Tag Archives: family

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Boa Black in dishabille

This is my beloved cat who died in February 2020. She was named Boa Black or Feather Boa, depending on the situation. We got her as a tiny kitten at the pound. She had the softest fur and purred the instant I picked her up. She was 17 when she died.

For the Ragtag Daily prompt: dishabille.

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Lit

My friend Maline Robinson is an artist, paintings and silk screens. This one fits today’s “luminous” prompt, pale lit color and layers and texture.

Meanwhile my brain starts playing one of our choral pieces: Luminous night of the soul. It builds and builds, layers of sound and complexity. Here is another group doing the piece:

For today’s Ragtag Daily Prompt: luminous.

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Family

The photograph is from left to right, my sister Christine Robbins Ottaway, my (sort of but not blood) cousin Katy, and me. This is a fourth of July. We wanted to DO something. We were at my maternal grandparents’ in Trumansburg, New York. My mother suggested that we dress up and do a presentation. We wore her 1950s prom dresses, held a small parade involving three dogs and a cat who were also in costume, and read the Declaration of Independance and the Preamble to the Constitution to a group of adults in lawn chairs. This was in lieu of fireworks. We had fun but we still missed fireworks.

I am thinking about asking. I could not ask my mother for specific things I wanted as a child. She would get me a different and cheaper alternative. If I was disappointed, I would be guilt tripped or humiliated. I did not ask my father for things either. He would make and break promises, too sick from alcohol or he would have forgotten. I stopped asking because I did not like being disappointed and I did not like being shamed. Once I really really wanted something for Christmas. My sister and I made a quiet deal, showing each other exactly which toy we longed for. Then we each shopped with our mother and insisted on the toy the other wanted. Our mother did try to talk each of us out of the toy. We had arranged it so that we were spending the same amount of money: $20. She thought that was outrageous and that something cheaper would do just as well. We both stood our ground on the other’s behalf and then open the presents on Christmas day with faked surprise and real joy. We did NOT tell our mother.

On an earlier Christmas I sewed my sister a toy stuffed snake. My mother was discouraging, but she let me have cloth and needle and thread. “Why do you want to make her a snake? A snake?” I couldn’t really explain well. We had gone to a county fair and my sister and I both longed for the velvet snakes, six feet long and deep red. The snake I made for my sister was only a foot and a half long and I had flowered fabric, not velvet. I coiled it in a circle and wrapped it. My sister was delighted with it and held it all Christmas morning. My mother just shook her head. “A snake.” she muttered.

The things that I could ask for were books and music. I was the kid that the teacher would hand the scholastic book box to after she handed out one or two books to the other kids. I would order 20 books. My father said I could have as many as I wanted as long as I read them all. The only books I avoided were about television or movies. I loved a non fiction book about WWI Flying Aces. The technology of the airplanes and the problem of bullets ricocheting off the propeller were amazing. I also liked that it talked about the ACEs on both sides: German, English, French, American.

For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: ask.

I don’t know who took the photograph. I think it was one of my grandparents. Oh, I think “cousin” Adam is in the picture too, though he is nearly hidden behind the flag.

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website ethics and mine

Two days ago I wrote to the owner of the website that “separated” me for “not explicitly breaking the rules”.

I have not gotten an answer.

Doesn’t matter, you say. I disagree. I think our ethics matters and it matters on line. Isn’t that part of what we are fighting about?

Let’s drill down. The editors stated on this obscure not to be named site that they were tightening rules and removing write-ups that should be logs or are just not high enough quality, and letting the writers repost them as logs. So far they have removed over 250 of my writeups. Ironically, I was one of the two most prolific writers in the last year. Let’s kill the golden goose because she’s annoying, won’t we? The other writer has not been “separated”.

I note that they have removed my write up called “birth of ——–“. Now, this interests me. This was a well received write up, had up votes, and was the start of a category. The category was people explaining how they chose their on line name.

So: the editors are liars and abusing their power. They have removed a well received and well liked write up because they have personal animosity towards me. I have protested the removal of 250+ writeups and asked that they be reposted as logs. No answer.

The other writeups in the how I chose my name category are still there. So this is PERSONAL and the editors of the site are unethical.

Therefore, I hope the site dies. Or gets rid of those editors. I think I want it to die, even though it has writing by my sister. This does matter. As a species, we will either learn to be fair and human on line as well as off line, or we will end in conflagration. The site will certainly not be there if we start lobbing nuclear bombs at each other. The owner works for the US government. Why is he/she not paying attention to this obscure website that he/she owns?

Whether or not the world burns this month, if the editors are manifestly unfair on the site, the site will die and deserves to die. I wish that I could have my sister’s drafts before it shuts down.

I ended my email that is not answered with this: Good luck. I hope that ethics matters to both of us.

Thank you.

on line site name

_______________________

I will not name the site here or anywhere again, until and unless those editors are shut down and the site becomes ethical.

We are fighting this fight as a species, as humanity. We have to learn to be as ethical on line as we are in person. Well, you say, some people AREN’T ethical. Yes, that is true. As a rural physician, my goal is to take care of ANYONE WHO COMES IN. The emergency room physician cares for the family of four hit by the drunk and the drunk too, even if there is a dead child in the family of four. We set our judgement aside and do the best for each and every patient, regardless of the story. At least, that is the goal. It is the highest goal I know of.

Blessings and be your ethical self on line. As my children said to me when I threw their father out of the house once, “We don’t care what he does. We want you to be polite to dad no matter what.” And they were RIGHT! We answer to ourselves and to the Beloved and to our children.

Blessings.

The photo is me and my sister, dancing before my wedding in 1989. She died of cancer in 2012.

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April A to Z reflection

April was a very interesting month! I went to Europe for the first time since 1988 and got covid, so had to stay an extra 8 days. The version I got was a mild cold and my lungs did not get worse. Traveling on oxygen is really challenging. I was anxious to get home because my son and daughter-in-law got married after postponing in 2020 and 2021, so they married on April 30th! It was a wonderful wedding!

So, I had to do some planning for the A to Z, writing about women artists, mostly Helen Burling Ottaway, my mother. I took a number of my mother’s etchings to give to friends in Europe and used those because they were what I had. In typing up her resume, I learned more about her! She was a prolific artist and I want to get more of her art out there. I had originally planned to set up an on line shop of her work, but the Europe trip, covid and the wedding derailed that idea! I still want to do that, but I am a bit slow about it. I need to catalog and photograph her work, after I recover from the wedding extravaganza.

When I got home from my trip on April 12, I started doing two posts a day. I did the present letter and then worked from the end of the alphabet, setting up Z for Zarathustra to go live on April 30th. By the last week of April, I had it all set to go live day by day. This is good, because there was no way I would have posted from the last Wednesday on!

I did not get to surf other writers blogs as much as I had planned. Too busy in Europe and too busy with wedding. This week I mostly want to do not very much. I am sorting wedding photographs, the ones I took, and sending them to the new bride and groom.

The picture is of my two aunts at the music rehearsal. I was cantor and led the two hymns. Both of my father’s sisters are church organists. They played four hands for the processional and the recessional and were wonderful! With both my parents gone I was very very grateful to have them present.