To the overlooked and silent women with MKP men.....

Your man went to the New Warrior Training Adventure weekend. His first night home he acts different. He walks different, his mind drifts,  and his mannerisms are slightly off as well. He is exhausted from his weekend get-a-way. You probe him for answers with many questions. You get time and time again the same answers, "I cannot tell you about that." You feel frustrated and angry and  you cannot see how this weekend has helped your man in anyway. He wasn't talking before he left and now he is told not too. You feel like screaming, crying, and banning Man Kind Project men from entering your life and his. You have decided this was a bad idea and want no part of it. I have been there myself.

You go to the graduation. Immediately you see your man smile big and walk towards another man and embrace him in an excruciatingly long hug. They whisper into each others ears and laugh heartily. You feel uncomfortable and turn away. You cannot believe this is the man that you know. You begin to wonder if you know this man at all. Your fears about his changes begin to well up inside and you begin to feel breathless with panic. So much has changed in one week and the future is uncertain because now you have a new man in your life and you only know his name.

I was that woman. I despised MKP. I hated the fact that my husband was told not to share. I was equally disgusted he chose not to share. We fought more the first year after his weekend than we did our entire marriage to that point. My husband was not and still is not a communicator. I had hopes and dreams the weekend would change that. I felt like I was the ignored equation to this organization. My needs and desires were overlooked. So I thought. It took me a few years but I began to catch on. This was not about me. I knew this on the surface but down below I thought of this as a couples group. What I was missing and could not see was how the men needed this. The media, coaches, and well meaning men push the message of don't be a sissy, don't cry, don't be emotional, be strong, BE A MAN! This really hit home watching my sons deal with issues about manhood, "What is a man?"

My husband needed to know it was OK to feel scared, to cry, and to hug another man in a long embrace and still feel secure in his manhood. He did not have to explain to someone in the room, "I am not gay" because of the embrace. He was not labeled a "sissy" if he cried. He was not the subject of ridicule if he said he was scared. He was able to drop the facade and get a life, a real life.

Yes, it would be great if MKP would see we suffer from the society pressures on men as well, but I have yet to see that. Just like the military, they make no claims about being there for the wives and girlfriends, just the men (soldiers). "Changing the World One Man at a Time" means just that. They have changed your man in your life. How that affects your relationship depends on your relationship. It is scary. It's very scary but so is living with a man that is not owning up to his own emotions and not living life to the fullest.

For the sake of the world, let him go through this process with your support and be the strong woman in his life that loves him the way he wants to be now and not the lie he was living to make society happy.


Support his desire to change into the man he always wanted to be and take time to find the woman you always wanted to be as well.

Too many irons in the fire.....

Today I wanted to burst into tears at the end of the day. My house is a disaster. I have no time to clean. The laundry is backing up with no time to clean. The bare essentials are getting accomplished. I squeeze in this and squeeze in that until I have no time to think! My schedule for the next 3 months are FULL. Tightly woven and stuck in place racing at a break neck pace. Giddy-up!

I just about broke down in the car driving home from taking my boys to lunch, open gym, dropping the smaller boys at the park while James went to orientation with a friend at a Fall job opportunity. Next week begins a 13 week odyssey for James, and this week 9 weeks for Jonah and Zane, of classes. I will have to juggle and work and re-work how to get homeschooling complete, house cleaned, laundry complete, dishes done, and dinner on the table without burning it! Not to mention the twice a week music lessons and once a week tap, and Jonah's fencing class! The only day of the week we don't have a class/lesson to rush to is Friday and Saturday, in which I will then transport James to and from work in Lawrence on our days "off"!

I have to keep reminding myself to take it one day at a time, not worry about the house at the moment, focus on the schooling and the getting everybody in their place on time! It will all work out and it will be fine.

After Christmas I can sit back and relax.......Right? ;)

am I alone?

I just finished reading my Facebook page and more than one friend posted Christian music videos. More than one friend joined the "group(s)" that say things like "Let us show we love the Lord, press Like". " I bet we can find REAL Christians, press Like" "Christ is my savior...." I feel scared by this. Am I alone? When did this happen? Why such a draw now? I remember a line from the movie Oh Brother Where Art Thou when Delmar ran into the river to "be saved" Everett said "hard times flush the chumps"

Is that it? We as a country have hit hard times and all the religious chumps are banding together? This is where and how the Taliban mentality breeds. Looks innocent enough then BAM you have yourself a major fanatic on you hands. (gay haters, burning other peoples religious texts, protesting funerals, pushing for policy change that take away freedoms)

The problem is the fact these worshipers are ignorant. Truly. How? The bible is nothing but reworked stories from another time. The Epic story of Gilgamesh, the Mahabarata, pagan myths, etc.... All the bible stories were told long before the Jews wrote it all down and God did not write it! Not only that but at the Council of Nicea Constantine declared much of the Bible unworthy, so people accept the new watered down version (much like school textbooks) and still harp about it being original sacred text.

They know nothing but what they have been told, like good little mindless children, and never once ask the important questions. They make worthless excuses that make no sense because truth be told they only read parts of the Bible the preachers says to, if at all that much.

Clueless Christians passing judgements (which the Bible says NOT to do) and are registered voters! Scary! Did the whole Shepherd leading his flock image not disturb you? If not you must be a believer in some religion. Some dogma/rule loving person. The slave of conformity. Doomed forever not to think for yourself. Raising children to do the same. Baaa baaa ram you to you fleece be true.

I don't roll like that. I cooked up my Dogma for dinner and decided I would never order that dish again, ick! I am not a helpless Lamb lost in the field needing to be rescued. I read between the lines. It's called CONTROL! They swoop in and "help you" and soon they think they own you. They only pretend to be your friend (see how friendly they are if you challenge them). You believe them to because they have sucked you in with guilt and fear. I threw religions out the window of a moving car, to be squashed and never seen again.

I realized you cannot raise creative freethinkers if you have a dogma belief strapped to you. You cannot think out of the box if you keep one foot in it. I burnt the boxes so my children have to learn life out of the box from the start! Free thinkers! Creative thinkers not tied down to the beliefs of others.

Life is about living. Life is about choices. Life is what YOU make of it. God does not have say and neither should a church.
Sadly, America and the world is going through some changes and it scares people. They grasp the cloth, grip the bible, sing the hymns, trust clergy people they do not know for answers, hummm.... hard times really do flush the chumps.

The Truth and Nothing but the Truth So Help Me God.....

We all like to think of ourselves as honest. We all like to think of ourselves as being a good and decent person. The fact is we are just not that nice. We are truly animals with rule books. It is hard to stop those urges of ou primal past. We struggle on a daily basis. Our laws are to protect us from acting on our animalistic behavior. Casual sex, stealing, raping, murder, and other behaviors are seen in the animal kingdom quite often.

Next morning: I found the above on my phone. I remember writing it. I had a bit too much wine. I am blaming that! I was feeling something, not sure how to explain it, about lying. Lying. Sigh.

Not a scholar? So what!

Lately I have been chastised for not being a grammar scholar and a math wizard. This is what is wrong with society today. educational snobs getting stuck on the idea you are not important or you have no value if you cannot figure out out how to properly use the words "lay" or "lie" in reference to putting something on the table. You are somehow a failure if you cannot remember your times table. They are so busy being educational snobs that they miss the fact you/I have other talents. Talents that could possibly change the world, but that is not important to them. No, only the grammar and math are important. These are typically the same people that buy into the notion that you must have a degree in something, even if it's basket weaving, to prove you are smart enough to answer the phone with a friendly voice.  I am not putting down college. I would love to have the extra knowledge it can provide. But from what I see, the people leaving, they only passed their tests to get the grade to get out. Same as with their public education. They pushed and rambled and partied their way through just so they could leave and get on with their lives. Not any smarter mind you, just job worthy. They still cannot spell, they do not know proper grammar, they still do not know their multiplication tables. They used spell check, grammar check, and a calculator to get through the piles and piles of homework. They were not out finding their passion and finding their genius. This here lies the problem. This is what the movie trailer Race to Know Where was talking about. We, as a society, need to stop and think what is really important.

Stop being educational snobs. Some of us, no matter how much you push, will not learn everything perfectly, but we know enough to get by and if left alone we can become better at something you cannot do.

As for myself, and I think this is my oldest son as well from what he has told me, mix numbers up while we read them. 514 becomes 415 or 154. Try to add that to another number and the wrong answer will appear and you don't know why! I have to go very slow when working with numbers. I triple check and then proceed. I am not dumb, my brain just works differently. Yes, it is frustrating. It's hard when someone yells out a phone number and expect me to get it down correctly the first time. I can cook! I can taste it and recreate it. I know smells, textures, and flavors. I know by memory the smell of a certain spice and just KNOW it will be nasty with another. I know color. I can problem solve. I am creative. I am full of ideas. I am a people person. I just suck at math and yes, grammar.

In school I was taken out of class during grammar lessons to learn more math. I missed recess to learn more math. It did not help me in the least. In fact I lost out on social time of making friends because I was taking so much math. I missed out on creative art because I was doing math.

I know doing more does not mean more success. Doing more creates contempt, no, contempt sounds to mellow. Doing more when you are struggling to understand it and missing out on what you love creates a seething hatred for all that is and that will ever be for the subject at hand.

Make a boy that hates frilly dolls or a girl that hates dirty football do it. Over and over and over and over.....

"Be the change you seek." Gandhi said that. That is what I am doing. I am changing the way I think people should be taught, one kid at a time, starting with my own! If you are one of those that disagree, keep your mouth shut, because your way has clearly not worked.