It’s been a while. Too long, really. But every time I tried to write something new here, I felt stymied. So I took the advice of a friend and am starting a new blog (she even helped me choose a name for it!) over at https://karenaissance3.wordpress.com/ — click here to be taken directly to it.
Renaissance = rebirth of creativity. I’m still in the process of building it to look the way I want it to look (without it costing me anything more than time and effort) but that is where you will find me writing and sharing photos now.
I’ve started multiple drafts over the past year but only a few have been published. Video might have killed the radio star, but social media sites like FB and IG have really dealt blogging a major blow.
There are plenty of updates I could give, like how last summer my youngest adult child came out to her immediate family as a transgender woman and how we shared that — with her permission, of course, and when she was ready — with her grandparents and later to the extended family of aunts and uncles and cousins — and how she chose to become publicly known as herself. In my old blogging days, when she was a child, I probably would have documented some of that here, albeit with her permission. But that’s not exactly my story to tell, especially now that she’s a 22yo adult. I am putting it in writing here because there has been enough time for the people in her life to digest this new information from her, and I’ve been waiting to let the rest of you know that this Mama Bear has a beautiful daughter. The wistful half-smile of my youngest child is now a beaming grin, and that has been the biggest change of all. Yes, she still has struggles that come from post concussion syndrome after more than five-and-a-half years, but the stress she was carrying by not being who she really was — that stress has been lifted. She is so much happier now, and I am grateful.
If you want to understand more about how to support LGBTQ+ young people, please check out The Trevor Project. If you have questions for me after you’ve visited that link and read the guide, please ask them respectfully.
Dying sea stars, August 2014, Cannon Beach, Oregon
I remember seeing starfish on the Oregon coast, splayed in amoeba-like positions, looking like they were attempting to climb out of their tidepools. Docents on that beach explained to scattered groups of people that large numbers of starfish were dying and no one seemed to know why. Climate change and the warming ocean was one theory.
Wildfire smoke is in the air, its acrid scent assaulting nostrils and at-risk lungs. It’s our fifth season now, following autumn, winter, spring, and summer. Being outside means breathing dangerous particulates into our lungs, yet being outside is a safer way of spending time with people during a pandemic.
It’s too hot to sleep at night. Summers were not this hot, not for this long, twenty years ago. We use machines to cool the air, but the noise of the fans competes with the noise of the thoughts in my head. All of those noises – the literal and the metaphorical – keep me from sleeping.
Covid-19 rages on. People already divided by politics are divided even more by personal feelings about disease management, risk tolerance, and public health measures during a pandemic. Families are being torn apart by death and lack of civility.
Several times each week this summer, I read the words “water rescue” combined with the name of a landmark in my city. There are increasing numbers of people climbing onto the thick cement walls of the bridge, desperate to escape the pain in their lives.
Nearly twenty years ago, two airplanes crashed into twin towers in New York City, and desperate people jumped to escape the Dante-esque inferno. My brain cannot erase the horrific images of individual people falling to their death.
A plane takes off from an airfield in Afghanistan, desperate people running alongside — some clinging to the outside edges of the giant machine. My brain cannot erase the horrific images of individual people falling to their death.
As I was reading the news over the weekend and into the beginning of this week, I couldn’t help but recall our visit to Alabama last year. We spent several days in Montgomery and one day in Birmingham visiting civil rights museums, monuments, and memorials. When I read about and saw the video clips of the Biden-Harris campaign bus being surrounded on the highway in Texas, forced to slow down to 20 mph, my mind went to the Freedom Riders bus that was attacked by similar means.
The Greyhound bus on exhibitphoto of burned-out Greyhound bus
Of course, the Biden-Harris campaign bus did not meet this kind of ending. They were able to call 911 for help. However, the lack of law enforcement on Highway 35 is telling. This wasn’t West Texas (miles of nothingness); this happened on a busy stretch of highway. The parade of Trump supporters, with their vitriol and hatred of anyone not just like themselves, reminds me of other parades.
Civil Rights for everyone offend some people
It’s 2020 in America. I’m trying to hold onto the hope that we can be better and do better, but this past week has me hanging by the tips of my fingers. I cannot understand why so many of my fellow Americans voted for hatred, disrespect, and cruelty.
On Sunday afternoon, we gathered in a circle outside his house — not arm in arm, but masked and standing apart — to pray and sing one of his favorite hymns. Tonight, our friend and Pastor Emeritus is in a hospice house.
He was still downhill skiing at 85 when he retired for the second time. This summer, at 87, he was still riding his bicycle, and three weeks ago he was driving his car around town. Just 10 days ago he was diagnosed with untreatable cancer.
I’m grateful he is not suffering a long illness, and I’m grateful his family could gather and surround him and one another with love over the past week. It won’t be long now until he meets his best friend, Jesus, face to face. He is ready.
SuperDad and I took a drive on Thursday to scout out some new camping spots along a river. This section of a national forest has free dispersed sites although not many of them are good for trailers, so it is smart to check them out first before attempting to camp there. This was supposed to happen while we were camped in an actual NFS campground within an hour of our scouting expedition, but heavy rains last night coupled with several days of bad weather in the forecast caused us to rethink the camping part of this trip. Luckily, there were photo ops present:
Peek-a-boo!A cow and her calfMama MooseI believe the calf is a male
After such a lovely day, it had darned well better be miserable weather or we’ll regret canceling our camping plans!
It hardly seems possible… yet at the same time, it feels like he’s been an adult for a long time already. The Scout is 21 years old today.
his senior picture, taken by mom, October 2017
He was born in the pre-dawn hours of July 23rd, weighing in at a whopping nine-and-a-half pounds. The staff in the delivery room passed him around and guessed before weighing him, and they all guessed too low. *I* wasn’t surprised since I’d just spent 15 minutes pushing that baby OUT of my body!
The Scout and his mama on his first birthdayMy four boys, summer 2000. Note the very dark tan hand around the baby’s middle. The Scout when he was not quite 3 years oldSpring in Texas, 2003The Scout with his Arrow of Light awardThe Scout hikes: Summer 2019Age three, he wanted a dinosaur cake. His parents made one with Cheetos… His first (but not last!) Cheesy-Puffasaurus birthday cake
HAPPY 21st BIRTHDAY to my baby boy, the SnakeMaster, the Adventurer, the Eagle Scout!
With his ScoutMaster Dad, July 2016 — just a few weeks after falling out of that darn tree
21-24 “I can’t stand your religious meetings. I’m fed up with your conferences and conventions. I want nothing to do with your religion projects, your pretentious slogans and goals. I’m sick of your fund-raising schemes, your public relations and image making. I’ve had all I can take of your noisy ego-music. When was the last time you sang to me? Do you know what I want? I want justice—oceans of it. I want fairness—rivers of it. That’s what I want. That’s all I want.
Spokalulu 