Author: Joy Ann LaJeret

I was reading on the internet, when I ran across an article written by Hannah Rappleye entitled  “I’am working as hard as I can: For the poor, the costs of life can be higher.” That seemed to strike a chord with me!  My husband is a laborer. He loves CNC machining. But he doesn’t make enough to keep our household together. He has a second job with a production company and works some 50-65 hours a week. I worry about him and how hard he works.

Since, I can not find a full time position, we are always on the edge financially. I work two part time jobs; but they don’t pay enough to buy groceries. From 2010-2012 I went back to school to get a teaching certificate.  Still nothing in that area is open to me. I have given up looking, because I need a job now and need to work today not in the future. So what exactly is happening here?

According to another article written by US news, 4 out of 5 American’s live in danger of poverty. I know we are struggling every day just to pay our bills and buy clothes for the jobs I do have. Every year our rent goes up, our water and sewer costs get higher and the power company rates leave us keeping our heat so far down in the winter months, I am always cold. Even in the summer our costs are high. One thing that doesn’t go up is our wages. All in all the article states the prediction is the poverty rates will continue to rise and soon be beyond those in 1965. That is a pretty depressing picture for those of us who are struggling to stay out of poverty. The bottom line is 1% of the people control 39% of the wealth and that number is growing!

While Washington keeps telling us the economy will improve for the rest of 2013, it hardly seems like anything has changed when I sit down to pay our bills each month. It doesn’t seem like anything is changing when my husband is working 65 hours a week to make what he made in 40 hours in 1999, when we first got married. So, where are the improvements in our economy and who is reaping the rewards?

In an article in the Farm Press written by Hembree Brandon, the author wrote, ” Those who have jobs feel increasingly threatened as automation increases, as employers push workers to do more and more so they won’t have to hire additional workers, and as millions more have only part-time jobs or are forced to work as “independent contractors” so employers won’t have to pay Social Security, worker compensation, and other costs.” I can relate to that because I am a contracted employee.  At the same time profits are higher for oil companies than ever before and I am certain its more than the oil companies profiting at the tax payers expense. So, my question is who cares about the middle class or even those just reaching the poverty mark? Apparently not Congress or maybe not even the president.

If these articles do not scare you, they do me. I see our inability to keep pace with the bills each month and wonder how we can possibly keep living like this. There has been no relief from the struggle to date and it doesn’t look like it is going to get much better in the near future. Every letter written to Congress just seems like a waste of time. As for the republicans…we best not get into that subject. 

This year I decided to plant a garden. I had my husband build me a planter eight feet long by two feet wide and eighteen inches deep. I used my wine crate planters for the tomatoes and the big planter for the green beans, one tomato plant, green peppers and lettuce. I have a small plant of chives growing as well. On the outside of the planter I planted squash.

Somewhere in the planting of this garden, I decided to use Miracle Grow soil. for vegetables It took a bundle of cash; but I planted in the rich top soil hoping for some results. I had used it before but this year I use quite a bit of it, letting it fill the new planter.

I think this  is where things got a bit out of hand. My tomatoes are about five feet tall. The pepper plants and green beans took every inch of soil in the planter and grew bigger than any plants I have grown before. I have eaten fresh salad leafs and many green beans since the middle of July. I use the green beans for salads and eating raw. I liked them cooked as well. So, back to what I was saying…

I have heard that Miracle Grow helps plants grow. What I did not realize was how big!! I have tomatoes all over every plant and wonder just what the yield will be when harvest time comes. I, also, wonder how safe this product is for humans. I have decided that most of the nutrients in the soil are non-toxic. In fact, it probably would not be on the market if it was harmful. I found another blog called, “The Rustic Vegetable Garden, Miracle Grow and my Fall Garden, written by Gary Pilarchik. Also, you might find it interesting to learn how to transplant tomatoes. Apparently Gary likes using Miracle Grow and using planters. In this video however, he is not using it. I probably should have watched this video before I planted my tomatoes.

What articles and videos like this did not tell me is…how big the plants would get. I have lost branches of tomatoes because the plant was so big it broke it’s branches from the weight of the tomatoes. I should have been more careful and watched the plant, before the branches broke. I just never had plants grow that big before. I did not prune the plant either.

The long and short of this story is, most of us know how to buy a plant start in the spring. What most of us have to find out before we begin to grow planter gardens is what are the best products to buy to grow the best plants possible with the best yields. So I will stop commenting on my garden and the overly large plants and just eat the harvests. I did all this to lose weight and eat healthy this year. Maybe some one out there will comment on this blog and let me know if I did the wrong thing by using all Miracle Grow soil; and whether plants are suppose to get as big as mine did.

It has been one month since I have joined weight watchers.  I am counting every single bite I take into my body and wonder how I managed to let my portions get so big! I am exercising more and my joints hurt, even though most of what I do is done in the swimming pool.

The benefits are noticeable. I have taken 28 pounds of pressure off my knees. I feel much better when I wake up in the morning and have so much more energy.

I have not felt hungry, unless I skip a meal. I love the points plus part of the program, since I can use those points when I need a bit more to eat to feel satisfied. I am eating out at restaurants half as much as before. Because the fruits, vegetables and lean meats and fish are part of this life style change, it means more money  is being spent on groceries. I absolutely love fruit and vegetables! I eat them at every meal and when I take a snack; but they do cost more than the food I was eating before! I have including a Weight Watchers video to show how it all works and why fruits and vegetables are so important as part of your diet.

One of the things I really like about this program is I can eat fresh vegetables. My husband hates vegetables; but he will eat salads and certain fresh vegetables that can be steamed or microwaved. He doesn’t like broccoli and cauliflower. My solution to this is to chop up the broccoli and cauliflower into the salad where he cannot taste it. I add fresh green beans, purple onions, carrots, cucumbers, radishes and my fresh out of the garden leafy lettuce. I spend more on fat trimmed steak since he cannot eat fish. When I want fish, we simply go out to eat. Even a few drops of fish oil can make him very ill.

Because I do not work with my hands and body like he does, I do not burn the calories he does.  I work with my mind and my hands sitting on my backside, he gets far more exercise per day. So, I have built into my program, swimming at a leisurely pace for one to two hours, weight training, biking and equitation. After I have reached the goal of reducing the first 5 percent of my body fat, I will increase the level of activity from low to moderate, given the willingness of my body to cooperate. I am fighting knee pain and when my knee joints swell, I am somewhat immobile. I have lower back pain when the weather changes and I listen very carefully to what my body is telling me, every day. I do listen carefully…especially when I exercise.

I have read a considerable amount of information on knee replacements and hope this is not something I have to do in the near future. Losing weight is the first step toward taking pressure off my load bearing joints. We are all aging and those of us who have been athletic all our lives find that deterioration of the joints is almost unavoidable. Most of the damage on my joints came from things like aerobics, running marathons, equitation, weight training and the martial arts. At the time, no one told me about the side effects of these activities and the many other sports I participated in. Racket ball and tennis didn’t help either. Regardless of all of these problems, I want to keep the equipment I have for as long as possible. Knee surgery has a long recuperation period. I cannot afford to be out of work that long.

Over the next several years, baby boomers with joint damage will rise from 46 million to 67 million  by 2030  and the Boomer population will rise to 20 percent of people living, per an article, “How Baby Boomers will Change Health Care”. The authors go on to state how one out of every two Boomers will live with arthritis and eight times more knee replacements will be done than are done today.  I for one wonder how the country can absorb these rising costs in health care. Taking steps to keep their joints functioning for as long as possible will be what is needed in the future. I for one, intend to continue down the path I have been travelling to avoid adding to the burden on the health care system. I do not know if I have passed the point of no return yet. Only time will tell.

photo credit: <a href=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/miqul/227467257/”>miqul</a&gt; via <a href=”http://photopin.com”>photopin</a&gt; <a href=”http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.0/”>cc</a&gt;

This week the American Medical Association has declared obesity a disease. In an online article by the Voice of America, they state there has been a fifty percent increase in obesity cases between 1997-2012. According to the article , the World Health Organization states, 2.8 million people die from the disease.

What does this mean to the average American who is over weight?  The hope is the insurance companies will allow benefits to treat this new disease, that has been around for some time now. However at this point in time, insurance companies not doctors set the standards and conditions for weight loss procedures and behavioral modifications. I for one am not happy with insurance companies deciding who may have surgery or help with a weight loss program. Hopefully, this will change in the near future. I am one of the one-third of Americans who must lose weight and have a body mass  index reading of over 35.

I am at risk for cancer, type 2 diabetes, stroke and heart problems. Knowing this, my nephew and his wife are offering a program that will be tailored to my needs. It is called, Take Shape for Life (TSFL). I am going to include the video for this program. It seems to include features from Weight Watchers, Jenny Craig, and the South Beach diet to list a few. Most of the cost is in the food packages that are shipped to you monthly. What makes this program different is the help that is given to the participants.

I am currently on the Weight Watchers program and have been trying to lose weight with it for over ten years. I, however, need the personal support of ” in your face” supporters, like life coaches or sports coaches provide. I have never reached my ultimate goal with WW and end up giving up and gaining weight. I do not like the meetings or the lack of individualized attention. On the other hand, I do not like food that is not fresh and in its natural state.

Working for Manpower, Inc. at Google in their Hosting Services Program, I get to eat in the cafes on Google’s campus. This is suppose to be healthy food and for the most part is. However, I have been counting portions and points and find that it is really important to make food choices based on the caloric cost of the food eaten. When everything is on display and looks fantastic, it is really hard to eat the correct portion based on your individual caloric requirements. Making food choices that are healthy is only part of the total picture. You must make choices on what the calorie count of the foods to be ingested is. There is nothing at Google that lets the person know what they are ingesting as far as calories go.

Granted most of the employees at Google look pretty lean and mean to me; because they are young and active. I have yet to see anyone that looks as fluffy as I am. When I look at the younger people ( just about anyone is younger than me), I can’t help but feel out of place. So, that is motivating me to go back to a strict life style change. I will spend two to three months on the WW program and switch over to the stricter TSFL program.

I have already begun to count my points on the WW program and do not feel satisfied with the food amounts I am now eating! I want to indulge myself; but I can only do this with a set amount of points which convert to calorie counts. My goal is 1600 calories per day. I certainly am not at that limit at this time. I have increased my exercise routine and swim once or twice a week, ride my bike and ride at a local stable once a week. By doing this I can increase the amount of calories I can use, since it gets added to my daily caloric count.

The problem is, there is a lot of guess work in trying to calculate points on this program. Often there is no way of knowing how many calories are in certain foods. For example, if you eat at Denny’s and order the senior tilapia the calculation is 14 points; however, this includes the bread that comes with the meal. What happens when you do what I do and don’t eat the rolls that come with it, have a salad with less than a tsp of salad dressing and get fresh veggies instead of rice or potatoes? This whole counting calories thing leaves a lot to be desired. The classes supposedly solve this problem, NOT! The other problem with meetings is everyone is trying to learn while sitting on their back sides. I would prefer learning while we were exercising.

I would like to go through sugar withdrawal like the South Beach diet demands. I can’t help but wonder if that program, as hard as it is for two weeks, might not be the right answer. I have a hard time with carbs and need to use more protein in my diet than other people. Worse yet, I need more calcium since certain medications strip my system of calcium. With all this on my plate, I yearn for the time when I could eat whatever I wanted and never gain a pound. I spent most of my life weighing 126-132 pounds and am now carrying twice that. Talk about having been self indulgent and never learning portion control!

So whatever diet you choose and/or if you decide to have the surgery, I wish you well. I know what a struggle losing weight is and like drugs or alcohol, food is addictive. The dictionary states the word disease means a harmful development. Now we know what real life conditions being over weight brings upon us, let’s try to commit to living a long healthy productive life, at a more suitable weight. Most “baby boomers” are heeding these warnings and are working on reducing their weight. Now if we could just get employers to hire us!!

photo credit: <a href=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/vlastula/2864400414/”>Vlastula</a&gt; via <a href=”http://photopin.com”>photopin</a&gt; <a href=”http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/”>cc</a&gt;

Have you ever seen an object in the sky you could not identify? Could you conceive of the possibility that something extraterrestrial has landed on earth and been seen in our sky? Eighty million Americans believe not only is it true, but they believe their government is hiding something from them about this phenomena. According to the United Nations circa 100,000,000 people have had some sort of experience with UFO’s since 1978 .

France was the first country to open their files on a government sponsored website in 2007 and in October of 2007 Canada followed suit. In 2009 Brazil and Russia released some of their files. In 2012, the New Zealand government joined the party. The United States terminated it’s program called Project Blue Book on the study of sightings in 1969. Today millions of people around the world continue to see objects in the sky that cannot be identified.

After watching every program and reading every book about ufology, I can get my hands on, I have mixed emotions and confused thinking about where the reality lies. One of my favorite programs is aired on the History channel and is called, “Ancient Aliens.” It is simply an unproved theory that captures the imagination. It does not answer what people are seeing. The magazine Popular Mechanics stated that the United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) had every reason for wanting people believing in the myth of UFO’s. The secret aircraft programs of both Lockheed and Boeing supported by the US government, to mention only a few, were best served by a belief in alien aircraft and not American experimental secret aircraft and unmanned drones. But the question to ask is this really all there is to the sightings?

Here is where the investigation of sightings gets bogged down in belief systems. For those who are committed to the belief that UFOs exist, there is no way to argue with them, when they cite the hundreds of pages of testimony about sightings from reliable sources.  Pilots are considered to be one of the most reliable sources. I think it is safe to say that many pilots are afraid they will lose their jobs if they report what they see in the sky. Which makes sense if they are seeing experimental aircraft that is highly classified. On the other hand, one has to wonder if they are seeing something else, that may not be one of ours.

I believe that the CIA has so totally confused us with it’s disinformation campaign that we may never really know the truth until we speak to an alien on national television or one lands in a place no one can discount. It makes more sense to believe that something has been left unanswered; but only concrete proof will clear up the matter once and for all. If in fact I was from another planet and/or galaxy and far more advanced then humans, I would not want my presence known to earth’s government officials. Our governments have been less than trustworthy for some time now.

I would make myself known to certain people; those who could not prove my existence. I would want to feed their curiosity. I would want them to search for the answers they would need to protect their sanity. Maybe in the end we will find they are the human race from the future or aliens from another dimension. As we search for the answers we increase our knowledge as a people. Maybe that in itself is the reason this quest has begun.

I have been assigned at the Google Seattle and Kirkland office via Manpower Incorporated for one year this month!  I love the place and really like the people, however young/old they are. I see mostly millennial generation employees. Yes, they are different…but in a good way.

I anxiously awaited the movie “the Internship” with Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn. I was so tired the Friday it came out, I thought I might fall asleep during the movie. Nope, I did not and loved it! I truly had a good time watching  what the Hollywood producers did with the material!

Because I am an older adult, I had a lot to relate to in the movie. I have read some of the reviews and know that it did not do well in the box office. However, there were a couple of messages in the movie that caught my attention.  First, as an older adult, I know how hard it is to get a job, much less a job in a highly technical company. A local company where I live has failed to hire me, even though I have tried for almost twenty years. I know I have the skills. Nevertheless, it has not happened for me. The bottom line is there are a lot of myths out there about older workers.

Secondly, there was a learning process taking place in the movie.  Wilson and Vaughn, through their interactions with the young techies, held onto a vision they had to get the internship no matter what. They really wanted to learn the technology and they wanted to work for Google. I can relate to that. However, it soon became clear that there were attitudes that needed to be changed when you throw a couple of older people in with young, bright, technically adapted digital learners. They proved that older people who actually helped invent computers like we have today, can learn the technology and adapt to the culture.

I have always had computers, since they first came out.  However, I never really learned the new programs and technology, so I went to the local college to get an online teaching certification. Nope, never got a job teaching and stop trying. I became so discouraged, I decided to stop and think about if I needed more training or not. I have decided all I need is a chance and experience.  I am still not certain if that will ever happen. Unlike me,  Wilson and Vaughn hung onto their dream and refused to let defeat get to them! A great lesson to learn and a great lesson to teach.

I want to admit that I have never really felt out of place at Google.  Most of the young men/women I have met there speak to me as an equal. I do not feel by their deportment, they are talking with an old woman, who is out of touch and out of date. I have been treated with nothing but respect, even when I had some complaints…which were resolved immediately!! Both of my supervisors and/or managers are younger women and I deeply respect them for their efforts to meet my needs as an employee. I applaud Google for doing this for their employees as well. That being said, do I have the skills they need to hire me direct…that depends? Would they hire someone my age, I have no idea. Did they hire Wilson and Vaughn? We will never know, because the story doesn’t take us there.

If you haven’t seen this movie, it is a good one.  I would rate it a B+. I think they could have worked toward getting a more developed story out of the script. However, they were dealing with a very complicated issue today…hiring older workers and then helping them fit into the teams they are part of, rather then hiring people human resources thinks will fit in. Actually, there are a lot of myths that need to be dispelled. So if you have the time, go see the movie or buy it when it comes out. I had a great time watching the peccadilloes they encountered real or not! I think you will too. Finally, remember Hollywood loves to exaggerate reality.

From the beginning of recorded history there has been a belief in mermaids. There are cave drawings in Egypt, that depict the appearance of said creatures of the sea. Recently Animal Planet ran two stories about the possibility that these creatures may exist and are undiscovered. In fact 3.6 million viewers watched the two programs.

All of the evidence used in the filming was based on a hypothesis called the ” Aquatic Ape” hypothesis or theory purposed by a marine biologist, called Alister Hardy in circa the 1930’s and was published in the 1960’s. By the 1970’s Elaine Morgan had written six books on this theory and gained some attention with her book called, “the Descent of Woman.” She wrote this book because of her irritation at the authors and scientists of the day that gave women little notice in the theories that were being accepted on evolution. Elaine Morgan (video on her reasoning) is a  octogenarian scientist feminist and believed the reason the theory was not accepted was because men in the scientific community were not interested in viewing women as the main subjects of their research. She also felt that the dominance of the Savanna theory, biased the research evidence found by these academics.

I use the word theory very loosely when speaking on this Aquatic Ape theory.  A theory is something built on testable hypothesis. Since there is no proof other than folk lore and cave paintings created during the paleolithic period some 30,000 years ago, it is difficult with any amount of certainty to say this is a theory and it is testable. However, that being said, a great deal of thought and scientific information went into the creation of the television program called, Mermaids: the Body Found and the New Evidence, which aired on Animal Planet and was created by Charlie Foley. It gives a person pause when it comes to dismissing mermaids and the Aquatic Ape theory and Darwinism.

If one wanted to visualize how these creatures would look, the creators of this program came close to creating a possible imagine based on the scientific information they had from other evolutionary theories. I for one, love to swim and scuba dive and could spend hours in lakes and pools. Swimming for me is as natural as breathing. I love the water (not so much now after watching Jeremy Wade in Monster Rivers), however. One of my children swam in our pool before she could walk. Yes babies do open their eyes underwater and can swim without being taught. They instinctively hold their breath. This leads me to believe there could be something to this whole idea of mermaids, even though it was not based on actual events, for the most part. I would like to think, after watching the creations of Animal Planet’s mermaids, they do look like the mermaids in the Mermaid’s presentation.

It is with great interest people all over the world watch presentations like the one aired on Animal Planet. I think we want to know how much of the fork lore about mermaids is real and how much is myth. I ran across this video and thought, “okay, that makes me think!” So I am putting in this blog video for you to view and consider whether you think there might be some truth to the myths we all grew up with. This video is  a lecture length video and worth watching if nudity or length doesn’t bother you. I highly suggest you also look at the material Elaine Morgan has written, as well. The video does ramble a bit, and could be a better presentation of the subject matter; however, it has presented some highly interesting material. The choice of pictures could be more scientific if they existed; but they certainly would hold the attention of some viewers. I apologize, for these pictures, to the female or males reading this blog and watching this video. What is so interesting is the concept the narrator is unraveling in the telling of the history, myth, folk lore and the art in some of the pictures.

Warning: Parental Guidance due to nudity of the 1 and 1/2 hour video. See: “Secret History of Mermaid”s on my Blog roll.

Have you ever wondered if you were seeing things? Have you ever wondered if there is a parallel universe with a black hole connection to earth or our world, where spirits can move back and forth between different dimensions? Have you ever watched Ghost Hunters or similar programs on TV and wondered if there really is any truth to what they are experiencing? Approximately one-third of Americans do.

On Memorial Day weekend, 2013, I decided my hard working husband needed a vacation and some rest. So we went to Vancouver, Washington to a local Inn. We planned on staying three nights. The next day was a sunny Saturday and we drove to Lincoln City, had seafood and watched the ocean waves crash on the rocks. I wondered if there were any mermaids there; but never saw any as we drove up the coast to Astoria and the Washington side of the Columbia river. Of course on the 27th of May, Animal Planet was going to show the documentary: Mermaids: New Evidence. I have a curious nature and watch this stuff and wonder about it, even if it is unscientific.

Sunday we planned on touring the Pittock Mansion in Portland, Oregon. I casually noted the place was haunted by some rather friendly spirits. We met my nephew and his wife and child at the Inn and proceeded to lunch at Applebee’s where it was decided they would accompany us to the mansion, since his wife had never been there,

After driving up a steep incline or mountain/hill to get there, parking was hard to find. Nevertheless, we piled out of the cars and began walking up to one of the most beautiful mansions I have ever seen! We passed the three car garage of this mansion and the mansion came into view. It was built in 1914, by Mr. Henry Pittock and his wife Georgiana Burton Pittock. The mansion was breath taking as we approached it. You could see down to the city of Portland and all  the mountains surrounding the city. We could not tour the mansion because there was only 45 minutes before it closed. So we began a tour of our own. I felt the true joy of this wonderful place and knew it must have been truly loved by it’s owners. I felt nothing that was supernatural, only peace and beauty.

As we walked around the mansion and viewed the sites and flower gardens, we came to a third building that served as the quarters for their servants or hired help. You couldn’t go in the building, so we looked through the windows. After walking around to the back of the building, I began to feel a bit dizzy.  That was only the beginning of my experience for the next two days.

By the time I got back to the room at our Inn, I was totally exhausted and laid down to rest. I fell immediately into a deep REM sleep. I awoke still feeling tired. As we watched television, I began to smell the most fragrant incense I have ever experienced. It was so strong and nothing like anything I had smelled before. I asked my husband if he smelled it too. He did not. I fell back to sleep again. When I awoke this time, I smelled a strong smell of flowers so sweet it took my breath away. Again, I asked my husband if he smelled the flowers. Again, he did not.

Shortly after that, I began to feel euphoric. I felt a loving comforting presence and began thinking about my brother (my nephews father and a USAF veteran who died recently) and our last days together before his death. It was 11:30 pm and this lasted until 3:30 am Memorial Day morning. I feel deeply asleep and when I awoke again it was about 5:30 am in the morning. I tried to get up to go to the ladies room and felt horribly dizzy. I was absolutely exhausted and felt totally drained.

We were leaving to go back to Seattle that morning and I felt even dizzier as the hours pasted. By 9:30 am I finally was able to get up and get our things packed. I managed to drive home to Seattle; but when I entered our house, it came back so strong, I felt nauseated. This feeling continued until the day after Memorial Day. I spent those two days lying in bed too sick to raise my head and too tired to even think straight. Oddly, I had no fever and/or signs of the flu or food poisoning.

By Wednesday morning I became extremely curious and began to read everything I could on spirits and encounters. Apparently, apparitions often do alert the person of their presence by using smells that are familiar. I found that whenever the ghost of Georgiana was present at the mansion, there was a strong smell of roses. Secondly, there is a belief that in order not to frighten the person the spirit is contacting, they alert them by using a scent that person can associate with the person trying to make contact or should I say spirit trying to make contact? Also, there is a belief that spirits can attach to the energy field or aura of a human person. Thus, one could have followed me from the mansion.

Incidentally, one side note,while we were driving to the Oregon coast, I began to feel a great deal of anger toward my brother. I began remembering all the past hurts and how we disagreed regarding religion, politics and family. My poor husband listened to a rather heated rant of mine! I was never a drinker and just did not get the life style my brother had after 33 years in the US Air Force where alcohol had played a role in the lives of service members before the Reagan Administration. In fact my officer husband was the drug and alcohol control officer during his years in the US Army. Neither of us used drugs and seldom touched alcohol. After having this rant, I felt really awful and wished I had not been so angry with his memory.

Okay, with all this being said,  I am sounding too weird for even me to comprehend. So, I contacted the Puget Sound Paranormal Society to see if I could get some answers. So far they have not responded.  I have never had an experience like this and am wondering what in the world did my imagination drum up or if I did indeed have a paranormal experience, for whatever reason.

Note: Just a side note. Roses have always been important in our family. My mother and daughter’s middle name is Rose and my favorite flower is the rose. Mrs. Georgiana Burton Pittock is called the Queen of Portland’s Roses. I have visited every rose garden in every city there was one. Incidentally, the state flower of Washington is the Rhododendron. In Greek” Rhodo means rose and Dendron means tree.

When I attended the universities and studied criminology, it was not uncommon to research the motives and history of people who today are called, “monsters.”  I have been closely watching the latest so called monster, Ariel Castro. What in the world motives a man (maybe this term is too loosely applied here) to kidnap, rape, enslave and brutalize three young girls, one in her 20’s and the rest the age of his daughter Emily?

He claims he was abused as a child. That doesn’t excuse his behavior and hardly justifies his alleged crimes.  One thing is quite certain you can act totally against societies norms and mores in an abnormal way and still be quite sane. I think what he did was absolutely clearly thought out and carried out. Was his decision making seriously compromised by his past experiences, most probably.

In an article called, “What Makes Serial Killers Tick,” Shirley Lynn Scott writes, “Yet if you intend to avoid the path of a serial killer [kidnapper and rapist], your best strategy is to sidestep the charming, the impeccably dressed, polite individuals. They blend in, camouflaged in contemporary anonymity. They lurk in churches and malls, and prowl the freeways and streets. “Dress him in a suit and he looks like ten other men,” said one attorney in describing Dahmer. Like all evolved predators, they know how to stalk their victims by gaining their trust. Serial killers don’t wear their hearts on their sleeves. Instead, they hide behind a carefully constructed facade of normalcy.”

That is exactly the way Ariel Castro came across to the many people and neighbors that knew him. He could put the veil of normalcy around everything he was doing. It has not been proved that our killer Ariel has murdered anyone except possibly unborn children; but given time most likely his victims would not have lived out their lives. They were not being fed properly, did not have medical care and mostly likely seriously lacked Vitamin D, from the lack of sunlight and outdoor experiences.

Ariel Castro, if found quilty was every bit a monster as those described in the Grimm tales. He had no compassion for his victims, based on what we’re hearing in the news. What bothers me the most however, is his lawyers stating he is truly attached and concerned for his daughter; the daughter he produced by raping Amanda Berry. Right! If he was so concerned about his daughter he would have stopped doing what he was doing and turned himself in. Or he would have treated her mother with human dignity and respect. Like any other batterer, he did none of those things…so I am not buying this plea copping! I have no compassion for this person. I do not agree with or believe in the use of the death penalty, as I have stated before…however, I really don’t want to pay for his life in prison. 

One of Ariel’s daughters is in prison for trying to slit the throat of her baby and kill herself. It doesn’t seem like the fruit has fallen too far from the tree. She tried to slash her baby’s throat…yup, that is right. She also attended elementary school with Amanda Berry and knew Gina de Jesus. Looks like Ariel Castro’s fathering skills need a considerable amount of work or fixing and up-dating. In fact, it sounds like he used this daughter Emily to get to two of the girls. There may be hope for his daughter Emily; But I can see no hope for him. Unfortunately, we have not advanced enough, as a human species, to know why there are people like Ariel. How very sad this fact is.