12/25/20

SWIRL


12/10/20

SAN DIEGO TEACHERS FACE THOUGHT POLICE - WHEN DOES THE BOOK BURNING BEGIN?

I used to think HOME SCHOOLING was for right wingers, people who did not want their children exposed to people of another religion perhaps.  Then I thought it was also attractive to people who felt they could do a better job than the school or teachers in their district, who maybe couldn't afford private educations.  I saw that it was attractive to people who could live on one income since it was often stay at home mothers who were the teachers.  Thus it became an extension of motherhood or parenthood. Though some people manage to have stay at home mothers while financially struggling and sacrificing - such as sacrificing their own careers - I still think home schooling is more haves than have nots.  (There is also the educational level of the parent(s) to consider.  Are they actually capable of teaching their children so that they are grade appropriate?)  And then there was Covid - 19 and school closures and more women in the workplace being let go than men.

There was (and is) a trend towards working from home rather than commuting.  There was (and is) a trend towards liking this.  And as more children have depended on home schooling, it has become clear that one of the reasons parents do not want their children in a public school is because they do not want their children having friendships with children who are badly behaved, drug users, or criminals.  It became clear this year that it's also about the parents value system and so their politics.  I believe this has all had an effect on children learning to socialize and have company and a classroom experience, and is a negative when it comes to diversity - the knowledge that other people are not like you - that there are different cultures. 

But now there is a new reason to home school.  The thought police.

KUSI COM : SCUSD and WHITE PRIVLEDGE TRAINING

Excerpt:  The NY Post reported that the , "San Diego Unified School District began the sessions with instructors telling the faculty members that they will experience "guilt, anger, apathy and closed-mindedness" because of their "white fragility," according to leaked documents obtained by journalist Christopher F. Rufo.

I would never sign such a thing.  I do not agree it describes me.

As a person who has not had a DNA test but assumes she is "white" I'm pretty disgusted with the thought police trying to make me hate myself for this nonsense privilidge.  I've met many "people of color" who were better educated than me and had better jobs and better luck or whatever than me, but I honor them for their achievement.

Stereotypes of white people and teaching self hatred is not going to end racism. This latest is a call to internalize racism and apologize for an accident of birth.  It assumes that whiteness means I think and am a certain way.

I have met racists. I didn't like them.  They were not all white people.  

Of Polish descent I have been taunted for it here and there, off and on, all my life. We're supposed to be dumb and servile. I've heard from a British woman circa 2000 that all Poles are alcoholic.  (She added the dismissive hand wave) when my parents barely drank and I've never experienced a reason to by in an Anonymous. Of Catholic heritage I've heard and experienced the anti-Catholicism, even though present day American Catholicism is, well, almost Protestant. 

I'm beginning to wonder where it ends.  I suspect that books that offend will be burned.  Libraries will have to scout their shelves for books that may be offensive that they aren't sure about. Maybe read the whole collection. Imagine all the books by men that offend women!  A bonfire!  And if a person of color does something nasty to you, a white person, and you sue them, perhaps a court will excuse them and tell you you're just too white to find their behavior acceptable.

Stereotyping begins with the assumption that all people of a certain, race, religion, class, sexuality, or whatever group or groups are out there to be part of, ARE ALL THE SAME.  

Teachers can teach HONEST DEBATE, RESPECTFULLY DECLINING TO AGREE, HISTORICAL CONTEXT,  THE LIVES OF AUTHORS, and so much else so that a person can use their own experience and reasoning to decide where they are at with issues.  And people can change as well.

The uniformity of thought certainly offends creativity and originality.  You can't write a character than might offend someone though in reality there are plenty of them out there or who is not YOU. There goes research and experientials and imagination.

Teachers.  Poor teachers.  Their classrooms will become bare if the home schooling continues.  They will find themselves out of work or moving to work in another school district that isn't so biased. 

It makes me sad.


C 2020 Christine Trzyna - Opinion

Christine Trzyna BlogSpot.


12/1/20




11/24/20

TUNES IN MY HEAD AS I PREPARE FOR HOLIDAYS DURING THE COVID-19 CRISIS and CRAZY LADIES AROUND

I was somewhat Grinchy about Thanksgiving a couple years ago. This year, not so. An Auntie of mine used to say the later holiday was really just for children. It feels that way to me.  But why the hell is the song "It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas" coming into my head as I wash dishes? It is just so cheery!

And here we are in this increasingly worrisome Covid-19 Crisis; It's 2020 and we are going into 2021.  Restaurants can no longer serve people inside or out. Friends have lost their jobs. I know of a few people who are facing eviction. The tent city closest to me must have elected a mayor as the tents were artfully arranged from large to small the other day.

People are going out of their minds with worry, fear, restlessness, anxiety, lack of hope, boredom, and sleep irregularities and sleeplessness.  I'm not immune to any of this. 

So is this why for three strait days two lines from "Along Comes Mary," by the Association, kept running through my head? "When we met I was sure out to lunch.  Now my empty cup tastes as sweet as the punch. Sweet As the Punch."

It's not that I can't fill my time, making slow progress on a research project, or start reading that stack of books other people wanted me to read. But yesterday I felt a little wigged out as the theme song from Sesame Street, Sunny Days, started playing in my head  I once babysat kids who would cry if I took the TV off and so they had Sesame Street on for hours every day.

I walk my dog and around the corner are some children who I suspect are not getting anything for Christmas.  But they have proud parents.  So I've been discouraged from leaving gifts on the porch steps.

I just had another crazy lady in the street start yelling at me re Trump.  And just like last time, I stopped and talked to her, sure she had actually gone insane in the Trump Cult and that something I might say could help her through the Transition.

"I'm a Mexican.  I used to be a Democrat!  I'm ASHAMED that I was a Democrat!" she wailed.  "Do you know what you people DID to that POOR MAN!?  (What, is he the latest to be nailed to a cross?) He has done more for Black People than any President!" And on it went.  I backed away as her finger swang in the air and pointed towards me. "You'll see!  You'll see!  Biden will DIE. Kamala will come in and she'll have those woman with a TOWEL on their head come in.  We'll be SOCIALISTS!" 

I told her not to fear.  I suspected she had not been raised in the United States and probably knew very little about The House, The Senate, The Congress, and our "checks and balances."  I said, "We are electing a President, not a King!"

Sweet As The Punch.

I went home and pulled out stacks of children's books that I intend to give as Christmas presents. I wrapped them all in festive papers. Then I pulled out the recipe for buttery rolls flavored with leaves of bay that I intend to bake and take to a Thanksgiving dinner. I pulled the recipe from the newspaper a while back and it needs yeast.  I went to a couple stores looking for yeast.  Wondering if my search for yeast would end me up in the hospital.

The plan is that everyone will go single file into the house to serve ourselves at the table and then sit outdoors in a backyard ten feet apart to eat.  I'm looking forward to this, but I would also be OK with staying home and watching The Crown. 

I'm in the mood to cheer you up.


Christine Trzyna

C2020

11/22/20

SKITTLES DIPS ARE A DIET BREAKER : THEY DIDN'T PAY ME TO SAY THIS!

I try NOT to buy candy, especially not big packages, but the original Skittles Dips that came my way were a diet breaker. There was no way not to eat all of them in a very short time span.  They have a creamy yogurt flavored coating that on occasion seems to have a hint of caramel. My only complaint is that they are not attractive.  They are a pale color that requires strong light to discern what flavor and an ugly black S stamp on each one. So if you're with the Skittle company product development or marketing, here this.  The candy needs a more appealing appearance. 

11/21/20

I TANGLE WITH TWO OLD LIT MAJORS WHO ARE STILL CARRYING THE LITERARY CANNON AROUND WITH THEM : TALKING TO STRANGERS

I was excited.

I had a few things to say to them.

They apprised me of the fact that they had both been lit majors.  Yea, in the 1950's and 1960's.  Had I, they wanted to know, been taught THE PROCESS FOR WRITING.

I said.

About one percent of the adult population of the United States buys ONE BOOK in a year.  That book may be "How to repair your Volkswagon."

The best selling fiction is bodice rippers.  Romances.

The number one topic in fiction or nonfiction on best selling lists is MURDER.

Very few people read books.  Very few people are like me.  I've read hundreds of books.

An "S and M" porn author with a trilogy that began on the internet, which resulted in some bad films as well, became rich on shit.  Badly written.  Horrible acting.  Shock value lost on me.  But because I wanted to understand the popularity, I read some of it.

AND

No matter how many classes I have taken, how many readings or question and answer sessions I've experienced in which audience members ask published authors about their recipe for success, there IS NO ONE WAY.  You may hear that the person wrote their whole novel while taking a shower.  Or that they are committed to 100 words a day.  Or that they didn't write for years but then they sat down and it flowed. Or that they took a decade to write one book.  THERE IS NO ONE WAY TO WRITE and NO ONE WAY TO LEARN TO WRITE. There is simply learning as you write.  

And WOMEN are UNDERREPRESENTED and ALWAYS HAVE BEEN when it comes to getting agents and getting published.  The stats against women writers are horrendous.

I forgot to say that in my Women's Literature class, within an esteemed Literature program that was judged to be about number 7 in the nation - something like that - when I attended - NOT ONE MALE GENDERED STUDENT took the class.

And so, you have to write because you have to write.

Without letting POLITICAL CORRECTNESS be your CENSORSHIP.

I couldn't write my own memoir and be politically correct.

This is the way writers and authors are being CRITIQUED.  Not for their ability to write or tell a good story, but if they are writing in line with the current politically correctness.  This is deadly if it happens in writing programs. It's deadly when it happens in publishing. So, no I've never read Harry Potter, but leave that author alone.

And so writers are, like the 'S and M porn author" publishing themselves.

And buying guns to protect themselves.

In this case, the two old lit majors just kept their mouths shut. I guess these strangers stopped talking to me, at least for a while.

C  2020 Christine Trzyna

All Rights Reserved


11/18/20

DREAM : EXPERIENCE THIRTEEN : CHRISTINE TRZYNA WRITING WORKSHOP

Write about a memorable dream - the dream that sticks with you.  You can use it as a place to begin.  Start a short fiction story based on that dream.


Christine Trzyna
C 2018 -2020 Christine Trzyna 
All Rights Reserved including Internet and International Rights
OK to use in not for profit situations. Please credit me.  It's karma.

11/12/20

JOE BIDEN WON and IT RAINED

It was 150 days with no rain in Southern California. That statement is probably in error as Southern California is thousands of square miles and it probably rained somewhere in all that territory in the last 150 days.  

However, we have been waiting for it.  

Real rain.  Not morning mist.  Not a little drizzle, though I'm sure the plants would love to have their leaves dusted off so they can breath.  

We wanted a downpour.  An inch.  Rain enough to stop using the hose and racking up the water bill. Rain enough to plant a garden and expect it to sprout.

It happened, for a few minutes. Then it happened again. The wind whipped through the trees.  The pavement was damp. The leaves glistened. The temperature went down and we pulled out the sweaters and warm fuzzy blankets from storage.

Soon after it was announced that Joseph Biden is our President Elect, it rained.

It was as if we had all been holding our breaths,  The fires consumed much of the state.  And then, he was elected.  And then the sky let it out.

That's my perception.

My friends and I opened a bottle of wine.

We all slept a little bit better.

Though we know "It ain't over yet."  (Where is the fat lady these days? Hopefully the White House.)

Then the catnip addicted cat, who now loves me, squinting it's eyes and looking up at my forehead, perhaps at my glowing third eye, got up on their table, though, because he is aging and bony it took more effort, and put out his hand-shaking paw.  "More"

I bought the catnip, claiming to be the world's strongest, at a dollar store. 

I bought it after he got beat up by some studly, younger, and mouse eating cats.

This one, he's an Egyptian. The smartest.  From the Pharoahs.

One of those other cats had put a neat slice in his head near his ear. It was deep and oozing. He was barely walking. He was in pain. His own eyes appeared foggy.  As he went out, my friend said, "In my gut I think he is going off somewhere to die."

A day later he came back.

I made a perch for him on top of their record album collection in the hall. Layered it with blankets.  

He had never had catnip before. The idea was to give him some bliss before it was all over. The idea was to increase his appetite.

Now, whenever he sees me, he wants some.

He is eating.  He is well. His eyes are bright and alert.  From their porch he watches the other cats carefully.

Joe Biden is President Elect.

Will we all get better?


C 2020 Christine Trzyna

All Rights Reserved


11/11/20

WRITING STYLE : EXPERIENCE TWELVE : CHRISTINE TRZYNA WRITING WORKSHOP

Go to the library and with your eyes closed, pick one book off the shelf in the fiction section.  (re Covid, perhaps this should be the bookshelf of a friend, an open bookstore, or your own shelf of long unread books.)

Take it home and read a chapter from any place in the book.

Reread it again and this time, write trying to write like the author.

Every author has their habits.  Their way of thinking.

To begin getting into the writer's habits and thinking, hand write or hand print the chapter over again on paper.

Then continue.


Christine Trzyna
C 2018 - 2021  Christine Trzyna 
All Rights Reserved including Internet and International Rights
OK to use in not for profit situations. Please credit me.  It's karma.

*Note that you don't want to publish what you have copied.  That would be plagiarism. 

11/4/20

NATURE : EXPERIENCE ELEVEN : CHRISTINE TRZYNA WRITING WORKSHOP

Maybe a half dozen people in the entire world that I know about, so to speak, have participated in my WRITING WORKSHOP spawned by recent posts - triggers - to get writing. Search this blog using the words WRITING WORKSHOP for the whole series.

EXERCISE 11

Write a descriptive scene from nature.
Then REWRITE IT being sure that you have included excellent color.
Then REWRITE IT being sure that you have included a variety of SMELLS.

Christine Trzyna
C 2018 -2021  Christine Trzyna 
All Rights Reserved including Internet and International Rights
OK to use in not for profit situations. Please credit me.  It's karma.



10/29/20

MELANIA and ME by STEPHANIE WINSTON WOLKOFF : CHRISTINE TRZYNA BOOK REVIEW

I was handed the hard-back copy that a friend had just bought and read and will be passing this book to another reader shortly. I know what certain critiques and articles expect me to think about this book but I'm not dictated to.

This book is one long immensely detailed bitch about being overworked, underpaid, disrespected, and under-appreciated in the work place, and ultimately in a friendship. Most of us have had that experience.  I know I have.  That might be my life story - or yours - but I wasn't a child of privileged, able to put a toe into prestigious Vogue to work there first.  Events I planned and saw through were not benefits for the Met's fashion ball. I've met a few celebrities and a few millionaires but my social life is not among them.  Stephanie Winston Wolkoff was immensely qualified for the assignment she was vetted for by First Lady Melania Trump. That she kept at it to the point of suffering financially and health-wise, is her fault. She was not one of us who has to work for a living.  Not that I think it's wrong to be well off and ambitious. But why do us commoners stay at jobs we hate?

The story of the chaotic Trump White House is as expected, sorry to say, and not a surprise.

The book reads as though S.W.W. was keeping a diary on top of everything else she was working extreme hours on. If not a diary, then a journal or at least a calendar, of her work struggles, including having lawyers work on a contract that might describe her title, responsibility, and pay. 

Very little is said about the FRIENDSHIP that the title of this book depends upon. There are mentions of brief smiley interactions, and many references to emails that are brief and full of emojis.  First Lady Melania actually seems appreciative, if not one to go on and on in her communications.  There are lots of air kisses on both cheeks, so to speak.

THE WORST THINGS YOU CAN SAY ABOUT MELANIA TRUMP after reading this book are the things noone would dare say about JACQUELINE BOUVIER KENNEDY.

That she prefers supporting her husband and his career and taking care of her child, then having a career of her own while also the First Lady.

That she's not in the loop about political issues, though once in a while she has influence on her husband.  She has a mind of her own as he does and is not always cooperative about what others want her to do as First Lady.

That she has very little personal power and then it's hiring staff to advise on fashion, hair, diplomatic expectations, protocol, and entertaining dignitaries.

That she goes off on relaxing vacations alone while others toil.  They are paid after all, while she is not.

That she shows up on the campaign trail not so much.

That she embodies tranquility and it seems that is what President Donald Trump looks forward to and depends on.

I think First Lady Melania Trump has mastered what few women seem to these days - That she is enough.

The real story here is how Trump's grown children, in particular Ivanka Kusher, are present, and domineering and can be sneaky or savvy about sabotaging Melania. It's the story of how a good soldier (Stephanie) on Melania's side goes to battle with Ivanka's side.

For that, Melania must, in my opinion, resort to supreme patience, philosophy, and prayer.

As for the preternaturally tall for his youth, Barron Trump, or his father, the author takes aim to diagnose.  Fair when it's about our President.  Unfair when it is a child.

C 2020  Christine Trzyna

Book Review - All Rights Reserved



10/27/20

HE DIED BUT VISITED ME LAST NIGHT - A MEMBER OF MY OLD WRITING GROUP

The strange dreams continue.  Is it the season?  Or the ongoing threat of Covid-19?

I woke up around 4 am.  My dog had walked through my sewing kit and I could hear buttons and spools - but I woke thinking "needles." She needed to go out.  So did I.

But I managed to fall back asleep.  I remembered three strange dreams. This one was a visit with a member of my short fiction writing group.

This man was a bit of a mystery.  I first met him at a writing class focused on short fiction at a community college night class. He wrote the shortest of short stories.  One pagers.  If you're wondering how a one pager can qualify as a short story, well, if there is the slightest change in a character's viewpoint, that would qualify.

If I knew him today, I would suggest that each short was actually a chapter.  He wrote scenarios that seemed to focus on people with mental illness.

He never stayed to chat or get personal after we had critiqued each other's stories.

He would stand up, bid us a hearty fare-well, and walk out in an almost military fashion, with his notebooks in one hand. 

Then one day I was telling a friend about this man and his work when he said, "Wait a minute.  I think my dad knows this man!"  And not only did his dad know the man, but they had worked together, and his dad had introduced him to his wife.  Who, it turned out, became seriously mentally ill.

I felt that this man did not want our group to know this.

So one day I encountered him and I spit it out. "I know so and so.  I'm friends with his son.  I know."

To which he said nothing in response.

But I felt maybe I had relieved him some.

In my dream I was wearing my reading glasses.  My reading glasses are really ugly.  I made a mistake choosing them. The first thing I saw was that he came up to me wearing the same reading glasses.  He was smiling.  I said "I thought you were dead!"

In waking life I have been thinking this for some time - years.  One day I happened upon a newspaper I don't normally read and there was a one liner.  It said So and So was dead, as if it was the least someone could do.  There was absolutely no mention of a wife, family, friend, or children. Somehow I assumed it was him.

In the dream he was sitting with a woman I didn't recognize at all but knew to be his wife.  They were together, well, and happy.  They had two young people with them - perhaps grandchildren?  What was most important to me was that they were happy.  I looked over this woman, who I had never seen in waking life, thoroughly.  Now if I ever see a photo of her and I learn it is her, I'll probably get one of those shocks up my spine.

C 2020 Christine Trzyna

All Rights Reseved

10/22/20

HE DIED SEVEN YEARS AGO and WAS IN MY DREAM YESTERDAY MORNING

Yesterday morning I woke from a dream.

Someone I knew years ago was in that dream. So unexpectedly.

I knew he had died about seven years ago. I hadn't been thinking of him. I hadn't been thinking of him when I'd learned he died years ago either. I hadn't had any contact or knowledge of him in years before that. 

We had not been speaking for some time. It wasn't that we were angry. We just had lost words. He was a man of few words. Uncomplicated and simple you thought, until you heard his lyrics.

I'm not claiming to be a psychic. I think everyone is a bit psychic. For many years now it's happened that I've learned that someone who was once in my life and who I haven't thought about in years, has died. Usually something odd happens. Like I read a newspaper I don't usually and see an obit. Or I have a thought about them. So I check the Internet.  

A little more than seven years ago, one afternoon, I suddenly thought "I wonder if he ever put out a CD?" So I went on the Internet and instead found out he had died, about three months earlier. In his case there was no obit. But there were memorials. There were postings in on-line newsletters. There was a YouTube video of an event where he was given an award that made me tear up. Once athletic and strong, he was weak in a wheel chair, only able to stand for a moment to say "Thank You." Once a man who slept around and had too many women, he had found the one for him. He had married and had children since I knew him.

I contained sadness.

This man was in my dream yesterday morning.

We were in a restaurant. Maybe a salad bar. Not fast food. It was bright and airy. I looked at him and the sun seemed to be shining on spots of his pale skin. We were both standing there, looking into each other's eyes. He was youngish and healthy. His sleeveless tank showed off natural muscle. He was silent.  So was I. That continued. In my mind I was thinking I had recently met up with him in another dream but I couldn't remember it. I wanted to talk to him. Arrange a time. He knew that. I felt he could read my mind. I felt there was something I didn't know.

Then I saw a cameo of a woman. I think I know who this woman was, though I can't remember her name. She and I were friendly. I don't know if she's still alive.  In the dream, she spoke. She told me that he was going to a certain city in Texas and to a certain type of medical facility. She was very exact.

I woke up.

I immediately put in the name of this city and the words she had spoken in my search engine.  I was astounded by what I read about this place.

I realized I had been meaning to send his best friend a letter for the last seven years. I hand wrote it. Then I searched for an address one can send an old fashioned hand-written snail mail letter to.

And no, the man who was in my dream does not have a CD out. Not one.  No YouTube videos of him singing. No web site. Nothing. His wife and children also seem to have disappeared. 

I fear his music is lost. That he let it go to have a life different from the one he was living when I knew him.

I can hear some of his songs in my head.  Hear him singing like a choir boy.

C 2020 Christine Trzyna All Rights Reserved

10/21/20

HE DIED and I IMAGINED HIM ALIVE FOR YEARS NOT KNOWING

As a teenager, I attended art classes on Saturdays at a famous museum and then a famous university. At the museum each week an honor roll was called. I was on it frequently. I also remember many of the names called as if it were yesterday. I think they called them alphabetically.  Hypnotize me and take me back to that time and I could announce the whole list.

Some of these people were my friends or friends of friends. We all had a small sense that we were special because we had been invited selectively from all around the county.

In the end almost all the people who got full scholarships to the famous university classes were male. I sometimes wonder about that. Was it sexism? Was it sexuality? Was it that the people who were behind these classes just thought that men artists had more potential and would be more serious about pursuing art? There were many women on those honor roll lists. 

So one afternoon back in the day, when I was visiting my friend Sandy, my favorite classmate, who lived near her friend Robert, a name called, a person who got the full scholarship, she introduced me to Robert. He was a very tall teen from a German background in a mostly Jewish neighborhood. 

We went over to his house.  We sat in his living room. He and Sandy were chatty.

I remember that day because of the finery about the way he spoke. The thinness of his fingers. A seriousness about him. And also because he had a slobbering Saint Bernard with a small barrel under his chin.  (Why do people make Saint Bernard's carry barrels?  Maybe this dog carried Robert's cash or stash?) The dog got on my lap and slobbered. They all told me this was because he "liked" me. I hated his slobber. I wanted him off my lap. You would never guess at that point in my life how much I would come to love dogs. They all thought it was sort of funny that the more I resisted the Saint Bernard, the more he "liked" me.

Every once in a while I would think of Robert, such a promising artist. Had he gone on to afford the extreme tuition of the university? Did he still paint? Was his work represented in galleries?  Maybe a museum?

So, one day I had the urge to check. I put his name into the Internet and up came an obituary.  He had been dead for years. He had died young in another city and state. The obit suggested that he had long had family in this other state. I wondered when he moved. What he did for a living when he was alive.  And what killed him.  Was it a car accident? A strange disease? Cancer of some sort? AIDS?

Then it bothered me, the way I had carried him around as a live person when he had been dead most of my life.

Even as I write this I see his face.

C Christine Trzyna All Rights Reserved

10/14/20

NOT GETTING TO KNOW AMY CONEY BARRETT : OPINION by CHRISTINE TRZYNA

TWO DAYS INTO LISTENING TO THE HEARING in order to confirm Amy Coney Barrett as a Supreme Court of the United States judge, I came away with the fatigue that sets in from repetition.  OK, we get the game.  One Democrat after another mentioned real people in their jurisdictions who would not have heath care if the Supreme Court got rid of our Obamacare and some  spoke about rights like abortion. (Which, by the way, is very region-specific. Having the right and having a local affordable clinic are not the same.)

I wished I had considered Amy Klobuchar more seriously as a candidate, as I think Saturday Night Live is right about Kamala Harris, and I thought Klobuchar's  pre questioning little speech/statement was the best I heard.  I was relieved when it seemed that Corey Booker finally got a direct response from a question.  The answer Barrett gave was "Yes." There was an instant of relief, then more inability on Barrett's part to answer in any way that might let us get to know her. She kept hiding behind her rights to not offer an opinion because presently she is a judge.  Peeyoooo!

Sure, we learned she knows her law and has a very good, if not perfect, memory.  She swore her personal beliefs would not sway her. We saw that she was dressed as a lady - with  hot pink and deep coral colored Dress for Success outfits, that her hair needed conditioner and a trim, and that she was not denying her Catholic religion or that she once signed an anti-abortion/ Pro-life statement.  That was authentic.

But when the last gasp of air flew out of the tire for me was when one of the Republicans honoring her mentioned that she not only had her illustrious education and law career and was mother to seven children, two adopted who are Black, a child - not present who is mentally slow - and obviously was upholding a sacred marriage.  No, that was not enough.  She also 'makes time" for community service.

I DOUBT THIS SUPER WOMAN CAN RELATE TO THE AVERAGE, ORDINARY, COMMON woman - or man.  The woman who comes home from work from her job exhausted and has one or two children who need dinner and their homework supervised, still has a load of laundry to do, wonders if over the weekend they'll be about to get out as a family to do something, like ride bikes or go by a restaurant and pick up dinner, or if she'll still be able to have her job if Covid-19 becomes Covid-20.  This woman may or may not go to church. The message of Christianity may be lost on her. She may have had an abortion or two in her life because she was raped, abandoned by a sperminator, or was not in financial or relationship position to bring a child into this world.  She didn't like it, but she had to do what she had to do. She may have had her two children and gotten her tubes tied. The children's father may not be in their lives. Her pay may be so bad that even working full time she sweats the rent and is relying on government benefits for food, or in line at a food bank or distribution.

Yes, AMY CONEY BARRET is EXCEPTIONAL, in an unrelateable way.

I don't have a poster to haul out for camera close ups as many Democratic senators were able to do, a poster that would show my AVERAGE, ORDINARY,COMMON woman.  I can think of an old friend who would be a good poster mom though.

She was highly intelligent and good in math.  She went to college.  She graduated with one of those degrees in which women, at the time, were unusual.  It was "still a man's world."  People like her, because they were not traditional housewives and mothers, created paths for younger women to go ahead and go to law school.  Women like her heard this on interviews: "You'll just get married anyway."

She got the Fortune-500 job.  She never actually worked in science, but it was related to her position and her degree was a brag point. She was reasonably cute and featured in the ads her corporation put into magazines to prove that they had hired a woman. They did not hire another woman for the next 20 years.  She bought a house in a neighborhood that offered excellent public schools.  

Her constant travel for the job made her a mother dependent on a cash nanny, who was paid more than most people earn a year, to be there early and to stay late and overnight at times so she could travel for the job.  Her husband eventually left the marriage in the worst way possible, leaving her a cheated on fool in the estimation of her upstanding community, and with a devastating financial drain.  It had been a long time since they actually had a relationship. She worked so much that she was chronically underweight though a big eater.  And then one day the Japanese bought her division and the younger men leap-frogged over her to the higher paying potions. She got the silk parachute and a no compete clause.  She never got work in her expertise field again and tried to sell real estate and be a stay at home mom.  

If it were not for affirmative action she would never have gotten the job. In her time there she did not mentor or patronize other women so they could succeed at the company or outside of it.  She had not one moment for "community service."  She switched to the Republican Party.  The last time I talked to her she had become a snob.  She said she only "dealt" with people who had Master's Degrees. So why had I called?

I wonder how AMY CONEY BARRET compares with the other SUPERWOMAN in pop culture, actress and divorce battle bitch, ANGELINA JOLIE.  I can't prove it but I've heard that each of her children has or had their own NANNY as well as their own THERAPIST.

I want to know HOW AMY CONEY BARRET COPES.

I want to know HOW MUCH MONEY SHE and HER HUSBAND EARN so they can afford seven children.  Are the children in private schools?  What do they pay for health insurance?  How much time is she away from home as a judge?  Do they employ a nanny?

I remember my parents, Catholics, feeling so left out of the political process because Catholics were unwanted in politics past the local level and how proud they were that John Fitzgerald Kennedy had become president.  It was an affirmation that Catholics were getting ahead even though they were not Protestants in America.  With all the antics since revealed, we know he was not a good Catholic.  We know that some Catholics are Pro-Choice.

Being Pro-Choice does not mean that you, yourself would choose an abortion.  It means that the day may come when you find you have to choose.  It means that you do not expect other people to have your religious beliefs and live by them.

I could go on, but I'm hungry and tired.  I'm not watching any more of these Supreme Court nominees hearings. I hope Kamala, Amy, and Corey read this post and start asking some personal questions that have nothing to do with the law.


C  2020 Christine Trzyna


9/17/20

THE NEW GOOGLE BLOGGER FORMAT IS AN UTTER HORROR -

I'm DESPISING it.  You have to scroll more - the lines are CARTOONISHLY LARGE - for CHILDREN or THE LEGALLY BLIND. Every post features a picture block.  I rarely post pictures. The dates are obscure - they should be where they were - easy to find.  I would have difficulty finding what I want to take down. TOTALLY DISCOURAGING.  TOTALLY FORCED UPON the BLOGGER.  The so called LEGACY BLOGGER, which I would be happy with forever - gone.  I clicked to return to it multiple times.  I DON'T GIVE A RATS ASS ABOUT HITS, or how my LAST POST IS DOING.  That is not my priority.  Why is it YOURS GOOGLE?  FOCUSING ON THE NUMBER OF HITS YOU GET OFTEN INFLUENCES THE WRITER TO WRITE FOR HITS - LATCHING ON TO NEWS - LOOKING FOR SOME SCANDAL, SOME HYPER-INTENSIVE SUBJECT ALREADY BEING PLAYED OUT.  IT CAN CAUSE YOU TO BE A FOLLOWER INSTEAD OF A LEADER.  TO BE DOMESTICATED INSTEAD OF RADICAL.  


Update March 2021

I'm still struggling using this hideous new horrible blogger. It says published when a post is a draft. It holds the date you started writing it, prepublushing, even when you've instructed it to be posted at a specific date in the future. 

9/14/20

DEBUSSY - CLAIR DE LUNA - MAN PLAYS PIANO FOR 80 YEAR OLD ELEPHANT



An 80 year old female, nearly blind... and look at those ears showing her appreciation!

9/10/20

9/9/20

RUSSIAN LADY TELLS ME DEMOCRATS CREATED CORONAVIRUS : TALKING TO STRANGERS

I see a lady waiting for the local community bus.

She says "Does Dash stop here?"

She is not wearing a mask.  She is fat and weary and sitting on the bench.

I say, "It does, but you can't get on without a mask."

She whips one out of a pants pocket with disgust.  "I hate these things," she says.

"I do too, but it's the least we can do."

"It's the Democrats... They started this."

"I'm a Democrat, " I say, being brave.  "As are my friends and as were my parents.  Democrats did not start Coronavirus - 19.  It kills them, just like it kills Republicans."

"Well. It's Bill Gates," she says.  "He started it so he could make money with his vaccine."

Why do I argue with such people? "Bill Gates is one of many people investing in science for the vaccine or the cure."

The bus pulled up.  She put her shitty mask on and got on it.  Propelled her mass.

And - this is yet one more NEW conspiracy theory I have heard about the Virus.

C 2020 All Rights Reserved  Christine Trzyna

9/8/20

BLACK VOTES MATTER

BLACK VOTES MATTER
A constructive way to participate and count.

8/29/20

JOHNNY CASH : ONE PIECE AT A TIME


But this one always makes me laugh.  And, I think, I once had a relative with this mentality.

8/27/20

QUICKSILVER MESSENGER SERVICE - WHAT ABOUT ME


So sad that the words to this song which came out in the 1970's are too true today.  That's Dino Valente, the lead singer.

8/18/20

BERNIE SANDERS SAYS YOU CANNOT SIT THIS ELECTION OUT


VANITY FAIR HIVE - BERNIE SANDERS ENDORSES JOE BIDEN by Abigail Tracy

EXCERPT: Sanders said, "At this moment we have a president who's trying to undermine democracy and move us into an authoritarian form of society.  Those are huge issues. Unbelievable.  And I think Joe understands that.

8/16/20

100 YEAR ANNIVERSARY OF WOMEN's SUFFRAGE RIGHT TO VOTE

I have not always voted.  I started out voting every year.  Then in California, I got confused.  I also, though thinking of myself as informed by reading around issues, including Pro and Con arguments provided to California voters, have voted for some things that I regret.  Such as, I regret voting for three strikes = life in prison.  I sat it out for some time because I also felt that straight ticket, thoughtless party politics voting was beneath me.  And because I felt that there was no one I was especially thrilled with.

I've come full circle to believing that voting needs to be exercised.  I don't want to be part of the problem of people being elected and new rules going into effect simply because so few people voted.

Sometimes you have to give it your gut instinct or your best guess.

8/13/20

I COULD HAVE WON A LOT OF MONEY BETTING ON BIDEN - HARRIS DEMOCRATIC TICKET

Yes, I could have made a lot of money.  I predicted way back before the whole process started that, despite being for Bernie Sanders for President of the United States, in the end Joe Biden and Kamala Harris would be the ticket.  I thought Harris would be asked not only because she wanted the Presidency, but because she's in California, a populous state that has a lot of electoral votes.  Everyone wants California.

We Californians will probably still be part of the United States so long as we feel we have representation.  Though it's improbably I sometimes wonder if we are so different that we might have to form our own country.  If only we were not so dependent on Federal funds.


7/22/20

JOHN GRAY - EXCERPTS FROM AN IMPASSIONED ARTICLE

DAILY MAIL : JOHN GRAY : IT IS NOT AN EXAGGERATION  Full Text

Here are some highlights of this impassioned article by John Gray entitled  IT IS NOT AN EXAGGERATION TO COMPARE THE METHODS USED BY THE NEW WOKE MOVEMENT TO THOSE OF MAO'S RED GUARDS.

"It is not far fetched to compare the methods of this 'woke movement' to those of Chairman Mao'es Red Guards, who terrorised the Chinese people half a century ago.

The so called 'cancel culture' - publicly shaming and trying to undermine the professional standing of anyone who deviates from ever more extreme standards of political correctness -simply the latest expression of this intolerant, baying movement.

***
Why are our police officers virtue-signalling their wokery? The task of the police is to enforce the law and maintain public peace, not show sympathy for any political movement.

One reason why British institutions have been captured by the forces of illiberalism is contagion from the US, where the movement has been most extreme.

7/20/20

WHITE PRIVILEGE IS NOT A THING by SYDNEY WATSON and other CENSORED SYDNEY WATSON OPINION YOUTUBE VIDEOS



Refound video April 2021

Well thought out, well said, I honor Sydney's right to have an opinion I might not agree with.  Though, surprisingly to me, I did agree with her on several issues.  If you want to be a well rounded person, you should seek out a wide variety of opinions and see where you sit with them.

Last night on my cell phone I bookmarked two of her videos.  One called I'm a Conservative and I've Had Enough and the other called White Privilege Is Not A Thing.  This morning, neither video was coming up on my computer when I searched YouTube for them to post on this blog.  I will try again and post them if I can.

Listening to Sydney I learned I'm a "Classical Liberal" as opposed to a Radical Leftist.  (What a relief!)

Free Speech is of supreme importance to me as it is to all writers - all creatives.

I've written in the past about Writer's Block. 

Fear is now creating Writer's Block in many who are afraid to accidently (or perhaps purposely) upset someone else in the world. It begins when you are afraid to admit who you are and what you think because the indoctrinaters are everywhere and people - including writers - out there are loosing their jobs, or quitting, even being bodily injured and maimed or killed. 

There is no longer a sense of humor or any love, kindness, understanding, or patience.  I feel that the anxiety and depression common due to Coronavirus-19 is part of that.

I dealt with this years ago when I went to a college that was so thick with political correctness (of that era) that I seriously questioned what a creative writing program was doing there.  Overall, in society, it has only gotten worse.

NO MATTER WHAT YOU THINK OR SAY, these days there is someone who is going to POWER OVER YOU and be insulted.

So let me affirm that you can be against prejudice and bigotry and still want to distance yourself from the tactics of Black Lives Matter.

You are not a Radical Right Winger just because you want police to be retrained but not defunded.  (And know that riots in the streets and nightly gunfire as there is in parts of Chicago and Baltimore is not what you want in your neighborhood.)

That you were not a racist asshole when you bought Aunt Jemima pancake mix or Trader Ming's frozen dinners.

That Agreeing to Disagree as Gentlepeople is still an option.

C 2020 Christine Trzyna

7/6/20

WERE GOVERNMENT STIMULUS CHECKS USED TO BUY CHINESE and MEXICAN FIREWORKS? OPINION BY CHRISTINE TRZYNA

WERE GOVERNMENT STIMULUS CHECKS USED TO BUY 
CHINESE and MEXICAN FIREWORKS?  
By Christine Trzyna

My dog is hiding under the bed today, after a month of fireworks in the neighborhood, every night, sometimes in the middle of the night. I have held her, shaking, pawing at me to communicate that she wants to get even closer, night after night. She has been so agitated she can barely eat. But people who buy illegal fireworks and illegally shoot them off, and get off on that, could give a fuck about the animals among us.  They don't give a fuck about other humans either.

There was obviously no police presence what-so-ever. The street is littered with refuse from fireworks that were set off in it, despite cars being parked on either side of it; who cares if someone's car, their transportation lifeline, might be damaged?

I've experienced waking up from booms but also from seeing frightening brightly illuminated flares being shot between houses. The vacant building on the street was aimed at repeatedly; apparently there was desire to burn it down, never mind that the whole block could end up burned down. 

On Friday night some asshole in the neighborhood shot off what could be a cannon every half hour from 9:30 PM till about 2:30 in the morning.  I resorted to foul language.

I haven't gotten decent sleep in weeks, am falling asleep in the afternoon, something I hate to do but apparently need. I wonder when I will have a normal sleep pattern again. I felt alone in this unpopular attitude of mine, until Sunday night when two friends complained to me, feeling the same.

Our mayor, Eric Garcetti, announced the cancellation of any fireworks displays so as to avoid the assembly of large Coronavirus -19 spreading, and it seems there is no end in sight to this plague. I understand that people are ready to pop. The novelty of down time at home to do repairs and home improvements, to catch up on projects, art, painting, cooking new recipes, reading, all of it, is no longer feeling like an unexpected vacation. 

It feels like a prison sentence. 

Friends asked me if I could come to their home and be there for the numerous dogs and cats that live with them, so that they could go to their grandchildren's home and have a peaceable celebration there, all masked up. They had not seen their family in a couple weeks. I agreed.  At about 9:30 mayhem began. Fireworks were shot on just about every street in the neighborhood. They were shot in the streets. They were shot at houses. The dogs cowered and shook.  They followed me around when I got up. The cats came indoors and stayed put.  I put on a Led Zeppelin concert film and put the sound up to 90, when I usually can hear at 18, but could still not drown out the noise outside, and so close too. The eruptions were rapid fire.  Large and small, pops, whizzes, explosions - it sounded like a battlefield.

And I thought, "Don't tell me that these people have spent their government stimulus checks on fireworks."  

I wasn't the only one who was thinking this. My friends got back with reports that they had been up the hillside where, looking down, the entire town had erupted. Fireworks, be they illegal from China or illegal from Mexico, be they illegally imported here or brought back from a road trip, are expensive.  Those little poppers and sizzle sticks that are sold legally some places are not expensive, but when you see a bloom of multicolored explosions, that is. They heard one local had spent $1000 on fireworks. It may have cost the asshole down the street who set off what could be a cannon every half hour from 9:30 PM till about 2:30 in the morning, about $500 to screw his neighbors of their sleep. So the questions of where so many people had gotten the money to buy all this, while some people are facing evictions, was in the air.

"Shit," one of my friends said, "I see some of these people in line for free food at the Los Angeles Food Bank, too." 

OK, so let's say that firing off all those fireworks helped people let out their frustration.  But was any of it about PATRIOTISM?  About the love of this country?  The country that is distributing free food and actually has some so called government benefits?

Another friend, a citizen after legally immigrating from Guatemala, shook his head and said, "In my country, all these people would be on the street, begging."

We, the people, as PROTO-Americans, used to throw barrels of tea into the Boston Harbor protesting paying tax to the English, on tea imports.  Now, poor old Christopher Columbus, who did not plan to become famous, apparently has some blame - his statue is thrown in.  

In some cities all those fireworks were used as a cover - to hide the sounds of bullets shot and people murdered.  Baltimore, New York City - I want to think we in Los Angeles are better than that - but I just haven't read any horror news stories about Los Angeles this morning. There are definitely neighborhoods where no one I know wants to live.

I don't care if I ever hear or see another fireworks in my life though I bet I will. The thrill of being a child and being taken to a fairgrounds to watch a thundering display - long gone.  I will not go to Disneyland or Monaco - where people in range are treated to this noise every night.

C 2020 Christine Trzyna
Christine Trzyna BlogSpot - All Rights Reserved

7/1/20

QUIT VOLUNTEERING - I MEAN IT! - Real Reasons Volunteers Quit

QUIT VOLUNTEERING - I MEAN IT! - Real Reasons Volunteers Quit
by Christine Trzyna

I recently treated myself to reading articles on the Internet about how to QUIT volunteering.  Links to some of the most interesting - or infuriating - are below.  You may want to read them to see if something strikes you as truthful about the way you've been thinking and feeling.

Here's the "real reasons" volunteers quit.

1) Some people have the nerve to procure and expect free labor - your talent, skills, education, energy - because they are opportunists and users.  Some even suffer from Narcissistic Personality Disorder.  How dare they put you on a "team" to earn their dream for them? They can manipulate you into doing and giving more than you want to. Stop feeling guilty.  It's their dream.

Some nonprofits are started up by a small group of people and you get it, you'll never be one of them.  Sure they came up with the idea, plotted for months, raised funds, and put their own money into it. Still, what you have given does not matter.  Someone else will come through the door and give as much or more.  Maybe you're aren't able to give money too or kiss the right ass.  Or maybe the plan is that their daughter and son in law inherit the non-profit and make a living from it.

2) "Non-Profits" are rarely all volunteer driven. They do so pay administration, staff, leaders. Some in fact pay their employees quite well and are well aware of what the competing non profits pay. There is such a thing as ground floor opportunities and ways to make your way up into paid employment starting as a volunteer, but rare for one to be completely volunteer driven from day one. Paid staff may suffer the anxiety of wondering if their paid position will be eliminated and be filled by someone who "doesn't need to work." 

Non Profit is sort of a "do gooder" tax exempt status, which is not to say that paid employees don't pay taxes on their salaries.  As a volunteer there may be some things you pay for that are tax deductible, such as special clothing and transportation. Is it enough?  Do you really not need (or desire) to earn money?

If you're doing this to prove you're a dependable employee, give it six months, at most a year, and be seeking paid employment elsewhere the whole time. 

It may become clear to you that their "business plan" has always been unworkable without free labor.

Volunteers who resign cannot count on anyone giving a reference.

3) What attracted you to becoming a free labor - some imagined benefit such as making friends or contacts or plumping up your resume - goes poof!  You are surrounded by others in the very same situation.  Noone is mentoring anyone.  Your peers also have unrealized hopes and cannot help you, so there's no networking.

As for friendships forming, do you have friendships where you work for money, really?  Some volunteer work places run a "tight ship" and what this means is that you get there and work hard.  You may not get breaks or lunch or be able to say no or leave early, and you will not likely actually get to talk to other people and get to know them.  It's a good experience at times to work like a greased machine to accomplish a goal, but taking breaks and having lunch is as necessary where you work for free as where you get paid.  Would they be in trouble for labor violations if they were paying you?

4) The issue, cause, or reason you thought giving of yourself was a good idea proves to be uncomfortable or even ridiculous.  These are not "your people" after all.  You find them extreme, ridgid, or unreasonable.  Maybe you have changed or you learned this about yourself being around them

Example: At a church were one friend donated thousands of dollars, volunteered to mind children at services, headed up the yearly White Elephant Sale, and attended a Bible study, she found herself in a group of women who were so not feminists that they pretty much said that rape, sexual harassment, and so on is a woman's lot in life and that they were studying the Bible to become better Christian (i.e. tolerant of this crap) women.

Example: A friend got involved in a liberal church and found that the ministers were using the pulpit to foster a politically correct world view on multiple issues.  Pretty soon she felt guilty eating meat or using plastic.  She felt alienated. She didn't want anyone telling her how to vote. But what made her quit was when the church, not a cult, but with a clique, decided members should participate in demonstrations and marches.

5) Your goodness, your good will, is being exploited or it requires resistance to avoid being taken advantage of by staff or other volunteers.

Example

A staff member at one non-profit where I volunteered offered my writing and research skills to a stranger who walked in looking for help from them.  Suddenly I had this stranger firing questions at me and expecting me to write her letters, advocate for her, and become her new best friend.  When I told the staff member, who had not even asked me if this would be OK, this was inappropriate, she did not apologize.  I was not writing or researching for his non-profit nor had I taken on any such work for them.  She knew I did this in my personal life, as a living.  Now she intended to exploit my way of earning a living.

At another location, a volunteer, rather than quit herself, brought along her nasty, spoiled, demanding, and infighting grandchildren rather than leave them with her selfish, career driven daughter, and stuck me with them to keep them "entertained." In other words free babysitting because they are just so damn cute!  These brats got in my way physically, rearranged my desk, and the older one treated the younger one like shit in my presence but could I, not being mom or grandma, tell them off?  No.  So I fired these kids.  This did not make me popular.

At another location, a volunteer asked me to do unpaid favors "hey everyone's broke" such as traveling an hour each way to "just feed and walk" his two hounds for several weeks while they were in Europe.  Oh I could also pick up the mail.  Don't you just love people who can afford to travel in Europe for several weeks but can't afford to hire pet care or put their dogs in a kennel?  I said no, offering the business card of a professional.

6) You've started feeling like a human DOING instead of a human BEING.

You didn't want a "punchclock" paid job, which you did back in the day, so you know.  You didn't want the need to attend to personal business, such as going to funerals, having doctors appointments, or taking off because your car needs repaired or you just don't feel well, to be a problem  But it is.  Maybe you never entered into any agreement or understating of the volunteer job in the first place and you need to clarify that.  But occasionally when you don't show up you get an e-mail from some volunteer coordinator admonishing you for it, or you come back and get attitude, or find someone else was assigned to your project because you had to take care of personal business.

7) You started out open minded, enthusiastic, and energetic, but lately you feel drained.  It can be physical, emotional, or psychological. It is not healthy.  Maybe the desk work has turned into a more physical labor that you are just not up to - your back or feet hurt when you get home.  Maybe you explained at the start that you were not up to physical work but that has been forgotten.  Maybe it's that you find it all depressing.  You really wanted to save the world or at least your little part of it, but you see how little impact you've made.  Never mind about throwing pebbles and watching ripples.  Just go.

8) You are expected to but up with boorish, harassing, or illegal behavior from staff, other volunteers, or people they serve.  Sure some people are mentally ill and require understanding, but that hand in your crutch or the theft of your wallet from the locker is not OK.  They fail to put importance on these things and they have no grievance procedure or don't take it seriously.

Example:  I once went by to pick up a friend who was volunteering at a food bank.  One of the other volunteers was giving a lecture to a homeless man about his lack of "appreciation," really berating him.  I looked and there was a box full of half rotten apricots and not even any plastic bags to put your hand in to go through the fruit.  Whomever donated those apricots for a tax deduction should've been ashamed.  Worse, the whole reason for this food bank for the homeless was to provide empathy.  

9) The higher ups don't think lowly volunteers need to be in the information loop.  Decisions effect you and your desire to be there.  You're putting your face and your reputation on their organization.  You have the right to know what direction it's going in, and so much more.  Are they really for the community good or their own egos?  Reassess often.

10) They don't say thank you.  I stayed at one volunteer job long after I should have because there was not a day that I wasn't personally thanked by someone on staff as I was heading out the door. It does matter.

I want to make you aware that there are often Non Profit Porthole type websites run by states or other governmental offices, that will tell you who owns a non-profit, how long they have been around, what they intend to do, and what money they have.  You may be amazed by the great number of nonprofits that have near no money to operate.  Many of your neighbors may have founded non-profits. Check their web sites.  

Here are some articles to read: 

While you read, realize the assumption that you should be volunteering, that it is
your duty to "give back."  







C 2020 Christine Trzyna - Christine Trzyna BlogSpot

6/10/20

BEST SELLING LITERARY AUTHOR STEPHEN KING QUITS FACEBOOK


BBC NEWS TECHNOLOGY : STEPHEN KING QUITS FACEBOOK by Jane Wakefield

Excerpt: Novelist Stephen King has quit Facebook, saying he was uncomfortable with the "flood of false information allowed in its political advertising."  He also said he was not confident the social network was protecting "user's privacy."  He made the announcement on Twitter, where he as 6.5 million followers.

6/8/20

NETFLIX's POLITICALLY CORRECT SERIES "HOLLYWOOD" A FANTASY

I indulged myself in this series, which is supposed to be set in Hollywood after World War II.  I love historically correct exteriors, interiors, clothing (costuming), hairstyles, and so on, so I stuck with it.  It seemed to be an excuse for displaying suggestions of homosexual sex.

I kept thinking about how Netflix often nears pornography and how offended some of our American population is by this; Netflix doesn't care about loosing or offending some viewers. 

Let me save you the time spent watching it.

It was so politically correct it was ridiculously inaccurate.  It was the result of idealistic but ignorant script writing - a clear agenda - not based in historical accuracy.

Let's start with the language.  The young female Black actress talks about herself as a "person of color."  Black people in the 1940's were not called persons of color (to mean anyone not considered to be "white") nor were they called African-American or Black.  They were called Negroes and called themselves Negroes.  Into the 1960's some of the older people still referred to themselves that way.

Then there is a part of dialogue in which the actor refers to "the conversation" using it in the 2020 way.  Nobody in the 1940's thought conversation was anything other than talking to one or more people.

In the fantasy that this series is, feminism and gay liberation as well as racist issues are all part of the plot.  The characters are considered to be heroes and heroines as they move these ideologies forward.  Actually in real life such aspirations started happening twenty or more years in the future.  For instance, female studio executives and studio heads are a result of the thrust of feminism and women's liberation of the 1970's.  But they got it right when they suggested Hollywood was a Jewish-made town and most all of the first stage of female studio executives were Jewish women.

Multiple characters were based on people who are dead and research apparently included tabloids. These characters include Rock Hudson and agent Henry Willson and as characters they are used to give us more sex.

I note that Scotty Bowers, the man who a couple years back wrote the memoir Full Service, about a gas station in Hollywood that was a front for a prostitution service, is named as a character.  I read Scotty's book and he said he never took money for hooking people up, that he did so for pleasure and friendship, but he's portrayed as a failed actor who took a 50% cut.

I guess this is one of the reasons that I'm so focused on documentaries and memoirs. I'm up for some speculation and if a series is clearly labeled fantasy at least I know what I'm in for.  Know those popular posters that have James Dean riding Marilyn Monroe on the back of his motorcycle?  It never happened.  Hollywood - the Netflix series - is like that.


C 2020 Christine Trzyna

6/1/20

BLACK LIVES MATTER BUT LOOTING BURNING and VIOLENCE MAKE PROTESTS A MOOT POINT

I was busy helping a friend garden.  We didn't know that riots had begun, that looting, burning, and destruction had replaced the expectation of a peaceable BLACK LIVES MATTER demonstration around the country.  We didn't know that Los Angeles had an 8 o'clock curfew until well after our meal together, when we turned on the news. Watching the coverage, I was disgusted.  Where was the Black Lives Matter leadership?  Why were individual city mayors speaking up but no-one from Black Lives Matter?

A couple hours later, I got my dog and went to bed. I shut out the lights and was laying back when a boom and bright flash of light zipped past the curtains - a blast aimed between houses that illuminated the room. 

My neighbor is Black.  He has a White wife.  He has a Black son.  They are nice people.  His work van is out at the curb.  Shit!  Was someone in the neighborhood attacking them?

I put the lights back on. Got out of bed. Worried, I opened the front door and looked out for the possible source of the blast.  Across the way a family was having a birthday party. They are Hispanic. There were lots of adults and children over there.  Why wait until past 10:30 at night on a Sunday to set off fireworks?  I watched as a large white blast went up over the street between us flowering into a stadium-worthy sparkler.  Needless to say, this is illegal behavior and insensitive to both Coronavirus-19 and the fact that people were pillaging all over town.  Taking advantage that no police would come. Setting nerves already raw on edge.  What a horrible example for all those children!  Their back yard is small.  What if they had been injured or set my neighbors house on fire?

I was tired from yard work so I slept.

This morning I woke to watch videos of destruction all over the country.  Countless businesses - many small one family businesses - looted or destructed.

I learned that a church in Washington D.C. built in 1815 in which just about every U.S. President has worshipped once, was burned down. I think as a child I toured that church on a trip to Washington D.C.  The Lincoln Monument graffitied?! 
I mean, the LINCOLN Monument!?!  Lincoln, credited for freeing the slaves.

HOW DOES THIS HELPS BLACK LIVES MATTER?

I know the answer. So do you.
It doesn't help whatsoever.  Actually, it's made things worse.

It HURTS the cause.

HOW DOES THIS HELPS THE UNITED STATES ECONOMY?
Did anyone who looted ever intend to BUY what they took?

Well, good luck getting hired.

I saw expensive vehicles pulling up and looters throwing things into trunks and getting in and driving away.

TELL ME HOW SOMEONE WHO CAN AFFORD TO KEEP A CAR can't afford to buy their tennis shoes, their cell phones, their computers?  Because I've been too poor to own a car or buy new shoes and have gone without a personal computer or a phone and I know it's not easy - or cool - but it can be done without resorting to criminality.

SHAME SHAME SHAME SHAME SHAME on YOU! 

For doing it, for helping it, for putting up with it.


C 2020 Christine Trzyna

5/12/20

I PREDICTED JOE BIDEN and KAMALA HARRIS MONTHS AGO

Yes, even though I'm all for Bernie Sanders.  Now that Biden is almost out of the news, and we continue the daily chaos of a horrid Republican administration, with the King and All the Kings Men (and some Women) embroiled in daily antics, all which have given the American people a collective anxiety.

How I wish that Bernie had not "Suspended" his campaign.  Why do we use that language, "Suspended"?  If a student got suspended from high school, it was temporary, meant to discipline the student, but then they came back.  He did not Suspend.  He gave up and quit.

We need to get back to the "conversation" about the election.  Coronavirus-19 makes this especially so.

How I wish our government would go back to the WORKS PROJECT ADMINISTRATION and the CCC's - programs that helped people who wanted to work and earn some money during a Great Depression unemployment rate - survive. 

We have always had to give some consideration to a Vice President candidate - a running mate - and the line of succession.  Because of the virus we need to consider health issues more than ever.  However, we have had DISABLED PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES and DISABLED PRESIDENTS - who had to hide their medical issues at the time - and who still did the job.  Certainly their medical issues had effects on their world view and thinking, but we have no reason to think either was unable to do the job, the way President Trumps behaviors have.

These include President Franklin Roosevelt and President John F. Kennedy.


C 2020 Christine Trzyna

5/7/20

SHE'S ALMOST VEGETARIAN and AS THE CUPBOARD GETS BARE, SHE'S PANICKING : TALKING TO STRANGERS

I wish I could remember the name of the book.  It was about taking chances.  It had a long questionnaire that was based on food preferences.  Since there are certain spices I avoid and a certain food group that I avoid,  which means certain restaurant's I avoid, I took the questionnaire figuring that it would prove what I know about myself, that I'm adverse to risk.  I'm cowardly, I thought.  I was shocked to learn that I actually was as risk-taking as an astronaut.  Never mind motion sickness.

Basically, I got points for actually eating a wide range of foods or being willing to try some of them once.  Over time I've accepted that this is true about me.  Living in a huge city with many ethnic restaurants, I probably have given a lot of different dishes a try, even if I default to Pad Thai.  I've also adapted recipes and learned to cook with ingredients I don't remember from my childhood.  I'm not vegan or vegetarian, but I eat far less meat, and a far smaller range of meat, than my parents.  It is rare for me to have a hot dog or lunch meat or ham.  But if hungry and offered these by a friend, I will eat them.

I believe that bouts of limitation have also resulted in my possibly more expansive food choices.

I had this conversation with one of the most vital senior citizens I've ever met, someone I admire and find myself quite compatible with.

SHE SAID :  "I'm starting to panic.  My cupboards are going bare."

I SAID : I once knew a man who convinced me that I needed to stock up on canned goods.  He said there was only a three day supply of food on the grocery store shelves and that if it got real bad in this city, well, I'd better own a gun to defend my water heater!  After that, every time I went to the store, I bought a couple extra cans of beans or something.  Then one day I wondered what I was going to do with all those cans.

SHE SAID : Me too!  But look!

I opened her big wood cupboard, and what I saw was lots and lots of sauces and dips and condiments along with cans of chili from Trader Joe's.  Some of this stuff is exotic.  And expensive.

I SAID : Well, you know you cook something different every day.  You can utilize whatever it is you have in the cupboard.  No one knows how to use spices like you.

She nodded but pointed to her huge spice rack.  It was half full.

SHE SAID : And my friends leave me fruit picked from their trees on the porch.

She has loquats, grapefruit, oranges, lots of lemons.  Also avocado.

I SAID : Imagine the people who never have anything in their fridge or their cabinets, people who go out to eat most days, meet their friends - they must be going hungry and crazy.  What are they going to do with a sack of dried split peas?

She cut an invention of hers, an upside down pear cake.

SHE SAID : I'm out of whole wheat flour.

I SAID : Well, there's going to be a meat shortage.  Good thing you don't eat much meat.  You won't miss it.

SHE SAID : My son in law just goes to the store for me every two weeks.

I SAID :  No one on this earth better knows what you're willing to eat when he goes to the store.

She will not leave the house to go to a grocery store, even wearing a mask and gloves. When he brings the groceries in paper bags, she lets them sit 3 hours, then takes each item and washes it.  I've been picking up these bags and folding them for her.  Sometimes we leave them out in the sun.

SHE SAID : I'm not used to this.  I'm starting to get worried.

The truth is that this lady does not have a financial problem in her retirement.  She isn't rich, but she has enough, a good roof over her head paid for, many friends who call to check in, a daughter and son in law and grandchildren who love her.  She will not starve.  What she's reacting to is not hunger or malnutrition.  It's that the products she likes are not as available on the shelves at the grocer.

I've long admired this women, also, because unlike some elderly, she is not stuck on eating the same food frequently.  She's not the Duchess of Windsor with her boiled chicken diet.

This really is the time to try new ingredients, new recipes, with whatever you have in your cupboards.  Those who are vegan or vegetarian usually know how to get enough protein in their diets, though I still believe that some people, including me, cannot bodily get enough from a plant-based diet.  Nor do I wish to travel with suitcases of supplements.  Those split peas really are good for soups and to add to mashed potato to make fritters.  From all reports we American will not run out of apples or potatoes too soon.

C 2020 Christine Trzyna



4/30/20

DREAM A LITTLE DREAM : ARE YOU HAVING NIGHTMARES? I AM

I read that I'm not unusual for the times.  People are sleeping badly and having unusual dreams, some of them nightmares.  We are also, probably, remembering dreams more because we don't have to set an alarm clock.

I've tried to keep to a normal schedule and get out at least five days a week for a walk of about a mile in the sunlight and air.  It's actually been a very beautiful spring.  The air is good.  The sky is exceptionally blue.  There are clouds.  These things are special in Southern California.

I have my dog who is now a slower, aging dog, as well.  The soothing and stroking I give her should be therapeutic and she's an excellent excuse for being outside.  I love her.

I've gone into my sewing supplies and hand stitched a few masks.  I hate wearing them because I feel that the air I'm breathing in is probably more of my own exhaled air than usual.  Maybe that's a factor in feeling that I'm actually fighting depression and tears.  Out the door I go with my face swathed in one of my obviously hand-made masks.  Taking suburban streets means that I'm not encountering many other humans and can lift the mask to actually breath the good air.

Yesterday I shampooed and conditioned my dog.  She slept soundly after that.  She ate her dinner while I had mine. 

Last night I had a wonderful and nutritious dinner.  Kale salad.  An omelet with some good cheese melted inside.  Nuts. I slipped her a teaspoon of the omelet.

When I went to bed, I heard a helicopter circling around the neighborhood to one side of me.  Someone with an app that tells you what's going on with the circling helicopter told me it was about a car theft.  Let's just say that the neighborhood the helicopter was over has a couple banks but few cars worth stealing.  Unless you've gone Coronavirus-19 Crazy.  These helicopters are extremely expensive to operate and are usually taken out for murderer on foot.  I figured that the news of a car theft on this app of hers was either wrong or there's so little crime right now that they thought they'd take up a helicopter to stay in practice.  This helicopter also circled for at least two hours, maybe three.  Tell me how long it takes for a car thief to park and get out of a car.

I lay there trying to sleep. I got up and went out the front door and looked into the sky to see the copter.  Yea, it was black and white - police.

Around 4:30 in the morning I awakened to my dog heaving all over the sheets.  I could tell without putting on the lights that this was no small heave.  I took her into my arms and put her outside a while.  She went out but seemed, well, hangdog.  When she came back in she drank a lot of water.  Then she threw up on the floor.  Another expansive puddle.

I didn't think I would get back to sleep and I did not.  My dog was sick.  She threw up like a human does with food poisoning.  Repeatedly.

As the dawn made it's way into the bedroom window, I got up to look for rags, and begin what turned into a half a day clean up, locating puddles of throw up on various floor surfaces, mopping with rags, trying to at least soap the areas for sanitation.  I removed sheets and padding and blankets from the bed.  I had to hand scrub the puke before putting into the washing machine. I noticed that the 4:30 heave must have been explosive.  Some was on the wall and more on the floor.  It contained a lot of undigested chunks of kibble as well as some digested.  Oh, Lord.

I got depressed.

Last week I'd called the vet to see about a possible flea shot and was told that they were closed until further notice.  This is no time to try to locate an open vet, who is also a more expensive and unfamiliar vet.

I got on line to look for a home remedy.  Luckily I had a small container of goat milk in the fridge and I gave her a small amount, followed by a tiny bit of kibble.
I held her in my arms and moved her bed, freshly made, near where I sat, looking for a good documentary for later.  She finally settled in.

The whole time thought I was thinking about the horrible dream I was having and woke from at 4:30.  I was on line looking for dream interpretations.

In my dream appeared an old friend I haven't seen in years, a person who I know a lot about that I would probably never tell anyone, but who turned his life around from the time I knew him.  He is, I hear, probably the most successful person, at least financially, in his graduating class.  When he appeared, seeming to visit me, I felt emotional, rather honored.  There was a lot of chaos in the form of people I didn't know moving around in the setting, but I was conscious that I was carrying some items close to my chest, a couple notebooks or ledgers of some sort which I knew were important, my cell phone (which is turned off), and a pair of shoes I own which are extremely comfortable but dilapidated sandals (that need to be replaced as soon as I can go shoe shopping) as well as a pair of strappy sandals with chunky two inch heels, obviously new, and bright gold.  My old friend hands me a crisp new $100 bill which I don't want to take. 

I somehow know this is a dream but there are mental processes involved such as awareness of my emotions, which become less enthusiastic about this meet up when I realize that it will be no more than this interaction, that he cannot hang out. He just lost $2000 this day at his business.  Take the money.  Don't want to.  But it's not much money to him.  But he just lost $2000.  He has no time.  I tell him, "but I just sent you a gift and now you are giving it back!"  Am I shamed into taking the hundred? Are we even? He has to go?

He leaves me disappointed. In this chaos I first realize I lost the cell phone.
I then realize I lost the important papers.  Finally, I see that the floor is flooding and that one of the gold shoes is floating away.  I have one gold shoe and the dilapidated sandals still close to my chest. 

Have at it as you will.

According to various internet resources about dreams, this dream is all bad news, especially about financial loses, and loosing direction.  A symbol of great financial success only wants to pay me a brief visit.

How did I create this dream?

It is, not unusual for the times though.

Now I'm going on my walk.


C 2020  Christine Trzyna
All Rights Reserved