24/7

From the "Only in Texas" files comes Pole Dancing for Jesus . It seems to me that some things should remain sacred. And some things that aren't, shouldn't. Regardless of your views on Jesus--mortal or immortal--he just doesn't seem like the type of guy that anyone should be polishing chrome for. Isn't it the life-long goal of most fathers to keep their daughter's off the pole? Don't get me wrong. I think pole dancing can be fun, sexy and great for a wide range of muscle groups. But it's a sad state of affairs if the only way you can rationalize studio time is by declaring Jesus your sanctioning body. As Americans, we need to do a lot more work toward embracing sexuality. What I'm questioning is the productivity of wrapping the pole in the shroud of Jesus.

The Partner feels about cable news the same way he feels about reality television and speed limits. They exist because people are not willing--or in some cases, able--to think for themselves. Also, they have bad taste. I used to have a compulsive cable news habit. At work, I could be found at any given time on either the CNN.com, Foxnews .com or MSNBC .com exit of the Information Superhighway. At home, the themed breaking-news beat of the second Iraq war was a soundtrack to life in the small beige and white apartment (with pink bathroom) where I resided as a recent college graduate. The Partner married me despite this character flaw and was heartened to see that the birth of our first child brought to an abrupt end my interest in the world around me. I could no longer endure stories about death, terror and/or global warming. I retreated under the rock of new parenthood to the place where many others in similar circumstances navigated dark, labyrinthine passages that reverberated with i...

She's five now, but we haven't had enough time to realize how much she knows. She's almost four feet of feelings, but we forget. Like this afternoon, when I shouted to The Partner in his home office about the nearby shooting in which at least nine people were killed. "The guy killed nine people," I shouted. "Did you know?" "Yeah, I heard that," he said. I went back to the Hartford Courant article laid out on my computer screen. I read about the disgruntled employee of the largest Budweiser distributor in the state. He was, allegedly, a "disciplinary problem." I didn't hear The Boss come up behind my scratchy swivel-chair on wheels. "Tell me it's not coming here," she said. "Tell you what's not coming here?" I asked, hoping she was talking about something different. She does that a lot. But she looked at me knowingly. Then she pulled her hand across her throat, pointer finger out, making a sucking sound ...

All day "America" has been uttered in tones of reverence that haven't been heard for a long time. There's pride where it had depleted to almost non-existent levels. The United States, in its constant forward stride, has evolved more freely, fully and fast than many dared dream. When I woke up this morning I did not know it would be to a feeling of national security. I thought I'd be afraid that the president-elect would not make our defense enough of a priority, that he wouldn't be tough enough, that he couldn't be hard if he had to be. And maybe I still think those things. But what I didn't expect to experience was the overwhelming sense of safety that comes from being truly united. It's not that no harm can befall us; it's that we won't fall if it does. Today, Obama as a decision maker seems less historic to me than Obama as a man. He has pulled jagged and disjointed edges of our map into a well-rounded swell on the globe. After 9/11, I f...

So this is what it's like to be the elephant in the momosphere. I'm leather folds of gray tonnage lumbering across a landscape filled with more sprightly and adaptable beasts of burden. All around me hind quarters are kicking up a chorus line. There is so much braying that I couldn't hear a hoo if I wanted to. It's a grand caravan. It's a high flying party. I may be bringing up the rear, but I'm heading toward change just the same. And do you know what? We're all leaving the same trail. Everyone poops , my friends. Everyone poops.

I am plagued by frogs. There's a croak beneath each footfall once I step outside the house. As The Partner mows the lawn, I can picture the wet, green whir under the deck of his antique Gravely. I'm disgusted. I just want to sit outside and read. I don't want to scratch my scalp repeatedly in fear of the frog-itch as I hug my knees to my chest on a chair. I'd like to recline beneath the mild sun that still, even after noon, feels damp from the previous night's dew. I can't relax. I start to wonder about other plagues. Layoffs. Chemicals in plastic baby bottles. Foreclosures. Pesticides in my leafy greens. This is why I don't watch current events on TV anymore. It's irrational and alarmist, but that's me. I'm too affected by BREAKING NEWS. And it's all BREAKING NEWS these days. If I see death and devastation in backyard frogs, I see the apocalypse on CNN. And now back to your regularly scheduled programming. ___

It was the same damn sky. I left the driveway in my car as a fusion of Over the Rainbow and What a Wonderful World came on the satellite radio. The overall effect of high blue and a gentle warble atop the ukulele should've inspired something like contentment, but instead I listened closely to the lyrics for a meaning I could relate to. It was right there. I didn't have to wait long. The wonderful world over the rainbow is a dream. Before I got into the car I watched a ceremony and fed the baby. Then I drove to book club, where a group of us sat for two hours discussing things like organic food, the ubiquitousness of corn , and too many roosters in my friend's coop. Afterward I tooled over to the gas station to put $55 onto my credit card for transmittal to the Gulf. Soon after my day began--at home, while the baby ate, at ten till nine--a young woman was reading the As on the alphabetical list of victims from the Twin Towers. Z did not come till I returned home, ten minut...

So my name is a footnote in American legal history, which I'm perversely kind of proud of. I don't want to go around describing myself as a 'groundbreaker' or a 'difference-maker' because I'm not and I wasn't. But I contributed to people who were saying things that weren't supposed to be said. - George Carlin Last night I dreamed that the president was assassinated. When I woke up, it turned out George Carlin was the one who died. To me, there are few personalities as interesting and important as those found in the footnotes of American legal history as they pertain to the first amendment. Larry Flynt. Howard Stern. George Carlin. They're interesting (love 'em or hate 'em) because of the things they say. They are important because they said them. Each one made an indelible mark on freedom of speech by constantly pushing the envelope containing the letter of the law. If George Carlin's legacy was humor, it would've been enough. Bu...

We live downwind of a nuclear power facility. At The Partner's day job, the employees are given potassium iodide pills in case of catastrophe (as if one anti-radiation pill is going to help). On a main roads near Tiger Lily, there is a sign that says "Evacuation Route." I saw that for the first time and said, "oh." I rationalized our proximity to the beach (not so proximate, when you think about it) and pictured a flood. It wasn't until we held our first little get-together over dinner at our new house with some locals that we disocovered the evacuation route was, in fact, the road from nuclear meltdown to complete chaos. It does not make sense to live in fear. I know that. Que sera, sera. But the line between emotional baggage and rational thinking is a thick border crossing not easily traversed. I have a bullshit backpack strapped on ( it's Threat Level Orange, with a reflector strip) and sometimes it feels heavier than others, but it's always ther...

"We have lost the sense of peace that comes with learning." ~ Zenobia Hikes, Virginia Tech's vice president of student affairs My four breathtaking years in the blue ridges of Virginia were colored by freedom and discovery. They were infused with low mountain air recycled in the exhale of less than a thousand women undergraduates at one of the last remaining estrogen strongholds in the south. On that insulated campus, some found peace. Some found themselves. Some, like me, found a piece of themselves that they would only come to understand later. But almost all of us felt safe to search. The following is a message from my alma mater, Hollins University , in Roanoke, Virginia: Hollins University joins colleges and universities across the nation and around the world in extending our thoughts and prayers to the students, faculty and staff of Virginia Tech, and in expressing our deepest condolences to the loved ones of those killed or injured during the horrific events of A...

I woke up this morning as wordless as the day before. I watched the news. I unfolded the newspaper. Sentiments swirled. Then dark, tiny print gave way to the color of the comic section. The Family Circus cartoon of the day featured Dolly, with pencil in hand and and two neat pages of letters spread out before her. Her mouth was an oval of concern as she spoke these words: "I know all my letters. Now, how do I line 'em up to say something?" Dolly, that's exactly what I want to know.

I've written before about a local court case with international implications. Coast to coast, sea to shining sea, hopping continents and bouncing off satellites in space. Read about it , because it could happen where you are, too. You might think it can't, but it can happen to you. Here's the meat of the nutshell as I cracked it earlier: "Julie Amero, a substitute teacher, was convicted on four counts of risk of injury to a minor for exposing middle school students to pornography on a school computer. The conviction came after she testified that the sexually explicit material on her computer popped up as a result of adware , not from any prurient searches of her own. She faces up to forty years in prison." She will be sentenced this Thursday. There's someone else around these parts who will not face a day of jail time, however. It's a man who sexually assaulted a three year old girl. Under a plea deal, he will get five years' probation. According to t...

It sometimes occurs to me how inane by blog is. The thought crossed my mind today, actually, after I left comments on a couple military blogs upon which I stumbled. The soldiers behind those Blogger templates live out tales of heart and guts every day. They share their perspective in a way that's invaluable in the telling. Each post is layers deep. I came back here after leaving those comments and assessed my last few posts with a more distanced eye. I forced myself to look past my mommyblogging myopia. I tried to find something universal, or at least something that would be even halfway interesting to a person not in possession of two stretch-marked breasts and a blown-out vaginal canal. But I couldn't come up with anyting. I realize certain people attract a certain audience and that no single entity (with the possible exception of Anna Nicole Smith) is going to interest everybody. But when I start looking at my blog as other, more removed, parties must see it, well, then I ...

Gerald Ford's star shone in his wife Betty's light. She radiated modern American energy that helped bring an entire nation out of the pale back in the 70s, when suppression and secrecy were replaced by straight talk about recovery. What was muted turned bright as she shook hands, held hands, and, most recently, laid her own hands on her husband's casket. Betty Ford is powerful in a way that's easy for us to take for granted today. It's the power of free thought that combines with free speech to forge an honest depiction of what it means to be a woman. As First Lady, she talked about issues that affect more of us than those in the spotlight during the first 3/4 of a century would have liked us to believe: equal rights, abortion, addiction and cancer. My grandmother died of cancer at a time when the word was only beginning to take hold in vernacular. Betty Ford's candid fight against breast cancer had come to light several years before, but the message was slow in...