MeMe Time

I’ve been tagged for a meme by SilveryLizard at Another Room. This is my first one so here goes.

Rules of the “Survivor Needs” Meme:

Please link back to the originating meme at Survivors Can Thrive, so people can see its origins, get ideas for their own self-care list, see who’s already been tagged, and maybe we can track how far this meme goes.

• List 25 needs and 5 wants. Try to restrict your needs list to things that have to do with being a survivor of some sort of abuse, assault, etc. Your list can be anything…you want!

• Use this list to remind yourself to get your needs met in the New Year.

• Pass on this meme and tag five people to play this meme with you.

Needs:

1.) I need to be with Keepers, the babies, littles, smalls, teens, adults, all of them.

2.) I need to be able to provide the support and assistance they need to keep on keeping on.

3.) I need to help them help others

4.) I need our goofy cats, Owen and Max

5.) I need to remember there is only so much I can do and do that to the best of my ability

6.) I need to be a friend to keepers and others I meet along the way

7.) I need down time

8.) I need to focus on the job at hand

9.) I also need to be silly more often instead of so serious

10.) I need my new tv, it is so cool

11.) I need to hear what others are saying

12.) I need to keep the car cleaner

13.) I need to get the oil changed more frequently

14.) I need to control my temper more

15.) I need to respect myself

16.) I need to be happy and focus on the next 5 minutes

17.) I need to feel like Keepers and JM are safe

18.) I need my favorite foods

19.) I need springtime

20.) I need my sleep

21.) I need to curl up with keepers each night in bed as we sleep

22.) I need to remember how awesome God's creatures are and give them love and care and respect, human and animal, all too often the animals more so

23.) I need a good juicy steak and mushrooms every once in a while

23.) I need a nice 7 and 7 every once in a while

24.) I need to get out once in a while for a drive or ride, up the River Road to watch eagles or just look at the river flowing

25.) I need to see and hear funny things to make me laugh

5 WANTS JM HAS

1.) To continue helping Keepers with Keepers Korner but full time

2.) To do that full time I want to win the lottery so a job is not necessary

3.) To buy a cool convertible, for those rides to meet Pastor or up the River Road

4.) To take Keepers to Ireland

5.) To meet more of the people we have met online via Keepers Korner

Now I tag Elvina at A Gift From Within

Kirkwood, MO Another view

As we watched the news last evening regarding the shooting in Kirkwood, MO several things came to the forefront. One was the fact that our son is a county police officer and every time keepers see or hear about a policeman being shot they go into a panic that it could be him. I imagine this is normal whether one is multiple or not, it has to be a fear of any one who knows a police officer, and even more for a mother.

The other thing was that the shootings were about three blocks away from where keepers ex T had his office so they were often in that neighborhood. In fact it was in their mind and mine that it could be him. A man labeled as a sociopath by fellow therapists, a man who had had similar issues with the same zoning commission, a man whose wife filed for divorce, a man who has had his license suspended for 3 years may well have snapped and gone the same route.

As I said in my previous post, there seems to be a lot Kirkwood today in this country of ours, and they all are needless and senseless. The agony they inflict on all involved is so damaging to the human spirit. These are not easy circumstances to overcome, for many they will never be overcome. The questions will linger, the whys will have no answers, the what could I have dones will make no difference, it will be too late. Unless we as a race, as a civilization, and a species, learn to control our anger, our hurt, our rage. I am by no means saying we need to bury our feelings but we do need to find safe and healthy ways to deal with our emotions and those who we are at odds with.

Killing each other is not the answer.

Safe and happy trails

JM

Kirkwood, MO. 2/07/2008

Yesterday evening a way too often scene was reenacted right here in the heart of America. For whatever reason it happened, for whatever reasoning the gentleman was using in his obviously not in control state, his only way to resolve things was to take a gun and to start shooting, to take other lives and force those sworn to protect to take his.

In the end, Charles Lee "Cookie" Thornton lie dead in the Kirkwood City Hall, as did four of his five victims, the fifth was dead on the parking lot, his first victim and from whom he acquired his second gun with which he invaded the city council meeting room and began shooting. Two victims are in the hospital, a reporter whose wound was to the hand and the mayor of Kirkwood who has a gunshot wound to the head and has as of right now still not had surgery, why we do not know.

Keepers and I watched our TV as the local news channels reported on the situation, it began around seven in the evening and the information came in, slowly, some of it spilling over to this morning. On our local channel 5 it was obvious the newslady anchor lived in Kirkwood as she fought back the tears of reporting on this tragedy in her home town, a story that we knew tragically involved people she knew.

This morning as I looked on the computer, and there was another similar story, BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) -- A 23-year-old woman killed two fellow students with a .357 revolver in a classroom at a vocational college Friday, then committed suicide, police said.

These stories have become the norm instead of the unusual. In this great country where we sound our trumpet about our civil liberties and freedoms we can count that one about bearing arms in order protect ourselves and our families, those we love. Yet, that freedom also allows the taking of lives as people take that freedom and in their anger, their sorrow, their inbound demons, they take the lives of others and often themselves.

I know not what set these people off, I do know there have been times I would have loved to taken a baseball bat to some people and beat the you know what out of them for what they did to people I love and care for. But I did not.

I know I would have hated myself if I had, no matter how much it was deserved in my view. It is not up to me to punish anyone in that manner, to impart physical harm whether from my own fists, or my baseball bat or a handgun I could have in my possession to protect my home and those I love.

I have no right from God or my fellow man to take another's life without mine or my loved ones being in danger themselves. But, everyday we see and hear more stories like the two above. Here, where you live, anywhere across this country of ours. In large metropolitan areas, in the suburbs, in the country. It has become way to common, too every day, too "normal".

We shake our heads in disbelief but why I do not know. We should be getting used to this by now,
it happens everyday, over and over and over. Lives are taken indiscriminately. Futures are lost. Parents, children and loved ones are taken away in a second never to be held again. What could have been no longer can be. The expectations and hopes are now buried with the bodies of the victims and yes even the assassins. Anyone who was touched by or associated with the players in these dramas are forever tainted and disillusioned to some degree.

What we do to ourselves is beyond my comprehension. May God have mercy on us.

JM