chronic and is best left to authorities to figure out what to do with him. I'm a sucker for a rescue case, but I also know what's over my head.

In contrast, a couple weeks ago another guy came up to me in a parking lot asking if I could spare some change. He had on shorts, but was wearing a decent coat and hat, and carried a backpack. Normally these are the types that could be professional panhandlers that don't really need your money, but something made me stop and give him a five. As I was digging in my purse thinking how stupid I was because it was already dark and altho there were plenty of cars around, there weren't many people, and isn't this just exactly how you hear of rape/murder cases starting out? he mentioned that he was unemployed. I said, "Ha, so am I!" He laughed and asked me what I used to do. I gave him my former titles, and he told me whatever it was he used to do, and that he was having a hard time finding another job. I agreed that the market is tough, but told him to hang in there. He seemed like a really nice guy. Simple in the head maybe, but happy and just trying to get back to whatever his situation was before. (The only reason I believe he really was homeless is because as soon as I went to my car, he walked into the pizza place and bought food with the money I gave him.) If I had walked up to THAT guy and asked if his feet were cold, chances are I would've ended up buying him shoes and we may have even had a decent, if remedial, conversation.

Is it wrong that I had such an easy time helping out one guy and not the other? Well, things are only wrong that we make them so, but you know what I mean. The guy that obviously could've really used my help I backed down on. Should I feel bad for that or just scrape my bleeding heart off my sleeve and put it away already? Hmm. I dunno.

Both of these encounters inspired an idea for a web site to help out the millions that are NOT habitually homeless though. How would a homeless person access the web? Libraries across the nation have free computers that can get on the web and even without cars, these people seem to get around ok on mass transit. I also anticipate people that work at the shelters would be able to use this service.

There's a web site called Couch Surfing that has had some success (1.6 million members representing 232 countries around the globe). The idea of the site is to connect people with a spare bedroom or open couch with people that need a free place to sleep for a night or two while they travel, instead of spending money on a hotel room. After you sign up, the site owners verify your identity to provide a measure of security. Hosts leave a rating and description of what you were like on the site after you leave so other people know what to expect. Obviously when you're new to it, it takes finding people that will take a chance on you, but once you're established in the community it would seem as long as you're a good guest, you're welcome just about anywhere. Lots of people have made friends around the world this way as well.

Considering how crowded shelters get, especially in the winter, and knowing Gladwell's researched statistics on most people being homeless only a short time, why couldn't we use the same concept to connect those that can provide with those that need a roof over their head the most? People may already even be using Couch Surfing to do this very thing, but I think a site specifically for shelters to access would help. The people that work at the shelters can often see who are the chronic offenders and who is just down on their luck, and could possibly make decent judgment calls on who would be a good candidate to send to someone's home as opposed to staying in a shelter for a couple weeks. Well, it's an idea anyway. I've been doing so much thinking about the homeless situation lately I may even act on it. I have NO CLUE where to start of course, but I think it's something worth pursuing. I just hope I don't ever have to use my own idea due to not finding a job fast enough!

Tales From The Kitchen & Anza Observatory

Funny how one thing always leads to another and suddenly you're planning an adventure and wondering how you ended up here at 4am (or how you're even still awake).

Tonight I tried to bake for the holidays. I had a plan; I was going to light a nice fire in the fireplace, don my festive, red "Naughty or Nice?" apron (I think I've worn it twice in the decade I've owned it), play Christmas music while drinking hot chocolate & Kahlua, and bake at least three kinds of cookies if it killed me. Sounds like a real Norman Rockwell evening, doesn't it? Well that's what I was going for. Those Hollywood moments don't create themselves ya know.

Apparently the cookies (or the Universe) saw it as a challenge. How many monkey wrenches does it take to screw up a Rockwell-inspired evening?

7:00pm. I light the fire, press Play for the Rat Pack, don said apron, make hot chocolate, and proceed to pull ingredients from cupboards. Hey wait... where did all my butter go? I swear there were three sticks in here!

Wrench 1 from Universe: No butter.
Counterfire: Close glass doors on fireplace, press Pause on Rat Pack, remove apron, don coat, head to store for butter.

Forty minutes later I have TWO POUNDS of butter (heh, let's see the Universe get past that one!) and a can of whipped cream for the hot chocolate (extra points!). I hang up the coat, poke the fire back to life, press Play on the Rat Pack, re-engage the apron, re-heat my hot chocolate (add whipped cream! woo!) and proceed to dump ingredients into a bowl.

Oh crap... that's ALL the brown sugar I have left? At least it's enough for this batch but... ::rummaging through pantry:: Darnit, I guess that WAS the backup. Hmmm.

Wrench 2 from Universe: No brown sugar.
Counterfire: I'll just make the things that don't require it tonight.

I continue making chocolate chip cookies. The fire is really going now (I can hear it in the other room even if I can't see it), the oven is hot, the chinchillas are all staring at me from the breakfast nook like I've been abducted by aliens and replaced by a domesticated replica, which is fine with them as long as the replica intends to give them treats. I taste the cookie dough because God knows a quarter of it will never make it into the oven the way I do it, and...

WTF? It tastes weird. Not horrible, but weird. Maybe it's just my imagination? Nope, definitely tastes odd. I go over the ingredients and decide it's either the gluten-free flour I bought at the organic grocery store or the eggs which I now see are expired because they're organic eggs and since I don't eat eggs unless they're in something they rarely get used fast enough. Arg. Okay, well, I'll take my chances that it's the flour, not salmonella, and maybe the icky taste will cook out.

Wrench 3 from Universe: Bad batter.
Counterfire: I'm baking it anyway so sod off.

While the first batch is in the oven, I decide to start mixing the Sand Tarts (read: sugar cookies with almond extract) that my grandmother makes. The dough has to sit in the frig overnight, and does not require brown sugar, so this is probably a good thing to embark on next. I start blending the butter and sugar in another bowl.

15 minutes later: the bell rings but the icky taste has not cooked out. Grrr.

Maybe I can donate these somewhere - like the post office. Make a nice gesture AND get rid of icky cookies AND don't waste all those ingredients. Sounds like a win-win. Except the cookies practically fall to pieces as I remove them from the cookie sheets.

Oh yes, gluten doesn't just taste good, it also holds things together so when you use gluten-free flour, guess what? (I have no idea how I knew that, but I did. Probably that Home Ec class back in 9th grade.) I glare at the expensive gluten-free flour that will probably be in the trash if I can't find another use for it aside from baking. (Okay, not really, I'd more likely give it away on Craigslist first.)

As a last resort, I ask the roommate to try a cookie (which crumbles like the Republican Party as he tries to pick it up). I figure if a guy will eat them, then a post office should have no problem disposing of my mistake (one way or another). He says they aren't bad, but they don't taste like my normal cookies, which means others will notice the weird taste too. CRAP.

Open trash can - insert cookies.

It is now 8:30pm. Score: Universe 1, Traci 0.

I decide I'm going to Vons (a "real" grocery store as opposed to the smaller local one I went to for the butter) and I will try again this whole cookie fiasco when I get back. I'm a late-night person - I can bake until 2am!

I actually consult all the recipes I've pulled out and make a list this time. Yay for thinking ahead! I remove the apron, turn off the music, close the fireplace doors, don the coat, and go to Vons. I spend SIXTY DOLLARS on ingredients. Okay, maybe Peppermint Schnapps and Baileys don't count as ingredients, but one of them is certainly going into SOMETHING I'm making when I get home.

10:00pm. I return with (among other things) brown sugar, new eggs, and attitude. I stoke the fire and put the apron back on but skip the music. I finish mixing the Sand Tarts and get the dough into the frig. I wipe down the counters - three times because Gods, where does all that dirt come from? It's like the counters just make it fresh themselves. I clean the bowl and measuring cups I used so they're ready again. I clean the cookie sheets. Then I clean the sink because it's porcelain and anything aluminum (like the bowl and sheets) makes horrid marks all over it wherever it touches.

11:30pm. I decide to just check email and say hi on IM to the boyfriend before continuing, and you know what happens next...

That's it. I surrender. After 4 hours I have NOTHING to show for my baking efforts. Not ONE cookie. I'm too tired to face the kitchen again so I will live to bake another day (like tomorrow). I decide to just surf the net a bit and go to bed.

Except then I see my mother's CDs sitting by the desk. I had promised I would load them all onto iTunes and send her the files so she doesn't have to deal with it. The CDs have been there at least two months now. I decide since I'm sending her a box of stuff for her birthday, and I've just reformatted the Mac and not yet restored my own iTunes, this is the best time to do it. So I load a CD and grab my book (which I had intended to read by the fire while the cookies were in the oven... HA!!).

I'm currently reading Malcolm Gladwell's What The Dog Saw. It's a great book and I really enjoy Gladwell's writing style. He's talking about late bloomers vs. precocity... comparing prodigies to people that become successful later in life. One of the stories relates the difference of how two authors became famous. One took 18 years and 30 trips to Haiti before he had a bestseller. The other was in his 20s (I think) and took one trip to Ukraine (3 days) to inspire the book that made him rich. I realize I am more like the Haiti guy (the late bloomer), where I need to gather lots of experiences before I can write about them.

In thinking about this, I realize one of the good things about being unemployed is I have LOTS of time to go experience things. (And isn't that how Jen Lancaster wrote her first book as well?) The bad part is I haven't been taking near enough advantage of my freedom. I've been on quite a few trips in the past several months, which has been awesome, but they haven't really been explorations I would want to write about. They've provided very little new experience. So I get to thinking about taking a trip just for experience, but it cant be too far away as the money is running low.

The BF has mentioned before a place about 2 hours from here called Idyllwild. Unfortunately it's a place he went to with a former girlfriend (ew), but if I can get over that it sounds like a cool artist community up in the trees. Perfect for new experiences, yes?

So I pull up the map to Idyllwild and print it out, then go about finding out what's there that I shouldn't miss. I'm already thinking I'm going TOMORROW (I mean, why wait?) except I have cookies to bake. Damn the bad luck. And Thursday is Christmas Eve, Friday is Christmas. And I AM looking forward to them this year even though I feel like a total hypocrite celebrating a Christian holiday when I am so NOT that (except it's really a Pagan holiday that was warped by the Christians, so that makes me feel a LITTLE better). Hmmm. Guess this will have to be Saturday or Sunday.

Nevertheless, one click leads to another and I end up at a web site for Anza Observatory. I'm thinking AWESOME - you gotta love anywhere that wants to watch the stars watching us. Except the more I poke around this site, the more I find out that it's just a guy in a house out in the middle of nowhere AND now he's moved because society has encroached on his little hideaway and polluted the sky with light. ::SIGH::

The good thing is, he has built a page with the pictures of comparisons of star sizes that I've wanted to put together for a couple years. It's not quite as polished as I'd make it, but it works. Awesome! Now I can share it! And here it is:

http://www.anzaobservatory.com/ourplace.html

You may have received this (in part or whole) in email before, but it's always amazing to me to see how small we are in this big ol' Universe. And how TOTALLY insignificant that makes cookies in the scope of things. And I have to wonder how in the world the Universe has time to screw with me over kitchen antics when there's ALL THAT OUT THERE.

Incidentally, and totally off the subject, I also discovered this organization from one of my mom's CDs called Metamusic - Gaia:

http://www.monroeinstitute.org/

From their "About Us" page: "The Monroe Institute provides experiential education programs facilitating the personal exploration of human consciousness ... The Monroe Institute also serves as the core of a research affiliation investigating the evolution of human consciousness and making related information available to the public. The Institute is devoted to the premise that focused consciousness contains definitive solutions to the major issues of human experience and a greater understanding of such consciousness can be achieved through coordinated research efforts using an interdisciplinary approach."

I find this stuff fascinating and lately I've been pointed to a lot of info on brainwave research and such. Wonder where THAT'S going.

So I guess that's finally all I have to say for tonight. Now it's 6am and I have yet to sleep - AGAIN. You gotta write when it strikes I guess.

Have an awesome Wednesday. :)

Blonde Moment

"You grow up the day you have the first real laugh...at yourself."

- Ethel Barrymore.

People driving next to me must think I'm schizophrenic. I often think something or see something that makes me bust out laughing and I'm in the car all by myself.

The other night I was driving home. I had stopped at Panera to grab some soup for dinner and they were just about to close. After grabbing my brown bag I decided I wanted coffee too and went back to the counter to pay. The dude said "Don't worry about it..." so I got a free coffee. AWESOMENESS. The only thing better than coffee is FREE coffee. Panera has really good coffee too - I mix the decaf with the hazelnut and OMG. Heaven!

So I'm driving home with free coffee in one hand and the wheel in the other thinking life is pretty darn happenin' right now. The cell phone was sitting on my lap and it rang. And I shit you not, I look at it and think, "Crap, if I answer it I won't have a hand to drive with! How will I answer the phone?!" As if NOT answering the phone was simply not an option. A nanosecond later I realized the absurdity of what I was thinking and totally laughed at myself. Then I put the coffee in the cup holder and answered the phone. (Not that that was the right thing to do either because really talking and driving is probably not that great.)

Even after hanging up, I started laughing again at how stereotype Hollywood my thoughts had been. You see them joke about these things in the movies and wonder, "Who DOES that kind of thing?!" Apparently I do. In a blonde moment. Oh well. This wasn't the first time I've cracked myself up. I sure hope it doesn't mean I'm GROWN up tho as the quote above would indicate!

Winter Stories: Get Your Mug O' Hot Chocolate & Cozy Up

Story #1
I don't know who the architect was of the condo I live in, or if it was even that person that made this decision, but somewhere someone in the early 80s thought it would be a good idea to use radiant heat in my place instead of a conventional furnace. Normally I would be thrilled - who wouldn't love walking on warm floors in bare feet in the colder months? Except this genius decided to put the radiant heat in the CEILING, not the floor, even though the floor is tile and therefore would definitely benefit from some heat. Newsflash in Thermodynamics Einstein: Heat rises.
Needless to say, I do not use the provided heating system in my house. The downstairs unit may take care of upstairs, but upstairs would definitely only be keeping the spiders warm in the attic, and those little bastards don't pay rent.
Last year I purchased a couple space heaters from craigslist.com and they worked out pretty well. Even with three of them cranking they're not too bad on my power bill and they keep the areas I occupy warm enough.
One of the heaters did a great job heating the room, but the thermostat never seemed to work properly so it just kept heating and heating unless you were there to turn it on and off yourself. This was only annoying when I needed to leave the house for long periods; then I would have to choose whether I wanted to return to a freezer, or South America with Spunky (the iguana) sprawled out on his shelf sporting zinc on his nose and a margarita in hand.
This year, being unemployed, I decided I cannot afford to have a faulty thermostat helping SDG&E raid my bank account, so I kept watch for the same type of heater on craigslist. I finally found one for only $25 (I spent $40 on the first one; retail was like $80+ USD) and went to grab it. It looks exactly like the old one with a few extra scuffs. At home tonight I plugged it in and set the thermostat just as the gorgeous surfer dude showed me (amazing I even remembered how, I was so entranced by his steel blue eyes). It heated up past what I had set it at, then the temp number started blinking. I felt above the heater - still very hot. Hmmm. I waited a bit. I felt again. Still felt like heat coming out. I'm thinking darnit, this one doesn't work either! Maybe this is some faulty thing with all of these Honeywell models.
I sat playing with it awhile longer. Eventually I figured out that when the temp blinks, it has turned itself off to cool down, however, it doesn't feel like it because the metal grate above the heating element takes a long time to really cool off. Oh. Ok, my bad. So it IS working properly. Well yay for that.
I watched it do its thing for about 10 minutes, then I got to thinking. I wonder if I made a mistake with the old one and just didn't set it properly? Only one way to find out. I drag the old one upstairs and repeat the test process. Turns out it works perfectly! Now who's the dumbass about heating? ::sigh::
So anyone need an extra space heater? I mean seriously - when it gets down to 63°F, down blankets and wool socks just aren't enough!
~*~
Story #2
Last Saturday I attended a class on Brain State & Consciousness offered by Teri Mahaney at a new age store in Oceanside. It was a great class, but that was the third time I'd forgotten to bring something to write notes in. The Jeep hauls around enough "just in case" items to make any Girl Scout leader fall over with pride (no, I was never one of them), but paper is not among these items unless you count the deposit envelopes in the console, or the Starbucks contraband napkins in the glove compartment.
After the class I was determined to remedy this oversight, so I decided to stop by Barnes & Noble to buy a really cool notebook I'd seen that was on clearance (yes it was $7 - hell no, a $3 spiral bound from the drug store will not satisfy a Mac-toting, Starbucks-drinking, Whole Foods-shopping Snob Like Me).
Have I mentioned how DANGEROUS it is to let me loose in Barnes & Noble?
As I headed to the car consoling my wallet, I noticed Santa Claus sitting in the cafe reading a book. No, seriously, it was him. Round cheeks, big belly, white hair/beard, glasses, Reebok sneakers. If it wasn't him, I'll bet the dude never wears red lest he be accosted by small children everywhere he goes.
I made it to the car to leave, but my silly child-brain was poking me and giggling the entire way about how cool would it be to sit in B&N and read next to Santa Claus? (How old am I?) Even tho I had no intention whatsoever of speaking to him or saying anything about what I was thinking, the idea was just too much to resist. So I went back in with my books and sat down to read there. He even had THE PLATE WITH COOKIE CRUMBS NEXT TO HIM. C'mon! It was HIM!
I tried to sneak a peek at what he was reading but I couldn't see the title without looking like an idiot. I must've read for about an hour, or as long as it took to finish my latte anyhow. He eventually put down his book, took a snooze (I'm serious) for about 10 minutes, then got up and left in his sleigh. Ok, maybe it wasn't a sleigh, but I'll bet he had reindeer stuffed in the trunk. No, really.
I had such a nice time reading the other day tho that I went back tonight after picking up the heater just to be out of the house for awhile. I was looking for Augusten Burroughs' new book, You Better Not Cry. I thought it would be just like his previous publications - a regular size memoir - but it turns out these were just Christmas stories in a smaller, more compact read.
And read I did. In fact, I sat there and read the ENTIRE book in three hours. Straight through with one break for coffee. Which is good because then I didn't spend money buying the book (sorry Augusten!) but it was very funny in his normal morbid kind of way - MUCH better than his last full-length book, A Wolf At The Table. That one just made me cringe the entire way through and I hope never to read something that depressing again. You Better Not Cry was good though. It made me laugh out loud several times, to the point I was trying to suppress it so people didn't stare.
Lovely - there was a point to tell you that story, but I've been interrupted in writing it so many times I forget the point now. So I guess you'll just have to take it for what it's worth.
Ok, I remembered. Sort of. While in B&N, I also decided to pick up two classic children's stories for my Godnephew for Christmas. One was Shel Silverstein's The Giving Tree, and the other was Maurice Sendak's Where The Wild Things Are. I remembered having read these stories maybe once or twice as a kid, but I did not remember what each story was about. I only knew they were classics, and certainly every kid should have the classics in his library, even if he's only 2 years old. I was being a good Godmother, right?
I get home with these books and decide I should read them to refresh my memory. I wish I had done this in the store now. First I open The Giving Tree. In my adult life I've heard over and over what a great spiritual message it sends, or perhaps it was supposed to have a really good moral to the story. I can't really remember, so I dive in.
It's about this tree that loves a little boy. And the little boy asks for things from the tree constantly - all through his growing up years. And the tree always gives him what he wants... all the way to the end when the boy is an old man and just wants a place to sit and the tree can only offer the stump the boy has turned it into as a place to rest.
And then the book ended.
Wait, WHAT?
Where is the awesome moral? The spiritual message? Isn't there at least some GRATITUDE? The tree gives and gives and gives, and the kid takes and takes and takes - even chops it down to build a boat for his own selfish purposes - and never gives ANYTHING back to the tree? Doesn't even plant a new one? What is he, the CEO of a logging company? WTF??!! HE CHOPPED DOWN A TREE and was completely selfish and THIS is a great book that has become a classic? Ok, well it says he loved the tree, but I have a hard time believing asking more and more of something and never giving anything back is a good example of love. Or perhaps that's the exact message. But I don't see how a kid would get that message out of the book. It was hard for ME to salvage that from the story!
To me, this book says he only loved the tree for what it could give him. That is not Love in my world. Love is shared. Love is a two way street. A mutual thing. You take, but you also GIVE. The tree was the only one doing any giving here. I've read Silverstein's other books - A Light In The Attic was one of my favorites as a kid and I had several of his other works. He's probably the only poetry besides Dr. Suess that I've ever enjoyed, but THIS... maybe I'm missing the point, but this is a SUCKY story. Chopping down trees is sacrilege in my book (all puns intended) to begin with. Besides, the picture of Shel on the back cover would give a kid nightmares. What editor picked THAT photo? Dumbass. This book is SOOO going back.
Ok, so that one wasn't what I thought it would be. Surely Sendak's work - which is now a major motion picture - is better. I crack this one open.
Max, the main character, backtalks his mother and gets sent to his room without supper. But instead of being remorseful and thinking about how crappy he treated his elder, or the story supporting respect for your parents, the kid grows a forest in his imagination, travels to "where the wild things are," becomes their king, treats them shitty the same way he felt he was treated, finally gets bored, goes home, and finds that his mother (presumably) has left his dinner in his room for him.
Wait, WHAT?! WHAT??!!
The kid acts like a total brat and gets punished for it, then spreads the negativity to imaginary creatures, and comes home to be REWARDED??! Are you KIDDING me?
Ok, MAYBE forgiveness is the message here? But that would mean it's forgiveness on his parent's part, and what of his being a brat in the first place? Shouldn't the lesson be NOT to be a 'tard to begin with? Forgiveness is such a stretch, and again, how is a CHILD supposed to get that out of this story? My ADULT brain had to really dig around for that one.
What is WRONG with these authors? And HOW - pray tell - have THESE particular books become such "classics?" I can only think that they are popular because people my age who had them as kids saw nothing wrong with how the characters acted because they were a bunch of spoiled brats themselves, and to a worm in horseradish, the world IS horseradish (as quoted recently in a MUCH better book for bigger, more intelligent kids: What The Dog Saw by Malcolm Gladwell - I HEART HIM!!).
And THAT, my friends, is exactly what's wrong with the world today. Nothing but brats born in the 60s turning into bigger, older brats and seeing nothing wrong with their bratty behavior because they have NO respect for their elders. At the risk of sounding just like my grandparents, what is this world coming to?!
Both of these books are going back. No wonder I don't remember them from when I was a kid. Their messages suck. If anyone has a better explanation of what I'm missing that others must be getting from these stories, PLEASE PLEASE enlighten me.
~*~
Story #3
Today was trash day in our neighborhood. I'm always grateful for the G-man on Wednesdays because I never want to take for granted the fact that I don't have to deal with the trash I create beyond getting it out of my house to the curb. What a blessing! I think too many of us don't often think about where it goes after that, or the people it takes to get it there. Or that we should really be making a much bigger effort to send less of it wherever it ends up. But that's another blog...
I personally have it down to less than one kitchen-size bag of trash per week, except for when I clean the chinchilla cages and I have a second bag full of their nasty peed-on cage substrate, which is all biodegradable anyway. The roommate has added a bit more to my weekly refuse, but mostly we are less trashy than most of my neighbors. And I mean that literally when I talk about the asshole with the two always-screaming children and mufflerless Harley under my bedroom window.
When I moved in and realized I had to buy my own rubbish bin, I bought a 42-gallon wheeled thing that I knew I would never fill in a week, but figured bigger is always better for those few occasions when not everything fits, right?
The first time I left it on the curb on trash day I got it back with a terse note that they would not empty anything larger than a 32-gallon can. Oops. Sorry guys. I took the 42-gallon back to Home Depot and got the smaller can. Everyone was happy.
Today though, the garbage man not only took stuff, he left us all a present. Apparently Waste Management got a new contract, or new truck, or something because everyone in my little condo complex received a brand new GIGANTIC plastic city-owned trash bin. This thing is the size of Kansas. Even bigger than the original 42-gallon one they were so upset about. I guess the trucks have stronger back muscles than The Man.
Unfortunately fitting this monster in my garage has been a challenge. It's only a one-car garage and with all my daughter's stuff packed up in boxes in there, there's not much room left for things besides the washer/dryer and the Jeep.
Now that it's 3am and my brain is getting fuzzy, I don't know why this is news, but it did make me laugh earlier trying to fit it in the garage. I swear the Jeep actually glared at it because the only place for it is right in front of its nose. I tried along the side but squeezing the car between that and the other wall was just too much maneuvering. The Condo Association won't let us keep cans outside where anyone can see them - not even on the back patio (not that I would want it there anyway), but seriously, where do they think we have room for these things? Why wasn't I consulted? Oh yeah, maybe if I'd go to the Condo Assoc. meetings I would know. :)
Okay, time for bed. I just discovered I have other blog entries I haven't even finished from awhile back, but there's no way I'm staying awake for that. I'm not even going to proofread this. Ooooo - living dangerously!

Knowing Just Enough To Be Dangerous

"Nothing is so dangerous to the progress of the human mind than to assume that our views of science are ultimate; that there are no mysteries in Nature, that our triumphs are complete, and that there are no new worlds to conquer."

-Humphry Davy