Jill Rants and Raves

labradoodle dandy

It has, by any standard, been a cruel and violent Christmas season around the world. I've got a lot to say about this stuff, obviously. And I'm sitting here, not warm enough in my study/office - whatever - writing away about Bhutto, and suicide bombers, and Darfur and conservatives who are fixated on the 'culture war' they have created. I mean, listening to the right wing, you'd think feminism and gay rights had brought the world to the brink of extinction. Jeez, I can't get myself all worked up about this - right now I wanna give you a new year smile -

A couple of months ago I wrote about Bernie Tucker, the sheepdog who I helped get home to his owners after nine months of being lost. At the same time that Bernie was missing, there were flyers all over the East Bay with a picture of a young female labradoodle, who had spent 6 months of her short life tied to a tree. She was rescued from that situation and went into foster care. She got away from the foster parent even before the woman got her back home. Since May, there have sightings of this dog in the town of Point Richmond, and more frequently in the hills overlooking the Bay, where hundreds of acres give cover to wild animals including coyotes, possums, skunks and rattlesnakes. This white shaggy dog could be seen grazing in meadows and skulking in bushes, watching dog walkers and joggers but never ever coming close. A leash still hung from her collar.

Once again, it was a phone call from Steve that got me galvanised to help with the search for this dog. And because you already know what the ending of this story is, I'm just gonna leap ahead. My friend Karen and I drove out there with the trap, and working with Kate and Chris who had seen the dog, we carried the trap up a steep hill and set it. Karen was driving me to Berkeley to pick up my car so that I could go back to do my shift watching the trap and before we even got to Albany, an emotional phone call told us the dog was in the trap. We virtually did a U turn on the freeway and headed back, drove in reverse up the hill, loaded the trap and within minutes had Noodles safely in a warm building.

Here is Noodles - just moments after I had taken her out of the trap at a dog biscuit bakery owned by one of the people who had been spotting her - she was soaking wet, covered in fleas, her coat matted and filthy and she is pretty thin. She was shaking with cold and fear, but honestly - just completey happy to be caught after seven months fending for herself. The one sad thing is that Noodles doesn't have an excited owner running to collect her, like Bernie did - so if you know anyone who can give this dog the love, the security and the care she deserves - you know where to reach me.

Here's the thing folks. If you see a dog that looks like it's lost, chances are it is. Don't hesitate - find out who your local animal whackos are and get them out to help you. There's people like me and Karen and Steve everywhere. Just call us.

of siberian tigers, zoos and pushy jews

It's not meant to be that way. You're not supposed to go to the Zoo on Christmas Day and get killed by a Siberian Tiger. Or mauled. Or even meet wild animals on the footpath or while sipping a latte at the cafeteria.

You go to the Zoo to look at animals robbed of their wildness, in cages and what are laughingly called 'habitats'. Get there at the right time, and you can watch the tigers get fed. This is clearly a hugely educational experience.

I think it's horrible that someone was killed and two others injured. I also think it's pretty damn shocking that it was police officers who shot the big cat to death, and that there is even the chance of an incident like this in a place that prides itself on taking humane care of the creatures who are forced to live in captivity. What kind of emergency response does San Francisco Zoo have? What happens if an earthquake occurs and walls and moats fail? Do we call in the cops to shoot all the loose animals?

I like the idea that Zoos can play a role in preserving and breeding endangered species. There are many (including the Siberian Tigers - oops there's one less of them today) whose survival depends on the intervention of humans and nurturing through artificial means an increase of an otherwise diminishing species. But I've never liked the concept of Zoos as entertainment. I hope one day that there will be no more of them - and that any study, breeding program, rehabiltation or rescue of wild animals can be done in their 'real' habitat, through sanctuaries and reserves. We can support sustainable tourism programs that provide local communities incentives to be guardians of their natural resources - whether they be tigers, coral reef, apes, butterflies or fisheries.

But this zoo story has me thinking of my own tenuous connection to the Berlin Zoo, where I first became shocked, in the early 60's, by the imprisonment of animals that I had seen wandering loose in Malaya as a child. My fascination with history, with the study of the ancient has roots in my family - my great uncle Paul Oppenheim was one of the most respected palaeontologists in Berlin, before the First World War. My father spoke reverentially of visiting Uncle Paul and uncovering the secrets of plant and animal life on this planet through the study of fossils, and I still have a few small pieces that my father passed on to me. Paul played a strong role in Berlin civic life and among other things was an early supporter of and financial contributor to the establishment of the Zoo and the Aquarium.

Paul applied for a Professorship at the University of Berlin. His reputation and expertise were unrivalled. Yet he received a short note in response turning him down, in which the trustees wrote that his very application was 'typical of the pushiness of your race'.

Tigers apparently kill more humans than any other wild animal. We clearly have not yet made the world safe for people to live in. Those remaining 600 Siberian Tigers better watch out.

roo sez be merry but not married and eat a lot

Roo says this in spite of my exhortations that we all need to be a bit more humble next year. She says that just because other dogs are suffering, doesn't mean she should also. I can't argue with that. Luckily, my household is not so uniformly sodding selfish - Frank gave away an old cow hoof he found under the bed, Joey, Slim, Tutte and Alice sent their allowance to Wildcare which takes in every wild animal brought to its door in San Rafael (including, regrettably, the mockingbird that these loser cats cornered in the garden) and does everything they can to save them - they did a phenomenal job after the recent oil spill. Calvin spends his free time making people laugh. And Oscar is, simply, a gift to the world. Roo, selfish brat that she is, remains my favorite. In 2006 she almost died, and I think she feels this gives her walk on water privileges. Roxy and Ophelia are swapping tales with my stepdad Norman somewhere in the universe.

I'm not crazy 'bout this time of year, honestly, but one of the most beautiful Christmases I ever spent was my loneliest. In my last year at school (our equivalent of High School) my mother had left home, again, and I found myself alone, renting an underheated room in a large house broken up into cheap bedsits, with green shag carpet, a shared bathroom and two electric rings on a table top cooker. It was an era of discontent in Britain - a newly elected Conservative government, industrial strife, some of the worst violence in Northern Ireland, the 3 day work week to conserve energy and a bitter winter.

On Christmas Eve I tried to cook a chicken, but had not figured out about taking that little plastic bag with the innards out of the cavity. Pretty gross. I unfolded the sofa bed and climbed in, shivering, with the smell of burning plastic in my nostrils.
It was desperately cold and it snowed overnight. Christmas morning was crisp like a peppermint, the skies hung grey but dry above the listless trees and I started walking, nowhere really, but it was warmer outside than in. I spent the day walking through the streets looking in the windows of other people's homes with the light and the warmth seeping from them. I didn't envy them, but I made a promise to myself. That whatever else I was or was not capable of - that I would fill my life with the warmth of friendship. I knew even then, that a conventional 'family' would never be my choice. But I didn't know what the alternative could be, it was no more than a sensation of need.

As I returned home, I passed a small 18th century church, the wooden slab doors cracked open, the candlelight casting a glow of serene warmth, and the sound of a Bach cantata 'Herz und Mund und Tat und Leben' (Heart and Mouth and Deed and Life) filling every inch of the stone building. There was a plate of small pastries by the door. I took a few and sat for what seemed an eternity, listening to the glorious sound. The vicar came over to me at some point and asked if I needed anything. My cold hands spoke for me, and he brought a steaming cup of tea, amber coloured, and with so much sugar you could stand the spoon up in it. My memory of that church seems so at odds with much of what passes for Christianity today.

I am not a Christian, I am definitely not a religious Jew. But my loneliest Christmas contained such exquisite moments of beauty that it remains in my memory one of the most spiritual days of my life.

 

nights and shining armour /a trilogy /part one

Are some of us just innately attracted to whatever fire is burning? Are there some who aren't drawn to the schoolyard brawl, or really don't hear the crying? Or are they just more able to know when to turn away, to move away from the magnetism of a crisis rather than into it.

I like to think of myself as having enough self protective oilskins to be able to wade into a storm and come out relatively unscathed. I fancy myself as good a judge of character (read 'red flag') as anyone. Better than most. I am naturally suspicious, yet monumentally loyal, even to those who have lied, deceived or avoided the truth with me. I believe in my assessments so fervently that even in the face of overwhelming 'evidence', I trust my inner panel of flashing lights rather than any external reminders of their failure. I have rarely, over my entire life, been wrong when choosing a friend. Those times when I wonder what piece of my antenna was busted are so few that they stick like pieces of cling film to my memory.

I don't know why I remembered her over the last few days. I have not remembered her name. I was, oh maybe 18 and I had been venturing to a bar in Soho - the Oasis - a hidden place behind a gate down an alleyway reeking of the usual suspects. One of those alleys in London that had not changed since the days of Dickens, moss covered dark brick, damp dribbling down through the cracks, large uneven paving stones. I used to love the sound of high heels captured in the tunnel. I couldn't see the legs they adorned, but I imagined the kind of woman I never met in the dingy bar. A short hallway led from the front door to the back of the building, on the right the larger mens bar, where actors from the West End met with drag queens from Camden Town, both eyeing the truck drivers and fruit and vegetable sellers from the Covent Garden Market. To the left a tiny room, a palm tree in one corner, its leaves stained dark from years of beer and nicotine abuse, a lone lightbulb hanging in an orange paper shade.

The two butch women in their forties sitting at the bar turned as I walked in. I vowed then, never ever to be like them. Heavyset, their hair slicked back, their flesh a sort of grey with tired eyes, a cigarette rolling in their yellowing fingers and a pint in front, another being pulled and a shot glass to the side. She sat between the two women. She didn't turn.

There was no jukebox in the women's side of The Oasis. Music drifted in from across the hallway, from the men's bar. The men didn't stop us moving across the border, but the laughter subsided if one of us crossed  the damp carpet and into the larger space where at least someone was telling jokes, even if most involved the word 'bitch'.

I noticed that she, the girl, no older than I was, had left the two murky figures at the bar in the other room and was opening a door off the hallway, and as she disappeared I could see it wasn't a toilet, but a staircase leading to darkness above. She smiled at me before gently closing the door. I was 18, what did I know? That question seems odd. I understood more about the dirty laundry of human interaction than I should. But I was 18 and suddenly in love. With the girl who lived in a room with three others, up a staircase that stank of whisky and stale cigarettes, sleeping on a cot with dirty unmade sheets, in an attic room with a sloping roof with window panes cracked, and clothes, hairspray and lipstick discarded on the floor, cups stained with coffee and the constant to and fro of men on the staircase, above a queer bar in a Georgian building in the shadow of the Opera House. If you pulled on the layers of wallpaper bulging from the walls, the place might collapse in a heap.

What part of 'red flag' didn't I understand? When she led me by the hand and up the stairs a week later, a black woman our age lay on one of the cots, sleeping. I protested. I could not make love in front of someone. She shushed me 'she doesn't care'. She was right. For the first time in my life I knew what it felt like to want to 'save' someone. And at 18, I made love to her, and she faked coming. I was lost. Over the two months I saw her, I turned my eyes and ears away from every clue. Then one summer evening, I met her in a pub near where I was working and as she started doing business right over my shoulder, I, in my best knight in shining armour decided to do battle with her clients. Most shook their heads and walked away. But one didn't. As I stood my ground, which was a little shaky at best, he took his shot and I dropped to the ground. The barmaid threw him out, and she, my girl, followed, cursing me for getting hurt and interfering in business all at once.

One lesson I don't appear to have learned - how to walk away from a situation I can't win. I left the bar behind them and onto the bustling rush of Upper Street in Islington. The man, incensed by my persistence, hit me again, and I stumbled off the sidewalk into the gutter. And stood up. He hit me again. He yelled at me to stay down. She screamed at me to stay down. He shouted that if I was going to behave like a guy, I was going to get hit like a guy. It wasn't until a crimson gash cracked open above my eyebrow and blood trickled into my ear that I stayed, on all fours, gasping for air and pride. Saliva dripped from my swollen mouth.

She looked at me with unbearable pity and sadness. 'Go home, Jill'. He opened the door of a white sedan and she got in. I pushed away the offers of help, a cup of tea or sympathy, and stuffed the tears back into the sockets of my eyes. There are some of us who can't seem to walk away from a fight, not when there is someone to be rescued. Bloodied, I found my motorbike parked a street away, I placed the helmet on my head and winced as it grazed a wound. I drove home and bathed. 'Rescue' is a strange curse. 'You can't save someone, Jill', they say. But there's always a nagging doubt, and the white horse stands ready, the sound of its hooves and it's impatient snorting echoing in the tunnel, the suit of armour gleaming, hangs in the closet.

witches, culture wars, faggots and neo cons

I know I know, I promised no more elektion blogs for a week or so, but I can't help it. Talk radio is a wunnerful thing, you know that? And nothing more beeootiful than listening to the neo-cons screw themselves into a tightly wound ball of blustering and blistering self-hatred.
They are, for one thing, obsessed, completely and utterly, with Hillary Clinton. So much so that the phrase by Thomas Jefferson about a 'reign of witches' coming to an end has been grabbed by right wingers to refer to her years as First Lady. But while the talkers - Rush, Levine, Hannity, Larsen, Savage et al foam at the mouth about Hill, the gal from the rough and tumble world of Arkansas politics, they seem to be leaving Obama, Edwards, Dodd et al, alone. They talk about a Democratic implosion if Hillary loses ground, but they need look no further than the religious war being waged among conservatives to see where the deepest conflicts lie in Amerika today. They are scared out of their neo-con fur coats, and it's fun to listen to.

They are brutalising each other so badly it's good they all have the best health care plans your money can buy. You should hear the insults heaped on Huckabee, the current front-runner, famous in his own party as The Huckster. You should catch the culture war crusader, Alan Keyes, on talk shows where the host can't get this insane man to stop talking. You could check on the chatter about Rude Boy 'Married My Second Cousin' Rudy, the comments about Mitt's illegals, the sorrow about Fred Thompson's failure and the sudden resurrection of a candidate they all hoped had gone away - Johnny Hanoi Hilton McCain.

But then of course, there are the tired old leftie commentators who, latching on to the Jefferson comment, refer to the Bush era as the 'reign of witches'. One blogger got himself all het up describing the hysteria generated by Bush's war on civil rights as an example. But even though I failed History A level (my favorite subject) I'm not the only one, am I, to remember that the witches were the victims of hysteria, not the instigators.

But given that gay marriage will play a ridiculously large role in the choice of the next president it is fitting that witches would be evoked to create hostility towards Clinton. After all, faggots, meaning 'a bundle of sticks for burning' were used in the bonfires to burn witches to death. And unfortunately it isn't just men on the right who use the term 'witch' to describe a strong woman.

Now, on to the subject of lesbian divorces. Oh, damn, there's the kettle. Back later.

you spent how much???

Photo:Jill Posener, London 1985© All Rights Reserved

I have to say - I am fascinated by the way you Yanks do stuff - from Elvis posing with Nixon in the Oval Office to Clinton pretending to be Elvis in the Oval Office, Hillary being endorsed by Madonna, Barack by Oprah, Chuck Norris 'approving' of Huckabee - but wouldn't y'all be happier if the Repo Men and Demo Derby parties chose a 'leader' and you went to the polls in November 2008 to vote the Party of your choice. I mean, you do this anyway. All of you who support Barack or Hillary and glare at each other in Town Hall meetings in the primaries - you're all gonna vote the Demos come November, right? Are any of you gonna vote the Republican ticket if your favored nominee isn't the Demo candidate? Nah, didn't think so. So tell me the point again?

The cost of the 2004 General Election was estimated at 4 billion, and that’s not even counting the cost of all the ballots, poll workers and election lawyers or the expenses incurred by states and local government, adding a possible $1 billion more. Any thoughts on how you would rather have spent that money?

But it isn't just the sheer dollar amount - it's how disengaged from their jobs politicians and their staff become for up to 18 months before an election while they raise record amounts from you, and that only millionaires can run for office in Amerika today (think of the $62 million of his own money that Democrat Jon Corzine put into his New Jersey Senate campaign - yup, he won), and in spite of a record 60% turnout in 2004 America still has lower voter turnout than virtually every other established democracy in the world.

And that record turnout? It put BushWhacker back in the Off-White House with a majority of the popular vote and the electoral college. I know I know, you all feel the elections have been stolen since 2000. But if you feel that Diebold is robbin' ya of democracy then how do you feel about the suggestions that Lyndon Johnson thieved the Texas vote and Mayor Daley's Chicago corruption tipped the scale for JFK in 1960, among the narrowest margins of victory in US history.

Don't get me wrong - my heart beats somewhat libertarian, I chafe at what I feel is an encroaching government slime around my neck, I resent lowest common denominator politics with 'liability' as a primary reason for laws; code disguised as protection, designed for the stupid; and lifestyle laws, starting with Berkeley's recent criminalization of lying on the ground, quaintly called the Public Commons Initiative, all the way up to bans on gay marriage - but I'm someone who might support mandatory voting. Don't try to figure it out - life is complicated.

But there's almost a year left - and I'm already in a tizz. I'm gonna get back to harmless blogs about guns, dogfighting, lesbian divorces, money, and being an older butch with a tattoo.

geez, i love a political system i can't vote in

I started off being annoyed about Oprah's entry into national politics - especially this early in the selection process. I felt that taking a position now - endorsing Barack Obama in the earliest of the early primary races - was a veritable fuck you to Clinton. But perhaps she felt that this will be her only opportunity to make this plea. Obama may simpy be overwhelmed by the ferocity of the Clinton campaign, and the Iowa Caucus and New Hampshire Primary give a sort of respite from the sustained battle ahead. The 2012 Presidential race will be here before the dust has settled on the 2008 bout. And Oprah, who is the most beloved entertainment figure since Bill Cosby, knows - name recognition, name branding and product placement play as important a role in the elevation of political figures as do laws passed, positions taken or experience earned.

Obama will not be the Democratic nominee in 2008, and I'm not certain that the once Inevitable Hillary will either. Like all popularity contests, momentum swings back and forth, and circumstances, scandals, false moves, and surprise endorsements can make one candidate glow bright until the next week brings a change in fortune.

The Republican field is as intriguing as the Democratic. Guiliani looks to be out of it. He can't survive the scandals which keep surfacing - Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik's legal problems; the public cost of his Hamptons affair with Judith Nathan (now his wife); the torn relationships with his kids. His self-aggrandizing about 9/11 is, well, wearing pretty thin. McCain is the loser who keeps getting up off the canvas even though his bloodied face is barely recognizable, and Hunter and Paul are there for shock or comedy value only. It's gonna be Huckabee or Romney. Now there's the 'Willie Horton' in Huckabee's past, and he could spend the next 3 months defensively explaining his record of clemency and pardons. Even though evangelical christians voice suspicion of Mormons, I think Romney is the most likely to survive the religious infighting. Scary. Whoever gets to play next in the Rose Garden will be the most ostentatiously religious President in memory. In his eagerness to play down Moroni the Angel, or Joseph Smith and the golden plates, Mitt might be the most likely to try to be secular.

If Oprah's evangelistic like trailblazing for Barack does anything, it will be to bring an increasingly cynical and tired electorate back to the voting booth. And that's what shifted my attitude to her appearance in his camp. Black self-disenfranchisement plays just as large a part as the well-documented scandals of polling places closing down in heavily African American districts, or misplacement of voter rolls and registration. At this point it may well take a superstar to evoke the memory of Dr King to jump-start a belief in the positive benefits of democratic participation.

I just don't believe Obama has the depth - to tackle the complexity of government at that level. In a role as an international symbol of a new Amerika, he could be stunning and persuasive. And Clinton? Hey, I'm sorry, but I think the Clintons are damaged goods - compromised, unpredictable on foreign policy. Make no mistake. Bill ain't coming to the Big House as the little woman. It doesn't matter how much you liked Bill - Hillary has none of his populist charm, and even less of his political instincts.

Amerika is pretty evenly split - you could put in a Republican or Democratic president and make an adequate case that they have a mandate. The devil is in the details of Supreme Court appointments, the power of the Vice President and the choice of an Attorney General. The role of Secretary of State - the job once occupied by Thomas Jefferson - has been sent to the back of the bus by BushBoy. Yet it was, under Nixon for example, one of the most legitimately powerful positions in the American political landscape.

So, which one of the candidates still standing after these early rounds - Obama, Clinton and Edwards - will commit to protecting the concerns most dear to social progressives. You know, this is gonna sound strange, but I'm looking to the candidate who is the least like a lightning rod. Obama may evoke Martin Luther King Jr, but he doesn't have the ability to tell me what his actual program is going to be. And I'm not interested in women getting all in a lather about electing the first female president. It's a facile reason to elect anyone. My mum voted for Margaret Thatcher for just that reason. Clinton is not the right woman. She is not a stateswoman like a Golda Meir or an Indira Gandhi, she is not a unifier, or a steady hand. She can't even get the most popular woman in America to endorse her.

Oprah went with her gut. I've got no complaint about that. But she went with her race, and while the short term result may well be higher voter turnout and yay, who could complain about that, the longer term effect might be to remind one and all that there are two dominant ethnicities living either side of Main Street. Perhaps when the numbers of Latino and Asian voters make a more profound dent in the end result, America will break from the stranglehold of the two party and the two race system.

So, I'm giving Winfrey a free pass on this one. And as I don't believe in walking away from the 'system', even though I'm not allowed to vote as an Alien, albeit a legal one, I'm supporting a candidate who more than 50% can stomach. Edwards for President. And hey, why not an Edwards/Obama ticket. And after two terms - Obama in 2016?

how do lesbians have sex

I have no freakin' idea. Well, I do, but I don't think I got the answer from any kind of online wo-manual. Would I have been a better lover in my 20's if I'd been able to consult the Internet? Watching the only film about lesbians available to me - The Killing Of Sister George, I might have got the idea it had a lot to do with tweed suits and a cigar (Oh wait, that's a boy thing, right Bill?). But I'm just amazed at how often this question, typed into search engines from Shangai to Marseilles - leads to my blog. I can't work out whether this is just the eternal prurient question from curious blokes or whether women across the world are genuinely looking for the answer to this. Isn't it like getting up in the morning? We don't know how it's done, but somehow, there we are with a coffee cup in our hands. How did I get here?

Photo: Jill Posener, San Francisco, 1989 © 2007. All Rights Reserved

Somehow, in the absence of any famous lezzies on the telly, or GLBT film festivals, any positive cultural references whatsoever, my g...g...g...g... generation, and lesbians before us, managed to get it on and get it on good. But I'm growing worried about the 'new' lesbian. If some of the reports I'm getting from the 30 somethings I know are true - she's too busy setting rules for dating - 10 dates before sex, three dates before a kiss, but you can go to the Farmers Market on the 2nd date and hold hands. What???

Unless of course you're advertising on Craigslist, in which case you can have tea with your Mum at 4pm, walk the dogs, see your therapist, have dinner with your best friend and get laid by a complete stranger by 10 o clock that night.

Going to the Farmers Market with the woman you have just started dating is the new version of the U Haul. And holding her hand (even though you haven't kissed yet) in front of all the rural lesbian cheese makers and organic farmers is the new 'hot' date. We virtually live in coffee shops and we barely have bars anymore - thank goodness for my favorite dive The Lexington in San Francisco (though my age might make me look more like June Buckridge than someone's online catch - go rent The Killing Of Sister George).

My memory is that there was a lot of sex in the 70's and 80's. Now, I grant you, a lot of it wasn't worth having, especially as proscriptive feminists - who shall remain nameless here because we all know who they were - spent an inordinate amount of time telling the rest of us what we could or shouldn't do in bed, or on the sofa after the anti-nuclear rally, or in the grass on Hampstead Heath by the Women's Pond, or in the toilet at the Wimmins Disco (pretty good sex actually), or at a Spare Rib Magazine Benefit. That's the thing. We were socialising all the bloody time. And it didn't matter whether you were getting off (I hate that phrase, but no one would use the word 'fucking') with your best friend's current squeeze, because after all, we were in the vanguard of a new age, where no patriarchal rules applied.

I'm getting shaky just thinking about it. Everyone smoked (except me), most people drank (more than me), many couldn't get up in the morning without a joint between their lips (except me), and everyone seemed to eat too many lentils and smell of garlic. I could tell who was a femme screaming to get out of her dungarees, but I wasn't allowed to, I could feel who would want me to hold her down and fuck her hard but I wouldn't dare, and I could feel myself battering against the constraints of a political dogma that told me I was wrong to feel the way I did.

I guess I'm pretty happy that some of my younger compadres feel OK waiting till date # 11. Mind you, these days there's so much negotiating to do it takes all that time to get the contract drawn up.

lost pound puppy shoots eight to death

I'm sorry - I was writing a really funny blog, I thought we could all use a laugh, but I can't handle this. I am so fucking sad about the eight dead in an Omaha mall, the five others wounded, and yes, even for the nineteen year old boy - though everyone insists on calling him a man because he committed this unspeakable act of terror. He had become estranged from his family, lost his job at McDonalds and his girlfriend. He struggled with depression. Yet he was able to 'obtain' a gun from his father's house.

The right wing are scrambling to find another good reason why another mass killing by another American justifies anti-terror laws which perpetuate hatred and suspicion towards foreigners, outsiders and immigrants.

And along with this horror I feel, I'm sad at the description by the good hearted family who took Robert Hawkins in - a year ago when his own birth family threw him out - that he was like a lost little pound puppy. There isn't a pound puppy alive that will ever take a gun and put it to your head, or to the heads of shoppers in a mall, or students in a classroom.

This is the flip side of the way law enforcement describes killers as 'animals', as in 'only an animal would do this'. If we spent less time on meaningless analogies between killers and animals and more time coming to terms with the fact that humans are pretty much the only species that kill like this for sport and fame, we might actually face and address the terror that we keep insisting cannot conveivably have come from our own heartland.

dogs on a cold day lyrical

I wrote a blog the other day in a cotton wool mood of happiness. And before you get worried, I'm pretty clear that happiness like anger is just an emotion, as quick to pass as it was to arrive. Why is it that people ask 'are you happy?' when enquiring about someone's permanent mindset? Or 'does she make you happy?' when prying into what sort of relationship your friend is having if she often seems unsettled. Why do they do that? I am, honestly, not a believer in the concept of 'happiness' as a state of being.  Optimism - now there's something I can lay claim to. But being an optimist means that things are often not quite as good as you'd like.....I guess cynic could be added to my list of lesser qualities.

But on that morning, it was Sunday, I was in a sort of happy zone. Not totally unknown to me - it's just that I don't normally write about it. So, I wrote about it being autumnal, really pre-winterish and I was kinda liking it....and then when it was done, I hit the 'Save' button and sent it off to you. I got one response, from someone I love. We were having dinner and she said it was sickly sweet, sentimental, she didn't like it at all. I raced home after the movie we went to - 'Margot At the Wedding' (don't see this movie immediately after fighting with someone) - and took the blog off the site.

But I've had second thoughts - partly because it is now raining and this is making me miserable, as the greyness always does. So, it's a little comforting to remember that I sometimes do write when I feel at total peace.

Sunday - It is freezing in my house, but it could be because I leave windows open 365 days of the year, so that the cats can come and go, playing up and down ladders in and out of the kitchen. There is frost on the roof of my little office, and my delinquent cat Slim watches his breath hang in the cold air. Early morning coffee - is there anything better - and the grilled lamb leftovers from a party I went to last night (which, before you ask, I did share, extensively, with the animals clamoring at my feet).

It was so cold I had to wear a zippered hoodie over my black T shirt today, and then added a favorite jacket, a circa 1997 tan Dickies with a brown corduroy collar, ipod in my pocket, and the dogs having fun with the leaves skipping on the trails in the park. The sky was not quite blue and the grass stood to attention in the unfamiliar nippy breeze. It was cold, and I couldn't have been more content. I flipped the replay on the Pogues 'When The Ship Comes In' and danced along the gravel path through the woods, cradling little Emily in my arms when she refused to put her little poodle feet on the cold ground one second more. This was not a particularly compelling butch image, but it could be why many people mistakenly think of me as 'sweet'. At first. As the little dog's eyes met mine with the bursting with flavour music pounding in my ears, I was glad this wasn't witnessed by a human who might smirk at the scene.....

Emily, a young poodle mix, who came from the Berkeley Shelter has distracted me a bit from the loss of Roxy, especially as she broke her foot falling off a very low deck (I think she deliberately did this so that I couldn't adopt her out sooner), and as she races through my house, the splint cracks and thuds on my wooden floors. It will be mercifully quiet when she leaves. I am embarrassed to say I am quite fond of her, and her presence has made Roo and Oscar appreciate each other even more than before. You may be wondering whether I'm just going to wax lyrical about dogs on the trails, and being undeniably butch on an uncharacteristically cold day. The answer is yes. And Emily needs a home.