Moonbeams

A Story

2009-04-13T00:22:00.002-04:00

Emily knew what her morning would be like when she opened her eyes. The sun struggled to find its way into her dark room and she could hear the far off church bells ringing in the still gray morning. Still vacuous from sleep she groaned and rubbed her eyes looking at the hearth as she turned her head. The room was cold and the fire had gone out and she hated the thought of putting her feet on the icy floor but knowing she could no longer disregard the feeble sounds coming from the other bed. She pulled her wrap around her thin shoulders as she made her way through the small cottage to get wood for the fireplace.

Many hours and chores later she took her mum a cuppa and sighed as she looked at her lined face with the sadness seeping out of her eyes. She hated the look she saw now and thought, no old woman; you will not sweep me into your discord! She looked away before the abyss she saw swept her into it.

Later as she walked through the meadow and headed to her favorite quiet place she reflected on her life and the turn it had taken just three short years earlier. She was still in school, had friends and had a mum and da who loved her. Then he rode in on a warm spring day. Her da was in the field and her mum was in the little garden when the pale stranger came into their lives. No one knew that this day would be the end of life, as known before. She shook her head and pushed the thoughts out of her head as she looked around her at the new life struggling to bloom under the thin layer of the late snow. New beginnings, she thought in anger as she drew her wrap tighter. Bitter beginnings and goodbye to the life that was so full of promise. She wished her da had taken her with him when he left. The life he now lived had to be better than the one he left her to live. Did he hate her too, she wondered. Was this her punishment for having thought her life was good? Should she have been more pious? The life she did take for granted, thinking she would finish school and go to University, change the world, see the things about which she had only dreamed. Now she lived the life of a spinster at seventeen, taking care of an old woman with no will and the one thing the stranger left in his wake.

When supper was over, she led her mum into the warm kitchen and drew her into the tub of water she prepared for her. She scrubbed her mum’s hair and tried to talk to her. That was like talking to a child, but at least it was a human. She still could not break through the wall behind which she had retreated. Perhaps she should not be so bitter to a thing that used to hold her and stroke her face with much love. Who knew how much damage the stranger did to her mum or how much it cost her to do the thing she did. She pondered her mum’s decision and how a stranger could take someone’s heart the way her mum‘s was taken. Her eyes rested briefly on the small hump on the top of the hill and wondered if her mum thought about what lay under the earth? Was what was gone longed for? Did she know her life would change irreparably on that fateful day?

Thankfully when her bath was over it was time to take care of the other one so she could put her to bed and have the rest of the night to mull over her thoughts. She went into the shared room and stared at the other one. The chair that held her dwarfed the child’s tiny body, the straps keeping her up were tangled and she had slipped too far in the seat. She crossed the small room, unbuckled the straps, and caught the slipping child. The small child who was her half sister looked into her eyes and Emily could see the smile hidden in the depths of them. Please do not, she thought. I cannot and will not love you! Emily placed all the blame for the sad state of affairs that was now her life on the small helpless child. How I wish I could hate her, she thought, but as she held the little body in her arms, she knew in her heart that this small waif did not ask to for this life. She sighed and bathed the small child, dressed her and laid her in the bed she shared with her mum.

As she weeded the small garden she had scratched from the resistant earth, she heard a horse and rider coming through the woods towards the small stone cottage at a leisurely pace. She gave a small start as she realized it could not be the man Gerard and she never expected to see her da again. She threw down the hoe and ran as fast as her trembling legs would carry her towards the relative safety of the house where her sister and mother were resting. Hurriedly she slammed the door, turned the lock, and grabbed a knife before peeking out of the window at the man as he tied his horse to the stone wall.

The man was tall and at first glance was built slight , but as she watched him walk towards the house she detected strength in him, perhaps by the way he carried himself, the set of his shoulders. His hair was wavy and jet-black like her sister’s hair. His eyes looked much older than the rest of his young countenance showing her he had lived live with many hardships. His dress was not displeasing although he was very dusty from his travel on his horse. Before he could knock, she called out to him and startled his easy approach.

She knew he would not leave for he saw her hoe lying in the yard where she dropped it in her haste to reach the house. Yes, what do you want she called? I am looking for a bit of work he answered as he stuck his head under the eaves of the house. She opened the door and looked into his ice blue eyes, eyes so like her half sisters they could have been the same. Her heart beat furiously and she blushed when she met his friendly smile. No she was thinking, not again. She knew in that moment that her life would never be the same.

Love, me

Words

2009-04-11T09:04:00.000-04:00

Shades,
grey,
stone,
define the pale,weathered
brow
looking over
the
miles
that have been traversed
young
heart
ancient frame
if he could,
would again.

Love, me

How our lives have changed

2009-04-08T10:01:00.000-04:00

50 years of wondrous, ponderous technology

Technologically speaking, there have been many changes since the year my mother gave birth to me. Fast and furious the changes came into my life and were barely noticed. When my mother delivered me it was 1958. Eisenhower was president, Charles De Gaulle was Prime Minister of France and Nelson Rockefeller was Governor of New York. The microchip was invented, which was later bought and developed by Intel, beginning the phrase “Intel inside.”

Growing up we listened to our music on tinny transistor radios, or be-bopped to Broadway musicals on vinyl 33 LP’s from a Hi Fi. New televisions were only for the upper class and receiving that very first one was the start to a magical journey into the lives of people we had only heard on the radio.

NASA was formed in 1958, and this paved the way for the nay Sayers to tell the world about the Government and a movie lot. Toyota and Datsun cars were sold for the first time ever in the United States, and the first passenger jet transatlantic flight was made between New York and London.

Amazingly, the U.S. Military claimed that it would be possible to make detailed maps from space using satellites orbiting from space. Could we have imagined we would be viewing detailed maps brought to us from Google Earth in the comfort of our homes on our computers? While RCA introduced Living Stereo Sound, and all the while I was too young to know of all this wonderful technology changing the world.

1968 came and went while I played softball and roller-skated, learning to lose at sports and deal with skinned knees. The Boeing 747 made it’s maiden flight and NASA launched the first manned space flight, Apollo 7,and late the Apollo 8 became the first manned space mission to orbit the moon.

Oblivious to these changes, as I walked to school, fought the neighborhood boys and vied to be the one to swim in my sometimes friends pool, Dr Christian Barnard was performing the first successful open heart surgery, while the U.S. exploded the first Hydrogen bomb. Ironically, as one man saved lives we were learning to destroy them.

The United States started the first 911 emergency services, and manned it 7 days a week, 365 days a year, and First Philadelphia Bank installed the first automated teller. Worrying about the bomb, we could have a heart attack, withdraw money from the ugly teller and then have Dr. Barnard fix us up.

Cellular phones were introduced in 1978 in Illinois and amazingly enough; Space Invaders was the game that began the video game frenzy. Created that year was the computer service, Bulletin Board System, or BBS, and by then 98% of Americans owned a television set, paving the way for an influx of car accidents and obese Americans. Talking on a cell phone while driving, becoming couch potatoes watching television and playing video games made us a nation of fat people who drive like maniacs.

Simultaneously handling 40,000 phone calls, the first transatlantic fiber optic cable was laid out and the beginning of computer viruses infected computers connected to the Internet. Put into operation was the Hubble Space Telescope and the Stealth Bomber was unveiled, making everyone with an infected computer wish they could unleash a Stealth Bomber of their own.

Many things happened in 1998, such as Digital Television Service launching in the U.K. Microsoft released Windows 98 and the Department of Justice then brought an anti- trust case against them. More and more companies decided to create their presence online with the maturing of e- commerce, and started their own websites. Larry Page and Sergey Brin started the infamous Google search engine, joining Microsoft in successfully holding the Cyber world hostage. Apple unveiled it’s I- Mac, which is incompatible with Microsoft Windows, and over the ocean, India and Pakistan tested Nuclear weapons.

This also was the year 19 European nations agreed to forbid human cloning while the FDA, approved the first Erectile Dysfunction pill in the US, Viagra. Now this magical drug is sold on the open market to porn stars and young adults who think a four-hour hard on is to die for.

With the advent of 2008, Sony’s Blu-ray HD format now has roughly 70% of the new high definition market in their pocket while Apple computer sells the new ultra thin MacBook Air notebook computer. It is less than one inch thick, turns on the moment it is opened and still is not compatible with Microsoft products. Attempting to buy the number two giant Yahoo, Microsoft offered 44.5 billion dollars and was snubbed. Honda Car Company begins selling its zero emission, hydrogen fuel cell powered vehicle, the FCX Clarity

Proving it’s missile defense system the United States aimed it’s missiles at a U.S. spy satellite that had fallen out of it’s orbit while also demonstrating the fact that we did not prepare for our garbage coming right back at us. Increasingly people are looking for the gadget that is unmatchable. Towards that end Chumby released a tiny computer, enclosed in a stuffed leather pillow with a 6-inch LCD touch screen which shows pictures, news headlines, games and incoming e-mail from the Internet.

Spanning 50 years, technology has changed the way we live our lives. For better or worse, I wonder what the next 50 years will bring.

Love, me

Why?

2009-04-01T09:50:00.000-04:00

Darfur, by far is my torment. I want people to know how life is for the people who live there, if you can call rape, torture and death living. In the middle of the desert there is very little firewood and the walk to find it grows daily for the women of Darfur. Men would be killed immediately if they are seen outside of the camps so the duty of gathering firewood falls to the women.
Waiting on the outskirts are the rebels and Janjaweed who attack these women constantly. Women are usually gang raped by these animals and when the women are found to have been raped they are shunned by their husbands and the family. When you think of rape, you think of the forced sex act of a man on a woman, but it is so much more than that. Sadly the men use their rifles to inflict as much damage as they can to the women. Some have shot rifles inside the vagina of the women. Many, many women have been ruptured and torn by the act and now have what are called "fistulas" which is the tearing of the walls between the rectum and vagina spilling excrement into the vagina which drains constantly.
How can I not be obsessed with this going on. My heart and mind scream for the people of Darfur and I hope to tell the world to scream with me. These atrocities have to stop.

Love, me