What a New Year

Dears:
Your probably weren't aware that newspapers are in trouble; venerable ones are in bankrupsy and others are shrinking their content and laying off editorial staff, which, translated, means "writers." I am one of them. My paper didn't publish this week or won't next for lack of funds.
Therefore, this week I applied for 5 new jobs for pennies on the dollar of what I'm worth, and the competition was so intense that more than hundreds of talented and capable writers applied, too, for the pittance that was offered.
I won't know for several days if I got any assignments. Meanwhile, I have a good New Years Eve story.
Since John and I live with many, many old people, we all gathered at our clubhouse, turned on CNN (which is three hours ahead in time on satellite), kissed each other and blew horns ( I provided) at 9p.m, because it was midnight in New York and the crystal ball had dropped. Then we went home and went to bed. Good show for old people.
To celebrate a small but vital quarterly payment, we went to our favorite restaurant, ordered the most expensive things on the menu, tipped the piano player $5, and toasted the new year with decaf coffee.
We also charged a trip to Russia. By June, we may have it almost paid off.
We also sent some slippers to Carole because she had coveted Tim's, and you know that's a sin.
I love you all. We're walking around the corner to pork steak and baked beans courtesy of one of our social residents and I'll just wish any soul who reads this a very happy New Year.

The Husband Tree

There they sit, those widowers. Looking lost in their gray aloneness. Singles in church, singles in the restaurant. Wearing mis-matched socks.
Little do they know, they're widow fodder. In fact, they're low hanging fruit.
John was the best of them. A former lifetime member of the Republican party, he had a brain waiting to be molded. The author of a house bill to restore tax breaks to home-based business, he had earned his modicum of fame. A good looking guy with just a bit too much fat, he could be slimmed down.
Three years of married life, he's a slimmer Democrat and tons of fun. He entertains me daily with his avocation, magic, and earns some coin with his vocation, accounting. He always has a project: The History of Russian Opera is current and with him I watch A Life For the Tsar in it's four hours of glory, found at Amazon for $10. Since he creates on a typewriter, my Internet facility, such as it is, is indispensable to him.
We're learning Russian from Rosetta Stone and planning a Volga River Cruise. He's been amazed at all the places I've taken him. I've been amazed that he's been willing to go.
What a good guy; and there he was, lonely and wifeless. Ripe for the picking.
A real treasure. Widow fodder.

Is it ok to be intelligent?

Dears:

I hid my Phi Beta Kappa key when I became a Christian because I was pretty sure Orville Roberts would come and take it and send it back. "We don't want none of them scholar-types in this deal" seemed to be the prevailing cant.

Then, steadier believers steered me to the likes of Pascal and C.S. Lewis and Phillip Yancy, all of whom were first rate thinkers. Pascal's Dilemma: If I live as if there is no God, and get to my end only to find I was wrong, what an awful consequence! If I live as if there is a God and get to the end of my life and find I was wrong, I still will have lived a fine life. The right decision comes down to living a Godly life and hoping for the best.

Lewis wrote: Jesus was a liar, a lunatic, or a Lord, and proved the first two were impossible based on his life; thus leaving the third to be true.

And Phillip Yancy? I became his disciple when I read his column in Christianity Today, a slight little magazine much frequented by ministers. Then I read his books, most notably What's So Amazing About Grace?

You may, dear children, wonder why I have left Lee Strobel off the list? I'll tell you. He's a good reporter, but he ain't no deep thinker. Hey, wait a second. Is that true of me? "No, no, Orville. You can't have my Phi Beta Kappa key."

Why Does my Bose Need a Plug?

New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman is a Seminar Thinker in my book so I am reading his book, Flat,Hot, and Crowded about the rapidly deteriorating world we live in. The book has caused me to think I must solve the world's energy poverty because some 75 per cent of the people in Africa have no power, thus are falling further and further into AIDs, poverty, and ignorance.
And, of course, today's delusion of grandeur is "It's up to me to fix that."
So, the question: When I made a crystal set in 4th grade, and got a working radio, it didn't need a plug. Why does my Bose need one? And what does that mean about electricity and the electric grids in the world.?
I'm sure the answer is obvious, but when I consulted the smartest people in my little orbit, they couldn't answer. If a plug was optional in 4th grade in Pittsburg Kansas, why isn't a plug optional in Sub-Saharan Africa?
It may be a silly question, but it's my silly question.

A remeniscence

At my 6:30 a.m. 12-step meeting today, John W shared his Delirium Tremins story: seeing ghouls, hearing screaming, seeing fires, etc. When that happened to grandma letty in 1965, for the same reason (over-imbibing of alcoholic beverages, for those little ones who don't know what DTs stand for), I was clapped into a mental hospital. Because my friends came to visit with pitchers of martinis and my husband always brought me a few beers and because I always kept a bottle of vodka in the woods under an old log, I never got better. Further, I was being medicated with tons of tranquilizers which is what they did in the 60's and drinking, too, often I was "out of it." When I went out for a visit anywhere I always was brought in drunk as a coot.
Here's the deal: I never associated my mental state with alcohol. That seems unlikely, today, because the media are full of articles and dramas which highlight the problem. Not so in the 1960's. Then, an alcoholic lived under a bridge with a bottle in a brown paper bag, or so the popular culture believed.
I had a fancy house with a housekeeper and a scientist-husband and I was only in my 30's and (if I do say so myself) a looker so I was too rich and too young and (believe it or not) too pretty to be a drunk. Hence, I must be chronic, paranoid schizophrenic, a diagnosis which terrified me. Meant, to me, that I'd never recover.
In 1975 something amazing happened. My dear friend Anna with whom I imbibed in the woods, making us drinking buddies, was caught drinking grain alcohol in the hospital's research lab and was sent to AA. A new deal, then. She soon had rides, cards, plants and I decided that while I wasn't an alcoholic like Anna, I wanted all that attention.
The two old timers in AA who picked me up for my first meeting later told the woman who was to be my sponsor (or mentor in the program) that "she's so sick she'll never make it." It's 30 years later, and I made it. Not without a lot of prayer and effort, but I made it.

Merry Christmas to All

Dears
The Christmas letters went out today along with a card with this address on it. I doubt if anyone takes the trouble to find my blog, but it would be heartening if they did. I expect I should be advertising my books but I think the only ones I have stocked are In the End It's Faith and Clues for the Clueless. Either would be yours for $10, and I'll ship and handle free. John and I are appearing at an evangelism festival in Orange County in March and we should unload some there. His much more useful book is Church-led Evangelism Ministry. I'd send that along for the same sum.
I see by the news that Wyndham is downsizing its Timeshare operations. I wonder how many of the old crowd will fall to the axe. I did it early when I wanted a few weeks off for Maine in high season, but I wouldn't have been there long anyway, I suspect. Especially now.
Tough times. Write if you wish to comment, and I am thinking of each and every one of you with fondness and interest.

It took a Little Old Lady in Vista, CA

I am a great fan of Media Critics, both in the press and on the telly with the esteemed Howard Kurtz.
Lately, they all missed one of the amazing stories of the year.
In the latest Congo Rebellion, it was not Condi Rice who negotiated with the rebel leader. She was probably playing the piano in Crawford. It was, of all people, Kyra Phillips, the afternoon anchor on CNN. She got the guy on the little camera phone, asked him if he'd heed a cease fire, and he said yes. Here's what the State Department is missing: These guys love to be on TV. They know what CNN is. They probably watch it in their opium dens in living color. Obviously, Kyra Phillips has more clout than Condi Rice. Condi Rice hasn't won an Emmy. Kyra Phillips has.
But that's just the CNN beginning. During the election, which they covered so splendidly they even time travelled Jessica Yellin, it was beleaguered money man what's his name (see; I'm old) who manned the complaints nationally about election irregularities. He even had a magic map which showed the thousands of calls and their locations. He even trouble shot with state and local election officials in those complaint areas. He even resolved complaints. (Oh, God, I know his name as well as I know my own. I watch him on Your Money and admire him enormously. My advice: don't get old.)
Barack is already on to it. He has his fireside chat on You Tube. He probably has the power to move the CNN government to his purposes by posting his government on Twitter or even his webpage. To think this through, he praises accountability and what could be more transparent than taking over a TV network for his governing. I propose Fox. And I think Keith Oberman, with his 30 million dollars, should be his interlocutor.
Damn, I still can't think of the CNN anchor who handled the complaints. I know I could look on their website but I'm on a roll.......