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<title>Donne Tempo RSS She Says</title><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/index.html</link><description>Women talk to women</description><dc:language>en</dc:language><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><dc:rights>Copyright 2007 Donne Tempo</dc:rights><dc:date>2008-05-09T21:22:11-04:00</dc:date><admin:generatorAgent rdf:resource="http://www.realmacsoftware.com/" />
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<lastBuildDate>Fri, 09 May 2008 22:45:03 -0400</lastBuildDate><atom10:link xmlns:atom10="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" rel="self" href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/DonneTempoRssSheSays" type="application/rss+xml" /><item><title>Girls on the Edge</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Paxton says</category><dc:date>2008-05-09T21:22:11-04:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/girls-on-the-edge.php#unique-entry-id-55</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/girls-on-the-edge.php#unique-entry-id-55</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[There&rsquo;s nothing like those first seventy plus degree days after a windy, chilly winter!  It&rsquo;s time to rip off the bulky sweaters, put away the fleece lined shoes, pack up the quilts &ndash; and go shopping!

Eagerly we speed-walk through the crowded store until we spy our destination &ndash; summer clothes!  We&rsquo;re surrounded by frilly skirts, barely-there tops, string bikinis, and micro mini-dresses that would make any pop singer proud.  Unfortunately, we&rsquo;re in the girls&rsquo; department, attempting to outfit my eight and ten year old daughters.

...I don&rsquo;t care if you like it &ndash; you are NOT wearing it....  You are NOT getting ANOTHER piece of clothing with Miley Cyrus&rsquo;s face!

That&rsquo;s the spectrum of choices: sexy sleaze or Disney hype....  My oldest dances, sings and writes her own songs, so Miley is definitely her hero (although she hated the Vanity Fair picture).  The question remains &ndash; what kind of heroine will she turn out to be?

Miley Cyrus&rsquo;s music is upbeat and positive &ndash; and focuses on girls achieving their dreams!  Her Disney persona is also funky and fun, and the wardrobe seems to walk the fine line of being flirty without being sleazy....  She seems to be embracing the country/southern gal/starlet tradition: proclaiming your love for Jesus and your virginity while wrapped in a low-cut gown and enough face paint to make Dolly Parton proud!

...To be fair, our country stars seem much more capable of maintaining the &ldquo;good girl in trashy clothes&rdquo; persona than their Hollywood counterparts.  But Miley is emulated by young girls around the world.

...It&rsquo;s our responsibility as parents to set limits, to explain WHY an outfit that would be at home on the Hollywood strip is NOT appropriate for a 10 year old.

But really&hellip;.are simple, flattering (not revealing) clothes for young girls a ridiculous request?

...I actually attempted to add a few articles of clothing to my spring look....  I found some wonderful tops &ndash; feminine, draping, NOT midriff &ndash; and eagerly raced into a fitting room.

...(or NOT) Why is there no chocolate in my purse!!!

And so the day ends as it began&hellip;in a dressing room with battling generations.

...Perhaps that&rsquo;s the real lesson for our daughters: There will always be fitting rooms and endless choices....  But we must be able to love and respect that person in the mirror &ndash; our clothing choices should help us feel our best, our most confidant, our most powerful.

...Here&rsquo;s to the beauty of spring and the beauty of strong women.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>Miley, Miley, Miley or Bad Advice and Vanity Fair Have Done You Wrong</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Jacquie says</category><dc:date>2008-04-30T23:16:47-04:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/miley-miley-miley.php#unique-entry-id-53</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/miley-miley-miley.php#unique-entry-id-53</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[As a fan of Miley Cyrus I have been rooting for the young Tennessean.  My prayers to the Goddesses have issued forth offering hope that her father, Billy Ray Cyrus -- with lots of Hollywood, Nashville and music experience under his big belt buckle -- would guide her.

...No one wants to see another child star turned train wreck and with her great smile and husky voice, there was great hope for this particular child.

...Maybe it would give her the bit of extra strength she needed to not succumb to the whole &ldquo;I make a million dollars a week&rdquo; fame debacle.

...Attending the Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus &ldquo;Best of Both Worlds&rdquo; 3-D movie, I was awed by the marketing brilliance and the deft division of the young star from her &ldquo;Disney&rdquo; persona allowing her to emerge and be recognized not as Hannah, but as Miley.

...A chance for Miley to shine her star as a young performer, instead of a young Dinsey performer.

...A look she has been capitalizing on since her early days shooting personas such as Mick Jagger and Iggy Pop.

...However they were adults and their inner soul exposed was one plagued by the drug and sexual addictions that came with the &ldquo;rock n&rsquo; roll&rdquo; lifestyle.

Ms. Leibovitch&rsquo;s subject for this session however is a child and the inner soul exposed is her emerging sexuality as a young woman.

However, Miley does not need Vanity Fair, or Ms. Leibovitch or stylist Michael Roberts to out her sexuality at fifteen.  I don&rsquo;t care how much money she makes, or how savvy she seems to be she is still fifteen.

In the photo Ms. Leibovitch, or actually her stylist Michael Roberts, has positioned Ms. Cyrus, a very young girl, as though just awoke, hair tousled, lips swollen, classic come-hither look and obviously very naked beneath the satin sheet.

Vanity Fair is hiding behind the fact that Ms. Cyrus has stated &ldquo;No, I mean I had a big blanket on. And I thought, this looks pretty, and really natural.

...For a fifteen-year old girl, yes she probably does like her &ldquo;grown-up&rdquo; look in the photo....  And as no one else seems to have your naked back Miley, let me make it clear.

...The exposure that makes the young singer so very white, fresh, clean against the darkness of her hair and intensity of her eyes.

I know sense and sensibilities being what they are in Hollywood, people there look at things differently.

...Just let me say that you should be beyond exploitation of children and women by now.

Billy Ray Cyrus please tell us you didn&rsquo;t approve this photo of your little girl.

For whatever it may be worth, when I asked my son, who is eight, what he thought of the photo he said: &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t like it.&rdquo;

I asked, isn&rsquo;t she pretty, and he said: &ldquo;No.&rdquo;

I said isn&rsquo;t she sexy (yes, 8 year old children understand sexy pictures, even if they don&rsquo;t completely understand sex) and he said: &ldquo;No, she is creepy looking.&rdquo;

Before leaving he stated &ldquo;twenty-eight year old girl should look like that, not a fifteen year old girl.&rdquo;

...What I don&rsquo;t understand is why all those people looking out for &ldquo;Miley&rdquo; could not plainly see what an 8 year old could?]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>An Earth Day Birthday!</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Paxton says</category><dc:date>2008-04-26T15:14:10-04:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/earth-day-birthday.php#unique-entry-id-52</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/earth-day-birthday.php#unique-entry-id-52</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[Earth Day began 38 years ago, as a series of grassroot &ldquo;teach-ins&rdquo; about conservation and pollution.  It&rsquo;s a time to re-dedicate ourselves to honoring, protecting and preserving the earth that nourishes us. It&rsquo;s also my birthday (I&rsquo;m a wee bit older than Earth Day) and I always enjoy sharing my special day with Mother Earth!

I&rsquo;ve evolved into something of an Earth mother, myself &ndash; and become more so every year.  And yet, despite all the changes in my life, there are constants that remain as strong and reliable as Gibraltar itself....  We all change and grow &ndash; yet our love and commitment to each other, and to each other&rsquo;s dreams, remains unscathed.

The other constant of my life &ndash; and probably yours &ndash; are girlfriends.  Through the years and the decades my girlfriends have been there offering chocolate, wine, advice and unwavering support.  Actually, there&rsquo;s a male friend that has stood the test of time as well.  I received a birthday email from him this morning &ndash; almost three decades removed from his first birthday card to me.  We don&rsquo;t actually have much in common anymore, but we&rsquo;re both too stubborn to abandon a friendship.

...But it&rsquo;s the girlfriends that have shared my long and twisted journey from insecure preacher&rsquo;s kid to outspoken earth mother and advocate.  From the long maiden years, searching through the mountains of frogs in search of my prince to the even longer motherhood years trying to navigate the endless sanity-challenged days, girlfriends lend encouragement, sympathy, direction and unconditional love and support to our neediest moments....  Who else would drive three hours to your (it&rsquo;s about freakin&rsquo; time!)

...My girlfriends are the jewels of my life, each one treasured for her unique talents and viewpoints.  There are several I don&rsquo;t speak to often anymore &ndash; but the love remains &ndash; and the friendship is as dear and sacred as in days of yore.

My girlfriends welcomed me to the married world, and again to the motherhood domain.  And now I&rsquo;m being welcomed to the crone years.  (yup &ndash; a girlfriend emailed me today, telling me the crone years were pretty good, though the wisdom was gained through tears.  She also sent a you-tube clip reminding me of a past mistake in the &ldquo;Are you my prince&rdquo; game.  She&rsquo;s one of those who&rsquo;ll be getting a plaque that says &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll always be friends.

...I don&rsquo;t think I&rsquo;m quite ready for the crone role yet....  Instead, I prefer to say I&rsquo;m in the Dancing Womyn stage of my life.  My powers are unfurled, and it&rsquo;s my time to change the world.

...<div class="js-kit-comments" path="http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/earth-day-birthday.php"></div>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>Tattoos In Sports&#xD;</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Lisa says</category><dc:date>2008-04-26T14:56:02-04:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/tattoos-in-sports.php#unique-entry-id-51</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/tattoos-in-sports.php#unique-entry-id-51</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[(Read, &ldquo;Until I Find You,&rdquo; by John Irving, not only because I adore everything by John Irving, but also because it&rsquo;s an interesting look at tattoo artists and people who get tattoos and the ultimate tattoo-ees, those with full-body tattoos).

Whenever I see someone with a tattoo, I wonder what motivated him/her to get the Tasmanian Devil or a girlfriends initials or a Picasso painting eternally etched on their skin.  I wonder whether they still like it, whether they think about having it removed, whether they want another one, whether they wonder how it impacts other people&rsquo;s views of them.

...I have had it for 13 years, so it&rsquo;s not lust for a new thing, it&rsquo;s the real, long term adoration.

...It&rsquo;s very interesting to me that some sports &ndash; basketball, for example &ndash; have a lot of ink, whereas other sports &ndash; baseball, for example &ndash; are much more ink-free.  Obviously, there are exceptions, but as a rule, it seems to me some sports are much more ink heavy, both in terms of the number of players with tattoos and the number of tattoos per player, than others.

...If you are not a basketball fan, you might not be aware of how much ink there is on the court at any time, but I urge you to turn on a game for the sheer interest of the tattoo study.

When I started doing research for this blog, I found out there is actually a book called, "In the Paint: Tattoos of the NBA and the Stories Behind Them."...  The ESPN story on the book notes, &ldquo;Body art dominates the NBA, and for many players, their number of tattoos is higher than their nightly scoring average.&rdquo;

...I think Rasheed Wallace has one of the most impressive tattoos in basketball It seems that most basketball players have tattoos, and they aren&rsquo;t at all hesitant to add more.

...At first, I thought football players were not big on tattoos, but after a closer look, I was wrong.  Football players also are big on tattoos, although they don&rsquo;t seem to be as covered with them as basketball players.

...It seems to me, defensive players seem to be heavier on the ink than offensive players, but I haven&rsquo;t done extensive research on that yet.  I do know quarterbacks don&rsquo;t seem to have tattoos, at least none you can see.

...I get the feeling that baseball managers, owners, and fans, are just less ok with tattoos than fans for basketball and football, because even baseball players who have tattoos don&rsquo;t flaunt them as happily as basketball players or football players.  In fact, in 2004, Major League Baseball required relief pitcher Justin Miller to wear long sleeves when he pitches because, they said, his tattoos are a distraction to the opposing batters.

...American soccer players seem to have very little ink, with the exception of a little tribal art they probably got in college.  I&rsquo;m a soccer fan, so you would think I could name off a bunch of soccer tattoos, but off hand the only one I can think of is Natasha Kai....  After some research, I came up with the fact that Landon Donovan has a hummingbird tattooed on the inside of his wrist.

...When I was telling my son about this blog, specifically about football players and wondering why it seems like defensive players have more ink than offensive players, he said, &ldquo;Offensive players aren&rsquo;t supposed to look as tough.&rdquo;

...Actually, as I re-read this and think about it, I think it&rsquo;s probably much more basic....  I think maybe tattoos still are more acceptable in less wealthy socio-economic circles, and I think maybe kids who start out in poor neighborhoods and fight and become professional athletes are more likely to get tattoos than are professional athletes who come from wealthier backgrounds.

...Because they don&rsquo;t have to go to job interviews where they will be turned down because of a tattoo.  Maybe athletes in basketball and football are more likely to get tattoos because the culture of the sport allows, maybe even encourages, it, whereas other sports frown on it or even forbid it.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>Craigs Life</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Terre says</category><dc:date>2008-04-21T21:59:16-04:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/craigs-life.php#unique-entry-id-50</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/craigs-life.php#unique-entry-id-50</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[What do a newly divorced artist with a rare genetic disease, an elderly woman who plans to live in a berm house in Florida after her home of 40 years is plowed down and a woman with big game trophies in her basement have in common?

They are all the people behind the products you can find online on Craigslist.

For those of you unfamiliar with Craigslist (sic) (www.Craigslist.org), it is an online classified site where one can find everything from a kitchen sink or fish aquarium to a new job or even a soul mate.

For me it has become an obsession (for the record, I&rsquo;m not looking for a soul mate).

Instead, I&rsquo;m in the process of buying a new house that&rsquo;s going to need a lot of work.  With a limited budget for fixing up things I turned to Craigslist to see what was available.  I was surprised to find people selling or giving away great stuff.

I have found light fixtures and ceramic tiles as well as garden tools and paint.  Most importantly I have found a wealth of incredibly interesting people.  With my propensity for talking to almost anyone, Craigslist has given me a whole new audience.

Some of you may be familiar with Ira Glass, the creator of the syndicated radio (and now TV) show This American Life.  His show offers up some of the most fascinating and sometimes bizarre stories about people and their lives.  When asked in an interview why people told him personal stories, Ira responded, &ldquo;A little curiosity goes a long way.&rdquo;

I have found this to be true with my Craigslist encounters as well.  I have been surprised how open, with just a little interest, perfect strangers can be about their lives....  I have been privy to some of the most poignant stories.  Stories that include a life threatening illness that has caused a woman in her 40&rsquo;s to endure 41 operations and 3 heart attacks, a woman whose son committed suicide, and another woman who has finally found the courage to leave her abusive spouse of 20 years.

And yet another feminine soul who is lovingly digging up her beloved plants to find them new homes before her house is plowed down.

I merely arrived at their doorstep to buy their tools, plants, sinks, etc. Little did I realize how much I would come away with.

Indeed, a little curiosity does go a long way.  I have stayed in touch with a few of these people, emailing periodically to see how things are going.  I hope as my quest for attic fans and garden tools leads to me to new encounters I will have the opportunity to introduce you to some of the new people I meet along the way.

My experiences have reminded me the world is full of pain and sadness, joy and laughter.

Because I have taken a little time to listen and share an empathetic moment with someone else I have been reminded, too, what a truly blessed life I have.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>Petty Fears</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Jacquie says</category><dc:date>2008-04-15T23:11:01-04:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/petty-fears.php#unique-entry-id-49</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/petty-fears.php#unique-entry-id-49</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[All my life I have had three defined fears &ndash; small spaces, tunnels and bridges.  There is an odd feeling that comes over me when I begin to drive over a long expense, into a tunnel, onto an elevator or I need to reach a great height.

Standing on the roof of our house, three stories high in the back, is enough to literally cause me to quake in my boots.

My fears do not stop me from slowly crawling up the ladder to lie on the roof and gaze at the stars, stand next to the Grand Canyons edge or traverse that bridge to get to the other side.

...I clutch the steering wheel until my knuckles are white or my legs can barely hold me up.

...This last week, returning home from a wonderful two-day jaunt to Chestertown, Maryland we approached the Chesapeake Bay Bridge (http://www.cbbt.com/), a magnificent 4.3-mile expanse that connects Maryland&rsquo;s Eastern and Western shore.

One the way out and over the bridge, I hesitated ever so slightly and said, as I always do &ldquo; I hate bridges&rdquo; as I started moving up the ramp.

...I love how they stand as this solid solution to the problem of &ldquo;how will we get across&rdquo; and are amazed at how people drive over them, without even seeing them.

A few of my favorite include the Delaware Memorial Bridge; the World&rsquo;s longest twin suspension bridge wears a lovely green patina....  Her twin towers, from which her massive decks hang, soar to the sky and are truly beautiful against a bright blue sky.

I adore the bridges the cross the Chicago River at Michigan Avenue connecting the Loop and the Near North Side community areas.  This double leaf, double deck, fixed counterweight, trunnion design bascule, or Chicago Style Bascule bridge, dates back to the 1920s as is a part of Daniel Burnham&rsquo;s 1909 Plan of Chicago.

...What makes this bridge so remarkable is that it can be raised to allow tall shifts to pass beneath and it is a remarkable site to see this 3,750 ton bridge raise and lower.  At both ends of the bridge are massive square towers, adorned with friezes entitled &ldquo;Tablets to Pioneers&rdquo; that are these permanent reminders that Chicago was a frontier town.  The works are the art of Wheeler Williams, a Chicago born sculptor whose monument work can be seen around the United States, from Washington, D.C. Environmental Protection Agency building pediment to the &ldquo;Fountain of the Water Babies&rdquo; at Children&rsquo;s Hospital in Seattle, Washington

...At 2.12 miles long, one of its more remarkable features are the 34&rdquo; high barrier railings that are engineered to keep cars on the bridge, while allowing for an unobstructed view the edge of its 200 feet height.

...The San Diego Bay Bridge has earned the Most Beautiful Bridge Award of Merit from the American Institute of Steel.  However, I just need to close my eyes and think for a moment and I distinctly remember the feeling that I was never, ever going to reach the other side of that bridge.

...And, if memory serves me right, this is the only bridge ever encountered I would not drive back across.

...After two wonderful days with a friend, Carol and her son, Adam, we were all tired and anxious to get home.  Its not a long drive and we were all arguing over who had seen the most Mini Coopers (I was up to 11 or so, which angered the young boys &ndash; but then I had the best view) when I looked out and realized we were about half way across the bridge.

...My friend asked if I was ok, and I said yes, I am just too tired for petty fears.

...I think the best gift might be the understanding that the emotional stress is not worth much of anything.

...Which is maybe why women, as they become older, are often called fearless, self-reliant or described as having &ldquo;found themselves.&rdquo;]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>The Snake Whisperer</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Paxton says</category><dc:date>2008-04-13T16:41:03-04:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/snake-whisperer.php#unique-entry-id-48</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/snake-whisperer.php#unique-entry-id-48</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[You know you&rsquo;ve adapted to life in the country when you step off of your back porch and onto a small snake &ndash; and your heart continues to beat!  In fact, after the initial gasp of surprise, you turn it into a learning experience and call the kids out to see &ndash; then carry the snake out to the field, in the hopes that the rye grass will protect the poor baby from predators!

...It all began when I was ten &ndash; and a boy in our church brought me a small milk snake as a pet....  Of course, my father was a minister and was in an Adboard meeting with a roomful of nicely dressed church folks.

...We lovingly referred to her suburban home as &ldquo;Hell House&rdquo; &ndash; and never was an abode more aptly named.  For two years we shared such travesties as exterior doors that refused to open &ndash; simultaneously (try explaining THAT to your boss), electrical fires, deranged squirrels, cats in the walls, a raining lamp, flooded basement &ndash; and bombardier snake.

...My friend and I were returning home after a strenuous day of bargain hunting; she went to the clothesline and I went to the back door....  I ducked and screamed as a snake fell from overtop the door, caught itself on the metal railing - then raised its head and flicked its tongue at me!

To this day, my girlfriend swears I saved her life, &ldquo;Because if the snake had fallen on ME &ndash; I&rsquo;d have dropped dead from a heart attack!&rdquo;  She lived in the house another 10 years or so &ndash; and NEVER did either of us enter the house without first stepping back and looking up (and try explaining THAT to strangers!).

When we first moved to our home in the country we piled boxes of belongings in the front room until we had done necessary repairs.  One day my four-year old daughter came through the front hall and started screaming &ndash; the bad kind of scream that makes your heart clench and your hand start dialing 911.  I ran to her &ndash; and almost collided with a large black snake winding its way through my hallway.  The snake &ndash; not liking the loud noise - was trying to hide by going under the door to the front room which we had filled with our boxes.

...I knew that if the snake got into the front room we would A) never find it and B) my husband would torch the house.  Without thinking (and while screaming) I grabbed the snake by the tail and yanked it back from the door, dropping it when it turned to strike me.  Several times this comedy of terror continued &ndash; with the snake getting more and more angry &ndash; until I was able to open the front door and swing the snake outside, where it disappeared under the house.  I later found that a trap door in the closet floor was open, making easy access from below.  Of course, once I realized how many mice find their way into a 1900&rsquo;s country house I was wishing I had let the snake live indoors!

...Last year I was somewhat dressed up for a 50th Anniversary party &ndash; hose, black high heels, black sheath dress, etc. As we started to pile in the car I noticed a large black snake by the front tire &ndash; possibly the same snake I had thrown from the house years before....  The snake left the car and slithered right towards me, up on to the porch, then circling around my foot and going through my high heeled shoe!  It paused &ndash; just for a moment &ndash; then disappeared through the porch boards under the house.

...It was a wonderful moment &ndash; but not an incident I would have welcomed in my younger years....  <div class="js-kit-comments" path="http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/snake-whisperer.php"></div>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>Gone to the Birds&#xD;</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Paxton says</category><dc:date>2008-04-07T21:00:06-04:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/gone-to-the-birds.php#unique-entry-id-46</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/gone-to-the-birds.php#unique-entry-id-46</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[There&rsquo;s nothing like taking that first cup of coffee outside into the dewy morn and reveling in the spirited songs of the birds, the low hoot of an owl, and the brightness of daffodils and tulips to make you long for&hellip;.chickens!

...I grew up in mainstream suburbia with the requisite dogs, cats, hamsters and occasional turtle or snake (THAT one didn&rsquo;t stay for long!).

...About five years ago we moved from a bustling suburb of DC to a country town on MD&rsquo;s Eastern Shore &ndash; with an entire 1/3 of an acre to call our own....  Wisely, with three children aged five and younger and two dogs, I suspected I had all the livestock I could handle!

...and although we&rsquo;ve seen snakes in and around our home &ndash; we haven&rsquo;t named them!  My middle child is as animal crazy as my younger self and dreams of horses and goats and chickens &ndash; and more horses!

I&rsquo;ve been considering adding a small flock of laying hens to our backyard for several years now &ndash; but was told I was nuts.  This year the husband and kids have agreed it&rsquo;s a great idea AND I&rsquo;ve found three other intellectually challenged womyn who have agreed to split an order of chickens with me!  The minimum order from most hatcheries is 15-25 &ndash; and that sounds like a LOT of chicken poop!

...However &ndash; the eggs are tinier, needing 3-4 eggs to replace 2 standard eggs AND they are only sold straight run (male & female mixed together)....  I want eggs, I&rsquo;m not willing to cull the males to my freezer, and I&rsquo;m pretty sure my neighbors wouldn&rsquo;t be very excited about several crowing roosters.

...You want the Araucana, a spirited, comical bird named from the Indian tribe of Chile where they were first discovered.  The Speckled Sussex lays warm brown eggs and is known for being gentle with children (my daughter has named her still imaginary Sussex, Brownie).

...Because they lay the most eggs, they are found in most of the commercial chicken houses.

...I&rsquo;m attempting to find the right combination of egg-laying ability and personality to stock my backyard flock.  Many breeds are skittish or aggressive &ndash; and I want these critters to follow my kids around when given the opportunity!

...Today&rsquo;s backyard farmers are all about the chicken tractor &ndash; a movable chicken coop and run.  By relocating the run every few days (depending on the number of birds) your birds keep your lawn picked free of bugs and weeds, and add their nitrogen rich &ldquo;compost&rdquo; to your lawn!...  Larger farms may use an actual tractor to haul them around, but the backyard farmer usually can roll his smaller contraption without too much hassle.  Most designs include an attached run which may be completely enclosed, totally protecting your birds from predators.  A friend uses a movable electric fence around her small coop, which effectively keeps all land predators at bay, although her birds are still at risk to airborne attacks.  (she doesn&rsquo;t want to end up with a flock of geriatric non-laying pets, so the process of natural elimination works for her!)

...Apparently Native Americans would coat their bodies with bear grease &ndash; which would insulate them against harsh weather AND protect them from mosquitoes!  I&rsquo;m a little low on bear grease &ndash; but I have some Crisco in the back of a cabinet &ndash; and I&rsquo;m NOT afraid to try it!]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>Four Great Books</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Lisa says</category><dc:date>2008-03-24T21:32:08-04:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/four-great-books.php#unique-entry-id-43</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/four-great-books.php#unique-entry-id-43</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[I wanted to stay with Elizabeth Gilbert, who I felt had become my close friend, and keep her close to me.

...The second part of her quest is the "Eat" part of the book, where she goes to Italy and allows herself to explore all sensations.

...The book is an easy, beautiful read, that makes you feel like you travel without leaving your couch, and will help you appreciate yourself a little more.  From the New York Times Book Review by Jennifer Egan, "If a more likable writer than Gilbert is currently in print, I haven't found him or her...Gilbert's prose is fueled by a mix of intelligence, wit and colloquial exuberance that is close to irresistible, and makes the reader only too glad to join the posse of friends and devotees who have the pleasure of listening in."

...Like other John Irving books, Owen Meany talks about friendship and faith and includes several bizarre scenarios that only John Irving could imagine.  I am not someone who laughs out loud when reading books, but I laughed out loud, hard, when I read Owen Meany....  I have read a lot since I first read this, and I still think it is the perfect book.  Irving ties up all loose ends, leaving you completely satisfied after reading the book, as though you've had a really good meal.

...From the New York Times review by Alfred Kazin on March 12, 1989, ''Jesus has always struck me as a perfect victim and a perfect hero,'' said John Irving, explaining the genesis of his seventh novel, ''A Prayer for Owen Meany.''  The story about a freakishly diminutive self-proclaimed prophet and his effect on the religious belief of his lifelong friend represents ''a natural progression'' for Mr. Irving.

From the Salon.com review by Cintra Wilson on 30 September 1996: Owen Meany is simply a great and luminous character, a man whom you wish you knew and hung out with, and the novel is driven by the merits of his palpable soul. This is a book about the interconnectedness of things and the importance of seemingly meaningless details and the yielding nature of true friendship, and how everything plays a part in recognizing a larger force and ultimate plan....  I think this is what all people want from faith -- a feeling that the seemingly senseless indignities of life ultimately serve the higher purpose of educating the soul. Like life, nothing in this book makes any particular sense until later in the book when it all falls gracefully together into a whole that means more than the sum of its parts.

...He wants to SAY something, he wants to infuse his readers with a sense of divine possibility, and he wants to make a bunch of subjective political insights and make us laugh and cry all at the same time, and I appreciate it, even if I don't necessarily regard it as a Great Work of Art. A lot of the book falls prey to Irvingisms: he digs his own pits -- incest, New Hampshire, freak accidents and amputations, untimely death, ironic sexual shame -- and falls into them in nearly every book.

...This is the best book I've read this year (2008), mostly because of the beautiful prose of Mr. Banville....  To cope, he returns to the place where he spent summers during his childhood, and tells the story of one significant summer and his interaction with another family vacationing at the same time.

...Grace, kneeling, a cigarette clamped in a corner of her mouth and one eye shut against the smoke, laid out the picnic things, while her husband, his hat falling further askew, struggled to draw a resistant wine cork....  She is there, in her scarlet shirt and dancing pumps and dancer's tight black pants with the straps that go under the soles of her feet, and her hair black as a crow's wing tied in a plume behind her fine-boned head....  She had not been in the car with us. A bicycle, yes, I see a bicycle asprawl in abandon among the ferns, handlebars turned sideways and its fr ont wheel jutting up at a somehow unseemly angle, a sly prefiguring, as it seems now, of what was to come.

...Too Close to the Falls is a memoir, about a young girl growing up in a small town near Niagara Falls in the 1950s.

...Review from Publishers Weekly: Now a successful clinical psychologist with a monthly advice column in the popular Canadian magazine Chatelaine, Gildiner tells of her childhood in 1950s Lewiston, N.Y., a small town near Niagara Falls, in this hilarious and moving coming-of-age memoir.  Deemed hyperactive by the town's pediatrician, at age four Gildiner was put to work at her father's pharmacy in an effort to harness her energy.  Her stories of delivering prescriptions with her father's black deliveryman, Roy, are the most affecting parts of this book, with young Cathy serving as map reader for the illiterate but streetwise fellow, who acted as both protector and fellow adventurer.  In a style reminiscent of the late Jean Shepherd, Gildiner tells her tales with a sharp humor that rarely misses a beat and underscores the dark side of what at first seems a Norman Rockwell existence....  By book's end, Cathy, too, gets her share, as beloved Roy mysteriously exits and an entanglement with a confused young priest brings her literally and figuratively "too close to the falls."]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>The Garden of Plenty</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Paxton says</category><dc:date>2008-03-24T21:29:55-04:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/the-garden-of-plenty.php#unique-entry-id-42</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/the-garden-of-plenty.php#unique-entry-id-42</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[According to the calendar &ndash; it&rsquo;s Spring!  Unfortunately, I&rsquo;m still hiding under three layers of clothes, sipping hot tea and fervently hoping the woodpile holds out.

...To be honest &ndash; I&rsquo;m not known for my green thumb.  In fact, my darling husband chuckles each year as I purchase seeds, plants, soil and such.  He calls it &ldquo;Our annual sacrifice to the gardening gods&rdquo;.  He does this because, by mid-July, all will be dead.

...I&rsquo;m really more of a &ldquo;black thumb&rdquo; kind of gal.  Still &ndash; I&rsquo;ve had at least two girlfriends who were known to have killed artificial plants....  [I don&rsquo;t actually OWN any artificial plants &ndash; but I&rsquo;m sure I WOULDN&rsquo;T kill them, anyway!]

My point being &ndash; there&rsquo;s hope for me!  And this year &ndash; is MY year to garden!

...This year I dig an actual vegetable garden, start plants from seeds, and grow a wonderful vegetable & flower & herb garden &ndash; and can/freeze/dry the bountiful results!

...I&rsquo;m positive &ndash; THIS is my year.  I have a new affinity with the earth &ndash; I&rsquo;m not trying to force my will on the soil, merely work in its best interest.  I&rsquo;m starting seeds in eggshells, we&rsquo;re building a compost bin [I purchased a worm composting system and worms several years ago &ndash; they&rsquo;re dead, too], and are planning to buy a few chickens, as well!...  [At least &ndash; if I kill the chickens &ndash; it&rsquo;s dinner!]

...This year, I have a plan!

...It&rsquo;s the follow-up, or more accurately, my failure to follow-up, that de-rails me.  The old me, that is.

It&rsquo;s funny &ndash; part of me is laughing at the idealistic fool who lurks inside me, and yet I absolutely believe we do NOT have to repeat old patterns.  If I really want this year to be my year of abundance &ndash; my garden &ndash; and my life &ndash; will indeed overflow.  I simply need to do the small things, everyday.  I need to not get bored, give up, or feel overwhelmed by my choices.

Instead, I will be grateful for the gifts in my garden and in my life.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>Where The Road Ends</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Heather says</category><dc:date>2008-03-22T18:01:10-04:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/where_the_road_ends.php#unique-entry-id-41</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/where_the_road_ends.php#unique-entry-id-41</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[Our destination was Mendoza, which was about a 6-hour drive from Cordoba, which was where we were departing from.

...&ldquo;Yeah he gave me this and told me how to get out of the city,&rdquo; Jon said while handing me a tourist map of the city of Cordoba.

...&ldquo;&rdquo;He told me to follow signs towards Valle De La Paz,&rdquo; Jon said while pointing to a road sign.

I thumbed through my Lonely Planet guide to look at the crude road maps they have printed at the beginning of sectional chapters.

...&ldquo;No, this is fine, it&rsquo;s just a dirt road, not all roads need to be paved,&rdquo; Jon said while giving me a strange smile.

...I looked at the gas gauge, we had a bit over a quarter of a tank, and I took a deep breath and sat back.

&ldquo;Maybe it&rsquo;s this little squiggle on the map, but they wouldn&rsquo;t put a dirt road on a map like this,&rdquo; I said while pointing out a small squiggle in the Lonely Planet map.

...We were an hour into the dirt road drama and turning back was getting further and further out of our grips.

...We pulled over and all got out to pee on the side of the road in the freezing cold wind.

...We had a loaf of bread and some cheese in the car, but neither Jon nor I said anything about eating, we both silently knew we may have to have that loaf of bread for lunch, dinner and maybe breakfast tomorrow, if we didn&rsquo;t get out of the mountains and to a gas station soon.

The gas needle was about to hit the red mark, when we came to a fork in the dirt road.

...We sat for a few minutes, got out of the car and then noticed a word and an arrow spray painted on an abandoned cement hut, [Taningua &rarr;].  Jon scrambled through the pages of our Lonely Planet guide, to the small map of the Sierra Mountains.

...&ldquo;Well, were not really lost we know where we are, but we don&rsquo;t know how far we need to go,&rdquo; I tried to reassure him.

...&ldquo;Oo oh, I see it, here Tala Canada,&rdquo; I showed Jon on my crude map of the desolate mountain pass.  "It looks like we have about the same distance to go as when we passed the fork in the road.&rdquo;

...No cars passed us and the perfection that would come with finding a gas station at the exact right time was something right out of a cheesy movie.

...&ldquo;What if Taningua is just a small village like Tala Canada and there&rsquo;s no gas there either?&rdquo;

...We had absolutely no intentions of driving through the mountains on a dirt road or even driving through on a paved road.  We were supposed to be on the RN 20 to the RN 7, which bypassed the mountains all together, and would have gotten us to Mendoza in 7 to 8 hours.

...&ldquo;Well there she is Taningua,&rdquo; I said motioning to Jon with my eyes, that this was our last hope.

...We loaded back into the car and with a great weight lifted from the pits of our stomachs we remembered that we were hungry.  I grabbed the loaf of bread and cheese and made some sandwiches, it wasn&rsquo;t much but it hit the spot....  I looked up the names of the places in my guidebook and found nothing but a small paragraph giving mention to the fact that they existed.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>I am old</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Jacquie says</category><dc:date>2008-03-15T19:38:34-04:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/080315_jacquie.php#unique-entry-id-40</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/080315_jacquie.php#unique-entry-id-40</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[Well, I did get my AARP card the other day, but that is another stream of consciousness to share with you at another time.

...My mother told me just today that it is OK to be in a box.

...I think, because she is intelligent, creative that maybe if she let herself out of the boxes created by society and family; the boxes designed by those that say &ldquo;this is what YOU should do,&rdquo; she would have had a very different life.

...But I am not a fan of right angles, square rooms, or furniture without shape.

...One that gets to the point, but in a way that is clever, or that is just damn good looking.

...Hardly a day goes by that I don&rsquo;t have what I think is a great idea for an ad campaign.

...Then there is the Internet and the art of branding &ndash; of advertising &ndash; which has completely changed.

...They are boxy, boring and the brand flavor is lost to just the word....  It&rsquo;s those folks and their damn boxes that are saying it has changed.

...And here, in Internet world, the rule I keep reading is to keep it brief.

...I actually read that if a word has the suffix &ldquo;ly&rdquo; on it, it should probably be deleted.

...The cost, the environmental impact, which is absolutely none as we do everything electronically and the challenge.

...As Donne grows, and as she gets more and more beautiful everyday (thank you Joe!)  I am impressed on how pretty the Internet can be used as a medium.  That there can be well designed graphics, pages that are more than a bunch of boxes and rectangles.

...But it takes a lot of time to get her that way.  Poor Joe is stuck in his box &ndash; though he has a great window that looks out over the trees and sky.  I like to think his creative mind is free of the boxes.

...You can&rsquo;t do that with a box.

Now reading about how all these &ldquo;young&rdquo; folks are using the Internet to brand themselves.

...I think Donne Tempo is beautiful and I like that she doesn&rsquo;t have massive amounts of square little boxes that scream, &ldquo;click me.&rdquo;

We want you to stick around, read about where we have been, are going, or want to go.

And the point of this is that I will stick to what I know....  I will create a publication that is graphically beautiful, meaningful and that readers can look forward to reading, and coming back and rereading, time and time again.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>Girls, Girls, Girls</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Lisa says</category><dc:date>2008-03-15T19:23:59-04:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/080315_lisa.php#unique-entry-id-39</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/080315_lisa.php#unique-entry-id-39</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[To mark International Women's Day (a holiday I didn't even know about until my friend Jacquie told me about it) I decided to write about girls.  Something that has been on my mind for a very long time is the question of why it is that despite tremendous strides in women's rights and opportunities, women often continue to have lower self esteem than men, continue to tend to pursue lower-paying jobs involving less risk, feel anxiety about appearance, back off from conflict and extreme competition, and worry ourselves to death over not doing things as well as we should.

...I'm not a scientist, and although I find information on brain chemistry, DNA, and other physical differences fascinating, I so far have not performed any of my own studies and &ndash; quite frankly &ndash; am not all that well informed about the results of studies other people have performed.

I am a pretty keen observer, though, and I do see many, many ways our society reinforces female stereotypes, many of which seem to undercut self-esteem in our girls and women.

...For those of you unfamiliar with travel soccer, this is the competitive program for the kids who are more advanced than recreational players.  By U-14, most of the girls who play on the travel teams are very good athletes and have relatively extensive soccer experience....  At the end of every practice, I asked each girl to tell me one thing they did well at practice that night....  One girl even asked if she could run laps instead of trying to think of something she did well and then say it in front of the other players.

...At the end of practice, I told the boys that before I would release them, they each had to come up with one thing they did well that night at practice....  They talked over each other listing their wonderful skills and accomplishments, trying to top each other with their soccer prowess, and insisting on having more than one turn to talk.

...Every year, I ask the kids in my son's class what they are going to be for Halloween.

...That's about my favorite costume ever&hellip;but as a whole, we girls go for the pretty fluff rather than the interesting or exciting or creative.

...For those of you unfamiliar with Tranformers, they are often very difficult puzzles that transform (hence the name) from a car or helicopter into a robot....  More than one of our Tranformers "mysteriously" ended up in the trash while my son was at school because my efforts at transforming it had maimed the poor thing into a mutant.

...My son eventually gave up on playing it with me because I could never remember the special ability or who trumped what card, and I admit I even sometimes sank to making things up because it was all too confusing to follow.

...They also somehow learn they are important because parents schlep them to practices and games and back again (I'll save my lecture on over-jealous sports parents for another time).

...My son plays several sports, with other boys, and there are many boys on the teams who have sisters who "don't play sports."  Parents tell me the girls "don't like it" or "don't want to" and parents seem far more willing to accept that answer from girls than from boys.

...I know from my own experience that there is a huge drop in the number of girl's sports teams when they reach 11 years old....  Sports not only helps girls feel they have a "place" and gives them something positive to do in their spare time, it also exposes them to exercise and helps them develop a positive, healthy body image.

...Are women suffering from poor self esteem because we didn't get to play Yu Gi Oh and got dolls for our birthdays?...  I do know there is a strong trend in this country, still, for women to suffer from poor self image, to stay in bad relationships because they somehow believe they deserve them, to toil at unchallenging jobs just for a paycheck because we somehow believe it's the best we can do, and to suffer from incredible guilt that we somehow are not good enough.

...I really don't know the answers, but when I look at young girls and how they behave, I believe we are somehow doing something wrong.  Somehow, we aren't getting the message to our girls that they really can be anything they want to be, and that whoever they are, they are wonderful.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>A Hard Day’s Night, Part Two: The Home Front&#xD;</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Paxton says</category><dc:date>2008-03-15T00:31:03-04:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/080315_paxton.php#unique-entry-id-38</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/080315_paxton.php#unique-entry-id-38</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[Donna Reed, Carol Brady, June Cleaver and my mother had something in common &ndash; immaculate homes.

...To get good grades, which would allow me to go to college, get a good job, and hire others to do the nasty work of cooking and cleaning.

...And then I realized that I preferred being home, raising and educating my children.

...I knew that it required yelling and blaming &ndash; but no clue how to actually do the work....  But my husband&rsquo;s ability to turn a blind eye to the mess outweighed even my own.  The mess really didn&rsquo;t bother him &ndash; but it did bother me.

...I&rsquo;d clean for hours or days, yelling about the mess, the work, and the ingratitude of those around me, then collapse into a heap, mumbling incoherently.  By the time I regained consciousness, the house was a mess again....  I had been destined for greater things &ndash; and yet here I was &ndash; scrubbing a disgusting toilet.

...It finally occurred to me (I&rsquo;m not always that bright) that keeping the house maintained was my JOB, a job I elected to take on when I decided my children needed me more than the business world.  I also knew the first thing I needed to work on was my attitude.

I was angry and stressed when I cleaned &ndash; much like my mother on her jeremiad.

...I tried journaling my outrage &ndash; but this actually fed the monster by giving it words and a place to flourish.  I can&rsquo;t grow flowers or vegetables on a bet &ndash; but hate and fury &ndash; I can grow that!!!

...I wasn&rsquo;t ready to actually clean &ndash; her routines left me breathless &ndash; but I absorbed her gentle and guilt free philosophy....  There was also something about &ldquo;taking a lick at a snake with a stick STILL blesses your family!&rdquo;

...I found Shelter for the Spirit: Create Your Own Haven in a Hectic World by Victoria Moran.  My copy is now dog-eared and stained &ndash; I re-read her words at least annually....  Rather than wrinkling my nose at strong cleansers, I deeply breathe in their gentle fragrance and feel &ndash; peaceful.

...Flylady now has almost 500,000 members in her yahoo group &ndash; womyn striving to organize and maintain their home and finances.

It&rsquo;s as if, en masse, when the world shifted and womyn no longer HAD to be at home with the children, we lost generations of homemaking skills &ndash; almost instantly!

...No, we DON&rsquo;T have to spend six hours a day dusting and scrubbing, but we need to spend a few minutes a day doing it.  And, more importantly, we need to teach our children &ndash; girls AND boys &ndash; that home maintenance is as simple and automatic as brushing your teeth before bed.

...We honor and care for our bodies, We honor and care for our homes, We honor and care for our earth.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>It’s Been a Hard Day’s Night – Part One – Food</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Paxton says</category><dc:date>2008-03-01T20:56:02-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/080301_paxton.php#unique-entry-id-37</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/080301_paxton.php#unique-entry-id-37</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[Our womyn is responsible for the food eaten by herself and her family....  She might go to several stores, trying to find the best deals on the food her family eats.  If she&rsquo;s focusing on the safety and nutritional value of the food she buys, she may go to several specialty stores, a farmers market, an Amish marketplace or the butcher.  She may even partake in a community food cooperative, buying in bulk, to buy organic foods more reasonably.  She may worry about pesticides, growth hormones, calories and omega3&rsquo;s &ndash; all before her morning cup of coffee!

...Will the food entice her family, fill their nutritional demands, and satisfy her own food demons?  Perhaps she&rsquo;ll start baking her own bread and bagels, making her own granola, and even grinding her own wheat!  Don&rsquo;t laugh &ndash; more and more womyn are returning to basics, finding peace in the routines of their great-grandmothers.

...My children are pale, with dark circles under their eyes, and only eat chicken nuggets and goldfish crackers.

...It was a horrendous chore at first &ndash; and the food left MUCH to be desired....  My husband growled for his cheese burgers, my children whined for their packaged cardboard &ndash; and all were mad at ME!

...Today my family eats MUCH almost anything &ndash; they trust me to make it tasty.  We&rsquo;re working on increasing whole grains & vegetables, as well as using organic products as far as our budget allows.  Part of our problem with our limited food budget is our feelings of denial &ndash; we want to be indulged.

...It wasn&rsquo;t nearly as horrendous as I had anticipated &ndash; and the bagels were delicious (though they did seem lumpy to me)....  I also made bread a few times &ndash; but haven&rsquo;t found the best recipe, yet.

...For breakfast I&rsquo;ve been making steel cut oats &ndash; and serving them with butterscotch chips, or cracked grains served with plain yogurt and honey.

...Best of all &ndash; I feel nurtured, healthy and loved &ndash; and so does my family.  These real foods satisfy a yearning of my body and soul that the fast foods and restaurant fixes never quite touched....  I take the leftovers and store them in individual containers for my husband to take for lunch, and for me to munch on during a stress-filled day....  Of course, I obsess over recipes, and grocery deals, and coupons, and recently about storing flour (the prices are supposed to explode), or even buying a mill and grain and milling my own flour.

...Also, to be quite honest, I have to go clean up the kitchen and wash the dishes from the day, so I can make dinner.

...I still have a LONG way to go &ndash; I&rsquo;m still very &lsquo;hit or miss&rsquo; with nutrition....  Maybe our grandmothers and their grandmothers were on to something &ndash; love, health and peace all begin at home &ndash; and they start in the kitchen.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>Terrific Toyfair… &#xD;Terrific Toyfair … </title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Jacquie says</category><dc:date>2008-03-01T20:50:39-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/86bed471f73eef7ebb63b636db77573f-36.php#unique-entry-id-36</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/86bed471f73eef7ebb63b636db77573f-36.php#unique-entry-id-36</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[We came home a full day early brimming with knowledge of the new toys, the new waves, the new ideas coming down the proverbial pike that are guaranteed to keep our youngsters educated, entertained and enthusiastic.

...Toy Fair is when toy vendors, the established giants, such as Mattel, to the little guys with a bright new idea, all head to New York City, in February, with hopes of catching the media, and toy buyer&rsquo;s, eye.

...Plus I got a chance to spend some time at the Metropolitan Museum of Art with my son staring at sculptures from the early Egyptians to the Impressionists before heading to the remarkable collection of Impressionist paintings that they have.

...They have some new twists, hypoallergenic dolls that can withstand the rigorous process that a doll must endure before an allergy prone child can love her.  They have lavender scented dolls, dolls that play lullabies and dolls that can help little Sammy or Sally learn to tie a shoelace, button a button or zip a zipper.

...And even though they don&rsquo;t eat, poop in a toilet, coo, gurgle or twist their heads around when the sense movement, they are a perennial favorite of mine.

...Basically there is a set of folks out there that have found teaching potty skills much easier to toddlers when those toddlers have a doll to teach too.

O.K., I had a toddler once and though he potty trained fairly easily and without much fuss on anyone&rsquo;s part, I can see how a doll that can make pee and poop could be helpful.

...She is cute, and doesn&rsquo;t really expel water or other substances, which according to the aforementioned reviews is a good thing.

Butt (pun intended) when you sit her on the potty, she does make a cute little tinkle sound and then a couple of realistic dropping/splashing noises, a comment on the stinky just made and when she stands up, voila, there in the toilet the lovely blue &ldquo;water&rdquo; has changed to an abstract yellow with brown splotches.

...We are big comic book, comic art, animation, manga, movie and anything else that comes from the creativity of comics&rsquo; fans in our house.

But I, along with many other members of the female fan base, have always questioned the sophomoric need to give heroines outlandish, bigger and better than believed attributes.

Some of these girls supported such huge breasts and behinds, they might have floated in water, but they were never going to fly stylishly through the air.

...Yes, they still look better than I ever did, actually better than 99% of the population ever did, but at least they looked realistically proportioned and as though they really could walk, sit and possibly fly through the air with stretching the rules of aerodynamics.

I asked brand manager Jim Fletcher about it and he said that the sculptures we were looking at were based on the actual art of the comic books.

...Some of my favorites, the Elmo Alive, does a great little dance, tells a cute joke&hellip;almost like having a mini-red Martin Short living in the house.

...Still young enough to be entertained by the absurd, Miley Ray Cyrus should spend some significant time laughing as she watches her long-armed look alike do the &ldquo;Bennis&rdquo; dance (aka The Elaine &ldquo;you can&rsquo;t dance&rdquo; Bennis of Seinfeld fame dance.)

At Hasbro, they have a Spider-Man that literally crawls the walls and a &ldquo;hokey-pokey&rdquo; dancing Hulk for little super heroes.

Speaking of comics, I am excited over the fate of the spring movie screen with great new comic inspired films &ndash; The Hulk, Iron Man and even G.I.

...I am always good for a love story and if I can keep my eight-year old son entertained at the same time, so much the better.

...Robert Downey Jr., an actor I have long admired and have wanted to see more of, takes on the heavy mantel of Iron Man as he brings the life and times of Tony Stark to the big screen.

Before you dismiss this as just another super hero, BusinessWeek has Iron Man as one the Smartest Superheroes of all time, alongside a litany of scientific whiz kids and intelligential everyday men, such as Bruce Banner, aka The Hulk, Reed Richards, Mr. Fantastic, Bruce Banner, Batman, Peter Parker, Spider-Man and Charles Xavier, Professor X.

This is a great story that combines regular guys, challenged by irregular circumstances, to make heroic choices, a story line oft repeated by creator Stan Lee (http://www.stanleeweb.com/).

...There were other things that caught my eye and you should watch Donne Tempo for further coverage on the Green Movement in toys, Mattel&rsquo;s Barbie now supports a &ldquo;Wear Pink, Think Green&rdquo; message as well as interviews with some dynamic women from the Toy industry, including Bandai Brand Manager Colleen Sherefy and Bette Holtzberger from the aforementioned Goldberger Toys who will be joining us in a new feature, Nurturing our Natural Natures, we plan to launch in the near future.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>Every Day Is A New Day</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Terre says</category><dc:date>2008-03-01T16:10:19-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/080301_terre.php#unique-entry-id-34</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/080301_terre.php#unique-entry-id-34</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[A few years ago as my daughter went screaming into the adolescent years, with it&rsquo;s dramas and tears, I adopted the mantra &rdquo;everyday is a new day&rdquo;.  It has proved invaluable as a sanity saver and a reality grounding meditation.

For those of you with teens I imagine you are familiar with the mood swings, bad decisions and general selfish behavior.  That once darling child has somehow morphed into the spawn of Satan.  When and how could this have happened?  There are days when I think the Greeks may have been onto something when they bound infants&rsquo; feet together and left them out on a hillside.

Gee, if parents knew what was coming we may have considered that option a little more seriously when these teens were infants.  But somewhere between the door slamming, screaming, tears and gnashing of teeth are moments of sweetness- the notes that say &ldquo;I love you&rdquo;, the occasional batch of cookies waiting when I get home, snuggling on the sofa watching a movie, even some of the long overdue chores done without asking.

Not surprising, these are often followed up with, &ldquo;mom, can I borrow the car?&rdquo;

My daughter has gone through some tough times in the last few years.  My friends call to ask how things are going and my usual answer is &ldquo;everyday is a new day.&rdquo;  My little mantra is not unlike the one used by most 12 step programs -&ldquo;one day at a time.&rdquo;

I think this reflects the belief that the longest journey begins with one step and I like that.  But I think &ldquo;everyday is a new day&rdquo; feels a little more hopeful.  Sure if you can just get through one lousy day that is a success but I like to think that tomorrow has the potential to be better maybe not a lot but somehow a little better.

So for all of you out there whose lives are less than perfect, who feel emotionally wrung out, stressed beyond belief, for whatever reason, repeat after me-&ldquo;everyday is a new day, everyday is a new day, everyday is a new day&rdquo;.

It may not have you singing &ldquo;The Sun Will Come Out Tomorrow&rdquo; but it may give you a little ray of hope.  <div class="js-kit-comments" path="http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/080301_terre.php"></div>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>The Test</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Paxton says</category><dc:date>2008-02-22T22:38:27-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/080222_paxton.php#unique-entry-id-33</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/080222_paxton.php#unique-entry-id-33</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[It&rsquo;s the Universe&rsquo;s way to determine if we really mean what we say &ndash; if we are actually growing into the person we&rsquo;re supposed to be &ndash; or if it&rsquo;s all lip service.

...I&rsquo;m too aware that I have no way of protecting myself and my children should that stranger be dangerous.

...I was not the one she was searching for, and she didn&rsquo;t know how to reach her friend....  I slid it out the narrow crack in the door &ndash; and did not offer any more help.

...I became increasingly concerned when she did not return with the phone book, nor did her van leave my driveway.  I made sure all the doors were locked, refused to let the dog out into the backyard, and alerted my eldest to call 911 if I gave the order.

...I wasn&rsquo;t willing to leave my children to go check on the womyn, and I was hesitant to call the police....  And if she had been driving drunk &ndash; and I called the police &ndash; did that make me a snitch?

...I finally called my neighbors and explained the situation, and they came right over with a strong flashlight and went to her car. Then they came to my door, and told me to call 911 and request police and an ambulance.

...The womyn said she had driven here from San Diego (her van had California plates) and she really wanted a cigarette.

...During this, different emergency personnel kept asking me questions, and I kept replying, &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know her &ndash;she just showed up!

...Eventually the crowd thinned &ndash; she was the one of the last to leave, in a police car. Apparently they don&rsquo;t take you to the hospital for de-tox.

...I finally returned to my warmer living room and tried to comfort my children, who were scared from all of the activity.

...I gave an obviously drunk womyn a phone book and WANTED HER TO DRIVE AWAY.  I didn&rsquo;t immediately phone the police and ask for assistance &ndash; I waited until another (my neighbor) told me it was all right to do so.  I became a frightened ten year old (I was 10, and home alone, when a strange man pushed his way into our home when I answered the door.

...Because of that fear, I locked myself into my home and did not offer assistance....  Even after my neighbors arrived and I finally felt brave enough to leave my locked home, I never talked with the womyn or offered any kind of comfort.

...A womyn in pain had somehow driven across the country and arrived at my front porch &ndash; and I was laughing with neighbors....  I told them all was fine, and ignored their need &ndash; just as I ignored the need of the stranger on my porch.

...A less terrified person would have offered blankets and hot coffee &ndash; on the porch &ndash; I still don&rsquo;t want to bring a drunk stranger into my children&rsquo;s home.  I should have called the police for assistance, then talked with the womyn.  I should have shown my children an example of a strong womyn helping another in need &ndash; not a terrified child hiding behind the crowd.

...Is it time to face your fears, so that you may grow into the person you always meant to be?]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>Castro's Latest Coup</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Lisa says</category><dc:date>2008-02-20T18:49:38-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/206c72acdd125315ed6092a02bc58786-27.php#unique-entry-id-27</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/206c72acdd125315ed6092a02bc58786-27.php#unique-entry-id-27</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[Fidel Castro announced on Tuesday he was stepping down as President of the Council of State and commander-in-chief after 49 years as the leader of Cuba.

Castro is the longest serving head of state in history, with the exception of monarchs, and while many Americans and Cuban ex-pats detest him, he remains immensely popular with some Cubans and is a legend in the developing world for standing up to the United States.

...But most observers agree &ndash; even if grudgingly &ndash; that Castro has demonstrated incredible stamina and staying power, even when faced with of some of the most daunting and powerful enemies in the world.

The general consensus is that the National Assembly will rubber-stamp Fidel Castro's chosen successor, Raul Castro, as President when it meets on Sunday.  Raul Castro, Fidel's 76-year-old younger brother, was named acting president on 31 July 2006 after Fidel underwent emergency surgery, and has been ruling the country ever since.

...Although Raul Castro has shown slivers of democratic leanings, such as allowing &ndash; some even say "promoting" &ndash; discussion about problems with the state-run economy, he has fallen significantly short of advocating real change.  Some critics have noted that in any other system, Raul Castro would be considered a dictator, but when compared to Fidel, he looks "democratic."

Moreover, Raul Castro has so far lacked any will to stand up to Fidel Castro or to counter any direct policy set by Fidel.  He also appears to lack the power base necessary to implement major change, even if he was inclined to do so.

Despite stepping down as President, Fidel Castro will remain powerful, and is likely to retain a kind of veto power.  He still holds the position of first secretary of the Communist Party &ndash; the only party in Cuba &ndash; and his legacy gives him the single strongest voice in Cuba, if he chooses to use it.

In his resignation, Fidel Castro hinted at his continued involvement in Cuban politics, and reminded observers of both the staying power of his revolution and the system he has put into place.

In his statement, he said, "Fortunately, our Revolution can still count on cadres from the old guard and others who were very young in the early stages of the process," He also said he will continue to write his newspaper columns.

...The US government and US media have spent countless hours speculating on "Cuba After Castro," examining scenarios and preparing for mass chaos, power vacuums, the return of the Miami Cubans, influx of investors, and violence.

...If anything, the question is what about Cuba after the fall of this government&hellip;and how long, exactly, can the system last without the leader who put it into place?

...The Cuba after the National Assembly vote on Monday will be very much like the Cuba of today&hellip;and yesterday.

...In Havana, many people were somewhat sad about Fidel's retirement, but most agreed it was the right decision because of his poor health.

...It seemed that most Cubans believe the system will work the same as it has for 49 years; the same way it has worked for the last 19 months without Fidel Castro officially in power.

...Fidel's opponents now seem focused on his death, hoping that the true end of Fidel will bring change in Cuba.

The fact is that, for now, Fidel Castro's resignation has very little impact on Cuba.  The system is likely to remain a one-party state, with curbed freedoms, closely resembling the system that is in place today&hellip;a government that Fidel has not officially headed for more than a year.

...They hope that the official designation of Raul Castro as head of government may provide the US with an opportunity to lift the embargo, increasing tourism and allowing exports of cigars and nickel.

...In many ways, Castro spearheaded another coup today, ending his official power without ending the system he put into place.

Contrary to most speculation, he did not leave in a flurry of violent unrest, or create a power vacuum, or open the way for major democratic reform.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>Valentine Wishes</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Paxton says</category><dc:date>2008-02-09T16:37:00-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/75e8dd0132401d8c541d92c61abc08e2-26.php#unique-entry-id-26</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/75e8dd0132401d8c541d92c61abc08e2-26.php#unique-entry-id-26</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[Valentine&rsquo;s Day and I have a strange history.  I was single &ndash; and alone &ndash; for a long, long. LONG time....  The lines of goofy-looking males lined up to purchase a cheesy pink bear and a single rose at the 7-11 always had me rolling my eyes in caustic humor.  Deeper was the feeling that these womyn had something I didn&rsquo;t, that they inspired such &ndash; devotion &ndash; from their mates.

...We did dinner and hand-written poems for our first Valentine&rsquo;s Day....  When we do give gifts, we try to tailor them to the other&rsquo;s personal growth and current interests.  Since we&rsquo;re rather &ldquo;way off main&rdquo; (no tv!), this can be challenging.

I, for example, would swoon over The Healing Drum Kit on Isabella&rsquo;s website.  The kit includes a drum, instructional book, and cd&rsquo;s.  Since I&rsquo;m attempting to learn the art of drumming - it sounds perfect....  Just going through their catalog is a spiritual experience &ndash; I&rsquo;m always sending friends their way.

GaelSong is another of my favorite places, and I&rsquo;ve always been thrilled with their offerings.  I have a very, very long wish list at this eclectic store &ndash; just wait until I sell my book!  One of my favorites is their Druid&rsquo;s Oak handbag &ndash; the detail is absolutely amazing!

And&hellip;since I&rsquo;m on a roll of my favorite places&hellip;I must mention Femail Creations.  They have many wonderful products, but I prefer the inspirational art &ndash; either jewelry or wall art. Visit the Every Day tile&hellip;&rdquo;Every day we decide who we will be by the actions we take.&rdquo;

...When it comes to shopping for the man in my life &ndash; things get complicated....  A gift card to a local coffee shop would also be appreciated, as would home baked scones and biscotti.  My guy drools over the B & H Photo catalog, and would love almost anything within the covers....  And for the quirky, off-beat liberal you need to see the Northern Sun catalog &ndash; very thought provoking stuff!

...Early in our marriage I wrote my love a song&hellip; &ldquo;This is why they write the love songs, this is what makes the world go round.  This is what we looked and hoped and prayed for&hellip;with you, this precious love I&rsquo;ve found.&rdquo;

...Love can be found in many different packages, in many different places.  May we open ourselves to love: giving it, receiving it, nurturing it and honoring it.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>Passages&#xD;</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Paxton says</category><dc:date>2008-02-09T16:33:19-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/e82270f43aeb8f59927ba68be8f61787-25.php#unique-entry-id-25</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/e82270f43aeb8f59927ba68be8f61787-25.php#unique-entry-id-25</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[There&rsquo;s cold, there&rsquo;s wind&hellip;..and there&rsquo;s the thousand and one things to do every day so that our lives function.  How easy it is to get caught up in the perpetual to-do list, and never stop and reflect on the actual moments that make up our lives.

...It is three years since I watched my father&rsquo;s life force fade away to join those that had gone before.

...I had left three young children home with their father, who had been laid off and was having a difficult time finding another position.  I had taken a part-time job and was waiting to begin a full-time one, as well.  My mind and heart were filled with my dying father, my grieving mother, and my own fears and terrors about the well-being of my family.

...For the third time, Donny Hicks arrived in our home in the dead of night, letting cold air blow in as he wheeled a loved one away.

...Even when the madness of the two jobs had ended, the neediness of home and family filled my moments and my days.  I had been away from my children for so long, missed so much.

...And now I realize I&rsquo;ve never really focused on my father&rsquo;s life and death &ndash; and I need to do so.  It&rsquo;s confusing to talk about my father &ndash; he had several distinct personalities &ndash; all of them different.

...Everywhere I go folks are getting teary eyed over my father, telling me how much he meant to them, how much he helped them, how much love he gave them.

...Yet, as the years progressed, it was obvious that my father&rsquo;s devotion did not extend to me, the step-child....  It was more like getting a brother that vied for parental attention, and would stop at nothing to be &ldquo;in favor&rdquo; while ensuring I was &ldquo;in trouble&rdquo;....  The funny thing was, he continually spoke about his childhood, about how his parents didn&rsquo;t want him and didn&rsquo;t love him.

...Except for the one time I made the mistake of moving back home &ndash; after my grandfather died &ndash; we enjoyed a light, casual friendship....  He was thrilled when I finally married (probably because it meant I would never return home again) and seemed to really enjoy my children.

It would be so easy to say the problems in our relationship were caused because I was the step-child, not of his blood.  Except&hellip;.he has two children from his first marriage that I finally got to know after I was married.

...Is this our cue to hug our children, love them deeply, honor their strengths and their spirits so that they can better love and guide the generation to come?

...We had a Life Celebration Party for him and my mother a few months before he died, and over a hundred people arrived to show their love and respect &ndash; many driving long distances.

...He&rsquo;s been gone three years, yet I still hear his dumb jokes and puns echoing through my mind.  My children still talk about missing him &ndash; although the youngest was just three when he passed.

...This spring I&rsquo;ll be officiating at a friend&rsquo;s wedding, filling in for my father who had performed all of the other weddings in this family for the past thirty-five years.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>My 13.1 Mile Hero</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Lisa says</category><dc:date>2008-02-09T16:18:59-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/f2d1538353034eb6d4e856a9bb4fd329-24.php#unique-entry-id-24</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/f2d1538353034eb6d4e856a9bb4fd329-24.php#unique-entry-id-24</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[She did it after only running for about 6 weeks, never really training, without benefit of a running club or running magazines or special equipment.

...Now, before I go any further, I want you all to embrace what it means to run 13.1 miles.

...Forget about the distance for a moment, and run the time.  Put on your sneakers, go out the door, and run for two hours and 18 minutes.

...The biggest part of the half marathon (or marathon), I think, is the mental part.  The part where your brain believes you can finish all 13.1 of those miles, even if it&rsquo;s hot, even if you have to get up at 4am, even if your legs hurt, even if you&rsquo;re tired.

Some people &ndash; like my 8 year old son &ndash; have no problem mustering the confidence to believe they can do it.  The rest of us have a harder time finding that strength to know we can push our bodies and finish every single one of those very long miles.

...She has heard criticism from others for all 40 years of her life.  First, from her mother, who criticized her every day, about everything from her appearance to her demeanor to her friends to her choices.

Then, she heard the same attacks &ndash; and some new ones &ndash; from a verbally abusive husband for 15 years.

For 40 years she heard that she couldn&rsquo;t, that she wasn&rsquo;t good enough, that nothing was quite right, no matter what she did or how she tried.  Her self-esteem was trampled daily, and eventually the voices inside her head echoed the voices outside.

She carried around the weight of doubt and self-dislike, questioning herself and never, ever, believing she &ldquo;could.&rdquo;

One day, she was caught in a rainstorm on her way home from a walk and she decided to run back.  As she did, she found a seedling of self-esteem peeking its way through her consciousness.  She allowed herself to believe that maybe she actually could run, at least a little.

The true miracle is that she listened to herself and found the strength to believe in herself.  This is no small feat, when you are jousting the demons that have been a part of your life every second of every day.

...Then she decided to run the IMG Miami half marathon.

...My friend completed the Miami half marathon because she found the incredible inner strength to stand up and say, &ldquo;I can.&rdquo;  She reminds me that the most important voice we hear needs to be our own.

She reminds me that it&rsquo;s ok to take on new challenges, to push ourselves a little, and to always, always believe in ourselves.

...And for that, more than for the really great half marathon time, she is my 13.1 mile hero.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>3-2-1 BUNGY!!!</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Heather says</category><dc:date>2008-01-28T20:43:13-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/7f79eaa303018d8542145ccde2027a19-23.php#unique-entry-id-23</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/7f79eaa303018d8542145ccde2027a19-23.php#unique-entry-id-23</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[I took a deep breath as I weighed in and they wrote very boldly on my hand, my weight for all to see.  I signed a waiver, acknowledging that what I was doing could be dangerous, I had no medical conditions and that I was sane, and was sent out to wait my turn.

I always wanted to Bungy jump and while traveling in New Zealand, where Bungy was invented, it seemed like the right place to try.

I decided on a bungy operation perched precariously on a cliff overlooking Lake Taupo, one of the most popular Bungy spots in New Zealand.

&ldquo;Ok, I want to watch a few Bungy&rsquo;s first,&rdquo; I said before I signed up and got myself into anything.

...The bungy platform was suspended in mid-air over a huge deep gorge, with striated rocky walls plummeting straight down to the blue water below.

...Watching along with me was a couple from Idaho who had already signed up.

&ldquo;Alright, I&rsquo;m going,&rdquo; said Seth, the guy from Idaho.

We all watched as he approached the platform got strapped in and in the distance his small figure&hellip;jumped.

...&ldquo;OK time to go sign up,&rdquo; my husband gave me a vicious smile.

I took a deep breath as I weighed in and they wrote very boldly on my hand, my weight for all to see.  I signed a waiver, acknowledging that what I was doing could be dangerous, I had no medical conditions and that I was sane, and was sent out to wait my turn.

&ldquo;Alright see you,&rdquo; my husband said while walking back over to the viewing area.

I gave him a queasy smile and walked up to the platform.

...I stepped on a scale again as I entered and then sat down to get strapped in.

...All right walk over here to the edge put your feet on the line.  I&rsquo;m going to count 3-2-1 BUNGY and I want you to just put your hands over your head and dive, OK?&rdquo;

I agreed with a nod of my head and looked down.  I couldn&rsquo;t believe I was standing on an exposed edge of a platform looking 154 feet down...down&hellip;down!

...It was just me, no cage, no harness, and no parachute, just two straps Velcro-ed to my ankles.

...&ldquo;Ok mate, just look at your feet while I pull you in.&rdquo;

...&ldquo;Oh, you did great, it takes some people a lot longer then that....  See those guys over there, they&rsquo;re the chickens, they didn&rsquo;t do it,&rdquo; he said pointing to a group of young sturdy-looking guys watching above.

...In one of the shops a T-shirt caught my eye it said, &ldquo;You need to be young and stupid, before you can be old and wise&rdquo;.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>Juggling in the Snow</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Paxton says</category><dc:date>2008-01-26T15:39:27-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/c47f7d2c39f254bdf122129d7d983481-22.php#unique-entry-id-22</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/c47f7d2c39f254bdf122129d7d983481-22.php#unique-entry-id-22</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[In my next life &ndash; I want to be a better juggler.

...There are SO many things I want and need to do each day &ndash; I end up getting that &ldquo;deer in the headlights&rdquo; look and freeze with indecision.  I bowled the same way &ndash; whenever I got a split my bowling ball ended up going right down the middle &ndash; I just couldn&rsquo;t choose which pin to go after, I wanted them both!  (which may be why I gave up bowling about 20 years ago).

Fast forward to today and my ever-present to-do list: morning routine that includes dressing, making bed, cleaning bathrooms homeschooling my children finding the kitchen planning dinner de-clutter the living room and dining room laundry &ndash; and PUT AWAY this time!  write a few pages in my book, The Tree Faeries read for meditation & spiritual growth write a news release for our group, www.TreeofLifeCelebrations.org write my weekly blog for Donne Tempo work on my classes for Mid-Shore Co-op knit

You know &ndash; the list doesn&rsquo;t look that overwhelming.  Much better than my usual list, actually.  And, since we have no outings today we can simply stay home and get a LOT accomplished.

...I could NOT get out of my warm bed at 6 am &ndash; and lingered until almost 7.  Hence I did NOT complete my morning routine (did make the bed, though) because I wanted to spend a few minutes drinking coffee with my husband before he left for his 13 hour day.  It&rsquo;s been downhill since then.

...It&rsquo;s snowing a LOT....  Inside our house, it&rsquo;s cold.  We live in a drafty 1900 house &ndash; and heat primarily with the woodstove.  I&rsquo;ve been hanging out quite close to the woodstove today &ndash; and the computer is really not that far from the heat source.  Ergo &ndash; I&rsquo;ve spent most of the day on the computer, researching different things &ndash; and trying to keep warm.

Maybe it&rsquo;s time to throw out the original to-do list, and adapt to the current day.  Let&rsquo;s see&hellip; stay in bed &ndash; and warm &ndash; as long as possible.  (check) spend time with husband (check) let kids sleep late &ndash; and stay warm (check) bring in firewood and keep fire going (check) load & start dishwasher (check) do as much work as possible on the computer (check) play with my children (check) give children library books and blankets (check) give children hot bath (check) plan dinner & defrost meat (check) drink hot tea (check) gather ingredients for hot mulled wine for tonight (check) write Donne Tempo blog post (check!)  take time to talk with mother & friends on phone (check) write few pages in my book The Tree Faeries read books with my children make & eat dinner relax w/ husband and hot mulled wine STAY WARM (working on it)

...Look at how much I&rsquo;ve accomplished today!...  And maybe, if I feel so motivated, I&rsquo;ll clean off the kitchen counters and unload the dishwasher.

...But first, I&rsquo;ll have another cup of tea and watch the snow fall.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>It's On the Internet, So It Must Be True … or Public Intellectual Lazyness In an Election Year</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Lisa says</category><dc:date>2008-01-24T14:16:04-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/ca0a35879c216993ba72f02659ff6fea-21.php#unique-entry-id-21</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/ca0a35879c216993ba72f02659ff6fea-21.php#unique-entry-id-21</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[Despite the facts that my degree is in political science, I worked for the Federal government for many years, and I believe vehemently in the obligation as well as the right of every American to educate themselves and vote according to what they believe, I have to admit I don't follow the primaries as closely as I could.

...With that introduction, you'll be surprised to know that I got an email in my inbox last week about Barak Obama that I actually read.  It upset me so much that I now have to devote my entire blog to it....  It also upset me because Barack Obama is not even my candidate of choice and now I feel compelled to spend my time defending someone who I am not even supporting.

...Doesn't that strike anyone as incredibly un-American, to wonder whether someone who is somehow different lacks the ability to be a good American?...  By the way, the answer is yes, of course Muslims can be good Americans and many Muslims are good Americans.

...The email also says, "Barack Hussein Obama, a Muslim, wants to be our President."  While it is true that Barack Obama does want to be our President, it is not true that he is Muslim.

...After the initial question about whether Muslims can be good Americans, the email says, "This question was forwarded to a friend who worked in Saudi Arabia for 20 years....  If your unnamed friend who "worked" in Saudi Arabia for 20 years says something about Muslims is true, it must be so....  Did he live on the American compound, like many other Americans in Saudi Arabia, rarely interact with Saudi's and have limited knowledge of the culture?...  I asked my friend who ran a bank in Saudi Arabia for five years, and he says Muslims can be good Americans.

...The first thing "the friend" says is "theologically, no&hellip;.because his allegiance is to Allah&hellip;" Does that mean Christians can't be good Americans because their first allegiance is to the Christian God?

Then, "the friend" says, "religiously &ndash; no&hellip;.because no other religion is accepted by His Allah except Islam&hellip;" I would ask "the friend" how religiously is different from theology, but "the friend" was unavailable for questions....  That doesn't mean they don't accept The Constitution of the United States, unless "American" is a religion.

...And now the friend says, "Scripturally, no&hellip;because his allegiance is to the five Pillars of Islam and the Quran."  The differentiation between religiously, theologically, and scripturally is somewhat confusing to me, but, that said, the United States does not have an official theology, religion, or scripture.

...TF (the friend) "Geographically &ndash; no&hellip;because his allegiance is to Mecca, to which he turns in prayer five times a day."

...The specific inaccuracies are intellectually insulting and intentionally misleading &ndash; like when "the friend" says, "&hellip;Christian's God is loving and kind, while Allah is NEVER referred to as Heavenly father, nor is he ever called love in the Quran's 99 excellent names."  That is true, but TF fails to mention that the 99 names do include Giver of Peace, The Merciful, The Beneficent, The Great Forgiver, and The All Forgiving.

...The writer says, "Obama even says if he wins the election, he will be sworn in on the Quran&mdash;not a Bible!...  Mr. Obama has even admitted he did not read the entire Quran, only parts of it.

...The purpose of my blog is not to get you all to vote for Mr. Obama....  Instead, my point is to please, please, please research your candidates and the issues and vote according to things you know are true, not what some unnamed source publishes on the Internet.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>Blessings</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Paxton says</category><dc:date>2008-01-19T17:48:45-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/36c3b4dbc60621f0b8932052dcdf5b59-20.php#unique-entry-id-20</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/36c3b4dbc60621f0b8932052dcdf5b59-20.php#unique-entry-id-20</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[But I have always had difficulty getting to know &ndash; and getting known &ndash; by these womyn.  I don&rsquo;t make friends easily &ndash; it takes quite a long time for me to get beyond the superficial.

...I get to connect with large groups of people in ways that I could never have managed one on one.  And&hellip;better yet&hellip;after I speak people come up to ME and start talking!  Much better than me having to break into other people&rsquo;s conversation (can you say, terrifying?).

I had the honor of attending my first Mother&rsquo;s Blessingway ceremony last week.  It is a spiritual, affirming event to support and strengthen the womyn who is about to give birth....  Instead of buying blankets or buntings or breastpumps we each made a quilt square (see my previous post for THAT comedy of errors) and food to share, and we brought a candle, a bead and a blessing.

The food was delicious &ndash; and the Mom had plenty left over to stock her freezer.  We gathered in a circle and shared our stories about the Mom, our blessings, our encouragement.

...May you relax and meditate on this blessed new person, yet to be born.

...May the womyn of the ages rise up to offer their support and encouragement as labor begins.

...Revel in your connection to timeless generations of womyn, past and present, as all prepare to bring forth new life, new hope, new promise.

May you forever feel the power, the primal call of the universe, as you follow the timeless instinct to bring forth life.

May you bask in the blessed aftermath of birth as you caress your newborn babe.

May the womyn of the ages smile &ndash; and cry &ndash; with you as your babe first suckles your breast, seeking life and nourishment.

May the power and magick of these moments stay with you til the end of time.

...The Blessingway was incredible &ndash; we all felt so connected to the mother-to-be, to each other, to ourselves and to generations of other womyn.  I have been SO much more creative this past week &ndash; it&rsquo;s as if I&rsquo;ve been re-born, and am re-discovering the creativity I have denied for so long.

...I&rsquo;ve worked with most of these womyn for about six months &ndash; but didn&rsquo;t really start knowing them &ndash; and letting them know me &ndash; until that night.

...We need to get away from the commercialism that makes us want more, consume more, waste more and start reveling in the unique power and serenity we bring to the world.

When the Blessingway was over the mother wore a necklace of the beads we brought to her, to remind her that we were with her, supporting her through her last days of pregnancy and delivery.  We each wore three beads on a string that the mother had tied to our wrist to remind us to continue sending her blessings and energy....  Every time I see the bead I am reminded of that evening, and the blessings we received &ndash; and I smile.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>2X4</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Terre says</category><dc:date>2008-01-17T20:39:27-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/97e5265d1727636123cc1232ca6e4087-19.php#unique-entry-id-19</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/97e5265d1727636123cc1232ca6e4087-19.php#unique-entry-id-19</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[Some days I think my life is an utter disaster, bills and laundry piling up, correspondences unanswered, the dishwasher needing to be unloaded, again, inspections, insurance, reviews, and for heavens sake who could bear to look at those horrible fingernails?...  I think anyone who&rsquo;s house is immaculate, children are polite well behaved overachievers and who can sip martinis, politely knowing they haven&rsquo;t overdrawn their bank account, again, must be freaks of nature, genetically superior in some way.

...So how then, I ask, do normal people manage to keep their head above the paper, laundy, dirty dish stream of life?

...One of the things I do with my students is teach them how to visually break down complicated subjects into simple forms.  I am able to teach five and six year olds how to draw things like the Capitol Building or Chinese dragons.  When children enter my classroom and see the project for the day, I often hear them exclaim,&rdquo;I can&rsquo;t draw that&rdquo;!

But by the end of class they, and their parents are surprised by what they have accomplished....  All the time management/life coaches out there making fortunes off us hopelessly, overwhelmed, disorganized wrecks know this secret too.

I have decided that I will never be able to stem the tide of paper, dishes, laundry that fills my life....  So rather than cry &ldquo;uncle&rdquo;, crawl back in bed and pull the covers over my head, I have adopted a plan.

...If I can do 2 things a day for my family, my job, my home, myself I consider I have had a successful day....  Consider cooking a meal or shopping for groceries or taking out the trash as discreet things we do.  Sometimes the mundane tasks get forgotten and somehow we end up telling ourselves we never get anything done.  I suppose the 2X4 plan is as much about chipping away at bigger things as much as it an affirmation that we already do a heck of a lot of things that we don&rsquo;t even realize we do.

We marginalize the time spent doing certain things and then beat ourselves up for not seeming to get more done.  If at the end of the day I can say I cooked a kick ass dinner and cleaned up the kitchen, returned 2 phone calls for work, cut my toenails and washed my hair, straightened up the living room and took out the recycle I can say I had a pretty successful day.  I keep a list of things that need to be done.  It helps me to organize and prioritize what I want to get done, but I don&rsquo;t feel the need to plow through the list or lose sleep until it all gets done.  And I don&rsquo;t feel bad that things stay on the list for a day or week even....  I&rsquo;m not an overachiever but I don&rsquo;t fall into the hopelessly lazy slug category either.  My 2X4 plan enables me to celebrate the fact that every day I do accomplish things, maybe small, maybe few but accomplish nonetheless.  Every day can be a success, its all in how you look at it....  Try, for one week to focus on all the things you have done and not all the things that remain undone and see how you feel about yourself.  <div class="js-kit-comments" path="http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/ca0a35879c216993ba72f02659ff6fea-19.php"></div>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>Julia – 1921 – 2007</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Jacquie says</category><dc:date>2008-01-14T23:53:06-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/d2336c500906c4296e2936090b71c2eb-18.php#unique-entry-id-18</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/d2336c500906c4296e2936090b71c2eb-18.php#unique-entry-id-18</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[This has been my 49th holiday season and one that I am very, very glad to see end.

It was as hectic as the normal season, and I fretted over what I could possibly gift to my husband, a great guy who deserves what he wants, but I could think of nothing....  Though I don&rsquo;t bleach them gray anymore as I have give up using bleach for natural, non-poisonous products.

...On Tuesday she no longer looked like Julia, the face changes as the fluids go haywire I guess, but her hand, as she held mine, was the same.  It was Julia&rsquo;s and it was the same hand I had held so many times trying to let her know that regardless of everything else in life, I would always take care of her.

...Even driving over there, I thought &lsquo;she has dodged so many bullets, she will be ok.&rsquo;

...It is not as if I did not know this day was coming....  I was just walking out the door to go see her when they called.

...I would have like to be holding her hand when she finally left.

...Julia needed to be flown back to Chicago for burial next to her husband, Gene who passed March 15, 2001.  I made the calls, ensured the arrangements were as they should be, arranged for our flights, hotels and rental car and we followed her in on Sunday.

Out of all those arrangements, the moment that was most difficult was when I realized for the first time, in a very long time, well over a decade, that I did not know exactly where Julia was.  The funeral home had arranged for her to be picked up for the flight, but I did not know where she was.

...No viewing, though I stopped at the funeral parlor to confirm that it was her and said good-bye.  My husband, son and I helped to carry her casket into the church and we sat amongst family as they performed rites we do not adhere to, but respect that it was what she wanted.

And then we helped carry her back out, and followed the hearse to the cemetery.

...She did not mean to be hard on me, she just was.

...Raised her son with a massive amount of love and would have done anything for him....  So we took care of her and we are all glad that we did.

...Realize we have to make decisions on things we have kept all these years incase &ldquo;mom&rdquo; wanted them.  She never did, but she would ask once in awhile and I could always say with certainty that &ldquo;it was in the blue bin in the storage room.&rdquo;

...So I took care of Julia the best I could for a long time and now she is gone....  And someday, if you want, I will tell you about this woman I have known for more than 20 years.

...And I did not get my husband new black socks for Christmas.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>Move Over, Martha Stewart! </title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Paxton says</category><dc:date>2008-01-14T23:52:08-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/cc2ae4fc82729675e72d59163c3b7ee3-17.php#unique-entry-id-17</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/cc2ae4fc82729675e72d59163c3b7ee3-17.php#unique-entry-id-17</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[I owe baby quilts to several friends and relatives &ndash; they&rsquo;re all designed; some have all the materials purchased.  Including the wonderful Life Celebration quilt I designed for my parents for their party over three years ago. My dad&rsquo;s been dead three years next month &ndash; so I&rsquo;m not really sure I&rsquo;ll ever actually make the quilt &ndash; but I have the design and all of the supplies.

To be honest &ndash; I&rsquo;ve never made a quilt in my life.

...I just seem to have a huge chasm between what I can see in my mind &ndash; and what I can actually produce.

...I need to take a candle, a bead, a blessing, food to share, and a quilt square.  I bought the candle but couldn&rsquo;t find a bead I liked, so am taking her a moonstone....  Am planning to make lavender shortbread cookies &ndash; and have actually made two batches of them recently &ndash; and they were delicious both times.

...(with NOT wonderful results &ndash; the last time was to make fairy costumes for the fairy festival for my daughters.

...So why do I own such a wonderful machine, if I don&rsquo;t actually sew?  It&rsquo;s because my husband, bless his optimistic soul, actually believes me when I say I&rsquo;m going to make something!

...I knew I needed to keep it simple, maybe a flannel background with a plain insert with the words, &ldquo;I am loved&rdquo;.

...I began by clearing out the sewing room so I could actually GET to the sewing machine.  Hauled several boxes up to the attic, but under the empty boxes (in case things need to be returned) was a pile of old papers, material and other assorted stuff that the cats had knocked off of the table and been sleeping on. This was starting to feel like work, so I decided to take everything I needed downstairs to my clean dining room to work....  Found a power cord, brought it downstairs to the machine &ndash; wrong power cord (I still have NO idea where it belongs).

...I lug down the five manuals that came with the machine and dig in. I decide to use the thread and bobbin that are already ON the machine, just to simplify things.

...About an hour later I&rsquo;ve managed to sew a straight line &ndash; but then realize I really do need to change the thread....  Then I realize I really need the embroidery attachment &ndash; or it&rsquo;s going to look stupid.

...At this point I&rsquo;m tired and frustrated, and realize my design is beyond my limited capability.  My main goal, I told my girlfriend, (who appliqu&eacute;d a tree of life and colorful leaves on her square) was that my quilt square NOT look like it was made by chimps.

I found a lovely sun design, which could be embroidered on plain fabric (and I remembered to use interfacing!)...  Another stressful hour, and I have an artistic (someone else&rsquo;s vision) sun in dark green embroidered on light green fabric.  It looks like something that should have taken 5 minutes of planning and 10 minutes of execution &ndash; and yet it is my entire day&rsquo;s work.

I really wanted to embroider SUN below it &ndash; but am terrified I&rsquo;ll mess it up and have to start all over.

...All SHE has to do is survive nine months of pregnancy, childbirth, and the next 18 hair-pulling years.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>Yes, I Am Going to Write About Jamie Lynn Spears…</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Lisa says</category><dc:date>2008-01-13T21:06:41-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/2b296173a032331a302e0e7b0ca0caf0-16.php#unique-entry-id-16</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/2b296173a032331a302e0e7b0ca0caf0-16.php#unique-entry-id-16</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[I don&rsquo;t know Jamie Lynn Spears or the Spears family, so all my thoughts are just that&hellip;thoughts and conjecture.

...I worry about everyone involved, including Jamie Lynn, the baby, and all her fans who are suffering collateral damage.

...I think she&rsquo;s a kid who desperately needs love and attention, and consciously or subconsciously, she believes a baby will give her that.  Not all that hard to imagine that the younger sister of Britney Spears would feel like she gets less attention than her headline-grabbing sibling.  It makes me sad to think that a teenage girl would feel so inadequate and lonely that she would consider having a baby to alleviate some of those feelings.  I worry that Jamie Lynn will spend a great deal of her not-quite-adult and adult life trying to win the approval of other people instead of finding self-acceptance.  I worry that despite the success and the money and the adoration of fans, she does not feel good about herself.  I understand there are people who will point out that Ms. Spears is doing quite well, thank you very much, with more than adequate financial and family support, and she simply chose to have a baby.

...I believe Jamie Lynn will love this baby and will do her best to take care of it, but it is a rare 16-year-old who is equipped to raise a child.  Maybe Jamie Lynn&rsquo;s team will make sure the baby has professional nannies to care for it, maybe it won&rsquo;t suffer the public custody horrors its cousins are enduring, but I fear the baby will grow up insecure, always seeking the attention it didn&rsquo;t get from its mother.  Not because its mother was evil, but because its mother was 16 and lacked the skills to raise a well adjusted child.  I worry the baby will always try to find the love it didn&rsquo;t have as a child, setting it up for a lifetime of depression poor self image.

...There is a legion of children who watch Zoey 101, some of them as young as 7 or 8-years-old, almost all of who know Jamie Lynn Spears is pregnant....  Parents whose who had not planned to discuss sex for months or years are explaining reproduction at dinner tables because children hear that Jamie Lynn Spear is pregnant.  Or adults find themselves attempting to explain social and cultural mores that sometimes exceed the emotional capabilities of children.  Some young children are perplexed by the fact that Jamie Lynn is not married or that she&rsquo;s the same age as the babysitter, or they have difficulty figuring out the logistics of how Zoey will work a crib into her room at PCA.  None of this may sound significant, but when you&rsquo;re walking through it, it strikes you that it&rsquo;s the end of a kind of innocence.

...Jamie Lynn Spears is a role model, and idol, for pre-teen girls.  The equation is straight forward and easy; if it was a good idea for Jamie Lynn Spears, maybe it&rsquo;s a good idea for me....  Teenage girls who know another teenager who is pregnant are much more likely than teenage girls who do not know other pregnant teens to become pregnant themselves.  Pre-teen and teenage girls could view Jamie Lynn&rsquo;s pregnancy as an event worth copying....  And while the leap from wearing a single key on a necklace &ndash; like Zoey does &ndash; to becoming pregnant as a teenager &ndash; like Jamie Lynn did &ndash; may seem gigantic, it is actually much smaller than we would like to believe.

...Or maybe Jamie Lynn is perfectly well-adjusted, the baby will grow up happy and healthy, and the fans are fine.  Or maybe the problem isn&rsquo;t really Jamie Lynn, the baby, or the impact of a high profile teenage pregnancy on all the rest of us. Maybe I just need a prescription for Lunesta, some rest, and to catch up on the laundry that is piling up while I&rsquo;m worrying about the Spears family.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>Searching for Rainbows
</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Paxton says</category><dc:date>2008-01-07T23:56:14-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/e5cdbaa78368bf532224bf9c9737e084-15.php#unique-entry-id-15</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/e5cdbaa78368bf532224bf9c9737e084-15.php#unique-entry-id-15</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[I am the brain addled mother who runs outside during summer rains, three children on my heels like little ducklings....  We ooh and ahh at our little piece of rainbow, and sigh when the brightness blends into the surrounding gray....  The day may still be overcast and wet, but we ferreted out a bit of magic and sunshine, and stayed in the moment as long as the moment allowed.

...It had touched and claimed my grandfather, assorted older neighbors and friends of my parents, and the occasional distant young person that I never met &ndash; but grieved for their short journey just the same.  My mother lost a breast to Cancer and went bravely on - just like she battled (and won) a fight with Leukemia when I was quite young.

...I was sitting in the hospital room with my best friend, a vibrant young woman with two small children, when her doctor entered.  Without hesitation, he informed her she had Breast Cancer, and it had spread into her lungs and into her spine.  She had no family history of the disease, she ate healthy foods, she exercised, and she nursed her babies for over a year.

...Now I was so close I couldn&rsquo;t differentiate between my friend&rsquo;s health and my own.

...Maybe living with Cancer meant there are no more perfect days (and if you happen to chance upon one, you cherish it intensely).

...I became more likely to follow through on a thought now; be it making a call, sending a note, or telling someone how much I value their contribution to my life.

...After the denial, the tears, and the surgery to remove her ovaries and tack down her lung &ndash; she began taking her life inventory.

...She took her children and left the man who refused to take her to the hospital for her surgery, the man who fantasized about how he wouldn&rsquo;t have to work any more after receiving her life insurance benefits.  She left the man who threatened her life when he realized she was serious in her desire to leave.

...The divorce eventually became final, although she ended up without health insurance, life insurance or child support, since the ex-husband refused to pay anything and she had no other resources.

Along the way she found love &ndash; and it strengthened her enough to trust in love&rsquo;s power.  She&rsquo;s now remarried, and her children are enjoying a stable family environment for the first time.

...Her treatments were cancelled when she had no health insurance, and apparently it gave the cancer the opportunity to spread to her liver.

...She now has a life worth living &ndash; and will do whatever it takes to keep enjoying it....  She is an amazing woman, and I am so proud to call her my friend.

Like the rainbows I&rsquo;ve always chased, she burst forth out of the gloom and made the day bright again.

...Maybe we&rsquo;ve always had the power to change darkness to light, but lack of faith in ourselves had us searching the skies, instead.  Maybe &ndash; instead of looking for something outside of ourselves to change our world, we need to look a little deeper within.

...But instead of running outside into the rain to find remnants of hope, we&rsquo;ll search for the strength within us to make our own rainbows.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>I See Dead Things — The point</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Terre says</category><dc:date>2008-01-06T13:42:29-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/f21bc6809290de72e97d00604ccc63fa-14.php#unique-entry-id-14</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/f21bc6809290de72e97d00604ccc63fa-14.php#unique-entry-id-14</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[I would like to state for the record that I am not obsessed with deceased parrots or other dead things, just infinitely curious.  When the universe presents us with an opportunity, we should feel at liberty to take advantage of it (though this is not especially good advice to offer kids - especially adolescents - without some sort of caveat).

In any case, I chose to look at my beautiful red fox specimen, not as some scavenger&rsquo;s dinner but as an opportunity to learn something new....  I missed the opportunity to dissect the standard offerings of slugs, crickets and fetal pigs, opting for Astronomy and Geology instead.

It wasn&rsquo;t like I was squeamish or any thing, just more interested in boys and clothes than the internal organs of dead animals.  I actually grew up in a family of hunters and, for better or worse, was accustomed to stumbling across the carcass of whatever animal my brother, dad and uncles brought home.

...Instead I was the kind of kid that would have funerals for the animals my big brother would kill.

The animals that cross my path now, all these years later, are dead through no act of mine (other people&rsquo;s road kill) and much like human bodies donated to science, I suddenly saw them as an opportunity to understand nature and thus my own existence a little better.

So, with that beautiful fox resting in the trunk of my van, I set about the task of learning to do something I&rsquo;d never done before: skin an animal.  There are not many ready resources for lay taxidermists, but I did manage to find a book in the local library to provide me with the fundamentals....  I can imagine that a surgeon feels that pang of discomfort when they make an incision.

...In any case, I felt like a surgeon when I was removing the fur from these animals, revealing the most magnificent workings imaginable....  Bending the fox leg, I imagined myself Darwin, peering at a bird in the dim cabin on his sailing ship.

...Occasionally one of my mother&rsquo;s neighbors would stop by curious about what I was doing.  I would hold up a pelt and announce without apology, &ldquo;I was flaying a fox!&rdquo;

...I had given myself permission to experience something very human &ndash; curiosity &ndash; the thing that caused explorers to seek the source of the Nile, scientist to discover how to clone animals, engineers how to create nanotechnology.

I don&rsquo;t expect my curiosity to lead me to discovering anything new about quarks, black holes, or new uses for inconvenienced electrons, but I am pleased that it has taught me more about myself, my aesthetic, my place in nature.  I skinned dead animals, I learned new things about how bodies work, and I appreciated something beautiful.  And to think, no one gave me permission and I didn&rsquo;t offer any apologies.

My experience made me consider, briefly, a career as a taxidermist, undertaker or even a medical examiner....  The point is that when you reach a certain age you no longer need to wait for permission before you can follow your dreams, passion, curiosities.  And when you do you should not have to make any excuses or apologies.  So hike the Appalachian Trail, learn Farsi, take up belly dancing, or skydiving, cook, travel, taste wine, paint, take up hula-hooping.

...<div class="js-kit-comments" path="http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/ca0a35879c216993ba72f02659ff6fea-14.php"></div>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>On the Road to Cairo</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Heather says</category><dc:date>2007-11-23T13:43:32-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/5a683ade1684c2c8ac4ebfe622afe5a6-13.php#unique-entry-id-13</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/5a683ade1684c2c8ac4ebfe622afe5a6-13.php#unique-entry-id-13</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[We arrived at Cairo International airport to a huge stagnant mass of people, who along with the building were disheveled and chaotic.  I tightly clutched my 2 1/2 -year-old son&rsquo;s hand; one slip and he would have been engulfed by the crowd.

...I chose a vendor that remained somber, checked his rates and exchanged a few US dollars for a stack full of Egyptian Pounds.

Managing to siphon through the crowd, we piled into a taxi and headed into the city of 20 million....  I just managed to grab my son&rsquo;s shirtsleeve before he went tumbling through the door and onto the dusty pavement.

Looking into the rearview mirror, my eyes caught the taxi driver&rsquo;s peering back at me as if to say, &ldquo;hey you&rsquo;re in Egypt.&rdquo;...  Funny, I held on tightly in the presence of a crowd of people, but when in a vehicle I lay down my guard.  I guess I truly am American, I feel at home in a car. I suppose here the car is just for getting from one place to another; a place that is too far away to walk and that doesn&rsquo;t include the Target four stores away from the Border&rsquo;s.

When we arrived at our hotel it reveled a quaint and proper space, having been a former British hangout in the days of English colonization....  I felt sorry for my friends and family who were not in this dimension experiencing all that I was.

...Neon lights flash, men sit in plastic lawn chairs smoking sweet tobacco glaring at me through mystifying eyes, woman hustled down the streets heads covered in Muslim scarves, children scurrying behind.

The next morning our guide arrived to take us out into the great Sahara desert.  I&rsquo;m not a passive traveler, so he would just be our guide and we would follow along in our own four-wheel-drive vehicles.

...As we headed out of the city, the Pyramids of Giza came into view and dominated the landscape for some miles.  It seemed as if we were driving in concentric circles around the great masses of limestone.

...The Nile River followed along beside us for many hours until finally it gave way to the azure Mediterranean Sea.  By nightfall we had cut back south into the desert and arrived at our destination, Siwa oasis.

My body was hot and dusty from the day of travel and as I turned on the shower in our dirt-floored room, I realized it was going to be a cold one.  Cleaned and chilled we wandered the village, until we spied a local Bedouin place with a huge bonfire beneath a grand tent.

...It was freezing that evening, but I pulled my camel hair blanket over top of myself and fell blissfully asleep.

...The air that morning was fresh except for the smell of fire&rsquo;s lingering from the cold night before.

...In the cretaceous era, some 100 million years ago, the Sahara desert was a vast shallow sea, separating two super continents.

...I could take my clothes off, run naked, run wild, be an organic being with nature, who would care?

...And I wondered if that Airplane flying 35,000 feet above us could see our tiny fire burning in the vastness of the desert.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>Make Mine Marble Rye</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Jacquie says</category><dc:date>2007-11-23T13:41:55-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/43f2725fd584ac09a489505c9d6f6f79-12.php#unique-entry-id-12</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/43f2725fd584ac09a489505c9d6f6f79-12.php#unique-entry-id-12</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[I have responsibility for my young son, age 8, and my mother-in-law, 86 going on 87.  It leaves little in between for my husband, or for me.

I spend large parts of my life home schooling my son.  Sometimes at a desk, other times out and about looking at life.  I see it as a great responsibility to enter into his brain more than just math facts, but also how to live.  Memories that he will keep and remember long after I am gone.  Those experiences that shape who and what we are.

...My husband&rsquo;s mother, my son&rsquo;s grandmother.  She came to live with us after her husband died and she was very ill. My son was one and she was 80.

I spend my son&rsquo;s infancy with her in oncologist&rsquo;s office and with heart specialists....  She didn&rsquo;t and I was able to get her healthy, but we could not change who she was and that led to her eventually sitting down in a wheelchair and not getting up again.  Which meant moving her to an assisted living facility, as she needed 24/7 access to care.

In June the assisted living center she moved to did not keep a careful eye on her and she dehydrated, had a stroke and we lost her.  Over four thousand dollars a month was just not enough to insure her care.

...So now, even though she is very much still alive, the "grandma" we knew is gone.

...In many ways a softer, gentler version of herself, though quite a bit of the old stubbornness is returning.

...What was there just after the stroke was hard to relate to; it just made you cry.

...Those bits and pieces of our lives that we keep inside ourselves to pull out when we need a smile or want to remember someone we loved.

...She remembers her parents, but not that they are gone.

This is a hard time in our lives but harder for her.  She knows she loves her son and grandson, but thinks that they are her brothers.  And she reminds me often to tell &ldquo;Jacquie&rdquo; I said hello.

...And to slow down and help my son live a bit more....  And there is more than one way to lose your life.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>The World Is My Playground</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Heather says</category><dc:date>2007-11-23T13:41:22-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/d65dee753369a06cf1bf89afd2dc15e1-11.php#unique-entry-id-11</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/d65dee753369a06cf1bf89afd2dc15e1-11.php#unique-entry-id-11</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[When People find out that I&rsquo;ve done allot of travel they always ask me, &ldquo;What&rsquo;s your favorite place?&rdquo;  I usually answer &ldquo;Hmm?  Well&hellip;Everywhere.&rdquo;

&ldquo;No seriously, what&rsquo;s your Favorite?&rdquo;  I&rsquo;ll be asked again with a slow speaking emphasize on the word favorite.  It&rsquo;s true.  Everywhere I&rsquo;ve traveled I&rsquo;ve found a land, a feeling and an experience that I can say is the best.

It wasn&rsquo;t always that way however.

One of my first travel experiences was a trip to Italy alongside my native Italian grandfather.  He would tell me to &ldquo;just push&rdquo; when we would get into an Italian line.  If you don&rsquo;t you&rsquo;ll never make it to the front&rdquo; he&rsquo;d advise in his strong accent.  That first trip to Italy I found the culture and people so intense, I wasn&rsquo;t sure if I liked Italy at all, and believe me telling people that you aren&rsquo;t just overly thrilled with Italy is like committing travelers sin.

But as my passport became fuller with colored inks, I began to realize that the Italian line-pushers were something I relished.  It was a new taste of life.  And though I found it hard to swallow, to truly taste it I had to digest.

I crave new tastes and each one becomes my favorite, something I want more of.

So ask me again, where&rsquo;s my favorite place?  And where do I want to go next.  And I&rsquo;ll answer, anywhere and everywhere.]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>Black Friday</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Jacquie says</category><dc:date>2007-11-23T13:39:21-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/9a7d55b9183611de1abea6c7169ff303-10.php#unique-entry-id-10</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/9a7d55b9183611de1abea6c7169ff303-10.php#unique-entry-id-10</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[The holiday season is here.  It is Black Friday that annual day of shopping hysteria.  Fortunately I am a part of the Internet shopping force &ndash; I sit with cup of tea in hand and aimlessly browse.  It is a good thing.

Probably one of the best aspects of the whole World Wide Web thing is that land no longer needs to be cleared to build large shopping malls with the parking lots that have negative water shed results with every rainstorm.  We no longer need to travel by car, idling while waiting for a parking space to open.  No more mom&rsquo;s screaming at their children while expecting seven year old boys to stand patiently while they debate the blue or the pink sweater.

...There is another positive benefit to our beloved World Wide Web....  Trees that can grow instead of being be cut down to create paper to print a magazine, a newspaper, or even paper to send a letter.

It&rsquo;s a good thing.  OK, it is sad that we no longer sit down and write letters to family and friends.  There is something quaint about receiving Grandma&rsquo;s letter and I have to admit I love to get mail.

But I also love to get email from friends and family.  I wish, often, that they would not be so brief

But this holiday, what am I thankful for&hellip; a lot really.  A beautiful son and wonderful husband, an extended family that is generally healthy including my parents, the bounty of my life and the love that is within it.

...But I am also grateful for the fact that I don&rsquo;t have to go to the mall, except to see Santa and marvel at the Christmas decorations.  Though those are no longer so great, often being themed around Disney Characters in red hats.

And I am hopeful that online shopping will destroy the mega mall and allow the neighborhood &ldquo;mom and pop&rdquo; stores to reopen.  Being nostalgic, maybe we are returning to the days of the &ldquo;Sears catalog&rdquo; where mom would shop out of the catalog and then wait for the mail.  But those day-to-day things were bought in town, at the local shop that was owned and operated by your neighbor.

...I remember the holiday decorations were better.  Not a Mickey Mouse in sight.  <div class="js-kit-comments" path="http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/ca0a35879c216993ba72f02659ff6fea-10.php"></div>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title>What the Hell?</title><dc:creator>Donne Tempo</dc:creator><category>Jacquie says</category><dc:date>2007-11-11T12:17:13-05:00</dc:date><link>http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/27949dae82a10ad9fc153c0b90aaeae5-9.php#unique-entry-id-9</link><guid isPermaLink="true">http://www.donnetempo.com/blogs/files/27949dae82a10ad9fc153c0b90aaeae5-9.php#unique-entry-id-9</guid><content:encoded><![CDATA[I am thinking about Christmas a lot these days because I am writing about &ldquo;gifts&rdquo; for the holidays &ndash; gifts for children, for adults, for mom or dad, siblings and friends.

And while I am writing about a very material aspect of the holiday, my thoughts wander to the more ethereal elements to the coming season.

...To open their eyes, and hearts, to people even if they are different, or not necessarily nice, or we don&rsquo;t understand them.

...Face it, Mascoutah is not much of a town, but they have put themselves on the map with the simple message.

...Using the always-handy Internet, and jumping over to Wikipedia, a hug like the one young Megan Coulter expressed is defined as &ldquo;a sign of support and comfort....  It is practiced in almost all nations, countries, religions and sects and can also be shared between members of the same gender quite normally.&rdquo;

When I first heard the report I thought, &ldquo;poor kids, they have to be protected from their fellow classmates.&rdquo;

But this is Mascoutah and I seriously doubted that the kids in this little town are walking the hallways with knives hidden up their sleeves waiting to hug and stab their fellow students.  And being a small town and very Midwestern, I seriously doubted that the kids were getting overly affectionate inside the middle schools

Checking out the city&rsquo;s Annual Public Safety Report , the most recent being for 2006, the number of sex offenses in the city for the year was two and deadly weapon offenses were three.

...On Halloween, three blocks from my home as my child was getting ready to go trick or treati