cathleen's place

There are colors that just simply should never be used on the outside of houses. In my opinion, of course. It's just wrong to paint a house pink.

Or yellow with dark purple (maybe it's dark blue) trim. I'm sure some folks would say it makes sense to use these colors because they're the colors of their favorite team. Of course. What was I thinking?

I also believe that lime green is a bad color for a house. Maybe you could get away with just a small bit of this color somewhere on the outside, but I'm thinking, why would you want to?

Here's another dark yellow one. What is it with these obscene colors? Why would anyone choose this for their house? Of course, in my humble opinion, the answer is: This is Florida.

So I can breathe.
So I don't stink.
Better health overall: circulation is improved, teeth and gums are healthier, less toxins traveling through my entire body (and goodness knows I don't eat enough foods high in anti-oxidants).
No cigarette butts to worry about when I'm out (even though my sweet husband keeps buying me portable ashtrays).
So our house doesn't stink. When we lived in San Diego, I only smoked outside. Here in Florida I had been smoking inside. Yuck.
No ashtrays to clean.
Save $$.
To impress people.
So my clothes don't stink.
To prove that I could do it.

This is the story of Allison. She's really amazing. I've thought so since the first moment I saw her. She's always smiling. She just smiles and smiles and smiles. If smiles were money I'd be so rich.

Okay, maybe she didn't smile every single moment, maybe she cried once in a while, maybe she pouted once when she was upset about not getting another cookie. But honestly, she just was such a happy baby and a happy child. At least that's what it looked like to me.

She wanted to learn ballet, so she studied at a studio run by a graduate of the Royal Academy of Ballet Teacher program. It was a very good program -- an inspector came from the Academy once a year and held examinations. Sometimes the teacher would spend too much time correcting a particular student and the rest of the class would drift off. It was fun watching the classes. It takes a really special person to teach little girls that age.

A bit later Allison tried cheerleading for Pop Warner football. Neither one of us liked that very much. The football coaches were awful -- they encouraged violence and dangerous risks. The cheerleading coaches were just as bad. The cheers were horribly sexist and made the girls look ridiculous. Allison caught on by herself and decided she wanted to play soccer. Now that's what I'm talking about.

She also played the flute and loved to be in stage plays. She even majored in Drama for a while at San Diego State. She lost interest in that eventually and graduated with a degree in Psychology. Allison decided that San Diego was too small and moved to New York. That was a tough one. I worried -- needlessly -- for months. Such images I had! But I'd forgotten that smile, that amazing immediately-melt-you smile. She dazzled everyone she met. (That, of course, is a mother talking. She would have a very different version if you asked her to tell you about it. But I'm the one telling this story. So there.)

She had a few boyfriends in the first couple years she was there. And then she met Carl. Carl. He smiles a lot too. And it's a great smile. You wouldn't know it from this picture. This is them playing footsie.

So Allison and Carl fell in love and now they smile all over the world, starting in Central Park.

And San Diego....

And Jamaica...

And St. Martin...

And Rio....

And Sao Paolo.... (oops, where's Carl?)

And Germany....(for the World Cup)

And Montevideo...

And Seattle....

And Napa...

Aren't they lovely together? Where will they smile next? I'll keep you posted.

Delicate. Lovely. Soft-looking. Always surprising. Flowers, wherever you find them, are wonderful. They fill the world with every color and the most delicious smells.

This is the quintessential Florida scene -- wet, wet, wet and green, with some Spanish moss thrown in for good measure, of course. Although Florida is not a great place for hiking, we decided to "hike" through this park. It's called John Chesnut Sr. County Park and it's located in Palm Harbor, Florida.

It covers about 255 acres and was built in cooperation with the Army Corps of Engineers. The reason Florida isn't a great place for hiking is because 7 months out of the year it's too hot and humid to move with any speed and there are no hills or mountains in Florida, so there's just these flat, boring stretches of path through the humidity.

And truly, in the months of June to October, the bugs will eat you alive in a close environment like this. The air barely moves at all. It's really amazing -- people who've lived here for years don't seem to notice that you can't actually get any air when you're outside. On our walk through Chesnut Park we were warned about the dangers of messing with the wildlife. We've heard stories, like everyone has, but we haven't seen anything scarier than a medium sized spider.
The park is built beside the rather large Tarpon Lake and is full of swamps, so the Army Corps of Engineers built these cool raised boardwalks. The boardwalks do two things: keep your feet dry and keep humans out of the marshy, swampy, somewhat delicate terrain.

Walking through the Florida jungle on these boardwalks in late October was almost pleasant. There was a tiny breeze, it was cloudy and the temperature wasn't much higher than 79 degrees. What kept it from actually being pleasant was, of course, the humidity, which was probably in 90% range. Yuck. But the marsh is full of wondrous life.

This is what fall looks like here. Pretty much that's it, the one leaf. We saw some orangish-brown needles on the pine trees. It was just some old dead branches.

It's really a lovely place and easy to enjoy. There are plenty of benches for relaxing, watching the wildlife and listening to the sounds of the water creatures. There's even a swing.

It's truly unfortunate that I still associate relaxing outside with smoking. I'm happy to say that the urges passed quickly and Kim helped me by talking through it with me. He's very understanding -- he quit smoking more than 30 years ago.

No one wants to admit they were sucked in by a slimy, mind-controlling cult. Well, here I am admitting it. Yup. Got sucked right in. Hook, line and sinker. It's an awful thing, waking up one day and realizing you've been had. Really had.

Actually it doesn't quite work that way. The waking up takes a little while. There are clues and hints as you go along that all is not right. But, being the good cultist, you ignore these and keep your head firmly in the ground (or up your butt, peeking out your bellybutton, depending on your "in-ness"). The indoctrination is slow and subtle. At each step of the way, what you're being told about the cult and what you're doing in the cult seem reasonable. Seem reasonable. That's important. You see, if you were really thinking like your usual self, you would clearly see that nothing of what you are told or what you are doing is logical. Big difference.

Think for moment: what would your reaction be if someone said, "We can totally and completely solve all your personal problems. All you need to do is take this free course." Sound too good to be true? That's because it is. But if you're in some emotional pain, or you're young and 'searching' or you like the idea of having THE answers or maybe you just want to be led around by your nose, a free course that claims to be the SOLUTION sounds really wonderful. Let's go, where do I sign? There are many reasons people walk into the clutches of cults like the Moonies or Scientology or Amway Quixtar. And there are very good, well written books on the subject of mind-control as practiced by these cults. I recently read Steve Hassan's Combatting Cult Mind Control and, although his experience was with the Moonies, his description of the techniques used to 'trap' people applied perfectly to Scientology. I highly recommend this well-written book to anyone who has been in a cult, knows someone who's fallen prey, or just wants to understand how a cult works.

Well, this isn't a story about $cientology exactly. It's about a visit to a Caribbean island, I think it was Barbados. And the connection to $cientology is that they have a lovely ship that sails the Caribbean and is used as a 'religious retreat.' What that means is that $cientologists can go live on this ship for a few days or a few months and take courses and get other services. It's very expensive, but it's fun being there. The food is outrageously good. The side trips are wonderful, when you can get 'permission' to go. The ship is called the Freewinds and I made two trips, both at the request of my local $cientology organization.

I was really fortunate on one of these trips to have an opportunity to ride around the island and see lots of different things -- caverns, cafes, beautiful architecture, and incredible views. I'm not big on tourist-type shopping, but I really love the natural things and the people.

The coolest place we went was an orchid garden. A BIG orchid garden. I thought I'd gone to heaven:

My husband Kimball and I are very lucky -- we woke up. Even if it took us a little long to realize how ridiculous $cientology is, the important thing is we got the hell out. We've been 'declared suppressive' because we've spoken out against the cult and none of the people who were our friends are allowed to speak to us. It's such a bizarre experience to walk into a store and see someone you know and like and they won't even look at you. Weird. $cientology cannot allow the 'innies' to have conversations with the folks who have left. The bubble might burst.

I'm sorry.
I'm sorry for so many things, mostly for my pride and stubbornness.
I'm sorry too for my quick temper and selfishness.
I'm sorry for pain I've caused you because of my foolishness.
I'm sorry your life has been so hard.
I wish I were farther along on the path of forgiveness.
I wish our family had been a happy, nurturing family.
I wish growing up had been fun, full of joy and learning.
I wish for strength and peace inside myself.
I wish I wasn't waiting for you to apologize first.
Thank you for the beautiful daylilies in my garden.

Yesterday, I went online and bought tickets for Last Comic Standing. No sooner did I get the confirmation email, than I started fretting. And what, you may well ask, did I have to fret about? Well, here's the thing, I hate going out. It's not anything like agoraphobia. I can go out, I just don't like it much. The reason is simple: PEOPLE WEAR TOO MUCH PERFUME, AFTER SHAVE, COLOGNE, FRAGRANCES and so on. They don't know when to stop. Have you ever sat down on an airplane, only to discover that you're trapped between two people who marinated in some godawful stuff just before getting on? ARGHHH! I really really really hate that. And it seems to be getting worse. We live next to a popular jogging/bike trail and you would be appalled at the number of people who go by smelling to high hell. Unbelievable. Truly unbelievable. It's my theory that they can't smell it because they've ruined their olfactory nerves by using so much of it. It's a horrible spiral.

This is another brainwashing problem. You see, people think they don't smell okay without all that shit. And where did they get that idea? From very good advertising. Huge amounts of money are spent to convince you and me that love, happiness, beauty, success, and sex are all just waiting for that perfect aroma to come wafting from our bodies.

"The amount of money spent on perfume advertising has increased since 1999: the launch of a new scent often costs tens of millions of dollars, sometimes even more." (The New Yorker October 5, 2007)

And what about the millions spent by consumers on these products? In 2000, a perfume called J'adore topped $120,000,000 in sales!! I'd say that the advertising did a good job, wouldn't you?

Even a great company like Bert's Bees uses so much fragrance in one of their shampoos, I couldn't get the stink out of my hair for days, even after repeated washings with an unscented product. These long lasting, man-made smells are toxic. They basically come from petroleum products and they don't dissipate into the air. They linger. They cling.

"The manufacturing process to create a perfume starts with the collection of the ingredients used in the scent. The perfume can be based either on one scent or a combination of hundreds of aromas. Ingredients come from many different sources such as flowers, grasses, spices, fruit, wood or leaves, among others. Only about 2,000 of the 250,000 flowering plant species actually produce oils naturally, so synthetic chemicals are often used to duplicate these smells. Synthetic chemicals are also used to create scents not found in nature. Perfumes can incorporate animal products (e.g. musk comes from male deer), which are often used as fixatives that prolong the scent by slowing the evaporation process. Other fixatives used are coal tar, mosses, resins or synthetic chemicals." (How is your favorite perfume made? from CareFair.com)

Human bodies don't stink unless they're sick or really filthy or something like that. And as if all that body scenting isn't bad enough, now folks think they have to spray their houses, cars, closets, clothes and everything else in their immediate vicinity. Or they light disgusting candles; or they use those nauseating dryer sheets everywhere. I am so tired of not smelling the real world I live in. That's one of the reasons we want a few acres when we move to Oregon. I'd like to be far enough away from any neighbors that I don't get a whiff of their fragrance du jour when I sit on my patio. I'd like to be able to smell the trees and the flowers and the air. Hey, now that I'm not smoking, this is serious.

Today is all about air. I can't seem to get enough of it. I keep gulping and gulping huge deep breaths but I never seem to get full. It's such a relief today -- the idea of smoking a cigarette is disgusting, instead of interesting or inviting. I actually do NOT want to smoke a cigarette. I'm pretty sure I didn't want to yesterday, but I was simply feeling the urge intensely, to the point of distraction. I was watching people smoke today on my way to the gym. I didn't envy them. I really meant what I said about never wanting to have a first day of no smoking again. It truly is the hardest, although there are moments when the idea of NEVER having another cigarette sends me spiraling into despair. Fortunately I found a perfect solution to this particular nastiness. I visualize a foul, poisonous creature that's trying to kill me. So I'm fighting back. It's a fight to the death. I must kill that little sonofabitch before he kills me. And if I keep breathing and I keep fighting, I can get through this. I imagine a day will come when I won't even think about smoking or cigarettes or other smokers. At least I hope that day comes. But I won't hold my breath.

It's only been eleven days. It feels like years. It feels like I lost something I really needed. How crazy is this? I know I've quit smoking and I made a vow that it's forever -- I'm never ever going to have another cigarette. Ever. Not one. But I keep feeling like if I just wait a little longer, it'll be okay to have a smoke. The urge, the drive, the god awful NEED, is really almost too much. I'm whining. But other quitters will understand.

I was thinking about how to choose what to write about. Everyone has oodles of stories, lots of things happen in a person's life. My sister had coffee with Jim Morrison after a Doors concert in Phoenix, one of my friends moved to Dublin just because she loves Ireland (and Guinness) so much, another friend was living in Japan teaching hip hop, and my brother drives all over the southwest finding new butterfly species -- see what I mean? Really interesting stories.

I have so many photographs of flowers, must be because I love flowers -- in my garden, in the forest, in parks, in my neighbors' yard, doesn't matter, I just love flowers. So I've taken lots of pictures. There are stories here.

These were taken early, early in the morning at the New York City flower market. Many years ago, the fresh flower market stretched for blocks and blocks, now it's down to just the one block. Nevertheless, it's incredible when the delivery trucks are being unloaded: Thousands and thousands of flowers, all colors, all shapes and sizes.

I watched the other early risers making purchases -- flower shop owners, florists for the big hotels, and regular folks like me. I couldn't get enough of the smells; and they were so wonderful mixing together with the coffee shops on the block. Sensory delights, mmmmm.

Kim and I go to New York once in a while to visit Allison and Carl. We've been there in the summer and in the winter. Someday I'd like to see New York in the springtime. Allison says it's really pretty then and in the fall too.

I graduated from high school in 1966 and, at the end of the summer, started college at Arizona State University. My best friend Cyndi and I had already started hanging around with a group of college kids we had met in our senior year. At the beginning of the school year we attended parties with these friends and that’s where we both met Kim. Cyndi and Kim started dating and I was dating Kim’s best friend Ross. So we were a foursome. And we were hippies; it was, after all, 1966. Ross and I lived together for a while during that year but eventually we went our separate ways. I moved in with Cyndi and he moved in with Kim. Then Cyndi and Kim broke up as the school year was coming to a close. Kim and I found ourselves alone together more and more and had a little flirtation going on – feet accidentally touching, eyes locking, well, you get the idea.

Two of our friends wanted to go to San Francisco. It was the “summer of love” and I had a great old car just perfect for a road trip. We pulled out the back seat, filled the empty space with pillows and set off. Our many adventures will have to wait for another time, suffice it to say we arrived safely.

That was the beginning of our love affair. We spent two wonderful weeks together exploring the city. Then Kim left for Europe and I went home to Scottsdale, to my mother’s house. When he returned he stayed with me until it was time for him to start school again. I wasn’t going back – I had spent that time learning about Scientology, which, unfortunately, was to become increasingly important in both our lives. I did courses at the mission in Phoenix and then went to England for more. When I got back to Arizona Kim and I were together for a short time. I left again to join what is called the Sea Organization, a Scientology group that requires complete lifetime dedication from its members. I was gone a year and a half – that was all I could take. And I was pregnant. And not married. And I didn’t know where Kim was. I hadn’t seen or written to him for about two years and now was wishing I knew how to get in touch with him. I found out that he had gone to Scotland to work for one of the many Scientology organizations. So I wrote him a Christmas card and casually told him about my situation. He dropped everything and came to Arizona to marry me. He didn’t care one bit that I was pregnant with someone else’s baby. He never even asked me about it. He only wanted us to be together – white picket fence, rose bushes, and all that. He was ready to be my baby’s father. Meanwhile, I was going through a rough patch, full of fear and worry, probably connected to hormonal upheavals. I wasn’t very helpful or communicative and eventually my mother persuaded Kim to leave. (I found this out years later – Kim would gladly have stayed and patiently seen me through whatever nasty business was going on.)

So in February 1970 my daughter Allison was born, healthy and beautiful. I took college classes offered on TV (a very new thing then) and I did a little work for the local Scientology mission. Gradually I completely lost contact with the mission and the other Scientology organizations and went about my life raising my daughter, with my mother’s help. I went back to college and was working on getting a degree when friends in California asked me to house sit for them the summer of 1975. I had not spoken to Kim since he left my mother’s house.

I knew that he had returned to work for Scientology in California and I wanted to marry him. I wrote to him and told him I was coming for the summer and that I was now ready to get hitched. He wrote back saying “YEAH!!” Off we went, Allison and I to stay in Claremont for the summer. About a month before Allison and I had to return to Arizona Kim told me he wasn’t ready to leave what he was doing right at the moment (turns out he had joined the Sea Organization). I said we’d have to call it quits right there because it would be much harder at the end of the summer. Sadly, Allison and I went home to Tempe, without Kim.

Seventeen years went by. Kim had married someone and they had two children together. They left the Sea Organization so they could raise their family. They divorced. I had also married. That marriage lasted about 4 years. Allison was in college when I divorced my first husband, sold the house and bought a small condo. I lived there and worked and kept to myself for 3 ½ years, thinking about Kim all the time.

My friends heard about Kim so often that finally one of them said “Put up or shut up.” I knew that Kim was the only one for me and that if he didn’t want to be with me I would be better off knowing it so I could just get on with my life.

But 17 years had gone by. We hadn’t kept in touch at all, nothing, no letters, no phone calls. How was I supposed to find him? He could have been anywhere. That was the summer that Sleepless in Seattle came out. As I watched it I knew what I had to do. I simply had to find him. I started with L.A. area phone books, looking up Scientology organization numbers. I didn’t call any of them, not in the beginning. I also wrote down a few numbers for Hawkins, still not making any calls. I was terrified. What if he said “Cathy who?” or “Oh please, not again.” Or “It’s great to hear from you, I know you’ll just love my wife and kids, can’t wait for you to meet them.”

Then I saw a movie that had been out a while but I’d never seen: Home Alone. There’s a scene where the little boy is in a church on Christmas Eve, talking to his neighbor. The man said he came to watch his granddaughter in the Christmas pageant on Christmas Eve instead of Christmas day because his son was angry with him and he wanted to avoid a confrontation. The man said he wanted to make up with his son but was scared of what his son would say. The little boy said, “What have you got to lose? He might still be mad at you but he might be glad you talked to him.” Well, that did it.

I started making calls from the phone numbers I had collected. I ran into several dead ends. But one day I called the place where I thought Kim had last worked. I asked for him and was transferred to the woman who had taken his job. I asked her if she knew his address and would she forward a letter if I sent it to her. She said yes to both.

It took another bout of nerves to write the letter and I tried very hard to sound nonchalant. I mailed it and waited to see what would happen.

What happened was that Kim got my letter, went through his own ordeal over what to do, decided to call me (my number was in the letter, of course) and we were married a month later.

After trying for 26 years to have a life together, we finally made it happen on October 3, 1993. We’ve been blissfully married for 14 years (okay, maybe not blissfully the entire time, but certainly now we are sure that this is exactly right). Our rings are engraved with Pour Toujours, for always.

This is the short version. There are innumerable side stories. Another day perhaps.

There's at least one person who believed it's easy to quit smoking. His name was Allen Carr and he actually wrote a book called The Easy Way to Stop Smoking. It's a very subtle book. It quietly and completely erodes the bubble of blissful denial that a smoker lives in. It tears apart the smoker's self-inflicted brainwashing. It keeps whacking the smoker in the face with stuff the smoker knows is true but has conveniently tucked far far away. Carr points out: Certainly no smoker started out to become addicted. Certainly no smoker said, "I want to be a slave to cigarettes for the rest of my life." I know I sure didn't. When we start smoking, when we're just 'experimenting,' when we're fighting with our parents and teachers over who will be the boss of us, when we're struggling with an identity idea, we certainly are NOT going to stop and say to ourselves, "hey wait a minute, this is nicotine we're talking about here, this is very very addictive stuff and the tobacco companies don't give a flying fuck about whether or not I die from smoking this shit not to mention that it costs a bloody fortune." Carr keeps hammering away, bringing up all the things the smoker wants to ignore. And he should know -- he was a 100/day smoker for 30 years. He speaks from personal experience.
As with any attempt to undo brainwashing, the important thing is to find the key that holds all the pieces in place. Somewhere there's a tiny shift that forces all the other denials and stupidities to crumble. I'm not sure I even know what or when or how, but I do know that reading this book thoroughly undermined any ability I had to delude myself another day.