OK....it's official...This blog has moved to:

http://theblissblog.lunanina.com

I hope that those of you who are kind enough to link to me will adjust those links to the new address. It's been great here at blogger but it's time to move on.

See you all over at the new place!!

Blessings,
MissBliss

posted by Miss Bliss3:59 PM

. . .

There's a wonderful interview with Robert Kennedy Jr. in Salon today. It is likely that you have to subscribe to Salon to actually read the interview and I would strongly urge you to subscribe.

Robert Kennedy Jr. broke my heart back in the 80's when he O.D. on heroin while on the way to a drug treatment program. I understand, but I was so hoping that he would run for office one day. Who knows, that could still happen, but I guess I wouldn't wish that on him or his family. He got sober. He's built a wonderful career as an environmental lawyer/activist. I love what this man says, he's got sense, he's got good facts, he's a conservationist of the school that is about having long range vision, not the "never cut down a tree or fish or hunt" type. Now, let's not start a battle about fishing or hunting....I don't do much of either...but to my mind the goal here is balance. If humans are so damned smart why can't we seem to balance our needs, desires and our FUTURE well being? Why can't we seem to see beyond the end of our own damn noses?

Here's a few things he said...

"Under Bush we're seeing the complete corporate domination of the various departments of government. The Agriculture Department, which was created to benefit small farmers, is now a wholly owned subsidiary of big agribusiness and the principal instrument of their destruction. The Forest Service is being run by a timber industry lobbyist, Public Lands by a mining industry lobbyist. Virtually all Bush's Cabinet secretaries, department deputies and agency heads come from the very industries that those agencies are supposed to be regulating.
The same thing happened in Germany, Italy and Spain during the fascist takeover in the 1920s and '30s -- you had industrialists flooding the ministries and running the ministries, and running them in many ways for their own profit. If you read the American Heritage Dictionary definition of fascism, it says "the domination of a government by corporations of the political right, combined with bellicose nationalism." Well, we're seeing that today.
Of course the first people who start talking about this connection are going to be derided for it. Even though Rush Limbaugh calls feminists "Nazis." The right wing for years has tried to discredit anyone who believes in the idea of community as a "communist" or a "pinko." But it's time that people started telling the truth about what's going on in this country. And start realizing that democracy is fragile, that corporate cronyism is as antithetical to democracy in America as it is in Nigeria.
The other day I got something in the mail from a farmer -- small farmers in this country understand better than anyone how markets are being stolen and democracy is being eroded. He sent me a quote from Mussolini that said fascism should really be called "corporatism" -- because it's the control of government by large corporations.
Another farmer sent me my favorite quote. This one was by Lincoln, in 1863, during the height of the Civil War, when he says, "I have the South in front of me and the bankers behind me -- and for my country, I fear the bankers most." Lincoln, Jefferson, Teddy Roosevelt, FDR, Eisenhower and all of our great leaders have warned our nation that the greatest threat to our democracy is from large corporate interests."

AND....

"Well, let me say this: Good environmental policy is identical to good economic policy, if we want to measure our economy -- and this is how we should be measuring it -- based on how it produces jobs, and the dignity of those jobs, and how it creates opportunity, and how it preserves the value of our nation's assets. If, on the other hand, you want to treat the planet the way the current Washington regime does, like it's a business in liquidation, to convert our natural resources to cash as quickly as possible, to have a few years of pollution-based prosperity, well then you can create the short-term illusion of a prosperous economy, but our children are going to pay for our joy ride. And they're going to pay for it with denuded landscapes and poor health and huge cleanup costs that they're never going to be able to pay. Environmental injury is deficit spending. It's a way of loading the costs of our prosperity onto the backs of our children."

I remember asking my Dad when I was little how the lumber companies expected to be in business in 20 years if they cut down ALL the trees now. He explained to me the shortsitedness of corporations and their CEO's who only cared about the bottom line while THEY were the CEO. It didn't matter that they created a situation where the business was no longer sustainable. That just seemed like bad business sense to me...even to an eight year old it seemed dumb...still does.

posted by Miss Bliss11:32 AM

. . .

Well just to give you all a heads up...I'm moving this blog over to Lunanina. I think everything will be ready pretty soon ..... heck for all I know it might already be ready, but I'm waiting for the official word from P. I'm very excited about this...because this means that I will be able to post a photo or two now and then....um...once I figure out how to post there at all...heeeee.

I'll keep you all informed as things unfold.

posted by Miss Bliss12:41 PM

. . .

I've been revisiting some of the stuff I wrote back in 1998...it was a very interesting year, very tumultuous.



a little more of me
bonnie raitt, joni mitchell and nine inch nails
all mixed into a spicy bowl of tom ka kai soup
on a santa ana windy night in east hollywood
walking up wilton to my car, wishing I still lived in hollywood and at the same time so very glad that I don’t. Perhaps it’s all these conflicts that define me in my city. I am that wild coyote running down hollywood blvd. in the middle of a drought ridden night - not in the right place but not really in the wrong place either. We’re a special breed - the LA coyotes - desert wild but city made - we find what we need and usually steal it.



I hope I didn't already post this one...like I said...it was an interesting year.


I search out pain like it might miss me
and once found
I hold it close and feed it all it needs
Building rooms in my heart
shaped perfectly for despair
with the hope
that my old friend
will stay



Yep...it was a crazy year...

Caught in a lonely kiss, once more with a man whose eyes are tightly closed as he struggles to pretend that I’m someone else. The real woman, the one he loves, rather than the one he’s with. I really don’t take any pleasure from knowing that when he makes love with her that he’ll think of me. It will only make him hate me, as though it were my fault that he wasn’t true to her. Like Bonnie said, “you can call it what you want, but it’s lyin’ just the same”.

posted by Miss Bliss11:12 PM

. . .

The Best Coffee (written for my Dad for Fathers Day a few years ago)

I woke up this morning and did what I usually do, I made coffee. I’m very fond of coffee. I’ve been drinking coffee since I was a little girl. It was my father who introduced me to the glory of coffee. Sweet with lots of milk. But some of my favorite coffee memories are from our family camping days. We used to go camping regularly when my brother and I were little. I remember coming home from school on a Friday afternoon and walking up the driveway to discover that Mom was packing the car up with all our camping gear. Dad would have called her at some point during the day and said I’ll try to get home early, pack the car, lets go camping.
Now Mom was no slouch at this packing the car business by this time, she could do it efficiently and with very little help. I have to admit that we were just a tad snooty about our camping experience back then. We were strictly tent campers….a tent, your sleeping bag and the food in the car. I’ve come to realize there are people much much snootier about camping than we were (they don’t even keep their car somewhere near by, smarty pants hikers). But at the time we were almost considered mountain people by our surrounding neighbors. “NO MOTORHOME?” they would exclaim…how will you survive? “NO CABIN?” they would shout…you’ll surely die up there in that wilderness. We of course thought they were all babies (well at least I did).
So off we would go to any one of our various local campsites, for a weekend in the wilderness. We would do our best to get to the campsite before dark, because trying to set up camp in the dark was a real pain in the wazoolie. Mom and Dad were pretty much pros at setting up the tent even though there was usually one or two tense words wherein my Mom would call my Dad “John” rather than “Hank”. My brother and I would gather wood for the fire while the tent was being set up. By the time we got back to the campsite Mom usually had some sort of dinner going on the Coleman stove. We would help Dad build the fire, then we would eat dinner. In the mountains, beans and franks with white bread is the best food you’ve ever eaten in your life. After dinner there was washing the dishes in a tub of water while Mom would set up the sleeping bags. Dad always slept on an old cot because his hip would give him trouble if he slept on the ground….but for the rest of us, the ground was part of what camping was all about. After we had sat around the fire for a while and looked up at the sky which was filled with stars and commented on how you were lucky if you could see one or two stars in the sky back at home, it would be time for bed. Once we were all settled into our respective bags all those wild mountain nighttime sounds would start and I was certain that I’d never get to sleep with all that hooting and rustling going on, but somehow I always did.
Then, the next thing I knew, around 5:00AM I would hear the sound I now most associate with camping… ZZZZZZIIIIIIIPPPPPPP!! The sound of my Dad unzipping the tent to go out and then re-zipping it closed. I knew that he would start the campfire, so I would wait for a few minutes because it was cold and I wanted the fire to be started before I went out there. I would then pull on my jeans and a sweatshirt or a flannel shirt while still in my sleeping bag. Then I’d wiggle out of my sleeping bag, put on my shoes, step over my still sleeping Mom and brother and unzip and re-zip the tent myself. It would be freezing out there, and clear and quiet. The sun would be up but it was still so low in the sky that the only way you knew that it was up was because it wasn’t totally dark. We always brought those folding yard chairs to sit in around the fire and my Dad would be sitting in one. The fire would be going strong and he would have the little metal coffee pot that we always took with us camping filled with water sitting either on the grate over the fire or on the Coleman stove. I would sit down in a chair next to Dad and almost put my hands in the fire to get them warm. We would ask each other how we slept, comment on how cold it was and then stare at the coffee pot. Now we were not making coffee in this pot, we were simply trying to get water to boil. Camping coffee was always instant coffee. The only time that anyone in my family would drink instant coffee was when we were camping. This was also the only time that CoffeeMate non-dairy creamer was ever used instead of milk. So next Dad would get up and put some instant coffee into two cups and then sit back down to wait on the water some more. Usually around this time he would start pointing things out to me, such as the bright blue bird watching us from a near by tree or a squirrel that was trying to make up his mind about whether or not he should try to get a nut that was WAY to close to our campsite. Soon we would be chatting about all the goings on in the forest and wondering if we were gonna have time to try some fishing when it would dawn on us that the coffee water was finally boiling. Dad would get up and grab a dishtowel and pick up the coffee pot of water and pour it into our cups. He would then put in plenty of sugar and CoffeeMate non-dairy creamer and mix it all up. He would hand me my coffee and then sit back down in his chair and we would continue with our discussion of birds and squirrels, fishing and old old trees.

It was the best coffee I've ever had…when I was seven, in the mountains, with my Dad.

posted by Miss Bliss8:14 PM

. . .

Stop watching me
please
Stop waiting for me
to entertain you
please

It makes me want to come out of my skin

Stop pushing me
to be your dream
please
Stop consuming me
to fill your emptiness
please

It makes me want to cut and bleed

Stop

posted by Miss Bliss7:55 PM

. . .

Now I have seen that sad surrender in my lover's eyes,
And I can only stand apart and sympathize.
For we are always what our situations hand us...
It's either sadness or euphoria.
B. Joel



I didn’t mean to forget. I mean, does anyone ever “mean” to forget something? No. But I guess what I really mean is….I really did forget, I wasn’t acting out or just being an asshole. I don’t remember ANYONES birthday…ever. I tell everyone this…all the time. Please don’t make my memory some test of how much I love or care about you because I will fail every damn time. I certainly did that time. But there was so much distraction. I had gotten laid off and was back to freelancing. I was barely making it financially and I wasn’t loving the work the way I had when I was in my 20’s. Now it just made me tired, physically tired and tired of all the drama that went with the whole “who’s getting what job, and who recommended who for it” crap. It’s amazing what a small world non-union theatre can be even in a big city. And quite honestly….I thought he was about to break up with me. I had been feeling like that for months. He was so distant, so generally unhappy in his own life and just sort of vacant. Being just a teensy bit self-obsessed I was certain it was all about me and that he was just trying to find some way to leave me. I was trying to get up the gumption to talk about it with him when I found the card. He was working on some soft-core film and I guess the whole crew got him a cake and a birthday card. Normal enough. I just didn’t happen to realize that it had been his birthday three days earlier. He hadn’t mentioned anything to me. My head was filled with an ongoing dialogue of what I was going to say when he broke up with me. How could I possibly keep some friggin date in mind with all that noise in my head? Once again, trying to avoid the painful moment simply brought more pain. I picked the card up off the table and I read it and then looked at him totally confused. He grabbed it and said, “Oh, you weren’t supposed to find that.” Looking sheepish for some reason. It finally dawned on me that I had missed his birthday. At first I felt horrible but then I got enraged. I felt so fucking set up. I’m pretty sure I said something really graceful like, “You fucking asshole you couldn’t have just given me a heads up or something? Thanks a lot!” He said something about it not being a big deal, that he felt like I didn’t need any added pressure with everything that was going on in my life, blah, blah, blah. Yeah…but he made a point of telling his friends about how I totally forgot his birthday…so I guess it was SOME kind of a deal.

The truth is….we were at the end we just didn’t really know it yet. Well, we knew it, we just didn’t like that truth. So we tried to ignore it for another six months or so. See, we really liked each other, really loved each other too….but there was just too much in the way. So he just drifted farther and farther away without really meaning to and I stayed as long as I could. Then when I couldn’t stay anymore, I left. I left without much looking back and with no apologies for the leaving. It made us both very sad. I don’t think it was the wrong thing for me to do. But being right doesn’t make it any less sad.

posted by Miss Bliss9:58 PM

. . .