Women's lives are fragile, with strength

Loss and grief are part of our lives; we can’t escape them. My very good friend Mickey shares her feelings with us as another of her friends travels a painful life passage. Mickey is a briliant woman with unwavering faith. Perhaps she’s the most centered woman I know.

He is a tall drink of water, as my mother used to say. Tall and trim with a soft spoken voice, he doesn

Making reasonable changes with cosmetic surgery. This is an article I did for the Chicago Daily Herald some time ago. It occured to me, after my daughter decided on cosmetic surgery, that we need to be careful with our choices.

Face lift gone bad

Cosmetic surgery

Women persevere

We all need someone to look up to and women make great heroes. My guest blogger today is a young woman growing herself into a role model and hero, though she doesn’t even realize it. Blanca Stella Mejia, from Miami, has been a victim of the economy like so many of us. She’s not only a writer - a slippery enough career slope right now - but she’s a real estate professional in one of America’s most depressed markets. Still, she thinks she can.

There’s a famous children’s book called The Little Engine That Could. It is a story about a train that must be pulled over a large mountain. The Engine seeks the help of larger trains, but they refuse to help. Finally, a small train comes and helps the Little Engine get over the mountain. According to Wikipedia, some say this story is a metaphor for the American Dream.

My own story should be called the Little Engine that Became a Ferrari. I say this as a metaphor — the engine being my interior strength of steel in the midst of having my income come to a screeching halt in the last two years. In a few short words, I am a real estate broker in Miami. Can you get the picture?

Roadblock after roadblock has met me face to face in this huge financial struggle. Yet because of prior challenges I have faced in my life, I knew it was an opportunity to be rebuilt again from the inside out. It is as if I have been sitting inside a garage for two years for a complete overhaul with a new engine instead of minor scratch and dent repair for a week.

I finally came out of the garage today with my engine purring like a Ferrari. I am currently parked with a team who has a vision to create a prosperous company and they invited me to be a part of it. I am giving it a test run for 90 days. And if, for whatever reason, this doesn’t work out, my Ferrari engine is ready to rip on this great highway of life and fly high on a greater road. I know that this engine, this time around, will never fail me because the strength of steel comes from a heart that has immeasurable value even if on the exterior, the currency in the bank account has been temporarily dried up and in a lot of debt.

Still, I believe in the American Dream. It has been seemingly shattered for many. But I think of all those millions of soon-to-be Ferrari’s in the overhaul station. I can’t wait to share the highway with so many priceless hearts.

Please join Blanca Stella Mejia at her personal blog and get to know how to overcome adversity.

We will remember our military people

Please take some time amid the picnics, boating, partying and fun this weekend to have a moment of silence in which you honor our veterans and service women and men this Memorial Day.

I honor my father, R. Buczek, U. S. Navy Corpsman WWII, Pearl Harbor

I honor my mother, M. Braun, U.S. Marines WWII, Pearl Harbor

I honor my brother R.J. B. U. S. navy Viet Nam

I honor my brother W.D. B., U.S. Army, Germany

I honor my husband, D.W.P., U.S. Army, Viet Nam

I honor my son A.D.K., U.S Army, Operation Iraqii Freedom

I honor my daughter, E.M.K., U.S. Navy

I honor my son, M.A.K., U.S. Federal Government

I honor my niece, K.B., U.S. Air Force, in training

We are fortunate enough to have lost none of our family to these wars and services, but that doesn’t mean we have escaped unscathed. I offer my gratitude, pride and respect to all of mine, and to all the others who have chosen to serve.

We will remember.

Women have the freedom to go out on a limb

Quick and dirty today. I want to give you some links to great places for women on the web. It’s all about me. These are some of the projects I’ve completed recently and thought would be valuable to you. Enjoy. (Photo is by alicepopkorn)

How to install a high def TV antenna and save a fortune in TV costs - get your sig other to lend a hand or honest-to-gosh do it yourself in half an hour for under $100.

Amazon Kindle Deluxe is overpriced and under exciting - too much money, too much hype, too little value. Skip this gadget.

On women, community and quilting bees - how I grew up in the big city.

Cure warts, bug bites, and CD scratches with banana peels - modern folk lore that really may work. The ubiquitous banana peel can work wonders.

A pair of interviews with Sara Paretsky - renowned author of the V.I Warshawski detective series. A great look at a warm and earthy celebrity coupled with excellent advice for the writer who wants to sell writing, or the would be writer looking to improve. About Sara. About selling your writing.

What’s happening to the newpaper industry and other media? Will you have your morning paper much longer?

Drop me a comment and let me know what you think of the stuff I’ve told you via these websites!

Why is journaling worth your time and effort? Why should you write and illustrate your life story? Here’s a guest post by a very cool woman who’s developing an Internet presence all her own. Faith Rose will tell you why.

Through the gateway of my journal I enter a world of dreams and possibility. The howling winds of creative fire, the tender heartache of yesterday, the billowy wings of awareness and the promised hope of tomorrow: all are available for my rumination.

Every event in our lives is a fertile field where we can plant, or weed, or harvest. Each field represents a personal life story, daily unveiling new challenges and reward. We are the only proprietor of our sacred land; a place where we can run and play, jump and hide. This is a place of pastoral invitation and exploration. We are safe here.

As a writer and illustrator, I have journaled for many years. The art of journaling is available every day, to everyone. Whether I read my current entries, or reflect on past ones, I am able to see a cohesive path braided together by yesterday, today, and tomorrow.

Within the pages of a journal, we are daily offered an opportunity for compassionate understanding. This is the beauty of a journal. You can enter “your personal pages” when you choose and leave when you’re ready. There are no to-do lists; no internal critics. There is no “right way” to journal and no “wrong way”. It is” your way” and your way is perfect for you…and my way is perfect for me. There is no watchful teacher, no advisor…..just the gentle tip-toes of a meandering mind.

With a light-hearted laugh, I always remind people, Journals are SELF-adjusting.

Often, I encounter people who think you need to learn how to journal or those who truly believe that only Writers journal. This is simply a misconception. I patiently direct them to begin to write about their current lives, and when they decide to float in the water of words, I encourage them to relax. Their writing will flow freely from the heart. On a fanciful Mary Engelbreit card, Marcel Proust writes, “The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.”

I share many of my journal entries and illustrations with others, some I reference periodically, but most are private. As a stay-at-home mother of four, I became keenly aware that my life was daily displayed before the watchful and curious eyes of my children. Through the pages of my journals, I interpret my private yearnings and conflicts, my hopes and challenges. I create a timeline of my life journey. I believe my memoirs will be a source of comfort and inspiration for my children. Like a mirror, my journals reflectively display the intertwining images of their life with mine.

“What things there are to write…My mind is full of gleaming thought; gay moods and mysterious, moth-like meditations hover in my imagination, fanning their painted wings.” Logan Pearsall Smith

“Journaling creates a safe, comfortable place where you can vent your feelings, chart your success, recognize patterns, and enter a private world of self-discovery.” (author unknown)

Faith Rose is a deep thinking writer and illustrator. She has been journaling most of her life, beginning with childhood diaries. Faith Rose understands the journaling process and incorporates powerful illustrations within her text.

CSI, or one of those shows, talked about rape kits last week. Their premise was that thousands, even tens of thousands of rape evidence kits languish on dusty shelves throughout the U.S. Those kits have never been processed. I was astonished, and deeply upset.

Kits unprocessed means women who have been assaulted at the most traumatic level are waiting for justice. And justice sits immobilized. If the kit isn’t processed, chances are the perpetrator has been released. No trail took place.

The victim is trying to move on, but has no closure. She went through an incredibly tragic trauma and will have to go through it all over again if the authorities ever get down to processing the evidence of a crime committed against her. Look, put yourself in the position of these victims. How devalued would you feel?

Courtney Martin

But that’s just a TV show. Right? Not. I found a real story in exactly the same vein written by Courtney E. Martin. Martin is a columnist on youth and political culture at The American Prospect Online and a blogger at Feministing. She authored Perfect Girls, Starving Daughters and is part of the Progressive Women