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i'm checking this page out at length.
- posted by barbara @ 4/28/2002 04:19:00 PM  0 comments

 
Justice for Murdered Children

if you are in southern california, tomorrow monday
4-28-02 at 6 pm, tune in to 1460 AM for "victims voices"
and listen to me reading some of the poems i have
written since bekah died...if you do [somehow i
just know NOBODY is going to be listening!], gimme feedback.

i'm hopeful that this first public reading will
not be the last, and even more hopeful that with
my writing i can make a change for just one child.

amen....
- posted by barbara @ 4/28/2002 02:12:00 PM

 
buff - beauty (author)

a friend from writtenbyme and a beautiful soul who writes of nature with surprising rhymes...
- posted by barbara @ 4/28/2002 10:45:00 AM  0 comments

 
Love You Forever

my friend wrote to me that when he read this piece he gained a little more understanding of the unique and excruciating grief of the bereft mother.
- posted by barbara @ 4/28/2002 10:29:00 AM  0 comments

 
Cry

posted this today...then i thought maybe i should have added my sonnet:

Sonnet III

When she does cry, it is a hurricane -
Woolly and wild, windswept tears shake the earth -
Buildings crumble, lifetimes cease at her pain;
As she sculpts a landscape fit for rebirth.
While an anguished roar torn from some far place
Ranges through the present, running amok,
Trees are uprooted, saplings are replaced
With fertile seeds in a maternal muck.
When she is spent, she lays for centuries,
Loving her solitude, drying her tears;
Raising children to be stronger than trees,
Willing her love to be longer than years.
Sadness allowed, a tear every day,
So the raging pain finds no place to stay.


Of course i never have been pleased with the last two lines.
Sometimes while i'm driving it'll come into my mind like a
chore i forgot, and once or twice i think i have written a
better two final lines for this sonnet...but never when
paper or keyboard was anywhere around.

if any poets happen along and read this and have suggestions,
i'd love to hear them. thanks
- posted by barbara @ 4/27/2002 08:17:00 AM  0 comments

 
Joe McCarthy (author)

one of my favorite and among the most encouraging of the many writers at writtenbyme
- posted by barbara @ 4/26/2002 09:44:00 AM  0 comments

 
scribbled this to bekah at 2 am or so:
I fell asleep on the couch and was all the time partying with you.
Marcia was at the first place, Bonnie too. Marcia was pregnant.
I believe it was Andrea who was with you. In the place it was
so crowded. I found my way back to the couch and was nearly
smothered by young women.

Then we were outside [Simon and Simon was on TV - I think listening
influenced the dream]. I looked at the sky and saw what I first
thought was an approaching tornado - but no, it was a house on
fire maybe just a block away. The occupants had lost someone or
been threatened with losing someone by murder. The adult son walked
down the crowded street in front of us, shirtless, chest blackened,
face blackened by the fire, enraged wanting revenge? was it his mother?
It was not clear.

I feel i should mention that he was walking toward the
burning house not from it. That my understanding is that all
survived the fire.

Andy or Rory with us? not sure...we were walking down a highway
and it was raining or had been so the ground was quite soaked.
From off the road through too much water, muddied, grass tall,
cars and trucks trying to make their way back to the road.

I cautioned you be careful you don't get hit.

Back in another place, like a small tourist town? You were barefoot.
One shopkeeper asked how old as you sprinted on to the next adventure.
You offered that you were in fourth grade.

We laughed uncontrollably at some point. I couldn't stop laughing
[feel certain that i was really laughing in my sleep]. Then I acknowledged
that this was not the first run of this experience but a reliving when
I asked you, "Did we laugh a lot this time?" or words to that effect.
You assured me we had, and I woke up.

Back out...
- posted by barbara @ 4/26/2002 07:39:00 AM  0 comments

 
man i have just about had it with commenting. nobody commented but me anyway, and tom a couple of times...at the same time i've used two different commenting sites both of which went down on me.

that sounds bad huh? went down on me....lol
sorry about that...

yeah, i'll probably try netcomment again if it's up now...i want my blog to look good and be functional and encourage interaction which i hope to see visitors interacting...

the deal about uigui (?), whose code WAS supplying my blog's commenting ability, is a "web event" known as "may 1 reboot" i believe it is, and this event requires anyone taking part to shut down their website today, 04-25-02, to reboot with something momentously changed about their page, i gather...i downloaded the zip file to take my site offline but doubt that i will. truthfully i also have serious doubts about whether i have a future in web design...never woulda guessed that, huh?
teehee

- posted by barbara @ 4/25/2002 08:36:00 PM  0 comments

 
A Spiritual Journey

i just surfed onto this site from blogsnob...haven't read it yet, but i will
- posted by barbara @ 4/25/2002 06:23:00 AM  0 comments

 

check out "Expanding Definitions" gotta read this daily.

by the way i blogged it earlier but when i checked my page it hadn't "taken" so if it's here twice that be why...
- posted by barbara @ 4/25/2002 05:46:00 AM  0 comments

 
www.thoughtcafe.com

this is the profile page for robert williams, a fellow writer at ThoughtCafe...he's writing a book, i think it's a book, and it's good, funny, pathetic, and probably autobiographical. check it out, eh? :)
- posted by barbara @ 4/25/2002 05:18:00 AM  0 comments

 
COURT TV ONLINE - PEOPLE

dog bites. FYI

:)

HELP! i want emoticons on my blog...can anyone tell me how to make that happen? thanks...
- posted by barbara @ 4/25/2002 03:01:00 AM  0 comments

 
REVEAL: Leaving the International Churches of Christ (ICC) (ICOC)

this organization was created by and for former adherents to the International Churches of Christ, which based on my reading here and elsewhere, should be more accurately named the Kip McKean and Cohorts Cult...

on this site are many first person narratives following the indoctrination of new members of this church. the stories are so similar it is disturbing to me, leaving me wondering what if anything should i do or attempt to do, or should i just let it alone and let them know i love them...

you see one of my best friends from childhood is a member of this church. it's a testament to the true nature of our friendship that several years after she joined we remain friends. neither her nor her daughter has ever been able to convince myself or my children to attend a church function. she quit trying in fact, and we do not spend much time together...however i know as she knows that we still love each other and always will. we are friends for life. amen
- posted by barbara @ 4/25/2002 02:36:00 AM  0 comments

 

I've the gift of tears
the cleansing gift
that wastes my fears
Washes my sadness
Keeps my soul new
And free of the tears
Imprisoning you...
The hurt can be huge
But if you are not dead
Stand up to the hurt
Feel your pain
Then bask in the lightness
That follows the rain...
- posted by barbara @ 4/25/2002 12:07:00 AM  0 comments

 
Ruling shocks RPV family

I saw this story and just felt like calling the victim's family and saying, yes, i know just how you feel.

In CA justice is just as much a joke.

One of many causes I now espouse as a direct result of my daughter's terrible and tragic death is that of re-educating society regarding the machines we employ to go from one place to another. apparently we are so wedded to our cars that conventional wisdom holds that murder cannot be committed while driving.

Also we are apparently so committed to the freedom to get drunk that when a drunk uses a car to kill another human being it's like pulling teeth just to get the courts to view that killer's action as a crime.

People get real! Bekah was killed so violently that her family could never see her again. The damage done to my beautiful healthy daughter was so extensive that we were not even asked to identify her body. While we were up all night long trying to find a way to believe the impossible [our girl was dead], the person who killed her was asleep in her bed at home. Having sped without headlights on the wrong side of the street, having continued driving after Bekah's head shattered the windshield of her car right in front of her face, having dragged my daughter's helpless body some 80 to 100 feet and tearing her jacket into two pieces, having dumped bekah's body contemptuously in the median amid so much blood the stain was visible months later, bekah's killer went home and went to sleep.

She will be out of prison in two years. Bekah is dead forever and everyone who loves her is forever bereft. The two felonies for which Lynn Mary Woolever was found guilty do not count as violent crimes. WE COULD NOT VIEW OUR DAUGHTER'S DEAD BODY.

Go figure. And while you're at it, think about whether a car might be an effective murder weapon. Bekah's unviewable body lying in a huge pool of blood all alone, compared to a woman sleeping in her own bed after having killed her, tell me that the automobile should be the weapon of choice for anyone feeling particularly homicidal and yet not desirous of risking the consequences for committing a serious violent crime. And that is really fucked up.
- posted by barbara @ 4/23/2002 07:26:00 AM  0 comments

 
All Images

for some reason i love just checking out this page...it takes forever to load and cripples my modem connection but it is just cool...and if you look very carefully you will see my girl.
- posted by barbara @ 4/23/2002 06:50:00 AM  0 comments

 
it sometimes appears to me that there are more reliable and understandable blogging sites than blogger. just now i opened my browser and it's set to open on my blog. for some reason the post from the wee hours this morning was cut off in the very middle of a word...so i clicked on a time prior and the blog came up once again complete. then i hopped right over here to hopefully edit my blog and restore the apparently missing text. which is apparently no longer missing.

and then i got a great big MOUTHful of my tail. finally! i've been chasing it approximately as long as i have been blogging.

jeez
- posted by barbara @ 4/22/2002 09:40:00 PM  0 comments

 
-::Meticulously Underthought::-

a blog that is either by a poet or a poetry lover. not a lot out there as far as i can tell so i will resolve to visit further.
- posted by barbara @ 4/22/2002 07:39:00 PM  0 comments

 
random website dot com

you take a chance from here; also they invite you to add your site to the mix.
- posted by barbara @ 4/22/2002 07:27:00 PM  0 comments

 
what will it be? bekah. on the plane to Washington i sat by the window just rear of the wing and regarded infinity in the form of a west coast sky in february. three days before that i had said good-bye to the shrinking she-thing handcuffed for my edification and spirited away to return.
she'll return before your absence is normal. she is the one person who possibly could but certainly never will provide a why that still will never bring sense to your demise. and she will most likely die of natural causes by which time your absence will be understood by me because it commenced so long ago.

[NOTE: i got wise! i needed to enlarge the writing window, so i selected and copied what i had written thus far. HAH! cyberbogey you lose today...]

i sat in that window seat bekah and was dazzled by the sight. mother, nature, she's such a wonder. and what next? there is my daughter dancing on the wing...she's doing cartwheels for me, then sitting on the edge and crossing her legs at the knees, so pretty, prim, properly. she waves she blows kisses and she winks at me...by and by accompanying the water that steadily cleanses my eyes to my mind comes a tune that sounds like a theme. a movie ends just like those criminal proceedings, ends, and for the mother closure just does not happen, so she cherishes the image of her daughter on the edge of a jet wing in flight, this could be real no? the sky is infinite and eternity an aspect to your dimension. the song plays again and again in my mind and with each new refrain i cry, cry, i am letting you go as i must, i know, but this beauty, the sky, you, this pain, release, exquisite, yes, but it cuts girl! oh. oh.......it cuts.

the song:
love you forever and for ever
love you with all my heart
love you whenever we're together
love you when we're apart
[the beatles]

a lot of songs used to be about romance, now they're about you. i've experienced the phenomenon before. that's why "my girl" is "my" song about you, and always has been. that's why before you died when i heard "take good care of my baby" i would fantasize singing it at your wedding, and shed those sentimental tears i'm so fucking good at. now i would sing it to my mom and dad, my grandma blanche, and who knows the number of loving souls who have taken you for their special project on the other side.

anyhow. love forever in eternity in time on earth in the sky and the great beyond where you be winking at your lonely mother comforting me...be well be free bless your soul darling girl and fulfill your finest possibilities in eternity. with time this will be understood by me - it is how it is so that must be how it must be. amen

i got lost in the rhyme i fear...the final line is a lie i fear...maybe not, but it forgot the fact that is intractable and just as true. that is that you, bekah-la, were not supposed to die. if i live another 50 years i will die knowing that my girl should still be alive.
amen

- posted by barbara @ 4/22/2002 04:14:00 AM  0 comments

 
The Spam Letters

i wonder if we ALL did this would it stop? well, i'm not gonna be the one to find out, but this gutsy guy did. an entertaining site all right.
- posted by barbara @ 4/21/2002 10:43:00 PM  0 comments

 
i have read semi-extensively at thought cafe this day...wanted to say morning, but the morning has already sped away. rory and i discussed going to bekah's grave and driving the bridge again but he's got energy for nothing but cartoons and computer games and i want to play cards anyway.

so i'm going to play cards anyway and he will gaze on cartoons and play computer games while i do.
- posted by barbara @ 4/21/2002 01:30:00 PM  0 comments

 
When I was 13 years old my father, who was 49, died of a heart attack. He was alone when he died and out of state. Consequently this forwarded email that i received today was welcome as forwards rarely are [my mailbox is overflowing]. Read it. It makes sense.

To: Special Friends
Subject: HOW TO SURVIVE A HEART ATTACK WHEN ALONE


Subject: FW: How to Survive a Heart Attack when Alone

If everyone who gets this sends it to 10 people, you can bet that we'll
save at least one life. Let's say it's 6:15 p.m. and you're driving home

(alone of course), after an unusually hard day on the job. You're really

tired, upset and frustrated. Suddenly you start experiencing severe pain

in your chest that starts to radiate out into your arm and up into your
jaw. You are only about five miles from the hospital nearest your home;
unfortunately you don't know if you'll be able to make it that far. What

can you do? You've been trained in CPR but the guy that taught the
course neglected to tell you how to perform it on yourself.
Since many people are alone when they suffer a heart attack, this
article seemed to be in order. Without help, the person whose heart
stops beating properly and who begins to feel faint, has only about 10
seconds left before losing consciousness. However, these victims can
help themselves by coughing repeatedly and very vigorously. A deep
breath should be taken before each cough, and the cough must be deep
and
prolonged, as when producing sputum from deep inside the chest. Deep
breaths and a cough must be repeated about every two seconds without let

up
until help arrives, or until the heart is felt to be beating normally
again.
Deep breaths get oxygen into the lungs and coughing movements squeeze
the
heart and keep the blood circulating. The squeezing pressure on the
heart
also
helps it regain normal rhythm. In this way, heart attack victims can get

to a hospital.
Tell as many other people as possible about this, as it could save their

lives!
From Health Cares, Rochester General Hospital via Chapter 240s
newsletter AND THE BEAT GOES ON ... (reprint from The Mended
Hearts,
Inc.publication, Heart Response)
BE A FRIEND AND PLEASE SEND THIS ARTICLE TO AS MANY
FRIENDS AS POSSIBLE

Sherry Schlosser
Administative Officer for Montana
Ph# (406) 441-1044 ext. 245
Fax# (406) 441-1008
- posted by barbara @ 4/20/2002 12:09:00 PM  0 comments

 
i've been surfing diligently and waiting impatiently for the jimmy poem to form in me. here's a question for any poet who glances this way: can you write a poem if you are not inspired by at least one or two lines - ? Cause it seems i cannot; i must have at least the first couple lines, or a refrain, demanding their committal to paper. after that very often, usually actually, the rest of the poem is made by dint of intense concentration, work, counting syllables sometimes, reading and reading and reading it over, sometimes changing the tense of one word, where it goes in a line, deleting a comma, placing a period...

this process is so delicious to me. i want it. but the first words must come first, and they don't. i remember jimmy. i will not forget him. the way he walked on the balls of his feet; the way he said he would never make the first move on me (then did); the way he stood at the door and his voice when he said, "I'm sorry Barbara," instead of saying, "I'm not coming back Barbara."

i missed his services and just now am going to head out to the cemetery. bekah needs flowers, i need to be near her bones, and if possible i will find jimmy's grave and say a prayer for him as well. amen
- posted by barbara @ 4/20/2002 06:57:00 AM  0 comments

 
GregLog :: Rants and Raves

there is a hilarious news story on this page. i'd love to just copy the whole thing but that would be rude, so go ahead and leave me for this guy's blog. now. go ahead, go ahead!

:)
- posted by barbara @ 4/20/2002 02:12:00 AM  0 comments

 
sometimes i said something i wanted to be heard...to read the poem of which i speak, Bitterness

07-02-00
an email inspired by a response to my poem "Bitterness"

in my life i have loved more than once, and even more than one man who did not love me too. so it goes. just like 40 came and went, accompanied by (what i believe to be) extraordinary circumstances, lifestyle changes, catastrophes, disasters, loss...coming on the tail of eight or so years of divorce during which my primary concern was the raising of people and the best description i could fit to my "romantic" life came from ABC's song "The Look of Love:" strange arrangements.

"Bitterness" represents perhaps more than anything, in terms of my personal development, the first acknowledgment of its parasitic, growth-stunting qualities. practically speaking, i had been living under the thumb of "bitterness" for quite some time, and it not only did not make me happy or make me feel good about myself, it precluded me from experiencing the greatest joy, pretending it was saving me from being hurt again. when in reality for someone like myself, that translates to forever daily hurt, half life, pretensed numbness that was never real enough for me to say, "I don't care," without knowing that i was lying.

eventually i began to regard it as a mortal enemy, and i could see among many of my women friends how it had truncated their capacity for happiness - but, i thought, they let it! because other of my friends had suffered too, even at the hands of men (nah! not men! lol), yet they maintained their openness. through many ups and downs and ins and outs, fits and starts, loves and losses, i observed that the bitter-infected ones were plain miserable, even when they were happy - because bitterness had convinced them that their happiness would never last, while the women who had managed to beat bitterness in spite of the facts still, it seemed to me, had a chance to achieve happiness - to love and be loved with so much feeling that it seems to demand the recognition of a different plane of experience. in other words to really love and be loved. and this love i knew was what i wanted and what i believed would represent the fulfillment of my purposes...allow the completion of my growth.

it may not happen in my life - it may yet. i have my children and my grandchildren and my life is better minus bitterness with or without someone to love who loves me too. not that it doesn't threaten and tease, not that i haven't experienced pain so gratuitous that it made bitterness seem like a sage and a prophet, just that i know its true character and have resolved never to kowtow to it again. love is the antithesis...

- posted by barbara @ 4/19/2002 08:43:00 PM  0 comments

 
Taco Shop Psychic

found this page through blogsnob...he writes pretty well, i think
- posted by barbara @ 4/19/2002 06:49:00 PM  0 comments

 
netcomments - feedback for the masses

hey, they say i'll have my comments back on saturday. that's tomorrow. hopefully ... hopefully
- posted by barbara @ 4/19/2002 01:58:00 PM  0 comments

 
:barbara > to this plane, where we live
:barbara > yes, i can see what you mean, you teach me a lot sky. believe me, thank YOU
:barbara > same for you ....xxxx
:barbara > and all of us too both here and beyond
:barbara > i lost a friend to suicide this week
:barbara > ty, he didn't come today but i was looking for him, you know? :
:barbara > thank you
:barbara > that brought a large smile to my face, thank you so much sky!
:barbara > i have had calmness and understanding conveyed to me from spirit while i slept, so that when i woke up
:barbara > i knew something i did not know before, and was comforted
:barbara > it was beyond the dream state; not within a dream, but while i slept
:barbara > love and peace to all, and thank you so much sky

- posted by barbara @ 4/19/2002 01:42:00 PM  0 comments

 
Elsewherez

a writer from writtenbyme...navigate to the October 2001 poems and read "Atmosphere of Doubt" - I love that poem
- posted by barbara @ 4/19/2002 10:15:00 AM  0 comments

 
Daughter

Check out my first attempt at including a java applet on one of my pages. It's Bekah in water, one of her cherished, delighted expressions on her beautiful face...and a poem.
- posted by barbara @ 4/18/2002 01:12:00 PM  0 comments

 
i talked to jimmy's father today. he and his son, jimmy's brother, do not believe that jimmy meant to die. jimmy hung out in his storage all the time, i know that much. he had had an accident two days before he died and his truck was wrecked in front. when it got cold jimmy sometimes would run the motor for a little bit. his dad believes that the way jimmy was found slumped over his truck right next to the door indicates that he was trying to get to the air. but the wrecked bumper got stuck on the door and jimmy ran out of time, and out of air.

they may be right. i am not so sure. because - at any time - jimmy could have turned the truck off. according to the paper the truck was still running when jimmy's body was found.

i know that nothing jimmy ever did or said in the almost fifteen years i knew him suggested to me that he would ever try to kill himself. so another mystery commits itself to the other side...amen jimmy be happy have peace with your mother...give a hug to my little girl.
we connect via love. amen
- posted by barbara @ 4/18/2002 10:01:00 AM  0 comments

 
The Window

Read about the "Boston Church of Christ" - it sounds very much like a good friend's church of which she has been a member for five, maybe more years, the LA Church of Christ.

We often want to think of churches as sanctuaries and only good things. We often can be wrong.
- posted by barbara @ 4/17/2002 05:03:00 AM  0 comments

 
MB man's death is ruled suicide

the article in the online version of the Daily Breeze, regarding my friend jimmy
- posted by barbara @ 4/17/2002 12:52:00 AM  0 comments

 
i check the local paper daily. today this headline caught my eye: MB man's death is ruled suicide

i lived in manhattan beach for over seven years following my divorce in 1987 and continue to play pool there and maintain friendships with persons who live there. i clicked on the headline and read:

From news services
The death of a man found slumped on top of a pickup truck with the engine running in a closed self-storage unit in Redondo Beach was a suicide, police said Monday.
James Pollock, 38, of Manhattan Beach was discovered dead Thursday at Redondo Mini Storage, 3701 Inglewood Ave. police said.
Redondo Beach police Sgt. Don Baird said Pollock died of carbon monoxide poisoning and that he was suffering from personal problems.

Publish Date:Tuesday April


Jimmy and i were friends for ten, fifteen years...almost fifteen years. during the year or so before bekah was murdered we spent almost every weekend together. mostly just hanging out in front of the tv.

when bekah died jimmy freaked and did a disappearing act on me. i saw him one time after bekah died, about last july or august. and when he left he said, "I'm sorry Barbara!" and i knew i would not see him again.

my pain was more than he could stand to be near. i said, "good-bye, jimmy," and i knew it was good-bye for good, and i did not spend time fretting it. i thought how weak, how really weak he is. i would not want to give the impression that there was a future in our relationship; there was not. we were too different...i'm a true adherent of the feelyourpain school of mental health while jimmy was dedicated to feeling as little as possible, or at least never copping out loud to having feelings.

obviously his pain was more than he could bear too...i send a hug to you, jimmy, and you know i cry every day anyway. don't think it's about you. i hope you find peace where you are...i really do.

love. what the world needs now is love
- posted by barbara @ 4/16/2002 10:33:00 PM  0 comments

 
as my blog mentor Tom has taught me, sometimes writing an email can provide an entry to one's blog. today i had occasion to describe how bekah was killed...

on july 19, 2001, bekah was crossing 25th street in san pedro when a hard-core drunk 53-year-old woman driving too fast on the wrong side of the road without headlights killed her. the woman's nickname is rambo; she has a widespread reputation for being "crazy" and on that night she'd been barhopping. she had been fired from 2 or 3 bars in san pedro and just moments before she killed bekah a witness watched her being dropped off at her car about 3 blocks away...according to the detective she was upset because "getting fired from the bar ruined her reputation," and when her friend dropped her off she said to rambo, "just go straight home and don't be an ass." the woman staggered to her car, fumbled her way in, peeled out of the parking lot so conspicuously that the witness said, aloud, "she's going to hurt someone." within a minute bekah was dead.

the woman took my girl out of her shoes, dragged her body 80-100 feet down the road, tearing bekah's jacket in half, ran over her, and dumped her body in the middle of the street in a pool of blood so big we could still see the stain 6 months later. bekah's head had shattered the windshield directly in front of her face! and a tenant in the apt building heard bekah's last scream...but the woman just kept driving. she went from where she killed bekah, made it up a pitch dark, winding 2-lane road to her house just fine, and went to sleep. one thing i really have trouble with is that this woman slept after she murdered bekah. i cannot even imagine doing what she did, and she could sleep after doing it. the paramedics responded within 3-5 minutes and tried to bring bekah back, but her brains had been separated from her body and so it is best that she died. [if i was the DA i would have charged rambo with mayhem and murder]

the witness back at the bar had memorized part of rambo's license plate and parts of her car [a hubcap and a side mirror, i believe] were left in the street - bekah was killed so violently we never saw her again. when they caught up with her killer 4 to 5 hours had passed and she blew a .11 which means she was plowed, probably about .20, when she killed bekah. to me it is just as relevant to realize that she was pissed off...anyway. the criminal proceedings have been adjudicated and no justice from where i sit: although she was charged with murder, the DA allowed this snake to plead "NO CONTEST" to felony vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence while intoxicated and felony hit and run, and agreed on a 4-year prison sentence [where 15 was possible], which means she will be out of prison in 2 years. all of this maneuvering was accompanied by spin sessions, misrepresentations and overt lies from the DA.

i wanted to see her put away for the rest of her life. the victim is dead and the victim's loved ones have no choice, no voice but for the venting. Eight of us stood up and tried to give this woman some idea of the devastation she caused, and to persuade the judge that the bargain was unjust. for nothing but the chance to blow off steam. by the time she was sentenced as far as i can tell nobody in that court acted as bekah's advocate, because the DA had jumped to rambo's side. as far as i can tell. i'm sorry, i am still choking on the bitter pill. i'll get it down somehow because losing bekah has been such a blow it is anathema to me to think that any other part of my life or my self would be allowed to be diminished by the barbaric act of a sick woman. she can't have me, or my 3 sons, my grandchildren.

there's more to this story, but i have rambled on long enough. i have written a book since bekah died. writing is my lifeline and has always been, and i am hoping to get it published. i have many causes now and maybe i can persuade just one person to look at the situation from a different perspective. my daughter was murdered and her killer will be out in 2 years. i shudder to think how often this goes on.

i believe that bekah is in a good place and that for her justice was wrapped around her like a blankie when she crossed...i still wonder about what will happen to rambo when she crosses, but it's not my problem to know although at times i can't help guessing.
- posted by barbara @ 4/16/2002 05:09:00 PM  0 comments

 
Group offers victims a voice

This article is about the group Justice for Murdered Children. The Lawanda mentioned and I have been playing phone tag for about two weeks after I got in touch following the distribution of flyers from her group at grief counseling. At any rate once we coordinate, the plan is that I will read some of my post-Bekah's murder poetry on her weekly radio program.

so things are happening, about the writing, about the activism. Neither my MADDwoman nor my counselor is close to letting me get down with the newly bereaved, however. Though I long to help others...I know hell, better than most. I will have come far indeed when I am well enough to sooth that path for others just thrown into it.
- posted by barbara @ 4/16/2002 03:45:00 AM  0 comments

 
i'm lifting the following off a grief message board where i had posted it back in november [i just did a websearch for my daughter's name because i found a site where i can light a virtual candle for her but wanted to be sure i did not already]:

three weeks after bekah died i rememebered that i dreamt she died years earlier. on the morning after i had that dream i wrote in my diary, "I'm glad my dreams aren't prophetic," because my mom
and sister are psychic.
i never dreamt it again and was essentially oblivious right up until the second i was told bekah was dead.
it seems that bekah had premonitions...i found this poem, which was apparently written within 48 hours of bekah's death, the night after she was run over, dragged down the street, and dumped in a huge pool of blood to die while her killer drove home and went to sleep:

I've never felt like This before,
What the hell is going on?
My brain is going, going &
Going
My body is going, too
What the hell is happening
to me, is my life through?
I've never felt like This
before. My head keep falling down
Oh my God, what's going on?
here? My head is picking up sounds
Sounds that aren't really
There, the room was silent & empty
Have I finally crossed the
line This time, This is really scary
This numbness is strong, it
feels like it's killing me
What the hell could this be


Rebekah-Marie Bales Zask, © 1980-2001 all rights reserved
- posted by barbara @ 4/16/2002 02:46:00 AM  0 comments

 
Current results for bush

i said i would be looking for a poll and this place is about the easiest, least demanding i could ever have asked for as far as i know...in like 10-15 minutes my poll was there...i hope i get some responses.

in short, from my conversations with persons i simply do not believe the numbers being quoted on the radio about bush's current popularity and/or confidence ratings. i know for sure that many people do agree with me as to this president's moronic qualities, and even agree that war is not the answer. what do you think?

netcomment is down according to his site just for about a week, so i'll let the unattractive disclaimers stay til then. you can just take the poll, or put your opinion in my dream book.

i am utterly ineffectual there is nothing i can do. i could not even affect my daughter's justice which was thrown away by the DA. i'm just curious about how out of touch i may or may not be. thanks
- posted by barbara @ 4/16/2002 01:56:00 AM  0 comments

 
for about - oh, almost two months after she died, i listened to bekah's funeral daily, often more than once a day. i decided that to continue listening to her funeral over and over would contribute to chronicity of my grief and resolved to stop listening to it after 09-30-01...which for the most part i did.

i'm listening to bekah's funeral as i write, and it's allowing me to cry again as i have not cried for too long. in denial, blandly depressed, unmotivated, tired of pain. but this grief is very, very large, and these tears are welcome.

i miss my girl. i miss her
- posted by barbara @ 4/15/2002 05:55:00 PM  0 comments

 
Poetry Life and Times

I am being interviewed by the editor of this ezine in connection with the printing of six poems. Apparently I will be the May interviewee.

kinda exciting, huh? so i'm blogging, which means i can write about my doubts and misgivings. her interview questions are all about Bekah, should i have limited my submission to poems about bekah?? she solicited my submission by referring to Testify which is decidedly not about bekah [written almost a year before bekah died]. so i submitted poems that were about men, and shit...ah, well. i offered to alter my submission and make the whole thing about bekah but she seemed not inclined....we'll see how it all works out, and if anything comes of it.
- posted by barbara @ 4/15/2002 10:42:00 AM  0 comments

 
Bekah Movie Star

i made it into an html document so let's see if geocities lets it fly now...
- posted by barbara @ 4/15/2002 02:14:00 AM  0 comments

 
sunday evening...i've so much to do and barely enough energy to start on it. rory and i got KFC and ate at bekah's grave. roses are two dozen for $12.97 at HOME DEPOT, so bekah has 2 dozen lovely roses. go buy roses for your loved ones today, while they live.

peace. love. happiness.
i'm going to start looking for a poll next, because i totally do NOT BELIEVE the polls i'm hearing in the news. i think bush is an idiot who for some godforsaken i do not get it reason wants to put the US into a world war. i lament this, all war in fact, all murder, all hatred, all racism, etc.

that is why the hate i feel toward the lowlife who killed my daughter is something i feel the need to eradicate. hate, bitterness, very closely related to my mind, and what they do is they ruin YOU. her hate and bitterness was so large and was allowed to grow unchecked to where it took my daughter with it. well, i am more evolved than that. i have more love in me than that. though i must mourn my daughter for the rest of my life, i have to find a way to do it without moaning for the rest of my life, and without hate. without bitterness. this is my task, i do not turn away from it [sometimes i do].
anyhow.
- posted by barbara @ 4/14/2002 07:02:00 PM  0 comments

 
Morgansrest
this is an online spiritualist site where you can get free psychic readings from developing mediums and take part in open circles...this site and the people there, most of whom are from the UK, have been of much comfort to me during my bereavement.
note: i've tried 3 times to blog the site and every time although the URL appears in my edit box, the link is invisible on my blog. . .

okay! lol, i've tried again...the URL is www.morgansrest.com
the hyperlink is in this window as i type. maybe it will show up in the future. maybe someone's working on blogger again. maybe
- posted by barbara @ 4/12/2002 03:07:00 PM  0 comments

 
JPEG image 360x349 pixels

i'm trying "blog this" to get bekah's picture linked to my blog...my hopes are not high, however.
- posted by barbara @ 4/12/2002 10:14:00 AM  0 comments

 
okay i was looking over yesterday's post and considering other words for bekah's headstone. for instance these lines from shakespeare:


REBEKAH-MARIE BALES ZASK
"Bekah"
July 6, 1980 - July 19, 2001
Beloved daughter, granddaughter, sister, friend, and "Auntie Bek"

Take her up tenderly,
Lift her with care;
Fashioned so slenderly,
Young, and so fair!

Love Forever


or perhaps these words, found among bekah's papers and not attributed:


REBEKAH-MARIE BALES ZASK
"Bekah"
July 6, 1980 - July 19, 2001
Beloved daughter, granddaughter, sister, friend, and "Auntie Bek"

Friendships fade away & you grow apart,
but you've not spent a day outside my heart.

Love Forever


do comment; your opinion will most probably have nothing whatsoever to do with what will ultimately appear on bekah's headstone, but still i'd like to know it. thanks...
- posted by barbara @ 4/12/2002 10:07:00 AM  0 comments

 
A Consider

i sequed into a dream, here in front of the tv, with people i know including my son. i awoke just as we climbed a set of stairs and pushed open a glass door to go to the movies.
- posted by barbara @ 4/12/2002 04:50:00 AM  0 comments

 
National Endowment for the Arts, a federal agency

oh won't you subsidize me NEA?
i really have lots of stuff to say
all i really want to do is write
or surf the web throughout the night
much of myself consumed in flight
from wretched bereft reality

and her name is Bekah....
- posted by barbara @ 4/12/2002 03:20:00 AM  0 comments

 
barbtries a blog

myself, i blogged meeself.
so, i need to make some changes to the template, to put in the counter and to fix the dreambook. so i open up my blog, click on template, and it's blank.

it's blank on neo planet. it's blank on aol. it's blank on netscape. in a second i will reboot my machine, log on to net zero, and see if it is blank on internet explorer too

the status page has nothing on it. hopefully the crap that went on this afternoon as well as this glitch are all blogger, and someday i'll know that and won't have to get all anxious
- posted by barbara @ 4/12/2002 12:59:00 AM  0 comments

 
okay, i have two tasks when i return [rory's screaming for his dinner]: make the dreambook links correct so they open up my dreambook, and put the counter back in.

i wish i'd had another year or two of computer school; with my webpage and this blog, it's like typing with one toe. hunt, peck, check, shit, save, change, hunt, peck, check, shit....
- posted by barbara @ 4/11/2002 06:03:00 PM  0 comments

 
well, there's some adventures to be had with this blogging business i say! [i can smile now] for a couple hours this afternoon after i attempted to remove the comments since they were non-operational, when i tried to open my blog it would get to less than 30% then freeze the computer solid.
so some little goodies i played around with over night are gone. but i'm [hopefully] going to be able to stay with NetComment even though i haven't the wherewithal to help him keep up financially speaking. i'll link to it tht's what i'll do
- posted by barbara @ 4/11/2002 05:14:00 PM  0 comments

 
one quick note: in neoplanet the hyperlink to bekah's picture does not work; in netscape it does. dunno about aol or explorer but i'll find out

also, i am attempting to remove the comment box because the guy's server is giving him a hard time about the bandwidth or somesuch...i have looked around for other commenting options but it appears that i came into the blog scene too late...
- posted by barbara @ 4/11/2002 01:05:00 PM  0 comments

 
when i dropped rory off at school i went straight to the cemetery. i wanted to read poems to bekah and ponder extremely deep spiritual matters. i wanted to gaze on the sky and see turtles drawn by bekah in clouds to tell her mother i love you. i wanted to see robins carpeting the park as they did back in february and my sister was here and i went early, early, partly just to have some down time on my own...

it's thursday. not only is bekah getting a new neighbor today but the crew was out picking up flowers. the grass was soaked, and the sky was solid grey. but they left bekah's flowers, and her friend sara had been by with a finger puppet of lamb chop and an invitation to a house party that bekah most definitely would be attending, had she not died.

i stayed quite awhile and took a walk through the wet grass. so much youthful death. there are double graves with brother and sister buried, and i think of those children's mother more than those children at that point. there is also, a ways away from bekah, four graves side by side with what i imagine must be four siblings...the oldest 13, the youngest 4. they died together in 1967 and i would like to know what happened.

i think about her headstone a lot; though a month or two ago i mentioned to her father that it is time to start discussing what we want it to look like and to plan her memorial, he's not gotten back to me. i saw an inscription on one headstone today that really appealed to me, but i think i want the couplet from milton: and now my task is smoothly done:/ i can fly, or i can run.

i've also decided that i do want her picture on her headstone, the same one from the funeral i think or maybe the one from the autograph poster...and on plain shiny black. her complete dates, not just the years of her birth and death. and so on.
http://www.geocities.com/bbalesgeo/bekahmoviestar.jpg - copy and paste this address to see her...geocities will not allow me to have it as a link, apparently.

REBEKAH-MARIE BALES ZASK
"Bekah"
July 6, 1980 - July 19, 2001
Beloved daughter, granddaughter, sister, friend, and "Auntie Bek"

But now my task is smoothly done:
I can fly, or I can run.

Love Forever

- posted by barbara @ 4/11/2002 12:55:00 PM  0 comments

 
ThoughtCafe

a little ego masturbation i posted this morning...how can i be the only writer who finds writing so necessary and such an object of love and passion that i have been inspired dozens of times to simply write about the writing?

i cannot believe that; and really, i know it's not so...neruda did. others too.

i call the post an ego masturbation because it includes several poems that i cannot on my ego-healthiest day say are "good" but i wanted to share them anyway, because i like them anyway.

whatever. this is what being a writer means to me. think a 3rd grader standing up in class to give an oral report. this is what being a writer means to me.
- posted by barbara @ 4/11/2002 06:35:00 AM  0 comments

 
My babies are ribbons


i wrote this poem in about 1995. for many years as i raised my children after my divorce i considered them my primary force for life as well as the best thing i would ever be able to say about myself. certainly the latter observation still holds true. their names are john, andy, bekah, and rory, and they are the four best things i ever, ever did.
- posted by barbara @ 4/10/2002 10:19:00 PM  0 comments

 
just came back from my grief counseling. there's been a hiatus as the facility moves from the heart of south central to the outskirts of south central. i've missed it. as i wrote yesterday, i've been remiss - not really doing much of anything basically. as i sat there with my counselor i cried for the first time in a few days. i raged a little...on tv yesterday there was a commercial and as i [as almost always] wasn't looking at the box, i only heard it...the announcer said if you have a flair for fashion, and i thought that's bekah all right.

it was her school, brooks college, from where she would be preparing to graduate right about now. instead she's dead because some lowlife drunk got pissed off. and i am pissed off! hate. i hate her, i do. and i will have words to share about hate soon. for starters when i was, hell i dunno, maybe 8, 9, 10 years old, i resolved never to hate again in my life. how wise i was. this hate that i have now was put into me by a stranger when she murdered my only daughter. but it is up to me to eradicate the hate that threatens to diminish the person i am for the rest of my life, which still goes on whether i like it or not.
- posted by barbara @ 4/10/2002 01:52:00 PM  0 comments

 
ASAP!   A Stand Against Pop-under ads!

advertising is trying to take over the world. here's a place where someone has said enough.

- posted by barbara @ 4/10/2002 09:16:00 AM  0 comments

 



- posted by barbara @ 4/10/2002 09:03:00 AM  0 comments

 
so when i got my email i thought it'd be great. no one who knew my name would ever forget my email, and i wanted to keep it forever.

but the spam! goodgod i spend about a half hour daily just shitcanning the spam. i don't open anything unless i know who it's from. i've lost millions and millions of dollars in recent months.

today i'm going to nonags and zdnet and see about a spambuster. any suggestions, leave a comment in my new comment box! :)
- posted by barbara @ 4/09/2002 07:07:00 AM  0 comments

 
i've been very remiss in a number of ways. tonight i started thinking
about why. i think i just got tired of non-stop hurt. i was thinking
i'd just as soon move out of the desert of despair and go on with my
life.

but i wasn't ready, and instead i stalled and denied it to myself.

some griefs don't let you go that easy or that quick.

i have learned things that i find comfort in however. love does not
die. bekah and i love each other and that will not change, ever, our
bond is eternal.

there is life after death.

there is no why.

and that's all, for now.
- posted by barbara @ 4/09/2002 06:15:00 AM  0 comments

 
Mona's Closet; A Healing Journey

the title says it all...a story of abuse and ongoing recovery
- posted by barbara @ 4/09/2002 05:07:00 AM  0 comments

 
Eulogy for Bekah

my daughter's eulogy, delivered by her brother on 07-25-01
- posted by barbara @ 4/09/2002 04:55:00 AM  0 comments

 
home

david coyote's webpage...he's an enlightened poet from writtenbyme
- posted by barbara @ 4/09/2002 04:47:00 AM  0 comments

 
ok, i think i'm getting somewhere. my comments are working, i like this template so now i just have to get my blogsnob code back into it, my new window? code too, and i be gypping! :)
- posted by barbara @ 4/09/2002 04:26:00 AM  0 comments

 
NetComment
- posted by barbara @ 4/09/2002 03:06:00 AM  0 comments

 
so i've tried to add a commenting ability; so far it does not seem to be working. but i will give it some time and check over that i followed instructions before going apeshit about it.

happy wee hours, poring over the internet, working on my webpages. mostly i'm stabbing in the dark, but when it works it is real cool
- posted by barbara @ 4/09/2002 03:05:00 AM  0 comments

 
BLOGGER - How to create a BlogThis! bookmarklet BlogThis!

so far this is like my favorite toy that came with my blog
- posted by barbara @ 4/09/2002 01:00:00 AM  0 comments

 
WHAT IS THIS CRAP!?
that's twice now that i have poured my creative soul into this window only to see it swallowed by some sort of cyber bogey monster.

crap.

it was a poem! or the beginning of a poem. it was about my daughter, Bekah. and about where i am at in my journey of grief, my trip through the desert of despair....
oh well. i am pissed but when it comes to poems i guess i get the hint: go back to your pen and paper
- posted by barbara @ 4/09/2002 12:56:00 AM  0 comments

 
i give. it says it's published, i see the words in edit mode, i ask to view page, it is not there. i reload the page, not there. .. try again, not there. what's up?
- posted by barbara @ 4/08/2002 11:07:00 PM  0 comments

 
things that piss me off, that seems to be a popular subject for blogs...you rarely watch a particular tv show...the second time you decide to watch it, it's a rerun of the last time you watched it.

just happened to me today - twice! with "sex in the city"

i'm waiting to learn: how to add a counter, how to put in a place for comments....or maybe i'll surf around and manage all this tonight. maybe.
- posted by barbara @ 4/08/2002 11:04:00 PM  0 comments

 
kids! rory's had this whole vacation which ends tomorrow to do almost nothing...he's been playing on the computer, watching tv, playing on his play station, watching tv, playing his gameboy, watching tv, playing his poker game and his yahtzee game, watching tv...

at 7 pm i notice he is writing on paper instead of playing or watching tv. i say what's this. oh, yeah, it's a paper due tomorrow.

i wouldn't go back to 4th grade if you paid me
- posted by barbara @ 4/07/2002 08:40:00 PM  0 comments

 
dreamland
this is a site put up by a woman involved with solving the case of the vancouver missing women.
- posted by barbara @ 4/07/2002 05:19:00 PM  0 comments

 
am i the only person in the world who uses neoplanet? netscape 4.something?
i tried the beta of netscape 6 and crashed so haven't wanted to switch. and i just want to keep using netscape because of a prejudice against microsoft having it all.

please let me keep having my MS office though. smile

neoplanet is fun. i switch skins daily there. without knowing just how i did it, when i put up the channel bar there's my blog! which is why it got a comment today, i think. i'm barely awake and it's later than i think it is and will be for several days. which i will hate in the morning and love at sunset.
til later.
- posted by barbara @ 4/07/2002 09:05:00 AM  0 comments

 
it seems that many people are not blessed to have the little supernatural occurrences that (to my mind anyway) cannot be easily explained short of that a loved one is near and wants us to know that. what i really think is that a lot of people are too skeptical to recognize the signs when they happen.

i'll give you one story that illustrates what i mean. it comes to mind because it was my sister-in-law who told me about it and her husband, my brother, the last time we discussed it professed to believe nothing. you die you're buried that's it you're done.

at any rate they have an 18-year-old daughter jamie, who just graduated high school a month before bekah died. and like bekah she is quite popular with her friends and has many. now bekah and her friends always referred to themselves as "the crew." bekah had written a song about the crew and in her papers there were references to the crew, and my sister-in-law spent about 24 hours straight scanning and working on bekah's papers and pictures for her funeral, so she knew that bekah and her friends were known as "the crew.".

i told deb that i was cataloguing bekah's phenomena - and about a week or so after the funeral on the phone she asked me if i still was, "because something happened i think it might have been bekah." the day before that jamie had had a bunch of her friends over. before bekah died they were "the group." on this day before they got there jamie said, "by the way the CREW's coming over" and when debbie heard that the hair on the back of her neck stood up. she asked jamie why suddenly they were the crew instead of the group and jamie said, "i don't know."

debbie and i know...:) and my brother...would just laugh at us. he has no faith...
- posted by barbara @ 4/06/2002 10:06:00 AM  0 comments

 
The Research Kitchen of the Virtual Man

this is the man who is directly responsible for my attempt at blogging, or whatever you call it...:)
- posted by barbara @ 4/06/2002 08:39:00 AM  0 comments

 
omigod, i just wrote a bunch! and pushed the enter bar for a line break. and all gone.

kinda funny actually, what i was writing was how cool it was to write something, click publish and voila! but instead of voila! here's your post barbara it was abracadabra goodbye....
- posted by barbara @ 4/06/2002 08:36:00 AM  0 comments

 
The Los Angeles Police Department

LA police press release. it should be the release regarding my daughter's death and her killer's arrest

NOPE, i checked it out and it just takes you to their front page. the release about bekah is in the archive however, dated july 20, 2001

okay, don't ask me why but the bookmark i saved in yahoo works: Hit and Run Suspect Captured
- posted by barbara @ 4/06/2002 08:13:00 AM  0 comments

 
Bales Law

this is my webpage, "Bales Law"
i've been working on it since 1997
- posted by barbara @ 4/06/2002 08:00:00 AM  0 comments

 
ThoughtCafe

this is where i post my writing these days...though most of the poems are older, because the late lamented writtenbyme is where my book on bekah went.

now i am nearly ready to go for it. publishing it, i mean
- posted by barbara @ 4/06/2002 07:57:00 AM  0 comments

 
traffic incident log

here's the link of the moment...and my first confession. i click on this link almost every time i am online and that is a lot...and it's weird! what is this bloodlust? since bekah died whenever there's a hit and run on a pedestrian or bicyclist i copy it and send it to my yahoo group for what exactly i don't know. hopefully a piece down the road that makes the case for murder, when murder is the crime.

just an intro to my issues. more links to follow
- posted by barbara @ 4/06/2002 03:14:00 AM  0 comments

 
ah, this is just too too cool...it's done and i did it. hah! are there smileys for blogs?
- posted by barbara @ 4/06/2002 01:52:00 AM  0 comments

 
hey, i did it! now to learn how to customize it and make it look real cool. like others i've seen
- posted by barbara @ 4/06/2002 01:36:00 AM  0 comments

 

- posted by barbara @ 4/03/2002 04:47:00 AM  0 comments

 
Sample Blog
- posted by barbara @ 4/03/2002 04:43:00 AM  0 comments

 
BlogSnob - The better, faster way to publicize your personal site
- posted by barbara @ 4/03/2002 04:32:00 AM  0 comments

 
HourGlass Forums :: View Forum - BlogSnob Help
- posted by barbara @ 4/03/2002 04:26:00 AM  0 comments

 
BlogSnob - The better, faster way to publicize your personal site
- posted by barbara @ 4/03/2002 04:17:00 AM  0 comments

 

- posted by barbara @ 4/03/2002 03:38:00 AM  0 comments

 
movabletype.org : news
- posted by barbara @ 4/03/2002 01:28:00 AM  0 comments

 
blog*spot terms of service
- posted by barbara @ 4/03/2002 01:12:00 AM  0 comments

 
okay i think i'm about to lose it. lose it
- posted by barbara @ 4/03/2002 12:59:00 AM  0 comments

 
edit your blog:

i am getting frustrated, every template doesnot work, my blog's not published yet...it's getting real late.
- posted by barbara @ 4/03/2002 12:51:00 AM  0 comments

 
BLOGGER - How to troubleshoot Blogger errors
- posted by barbara @ 4/03/2002 12:31:00 AM  0 comments

 
edit your blog:
- posted by barbara @ 4/03/2002 12:27:00 AM  0 comments

 
my second blog. how much easier can this be?
- posted by barbara @ 4/03/2002 12:18:00 AM  0 comments

 
my first blog, don't look for any earth-shattering wisdom, tearjerking pathos, or a laugh. it's just my first blog after all.
- posted by barbara @ 4/03/2002 12:17:00 AM  0 comments