Victory!

I haven't had a crafty post in quite a while so, here is the latest news.

It's 80 degrees F and gorgeous in L.A. with no reports of a cool down. Must be time to start planting!!!

Despite my backyard being a total disaster (my fault entirely), I am, as part of this weekend's MLK National Weekend of Service, going to do my part in making this a healthier earth by planting my very own victory garden!

I have Mel Bartholomew's All New Square Foot Gardening
for a guide. He's quite a "character", that Mel. I think in the south, they'd call him touched. I'd call him a total nutbag, but he has some great tips for raised bed gardening.

This weekend involves building the beds. I won't be following Mel's advice exactly because my existing beds will make excellent bases. Then next weekend, I will be adding Mel's extra special fancy recipe for soil. Over the year I plan to plant:

• Blackberries
• Carrots
• Cucumbers
• Lettuce
• Peppers
• Potatoes
  
• Pumpkins
• Strawberries
• Tomatoes
• Zucchini and whatever else seems fun at the moment.

In addition, I will be replanting some citrus trees that I have sadly neglected and thereby horribly murdered.

On February 1st, due to budgeting constraints this month, I will be purchasing this composter and making my own compost and compost tea!

Gardening appeals to me on a number of levels. I am crafty, but the crafts that appeal to me most are where something useful is created. Hence, my great love of knitting, crocheting and sewing hats, as all my Stitch n' Bitchers know.

I consider making fruits and vegetables grow out of the ground as supremely crafty. Not to mention, turning egg shells and coffee grounds into rich compost. That is some serious craft right there.

So, while I am still knitting, crocheting and sewing (btw - my serger is actually at the repair shop getting a spa mani/pedi and lube job!)

In addition to all of the love of having actual food growing in my back yard, the hard work of making it grow is something I have discovered in my two years in our new home. I really enjoy getting out into the dirt and the sun. I love getting into the shower afterward and watching rivers of dirt stream off me. Hard work on my land for such a great benefit is really quite fun and later in the spring I can have my niece and all of my other little faux nieces and nephews come over and help me pick the produce.

Transgender Day of Remembrance

Today is the 10th annual Transgender Day of Remembrance.

Since Prop 8 passed on the California ballot, two transgender women in the U.S. were murdered. Teish Cannon in Syracuse, New York was shot and killed and Duanna Johnson in Memphis, Tennessee was also shot and killed.

In the past year, since the last Day of Remembrance, 29 people have been murdered throughout the world for straying outside of the accepted gender norm.

The youngest of these was Lawrence King, 15 years old, who was shot in his classroom by a classmate because he wore traditionally women's clothing. But only 10 days later, Simmie Williams, Jr., 17 years old was shot and found wearing women's clothing as well.

Six months later, in July, we all heard about Angie Zapata, 18, who was beaten to death in her apartment in Colorado, but we didn't hear about Nakhia Williams in Louisville, Kentucky who was shot to death one month later.

Murderers often use the excuse that "they were tricked", they were "afraid" or they completely dehumanize the person as in the case of Angie Zapata. Giving, for one moment, the argument that being tricked or being afraid is real, the case for murder holds no water. A human being does not kill another for feeling "tricked."

In many of these cases, however, the dehumanization of a transgender or gender non-conforming person is the real "reason" they are murdered. Angie Zapata's killer said that he "killed it".

Destroying the other seems to be our "go-to" reaction lately. Whether it is raping and murdering women in the military, murdering people who don't conform to a gender norm or attempting to make Barack Obama into a terrorist Muslim, unpatriotic, scary black man that we "really don't know much about."

How about for one day, remembering that Duanna Johnson had a mother who loved her. That Angie was popular and fun, that Lawrence King had a life ahead of him to learn and grow and become whatever his heart desired. That all of these murdered people had friends and family (whether bio or chosen) that loved them and wept when they died.

See article by Queen Emily on How to Mourn.

Hope-y change....change-y hope?

It's all about the change-y hope around here parts. Because of so many donations, I am heading over to the Jeff Griffith Youth Center on Friday! Fully 32 days before my deadline with two lawn and leaf bags full of underwear, socks, washcloths, bras, shower gel, soap, mouthwash, sweatshirts, socks, and all kinds of other stuff these kids need.

Frank at the Youth Center was super sweet and very grateful for y'alls help.

If anyone wants to bring stuff to Stitch n' Bitch, I will definitely be there this week. Here's the list of what is desperately needed:

Unused stuff
washcloths
towels
socks
underwear
bras
hotel-sized toiletries

Used OK
Pants (this is a big one! Men's and women's of any sizes)
Sweatshirts

Thanks everyone!!!

To my Peeps in the AZ

Here are Roland Spongberg's Arizona El Pollo Loco Locations!!! Keep it up!

El Pollo Loco #3566 5130 S. McClintock. Tempe, AZ 85282 (480) 557-5555

El Pollo Loco #3561 5810 W. Bell Road. Glendale, AZ 85308 (602) 268-6611

El Pollo Loco #3567 3781 W. Ina. Marana, AZ 85741 (520) 572-0010

El Pollo Loco #3573 820 N. 54th St. Chandler, AZ 85226 (480) 763-0400

Oh, no she didn't

Long ago, when I frequented El Coyote (mid-90's), I used to say it was the only restaurant in L.A. that you could flip over your plate and all the food would stay put. I haven't been in about 10 years and so my boycott won't amount to much, but if you go...don't.

Marjorie Christoffersen, part owner and manager of El Coyote gave $100 to Yes on 8 group ProtectMarriage.com.

She now says she regrets her decision.

Ms. Christoffersen said on one blog advocating a boycott of El Coyote.

I love you guys, I would never do anything to hurt you, I wish I hadn't done it.

So do I. But now there is a call to boycott the restaurant, which has been owned by a branch of Marjorie's family since it opened in 1931. To try to make nice, Marjorie says that she's holding "an open breakfast Wednesday at 11am to speak to the community."

Brunch started about 15 minutes ago. Anyone there to make nice?

Via Huffington Post

An Eye for An Eye

I believe strongly in Gandhi's quote, "An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind." However, when Gandhi said that quote, he was talking about his practice of Satyagraha or nonviolent resistance which is specifically what this movement is practicing. We are, in fact, by boycotting, "achieving socio-political goals through symbolic protests, civil disobedience, economic or political noncooperation, and other methods, without using violence.

Do not lecture to me about Gandhi if you have no idea what he advocated.

BTW - it looks like WKS only owns Corner Bakeries in Arizona and coming to Utah (of course).

More to come about protests and boycotts. Of course.

By the way, there's a huge protest tonight at the Mormon Temple in NYC. If you're on that side of the country, get out there and hold a sign. In addition, there's another protest this afternoon at the Mormon Temple at Santa Monica and Selby.

What:           PROTEST & RALLY against the Mormon Temple (W. LA) Over the
              Church's Backing and Financial Support of Proposition #8
When:           Wednesday, November 12th
              5:00pm - 7:00pm
Where:          Mormon Temple (Los Angeles California Temple of the Mormon
              Church)
              10777 Santa Monica Blvd. @ Overland
              West Los Angeles, CA 90025
Who:            endH8now organizers, protesters and community leaders
CONTACT:        Michael Sanchez, endH8now
              310-940-6886
              axistalent@gmail.com


               www.endH8now.com

Inspired to Change

Good morning everyone! It is a new day here in America and I am feeling it. The photos and speeches have made me cry (ME!!! I know!!!) and I can't get enough of the hope.

In that vein, I know we're all going to have to do our part to help this country heal.

In honor of our President-Elect Barack Obama, I am starting a new project.

I would like, by my birthday, to have at least 2 black lawn bags worth of new packaged socks and men's and women's underwear of all sizes to donate to the Jeff Griffith Youth Services Center for homeless gay, lesbian, bi and transgender youth.

I will also be accepting any toiletries you happen to have as they offer showers for drop-ins. The next time you go to the market, pick up a 3 pack of socks. If it won't affect your bill in much of a discernible way or you are feeling generous or perhaps you'll get the magazine/grapes/case of Coke at your next shopping trip. If you are pinching pennies right now and just can't make the donation, I completely understand. It's rough out there and I don't want anyone to feel like I'm assuming their situation. If you can help, they need it. When the economy slows, many organizations start losing donors and gay and lesbian street youth can be some of the most disenfranchised of all.

Lessons of Yom Kippur

I went to synagogue starting in about the 3rd or 4th grade and we always attended services for Yom Kippur, both evening and all day. (in addition to Shabbat, Rosh Hashana, Purim, Sukkot, Simchat Torah, and others...)

I don't remember much about the rest of the holidays (though I loved Simchat Torah) Yom Kippur, the day of atonement, was, for me, a great lesson in ethics.

First, the language of the prayers for forgiveness of chet (sin), are all in the plural.

As I recited the Vidui (confessions) as a child, I wondered how I could have committed the "alphabet of sin" from Aleph to Tav (A-Z). I tried to remember everything I had done wrong over the past year. Eventually I realized that the reason for the plural (al chet shechatanu) was that no one single person has committed all of these chet, but rather we, as a community, are collectively responsible for all of the chet committed. We said every year,

"For the sin we have sinned by failing to work for peace."

As a 12 year old, how could I work for peace? How could I have sinned like this? And I realized, even as a 12 year old, that I could, in fact, work for peace. Perhaps not like Jimmy Carter did, but peace within my own circle. Peace between classmates. Peace as a noble virtue. (is it any wonder I was voted most likely to join the Peace Corps?)

In praying in the plural I also learned that being arrogant, while not equal to, for instance embezzling millions, it did not give me the right to be arrogant just because other people had done worse than I.

We said every year,

"For the sin we have sinned by our narrow-mindedness."

And I took this to heart. I tried very hard to look at both sides of a situation early on. I wanted to know exactly where I was being narrow-minded. I also knew I would have to answer for it again next year and I wanted desperately to say, no, I had not been narrow-minded.

In Judaism, we recount the chet of taking credit that we didn't earn. That was never something that was taught to me specifically but I remember reading it in synagogue and thinking how unethical that would be. I try to always give credit where credit is due. Acknowledging the contributions of others to a project is something I see as inherently ethical.

Another chet we confessed to was of giving in to despair. I could feel despair, I learned, but I could not give in to it. I could not give up. Even today, I carry that with me. I may be frustrated and may feel helpless but I still will not give up on working for change.

Tzom kal to everyone who is fasting today and may none of us give in to despair.

Semantics/Semiotics/Propaganda

The way we speak, how we refer to certain things affects the way we behave.

AIDS/HIV
18 years ago, when I started working in the HIV field, I was amazed at how the media ignored the science to go with the vernacular - for instance, "AIDS victim" and "AIDS virus". A person who has HIV is a person with HIV, not an AIDS victim and it's HIV, a virus that may cause AIDS. The first is an unbelievably sensationalist term and the second prevents effective education about HIV transmission, prevention and treatment. I spent years undoing the damage that was done around that term.

I won't go into all of the media misuse of scientific terms because it could be an entire textbook.

SEX/RAPE
Recently, Liss at Shakesville has been championing the cause against the defiant misuse of "sex" when the word that should be used is "rape". When a man has forced sexual intercourse with his daughter while keeping her in a basement, it is rape and should be considered as such by the media. I imagine it is search engines looking for the word "sex" that makes CNN continue using the "forced her to engage in sex acts" when the more concise term would be "raped her".

ABUSE/LOVE
What brings up all of this rumination on semantics is this survey, commissioned by Liz Claiborne Inc., which polled 1,043 "tweens" ages 11 to 14; 523 parents of tweens; and 626 teens ages 15 to 18.

The article, published by Reuters was entitled, "Young love often marred by abuse."

In the survey, among youths who reported sex by age 14, 33 percent said they had been hit, choked or punched, while 58 percent had been verbally abused. In comparison, about 10 percent of all 15- to 18-year-olds reported physical abuse by a partner, and 29 percent reported verbal abuse.

I don't know if author, Julie Steenhuysen, wrote this headline or not but what is described in this survey is not young love. When a teen hits another teen while in a relationship, it is violence. When the abuser apologizes and promises never to do it again, it is the beginning of a long road which often leads to someone being seriously injured or killed and too rarely results in the abuser going to jail. Romanticizing it as "young love" serves no further purpose than sensationalism.

Rape as a weapon of war

Major General Patrick Cammart, Former Division Commander of MONUC:

"It had, therefore, probably become more dangerous to be a woman than a soldier in an armed conflict."

Rape is being used as a weapon of war. It is not new and it is always disgusting. And it has exploded. The UN Security Council today demanded an end to persistent sexual violence during armed conflict, calling it a war crime and a component of genocide.

Approved by all 15 members, Council Resolution 1820 "demands the immediate and complete cessation by all parties to armed conflict of all acts of sexual violence against civilians with immediate effect."

It also urged that "all parties to armed conflict immediately take appropriate measures to protect civilians, including women and girls, from all forms of sexual violence."

Rape is used to instill terror in the civilian population, humiliate and degrade them, destroy group bonds and further agendas of cultural and ethnic destruction. Children of rape survivors often are abandoned and shunned by their families.

This isn't just occurring in one or two places. It is happening in:

• Sudan,
• the Democratic Republic of Congo, where, of the 15,000 survivors of sexual violence treated at Panzi Hospital since 1999, one-third are children
  
• Colombia,
• Sri Lanka,
• Haiti,
• Rwanda,
• Myanmar,
• Algeria,
• Cambodia,
• Sierra Leone,
• Iraq,
• Afghanistan,
• Peru,
• Bosnia and the former Yugoslavia
• El Salvador
• Uganda
• Chad
• Liberia

I wish I could name every country in which a woman was subjected to rape as a weapon of war. I wish I could type each of their names so they wouldn't be forgotten.

No one is doing enough though. Except Stephen Lewis (who is my hero). According to the New York Times, every day, 10 new women and girls who have been raped show up at Panzi hospital. Many have been so sadistically attacked from the inside out, butchered by bayonets and assaulted with chunks of wood, that their reproductive and digestive systems are beyond repair.

This is a direct quote from CNN.com

With U.N. officials calling for more female officers to better educate women against rape and women saying they won't feel safe until the under-equipped and undermanned United Nations force is strong enough to protect them, the situation shows little sign of improving.

I want to know, how, exactly, women are supposed to be educated against rape. I tend to respect Nic Robertson's reporting but this may have been the stupidest statement I have ever heard. This is Robertson repeating a press release, not reporting!

I haven't read the U.N. resolution (I can't find it on the internet and if someone can - please email me I'm reading it now I haven't found anything yet...), but if they actually say something about educating women against rape when armed gunmen hunt them down while collecting firewood or escaping their burning homes I have little hope.

Honorata Barinjibanwa, 18, said she was kidnapped from a village during a raid in April and kept as a sex slave until August. Most of that time she was tied to a tree, and she still has rope marks ringing her neck. Her kidnappers would untie her for a few hours each day to gang-rape her. Here is one face. One face of thousands.

She was being treated at Panzi Hospital, which has 350 beds, and though a new ward is being built specifically for rape survivors, the hospital sends women back to their villages before they have fully recovered because it needs space for the never-ending stream of new arrivals.


Eve Ensler, founder of the V Day Project and author of the Vagina Monologues is building a center for survivors who have been left without family, community or the capacity to have children in collaboration with UNICEF and Panzi Hospital. City of Joy will give them a safe place to live while providing an education, leadership training and a chance to earn income. To donate or learn more, go to V-Day.

I close with another quote from Major General Patrick Cammart. Putting the responsibility in the hands of the UN, he testified that:

"You [the United Nations] have the responsibility to protect them
and to take real and effective measures to put an end to this."

Dai!

In Hebrew "dai" (pronounced die) means enough.

Judaism is a beautiful tradition. I am an atheist, but I still identify as a Jew because I love the tradition in which I was born.

At its heart, Judaism encourages and even demands questioning. It talks of integrity, respect, caring for others. It is a tradition of wonderful and horrible stories, all of which can be used to learn how to better care for ourselves, our families and the people of the world or to hate, divide and to indulge our personal agendas.

Once again, the tradition that I love is being twisted by a few into justification for violence against women. This week, a 14 year old girl was attacked by members of the ad hoc modesty patrol in Beitar Illit because she was wearing pants and a t-shirt. After confirming her identity, the young man poured a bottle of acid on her. According to YNET, the family has been threatened previously and the focus of these threats has been the 18 year old sister of the victim.

Dai.

The Jewish legal tradition is embodied in a corpus of law and mechanisms for making legal decisions known as Halacha.

While Judaism is not a pacifist tradition, allowing self-defense, it does not permit the harassment of others. It does not permit a gang of vigilantes to judge, determine sentencing and punish those who are not following Halacha. Some would argue that this is, in fact, self-defense, some would argue that they are preventing a sin from being committed. I would argue that is justification for behavior that advances a personal and selfish agenda.

Chazal (Sanhedrin 72a): "If someone comes to kill you, act first and kill him." This rule applies not only to self-defense but also to defending the lives of others. Moreover, it also applies to someone who engages in sexual assault (Sanhedrin 73a). Thus, one must kill (if no other alternative is available) someone who is attempting to murder or rape. But a 14 year old girl in a Charedi neighborhood was doing none of those things but dressing contrary to the norm in her community. Wearing a t-shirt and slacks is not a punishable offense. Under any halacha.

Standards of modesty (tznua) are becoming increasingly stringent not only in Israel, but in Charedi communities worldwide.

Women must include a seam in their stockings so it is clear they are not bare-legged. Schoolgirls cannot wear shiny shoes that could reflect their underwear. Clothing in pink, red, orange or otherwise bright colors are not only not to be worn, they are not to be sold in stores within Charedi communities else the store may be burned to the ground. Recently a sheitel (wig) store in New York was boycotted because the windows exhibited advertisements for wigs that included pictures of women. Separate shopping hours for men and women, separate buses for men and women are becoming more common in certain Israeli cities.

Devoid of contact with members of the opposite sex from an early age (other than immediate family), are Charedi men becoming hypersensitive sex maniacs? Does Judaism really believe that men are nothing but walking libidos? Isn't this all Bittul Torah (wasting time that could be spent on Torah study)?

This is not the Judaism I know. This is not the tradition I love. Judaism is full of laws and traditions that I may not agree with, but laws, for believers, with which I sympathize. This trend is a distortion of these rules into unrecognizable restrictions on women, judgment by mob rule.

For a believer, G-d alone can judge. I cannot imagine how, other than the greed and arrogance of knowing that you are right and all others are wrong, can justify this behavior.

Dai!

When nothing makes sense

Sometimes things stop making sense.

• When people call you names because you are not laying down like a doormat for them
• When men slit a woman open from her vagina to her throat as a tool of war
• When a biological family member becomes a sworn enemy out of the blue
• When children are raped for the privilege of food and money
• When anyone feels entitled to touch or comment on a body when they weren't given permission.
• When I can't get drugs for our patients on a compassionate use basis because of red tape.

It makes no sense to me. But I have to have a way of dealing with these things on a daily basis, because I do deal with them on a nearly daily basis. I desperately try to remember that these people are human.

• That the man who drove by me, flipped me off and yelled something from his window may be having the worst day of his life.
• That the person who called me a fat bitch for taking a parking space has such incredible loathing for their own body that they are terrified of being anything like me
• That the Hutu men who cut off and handed a Tutsi woman her own breast in front of her mother and father were, in many cases, children when they were taken to fight other people's battles in the DNC and have not only been desensitized to this behavior but have grown up with it all around them.

I don't understand, I don't accept, I don't forgive, but I do remind myself that these are human beings.

And I never want to become so desensitized, so hateful that I become like them.

Agenda for 5/27/2008

Old business:

• same sex marriage has become legal in my state!
• we landed on Mars (!)
• about 500 deaths occurred due to our occupation of Iraq (including about 20 US military)
• Aftershocks of the fault rupture in China has tumbled about 420,000 more houses
• It was reported that UN aid workers were raping children

Personal Business:

• I cut all my hair off
• I hosted a yard sale at my house and learned, once again that the masses are idiots, not to mention obnoxious and self-centered and prone to fits of irrationality but spending a day with my friends totally and completely negates the effects of the masses.
• I had the weirdest job interview EVER. I thought maybe there was a hidden camera but there wasn't
• I needed to get this all out so I can start posting again because it seemed like I hadn't posted about the most important stuff and so I couldn't post about anything else (even though that's slightly irrational...)

New business
You might have noticed (or not) a donation button on my side bar. This is not for me. It comes from the great deal of respect that I have for one Melissa McEwan, founder and leader of Shakesville. Easily the best feminist, hardcore thinking blog ever.

In honor of Shakesville, Melissa and all of the writers therein, I have created teaspoon jewelry, earrings and necklaces (I haven't figured out how to do pins yet...sorry) in her honor where 100% of the proceeds will go to CARE.

I am a big fan of simple jewelry. I have one plain silver band on my left hand and the simple diamond earrings that my darling husband bought me on our 5th anniversary. I'm from a family with hardcore jewelry issues. I might share that story sometime soon. Anyway, the point was, these are very simple pieces.

So what's with the teaspoon?

Liss, as she is known to readers, writes:

The teaspoon reference started with my post on International Human Rights Day, when I said: "Today is the final day of the 16 Days of Action Against Gender Violence, during which I suppose I have blogged exactly as often as always about violence against women, in America and abroad. Sometimes it feels like it's all I ever write about; sometimes it feels like I can't possibly write about it enough to do the issue justice; often, those feelings exist within me simultaneously. All I ever do is try to empty the sea with this teaspoon; all I can do is keep trying to empty the sea with this teaspoon." From that came the Shakesville Silver Teaspoon for Random Acts of Feminism, and a whole lot of subsequent references to teaspoons in these pages, when we are feeling crushed by the vastness of the work to be done.

If you are interested in teaspoon jewelry, each piece is a $21 donation. And go read Shakesville if you haven't already.


Meeting adjourned

Happy Pesach

Good morning and welcome to another edition where an Atheist Queer Jewess named Faith explains it all!

Our topic this morning is cleaning for Pesach, which starts Saturday night, (not the cleaning, the holiday). Why am I concerned with cleaning for Pesach? Well, in Jewish communities, it's a big deal. The reason for the cleaning is called bedikat chametz which literally translates to search for chametz. What is chametz? That all depends on who you ask.

Wheat, barley, spelt, rye or oats are the 5 prohibited grains during Passover. Once these come in contact with water = chametz. That's the technical side. It gets a lot more complicated from there. I’m not even going to go into it…it would be like the longest blog post in history. Back to cleaning. You thought your grandmother did spring cleaning?

Cleaning for Passover involves making sure there is no chametz in your home. Any crumb of old food in any corner of your home that might have touched chametz and still be edible is considered chametz. In my home, we would throw out all of the bread and crackers, cookies and cereal. Anything that had a carby ring to it was gone. Clean out the pantry, refrigerator, freezer, oven, microwave, appliances and check every crack and crevice for edible chametz. And that’s just the beginning.

According to an article in the New York Times, some families start a month ahead of time with a wash of every Lego that may have a crust of chametzy saliva.

Don’t forget to copy all the recipes from your cookbooks that you may need during the 8 days because if a cookbook full of cookie crumbs gets loose, all is lost. Lest you think you are done – go out to the garage and get your specially made Formica countertops to sit atop your regular everyday countertops for fear that you have chametz permeating the pores in your Corian.

Put all of your starched shirts in storage, for fear you may get water on them, lick your shirt and get a little chametz that way. Finally after getting out your candle and feather, searching for the last crumbs, burning them and nullifying all the chametz that may have inadvertently been left behind, then you can get out the Passover dishes.

“WTF?” You may be thinking.

Well, as nothing in Judaism is just as it is, chametz is more than just the little crumbs of carboliciousness that are prohibited during these 8 days. Chametz is said to symbolize the egocentricity that threatens to eclipse our essential selves. It is also seen as a symbol of the yetzer hara (our inclination toward evil). We spend this time searching for the parts of ourselves that are not ourselves. Those things that we hang onto because our mother wanted us to marry well, because our peers thought would make us more popular, more fun or just more interesting, but we couldn’t have cared less about.

This weekend, I am going to do a little inventory of my internal chametz. Then, I might just do a little burning.

What are the things that you are holding on to that you might need to clean out of the nooks and crannies of your home?

Letter to a 12 year old.

Over at Big Fat Blog, a 14 year old posted a question the essence of which was:

What’ll it take for me to love my reflection?
‘Cause everytime I say to myself “You’re beautiful” it feels like a lie…

How do you do it? How can you just totally accept yourself exactly the way you are! What your secret? Will you share it with me?

It got me thinking. A lot. What would I say to my sweet and rowdy niece if she asks a similar questions when she is 12 or 14? Here is what I came up with:

Dear Mia;

Your mom and dad think you are beautiful but I know that doesn't mean much because they're supposed to say that, they are your parents. Just so you know, not all parents think their children are beautiful and not all parents tell their children that.

Also, part of the reason that your parents think you are beautiful is because you are. I don't even know what you look like right now (it being 10.5 years until you are 12) but your beauty for them (and for me) doesn't just come from your skin or your hair or your size, whatever they may look like. Beauty comes from the person you are. Are you a good person? Do you care about people? Do you treat people with respect? Do you have fun? Do you make people laugh? These things make you beautiful.

You may say, well, Aunt Faith, that is all well and good, but I don't think I'm pretty. Or people at school make fun of me. Here are some things I wish someone had told me:

• Jr. high school sucks. Don't let anyone tell you that it's the best time in your life because it isn't.
  
• Kids can be really mean. I know it and your parents know it and if your teachers don't know it they're lying.
• All kinds of shit is going on with your body and your hormones which makes it really hard to get any kind of a grip on your mood and your feelings.
• Having a boyfriend isn't nearly as important as anyone makes it out to be. You're gonna get kissed. I have no worries about that but if you live your life to get some boy, you're not living life for yourself.
  
• The beauty industry makes a ton of money off of you feeling bad about the way you look. Don't let them.
• Be bold. Be brave. Try things just because. Get your mom to do something she'd never do. Get your dad to step out of his routine. Make noise, be dramatic, say what you think.
  
• Earn respect and then expect respect. If you earn it, you have every right to it.
  
• Focusing on yourself - on what you want in your life - will make you happier than any amount of popularity. If you love soccer and want to play professionally or if you love designing and want to be a designer or if you love writing or science or art or literature, focus on that. It will make you happier than anything else. Also, you'll find other people that love the same things you do and it won't matter to you what they look like and vice versa.
  
• Read. Read a lot. Read all kinds of things. Ask me for some recommendations.
• Ask questions. A lot of questions. Smart questions, stupid questions, just ask. Don't just accept the answers. Sometimes, the answer is wrong. Also, the more questions you ask, the more you'll realize that kids are sometimes smarter than adults and you'll learn answers to things you didn't even know there were questions for.
• Being cute doesn't last forever, being smart or funny or witty lasts a long time and gets you a lot further in the end. Also, being cute is a lot of work.
• You just need to make it through Jr. High and high school. That's all. Bonus points if you have some fun. The rest of your life starts after that. Get good grades, be an ethical person, find good friends, nothing else really matters.

I love you. I will never stop loving you. If you ask me questions I will always try to find the answers with you and if we can't find the answers together, we'll get someone else to help.

Love,

Aunt Faith

Man, I wish I'd had me when I was 12. Or the internet. That would have been good too.

Chicken Soup for All of Us

Last year, thanks to Laurie, one of the guys who writes the Chicken Soup for the Soul books sat on me.

There are photos. I will not be publishing them. Ever.

Laurie might. You'll have to talk to her about that.

There is a point to this. The Chicken Soup books are all about giving comfort.

I am in short supply of comfort this week as I've been sick, and frankly, a little down.

I say "down" because for me, the word "depressed" takes on considerably serious meaning in my life. Just ask my patient husband. Depressed means curled up in fetal position for a good number of months self-isolated from all human contact having not showered in far, far too long.

I am a long and terrible journey away from "depressed".

I am a little down. It will indeed, pass.

I haven't always known this but when I am "down", the urge to isolate myself hits me like a ton of melancholy bricks and yet, what I need is to be taking active steps to comfort myself. To nurture myself.

Nurture is a concept for me that claws at my brain.

Nurture is care and kindness and support.
Nurture is development, creativity, education and cultivation.
Nurture is nourishment, sustenance, refreshment.

All of these things have never been a problem for me to provide to others but are nearly impossible to accept for myself. I have been known to feel virtuous for denying myself nurturing and yet should I ever deny it to anyone else, it would be mortifying to me.

The trick here is, in nurturing another, I nurture myself. Just go with me on this one, OK? I love taking care of others. It is embedded in (whatever passes for) my soul. It is a part of my being. I sometimes forget myself in taking care of others, which becomes a hazard. This week, during this time that I am not abundant with resources, I promise not to forget myself.

I also promised a recipe for chicken soup. (nice segue, huh? I thought so!)

This, just so you know, is not your grandmother's chicken soup recipe. I, personally, do not have 12 hours to boil a carcass just for broth. Therefore, this is the 21st century happy homemaker's chicken soup. Mmmm mmmm, good.

Faith's 21st Century Balabusta's* Chicken Soup

The night before, order Chinese food. Get brown rice. Trust me. The brown rice never gets fully eaten and sits in the fridge because you don't want to throw away perfectly good brown rice. You'll use this.

Then, the next day, go get:
One grocery store roasted chicken. Pre-roasted. Preferably garlic or rosemary. Not BBQ. OK?
2 quarts of chicken broth (I use boxed)
Six or seven whole peeled carrots
One stalk of celery (not one stick, the whole bunch)
One bunch of chives (or about 2 tbsp. dried chives)
Two bay leaves
Parsley flakes
Garlic powder
Salt and pepper to taste.

Pour all the broth into the crockpot. Take all the meat off the chicken, shred it into edible chunks and throw that into the crockpot. Get rid of the skin, you won't use it in this recipe. Cut up the carrots and celery into about 1 inch pieces. Throw that in too. Put in the chives, parsley flakes, garlic powder, salt, pepper and bay leaves. Cover and leave on low for about 5 hours or until the carrots are cooked to the softness that you like. In about the fourth hour, put the brown rice into the crockpot.

Eat soup.

Careful, it's hot.

*Origin: Yiddish–noun: Informal.
A capable, efficient housewife, esp. a traditional Jewish one, devoted to maintaining a well-run home, good homemaker

If mamas ruled the world...

Big ol' tip o' the hat to Quaker Dave and Blue Gal for this one.

Sally Field donned shades of Norma Rae at the Emmy Awards this week stating that " ... if the mothers ruled the world there would be no goddamn wars in the first place."

Well - here's what I think life would be like if the mamas ruled the world

• There would be no children starving in China/Africa/etc. because everyone would have enough to eat
• We'd share everything. We wouldn't take things that aren't ours. We would put things back where we found them.
• We'd leave a place better than we found it and there would be a lot more parks
• Everyone would get a turn
• We'd hold hands and stick together
• Whether or not you were born in a barn, everyone would have to clean up their own mess
• Though money doesn't grow on trees, trees are as important as money
• If you're going to start a fight do it outside and make up before you go to bed

Follow up on the Bulgarian nurses & Palestinian doctor

One week ago today, the 6 Bulgarian nurses and one Palestinian doctor known as the Benghazi Six were released from Libya after being accused of infecting over 400 children with HIV and sentenced to death.

Despite testimony from some of the top scientists in the world that the children had been infected long before the medics arrived at the hospital, they were imprisoned for eight years. During this time they were tortured for their confessions.

Drs. Luc Montagnier and Vittorio Colizzi testified in person that through hospital records, and the DNA sequences of the virus, they traced it to patient n.356 who was admitted 28 times between 1994–97 in Ward B, ISO and Ward A, and theorized that this patient was the probable source of the infection. The first cross-contamination occurred during that patient's 1997 admission. The report concludes that the admission records of a total of 21 of the children

"definitively prove that the HIV infection in the Al- Fath Hospital was already active in 1997"

The epidemic snowballed in 1998 to well over 400 children. Montagnier and Colizzi both testified in person at the trial of record for the defense, and the report was submitted in evidence.

Ultimately, the Libyan court system would not listen to HIV experts around the world, 114 Nobel Laureates or the U.N. The medics were only released when money from various countries was promised to the Libyan government for hospital upgrades and training for medical staff in addition to $1 million USD to each of the families of the HIV infected children.

The names of the released are:

Kristiana Malinova Valcheva
Nasya Stojcheva Nenova
Valentina Manolova Siropulo
Valya Georgieva Chervenyashka
Snezhanka Ivanova Dimitrova and
Dr. Ashraf al-Hazouz

They were raped, threatened with their families deaths and the rape of their family members. They had electric shocks applied to their genitals and were bitten by dogs. They were all injected with a substance and told that they had been intentionally infected with HIV.

They are home with medical problems and psychological issues that will last a lifetime. But they are home.

I wish for them:

• peace
• a place to express their anger
• loving family and friends
  
• dreamless sleep
• and gentle days.

Welcome home.

The sound you hear is the bullshit bell ringing in your ear...

It's the craze that is sweeping the nation! The Secret is the repackaged, lipsticked for 2007 version of every positive thinking program that has ever existed from Eckhart Tolle to Norman Vincent Peale.

Personally, I have no beef with the power of positive thinking. I think positively now that the Prozac is flowing steadily through each and every little capillary of my brain. I know that when I was thinking that the world was shit, indeed, the world was big stanky piles of shit. Not a wonder I spent a good 85% of my time under the covers.

Here is where my personal bullshit bell starts ringing. Rhonda (the contriver of said Secret) starts talking about your body and positive thinking, which would be just ducky if she talked about loving your body for what it gives you right now, etc. and she does give this motif a cursory once over but her solution for losing weight is the following:

Let go of all those limiting thoughts. Food cannot cause you to put on weight, unless you think it can.

The definition of the perfect weight is the weight that feels good for you. No one else’s opinion counts. It is the weight that feels good for you.

You most likely know of someone who is thin and eats like a horse, and they proudly declare, “I can eat whatever I want and I am always the perfect weight.” And so the Genie of the Universe says, “Your wish is my command!”

Hmmm. This has worked for how many people in what clinical trial? Also, in my opinion, the definition of the perfect weight for me is about 10 lbs. under my lowest healthy weight. Am I magically going to become 115 lbs if I imagine it? Rhonda? Anyone?

I realize that what she is trying to articulate is that focusing on your goal is a good way to get to the body that is healthy for you. But that's not what she says.

And then folks, it gets bad. Really, really bad. And stupid. And irresponsible and all kinds of other words that I can barely type.

Make it your intention to look for, admire, and inwardly praise people with your idea of perfect-weight bodies. Seek them out and as you admire them and feel the feelings of that-you are summoning it to you. If you see people who are overweight, do not observe them, but immediately switch your mind to the picture of you in your perfect body and feel it.

I'm sorry. Inwardly praise people with your idea of perfect weight bodies and do not observe overweight people? Are you fucking kidding me? Is this the tripe that millions of people have been spending their earned money on? Oprah has been feasting on?

I am calling bullshit. Here and now.

Public Service Announcement

If you or someone you know is in the medical field and has medical textbooks or journals, the UCLA Medical Alumni Association has started a project to improve medical education in Iraq.

Iraqi medical schools and doctors are in serious need of textbooks (especially covering anatomy, physiology, and pharmacology) but also could use journals, review books, and other helpful reference materials. Anything published since 1994 is considered current! Also, apparently all medical courses in Iraq are taught in English and have been since before this problematic incident we are currently engaged in.

Unfortunately, I won't be at Stitch n' Bitch for the next two weeks as my sister's store is having their grand opening tomorrow night and next week I have a work event but please let me know if you have anything and I'll figure out how to get it from you.

Thanks so much!