You started it

People who can hold grudges fascinate me. I mean the "from my cold, dead hands" kind of grudge. It's ferociously perplexing to me how such (seemingly) parsimoniously spiritual beings manage to function so über-reasonably well in this world.

Quiet and cool resentment is a total fail for me. Anger comes quickly and then it's all turned over to hurt, desperation, bewilderment. . . It's hard to let go. Usually, time along with the eventual tired old redundancy (!) of insanity (doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results) moves me on.

I'm missing my dad. He was a good man. He did the very best he could, but it wasn't enough for me. I gave up (see above). And it was O.K. We had a relationship on terms he didn't exactly dictate and I didn't exactly acquiesce to, but it was the best we could do. My resentment became like a pheasant cock dashing to the ditch. It flashed pretty plumage and went away.

With his decline--full-blown cancer and alcoholic dementia; nursing home--came more pain and confusion. But it wasn't resentment I felt during his last months. It was tenderness. It was the understanding that he did the very best he could with the earthbound life he was dealt. Considering what he was dealt, he did pretty damn well. And I considered myself lucky to be a part of his history. And today, well--I'm proud to be a carrier of his cracker-ass genes, as are my children, his grandchildren. I can take what I like and leave the rest for the owls to chew and chaw on and puke up. The beauty of it all, for me, was that I ultimately did not hold a grudge. I forgave him.

I forgave him because it was the only way. Forgiveness--no matter how it happens--is the only way to peace. I regret not honoring him as I wish I could have when his spirit left his body. There were shame issues among his family members, and I wasn't strong enough to protest nor did I understand what it truly meant to have his bodily existence exit the planet.

He was a warrior whose battles were mostly fought with himself, and he doesn't fight anymore. His body lies beneath the frozen ground. He rests in peace.

We are spiritual beings. We arrive all messy and brittle, encased in our transportation for life. We walk and we talk. We scoot along. Sometimes we float! There may be times of triumph. We glow, all health and terrific smile. . . and then we do not. We stumble and fall down and we hurt others and we say stupid, completely inappropriate things.

I am moving toward being conscious of my work-in-progress-ness. In this season of darkness-into-light, I am grateful to be a walking, talking part of the spiritworld that connects us; grateful to have the chance to make mistakes, to learn from my mistakes, to change.

Appetizers for the holidays

When Kay Orr was Governor of Nebraska, her husband, Bill, produced a book called The First Gentlemen's Cookbook (Jacob North Printing Company, 1989). This book is kindly on loan to me by my husband's mother. A certain recipe caught my eye. Steak Tartare.

Okay, so my husband once told the tale of eating at a place here in this city (now defunct--the restaurant, not the city) called The Lincoln Exchange. It was in downtown Lincoln and later became Julio's (also now defunct). He ate there with a woman who became his second wife. He described the Steak Tartare as being sort of salad-like, as in served on a bed of lettuce or something. Anyway, he became violently sick soon after eating it, and one can completely understand why; here's an appetizer version (with comments), as presented in the aforementioned cookbook:

STEAK TARTARE

The only way to make this is by using good lean meat with NO fat. Credit [!!!] for the recipe goes to the chef at the Fairmont Hotel in New Orleans.

Larry Myers, President

Commercial Computer Systems

Lincoln, NE

1 lb. extra lean ground beef [you're going to fry it and drain off even the bitlets of grease, right? alas, no]

2 tsp. Grey Poupon Dijon mustard

2 tsp. capers [husband is over the moon about these; must have caught his eye when he read the dish's description on the menu. Obviously he missed the part about the RAW hamburger. But of course, he ate this in the early '80s. There probably weren't so many warning signs posted in restaurants about the dangers of eating uncharred meat]

1/4 cup chopped onion

1 tbsp. olive oil

1 tbsp. red wine vinegar

4 anchovy filets [not really???--oh no]

juice of 1/2 lemon

chopped parsley for garnish

salt and pepper

1/2 tsp. Worcestershire sauce

1 egg yolk [WHAT?]

Tabasco sauce to taste

To begin, put pepper and salt in a bowl (to your taste). Add capers, onions and anchovies and finely crush. Add lemon juice, mustard, Worcestershire sauce, egg yolk and Tabasco and mix.

Now add olive oil and wine vinegar and mix. Finally, add ground beef and toss till well blended.

Serve with melba toast or plain crackers. [Find a toilet, or a bucket, or a towel--whatever--for inevitable later use]

[These are the First Gentlemen's notes following the recipe] WDO: Larry is the kind of guy who usually is hesitant about expressing an opinion or taking a position on a particular subject [because he's sort of nauseous a lot of the time]. Some of his friends, including yours truly, have been able to draw him out [of the bathroom], and we find Larry has some pretty definite ideas on a number of subjects. Larry is in his "second" career, the first having been spent as a CPA.

Well. Let's get the party started, then! Here's hoping Larry is still alive and not a victim of Mad Cow disease or Alzheimer's. Sheesh. And, Yuck.

Metanoia

Very dismayed re our elegant President Obama's speech outlining his decision about Afghanistan. More troops, harder war effort--but preparing to begin to leave in mid-2011. Got a "message" from Vice President Biden about it; "he" wrote, "It's a clean break from the failed Afghanistan policy of the Bush administration, and a new, focused strategy that can succeed." Really.

Really?

I think the only "clean break" could have been saying good-bye to Afghanistan and welcoming home our men and women who are currently engaged there. It's the most sensible solution. Matthew P. Hoh said it best--thoughtfully, with the perspective of both a Marine and a diplomat. Surely the President has read the lowly Hoh's letter. Surely, a huge portion of him agrees that this is the most sensible solution.

Watching him deliver his speech was unnerving. I don't think the cadets meant to nod off; they probably get up at 4 a.m. and the speech may have bled over into their bedtimes! I don't think it was a cynical thing, either, for the President to use this venue to outline what he had decided. (Yep, he's the decider now. With a Nobel Peace Prize.) And I don't think that Obama regards the military as his adversary. But I do think he's overwhelmingly ambivalent about this war. And the nation he leads is ambivalent. And if we're not wholly engaged (we're not--the "timetable" says so; we're not going to build the nation of Afghanistan; it is "beyond our responsibility, our means, and our interests")--if we're not going in wholeheartedly; if we ultimately just want to get out of there, well. . . then let's get out of there. Now.

A great many of the Afghan people are, uh, semi-pastoral nomads. This means that they're not interested in a strong national government. We in the United States do not understand them, and they do not understand us.

So here's what we can do. Instead of all that money pushed into Afghanistan through military engagement, we should surge money into our own Central Intelligence Agency.

We need a new spook shop. Something super duper secret. We're talking about the deepest cover imaginable. Deepest midnight-blue-with-that-hint-of-green-as-the-sun-rises ops. Something like the Agency for International Development (which was used by the CIA during the Vietnam conflict), but sneakier. Pour treasure into it; this is our security we're talking about, right? Pakistan is where we belong because Pakistan is where the bomb lives and cannot be consumed by the Taliban. (For me, listening to Obama pronounce "Pakistan" and "Taliban" was the best part of his speech.) Make it worldwide so we can recruit as many brown, blue-eyed people who need dental work as we can. Typical CIA field officer prepsters won't work for this. (But Cofer Black could come home to run it, maybe.) Make it worldwide so we can be everywhere--especially Europe and other shady places.

I don't think these people who hate us can be snuffed out. It's like trying to control the weather. The best we can do is try to be on top of it, everywhere. And raise up the women. Provide money for that, too, instead of military might. It's worth noting that there can be no "timetable" for this surge of intelligence. It will likely have to be a forever mission. But it's got elements of genuine humanitarianism. Worthwhile. Either that or resign to get attacked again and again 9/11-style--and we don't handle that sort of panic and death so well. It's hard to picture the U.S.A. "adjusting" to frequent acts of terrorism at home the way other nations have (Israel; the steely U.K.).

I am reminded of something a wise comrade texted to me: If something unkind is said about you, live as though no one will believe it. While I was listening to the President's speech, it occurred to me that maybe what he was describing--prescribing--was, actually, a new doctrine--the part (a teeny bit JFKish) about

not seek[ing] to occupy other nations and not claim[ing] another nation's resources or target[ing] other peoples because their faith or ethnicity is different from ours. What we have fought for — and what we continue to fight for — is a better future for our children and grandchildren, and we believe that their lives will be better if other peoples' children and grandchildren can live in freedom and access opportunity.

So let's do it. We have the communications technology. Special ops can sweep in and clean up quickly and quietly--a small yet necessary part of the strategy.

Okay, I don't know what the hell I'm talking about. (getting really audacious and dare I say logorrheic here) But the President doesn't seem to, either. Afghanistan: We need to git gone.