I want the United States to be a nation where people of all ages are allowed to experience the consequences of their decisions.

I want the United States to be a nation where the consequences of bad decisions are not hidden or swept under the rug for the purpose of Political Correctness.

I want the United States to be a nation of values, and ethics, and integrity.

I want the United States to be a nation where benefits and comfort come from work, not from voting for the political party that promises more.

I want the United States to be a nation where the government does not treat its citizens like children needing protection from themselves.

I want the United States to be a nation where accomplishment is praised more than raising awareness.

I want the United States to be a nation where objective standards of learning are taught and celebrated.

I want the United States to be a nation where people are taught and encouraged to take responsibility for the circumstances they are in.

I want the United States to be a nation where people are taught and encouraged to take intelligent action if they don’t like the circumstances they are in.

I want the United States to be a nation where the successful are looked to for advice on how to be successful.

I want the United States to be a nation where the successful are not vilified and treated as cash cows to be milked to buy votes from those who choose to remain ignorant in a coccoon.

I want the United States to be a nation where people constantly seek to educate themselves.

I want the United States to be a nation where people constantly seek to grow.

I want the United States to be a nation of equal opportunity, not equal outcome.

I want the United States to be a nation where people don’t covet their neighbor’s belongings.

I want the United States to be a nation where wealth earned is linked to value created, not to political connections or the right color skin.

I want the United States to be a colorblind nation.

I want the United States to be a nation where 51% of the population is not classified a “minority” group.

I want the United States to stop seeking out new categories of disadvantegedness.

I want the United States to be a nation where politicians don’t foment envy between groups for political purposes.

I want the United States to be a nation that values substance over style.

I want the United States to be a nation with a small government.

Editor’s note by Mr Lady at Whiskey In My Sippy Cup: I never imagined I’d feature a post from Red State Chief on Blog Nosh.  Though Nathan and I are close blogging friends, there are times when we simply cannot read each other’s sites because we live on two completely different political hemispheres.  To be frank; his blog pisses me off.  A lot.  But I respect the man he his, his service to this great nation and his dedication to his family and friends.  To me, that is the definition of a person, how they treat those they love.  I am thrilled beyond all words to feature my friend, a man who will be shipping off to Iraq in the near future to help rebuild their country and defend ours.  Thank you, Nathan.  Read his original post on Red State Chief.

I’ve been obsessed with time lately and how it passes. What a trickster time is, the way he seems to hand me moment after moment of joy and love and life in slow, lazy procession until I pause to look back and I’m cut down by how far I’ve traveled. All the tiny incidents add up to the whole year that my oldest children were three and my youngest was one and my last baby was thought of and conceived. I want to yell at him for the subterfuge, but he’s handing me new moments so fast that I can’t take the time, I’ll miss something important. I’m dropping the present and it’s shattering on the floor, gem by gem as I gaze backwards. I refocus on the moment in my hands and it all slows down again, to that disconcerting, tricky lull.

I tell time I know his game, I’m onto him, but it’s inevitable that I’ll forget until I look back once more. It makes me mad. I wish he’d leave me alone, stop stealing my moments and let me have them for mine. Maybe I’ll keep them in a carved wooden box on my dresser, magpie-like, the way I kept little bits of life in high school, a note, a charm, a worn braided bracelet.

I want to keep the way Quinn walks, steady but unsteady, on his toes, his fat little belly proceeding him. I want to keep the way Garrett laughs, mouth wide open, head back, his round baby face lit from within. I want to keep the way Saige runs to me at preschool pickup, the way it feels when she wraps her little body around my middle and wraps her arms around my neck. I want to keep this baby’s first tiny kicks, barely felt today, miniature popcorn popping inside my uterus.

Determined to stop his constant theft of my moments, I set a trap for time. I know if I turn and pounce quickly enough I can catch the decrepit old man. I wait for a slow, easy moment, a little lull in time’s flow and I spin faster than the earth, outside of time, grasping with both hands.

Then I falter in disbelief, caught off guard that I actually hold him in my hands and that the arm I hold is strong and young. He is timeless, handsome and confident with twinkling eyes and a devilish smile. “You got me,” he raises his hands in mock surrender. “There’s not much time. When should we go?” He leans forward, feverishly eager, “what should we change?”

Go? Change? I don’t really understand, not yet, I want a glimpse, that’s all, to steal some moments back and save them forever to visit at will. But I have this chance and time is staring at me, waiting. I don’t want to blow it. “What if I’d taken the other job out of law school?” I blurt at him quickly. “Would I have loved it? Maybe stayed an attorney? Maybe I’d have a big career now?”

“Maybe,” he fixes me with his too willing gaze and holds out his hand, falsely casual.

“Wait.” I’m suspicious. “What about Matt? He might not move to Houston. Would we still get married before graduation? What if we wait to see and grow apart?”

Time rubs his hands gleefully. “Let’s see.”

“No,” I stop him. “Not then. Some other time.”

“What about your first baby,” he entices, leaning towards me. “The first one you lost. We could go back to when his heart beat inside you. You could feel him again, maybe we could change things. You could know him.”

I am momentarily breathless. In an instant, I know. Games. Consequences.

“But then I couldn’t have Garrett.”

“True,” says Time, “true. It’s up to you.”

“Maybe something smaller,” I plead, “a moment to hold him as a newborn again.”

Time stifles a yawn and curls his lip. “Bor-ring. You’re wasting my time.” He snaps his carefully manicured fingers. “I know. We could revisit the time when you decided to adopt. You could make different choices. You could have a different little boy, he might stay with you. You could adopt two babies instead, or just your daughter. You could miss so much pain,” he tempts.

I picture it. A lot of grief avoided, but I am onto his tricks. “What happens to him?”

“Who?” he asks, all innocence.

“Our son. Does he get adopted? It’s a terrible life for the children that don’t find forever families. They have to leave the orphanage when they’re sixteen. Does he find a family that loves him?”

“I don’t know,” says Time impatiently, “we have to see.”

“His family is so right for him, he’s happy. They never would have found him if we hadn’t adopted him, there’s no other way he ends up with them.”

“Yes I know,” Time rolls his eyes, “that’s how it works.”

Take a deep breath, I tell myself, be smart, you can beat him at this game.

“My twins then. My other baby. That’s only two months back. A tiny change and they both live. They’ll still be inside of me right now. It doesn’t affect anyone but me.”

Time smiles slyly and stands up straighter. “Ready?”

I hesitate.

“What now?”

“I don’t know. I sort of believe, I mean, I like to think that his soul went to another baby. Another mother. Maybe she’d been waiting a long time.” He stares at me, uncomprehending, and I know it’s futile, but I try again. “I pretend sometimes that…the universe…thought, there is so much joy here, they can handle this pain, and so it gave the little spark to someone else.”

Time says nothing and I raise my voice angry and frustrated. “Is that how it works?”

He shrugs, “I don’t know.” His eyes narrow and he scans my face. “Is that how you believe it works?”

“I don’t know.”

“If it was, would you take it away?”

“No,” I whisper, “no, I couldn’t.”

He holds out his hand to me, palm up, fingers spread. “When do we go then?” My arms stay at my side and his arm slowly drops, his smile fades to a crestfallen look.

A tear slides down my cheek, but it is happiness, not grief that fills me. Or, maybe it is sadness, but it’s the good kind. Sadness because I’ve lived the way I want to live, most of the time, fully, optimistically, without hitting the brakes in caution, without wavering or ducking life to avoid potential pain.

“No,” I tell him, “steal what you will, I wouldn’t change a thing.”

He winces with disappointment. “Yes,” he murmurs as he fades away, “that’s how it almost always works.”

Editor’s Pick by MommyTime at Mommy’s Martini. Stacey is a writer after my own heart. She writes long, introspective, beautiful posts and tackles topics that range all over the map. With three-year-old “forced twins” (one adopted, one not), a two-year-old, and another child on the way, she more than has her hands full. And yet she finds time to think deeply and long, write profoundly, and still manages to make me laugh sometimes too. This post, in fact, is somewhat unlike her usual style in its commingling of fiction with her deepest introspection, but that is why I love it. Just when you think you’re getting to know her, she does something new. You may want to see the original comments on this post. I hope you surely will want to subscribe. You won’t regret it.

I seriously feel like I just had my lights knocked out, and I’ve woken seeing red and dusting off my rear end.

It’s sangria time, people. Are you raising your cups?

My husband and I can’t stop saying:  we only have this one life.

I’ll say it again - we only have this ONE and it’s riding like a breath on the wind, already in disintegration. So what are we doing here?

If God doesn’t shine through this spot of air He’s given me, may my computer fly to the moon, let the world wide web scramble to a fuzz, and may we meet outside weeping at each other’s necks for what we’ve been missing.

Luke 12:48 (The Message)

47-48“The servant who knows what his master wants and ignores it, or insolently does whatever he pleases, will be thoroughly thrashed. But if he does a poor job through ignorance, he’ll get off with a slap on the hand. Great gifts mean great responsibilities; greater gifts, greater responsibilities!

I have been given much. That is my confession today.

———————-

Orphans and widows, God’s heart is for you, and so should ours be. Here’s to riding this breeze with His breath in our wings, the intentions of His heart moving our feet.

———————–

On Saturday night, we visited World Garden, where the owner shared his vision for business with us. We cried together. Photographs of gorgeous children line the walls. Every meal you purchase there feeds a hungry child or supports a far-away and needy farmer.

Keep your glasses lifted here!

He blessed us, the owner and his vision for service, for selflessness. We decided then to adopt and it settled into me that God’s hands could be weaving her even now. Even now, I think of her mother, and she could be thinking of me. We ate the food, no doubt laced with love more than with the nutrition that whole foods supply, and it was whole food - beautiful and cared-for piles of it, as we have here in America, in abundance. Every bite was a rich, delicious reminder of our great responsibility and of a great inherited Love.

SO let it be that way with us! Let us enjoy this abundance, this ONE life and eat the food that multiplies to the poor. Let us do what gives us pure JOY, what serves the most High God, where he dwells in low-down places, near the broken. There is too much to gain to not eat that way, to not love because He first loved us.

Here’s to World Garden!

Cheers!

Editor’s pick by Robin at PENSIEVE.  Initially, I only knew Amber as the “Mother” of The Mother Letter Project, by helping her husband promote that Christmas-gift-of-a-blog last year.  We exchanged emails, met at BlissDom ‘09, and a kindred friendship was born.  Amber’s prose is lyrical and her voice will draw you in.  She lives and loves with passion and isn’t afraid to let you see her from the inside out.  She’s not just an above average writer, her posts will stun you.  Everytime.  She’s beautiful on the outside, beautiful on the inside–you’ve just gotta subscribe to her feed and follow her on Twitter!  Be sure to check out the comment thread on her original post, too!

Several nights ago I was sitting in the dark of Braden’s room; he was cradled in my arms, breathing quietly. As we slowly swayed back and forth in the rocking chair together, lullabies playing peacefully on the CD player, my mind jumped back and forth. It climbed mountains torturously, then lept off of the summits and plummeted into the valleys below. My face was slack, but my thoughts rumbled and tumbled below the surface while I felt the warm, soft life in my embrace cuddle deeper into sleep.

Suddenly, I burst out crying.  Crying for the tiny life that I wasn’t able to hold onto in this way.  I sobbed - quietly, so as not to disturb Braden - for a few long moments. Then I placed him in his crib and left the room. As suddenly as it had come upon me, the weeping was gone.

It’s been like that for weeks now. Since the miscarriage.

The extreme dichotomy of my feelings and thoughts lately has been a confusion at times, to me. At others, it has made no less than perfect sense. See what I mean?

I was pregnant one day. Then, suddenly, I wasn’t.

Riding the roller coasters at this Carnival From Hell that no woman wants to go to, but that is packed full of people, nonetheless, has been strange.

Some days, hearing about how many others have gone through this, multiple times, even, is a great comfort. I am actually incredibly buoyed by the scores of other women who feel somewhat betrayed by their bodies, or maybe even by God. By women who have experienced this same thing and are floating alongside me in this sea of uncertainty.

It means that I am not really standing out in the middle of a barren wasteland, alone, while a relentless wind tears and rips at my exposure-ravaged limbs, muffling my cries and carrying them silently away into the vast nothingness surrounding me, where they will mean nothing and no one will ever respond to them.

Instead, at every bend, there are arms ready to pull me close, hugging me and imparting comfort and understanding; a place to cry and grieve and heal.

But on those other days, the “bad” ones, if this has happened to you? I want to pretend like you don’t exist. I don’t want to hear about what you’ve gone through. I especially don’t want to know that it has happened to you two, four, or seven times. I don’t want to think about how sad it is that this happens all the time, multiple times to some women. And I really don’t want to think about how this could so easily happen to me again.

Then, the very next day, I probably want to run to you and make you hold me again.

(Please, if you shared these things with me, don’t be offended, and please don’t stop sharing.  Please.  This is the nature of the beast - while I sometimes want to pretend you don’t exist - I still find I need you!  Just read the first part I wrote about it up there^!  I just have a need to be really honest with myself and others about the dichotomy of my feelings right now, and this is part of it.  If you have been through this, you will likely understand.)

The split, this back and forth, doesn’t end there, though.  Ohhh, no.  There is so much more.

Some days, I look forward to trying to have another child at some point.  I think about a sibling for my son, a tiny baby to love and coo over, another dimension to our family.  I think about the joy of being pregnant, meeting a new life, and discovering how another personality will fit into our home.

Other days, I am terrified at ever being pregnant again.  I shrink away from thoughts of what it will be like to have another positive pregnancy test.  Instead of bursting at the seams with Joy and Bliss like I did the past two times, I imagine that I will feel incredibly Anxious and Fearful.

I mourn the death of the joy that should accompany that positive test, and I imagine the fear and sorrow that will replace it - as well as the paranoia.  I imagine it, and I feel a great sense of avoidance.

I picture a future pregnant me waiting to see blood every.time.I.urinate.  And I can’t imagine being able to shoulder the endless stress that will inevitably invoke.

Some days, I feel strong and whole.  Some days I actually feel more alive than before.  I feel more passionate about living and doing and being.  I feel more grateful and in awe of the life that courses through my veins, and that resonates through the bodies of my son and my husband.

Other days, I feel more vulnerable and fragile than ever.  I feel more fearful and worried about the delicate nature of life - not just early life, either - any life.  I feel guarded and over-protective about my son on those days.  I feel anxious and worried about my husband.  I feel scared.  Terrified, even.

Some days, I take comfort in knowing that my baby is in Heaven.  God wanted one of ours next to Him.  I feel the complete peace that is, as a lovely friend of mine so eloquently said, knowing my baby will live for eternity never having to experience sadness.

But most days, I just want my baby back.  And I feel selfish.  (But it doesn’t stop me from wanting that.)

In fact, some days I want my baby back so bad that it really doesn’t matter to me one way or the other that I can probably have another child eventually.  Hearing that does not really comfort on those days.  Because I don’t want another one.  As John can tell you, because I’ve said it to him multiple times already, I just want back the baby I already had.  I was feeling this so strongly one night that I just cried into my pillow, feeling guilty and selfish and immature. And whenever someone has said that to me… that I can have more… I have secretly been angry. Because you would never say that to me if Braden died. And this baby was no less my child than is he!

Then I read that I’m not the only one who feels this very way.

And it must have been a good day, because I felt a bit vindicated, and took comfort in that.

Proof that I need to hear all these things that you all have to say.

I’ve never wanted to get off a Carnival Ride so badly.  I’m just ready to fall asleep in the car on the way home, you know?

And more than anything, I hate knowing that while I’m riding, the damn contraption is going to keep stopping over and over again to let, no, force new passengers on.

All I can hope for is that I’ll have something to say that will comfort them.

On the not so bad days, of course.

Editor’s Pick by Deb at Missives From Suburbia. Lotus covers the ups and downs of motherhood, marriage and every day life with lyrical posts that often make me think, “Ugh! She’s living in my house!” If her powerful writing wasn’t already enough, her blog contains many examples of her beautiful photography, and her Weekly Winners feature is a popular gallery for talented photographers from all over the blogosphere. Give her a visit and be sure to subscribe to her feed while you’re there.

Richard Dansky’s short story, besides being an intriguing story about monsters and possibilities and what hides in the dark, challenges the reader to think about our preconceptions and how they affect what we see.

He introduces the story with this tidbit:

There are a lot of lakes and ponds in the Triangle, many of them man-made. There’s one I pass driving to work every day, and another that sits across the street from my office. You can go there on your lunch break and see people fishing or sailing or throwing frisbees into the water for their dogs to chase. I’ve even availed myself of the facilities a few times, and am pleased to report I’ve only fallen out of a rented canoe once, and briefly.

An admittedly unscientific sample suggests that most of those folks have no idea that Lake Crabtree (and the “lake” part is purely an honorific; it’s about as deep as a Bret Michaels interview and covers only slightly more territory) was dug out with backhoes and bulldozers in the not-too-distant past. Even the signs posted at various semi-prominent points don’t get the point across. Maybe they’re ugly signs. Maybe people have come up with their own stories about where the lake came from and how long it’s been around, and if things are otherwise, they don’t want to know. Either way, it works for them.

Which, I suppose, is the point of the story.

Enjoy.

***

THE DEEP END OF THE SHALLOW WATER

We got out of the car just before sunset, a half-mile down a gravel service road that we shouldn’t have been able to access. The spot where we’d stopped was a pretty one, a clearing in the second-growth pine woods that ran up the edge of the body of water we’d come to investigate. Soft dirt gave way to sticky clay down by the shoreline, and tree roots and tufts of grasses marked the bank all the way down. I could see reeds poking up through the water, stands of them here and there in places where the bottom was muddy enough to support plant life that ambitious. Across the way I could see the other side, red dirt and green grass underneath a purpling sky. It didn’t look terribly far away.

“What do you think?” Lester said, and grinned. His boots crunched on the white rock of the road as he moseyed around to the trunk, the better to pop it and get out the equipment. “Is this spot perfect or what?”

I stared at him for a minute, then pointed at the water. “Lester,” I said, “That is a pond.”

He nodded. “So it is, Tyler, so it is.” The trunk squealed open and his head disappeared inside as he began rummaging around.

“Let me try this again,” I said, and took a couple of steps closer to the water. “Lester, this is a pond. Moreover, if I am reading that sign there correctly” - I pointed to an innocuous piece of metal that proclaimed the pond to be “Flood Control Structure #32? - “it’s a man-made pond. Constructed, I might add, in 1966.”

His head popped out for a moment, now adorned with night-vision goggles. “Is it, now?”

I took a deep breath, counted to ten, and let it go slowly. No sense letting Lester drive me crazy this early in the evening, I thought. He’d have all night to do it, if I let him.

“Lester,” I said in my most reasonable voice, “stop that. What we are looking at is an artificial pond so small I could swim it without kicking my shoes off first. Hell, it’s so shallow I could probably walk it, and never have to hold my breath. If there are any fish in there, they were artificially introduced when this thing was built. There is maybe enough biomass in that whole thing to support one moderately anorexic snapping turtle as the local apex predator, and that’s it.”

“Really.” He sounded distracted, or at least he did until he straightened up too fast and bounced the back of his head off the inside of the trunk lid. “Owww.”

“Oh, for God’s sake.” I stomped over to the car and relieved Lester of half the armload of equipment he was carrying. It was all there, the usual gear for this sort of trip: NVG, infrared cameras, motion sensors, microphones, and more. There was also a sealed thermos marked “rotten fish” in Lester’s wife’s handwriting, more proof that she was the most patient and sainted of women to walk this earth, and what looked like 250 feet of 50 pound test line with no other fishing equipment in sight. “You all right?”

“Yes, yes, fine. Just…put that down over there.” He waved vaguely toward the water. “Ow.”

“Don’t think self-mutilation’s going to get you out of answering me,” I told him, even as I did what he said. “You still haven’t told me why the hell you think we’re going to find something here.”

“Because it’s there,” he said, as if it were the most reasonable thing in the world, and slammed the trunk with casual malice. “That’s the reason we go everywhere, right?”

I shook my head. “Lester, we go where there are genuine, verifiable sightings of cryptozoological specimens, not hysterical impossibilities.”

He joined me at the top of the bank and deposited his load of gear next to mine. “You’re absolutely correct, and again, that’s why we’re here. Give me a hand down?” Without waiting for me to answer, he slid down the muddy slope. His heels gouged long, smooth lines in the clay as he went.

I waited for him to find his footing, then started handing pieces of gear to him. “Les, we did not have a genuine, verifiable sighting here. We had a couple of drunk teenagers with a cell phone camera.”

“And the images they recorded clearly show something in the water. Which is why we’re here.”

“For God’s sake, Lester, where’s the breeding population going to come from? Old packets of sea monkeys?”

He shook his head, and brushed his hands on the well-worn fishing vest he always wore on trips like these. “You’re missing the point, my friend. Come on down here and I’ll try to show you.”

“Show me what?” I grumbled suspiciously, but by then I was already moving. “Another cell phone video?”

“No, not quite.” My heels hit ground and I skidded backwards. Only Lester’s hand caught me, stabilizing me from going over while I lurched to my feet. He said nothing until I was upright and steady, then gestured toward the far shore. “Now, look out there. What do you see?”

I peered out into the gathering dusk. Overhead, the sky had settled to a shade of deep-bruise purple, warning us that we were running out of light. The water’s surface was still, an indigo mirror reflecting featureless heavens. Across the way, a single heron picked its fastidious way along the shoreline, pausing every so often to stab at something small and unseen. Frogs, maybe, or minnows.

“I see a pond,” I said.

Lester shook his head. “No, you don’t. You know there’s a pond here, a crappy little hole in the ground they poured some water into, so that’s all you’ll let yourself think there can be. But what do you see?”

“Lester-” I started, but he shushed me.

“You see a flood control structure. Those kids? They saw a pond that’s been here all their lives, dark and scary and with something they’ve never seen the bottom of. Maybe their older brothers told them that it had a monster in it, and they believed.”

“Then they’re idiots,” I muttered, but Lester was rolling now.

“How deep is that water? What moves underneath it? What might have been buried, asleep in the muck for centuries before the return of the waters awakened it? From here, we don’t know; they certainly don’t, or they do, and their answers have nothing to do with what the engineers might say. Us? We can’t know. All we see is that-” he waved out at the smooth surface of the pond before us - “and that reflects all our thoughts back at us. It’s impenetrable, and beyond it lies whatever we can imagine living in those murky depths. Why shouldn’t there be monsters here, if those kids want there to be some?”

“Because there can’t be,” I said weakly. “Because there’s no room, and no food, and no history. There’s a million reasons there can’t be anything bigger than a catfish in there.”

“Ah, but there can, if we want it to be there badly enough. That’s the thing about monsters, you know. They come when they’re called. When they’re possible. When they’re told that they’ve always been there.”

I opened my mouth to tell him that he was crazy, that we’d agreed to do scientific investigation only, that I was done with this partnership if he was going to sprinkle magical pixie dust over everything I’d thought we’d stood for.

And from across the water, there was a splash. I looked up, just as Lester did, just in time to see the heron disappearing in a spray of black water. Its wings beat frantically against the water’s surface for an instant and then it was gone. A handful of feathers floated into view, bright against the dark outline of a vast shape moving slowly to deeper water.

For a moment, neither of us said anything. Lester looked at me. I looked at the ground.

“Did you…see something,” I heard myself asking.

Lester sounded noncommittal. “I might have.”

“Right.” I kicked a pebble toward the water. It hit with an audible thunk, then sank out of sight, instantly. “Why don’t I go set up the equipment?”

“Why don’t I help you?”

I shook my head. “Why don’t you keep an eye on the water?”

Editor’s pick by Heather A. Goodman at L’Chaim. Richard Dansky writes for video games and authored the novel Firefly Rain, a supernatural thriller. Richard blogs, along with a team of writers, at Storytellersunplugged. Storytellersunplugged brings together 30 authors, editors, booksellers, and publishing professionals to offer the reader short stories, tips on writing, and “behind the scenes” glances at the writing industry. On any given day, you never know what you might find: a bit of humor, a horror story, or a piece of advice to keep you typing the words that you love. One thing is for sure: This blog is for all who love words and, specifically, how these words come together to create a good story. You can find the blog here and subscribe to it here.

Moosh- your dad is up in bed snoring and moaning like a severely wounded walrus. Today is Father’s Day and I just wanted to let you know, as someone who’s lived with your dad for seven years that the teasing and relentless obnoxiousness will likely never stop. It’s how he shows us that he loves us.

Seriously.

Your shrieks of horror and protest must be music to your dad’s ears or else he wouldn’t insist on pissing you off so often. He never had a brother. We have to forgive him for this. Guy just doesn’t know how to be surrounded by wimmin all the time. It’s made him a little crazy. Good news? Any brothers that you may have will pale in comparison to what your faddah dishes out.

There is a moment in your birth video where he reaches out and touches you really REALLY quick while the nurses are cleaning you off. He didn’t want to get in trouble. You can hear the nurses say “It’s okay dad, she’s yours, you can touch her all you want.” Later when he told me that he got to be the first! to! touch! you! was the first time I ever saw him weakened with the power a little girl holds over her daddy. He hasn’t recovered since. You are his world.

In another hour he will get up and start teasing us. And poking us. And annoying us. This is how boys show they like you. From kindergarten to high school to marriage. The more they pick on you the more smitten they are.

I think it would be impossible for daddy to be any more smitten with us.

We’re lucky ladies.

Happy Father’s Day dude.

Editor’s Pick by Publisher and Editor-in-Chief Megan Jordan from Velveteen Mind: Moosh in Indy is one of our favorites here at Blog Nosh Magazine and this post brought tears to my eyes.  Casey captured in so few words what would take me scrolls and scrolls of the mouse to express.  That is a great way to sum up Casey and my highest recommendation for you to check her out.  Subscribe and follow her on twitter for laughter and tears, all rolled into one tiny package.  As in, do it yesterday.  Ooh, and that video featured in our NoshTube over there in the sidebar?  That’s by Casey, too.  (if you are reading this late, then no, that video about how to make cool cappucino foam is not by Casey.)

Just as life can sometimes distract you from getting things done, our solutions are often monotonous stop-gaps.  Nothing memorable and hardly worth the effort.  Which reminds us…  Father’s Day is this Sunday!  Did you forget to get Dad that amazing gift?  No problem, we have you covered and with sprinkles on top.

Blog Nosh Magazine is proud to present our favorite solution to those last-minute Father’s Day gift panics in the form of what we love best:  MAGAZINES!

If the dads in your life are anything like the dads in mine, they enjoy splashy pictures, punchy stories, and gorgeous women.  That’s putting it politely.  I gave my husband a subscription to Men’s Health one year and he thanked me every month, no fail.  The best part?  I absolutely loved Men’s Health and just about beat him to it each time it arrived.  I’d like to say that peeking into the mind of men made me a better wife, but I think it might have just made me more tolerant and patient because, wow, it’s all pretty much about desire for men.  Desire to improve, desire to build a better life, and desire for, well, we are talking about our men.

In honor of Father’s Day, Blog Nosh Magazine is giving away a prize pack courtesy of MagsDirect.com that includes subscriptions to the daddy of all magazines:  Sports Illustrated, GQ, and (my favorite) Men’s Health. All you have to do to win is be a US resident and either tweet about the giveaway using the keyword “@blognoshmag” or leave a comment below.  The winner will be announced Saturday morning, June 20, 2009.

Update:  The winner is @flesworthy! Her tweet about the giveaway was randomly selected from all of the tweets and comments.  Follow her on twitter and check out her blog:  flesworthy.  Thanks for entering!

Sold on the idea of giving Dad a magazine subscription?  Seriously, my husband asks for me to renew his subscriptions every year in lieu of another tie or coffee mug. Check out MagsDirect.com for cheap magazines and you’ll absolutely thrill him with your thoughtfulness.

Plus, you can do it Sunday morning if you forget poor ole dad.

(psst…  I usually subscribe online and then buy a copy of the actual magazine at the store to attach the “you’ve been subscribed!” note to on top.  Our other favorites?  Best Life and Maxim.  Yeah, totally opposite ends of the scale but both largely about ripped abs.)

Note:  This is a paid sponsorship from a Blog Nosh Magazine advertiser.  How else did you think we paid our bills?  You can bet your last nacho that I mean every word of our recommendation, though.  Love magazine subscriptions as gifts!

Nosh Notes from the Editor by Publisher and Editor-in-Chief, Megan Jordan of Velveteen Mind

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Once, there were two wise women who lived as neighbors in a village near a dark forest.

The land near the forest was fertile, and the village prospered. But every few years, a drought would sweep across the land, and fires would break out in the forest. For this reason, for generations, the people of that village had built their modest homes at a distance from the forest, and had taken care to keep the field between the forest and their village free of brush, so that the fire would not spread. And whenever the fires did come, the villages would work together, digging trenches in the field, and bringing pails of water from the river nearby to douse errant sparks and soak the ground around their homes.

But then more than a decade passed without a drought, and as the prosperous village grew more prosperous, and crowded, young families began to build homes in the open, empty field near the forest.

The two wise women considered it folly to take such a chance, and both shook their heads. They both advised their neighbors not to move into the field. But, enticed by the space and beauty the rich, open field afforded, the villagers continued to build there despite the advice of their elders.

Before long, the baron who controlled the realm around the village noticed this trend, and he began to encourage it. Because every time a new farmstead was created in the baron’s jurisdiction, he could tax the family that lived there for the use of the newly cultivated land. “Build near the forest,” the baron urged. “The climate has changed. We may never see a drought again. You are safe from the fires. Build larger homes and farms! Take all the space you want!”

And the loggers selling wood to those building new homes, and the merchants selling furniture, and the roadbuilders who were hired to build new roads into the new part of the village also found reason to encourage this trend. And some villagers even began to borrow money to build new, empty homes, in the hopes that they might encourage people from other villages to move there, and sell the homes at a profit. And so, people began to build houses right into the forest.

And still, both the wise women protested. Hadn’t the village prospered for centuries by living prudently, and taking precautions against fire? But the villagers did not listen. The wise women stayed in their homes, far from the forest. But the village continued to move.

And then one year a drought did come, and with it came the fires.

At first only the homes built directly in the forest were destroyed. And the first wise woman said to the second wise woman, “I told my neighbors, again and again, not to build their homes in the forest! I told them the drought would return! And so did you! And yet, they did not listen. Now they reap what they sowed.”

The second wise woman replied, “Indeed, we did tell our neighbors not to move. I am sorry they did not listen.”

And the first wise woman sat in her house, content that she had given the right counsel.

The second wise woman went down to the village to console the families that had lost their homes, and offer them what extra food and clothing she had.

Now a second round of fires came, and this time many of the homes in the field were damaged or destroyed. And the two wise women spoke with one another, and the first wise woman said, “Such fools! If only they had listened to our advice, or even taken a moment to think with their own heads, they would have known not to build their homes there. Look at us, safe and sound. We did the right thing. That is why our homes are still standing.”

And the second wise woman said, “I tried many times to convince our neighbors to listen to reason, as you know. But so many others, respectable-seeming folk, too, were giving our neighbors poor counsel. How were they to know whose advice to take, not being as experienced as you and I are in these matters?”

The first wise woman replied, “Well, next time they will know to listen to me, and follow my example!” and went back into her well-protected house to work on her knitting.

The second wise woman went down to homes near the forest that were still standing, and told her neighbors, “If we are going to save our village, we must work together. Let me show you how to build a firebreak, and soak the ground, the way we all once used to.” And the villagers, grateful for her offer of help, listened and began to work to protect their homes.

As the drought continued, more fires came, and though by working together to fight fires, the villagers did manage to save many homes, many homes were lost. Without an open field to protect them, even many homes in parts of the village that had been safe from fires for centuries were burned to the ground. The second wise woman began letting displaced villagers camp out in her wheat field.

The village elders petitioned the baron for help, but he responded with a letter stating that the royal tax coffers had been depleted in an effort to save the Roadbuilders’ Guild, the Furniture Merchants’ Association and the Forest Home Promotion Service from collapse.

When the first wise woman heard that the villagers had petitioned the government for help and been denied, she snorted and said, “Losers. My tax gold shouldn’t bet spent to fix their folly. I built my house in the safe part of the village.” She looked out her window at the second wise woman’s yard, which had turned into a tent city. “She’s out of her mind,” said the first wise woman to herself (for there was no one else around for her to talk to). “Wasting her time helping a bunch of fools. Well, a friend to fools is a fool herself, I say.”

As the fires raged, flames finally engulfed much of the old part of the village. Unable to beat back the flames on her own, the first wise woman was forced to flee as her home burned to the ground.

The second wise woman, with an army of fellow villagers defending her home and field from the flames, saved much of her property. The next day, it rained, and the fires were doused, and the day after that, the second wise woman was elected to lead the village’s effort to rebuild.

Editor’s pick by Leighann of Soy is the New Black: I met Jaelithe about a year ago and was instantly drawn to her. Reading through her archives, you can tell that she is passionate about and well-versed on so many subjects from gardening to feminism and everything in between. The Forest Fire is layered with commentary on urban sprawl, environmentalism, politics, greed, and community. It could easily be a discourse on today’s economic turmoil that our nation faces. As I read her essay, I couldn’t help but think about the new McMansion development on the ourskirts of my Midwestern town and of the need for prescribed burning to help prevent forest fires that destroy communities out west. Read more by Jaelithe at The State of Discontent, subscribe to her blog, and check out the original post.

Jenna always works 1 day on the weekend and you can never really tell if it’s going to be Saturday or Sunday. When Jackson started to play soccer games on Saturdays, Jenna suddenly started working every single Saturday. What an ODD scheduling coincidence. Poor Jenna. She is deprived of youth soccer AND the joy of watching a 4-year-old girl who hates her brother’s soccer games. No parent should ever be asked to miss these experiences.

But then she got last Saturday off. At last. Jenna could come to soccer with us.

MetroDad recently pointed out on his blog that we’re raising a nation of pussies. The kids are urged to “use their words” in a world where they can’t leave the house without a helmet and a safety net. The crazy thing about Jackson’s soccer league is that this insidious process of wimpification is being extended to the parents. We’re being declawed. Before the kids were allowed to play their first game, we had to sign a Spectator Contract and initial each rule (and yes I’m totally serious).

These included limited shouting. If we do shout, we promise to shout only positive messages. We are to cheer for our team’s successes but not the opposing team’s mistakes. At no time are we permitted to question the calls of the referees (this sets an example of bad sportsmanship for the kids). And my favorite: After every game, we promise to ask our child what was the most FUN about the game.

Ahh Ha Ha Ha Ha.

Anyway, the Soccer Gods saw fit to smile on Jackson on this particular Saturday and he found himself with the ball and no opposing players between him and the goal. GO JACKSON! Nothing but green grass and a nervous goalie. O MY GOD GO JACKSON! A defensive player was gaining on him but he had plenty of time. TAKE THE SHOT JACKSON! The crowd inhaled—KICK IT JACKSON KICK IT—as the kid behind him slid—HURRY UP AND KICK IT—and tripped my kid into a defeated pile of elbows and knees. The ball rolled limply into the goalie’s hands, unkicked.

No penalty. The crowd erupted into a stifled grumble. But there was nothing we could do. We had signed the contracts. Even as we witnessed blatant and obvious unsportsmanlike conduct, the soccer league had removed our right to protest. It wouldn’t be nice. It might hurt the cheater’s feelings. Then the happy soccer game wouldn’t be fun or nice and a rainbow might catch on fire.

“THAT’S BULLSHIT!!!”

Jenna served as a channel for the soccer collective. Everyone looked at her. We all just kinda blinked. It’s such a relief when something explodes.

We can try to teach everyone to be safe and nice with the hope of creating a world of super safe niceness. But what about the need, for our own health and the culture’s, to scream that’s bullshit? What benefits for the system might reside in a theory of healthy rage? You tripped my kid. And that’s bullshit. You voted Yes on Proposition 8. And that’s bullshit. You’re trying to legislate the expression of anger and the boundaries of love. And it’s just all a bunch of fucking bullshit.

I hope Jenna has next Saturday off.