Category: the personal side

February 14th, 2017, A Tribute to True Love

Posted on by D. L. Keur

I’m in love. I have been for decades. Oh, yeah. In love with life–that, too–but I mean with the man who is my husband, Forrest Wayne Lineberry. For years, after a very ugly divorce, due to the bills that divorce wound up ladling upon me, we lived in a space that measured 14×18. Feet. It included one tiny bathroom with a shower, one tiny kitchen, and the bedroom/living room. Two cats, three birds, a hamster, a frog and a tercel in an aquarium, plus a 55 gallon fish tank filled with very old, very long-lived fish resided there with us. My horses and livestock didn’t. The horses I boarded. The livestock went to Dad’s.

To say we were poor is an understatement. Still are. The divorce took everything and more. (Yes, I got screwed, having hired an attorney who was honorable, while my ex- hired one who was Machiavellian, more the fool me.)  The divorce took my relationship with my father, as well, a man who, because of his Dutch Reform upbringing, believed marriage was for life, never mind any abuse.

Anyway, I fell in love. With my bodyguard. If you ever want to know about that, watch the movie, The Bodyguard, starring Whitney Houston and Kevin Costner.  Except, unlike that movie, the bad guy wanting to do me harm wasn’t some wacko or some jealous relative, but rather the man divorcing me. I wasn’t a wealthy, successful singer with a beautiful voice, and Forrest was only a skilled martial artist, not a trained ex-Secret Service man.  Oh, yeah.  And, in the end, we stayed together.

I’m wishing for you all the same love and commitment we have with and for each other–a cherishing–in your relationship with your significant other. There really is no substitute for it. So, find it, keep it, and don’t ever settle for less, no matter what you have to give up.

Sincerely,

Me.

 

February 13th, 2017

Posted on by D. L. Keur

Twice a day, a flurry of activity breaks the peace and solitude. Livestock squeals, bawls, and whinnies. Dogs bark. Cats yowl. Diesel engines rumble. Then, the frenzy passes, and, for the most part, quiet returns, broken only occasionally by the shriek and rhythmic clucking of a hen announcing her successful laying of an egg.  It’s late winter, here, the unbroken snow fields where animals don’t roam waist deep in snow.

Today, sunshine bathes the land, delighting eyes weary of the past week’s storms. Birds sing and peep, crows and ravens cackle, happy for reprieve. A moose wanders by, still chewing on leaves and branches stolen from the rhododendrons.  She adores them this time of year, those and the twigs and branches stripped from the aspens and the maples by the ice storm than followed last week’s heavy snows.

Inside the house, faintly you can hear the washing machine cycle through its rinse and spin, rinse then spin, again, while, outside, you hear metal pounding metal and the occasional muttered oath when that pounding falters. Somebody’s smacked their thumb, again, while driving in a latch pin.

A while later, chains clank as a tractor rumbles up the track to park inside the shed. The engine dies.

Footsteps clomp upon the porch.  Chores done, it’s time to get to work up in the office.  It’s Monday morning in North Idaho.

Last week’s snow

Can Walk Like a Human

Posted on by D. L. Keur

Two weeks back, I was sprinting. On concrete. Didn’t see a rock, as eyes were looking ahead, not down. Shod foot landed off-square on stray rock. Something gave. Bad.

I didn’t go down, but I definitely dropped instantly to ‘walk’. Walk was hobble, though. Knew there was trouble. It was the same leg that got injured two years back by being banged into sideways by a very large, happily exuberant boar.  Same leg my Aussie shepherd banged into an re-injured it, mid-way healed, the same year.

“Yup.” Mumbled jargon. Typing. “It’s gonna take a good six weeks to heal. Ice, elevate, rest. No work for two weeks. None. Then gentle walking. Only.  Wear a support when upright. You have crutches, I see.  Okay. See you in two weeks.”

Sigh.  For me, that meant begging and hiring in help.

And I hate sitting on my ass, except to write or create artwork.

And, now, two and a half weeks later, I’m walking like a human, again. Oh, it’s not all the way healed, but it’s healed enough that I impressed everyone when I walked in for a recheck.

“Mild work, no heavy chores.”

Of course, I nod.  Then grin.

He grins back. He knows me. Shakes his head. Types on the keyboard. “See you next time.”

At least I can get rid of the temporary help and stop sitting around in front of the computer for most of the day.  There’s work to do and winter’s coming.

 

EVENING UPDATE: Well, bum knee and all, I made my walk tonight, me and Laddie. I managed 3 mph. Usually, I do a mile in 12 minutes walking, but, for a first time out since I tweaked that knee, I figure doing a mile in 20 minutes is pretty good, since it’s over 4 inch rocks that are tricky to navigate with both legs sound. But, yeah, I did wear a leg brace and, yeah, I did feel it grumble a few times.

 

The Start of Today

Posted on by D. L. Keur

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I wake up, refreshed and looking forward to a productive, happy day. The air outside brings joy. The wind brings a freshening. The sky is bright and overcast, feeling of potential storminess. It’s wonderfully invigorating.

Downstairs, I clean up the usual disasters from my mom’s misfit dogs. I clean her bathroom, so, when the CNA arrives to give her her shower, there’s no trace, no sight or smell, of Mom’s bad habits. I change her bedding once the CNA has her in the shower. Done, I grind coffee and set the 40 cup percolator to doing it’s job…after having drained the last of the previous batch into my carafe.

I head upstairs to my office. My cell phone rings. It’s Forrest, the love of my life. Unfortunately, hubs is Mr. Grumpkin, today. He spilled his coffee.

I suggest a different cup. (Because, damn it, he’s always spilling his coffee, though I don’t mention that.)

He gets grumpier, bellowing at me that he doesn’t need my advice.

Okay. Sorry.

Silence.

I share tidbits about his favorite cat’s antics. I mention some of the latest discoveries in science. I talk about one of his pet interests, our music project.

Silence.

It’s a non-conversation. I tell him so, beg off, and end the call.

He’s on vacation, starting Saturday. I think I’m going to have to find another place to stay for those eight days he’s going to be home. I really do.

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Resolve to be Kind

Posted on by D. L. Keur

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I have an aversion to cruelty. I especially have an aversion to cruelty perpetuated by humans. I think it, not just unnecessary, but the true evil, the only real evil–sentient-made and sentient-perpetuated.

We humans don’t need to perpetuate cruelty/evil. We don’t need to embrace and accept it, much less applaud it.  Yet, we do. And, while I very much understand the underlying factors which contribute to the behavior, I refuse to give credence to any permissive-minded excusing of it.

No.

As sentient beings, we humans have choice–a choice to refuse to act out our fear-based hatreds and craving-based greeds. We have a choice to be kind or cruel in any circumstance. And we have an obligation to be kind, not cruel. To ourselves and to all other entities, sentient and insentient. To do otherwise, to choose cruelty over kindness, condemns us in our own self, by our own memories–etched in our brains, our cells, even our DNA, to self-condemnation.

You can scoff. You can cry out that your personal savior, be that Jesus or some other, will wash away your every sin and you are forgiven. But the fact of your deeds is indelibly scribed, and while your personal savior might forgive you, you remember and, by your every cruelty, will self-condemn.

Now, psychologists will argue that self-condemnation requires conscience, and conscience is determined by cultural conditioning and neurology. They will point out that cultural norms define what is and what is not identified as cruel, as bad or good. They will point out that the sociopath has no conscience.

Right and wrong, according to psychology, is relative, yet science identifies a moral generator that develops in primates and in human children, the latter beginning at the age of four, despite culture and upbringing–a sense of fairness, scientists call it. It’s genetically ingrained, probably rooted in evolution of the species. Regardless, it exists and can be measured. It’s very much past time that we employ it for our own peace of mind and for the betterment of ours and every other living thing’s existence. To do less, even if conscience must be learned, as in the case of the sociopath, is to condemn yourself and the human species as truly, remorselessly evil.

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