This morning I awoke to find a stranger on my couch.  At first, I thought it was one of my children wrapped in a blanket but then I realized two things: they had gone to their own beds before me the previous night, and both had red hair--quite different from the blond highlights peeking out of the top of the blanket. The dog, sleeping on the floor beneath the body, was unconcerned and wagged her tail affectionately at me as I let her outside. Huh.

I peered at the body. Female. Blond hair. The ripped knee of a pair of jeans declared itself from the edge of the blanket. I went down a mental list of known blond hair acquaintances who might have business entering my house and sleeping on my couch unannounced.  All reside in another state. I looked again, closer. Nope. No clue. Huh.

Returning to the bedroom, I nudge my husband.  "There is a stranger sleeping on our couch," I say.  He leaps up. "What?" I repeat myself.
"Male or female?" he asks, alarmed, pulling on a t-shirt and jeans.
"Female," I reply.
"Really?"
"I can't make this up."

We walk down the hall into the living room.  She's still there, curled up and content like Goldilocks must have been in the just right bed. He peers at her with interest, then looks at me. Wonderment. "What the hell?" he whispers.  I shrug and shake my head.

We take a collective minute to stare at her.
"What do we do?" still whispering. I shrug and shake my head.

A quick survey shows no shoes, no coat, no open doors. Just a literal Goldilocks on our couch.

I wake my son from his basement slumber.  "Don't want to judge or anything, but do you know why there is a blond girl sleeping on the couch upstairs?"

Wide-eyed, he replied, "She was in here last night! She was wandering through the basement and came into my room.  I told her to get the hell out!"

"Okay.... and?"

"I walked her upstairs and put her out the door."

"And then you went back to bed?"

"Yeah."

"Really?"

"Well, what was I supposed to do?"

An obvious list of supposed to dos immediately entered my head. Later, I think to myself. Goldilocks first.

"She said something about R*?" he adds. " She seemed really drunk. Maybe she's in the wrong house?"

I relay the information to my husband. Not wanting to disturb our guest, he grabs the phone and goes into the garage to call the neighbor.  A minute later, he returns laughing, shaking his head. "R* will be over in a minute."

True to his word, a moment later the soon-to-be college graduate humbly knocks on the front door to claim his friend. Thirty seconds later, sock-footed Goldilocks and the neighbor were gone. Grateful she found a safe landing and suffered no harm in her wanderings, we were left with laughter and several questions, mainly: What the hell?

How in the hell did a stranger get into my house not once but twice without us hearing her?  Why in the hell did my 16 year old son not wake us when a stranger was found in our house. How in the hell did he just go back to sleep after discovering said stranger? How in the hell are you so drunk (or whatever) that you can ambulate well enough around (closing doors behind you) but not know where you are or belong? But the biggest, and I mean biggest question is this: How the Hell does a stranger come wandering into and around your house at 2 am and your faithful dog NOT MAKE A SOUND?  Why the hell does my dog come UNHINGED when the big brown UPS truck stops by the driveway but remain silent when a stranger enters my home in the middle of the night, preferring instead to curl up next to her?

As of today, the dog, the seven-year-old toe-breaking wiggle-butting Border Collie we call Jett (commonly known as DD or Dork Dog (for obvious reasons once met) has acquired a new name: WD for Worthless Dog...or maybe it should more specifically be WWD for Worthless WatchDog.

And we're going to start locking our doors.

Dear God

Dear God,

We have broken
the planet
that you created
for us

and which you
endowed with such
beauty and mystery.

Forgive us.
We are shitheads
so greedy and
so shortsighted.

Dear Important People,

Dear God,

We have broken
the planet
that you created
for us

and which you
endowed with such
beauty and mystery.

Forgive us.
We are shitheads
so greedy and
so shortsighted.

On love, life and toxins

My older sister has a couple of blood clots in her brain. Well, not really "in" the brain, but in a couple of veins that run along the superficial areas of the brain--or so I've been told. One vein, behind her left ear, is completely blocked. Another vein, running the length of her head from front to back, is 80% blocked. She's in pain, and therefore on pain medications. And she has blood clots in her brain and therefore is in the hospital on a cocktail of blood thinners. One week down, and there's no change in the clots. Stubborn, just like her. There is no clear indication when something might change--for better or worse--and so she waits. The family waits. Friends wait.

Any kind of life-threatening condition is likely to transform a person. My sister is no different. Forced to be still and take help from others, she has discovered the love people have for her and maybe found a little bit more love for herself. Family and friends come together to pray. Those who can, visit; those who can't send flowers and cards. Everyone shares stories about their own experiences. We all feel vulnerable and wonder: "if it can happen to her, it could happen to me..." We think: "What would I do if..." We make a note to hug our kids more, to thank our parents, to say I Love You, and to be grateful for the things we take for granted. And we ask, "How?"

I'll tell you how. Hormones. Especially the fake ones we consume--knowingly or unknowingly--that manipulate our bodies. 10 years ago, my mother spent several weeks in the hospital because of painful and dangerous blood clots in her legs that were finally attributed to the Hormone Replacement Therapy she had been taking for menopause. This is no surprise now, as the therapy has been deemed too dangerous for most women for that very reason. My sister hadn't been on HRT, but she had been on birth control for many, many years--most recently the patch. This is the same product used by millions of women every day to control periods and prevent pregnancy. The same product that when you listen to the advertisements rather than watch the happy pictures on the screen; or when you read the product insert that lists contraindications and side effects, warns that blood clots are a risk factor for taking hormones--especially for women over 35.

When I talked to my sister last night--the first time since her admission to the hospital--she expressed concern for her daughter, our younger sister and other family members who might be using birth control and could be similarly affected because of genetic predisposition. The benefits no longer outweigh the harm. Her diagnonsis of Sagittal Sinus Thrombosis and the attributed cause--birth control pills--is not a guess or supposition. All the doctors working on her case agree: her life-threatening blood clots are caused by hormones.

Now my sister talks about her need to avoid food and products that mimic estrogen and could exacerbate her condition. Even natural foods like soy, coffee, and sunflower seeds can increase estrogen. But there are less "natural" and even more pervasive things to worry about: Bisphenol-A (BPA) which has been in the news a lot lately, parabens used in personal care products, pesticides and herbicides, PCBs and PBDEs (flame retardants used in furniture) are all KNOWN estrogen mimickers or hormone disruptors. It makes you think even more about the milk you drink (laced with rGBH) and the meat you eat (laden with growth hormones and antibiotics). We get this shit everywhere--in everything we eat, drink, and touch. And we wonder why so many people are sick and crazy.

The more you dig into the problem of persistent hormones in our environment and bodies, the easier it is to see the connection to girls reaching puberty at 10, women being unable to conceive, obesity, and increased rates of and severity of depression and anger. They're all linked to and controlled by hormones.


My sister sits in a hospital bed waiting for blood clots to slowly break down. There's not much else she can do. In the meantime, she's spreading the word about the very real risks of birth control and learning ways to limit her exposure to the hormones that are causing so many problems. I figured I'd do the same. Rather than send a vase of flowers, I'm going to plant some seeds. Help me out, won't you?

Check out this website for some good basic information on estrogen in everyday products.
http://www.annieappleseedproject.org/chemfoodhert.html

Six Easy Steps to Avert the Collapse of Civilization

Words and phrases are scribbled on scratch pieces of paper all over my house and on the backs of notebooks stuffed in drawers. There's even napkins in my van with some aphorism worth remembering--at another time.

Here's some I rediscovered this morning while performing an archaeological dig on my desk.

"Six Easy Steps to Avert the Collapse of Civilization!" Screamed the headline from the e-newsletter. Now I'm not altogether convinced that civilization is actually going to collapse, but I thought I'd take a peek so that I could make my contribution to society. I only had to wade through ten pages of text to find them. And I didn't take the time. Damn. Now civilization will collapse all because of my inability to decipher six. easy. steps. When the end comes, look me up; I'll take the blame.

I guess I just go fry me up some Kitchen Kleen Potatoes that are
"Certified Environmentally Grown," according to the bag. While I'm not sure exactly what that means, I'm sure I'm supposed to think that being "environmentally grown" makes these potatoes much better than those I can dig out of my own garden. Aren't all things grown in the environment? and who certifies the environment? God? Monsanto? Never mind. I shouldn't be thinking for myself, I know.

Maybe I'll just go to the movies for some mindless distraction. There's a new 3D movie in town. I'll take my kids to the matinee so it'll be cheaper: only $7.50 each plus an additional $2.50 each to cover the cost of 3D technology. When we get inside, I splurge on the "couples special" which will give me 2 medium drinks and a medium popcorn for only $16.50. We can share. I'm sure that I'll be so inspired by the movie I'll want to come back often, so I think I'll beat those high prices and "invest" in a refillable popcorn tub for only $15.00. That way, when I come back (with my tub) I'll only have to pay $2.00 for each refill. Total cost for two hours of mindless distraction: around $60. What a bargain.

I think I may have discovered the reason our civilization is going to collapse:
1) We make things more complicated than we need to
2) We have abdicated our right to individual thought and individual action and given it to a corporation
3) We spend more than we have for things we don't really need and think it's a bargain

I could come up with my own six easy steps to avoid the collapse of civilization, but I'd be interested to hear what others think. Readers? Any suggestions?