–bring me cupcakes with homemade frosting. At 11 p.m. On a Sunday night. While I am watching a good movie and need something munchy. Thanks Amy!
:)
Perhaps this is just political rhetoric, but this article hit me powerfully, especially the part where Tokyo pledges to never again go to war. Wish other nations would follow suit….
TOKYO (Reuters) – Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi marked the 60th anniversary of Japan’s defeat in World War Two on Monday with an apology for suffering caused by Japanese military aggression, and pledged that Tokyo would never again go to war.
Sixty years after Emperor Hirohito exhorted his subjects to “bear the unbearable” and accept defeat, memories of the war that killed millions in Asia still bedevil relations between Japan and its neighbors, particularly China and North and South Korea.
“Japan caused huge damage and suffering to many countries, especially the people of Asia, with its colonization and aggression,” Koizumi said in a statement.
“Humbly accepting this fact of history, we again express our deep remorse and heartfelt apology and offer our condolences to the victims of the war at home and abroad,” he said.
About a year ago, Caroline and I volunteered to guest-edit an issue of the Exponent II. This image, a collage by Emma Taylor, appeared on the cover of the finished product.
Our “Southern California” issue just came out two weeks ago. It’s been a thrill to receive feedback from our readers.
:)
The mother of this kitty has been living off the vegetables in my Mom’s garden and drinking water out of her pool (in 110 degree desert weather). Apparently this mama decided to give birth in my Mom’s yard not knowing that my Mom doesn’t like cats (or kittens). Lucky for this kitten that my cat-loving sister has rescued her mom and three siblings. Now they are on their way to Riverside where they will get a few weeks of pampering before they can leave for new homes.
Any of you who want one of these precious kittens, speak up soon before they are all taken!! [And, BTW, they are no longer having to live on tomatoes and squash. They’ve decided that tuna and salmon are much tastier!]
:)
No one leaves comments on my blog, but I have had some nice emails and comments from friends who seem to enjoy reading it. Perhaps the post that’s generated the most comments is walking (about a friend who was critiquing the way I walk).
It’s interesting that being disabled means that your body is a public object–most everywhere I go I am stared at or asked questions about my leg. I’m pretty used to it. I expect that when I’m walking through a mall there will be numerous people staring (maybe that’s why I don’t care for malls?).
When I was in France I noticed that everyone stared at everyone. It was a socially accepted and expected activity. Here in the US people are more subtle–they try to stare without me knowing that they are staring. This is particularly obvious when my back is turned to people and I quickly turn around and see them averting their eyes. It’s funny, too, when I’m at the gym and people forget that the walls are mirrored and I can see them staring.
When I was younger I used to wish that just for a day I could go in public wearing shorts and not being noticed. Now I think I’m so used to it that I don’t even care any more.
Though the stares don’t bother me, sometimes the comments or well-intentioned adults do. The most common is, perhaps, the question about why I don’t run marathons or participate in a paralympic sport “like so many other amputees” that this person has seen on TV. Well, duh. My cynical response is to ask them how many olympic medals they’ve won recently [And then there was that one day that someone at church insisted that I had dated her brother, simply because I was an amputee and she knew he had dated an amputee. As if I was the only female amputee in the western hemisphere. Sheesh].
Though the adult comments sometimes sting, kids’ questions rarely do. For the past 4 years I’ve encountered hordes of kindergarteners each day as I picked up my kids from school (the kindergarten classrooms are near the school entrace so I always pass them). When I don’t wear my “skin” (when my pylon leg is showing), the kids are so fascinated!! They meake me feel famous as they gather around me with awe and ask to touch my leg. I love it. We have such fun conversations. It’s the well-intentioned adults that try to shush them that leave me feeling disabled.
This mother of a slain American soldier is asking the President to meet with her, to explain exactly what it is that her son died for. I wish her luck.
–practice your cello just for me
–do your chores the first time I remind you
–put the cereal and milk away after breakfast (and even wipe up the bits of milk and cereal you left behind)
–tell me that the garden should be my first priority when my schedule is full of other ‘important’ things
:)
Reading this post today on dooce.com made me think of my own fears about the ways my kids would interpret my physical difference. In the last paragraph of her post, Heather talks about her daughter noticing the mole in the center of her forehead and how this mole–what Heather had perceived as a flaw–has become secret sign between her and her daughter.
When I first realized I was pregnant I wondered how my children would perceive me–would they see a mother who was “less than whole?” Would the resent the fact that I wouldn’t be able to run and jump and play with them in the same way as other mothers do? Some days, when I wanted to teach them to skip rope, or to ride a bike, I agonized. I felt so awful that I couldn’t do such things.
One day when my son was about 5 years old I asked him why he thought it was that we sometimes parked in handicapped parking spots–did he think think that someone in our family was disabled? He thought for a moment and then replied:
“Well, Mom, I suppose it’s because you wear glasses.”
After I giggled a bit at his response and questioned him further, I realized that he thought that all Moms had legs that could “come off,” that all Moms were amputees. Though it was only a little while later that he figured out that I was unique, neither he nor his sister have ever whined or complained about my limitations. Sometimes they even “mother” me–worrying if I”ve been walking too far or if my stump is irritated. When I get pressure sores, my daughter is often the first to comfort me.
I feel so lucky to have such wonderful kids, and while I would love to be able to do all things “normally,” I suspect that because of some of my limitations, many interactions with my children are all that much more precious. For example, when we went swimming together on Saturday it was pure joy to race with them, to be able to swim fast, jump high, dive deep, etc. When we pulled ourselves out of the pool and I retrieved my crutches from a nearby beach chair, I think that I savored the thrill of swimming so much more because it was an unusual gift of freedom.
I just finished watching Pearl Harbor. Yes, it’s a dumb story [you’d think they could’ve spent as much on the writers as they did on special effects]. BUT, while it is a rah-rah America- can-whoop-anyone’s-butt kind of movie, it struck me as incedibly anti-war, too. Though perhaps not as vividly as many well-written war movies, this flick shows the futility of nations that (ab)use innocent young lives to promote their own political agendas. Just as the young Japanese pilot who bombs Pearl prays for help in his mission as he gazes on a picture of his wife, so do Doolittle’s men as they head for Tokyo. There’s no sense that the day-to-day battles have anything to do with the larger disagreements of the nations. Rather, they are a ceaseless round of individual suffering and misery.
IMO, there’s no reason for the young and innocent to sacrifice themselves for the abstraction, or ‘imagined community,’ of the nation-state. The loss of life on either side hurts us all. It’s a no-win game for everyone.
One website that tells more info about Doolittle’s raid also explains that the Chinese people who harbored and helped the American pilots may have, themselves, been biggest losers: “In May 1942, the Japanese army launched operation Sei-Go, with the dual aims of securing Chinese airfields from which raids could be launched against the Home Islands, and punishing villages which might have sheltered Doolittle’s airmen after the Raid. Exact figures are impossible to come by, but tens of thousands – perhaps as many as 250,000 – Chinese civilians were murdered in the Chekiang and Kiangsu provinces.”
Aunt Susan is entertaining the kids for the next day or so. They’ll be mountain climbing, trampoline jumping, quilting, and eating large amounts of sugar-laden foods. The kids knew there were in for a good time when barely an hour into the visit she broke open a big package of minty Newman-O’s (hoorah for _organic_ junk food!).
I’m not sure what I’ll do with my time sans-kids. John has to work. I’m tempted to paint my bedroom. But I might just go shopping instead….
kitty
Originally uploaded by pilgrimgirl.
I’ve uploaded more of E’s summer art to flickr–just click on the cat picture above and it will take you to the pictures…
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