A Chinese Curse

You know the Chinese curse that says "May you live in interesting times"?  Please help me track down the fucker that said that so I can stomp his bones into dust.  Because apparently I crossed his list at some point, and it has made for some craziness the likes of which defy the imagination.

Let's see - #1:  We get a call the first of February from our Landlord.  The home we live in and property we live on is part of an estate, and we pay our rent to the heirs of the estate.  However, the heirs would like to get a better return so they asked us to move in 30 days from that date so that they could renovate the home before putting the property up for sale.

This was a very devastating blow to us.  Truthfully, we really hadn't recovered from the traumatic move out of Easley a year and a half ago - there's still a lot of stuff in boxes in the basement. Maybe that's not such a bad thing though - saves me having to pack it back up.

The thing is, it's not that simple to move this household.  We can't just open the paper, find a property in our price range that has the required amount of square footage and number of bedrooms, put down the deposit and first month's rent, and move in.  We have a fair amount of furry baggage by anyone's standards that comes with us.

Call any house for rent, in any price range in your local market, and say the words "Fifty cats" somewhere in the conversation.  I dare you.  If you get another fifteen seconds on the phone with that person, I'll personally give you a $5 bill. 

Owner financing is a better option, but we don't have the money for a down payment, and even then, most people who would do owner financing aren't going to agree to allow an animal rescue to set up either.

What you have to look for is the unique property, the one no one else is looking at....it's most likely non-traditional in some way...maybe an old farmhouse that has been built onto three or four times so that it almost appears to be a series of sheds. Or the storefront building sitting at an intersection in the middle of nowhere that has been empty for five years.  Or an old wooden church or school building off the main highway.  An old Victorian with Federation columns that has pretensions to a southern mansion that someone started a renovation on years ago and sits still in an unfinished state.  The only requirement to any of these properties is that they have some space that can be converted into a rescue cattery.  Since that conversion mainly means installing some extra heavy-duty breakers and outlets, installing some additional lighting, laying down linoleum tile and having a nearby water source, you can use anything from an enclosed carport to a metal shed with a concrete floor to an old barn.  But finding these properties is tough.  I've been at it for well over a month now, so I know.  We actually did find a place that would have worked perfectly for our needs, a soon-defunct day care center, but unfortunately it was far out of our price range.

So the search continues, in Oconee, Anderson, and now Greenville counties.  We will not return to Pickens County.  Our experiences there continue to haunt all of us and I for one refuse to live in fear of jackbooted thugs with badges and guns coming to my door again.  The nightmares have stopped, I have no intention of allowing them a way in again.

That being said, I'm willing to look at things outside of that area, but only as a last resort. I'm even willing, for the right property, to give up high speed internet for now.  Anyone who knows me knows it will be like a junkie going cold-turkey - my methodone will be my smart phone, but just like a junkie, it won't be the same.  But I'll do it for the cats, and pray for U-verse in the meanwhile.

#2 - My search for a full-time job has so far turned up nothing, and cell phone repair has not progressed to the point where I have a steady income from it.  It's picking up as people hear about me, but not enough.  Our income is now upside down, and if something doesn't happen soon I don't know what we are going to do.

#3: My father is sick again.  See a few blogs back about how I feel about that.  I'm still working on those feelings, trust me, but it's not going to change anything.

#4:  Food Trip To Washington:  The last two weeks of February I fundraised like mad to raise $300 to cover gas to and from the DC area to pick up a HUGE load of cat and dog food.  Finally, on Friday, March 1st, we had $200 of it raised and I just decided screw it, I'm going anyway.  Surely people won't leave me stranded on the side of the road.  If I have to I'll go in a truckstop and pass the hat for money.  But that wasn't necessary - a few hours later we had what we thought was more than enough for the trip (Denise didn't take into account the heavier load causing a severe reduction in  MPG on the return trip) and the next morning I left bright and early for DC.  It was an uneventful trip with the exception that I ran into traffic in Richmand, VA.  I got there early enough that Chris Haslam with Commonwealth Humane Society and his lovely wife Linda were able to buy me dinner (a luscious bacon cheddar cheeseburger - definitely NOT on my diet!)

They also got me a hotel room donated at a Hyatt in the DC area.  The room was very comfortable - my only complaint is that high speed internet cost extra, or you could lug your computer down to the lobby and use it there for free.  I didn't think the Hyatt's patrons would appreciate my Pink Floyd oversized tee and men's blue boxers, and I didn't feel like getting dressed, so I watched TV instead.  It was hard but I had my phone. 

The next morning dawned cloudy and cold, and after a wonderful breakfast we spent the next five hours packing and loading the truck and the trailer.  By the time we were done the hitch was about 10" off the ground.  I wondered at the time if I were going to leave the transmission someplace on I-95, but that 2000 GMC Sierra performed like a trooper and the trip home, with the exception of some traffic in a couple of different places and a short visit at Sacha Furr's house in Mebane (a fellow rescuer who works with cats and kittens with neurological and genetic disabilities primarily) to drop off cat food, treats and pee pads, get kisses from my Beenie Baby, a handicapped cat I helped transport and fell madly in love with, and take a short nap, was pretty uneventful.  I'm still distributing the dog food, treats, toys and bedding to local dog rescues.

Check out where the hitch is!

#5:  Found out that we will most likely be losing the loaned rescue vehicle we have been using for the past two years.  The person who has kindly allowed us to use their vehicle, as well as paying the insurance and taxes while we used it, is now in need of the vehicle back themselves, and will continue to help us as they can but we need a full-time vehicle for the rescue.  If you're reading this and you know of anything, please let me know.  We can't afford to buy but if we can find one donated we are a 501-c3 charity so it would be tax deductable.  Email me at dotsplaceanimalhaven@gmail.com if you know of anything.

#6: Made a new friend - the one bright spot in all of this is that I have gotten to know a really nice person in the last two weeks and it has made a huge difference in my life, just having that new connection.  I've known this person for a while but finally got the chance to have some interesting dialogue and realized what a great individual this is and how lucky I am to have found this out.  I look forward to many more spirited discussions in the future and I think that even with all of that above, I may have, for at least two weeks, come out on the positive side for once.

I don't know what the future holds but I can pray for peace, which I do.  I don't like all this upheaval.  I want my life to be smooth, orderly, even predictable and boring.  I would welcome boring for just a little while.  But that damn Chinese philosopher keeps raising his ugly head....

Letter to the Editor

Last week Covidien, a major employer in Oconee County, announced that they were closing their plant in Seneca and taking all 600 jobs to Costa Rica, where minimum wage for these jobs is between $1.85 and $2.45 per hour (American Dollars).  This announcement, coming on the heels of a major layoff at Itron, is a severe blow to the Oconee County economy.  In July, a bill went before the US Senate that would stop companies that ship jobs overseas from getting tax breaks here in the US.  It failed, and only three Senate Republicans voted for the bill - Olympia Snowe, Susan Collins and Scott Brown. Under existing law, employers may take tax deductions for the costs associated with moving OUR jobs out of the country! The proposed legislation would have stopped this practice, and used the new revenue to fund a 20% tax credit for the costs companies have bringing labor back into the U.S.

I wondered if a similar bill had gone before the House of Representatives, and if so, how Jeff Duncan had voted.  I did a little research and found that, while this bill had not gone before the House, another bill introduced last year that would stop call centers from outsourcing jobs overseas had.  It was no surprise to find that Mr. Duncan voted against that bill, against stemming the flow of good paying call center jobs with companies already making a profit out of this country to places where an hour's wage wouldn't even buy you a bag of groceries.

What I would like to know is, what did Mr. Duncan and our local leaders do to try to stop this loss of much-needed jobs in this poor county that they represent?  Did they meet with company officials to try to work out a compromise?  Did Duncan pull together county leaders and work with them to find a way to keep Covidien in Oconee County?  Did any of them do ANYTHING to keep these jobs here where we need them?  Was Mr. Duncan even aware that these jobs were leaving?

This county is heavily in Republican hands, and I have seen no effort by them to try to either keep the companies we have, like Itron and Covidien, from leaving, or to attract new companies with good paying jobs to this area.  New businesses have opened and relocated to the counties around us, but it never seems to reach here.

It is time to hold our local government responsible for what is wrong in this county.  Obama didn't cause this, those in power in Oconee County let this happen.  It is time that we put people in place that will work FOR Oconee County, not against it.  Think about your vote in November..

Love Sucks...

It seems to be shaping up to be that kind of week.  I got news that my Dad is back in the hospital again.  Despite being "friends" on Facebook with several of my cousins, things get to me kind of slow about goings on back home.  Like sometimes snailmail speed slow.  I don't fault anyone, it's not a priority and I know that.  But it is frustrating at times.

Throw in a little Olympic crap (I can watch Michael Phelps swim a lap or maybe two, and one of those little girls jump around a bit, then I'm bored.  I don't get the fascination), Chick-Fil-A and the manufactured crisis, and trying to plan to move a business AGAIN, a day of severe neck pain and a lawnmower issue and well....

I made a decision a few years ago to stop associating with some members of my family, most especially my immediate family.  Ours has never been a peaceful coexistance, and after Mom died things went downhill to the point where every time I'd travel home to Tennessee, I'd spend half the trip back crying, and the next two weeks severely depressed.  John got horribly frustrated with me, because he wasn't on those trips and he just couldn't get what was so bad - so what if we had a little tiff?  See, his family is the total opposite of ours - they get into it on a regular basis, get loud, wave arms and stomp around a bit, then it's over.  No grudge, no long drawn out vendetta, it's just done.  In our family, we remember every slight, no matter how small, and we bury it all until it just gets to be too much and we explode.  And when we explode, anyone within shouting distance gets hurt.

So I think even John is a little baffled as to why I decided to put an end to the pain being dealt out to me by those I have no defense against.  Not recently, but not too long ago he was still encouraging me to go visit Dad again.  He doesn't understand, as a number of others don't, that at this point it's not a choice I can make.  The last time I found myself in my Dad's presence I got physically sick and had to leave immediately. While I love him and always will, (and we know that we have no say in who we love), too much happened over the years, there is too much rage, too much hurt.  And there is nothing he can do to change that.  I have been told that until I let my anger go, until I forgive, that I am not in a state of Grace.  Well, that may be.  But it doesn't change things.

There's been a lot of misinformation and disinformation associated with me and my name over the years.  A lot of it came from my ex-husband.  I won't lie to you, I was a very troubled teenager and I ran away from home a number of times.  I also drank and occasionally smoked pot.  I made some less than intelligent decisions in my teens and early 20's - but nothing on the scale of what was passed around about me by my family.  By the time I was 26 I had grown out of all of that, I was in school, supporting myself and the kids, working two and sometimes three jobs to pay the bills.  Did I cut up, cut loose on occasion with friends?  Yes - just like everyone else.  But there have been no arrests, no jail time, no rehab programs, no halfway houses, no drunken car wrecks, no car thefts, no attempted murders, no thefts of any sort, no marriages destroyed....in other words...my record is looking pretty clean in comparison to a great many members of my extended family.  Oh yeah, and in that time period I also managed to buy and sell several houses, start and sell two successful businesses, I'm a published author and I've been quoted in The Nation.  I got a college degree, I married a wonderful man and we've been together for almost 20 years, and I found several of the best friends any one person could ever have. And yet I'm seen as a failure.

I don't know if the people that made the stuff up just thought that I'd never hear any of it, or if they just didn't care.  Either way, if you believed just half of the gossip exchanged by my good Christian extended family members, it's a wonder that I'm alive today.  I should at the very least be in an AIDS ward someplace.

I remember the day that Dad apologized to me for believing my ex-husband instead of me.  His excuse was that James was so credible, being an engineer and an Air Force Officer and all, that it wasn't until James broke promises to him that my Dad realized what a skumbag James was, and that maybe I had been telling the truth about him all along.  When I asked him about the time I came to his house, bruised and bloody after yet another beating by the Officer and Gentleman, about why he didn't help me then, his answer was "Honey, every married couple fights".

I think, at this point, I'm pretty much done trying to prove myself to a group of people who have no interest in knowing who I really am.  As one cousin recently opined, it's amazing that we're all from the same gene pool.  I am so completely different - all of Dad's kids are so completely different in so many ways from the rest of his family... which makes me think it has to have something to do with Mom and what she brought to the genetic pool, and our upbringing as well.  One of the things Mom taught all of us, but especially me and Kim, was that there were no limits on what we could do.  Just because we were women we should never think of that in relation to anything we wanted, and I don't believe either of us ever have.  I know I haven't, and judging from Kim's success as a business woman, I don't think she did either.

But unfortunately what she neglected to teach either of us was that being women, we would be judged to a higher standard than our male counterparts all of our lives.  Behavior that society accepts for most men as normal is seen as risky behavior, promiscuity and general skankiness in a woman, even today.  My father could go on a drunken binge and leave home for two weeks, and other than his brothers going and finding him and sobering him back up and bringing him home, there would be no reaction by his family.  It was like it never happened.

If I'm beginning to sound a little angry and bitter well, you're right, I am.  I have no desire to see Dad.  I don't.  My great-grandfather was more of a father to me that he was, and there isn't a day that goes by that I don't think about Papaw.  But Dad spent our younger childhood drinking and fighting with Mom, running around on her, blowing his money...there were far too many nights that we sat in the dark at our home because Dad had drank up his paycheck and Mom couldn't pay the electric bill.  Then when I was 13 Dad drank and drove and a woman died because of his selfishness, and the somewhat pitiful life we did have went to hell in a handbasket at that point.  As Dad was scheduled to be released from prison three years later, Mom got the courage to file for divorce and it was like Dad not only divorced her, he divorced us too. We three kids used to call ourselves the stepchildren, because that's how we were treated.  Dad remarried almost immediately to a woman on her 5th marriage and with 5 children, the youngest one only 5.  Her unmarried daughter who also had a child also lived with them.  When his wife started abusing us, Dad did nothing to stop it, even leaving so he didn't have to witness it.  He made himself a good life with her family, and left us feeling like we'd done something wrong, but we never quite knew what. I'm glad he raised her son to be a good man, and was a good father to him.  I really am, because I love the guy like a real brother, not a stepbrother.  Always have, and because I love him I am glad that he did have a good father.  But I think it makes it difficult to discuss Dad because he sees one man and I see a very different one.

And now I sit here, angry with myself because I let it happen again....I let my extended family fool me into believing that I belonged, that I had a home, that I was valued and appreciated and loved.  I guess I'll never learn.  And then in one instant, it was all out in the open.  That's when I realized that some things are just never going to change, no matter how hard you try.

One of these days I will learn to stop giving my trust so easily.  Because people do not change.  Leopards cannot wash away their spots, and if someone believes something about you, it's very difficult to change those beliefs - true or not.  Maybe that's why I feel closer to people I have no blood relation with, but who have known me much better than my family ever has.  These people know the true me, know what I am really like, and they love me, and they show me that love every day.  In the long run, all I ever wanted from anyone was that they love me and let me love them, and it seems to be the one thing that continues to elude me when it comes to my family.  My Mom loved me.  I know that.  My stepbrother loves me.  I know that too.  Until today I would have named some other family members as well, but now I'm just not so sure anymore. Which has absolutely nothing to do with me loving them.  But then again, love never does.

And In A Blink, We Are Gone....

A lot of people start realizing their own mortality when their parents die.  They suddenly realize that Mom or Dad is only 20 or 25 years older than them, and that's when either the midlife crisis happens or they straighten up, fly right, and start treating the body like it's an investment rather than a nasty carpet at a New York party.  And before you say "Ew", think about some of the things you have done and put into your body over the years....even the CLEANEST living among you has scarfed half a dozen hot-out-of-the-oil Krispy Kreme's at 1:00 a.m.  You know you have.  Don't lie.  And if it wasn't that, it was something else equally disgusting.

I didn't have a midlfe crisis, though, when Mom died in 1999.  I mean, all of us kids smoked tobacco at that time, and since Mom was dying of lung cancer brought on by cigarettes, we all stood outside on the porch late one night while she lay inside dying, puffing away on our coffin nails and swearing that, when this was all over, we were going to quit.  Out of the three of us, as far as I know I'm the only one who actually did, and it took me three more years to do it.  To be fair, I had a good streak of 8 weeks clean going on September 11th, 2001, but Dad was having heart surgery that day and gave his cigarettes to me to hide from my stepmother.  After the 2nd building came down the patch came off and I lit one up.

But on July 8th, 2002 I got up, showered, and went to my first day at my new job where I wasn't allowed to smoke until after I left work for the day because my boss was six months into a nine-month high-risk pregnancy and the smell of tobacco smoke made her hurl major.  Best thing that's ever happened to me.  I wish it could happen to everyone I love who smokes.

Because, in the long run, what people don't get is you aren't just hurting yourself.  You aren't.  You think you are, you yell loud about smoker's rights and argue about the real impact of second-hand smoke, but in reality, what you don't see is where it hurts your family the most.  You don't see their faces as they wait in that hospital waiting room, waiting for you to get out of surgery, or wait for their fifteen minutes of visit time to you in the ICU, waiting for the doctor to finish his examination...waiting, worrying, crying, heart breaking...putting their lives on hold because you could not stop yourself from destroying your own body.  They make excuses to their employers, their spouses, their kids so that they can sit there and wait for news, good or bad, about you.  So that they can pray for you.  It's what you do when you love someone.

This has been a hard week for me.  I hurt my back on Tuesday, not at the lake, or tubing or any number of other great things I could have been doing that, had I hurt my back I could at least say "Yeah, but I had FUN" like I did last summer when I destroyed my knee, but doing something simple...bending over to get something out of a drawer in my office.  Yep, that's it...I bent over and it felt like I had been shot in my lower back.  Or what I imagine getting shot feels like anyway.  And I've been in pain constantly ever since.

I don't do "pain pills"...Darvocet, Hydrocodone, Tylox...ugh.  Anything off the store shelf that has "PM" after it puts me into a 12 hour coma, so you can imagine what these pills do to me.  I take them only as a last resort, and only when I can just no longer stand the pain.  And in addition to putting me in a coma, these pills also have the lovely side effect of making me nauseous.  In a coma, and throwing up...yep, I think a number of rock stars have died that way over the years.  So "pain pills" are a last resort option, only when I have a babysitter that can make sure I don't aspirate in my sleep.

OTC stuff helps a little, I'm taking two Aleve's every 12 hours on the dot...and believe me I know when that last hour is coming up.

Doesn't matter though.  It's nothing compared to what one of my favorite people in the world is going through.  Early in the year he ended up in the hospital for tests, and it was determined that he had had a heart attack...at 48.  He had been diagnosed with diabetes a few years before as well.  Recently he started feeling fatigued, then sick, then REALLY sick and ended up back in the hospital, only this time it's antibiotic-resistant strep, aka MRSA.  He's been going through some major treatment to combat this, including drugs that are genetically developed just for him.  However, the drugs are so hard on the body because this stuff is so hard to kill that he's been left bedridden, in pain and barely able to move.

Last night he told me that he was dying, and that he felt that he probably didn't have another year.  I argued with him, told him to FIGHT, that he could fight this and he could win.  I said all of the things to him that I would have said to my sister had I gotten the opportunity.  What I got back from him really scared me, because he sounds so depressed, so....like he's just given up.

I don't understand why people give up.  I don't understand why someone would choose to leave this life after such a short time here rather than stay and see what happens next.  I'm pissed off that I'm almost fifty, that I only have maybe 30 or 40 years at the most!  And that's if I'm lucky.  Because looking at my family, there's a better-than-average chance that the big c or another debilitating illness will find me in the next ten years.  Cancer is rampant on both sides of my family.  My Dad has COPD, and while most of that is due to 50+ years of smoking and working as a paint and body repairman, inhaling dust, fiberglass, paint and God-only-knows-what chemicals into his lungs all those years, some of it is inherited as well.  We all three had some sort of lung ailments as children, and on my part I developed asthma as an adult.  My sister died of lung cancer.  I have aunts and uncles who have died of lung and breast cancer.  Mother, Father, Sister, Aunts, Uncles...So I know that it's not a matter of  if, it's a matter of when.

I'm aware that suffering is involved here.  I know my friend, this person that should have been my brother, I know he's in a great deal of pain.  And I'm hoping that this round of medication will cure the infection raging in his system and that his words are all just the depression brought on by boredom, being in bed, being fucked up on pain pills, being broke, and feeling useless.  Because of all things, hope is something that I can never let go of.  Hope for him, hope for myself, for John, for Gareth, for my kids and their kids.  Hope for my cousins who, like me, are so vulnerable.  Some have already started the fight and are winning!

I know some very little of what good friend is feeling...only a very small part..because I've spent most of this last week sitting here in front of my computer, in the only chair in the house comfortable to me, in the only position comfortable to me, unable to do some of the most basic chores around here like change litter boxes, or even something as simple as feeding the cats (haven't been able to bend over or lift very well).  John has taken on the entire burden without a word of reproach, and I can't say enough kind words to him about that.  Gareth has been so understanding, despite the fact that he has had to run the store by himself most of the week.  And I know I haven't been easy to live with...I've been grouchy and short and petulant and...bitchy.  Because I hurt.  And now, after talking to my dear friend, I feel like skum.  I have no reason for complaint.

My "midlife crisis" as it were is that I worry about death coming and me not being ready for it.  I don't know if I'll ever be ready for it.  There is so much I still want to do, that I want to see, that I want to BE.  I want to travel.  I want to see where my sister lived the last 1/4 of her life.  I want to visit New York City again.  I want to watch my granddaughter and grandson graduate college.  And I want to LIVE every day to it's fullest.  I hope that I don't ever give up, that I don't ever give in, and that I don't ever say "at least if I'm dead, I can rest".  Because that, to me, would be the ultimate tragedy.

How Democrats are Failing in Oconee County and South Carolina

(NOTE:  The following is my own opinions.  They do not reflect and in many cases are in direct opposition to my husband John's opinions, so please do not read any of this and believe that I speak for both of us.  I do not.  If you want to know how he feels you are welcome to ask him, and I can promise you if you ask he WILL tell you. :)

(If you aren't interested in local politics, or aren't from this area, you might not find this blog very interesting.  If you are interested in local politics and are from this area, you may be offended.  Either way, you have been warned.)

As I sat in the glaring light and heat of the Fun In The Sun Festival in West Union today (June 9, 2012), I watched our neighbors to our right, - a conservative group who came together to make sure all of the previously Republican candidates get the required signatures necessary to be on this fall's ballot - scramble in the heat. The volunteers would approach each individual that passed and ask them where they lived, where they voted, and then asking the fairgoer to sign the petitions, if any, applicable to their area. Further down, across from us Republican Oconee County Sheriff's candidate Mike Crenshaw greeted fairgoers and shook hands, while his volunteers asked for the same signatures on their petitions.  Go down the street a little more and you will find more Republican candidates also engaged in getting the necessary signatures for this fall's election.

Of the Democrats, there was not a sign. Plenty of crafters, civic organizations and food vendors, a couple of local businesses, and the music stage at the end of the street, but all of the excitement on the street was being generated by the conservative political volunteers going from person to person.  This excitement virtually guaranteed that the now-defunct Republican Primary would be the big topic of conversation.

As I watched all of this I could not help but think about what an opportunity the Democrats of Oconee County had missed yet again. Since the Oconee County Democratic Party participated in the Christmas Parades in December of 2011, there has been very little other community participation by the OCDP. Including this one, there have been four community festivals that I know of - Mayberry Days in Westminster, Mayfest in Walhalla, Senecafest in Seneca and of course Fun In The Sun today in West Union - this year. We as Oconee County Democrats have participated in NONE of them that I'm aware of.  We should have been at ALL of them.

I don't wonder anymore why we are at such a disadvantage in Oconee County - I know. In order to gain community awareness, we have to PARTICIPATE in community events. We have to be out there, talking to people, giving them our perspectives and our information and our opinions and letting them know there is an alternative to the same government they've tolerated for forever. Our local party has been hijacked by a group of individuals who are stuck in their ways and refuse to try anything new, and the rest of the group are scared of them or have wandered away. Our State party has no interest anymore of supporting the party on the county level. So what happens is that instead of speaking up and giving support, those people who would make excellent volunteers, people with energy, and heart, and commitment instead get tired of being told "Well, we don't do it that way" and they quit coming around.

I first posted information about today's festival two months ago on the OCDP Facebook page. Booth space was CHEAP compared with what most festivals charge - only $25. I even recommended that the party request their booth be next to mine so that I could do double duty. I heard NOTHING in return, yea, nay or kiss my ass.  I also sent the same info in an email to the county Chair, and heard nothing from that as well.

At the county convention earlier in the year we knew there was the possibility that the OCDP could be disbanded. Many people approached my husband John and asked him to take over the Chair, and I was even approached to do it. My reasons for saying no were very simple - almost all of my energy and attention go into our animal rescue, and I could not devote the time and energy necessary to the party that it deserves to do the job properly. You will have to ask John his reasons for declining, but I know that the very frustration that I feel today played a role in his decision.  I'm thinking now that disbanded might have been the best overall. Because this is just downright embarrassing. It is EMBARRASSING to tell a Republican volunteer that you are a Democrat and have them say "Do we even have a Democratic Party in Oconee County?"

I haven't been to a meeting in months, partially due to rescue, and partially due to the OCDP making the decision to keep meeting in restaurants despite requests by members that we keep the meetings in public venues where purchase of a meal is not required. And why did our leadership choose to make that decision? BECAUSE SOMEONE MIGHT HAVE TO MAKE FREEKING COFFEE.

Yep, that's it in a nutshell...God Forbid that someone might have to break a sweat doing what? Measuring a few teaspoons of (party purchased or donated) coffee into a (party purchased or donated) coffee pot, add some water, let it perk on it's own, and then pour it into a (party purchased or donated) thermos and - here's the hard part - carry it to a meeting?  I don't even DRINK coffee so I am not very good at making it but I'd even be willing to take a turn at it now and again.  That's just ridiculous that I even had to hear about that. 

I have come to the conclusion that what is called the Oconee County South Carolina Democratic Party is, in reality, nothing more than a social club for a bunch of do-nothings who like to get together and argue.  And I'm sorry, but cleaning a stretch of highway once a month, in my opinion, furthers the Democratic cause very little.  If it makes you feel happy, I'm happy for you.

In the meantime we can't even field a slate of candidates.  In a county this size, we can't find more than ONE person willing to serve his or her community, or at least willing to try.  Why?  Because they know they will have little to no support from Democrats.  Democrats think we can sit around and discuss an election and make a few phone calls and win it, while Republicans KNOW that the only way to win local elections is to go door-to-door, house to house, church to church, club to club, until you are ready to literally drop from exhaustion.  You don't have a minute you can call your own from the time you announce.  And you have a huge group of volunteers to call on to do what you can't.  Here in Oconee County, and many other places in South Carolina, we don't have anything close to that kind of dedication.  Hell, Marilyn couldn't find anyone to man the filing location until John volunteered. Not that we had any candidates but you know... 

Democrats in Oconee County should have been all over this whole election brouhaha right from the beginning, starting with a strongly-worded statement against the State Legislature for passing this flawed law in the first place.  Then, when Adams "certified" his candidates despite them not being in compliance of State law, our party should have called a press conference to decry this action and demand that the county and state elections officials right this wrong. When the challenge against Bartee's credentials surfaced, we should have had an official representative of our party in the courtroom as the defenders of a fair election system. And when the Republicans made their recent crazy decision to completely dump the established primary election and force all of their candidates to scramble to get on the ballot in November, we again as a party should have demanded an investigation by the state as to what the heck Republicans are doing here in Oconee county to the voters.  But we did NOTHING.  You wouldn't even know that we exist...

The Democratic party is supposed to be the party of the PEOPLE. We are supposed to be the defenders of the downtrodden, the demanders of fair elections, and the ones who stand up and shout "I'M MAD AS HELL AND I'M NOT GOING TO SHUT UP UNTIL YOU MAKE IT RIGHT!!!" Instead, what we have here in South Carolina and especially in Oconee County is "I'm not happy about it but I'm not going to say anything because we never have before and besides, somebody might make me do something if I do".  Until we get an ACTIVE party that participates in community outreach, gives regular updates to the press and REPRESENTS Oconee County Democrats and Liberals, well, truthfully your little meetings are just a waste of my (and apparently a lot of others) time.  Call me when you want to act like a real party again.

As A Woman, I Am Outraged...And You Should Be Too.

Like many people, I was outraged last week to hear that the Susan G. Komen Foundation, sponsors and benefactors of the Susan G. Komen Foundation Race For The Cure, had chosen to stop funding Planned Parenthood and allowing them to provide free breast cancer screenings and mammograms to poor women.  As the story unfolded, I learned more and more about what goes on behind the pink doors of the SGKF, and I came to the realization that SGKF is not working for "the cure", they are working in their own self interests.


SGKF was started by Nancy Brinker, who's family also owns Cancer Treatment Centers of America.  Nancy's sister was Susan G. Komen, and she died of breast cancer.  According to PR blather, Nancy supposedly promised Susan on her deathbed that she would work diligently to find a cure for breast cancer so that women would stop dying of this disease.  Unless there's a witness that I haven't heard about, no one knows if this is the truth or some beautiful spin thought up by advertising mavens.  Until recently, I would have believed the former.  Now, I'm not so sure.


A year or so ago SGKF hired Karen Handel, a former Secretary of State from Georgia and avowed anti-abortion advocate, as senior vice-president of public policy.  Anyone who cared to do a Wikipedia search would know that during her tenure as GA SOS she attempted to chase Planned Parenthood out of Georgia, and lobbied members of the state congress to enact laws that would make it difficult, if not impossible for a woman to obtain an abortion, no matter the reason, within Georgia.  Luckily, she was not successful and Georgia women still have the right to make decisions with regards to their own bodies.


After her failed run at Governor, apparently she decided that if she couldn't legislate them out, she'd starve them out, hence her decision to go to work for SGKF.  Insiders within the organization state that as soon as she hit the ground she started demanding that funding to Planned Parenthood cease immediately.  And last December, she was finally successful, causing a long-term SGKF foundation member to resign on the spot, and several others to quietly resign over the next month.


When Planned Parenthood released a press statement in late January informing the public that SGKF had cut their funding for screenings and mammograms, I don't think anyone had any idea that the poop was going to hit the fan the way it did, and the resulting splash would color the pink ribbon a dirty brown.  Closets have been opened, skeletons have been dragged out and made to dance, Handel has resigned in disgrace, and Nancy Brinker has been proven in public a liar, and possibly a thief.


I think we all owe Karen Handel a resounding "thank you" and a round of applause?  Why?  Because without her, millions of Americans would be lacing on shoes, hitting up their co-workers, and writing checks for an organization, believing their dollars were going to find a cure for this horrible, horrible disease.  Now, we all know that SGKF is nothing more than a front for denying women the right to make choices regarding their own health issues, and a way for a rich family to get even richer.  Without Karen Handel, many of us, if not all, would not know that SGKF vigorously (to the tune of app one million dollars in 2010) goes after any organization that DARES to use the pink ribbon or the words "the cure".  Without Karen Handel, no one would know that SGKF brought in over $420 million dollars in 2010, but that only $270 million was actually awarded in grants, including a PALTRY $600 thousand dollars to Planned Parenthood for breast screenings and mammograms for poor women. Without Karen Handel, no one would know about the extravegant salaries, travel, and political donations paid for out of the kindness of those who have no idea how their money is being spent.  Without Karen Handel, none of us would know that SGKF has a political agenda - a very CHILLING political agenda, especially if you are poor.  And without Karen Handel, hardly anyone would know that Nancy Brinker dances on her poor dead sister's grave every day as she puts money in her pocket that could save the life of another sister, another mother, another daughter.  As someone who has lost a sister to cancer, this one fact makes me so angry.  I could never, in a thousand years, imagine using my sister's death for profit.  And I can't imagine anyone who could being a decent human being.

I will not celebrate the day SGKF closes its doors - and I'm pretty sure they're toast.  I will not celebrate because I wonder if we possibly might actually have a cure by now if a REAL organization, one that was REALLY focused on a cure, had sprung up in the place of SGKF.  Maybe there was someone out there that was actually working on such an organization, but didn't have the money or the prestige of the Brinker family, and found themselves overshadowed, or harried out of existence by their insistence on using the words "the cure". But, thanks to Nancy Brinker and her cronies - or crones - and their selfishness, their arrogance, their avarice, and their ambitions, we will never know.  The loss here goes far beyond money. It goes right to our very humanity, and will hurt other organizations in the future, as many will become skeptical of all charitable foundations.

Loyalty and Friendship

(I've been writing this blog in my head for a few weeks.  It's a work in progress, and will most likely continue to be edited for a long time to come.)

One of the things our family often lacked, in my opinion, was loyalty.  Loyalty to one another, specifically.  Whether it was a defending a sibling against a bully bent on a fistfight, or covering for one another with our parents, or one of our parents defending us against claims that "he/she started it", we all learned by a certain age that the only person we could depend on was ourselves.  Or, at least I learned that.  I guess I didn't get the memo that the rest of the family did that our family motto (according to my sister Kim) was "My name's "been it", and I ain't in it."

Me, I was always the one riding to the rescue.  As the oldest child, it was up to me to defend my younger siblings against everything from things that go bump in the night to those same bullies - whether they wanted me to or not. I shielded my sister Kim especially from many of the things going on in my parent's marriage - so much so that she had no memory of much that went on in the latter years before their divorce, despite having been in the next room for much of it.  I'm glad of that.

But it wasn't often the other way around.  Once when a boyfriend punched me in the face, I went to Kim's house, truthfully looking for a little sympathy, and instead got "Why do you always have to pick guys that want to hit you?"  Considering I had helped her shred a former boyfriend's tires for writing her name on the men's bathroom wall where she worked, along with the word "whore", I was pretty hurt.  There are many other examples where one or the other of us should have stood up for the other, and didn't.  I think that was just something fundamentally broken in our family.  I watched my father run through his front yard and into his house days after having knee replacement surgery to keep from becoming involved in a disagreement between me and my brother.  As I've said before, you just can't make this stuff up.

But I think it made me a better friend to others, because I knew how valuable love, friendship and loyalty were.  I don't make friends easily, but I have been lucky enough to have had the kind of best friend relationship that is like sister or brotherhood....where the phone call comes in the middle of the night, and you go, no matter what, or where I could make the phone call and they would come.  I have trust issues stemming way back to high school when my best friend, after a huge arguement, stole something from me then flaunted it to everyone that she did so.  I was stunned - you just don't do that to a friend, no matter what.  I wouldn't have.  What stunned me further was that someone else, someone I didn't even consider that close of a friend, chose to defend me and hold her accountable for what she did, when those closer to me chose to support her.  I wasn't used to being defended by anyone, and truth be told, had he come to me in advance and told me what he had planned to do, I would have begged him not to.  I'm just not the vengeance kind of person.  I'm more of a Karma kind of girl.

Unfortunately, believing that when you have a "best friend", you stick with them until the end has its downside.  When my best friend of 20 years succumbed to her drug addiction to the point she didn't care about anything, including losing her children, and then she turned on me because I wouldn't support her habit, I finally learned that when a friendship becomes a one-way street away from you, then it's time to stop the car.  I walked away from her, and despite the fact that I still love her, and have checked up on her over the years, I know that time in my life is over.  I grieve for her on occasion, but there's no way you can turn back the clock.  She and I, even if she has conquered her addiction, are different people today.  Another friend, for reasons I have never understood, chose to be rude and hateful to my Grandmother Didi and Great Aunt Helen on a visit to Florida.  Once we returned home, I never spoke to her again.  That's loyalty, and in my head, that's just the way it is, wrong to anyone else or not. You make my Didi cry, you're gone.

2011 was a huge year of losses for me, some of which I've explored in other blogs.  I lost Kim who, besides being my sister I also considered my friend, and who I loved and will always love so much.  I lost the house that I had loved very much at one time.  And I lost, again, a best friend.

Like other times, it was my decision to end the relationship, and I didn't take it lightly.  My friend, whom I will call Mike, had been so for over 15 years.  We had been through a great deal together, and next to my husband, for most of my marriage, he was one of only two people that I felt I could confide ANYTHING in...anything at all, and know that he wouldn't judge me.  We sat in a car not long after my mother died and I cried on his shoulder for what seemed like hours.  I allowed him to vent to me when he and his wife were having problems, and I did the same with him when John and I, as any marriage does, had difficulties.  Don't get me wrong - we had our own spats over the years - we're complete polar opposites politically, and finally had to come to a truce where we agreed that we just didn't discuss politics, and Michael Moore movies were definitely OFF the menu.  We had other disagreements but always seemed to eventually be able to work through them.  The biggest problem became logistics...as we moved farther and farther away from Greenville we didn't always get to see each other as often, but we always seemed to have fun when we did.

I can't actually put my finger on when things changed on his end...I know when I noticed it, and ironically enough, it had to do with Kim's illness and death.  When we found out Kim was ill her estranged husband Darrin did everything in his power to prevent anyone in the family from coming to Puerto Rico, including making threats against me via email, facebook and text message, threats which I took seriously and turned over to the FBI.  This was a terribly traumatic time for me, and I was very thankful for the support of my husband John, my friend Lisa, and my friend Gareth.  Conspicuously missing, though, was Mike.  I neither heard from nor saw him during that period, and for a couple of weeks after that.  When I finally did see him, he asked me how Kim was, and as I incredulously informed him that she had died, and then asked him had he not seen anything that had been on my facebook page, or the texts I had sent him, his response was "Oh, I saw something but realized it was a personal matter, so I quit reading and got out of it."

I was stunned and terribly hurt.  At a time when I could have used a friend more than anything in the world, this person that I had considered my best male friend for many, many years shied away from a "personal" matter.  I probably should have explored this at greater length with him, but we had been watching a movie at another friend's house, and at that moment he turned to the person with the remote and said "Press play."  It was never brought up again.

Later in the year, we were invited by Mike and his wife to see a movie.  I don't remember if we were told that other friends of theirs would be joining us or not.  We arrived at the theater, and Mike was standing out front with out tickets, as we had been worried that it would sell out before we got there so he had purchased them for us when he had gotten his own.  We paid him and went inside, and as we were standing getting refreshments before going into the auditorium, Mike came back and said "guys, I'm really sorry...my friends forgot to save you seats."

If this had been the first time his so-called friends had "forgotten" to save us seats, I would have been more understanding.  After all, if you have a large group coming, sometimes you mis-count.  But this particular group had "forgotten" to save us seats three times in a row.  It wasn't "forgot", and I knew it.  I had known for many years that Mike's wife didn't like me.  Didn't know why...on paper, we should have been the best of friends as well.  We have many of the same interests in hobbies and books, enjoy many of the same movies and activities.  But many years ago, whether it be jealousy or some other reason, she took a dislike to me and while she was friendly to us when we got together, I knew that under the surface it was still there. Apparently these other friends of Mikes followed her lead.

I confronted Mike in the lobby of the theater and told him how hurt I was that he allowed his friends to treat us this way.  He never said a word, just left us and went back to sit with them.  This hurt me even more.  First of all, I would NEVER have allowed my friends to treat another friend in that manner.  I'm not shy about speaking up when I see behavior I don't approve of, and if one of my friends had EVER treated Mike the way his friends treated us, they would have gotten an earful out of me.  Secondly, had I been Mike, I would have sat with us, not with them.  After all, he invited us, not the other way around, and I would have wanted my friends to know that that kind of thing doesn't fly.  But that didn't happen.  After the movie, Mike and his wife invited us to dinner and it was nice, but it didn't change the fact that Mike had allowed his friends to be rude to me over and over again, and if he ever said anything to them I never knew about it.  What really hurt is that there had been times I had driven round trips of up to 90 miles a day to care for his dogs while they were on vacation, while these same so-called friends couldn't be bothered, despite the fact they lived in the same geographical area - even when they told him they would.  Yet he allowed them to hurt someone that he professed to love.  That's just wrong.

Mike's father got sick later in the year, and we spoke a number of times on the phone and in person about how he was and what was happening.  I was surprised that Mike didn't drive home to be with his father during that time (his parents live several states away but he's very close with them) but I know that different families have different ways of doing things, and I tried to be respectful.  But when he told me very matter-of-factly that his father was dying, I was amazed that he was still sitting at his home here.  I don't have a good relationship with my father, haven't for years.  But if I did, and my family called to tell me he was dying, nothing would have kept me from doing everything in my power to be there by his side.  After his father passed, I expressed my condolences to him, and instead of thanking me he began telling me about the lawsuit his family is bringing against the hospital.  Remembering the night I cried on his shoulder for my mother, I couldn't help but compare how differently we handled the first loss of a parent.  Still, each person handles grief differently, and I tried very hard not to be judgmental.  I've sat with this guy and held his hand while he cried after his dog died though...

There were other things...little things...in and of themselves nothing much...and because Mike had been such a wonderful - and loyal - friend to me over the years, I let most of it go.  Then we decided to have a Halloween bonfire at our new home, and invited Mike and a number of other friends to attend.  I knew not everyone invited would be there, but Mike had been telling me for an entire month that he would be.  That very same day, he texted me a number of times about his excitement at attending.  So when the bonfire started, and we started cooking hot dogs, and singing songs, and the evening wore on and no Mike, I began to be worried that something had happened to him.  After all, with us moving to Seneca Mike would now have to travel through most of three counties to get there, and it being a holiday there could be idiots on the road.  So I texted him, figuring if I didn't hear back from him I'd call his cell phone next.  His text comes back that he's not coming, and didn't I get his Facebook message?

I was truthfully stunned.  The bonfire was held in honor of Kim, who loved Halloween.  Mike had know Kim, had liked her, had even gone on vacation with Kim, John, my son Clay and myself.  I walked inside and read his facebook message. He sent it about an hour after the time the party started, and it basically said that his wife wouldn't let him come.  Everyone at the party - even people that didn't know Mike but had heard of him, were flabbergasted....who does that to a friend???  Even a casual friend...who goes an entire month planning to attend a party given by his best friend, then sends a Facebook message bowing out?  How hard would it have been to pick up the phone and make up some excuse for not attending - even if it was a lie - to keep from hurting someone you profess to love?

If that had been the only thing, I would have gotten over it.  But coming on the heels of all I've described here plus other things I haven't even gone into, I was so hurt that I couldn't really even enjoy the rest of the party.  I put on a good face but was relieved when the last guest left, everything was cleaned up, and I was able to sit down and bawl my eyes out like I had been wanting to for hours.  At first I wanted to call him up at 2 in the morning and give him a huge piece of my mind, but I'm old enough to know that when I'm really angry or hurt, I say things I don't mean and regret it later.  So I waited.  I waited two whole months for the hurt feelings to die down, for the anger to subside, and all the while he keeps texting me and sending me messages like nothing has happened.  Our semi-weekly movie night went away...I didn't want to attend, and the person who's house we usually used felt uncomfortable about the whole situation, so he decided not to do it for a while.  And I guess, in the long run, I was waiting for an apology, for ditching my party, for treating a friend like that, for not calling...and none ever came.  To read his messages, you would have thought nothing ever happened.  After two months, I knew that I could no longer be friends with someone who has so little regard for someone that he has loved and has loved him for so long that he would treat me that way.  So I fired him.

I wanted to write him an actual letter and mail it to him, but after about ten ripped-up attempts and one violently-broken pen I gave it up.  I am STILL angry...two and a half months later, I still shake and tears still flow thinking about it.  I picked up the phone twice to call him, but didn't let the call go through because I didn't trust myself to do it without breaking down.  In the end, it came right back to facebook.  He sent me a message and it was like something went "click" in my brain and I responded, letting it out.  Not all of it...that's what this blog is for.  Just the highlights, ending with the thought that the person I used to love would have never treated me like this, and I just couldn't find it in my heart to love the person he had become.

What was the response?  Absolutely nothing.  Not a thing.  After a few days he asked for his DVD back, and asked what we wanted him to do with the DVD he had of ours, along with another item.  I was polite, asking him to mail the DVD and I would do the same with his.  Later, he friended John on Facebook something he hadn't done before then, apparently.  No idea why. His wife doesn't like John any more than she likes me.

At my age, it's hard to make friends.  So many people in my age group are involved with their families, careers, and personal interests, that while they keep up with friends they've had over the years they aren't really interested in making new ones.  I have lots of acquaintances, lots of people I'm friendly with, and the community I've moved to is where I've worked for a number of years, so when I go to the grocery store I generally run into someone I'm friendly with, but it isn't the same.  I feel the loss of Mike's friendship like it was a sore tooth that I had fooled around with for way too long, and finally had pulled.  The wound may have closed but the area is still tender, and I still keep sticking my tongue in the space expecting a tooth, and it's not there.  While picking up some things from Gareth's house I discovered a Christmas present I had purchased for Mike back in the summer.  I don't know what to do with it now.  I suppose I could donate it to a charity, or just keep it myself, but I don't really want it.  I guess I could even send it to him anyway...but I doubt he'd appreciate it.  Just like he didn't appreciate the gifts of my love, my loyalty, or my friendship.

In the same vein, I could have decided to continue to see Mike as a friend, and continue to socialize with him, but knowing that he didn't even care enough to be sorry that he hurt me, sorry that his friends hurt me, sorry that I was going through everything that I did with my sister.... I had to think of myself.  Allowing someone to continue to hurt me like that would be like...well, like continuing to be involved with men that liked to hit me.  And I vowed long ago that I would never allow another man to hurt me that way again.  I won't allow anyone to hurt me repeatedly without care, even if I do love them.  Sometimes, you just have to walk away.