This is Not the Story you Think it Is

For trauma to become complex one needs to experience the trauma at the hands of those who are most perceived to control a social unit (family, community, etc.). It needs to be repeated and woven into the fabric of distorted relationships.

Courtois and Ford give a cursory description of complex trauma on the first page of their book, Treating Complex Traumatic Stress Disorders

…involving traumatic stressors that (1) are repetitive or prolonged; (2) involve direct harm and/or neglect and abandonment by caregivers or ostensibly responsible adults; (3) occur at developmentally vulnerable times in the victim’s life, such as early childhood; and (4) have great potential to compromise severely a child’s development.

Rust Never Sleeps: Margaret Thatcher, nee Roberts

Chimney sweep, Dartford, 1951

Margaret Hilda Thatcher was born on 13 October 1925 in Grantham, Lincolnshire, the daughter of Alfred Roberts, a grocer, and his wife, Beatrice.

 

Her father, a Methodist lay preacher and local councillor, had an immense influence on her life and the policies she would adopt.

"Well, of course, I just owe almost everything to my own father. I really do," she said later. "He brought me up to believe all the things that I do believe." [read more]

 

 

 

 

 

 

The quality of mercy is not strained.
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest:
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.
Tis mightiest in the mightiest; it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown.
His scepter shows the force of temporal power,
The attribute to awe and majesty,
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings.
But mercy is above this sceptered sway;
It is enthroned in the hearts of kings;
It is an attribute of God himself;
And earthly power doth then show like God's
When mercy seasons justice.   Portia The Merchant of Venice Shakespeare      

Dennis & Margaret 4 May 1979  

 

Mark Anderson, head of the primary school Thatcher attended, said: "It is quite an honour to have a former prime minister at your school and be able to say to children: 'This lady sat on the same floor as you and she had gone on to be a significant person in history.' We frequently talk about past pupils and what they have achieved and she is the most significant past pupil we have ever had.

"We have an ethos of respect, expect, aspire, care and be honest. Many of the values she had can be interpreted through that as well." [read more]

 

 

 

 

Lone Daffodil, Milwaukee, IL May 2009

Image source soul-amp

 

 Tributes have been paid to the former prime minister Baroness Thatcher who has died at the age of 87.

Perhaps her most visible legacy in Wales was the virtual disappearance of the coal mines and the birth of a new economy of service industries and technology.

 

It could be argued that Wales' coal industry was already in decline when Thatcher came to power. But for good or ill, she presided over the most dramatic transformation of the Welsh economy since the industrial revolution. Her time in office saw the demise of an industry and, some would say, a way of life.

It can be easy to forget that other aspects of Welsh life got a leg-up from the Thatcher government.

[read more]

 

 

Cutting Loss

 

Daniel Day-Lewis as Bill "The Butcher" Cutting

Gangs of New York

 

 

John Bowlby's "Four Stages of Grief" Model

John Bowlby (1907-1990) was a noted British psychiatrist and psychologist, particularly known for his work with children. Out of this work he developed the now famous "attachment theory" that is taught in many academic programs on psychology. He also contributed to the body of work on bereavement, through his work with dying children and their parents.

• Shock & Numbness- the stunned reaction to loss, including difficulty in concentration, impaired judgement and an inability to function normally. This phase may last for a few hours or several weeks.
  
  
• Yearning & Searching- this stage involves a wide range of feelings, including guilt and anger, yearning for the loved one, and painful questions about the meaning of life and loss. There is a tendency to withdraw from others to allow this internal process to continue unhindered. This may last for months.
  
  
• Disorientation & Disorganization- a phase marked by depression and is usually a time when the loss becomes a reality, while the current state of living seems unreal.
  
  
• Reorganization & Resolution- an emergence out of the depression of the third stage, with increased energy and self-confidence and the ability to feel joy again.
• 
  

 

William Poole was antebellum New York City's most feared gang leader. Nicknamed 'Bill the Butcher', he was the iron fist of the nativist forces, battering men to jelly for voting Democrat or being of foreign birth.

Idiot Compassion: Don't Misinterpret

Don’t impose the wrong notion of what harmony is, what compassion is, what patience is, what generosity is. Don’t misinterpret what these things really are. There is compassion and there is idiot compassion; there is patience and there is idiot patience; there is generosity and there is idiot generosity.  ~ Pema Chodron


Quote snitched from Metta Refuge

 

Werewolf Moon: a quality of mercy

Full Moon, San Francisco

Climbing under

a barbed wire fence

by the railroad ties

climbing over

the old stone wall

I am bound for the riverside

well I go to the river

to soothe my mind

ponder over

the crazy days of my life

just sit and watch the river flow

find a place

on the riverbank

where the green rushes grow

see the wind

in the willow tree

in branches hanging low

well I go to the river

to soothe my mind

to ponder over

the crazy days in my life

watch the river flow

ease my mind & soul

where I go

well I will go to the river

from time to time

wander over

these crazy days in my mind

watch the river flow

where the willow branches grow

by the cool rolling waters

moving gracefully and slow

child it's lovely

let the river take it all away

the made pace, the hurry

the troubles, the worries

just let the river take them all way

flow away

~ lyrics Where I Go by Natalie Merchant

ALT 94: Goldfields Highway

I am the wind which breathes upon the sea,

I am the wave of the ocean,

I am the murmur of the billows -

I am the ox of the seven combats,

I am the vulture upon the rocks,

I am a beam of the sun,

I am the fairest of plants,

I am the wild boar in valour,

I am the salmon in the water,

I am a lake in the plain,

I am a world of knowledge,

I am the point of the lance of battle,

I am the God who created the fire in the head

 

~ Amairgen

Conchology

“Embroidery combined the humility of needlework with rich stitchery. It connoted opulence and obedience. It ensured that women spent long hours at home, retired in private, yet it made a public statement about the household’s position and economic standing” ~ Rozsika Parker

 

 

 

 

Locked For Good

Robert Service's hut, Dawson, Yukon
 

 

 

 

Prophecy

I shall lie hidden in a hut

In the middle of an alder wood,

With the back door blind and bolted shut,

And the front door locked for good.

 

I shall lie folded like a saint,

Lapped in a scented linen sheet,

On a bedspread striped with bright-blue paint,

Narrow and cold and neat.

 

The midnight will be glassy black

Behind the panes, with wind about

To set his mouth against a crack

And blow the candle out.

 

- Elinor Wylie, 1923

 

 

a profusion of forest starwort (chickweed)
 

The Grand Strzelecki Track

South Gippsland, Victoria

Australia

 

 

 

 

 

Angels and Earthly Creatures

Saunders Case Moth (melatus elongatus)
 

Escape

When foxes eat the last gold grape,
And the last white antelope is killed,
I shall stop fighting and escape
Into a little house I'll build.

But first I'll shrink to fairy size,
With a whisper no one understands,
Making blind moons of all your eyes,
And muddy roads of all your hands.

And you may grope for me in vain
In hollows under the mangrove root,
Or where, in apple-scented rain,
The silver wasp-nests hang like fruit.

Elinor Morton Wylie 1885-1928