Flora

This Christmas is not faring well, so says the lining of my stomach; so says the tossing, wearied, sleepless nights. The money goes out and does not come in. My recent Florida vacation adventures cost me half a month's pay and resulted in little of the vacation-y goodness I'd hoped. Now comes Christmas to add insult to financial injury.

Last Christmas went so well, I recall. I had such good gift ideas, and felt so fiscally unhindered at the time. I stumbled onto coupons and was able to give more than I'd hoped. It all came off so gloriously.

This year it's all a flop. I haven't but the one good gift idea, and it's for my father, who - as always - is calling off Christmas this year. He'll get his nonetheless.

I've found a series of heartless, dispassionate gifts to fill the place of the good ones I lack and my Christmas is now typified by anxiety and discontent. I've had one good gift brainstorm and found that even this rare, good idea is out to get me. It's a damned expensive gift to give and if I give it I can't bring myself to give much more. This necessarily places a great weight and importance on the gift and if it is not up to snuff I might just as well count all my giving-efforts worthless. There is further, a dread possibility that this gift would need returning, and the only place I can find to buy it is Amazon.com, and it's heavy as all hell, so the cost of shipping it back adds one more barb to the wire flossing at my ear canals lately.

Winter itself is an expense. I'm forced to drive everywhere now, so come the cost of gas. And winter entertainment is a bit more expensive than the other kind. The outdoors turn inhospitable and barren leaving men to amuse themselves indoors where the luxury of walls and heat take on a premium. I'll soon have need of coats and boots and such that I have somehow failed to retain from winters passed. All must be bought. Each has its cost.

And all this want of money has brought me to the sharp, deep precipice that is my current income. I once made twice what I make now, doing the same work, at the same location, putting in the same hours. But I came and left and came and left, and upon my last return times were bad and my services could nolonger be afforded at the going rate. Spiteful of money, never much of a capitalist anyway, I was happy to accept a pay cut while our business waned. And there I have remained.

But times aren't bad now. Times haven't been bad for a while, in fact. Oh, maybe for others; maybe for the economy in general. But as far as I can see our little shop has been pounding away with just as much business as we've ever had, and for quite some time now. Meanwhile my pay has not raised; my income has not returned. And though my worth is often noted and my labors very well appreciated, this appreciation has not extended itself monetarily, but only at the lip. My labor is billed at $80 per hour and yet I see naught but pittance of that, even as business booms. Five years exemplary service to the same employer: and my reward is poverty-level income. If I worked for a corporation this kind of thing would be expected, but I work for a friend, so it's an insult.

All this and more has been weighing on my mind and resting like a rock in my stomach. The gifts and deadlines of the season, paired with my regular obligations, tied to the one-time loss of a misfit vacation, bound to the rising costs of the season, matched with my unrewarded labor in the form of a flat income... And this not to mention the physiological effects of sunless, gray skies, lack of exercise, and a persistent chill that haunts me indoors and out. Well, I'm depressed, anxiety stricken, and my mind is taking every chance it has to redouble the weight of my woes. Even my dreams are starting to attack me.

So I've decided that it isn't a coincidence, but a meaningful, and charitable act performed in the greatest, and most magnanimous spirit of sympathy, that the potted tree on the other side of the room - that sits outdoors all spring and summer, basking in the warmth and sunlight, but never flowering, has decided -- yes, chosen this very day and moment to cast open a single flower as wide and as beautiful as any, for my soft consideration and health of mind. It is its gift to me. That only I had one as good to give to it or any.

Fauna

Grandma made some experimental muffins to go with dinner the other day. They were really heavy and a shade too sweet to serve with dinner. I liked them anyway. She didn't. So out they go to feed the squirrels. And who come 'long to meat, instead of squirrels?


Hungry-Hungry Possum.


My best shot, after major enhancement.

As a Consumer, She is Complete

Anyone else having trouble coming up with gifts for people this year? It started last month with my Grandma's birthday. I looked all around her house, considered her hobbies and daily activities, her needs and desires... and found that she has everything in the world. Every thing she could possibly desire is in her possession already. Which is an odd situation, I should think. Not too many can say the same. But I believe it's more or less true in this instance.

She's got a computer that does all she could want of it, with a really nice flat screen my cousin gave her one Christmas, and a printer that gets the job done. Her TVs are just as she wants them. Her kitchen clock-radio is the only she has use for. She's often in the yard, when the weather permits, doing light gardening and heavy cleanup, but she has every utility and device that could assist her in these pursuits already. Her truck is pristine and she's loath to drive more than two miles at a time anyway. She plays bingo every Thursday - or so she tells us - but what am I going to get her a bingo marker? Clothes, furniture, kitchen appliances, toiletries, dishware, phones, electronics... She either has it or hasn't a need for it. As a consumer, she is complete. (There's an album title for you.)

So what do you do?

Meanwhile there's my mom who, as a new-ish home owner, has need and want of a number of things that spring to mind, but they're all just a few dollars outside my anticipated spending zone. I'm considering teaming up, to make the purchase of one of them, but the only other person buying for my mom this year is Grandma, and with two other daughters, each one baring her up another twenty-seven grandchildren, I doubt Grandma's fractional contribution would bring me any closer to my spending comfort zone. Maybe I'll just bite the bullet and spend the big bucks. It would do my miserly comportment some good.

Then there's sister Emily. What do you give to the child who would be queen? I feel that my gift should somehow express my disapproval of her generation's 'New Moon,' Justin Beiber, Miley Cyrus mentality. But what gift could possibly contain all that? Maybe a Dead Kennedys - Mr. Bungle box set. (He said with almost no knowledge of either band's music. And then abruptly ended.)

Fossilized Chivalry

"[...]I will be his elder brother, and care for him and watch over him; and whoso would shame him or do him hurt, may order his shroud, for though I be burnt for it he shall need it!"

"Escape? Spare thyself discomfort, an that is all that troubles thee. For Miles Hendon is master of Hendon Hall and all its belongings. He will remain -- doubt it not."

Judge the Tree by its Fruits

In response to A Prayer for Ronald.
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So just because Enron and Tyco and Worldcom and Haliburton and Blackwater are evil, doesn't mean I should assume they all are. And just because Ameritech, AT&T, Avon, B.F. Goodrich, Bank of America, Bank One, Bearsterns, Bellsouth, Citibank, Clorox, Coca-Cola, Cox Enterprises, Diebold, Dow Chemical, Eastman Kodak, Eaton, First Bank, GNC, Hershey Foods, J.P. Morgan, Marriott, National City, Nestle, PacifiCorp, Panera Bread, Proctor & Gamble, Sallie Mae, Sherwin-Williams, Southwest Bank, Southwestern Bell, Union Bank, Wachovia, Walgreens, Wal-Mart, Walt Disney, Wells Fargo, Winn Dixie, and Zale Corp...

...secretly took out life insurance policies on their employees for the express purpose of turning a profit on their deaths, subsequently bleeding insurance providers and their legitimate purchasers dry with these statistically guaranteed "dead peasant" policies...

...Just because a couple thousand of the apples are rotten to the core doesn't mean I should assume the last half-dozen in the barrel are? Okay, well, I disagree.

My government has, throughout the years, imprisoned it's own citizens in concentration camps, murdered church goers who sought only to escape the 'ways of the world,' poisoned its own soldiers on the battle field, illegally stripped citizens of their birthrights to citizenship, physically tortured captured soldiers and civilians alike in an effort to gather information known to be unreliable, secretly surveilled their own electorate's communications and then pardoned themselves of the crime, corrupted election results, redistricted voters for political gains, erected road blocks and denied people of certain colors and persuasions access to ballots, invented fictional international incidents to facilitate fiscally desirable wars, armed and sponsored terrorist forces to overthrow sovereign governments, entrapped and arrested civic leaders... COINTELPRO... Bay of Pigs... The Cuban Five... Yearning for Zion... Jose Padilla...

And these are just the documented, proven acts of my government. No conspiracy or conjecture in the list above. But I should withhold my cynicism?

The Summer of the Shark, Super Sunday, Shock and Awe, Howard Dean's red face, "Torture and the Ticking Time-Bomb" the lack of single-payer options in the healthcare "discussion," no footage of Bradley Tanks in the US, '60 Minutes' withholding video of ATF forces firing on the exits of a burning building, G.W. Bush pelted with eggs on inauguration day never shown on TV, Fox News refuses to show building 7's collapse, no images of death from Iraq and Afghanistan, "terrorists have weddings too," the term "religious extremists," Obama's peace prize...

Listen, you can deride the individual who shouts "there's poison in the well" without a reason to suspect it - go ahead - but we've all seen more than enough evidence of corporate evil and inhumane greed. We've all seen more than enough evidence of government plots to subjugate and/or outmaneuver the will of a populace. We've all seen more than enough evidence of media propagandizing, tabloidism, and self-censoring journalism. And the incidents have become steadier and more egregious than ever before in the passed ten years.

We have every reason, at this point in time, to approach any and every corporation, government, and media outlet warily and with suspicion of mal-intent, remitting trust only once these have overcome their own much deserved, and well-earned reputations of corruption, collusion, and outright evil.

Ronald McDonald may want you to like him and trust in his products, but no more than the crack dealer on the corner desires the same. Both will be your best friend right up until their mutually addictive and poisonous products eat your insides out and leave you for dead. Then it'll be your fault for buying it from them.