people

A Letter to My Mother!

/ ludlumdrive / 1 Comment

diamae

Mom, I remember you having a mile-long list of things you wanted to realize but could not wait to hang your teacher’s baton to pursue them. You made plans to enjoy life, to breathe and live the world whenever time permitted. You were looking forward to retirement and could not wait.

Your dream was to travel the world, visit countries and see your girls whenever you felt like it, and for as long as you pleased. The plan was for you and Dad to do it the way retirees usually do.

You yearned to jump on board a big cruise liner, sport kaki shorts and Hawaii shirts, sunglasses, designer hat and cruise the world; hop on a plane and land in the nearest town, chronicle your latest adventures, take and share your many photos with us. You dreamed it all and were on track to do just that but it was not to be. The Almighty had a different script and your wishes were diverted, thrown off course.

Your husband first earthquake – he came down with not one but two and three strokes – came like a full force hurricane. It brushed his wits and for the avid reader that he has always been, it was an unintended prescription tantamount to a death sentence. The illness has been progressively eating up his brain and his physical and emotional behavior for a while now; never mind how long but it has been a while.

Locked blindly like a prisoner, it has battered your body but it has not taken an ounce of your energy or soul; and like one good warrior, you have soldiered on, catching the bus or taxi, whatever means of transportation to the hospital everyday, sometimes twice a day to visit your husband, to spoon feed your guy, your soul mate, your man.

Through it all, you tirelessly became his eyes and ears; his translator, his nurse, his companion in chief. You, the once delicate invulnerable flour in my Dad’s eye, metamorphosed into one-woman machine who (un)selfishly and meticulously lives by her very script of “God had other plans for me and I have accepted”, and no one dares say a word because you refuse to hear it.

You just commemorated your 50th wedding anniversary last week and, as expected, you were at the forefront of the magic that it was. I looked forward to seeing you strolling down the aisle, flooded by your loved ones, hand in hand with your unselfishness, and his bashfulness and hearing the priest pronounce you “husband and wife” once again, but it was not to be.

You hoped to haul him up on his wheelchair and wheel him to the church. I recall you wanting to celebrate a deux, fearful that he would not have any recollection or get too fidgety to even grace the event. Instead, the priest came to your house, an altar was erected and “millions” of your friends came to rejoice and toast you. I am jealous!

You have not talked about touring the world lately and I don’t believe you have stopped dreaming, nor accepted the fate that has been delineated for you either. Perhaps, beneath the seemingly stalwart veil, there is a glimpse of hope that you, one day, will be able to be that famous tourist you once longed for after all.

Your devotion to him, your irreplaceable love, transcend imagination. It is beyond belief. Yours is a bond that I will neither be able to mimic nor replicate but observe and be proud of.

Mom, I can vehemently utter that I will never be you; I will never be like you; I will not even pretend to be you, but your daughter I shall always be. You are one of a kind!  Thank you for being my Mom.

Happy Mother’s Day!

So What If She Does?!

/ ludlumdrive / Leave a comment

madonna

So, everyone is madly in love with the idea of Madonna adopting another child from Malawi. They are so exuberant that they are doing the unthinkable, hiding their contentment. They are totally flying kite with it as everyone and everybody are coming out of the woods to utter how bad this is; how there are so many kids in the States who needs a home and she chose to go across the world to “get” one; stamping her as “baby monster”, pointing their fingers at her as she is “buying” the vulnerable. How bad her! Terrible, terrible Madonna!

She is desperately seeking (desperately seeking Susan?!) new ways to grab attention to herself, doing it for publicity. Huh?! Madonna, searching for attention and doing it as publicity stunt, ok! Give me a break.

People, Madonna no longer needs publicity. One word, Madonna, and every butthead in the world knows or heard of her, good or bad, even my poor old mother.

I imagine her going to bed at night, losing sleep, kicking herself out, hurting from what she reads in the media. The truth is, she does not care one bit and continues to discount the naysayers by throwing punches at whatever is irrelevant, to her wants and needs off course.

Has anyone seen her at home? Has anyone seen her tucking the kids to bed at night, reading them stories or changing their diapers – possibly done by the nannies but who cares? Has anyone heard complaints that she is an appalling mother; she has molested or abused her kids? I am sure there are stories but perhaps, an air tied contract may be preventing the salacious stories from blossoming yet the way rumors swales around her, we would have heard it by now.

The cheap consensus is that she should not adopt another child because she does not have morals, yeah and you do; please!  She does not have any ethics, class; yeah, so does Malawi – a nation decimated by AIDS, ravaged by rampant civil conflict, corruption, and not to be undone, rape and child abuse. Yet, no one has accused Madonna of being a bad mother.

Morality, huh? If you don’t have it how can you give, right?

Word on the street is that they are weary of the guys she hangs around with; her special friendships. Oh really? How fast our pointer finger points to the other end! Like a ballerina doll inside of a crystal-clear glass globe full of snowflakes doing a one eighty.

I digress to take a glance at my own mirror folks.

You see, once upon a time, when I was young, pretty and dandy – oh please, I still am, I was involved in a platonic relationship. I swear; I am raising my hand to tell the truth and nothing but the truth so help me God. The only mistake we made was to enjoy each other’s company and listening to any and every little beat dwon monster stories.

Seriously, there was as far as it went. And no, he was not gay. He was very much proud and in control of his manhood (he is now married with kids; it is not a testament but a guarantee). Yet, there was not a soul in the world – that means my peeps, community and other portentous people – who did not accuse us of a cover up, sham or something like none of your business?! But they were sure something was up, there were because it could not be.

Their wonderful deafening need for my low-cost news desecrated their need to be responsible; which leads me to Madonna. Why are we being so press to deny the woman with the opportunity to adopt another child and teh child with a better life? Who’s to say that she is not just being friends with these guys instead of them being her boyfriends? I sympathize!

Really, who are these people criticizing and unable to distinguish between the public from the private persona? So, it is your fault if things go another way, if the adoption is not approved..

Adoption is an enormous commitment; a decision not so hastily taken; it is (and then some) dedication to a being who will never look like you, who will never resemble you, who will never have your physical features or mannerism. It is all pure and noble love. It is not like you assemble the child up and pick she/he from a line up; well in essence you do.

If Madonna wants to give the child a happy life, so be it, let her do it. She is rich enough, has the resources at her fingertips to give this child a home – love, food and first grade medicine; and if she is looking for publicity, more power to her.  Guess who will benefit from it? The poor little precious Mercy James; nothing less, nothing more. She will be the winner and if we could put our dismal stupidity aside temporarily; perhaps, we would be sane to catch a glimpse of her true motive regardless of what it is.

It is interesting to see how all of sudden, rains of people are marching on like mother duck and her little ducklings. They are coming to express their outrage and how they really, really care for this innocent child; how they honestly are trying to protect her from the maniacal evil the “purchaser”, “baby snapper” piranha. People run.

So, Mercy is 4-year-old, live in an orphanage, with no one to hold her, no one to love, no one to tell her stories, no recurrent doctor’s visits or medicine.  Her mother has passed away; her grandmother who has lamented that taking her is “stealing” – I wonder how often she stops by for a visit, and her father who has seen the light and rose up from the ashes (and who certainly will dissipate quickly into the fin air once the camera is turned off), I wonder how often he stops by to give her a kiss or bring her new shoes. I wonder if any one of the Malawian officials belittling Madonna has ever heard of little Mercy or thought of protecting her from AIDS. I wonder if any of these people has ever hugged or held her in their arms.

No people; Kabbalah, not watching TV, not eating animal products, having many boyfriends (then most of the Africa’s population would be going to hell), saving the planet should not be deterrents to not giving a child a home. What we don’t value in life and what life is, is no longer of great importance. It is about saving a soul and if Madonna wants to do it, so let her. I am sure little Mercy will thank her one day.

Then You Have Michael Phelps …

/ ludlumdrive / Leave a comment

phelps

Who found himself in a pot-related squabble worth the size of Mount Rushmore! Here is a kid, yes a kid let’s not forget he is only 23 years old except that he has this huge saddle of responsibility dumped on his back just because he excelled on what he does best. A kid with everything going for him, so they say, who cannot partake in one of the “joys” of college campus; suddenly he is a hero, a role model kids can look up to. Ok, whatever you say. I wonder what happened to your own daddy!

C’mon, let’s face it, it is just pot people, no biggy; nothing major I assume; just some kid trying to have a good time with his homies (so called) or at least he assumed they were, packed with cell phones and cameras (signs of the time we live in; a regrettable atmosphere to say the least.). I mean whatever happened to “What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas”? Whatever happened to when celebrities were able to gracefully take pictures without worries or reprisals that their most compromising poses would appear on any of the handful gossip (legit they are still not to me) websites?

The new celebrities became slaves of the new age we have created. We tag along like mummified corpuses obsessed with anything celebrity.   They can do no wrong but we keep forgetting that they are humans as we. If I were a celebrity thank God I am not, I would be considered a mock like Jessica Alba. She hardly smiles (well, she is doing it a lot lately ever since the birth of her child), indicative that perhaps, she is not amused neither enjoys being the “cover girl”. I bet Michael can’t even clean his lips with his underwear; someone will hear about it. Let the guy have some fun.

What is the commotion? My old suitemate, along with the basketball players, used to do it all the time. Granted, she was suspended for bad grades after two semesters – I wonder where she is now – but the parties were endless. All I heard across the room were a bunch of happy people. The fact of the matter is marijuana should not be allowed in college campus period but it is, and unless college administrators intend to rid the dorms of the bad behavior, it will always be there.

On the other hand, he should have known better that there is always danger lurking and its consequences. Then again when you are that young, your judgment is hampered by your infantilism. We don’t have to pretend that we are grown at that age because we aren’t.

Now, his once youth indiscretion has tarnished his reputation and turned into a situation not to take lightly; you are no longer a young kid but an adult who no longer holds the envelope of excuses my friend! You by design became a role model by default after winning eight gold medals. You now rub elbows with the big leagues and since you have been placed in that pedestal, you are regarded as God and can no longer afford hiccups. By virtue you became this big person and a paradigm for young people – as if they did not have anyone in their family (then again who wants to be like a screw up member of the family?). You are just a kid (who can procreate, so ???). You now walk on high waters, everyone worships you and your dog, bend in and out for your graces but as you have learned, the minute you sneeze, oh Lord, you are dead. You become one appalling individual, persona non grata with callous and cynical characters disregarding you as a human being prune to mistakes. So, here you have; welcome to fame and fortune, the life of a celebrity; hopefully you learned your lesson.

Funny, my girlfriend told me the other day that her grandfather is using medicinal marijuana to help him cope with his disease. At first I found myself laughing uncontrollably than the seriousness of the issue settled in immediately.  But the whole scenario is amusing. I pictured the elder man sitting in his porch, rocking his chair and enjoying his joint… No, my friend’s granddad is pretty sick so, he is not rocking anything but according to her, he did a one eighty ever since he started using. So, buzz off; take one for the herb.

Yet, how hypocritical! There are countless of other 23 years old, just like Michael who are no longer considered kids but adults who are not only paying the price of humiliation but incarcerated just for marijuana violations. They are not getting a pass; they are not going to treatment but to jail instead not because of their second but their first indiscretions. Would he be getting the same treatment if he was Hussein Bolton of Jamaica? I wonder! Perhaps, it would have been a different story altogether; a not so settled media uproar that would have broken and shaken the world; a not so tamed scandal that would have left some to mutter that they are not surprised.  C’mon, if you are you or me and if the police stops us and finds a little joint in the car, we are dead! We are apprehended, handcuffed and thrown in the slammer to rotten unless we are able to afford a good lawyer.

The thing is he was not be forced to give up his medal, the Olympic committee just handed him his so deserving (slap) punishment– three months suspension and only lost a few endorsements. While others were indicted, he has gotten a free pass. Second chances are hard to come by so he better take advantage of it. The fact of the matter is that weed is an illegal substance; there is no question about it. I am pretty sure Michael Phelps has learned his lesson; I mean, after this and the DUI, there better not be a next! He has done the two heinous tolerable by court of public opinion; one more and he is dead. Capiche?!