I find myself up early this morning. I am venturing off to the Farmer's Market later this morning, but the dogs woke me up wanting to eat and go outside. So.......here I am
My days, nights and weekends have been filled up so far this late Spring and early Summer. I find myself on the road, watching the ICubs, or working. It seems like this Summer, besides being the hottest I can remember for a long time, it is FLYING by. Not enough time to get everything done. This is my second Summer in central Iowa and find myself trying to experience all the activities that are available to me such as the Des Moines Farmer's Market (Best in the Midwest in my opinion), Minor League Baseball - and I am not even a Cubs fan (I am a little obsessed with it), or entertaining overnight visitors to enjoy all of the great offerings in DSM.
Many things have happened since I last posted that I wanted to give my opinion about from the Sandusky verdict to the health care Supreme Court opinion to a book club find. So here we go --
SANDUSKY GUILTY! WOW -- that was a complete and utter shock to me. Those that I have talked to since the guilty verdict came in said to me - "why are you surprised?" And my answer to that is that I have seen too many times that a serial pedophile get the sympathy from jury members. The media portrays the perpetrator as somehow guiltless and the victims as somehow "asking for it". So I was shocked and elated when the jury did the right thing in this case. But I want to "rant" on something else surrounding this and it is the silence of those that knew it was happening: The people that were involved in this monster's "non-profit" which really was a recruiting tool for him to find the most vulnerable of victims; his fellow coaches on the Penn State team who spent endless hours with this man and had to know what he was doing; to (and this for me is the most heinous) Mrs. Sandusky. Her guilt surrounding the young boys that she "sacrificed" to her husband should be brought in front of a jury as well. What goes through her mind on a daily basis? How many young boys needed to be sacrificed for the lifestyle that she lived? How many lives tragically altered for power and prestige? How many silences and turned heads for living "the dream"? YOU are just as big of a monster Mrs. Sandusky. I hope in light of this if there are other women out there that suspect their husbands are doing this are able to speak up and out about it? My training, teachings and personal experience tell me that it is very likely that Mr. Sandusky was also a perpetrator of domestic violence. Of course we will never know this unless she speaks out about her experiences. But those things go together. A perpetrator of domestic violence uses the same tactics for power and control in that relationship as a serial pedophile uses when grooming and assaulting their victims. I admit, this is a hot button issue for me. While I understand the dynamics, I don't understand how a mother can look away while their child, any child, is repeatedly victimized. In this case the child was the adopted foster child. Does that somehow make this better because he wasn't a blood relative? I think not! It is ALL children that are victimized. SOMEBODY needs to respond! Besides the verdict, my anger surrounding the silence came to the forefront after reading this Blog - Why Didn't You Say Something yesterday. Please take a moment to read it! It is very poignant.
HEALTH CARE SUPREME COURT RULING! AGAIN - WOW - another very happy shocking event. The fear that has been hyped around the health care reform act is amazing to me. The lies and exaggerations get more and more ridiculous. I am glad that the supreme court (especially John Roberts - who I will add was a Bush appointee to the court NOT Obama) looked at the constitutional LAW of it and not the politics of it (aside from Thomas and Scalia) and ruled accordingly. Since the changes have been implemented, my children have been able to be covered by health care NOT costing the tax payers any money only me and my premiums. They all three work full time and until very recently none of their employers offered health insurance. This would mean that my daughters $300 a month (really?) maintenance medicine for a rare bladder condition would not be covered and she would have to pay for it herself. It would also mean that my sons ADHD medicine would not be covered and he would have an out of pocket much more than $10.00 per month of his co-pay. So thank you Justice Roberts, thank you House and Senate for passing this legislation. Now let's see how it goes form here.
And last but certainly not least is the latest book club find - Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Coast Trail. It is a poignant and real look at a woman's journey through her life after the tragic death of her mother. I don't read parts of books out loud to people - I think they would be annoyed by that -- but I found this book so compelling that I had to. One particular passage is her processing and discovery of some wounds she needed to heal and it was raw and emotional and amazing. I hope you download and read it this Summer. It is worth the time.
Okay - that's it. I have set my brain into BLOG mode again. I leave you with an amazing fireworks display that we saw after an ICubs Game on July 4th (YEP, baseball again). We were fortunate enough to be right by the fireworks in the parking lot and enjoyed their grandeur. Make it a great week!
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