Call to Action (yea, yea, sue me… it’s deep and political and economical – but still very important so PLEASE, PLEASE READ!!)

For the most part, I try to avoid talking politics or economics on here but I’m going to make an exception here and talk about both at once.

I found out on Friday that the Arizona State government has proposed massive budget cuts to deal with the current state deficit. I find this to be very interesting because when Janet Napolitano left office last week, she had said that everything was in good shape. But as soon as she got sworn in as Secretary of State in DC, those left behind here totally scrapped whatever it was that she had in place, instigated panic among all state employees and threatened to, as ASU President Michael Crow has said, put the state of Arizona education and economies back to Third World conditions.

The thing is this isn’t just something that will affect the universities. It will also affect K-12 schools. They would face a cut of $900 MILLION!!!!!! Currently, Arizona is ranked 49th in how much we spend on our K-12 education. So what – we’re going for absolutely last place here?

We’re talking about 30% of the budget for the universities. Imagine for every $100 you brought in, you had to give up $30. How would a cut of that magnitude affect you? So you’re probably thinking – no big deal because they’ll just raise tuition again and no one will even feels it. But the thing you need to know about tuition is that the universities collect it and then turn it right over to the state. The state then budgets a portion of that back to the universities. Tuition doesn’t run the university. Tuition runs the state.

This brings up one of my biggest points. These decisions have been made in a STATIC environment. There was obviously no consideration given to actual market actions and reactions. In real life, one decision will lead to another. The market will react to external forces.

One example: So the state is telling us that less of that money is going to be returned back to the university to be able to actually serve its mission. So what are the options? The university could try maintaining the same levels of students and make up for the difference by increasing tuition and therefore bringing in additional revenue. But while that looks good on paper, if tuition increases, not as many people will come. It will be more affordable to go somewhere else or to not go at all. That means that the tuition will have to continue to increase which will continue to scare off more students. So what’s another option – cut programs to cut costs – which means fewer students, less tuition revenue, and another cycle of loss?

Lets look at it from another angle – let’s just increase the size of the classes, cut 2000 positions and now we’ll be good, right? Well, let’s look at the implications of this one. Ok let’s say I get fired. I immediately pull out everything I’ve put into my state retirement fund – pulling from the state coffers. Then, let’s assume that because the economy is bad, I can’t find another job. So I get in line and start getting unemployment payments – from the state coffers. And since I don’t have a job, the state isn’t collecting state taxes from my paycheck anymore. I lose my house, adding to the housing crisis and further decreasing how much is collected in property taxes. So how did the state get any better off? How did that balance the budget? 2000 people just lost their jobs and had to turn to the state for assistance.

On paper, the cut seems to work. But reality is not static. And I gotta be honest with you. I don’t think that the people that drafted that budget took any reality into consideration.

One suggestion that is out there, proposed by a member of the same political party as the legislator that actually made this budget proposal. She suggested that instead of just cutting education, we look at other voter approved initiatives. See there’s this law says that initiatives put in by vote of ‘we the people’ can’t have their budgets adjusted by legislators. Well, this rep has suggested that we have an emergency vote in March to put those on the chopping block. This would allow us to cut the budget to fund the no-smoking ban or other things. These things are obviously important because ‘we the people’ voted for them but they might just not be as important to ‘we the people’ as education. This sounds like at the very least, a great place to start!

So I know that the universities are willing take their FAIR share of the cuts. But come on… let’s try to play fair here.

So now comes the important part. This is my call to action. I’m asking everyone I know that lives in AZ to write your legislators. You can go to this website to look up who your legislators are: http://www.azleg.gov/alisStaticPages/HowToContactMember.asp. You can go this website to get info about what’s going on: http://www.speakupnowaz.org/.

Look – I know it’s a lot to ask but I’m asking you to contact your legislators. This is important. This does require our action. So please. Don’t leave it to someone else. YOU CAN MAKE A DIFFERENCE. But you can only do it if you do SOMETHING!!!

My Fav of Z's Christmas Gifts

This post is going to be uncharacteristically lacking in long-winded ranting… which is probably a good change for anyone who does happen to check it. For Christmas this year for Z, I had him lie down on some particle board, added some accessories to his silhouette, cut them out, painted them and hung them on his newly painted wall. Check ‘em out!!

For those of you who don't have little boys, this is jungle fury's red power ranger:

This is my oh so suave rendering of one Mr. Clark Kent sans secret identity:

Spiderman himself. Eventually he will have a rope in his raised hand but all in good time!

And my personal favorite super hero... Batman!! Nothing like a hot rich guy with cool gadgets who saves the damsel in distress to perk my interest!

And this is the super four all together, casually hanging out on the unproportionately sized city buildings. (Except Superman... he had to float... his building was too tall cause the atmosphere up there wasn't good for his hair do.)

Even after all that... Z still insists that there are monsters in his room. Sheesh. But I love it! And if he had a queen sized bed, would even consider taking it over. Maybe I should do some life size ones of me!! :D

Terminal Hope

I’ve had a lot to think about lately and I’m totally word vomiting here on the screen but it helps me work things out. (A quick shout out to my auntie R who talks things out with me over and over like beating a dead horse which, although probably annoying, helps me see things differently and with better perspective... eventually!)

In talking to her today, I was thinking about how my situation with my ex has really seemed to prove hopeless for me. There are little milestones that I keep putting up with the hope that by the time I get to the next one, things will be better, easier, less stressful. I put a lot of hope into those and then when things don’t really change or don’t change for the better, I abandon all hope and end up frustrated and upset. I was complaining that 14 years is too long of a goal post and that it wouldn’t be enough to sustain me.

But in the midst of admitting that feeling, a non-definitive thought began lurking and so now I’m trying to delve into that. It’s the idea of a terminal kind of hope. If today you were diagnosed with a terminal cancer or disease that would not kill you today or tomorrow or even this year but you know would make your life harder while you lived and maybe even shorten your lifespan, how would you feel? I would like to think that I would fight to find a cure, do my research, look at all up and become the expert and hope like crazy that before my predicted demise, the outlook on my condition had changed. I think people who experience that kind of thing may develop a long-term hope. Or maybe a long term cope.

Even with hope, the day to day would have to be hard. A friend of a friend of mine has crohn’s disease which may shorten her life but in the meantime, can make it unpleasant at times, limiting her ability to walk for long distances, requiring her to take frequent advantage of her sick time, etc. Her situation is hard. So I wonder what exactly keeps her going?

Well it’s kind of interesting because if you just saw her today, you wouldn’t know anything was wrong. She lives a normal life even though it’s not what is normal for me. So I don’t think that the answer is to paste on a happy grin and make like everything is swell. I don’t think it’s pretending to family and friends that you have it all together.

I think hope has to come in the little things. Hope that tomorrow night I will have fun with my son and friends and Chuckie Cheese. Hope that the girls night out that I’m going to miss won’t be too much fun without me and that I’ll be able to catch the next one (or the next one or the next one...). Hope that Saturday will be full of new adventures. Hope that we will laugh and smile and run and giggle and that the time that we have that really is so precious will not be wasted on things that don’t matter. Hope that family and friends and those that love will not get too tired of the word vomit and talking out the same endless circle. Hope, not that the world will change tomorrow from blue to pink… but hope that instead when I look out at the blue world, I will find in it the beautiful shades of azure.

When I have good things happen or I have a rejuvenating weekend or get a glimpse into a new perspective, sometimes I take that as a sign or proof that things are going to improve. I feel happy... things must be getting better! Then when the day to day doesn't really change, I let my hopes dash again. But maybe true hope isn't the expectation that because I had a great weekend that the next week is going to be wonderful and I've started on this long road that leads straight up with no pitfalls or potholes. Hope is knowing that you have a Hummer that can make the hilly drive and hit the potholes without crashing and nose diving into a ravine. Hope is knowing that even though the journey is tenuous, it's a good ride and worth the price of gas.

I think I am getting close to ending my belief in happy endings. And that’s ok. As long as I don’t give up my hope of happy livings. The end doesn’t matter. As it has been said so many times before… it’s the getting there that counts.

Randomness

Ok so I haven't pulled pictures off my camera in a while and don't feel like hooking it up right now so I decided to just post some random ones from my external hard drive to share.


This is one of my favorites of my dad (Mexico, Tzrararcua, 1999):





Me and my momma when I was big and preggos and she was skinny and stuff:



This is Nola - the horse I bought from my sister and kept for like a year but never once rode. I was scooping her poop and cleaning her stall the day before I had Z.




My nephew B in Z's carseat along with his two big sisters:





A digital enhanced photo of my cute niece T:





I digitally put those clouds in there on one of my sister's wedding pictures:




My dad back in his pilot days... what a stud muffin!


My little sister A's first baby - how cute!:





Two more nieces - J and M:



My two youngest brothers busting some moves:


And last but not least (at least for today!) is one of Z's first Christmas. What a cute chubby elf!!:


Happy randomness!

Love (and no… not the mushy romantic stuff… don’t get all excited)

It’s funny how we can grow up and have images or thoughts or experiences that determine how we define something for years or sometimes even a lifetime. I have defined the concept of love by this particular image in my head. It is a scene in which my mom is kneeling in front of someone, crying, begging, pleading, encouraging, pushing for the response that she is trying so desperately to elicit from the subject of her attention. For so long, that has been my definition of love. I have accepted it in different forms but I guess I’ve been holding on to that image as “pure” love or even my ideal for love.

I went to Tucson this weekend for some much needed friend time (and it was awesome – love my friends!!) and while driving back and listening to this talk on tape by S. Michael Wilcox, I just had this sudden epiphany… like lightning struck my brain. Love is the feeling that draws me to irresistibly to certain people, that provides a sense of well-being and welcome, that says that you’re invited even without an invitation, that prods me to open my soul and spill my guts with faith that such will not lead to rejection but deeper understanding.

Different people radiate their love in different ways and there are versions of it that I hope to never experience again. And there are others that I’m not sure I’ll ever get enough of, that seeps into my soul and infuses me with life!

And the thing that is most delightful is the far reaching effects of this love in my life. It fills me with hope. And if you’ve ever lived without hope, it’s amazing what a difference it can make to have it. It’s like putting on rose colored glasses – not in the “not dealing with reality, let’s just gloss everything over” kind of way either. It makes it seem like you can deal with whatever issue that comes up because you don’t have to do it alone and at the end of the day, you belong somewhere. It’s like being alive!

So for those of you who already have it… hang on to it, it’s the elixir of life! For those of you who don’t, I hope you find it. And to those who love me… thanks! It means more to me than I think even I understand!

New Year Work Out

For Christmas this year, Z got a power wheels jeep from Santa. He loves it and wants to ride it all the time. Which is great because I would like to get into shape a bit this year. So we got home last night from school/work and after a quick dinner, we took the jeep out. Now when it’s fully charged it’s supposed to go 5 MPH – that’s a 12 minute mile. I don’t think it was going quite that fast but I was jogging to keep up with him. We went for 30 minutes. Wow! It was really good for me but man, I am out of shape!!

So then we went to the library. We were going to go to this story time but there were a million people there and the line was out the door. So we checked out a few things and went home. I told Z he could watch 20 minutes of the movie he got at the library but only if he watched my movie with me first. It was a Pilates movie!! It was so fun! He tried so hard for the first 10-15 minutes to follow the lady but then got bored so was kicking me. Anyway it was really fun and I think this year Z will help me be more active and get in shape this year!

Four, Quatro, 4

The number four is a significant number. Right now it is my son’s favorite number. He loves it when we check out at the 4th register, confiscates any of my receipts with the number four on it, and counts in multiples of fours. He is, after all, four.

But it also has significance to me. Four years ago, my mom died. At this time four years ago, I was back to work after a long holiday break in Lakeside helping to take care of her. I was training a brand new employee, jumping every time the phone rang – fearing that it was my summons to return to Lakeside to her bedside. I think the phone call came on a Tuesday or Wednesday and it was not what I wanted to hear. She wasn’t going to make it through the week. I had to come back immediately. And I did. Z was only 7 months old. We have pictures of them together but he doesn’t remember her and often asks me to show him her picture again. Especially the ones of her holding him. But even that is a bit hard for me because the mom in those pictures is not the mom of my memories. She was 50 or 60 or 70 pounds lighter than the way I always picture her. She was frail and tired. And even though I couldn’t see it then with her in front of my face, her eyes in the pictures show pain.

Even though I was called home in the middle of the week, Mom didn’t pass until Saturday. We took turns sitting by her bed, warding off Dad’s multiple suggestions at yet another testimony meeting, greeting mourners, and even sneaking off. I remember the exhaustion that possessed me down to my bones. I remember feeling so exhausted and wishing that if God was going to take her, he would just do it and end the hurt already.

I snuck off for a breather. Went to Wal-Mart of all places. And I walked back in as she literally took her last breath. I tell myself that she waited for me to take that breath. That she waited so that all her kids were there and then she could die in peace. I don’t know if it’s true but it makes me feel better. It’s amazing how when you watch someone struggle for every breath you can wish that the air would stop and the pain end but as soon as that last breath is taken, you decide the pain was worth it and you’d give anything to see her chest rise again.

Even in the funeral home I kept waiting for someone to wake me. At the viewing, it was like a big party, a reunion. So many people. But I only remember it as a blur of images, of hair, of colors, of flowers – but not individual faces or people or thoughts. As the evening wore on and were getting close to going home, I stood over her in her casket and stared. Willing her to breathe again. To prove that she was the master of all pranks and she had pulled the ultimate fast one over us. I examined her hair, her face, her nose, her lips, her hands. Who was this woman who had given me life? How could she lie so still? How could she leave me to face everything else without a mother?

I know that it may sound extreme for me to say it. I don’t think you can understand that feeling until you have lost your mother. I’ve talked to lots of people who lost their moms at different ages and stages in their lives. It seems to be hard and life changing no matter what.

This is what my mom missed in my life:

My son turned one a few months after she died. My ex went suicidal. I filed for divorce. My ex was convicted of domestic violence against me and my son. I went through lengthy legal battles. My divorce was finalized. I was promoted at work. I moved to a different apartment. I dated several guys. I moved to Gilbert and moved in with my aunt and uncle. I faced more legal battles. I got a new, more promising job. I left behind my friends and everything familiar. I bought a house and moved into it. I took the GMAT. I learned to lobby and visited with my congressmen and their aides. My son went to nursery and became a Sunbeam and then a CTR5. My son turned two, three, and four. My son started preschool. He learned to walk, talk, scream, yell, whisper, sing.

It hurts very much that my son’s grandma is gone. I wish I could fill that hole for him. I wish I could fill that hole for me.

I have been told at times that because I am sad at the loss of my mom that I don’t believe in the plan of salvation. Well I honestly don’t know what I believe but I do know that no matter what your vision of the afterlife is, sometimes it just hurts to have that hole now. Someone once told me sadness is what you feel when things don’t turn out how you expected.

I can relate to that. I know that kind of sadness. A longing for what could have been. What in my mind should have been.

Sometimes I complain about my mom and the way she was in life. I complain that she didn’t love me enough or treat me right or put me first like I wanted. I know that sometimes I don’t give her due credit. But regardless of what our relationship was, I feel pain and sorrow that I never fully got the lifetime to work it out, to come to understandings, to forgive, to hold, to love, and to grow with her.

My mom is gone. It hurt. I want to find something to fill that hole but I think no matter what, it will be there. As much as I love other role models and reach out to people around me, I want my mom. I want mine, my one and only, her. The one that has to love me no matter what because she is my mom. The one that I would always have a claim on, who would talk to me when I need a friend, who would help me when I need strength. Who I could ask without wondering if I had overstepped my welcome or fear being turned away.

About a year after she died, I had a thought that lingers still. I thought that someday we’d meet up again and we’d pack a picnic. Just the two of us. We’d take it out and find a tree with a branch that hangs over to give us shade, pull out a blanket and sit and chat for a hundred and four years. She would explain to me all the things I wanted to know about her but never asked. I’d tell her what she’d missed since she left and by the time we were through, we’d know everything about each other. We’d make up for lost time and misunderstandings and it would all be ok. I would have a mom. Finally. Forever.