“In case you were unaware… asking permission to write about you in my blog is just a courtesy. I cite the first amendment, public domain, and the fair use limitation. Have a nice day.”
— Auntie Social, roller derby athlete with East Bay Roller Derby
Mr. Wright has taken to saying, when he does something particularly humiliating, “You can’t blog about this!” As if I would do anything to embarrass my darling husband. Okay, maybe I would. But – to slaughter an American Express slogan – “bloggership has its privileges.”
I’m not a journalist, so please don’t look to my book or blog for fair, balanced reporting on the things that happen to or around me. Like my namesake (Hunter S. Thompson, the original Gonzo McGonzopants), I can’t help but give my slant on events.
Perhaps Mr. Wright needs to start his own blog.
It’s powerful stuff, blogging. People have actually said to Mr. Wright, “Please don’t tell your wife about this. I’d hate to have her blog about it,” thus inferring I have absolutely no common sense or a shred of prudence. I actually do try to use a modicum of grace and self-censorship when deciding what to blog:
Will my kids require therapy if I post this?
Will Mr. Wright divorce me?
Will the FBI show up at my door?
How about CPS?
Fortunately, I’m happily self-(un)employed, so I don’t have to worry about a pesky employer objecting to what I write.
Mr. Editor excluded, of course.
There was one guy, an anti-fan I call Doctor Grumpenstein, who sent Mr. Wright a scathing message on Facebook after I blogged about another guy openly cheating on his wife at a convention. He told Mr. Wright I was an embarrassment, and the only thing anyone should be ashamed of was my decision to blog about what I’d witnessed. It basically made me cry, the way I do when Cantina runs out of Southern Comfort.
Then, I checked my blog hits. The thousands and thousands of hits were still there, and I was receiving an inbox full of emails, thanking me for speaking out against infidelity. Doctor Grumpenstein was totally wrong when he declared “no one” reads my “tabloid of a blog.”
Perhaps Doctor Grumpenstein needs to start his own blog, too. He can blog about bloggers who are blogging about things that shouldn’t be blogged about. Heck, I’d read that!
If I know you in real life or online, there’s a chance I might blog about you. If I see you out in public, you might find yourself in one of my posts. If you tell me, “You can’t blog about this,” there’s an increased probability I will do just that. If I share a bed or a dinner table with you, you can bank on being given a codename and your very own “tag.”
I’m thinking of changing my book marketing pitch to: If you don’t buy my book, I will blog about you. What’s your privacy worth? Ten bucks or more? I do take orders online.
Whew! I know you darlings didn't actually expect me to post Bad Gratitude Monday on MONDAY this week (or any other week, for that matter - it's rarely posted on Monday)! So much to do, so much to buy, so much to stress over...
Melody Beattie has a wonderful quote about gratitude, and it's very fitting today:
Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow.
Amazing, isn't it? This week has been tough. Really tough. However, I have endless gratitude for:
1. Court dates. We've received a (tentative) date for finalization of Curlytop and Snugglebug's adoptions. We're hoping that everything goes as planned, and we finalize on September 22nd. I know many have been praying for our family, and for resolution of the adoption. Looks like it's finally coming!
Also, we received a notice from the prosecutor that Tattooed Necklace Guy is going to trial in October. Creepy Lurker Dude was arrested, and we'll wait to see when his trial is. Read the back-story here. I'll keep you posted. Thank you to all who have prayed for justice. It is arriving, slowly but surely. Continue to pray that these monsters will not be allowed to "work the system" and escape consequence.
2. My amazing kids. Like most families with seven kids, we are always on a tight budget, and, like many blended families, we have been able to share many expenses with our kids' non-custodial parents. This year, however, the bio mom of four of our kids decided to refuse to contribute to expenses for school supplies and clothing because - well, I don't know why. She is frequently bitter and angry, and I can't explain most of the things she does. In any event, our budget for half of the kids' needs certainly wasn't going to cover everything they needed.
When we explained to the kids that we had planned to purchase half of their clothing and supplies, and now that money was going to have to cover everything, it was heart-wrenching. I felt terrible about having to tell the kids that we were going to have to scale back our lists.
Know what their response was? They went into their rooms, did inventories, and came back and said things like, "My friend gave me this skirt because it doesn't fit her, but it's practically new. I can wear this to school," or "My backpack from last year is in pretty good shape. I don't mind using it for a while," or "I have the dress shoes you got me over the summer, so I really only need one pair of street shoes," and "It's okay. We have more than a lot of people. It's just stuff."
Can I tell you, readers, that I found a quiet, private place to bawl my eyes out? Even though things have been emotionally strained in the Wright household as of late, these are the kids that I remember choosing to spend a December collecting cups of dried soups, small bars of soap, mini-bottles of mouthwash and packaged cheese and crackers, which they assembled into care packages. On Christmas Eve, we took the packages into downtown Seattle and handed them out to homeless people. Seeing my kids blessing others who were less fortunate and praying with them is a sight I don't remember often enough. How could I ever be cross with such generous kids?
3. Provision. We live in a rural area, and between us and civilization is a bridge. Beebe Bridge is old and beautiful, but Monday it looked like this: A semi truck hauling apples made an abrupt turn on the bridge for some reason and broke through the side of the bridge. The cab of the truck snapped off and fell into the Columbia River. The driver, a 48 year-old woman from Olympia, was seat belted in. Her body was recovered hours later. Her driving partner, a male, is presumed dead and his body has not yet been recovered from the river, despite extensive searches of the water and shoreline. Please pray for the families of these victims, and that the body of the second victim is recovered soon.
The bridge has sustained considerable damage. It's sagging and it's not clear how long it will be closed. What that means for us is that in order to get to Chelan, our "town," we have to drive all the way to Wenatchee and up the west side of the Columbia - about an hour and a half, one way.
Now, I can miss my belly dance classes for a few weeks, and I can do my shopping in Wenatchee, but my kids go to school in Chelan. Driving six hours to get them to and from school (three hours round-trip, twice a day) is not in our gas or time budget, to say the least. Fortunately, the school district has stepped up to help kids in our area get to school. The buses are running an hour earlier each morning and returning an hour later each afternoon, but they ARE running, and getting our kids to school.
4. Being able to make a difference. I remember seeing the events of 9/11/01 on television as I woke and prepared for the day. I watched as news crews reported on the horrific sight, even as the crashes kept happening. I remember thinking, hoping, praying that I was still asleep - that it couldn't be real. "This is the United States," I kept crying. "How can this happen?"
That night, we joined hundreds of others in lighting candles and leaving flowers and written prayers at the International Fountain in the Seattle Center. The entire place was awash with flickers of candlelight, and the sound of quiet sobs was the only noise.
September 11, 2002 we returned to the fountain. There were noticeably fewer people, but organizers had mulched the flowers left the previous year and made packets of mulch and bulb flowers to send home with those who returned. We planted our bulbs the next day. Our dog dug them up and ate them. I was devastated.
In 2003, even fewer people went to the fountain. Our kids were saddened that theirs were some of the only candles lit. By 2004, the tradition was pretty much abandoned, though we stopped by and said a prayer. We moved in 2005.
Since then, our remembrance of 9/11 has been pretty much a quiet, private one. This year, I'm publicly doing something to help keep the memory of those lost in the tragedy alive. I hope you'll help.
Project 2,996 is an online cooperative effort to remember the 2,996 victims of September 11th. Bloggers (or even those who want to participate but don't have a blog) research and write a tribute to an assigned victim. So far, just over 675 people are signed up to write an online memorial.
I truly believe it is an honor to serve the memory of those that were lost. This project is, in my opinion, too important to not take part. Please, if you can spare an hour to research and another hour to write a tribute, sign up here. If you don't have a blog, a page to post on will be provided for you. I am endless grateful to be able to help this effort, and my plea to you is that you'll do the same.
Green Eggs and Ham. Where the Wild Things Are. Corduroy. Charlotte’s Web. The Indian in the Cupboard. Little House on the Prairie. Goodnight Moon…
Which of these books should be banned from your local library?
The answer: All of them, according to Congress. The Consumer Product Safety Information Act (CPSIA), passed in August 2008 and enacted in February 2009, was intended to keep children from being harmed by products that contain lead.
That’s a noble quest, and an important one. The problem is, like so many well-intentioned regulations, the “safety net” was cast too wide. The results have been catastrophic for many small business owners, and may soon even be affecting your favorite public library.
The CPSIA requires that all products intended for children under the age of 12 are tested and certified as meeting the lead limits as set forth by law. “So what?” you might say. “That’s a good idea,” you might muse. I know I did.
The problem, as it applies to my library and my non-profit Friends of the Library group, is that some books published before 1985 were printed with inks containing lead. Some. Not many, but some books intended for children may contain lead in the ink.
It is important to note that the ink in books does not flake off, like paint chips. A child would have to actually eat the book in order to ingest any lead that might possibly be contained on the page. Furthermore, the amount of lead that a child might consume from the digestion of a book is so small that he or she would have to eat dozens of books in short order to ingest enough lead to be harmful. To quote citizen activist Sarah Natividad, “Even if you could find books with lead in them, a child would have to eat so many of them that the digestive consequences would kick in first.”
There’s a lesson here: If your allow your children to read books that were printed before 1985, you should absolutely discourage them from a diet comprised solely of books.
As the law is written, it prohibits the distribution of items intended for children that do not comply with the lead limits. How do we find out which books contain lead? We get them tested through an expensive process which, as it happens, destroys the book, or we get it tested through a different expensive process. Doesn’t really matter, because both are cost-prohibitive for most libraries. By the way, “distribution” does not have to be for profit, so it applies to our libraries.
At this point of compliance, your local library may have destroyed its inventory of pre-1985 children’s books through lead testing, but let’s just pretend that your library is warehousing the untested books. Now, they can legally a) restrict checkout of children’s books to patrons 13 years or older (“May I see your state ID card, please?”), b) stockpile the books for perhaps decades, until they become rare and valuable enough to be considered “collectors items” that are not likely to be used by children, or c) get rid of them.
Can’t sell them… that, too, falls under “distribution.” Let’s not put them in landfills… they could be loaded with lead, remember? Guess we’ll have to burn them!
The government doesn’t leave many options.
I am shocked that virtually no one in my world has even heard of the CPSIA, let alone its far-reaching consequences. The potential for devastation doesn’t just apply to libraries, either. Your favorite thrift store, crafter, school, youth club and more are targets. Even you run the risk of prosecution if you hold a yard sale and “distribute” items for children that contain lead. Many small businesses have already closed, unable to withstand the economic consequences.
A great citizen-organized website to visit for more information is http://whatisthecpsia.com. Start there. Get outraged. Write many, many letters to your lawmakers.
I’m not sure how so many members of Congress managed to vote in favor of the CPSIA without considering its catastrophic effects…
Perhaps they ate too many lead-laced books as children.
The above column was published in the Lake Chelan Mirror and on LakeChelanMirror.com. If you'd like to share your thoughts with the editor, you may do so here.
This weekend has been tough. I mean, really, really tough.
Especially tough is trying to emotionally deal with a child leaving home... and failing miserably. I'm not ready for Princess to leave, but she is going to, nonetheless, in just under three weeks. I'm sure I'll post more on that later.
Today, however, I am trying to focus on gratitude, and am sincerely grateful for these things:
1. Beloved and unknown veterans alike who served our country to ensure that today, I would have the freedom to write what I want, to say what I want, to celebrate Jesus the way I want, and so much more.
2. Mr. Wright, who made it possible for me to hole up in the bedroom all day, catching up on web updates, emails and blogs... even though all seven kids are out of school and making our home into a general madhouse. He even cooked for me, and made sure that I ate throughout the day.
3. My crazy-haired girl, Curlytop, who makes me laugh every single day, and makes me proud of how compassionate and empathetic she is.
