What is currently bringing meaning to your life?
Ladybear
Blogging and OUR sharing experiences.
I enjoy doing the daily QnR because it challenges me.
I try to come up with an answer that might inspire,
pass on world news, help to figure something out,
encourage or spread some positive energy.
This full Gaia network brings meaning to my life.
Everyday.
Thanks for that, Siona, Team, and Gaian's.
Access: PublicPhyllis Schlafly Anti Feminist gets degree
Ladybear
Washington University Law Professors: Rescind Honorary Degree For Anti-Feminist Phyllis Schlafly
Washington University recently announced that it would be awarding right-wing activist
Phyllis Schlafly an honorary degree at its graduation ceremony on May 16.
She got her degree today.
Schlafly is notorious for her outspoken belief that women should be homemakers and her opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment. In a statement, the university lauded Schlafly as a “national leader of the conservative movement.”
Opposition was swift. Two Facebook groups opposing the award immediately popped up and now have more than 4,000 members combined. Today, 14 faculty members of the Washington University School of Law also wrote a sharp letter asking school’s chancellor to rescind the award:
We are extremely disappointed that the University has chosen to honor Phyllis Schlafly with an honorary degree at this spring’s commencement ceremony.
We are fully committed to the principle of free speech, and we believe the University should encourage a discussion of diverse viewpoints. Commencement, however, is first and foremost a time of celebration of the intellectual accomplishments of our students. It is, we believe, a disservice to those whom we honor to inject into the proceedings a person who has devoted her life to staking out and promoting polarizing, anti-intellectual positions.
An even more important reason to rescind the degree offer to Ms. Schlafly is that her repeatedly expressed views are antithetical to some of the most fundamental principles for which this University stands.
As the professors note, Schlafly’s accomplishments include going after
“the gay and lesbian agenda,” calling for the “impeachment” of Supreme Court justices,
calling anyone who believes in evolution an “atheist,” and opposing the Violence Against Women Act. She has also claimed that women “are too emotional to handle intellectual or scientific debate” and described sex education as “in-home sales parties for abortions.”
E-mail Washington University Chancellor Mark Wrighton here to object to the Schlafly award. (Be polite.)
What are you drawn to in others?
Ladybear
I have no problem meeting & connecting with people.
I meet them in elevators, (a man thought I was a hooker
at The Marriott Marquis in New York a few years ago because I started to talk to him!)
I talk to people on the street, in stores.
Where ever I go I meet people and can be drawn to them if they
respond to me.
Say Hello & off we go into each others lives.
HOORAH!!! California Supreme Court Rules for Gay Marriage!
Ladybear
California Supreme Court Rules Gay Marriage OK
sfgate.com —
California's cautious and moderately conservative Supreme Court ruled today that same-sex couples should be permitted to marry, rejecting state marriage laws as discriminatory. In a 4-3 decision, the justices said the state's ban on same-sex marriage violates the "fundamental constitutional right to form a family relationship."
What's easy for you?
Ladybear
Some of my friends are hoarders, so much stuff you have to walk on a path
just to get through the house. There is clutter everywhere.
I have no problem with letting go of stuff.
I've had alot of experience in life to let go and
I'm a generous person, so I've given alot of stuff away.
In the 90's I had a business of resale. Going to yard sales and then working the
flea markets with the collectibles I found.
That taught me to let go of stuff.
The sad feeling I would get when I went to an estate sale made me end that business.
Going through someone's house, their closets, personal bathroom items, kitchen stuff,
having dealers haggle over a price for an item.
Something that meant something to that human being.
That showed me I never want that to happen to me.
We spend the first 1/2 of our lives gathering stuff
& the second 1/2 trying to get rid of it.
Let go of the old stuff, there's always new stuff just around the corner!
Direct Link on youtube
Here!What do you like best about birthdays?
Ladybear
Real New York Italian Rum Cake
with cannoli & custard filling, whipped cream frosting
& sliced almonds on the sides!
HaPpY BiRtHdAy!
Mama Mia
Ladybear
My Mother was a complex person.
She had a very bad childhood, only went as far as 8th grade,
but was street smart & physically beautiful.
She used this beauty to survive in her life, especially in her younger years.
At 16 she went into Manhattan, changed her name & began working for
The Harry Conover Modeling Agency.
She was a cover girl, worked for Vogue, was the Esso gasoline ration stamp girl
during the war & mostly did photo spreads in the old McCall's Magazine.
My brother has her portfolio, but the photo above is from her first set of proof photos,
taken on Park Avenue & 57th St., circa 1943 i'd guess.
She met my father, a US Air Corps Officer,
they married, and 2 weeks before my birth,
he was killed in a military plane crash. I found this photo of his plane wreckage on line.
So here she is, uneducated, 19 1/2 years old, with newborn daughter.
She marries a family friend's brother, who raised me as his own in New Jersey.
I had a normal happy childhood, until one day when I was 11.
I came home from school to find the living room filled with men in silk suits.
They were celebrating my mother's father release from "being away".
If you've ever seen the movie Max Duggan Returns,
that is pretty much what it was like for me!
All of a sudden we had a lot of money,
my mother & grandfather were spending more time together,
the man that raised me was out,
and I had to adjust to a new life with a mother that was drinking everyday.
My mother suffered in her life, and she made other people suffer by the choices she made.
She tried to be good to me, but the alcohol made her do bad things.
A bit of Mrs. Robinson with my boyfriends when I was in high school.
She always thought she was part of my friend's group, because she was in her prime
at 35 when I was 15.
She could never seperate my friend's & mistakenly thought they were her friend's.
Which some people loved, but not me.
My mother was the hottest babe in town.
She finally settled down when I was 19, but the drinking never stopped.
The cigarettes & alcohol finally killed her in 2004.
She had a child with the man she married when I was 19, my brother.
That created a new family for her and I reminded her of the bad old days.
As I got older & wiser, she resented me more.
She was afraid of me, because I knew all of her darkest secrets and she was afraid
I would tell.
She died an unhappy & bitter person. I can only hope that in death she found peace.
When her corpse was on her death bed, I placed my hand on her head & heart
and silently prayed blessings of Chenrezig.
She tried her best I guess.
She taught me to be strong & not to take any crap from people.
To always watch out & protect myself & to always have some money in my pocket.
Those lessons have served me well in my life.
After it was all said and done,
as she laid on the gurney in the funeral home basement,
last thing I said as I walked out alone was...
Thank You, Ma.
It always bugged her that I called her Ma.
Give this song a listen, It's really something. Direct Link HERE
What would you choose to make a film about?
Ladybear
Utopia
Woodstock Nation!
I didn't make it, but I made it into the film.
Right after Sha Na Na and right before Joe Cocker.
That's me, right at the beginning with the headband on wearing the yellow shirt.
Direct Link HERE
Click the small photo of me at Woodstock to read my story about being there.
QaR
May 2008