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The Big Day is approaching. We are heading to Hilton Head this afternoon and I won't be home again until I'm a mother-in-law.

Ick.

Mother. In. Law. That has such a horrid connotation. MILs are awful people who interfere and boss around hapless DILs and make them miserable. I don't want to be that type of MIL.

Mothers of daughters can do things to daughters, say things to daughters, be certain ways with daughters that are absolutely forbidden to mothers of the in-law variety. I know this. I know this because I have a MIL myself. My own mother might have said the exact same thing as my MIL and I would accept it from Mom but not from Ruth. Because, Mom was MOM and Ruth was not. She was His Mom, and that is not the same.

I have sons and so I will never get away with saying the same thing to my daughters of the heart that I could have possibly said to daughters of the womb. I know I can say things to my sons that no one else can. It is because I am the Mom, the one and only Mom. Regardless of anything else ever, I'm the Mom.

I assume this is the same with stepmothers, although I don't have much experience with that. My parents were on their starter marriage as were my in-laws, as am I. I would think the whole issue with stepparents is the 'you aren't my parent' variety and is true because the stepparent is NOT the parent. And so, as the MIL I need to remember I am not the mother.

Luckily, my DIL is wonderful. She is beautiful inside and out. She is fun and funny. She is artistic and practical. She is industrious and yet has time to give to others. She shares well. She is a great cook. She has beautiful children, although that may be partly due to my own gene pool. Regardless, the kids are great, too.

We have known each other for years. We have laughed and cried together for years. We have looked at Joe and wondered for years. We have hugged and kissed babies for years. This really is nothing new. It is the same, but different.

I wish … I want … my DIL to always know she is welcome to all I have. I am giving her one of the most precious things I've ever – not quite possessed, but felt was my own. I am giving her my precious son. One of my favorite people in all the world. And that's just the beginning.

I know she has a mother. But now, with a twist of the legal system, I'm going to have a daughter. I am so thrilled. A girl. I've always wanted one.

Thanks, Joe, for getting me a daughter. And such a great one, too.

Only Because I Love Her

I knew it was going to be bad, but I didn't think it would be that bad. My soon to be daughter-in-law is a kind, sweet woman. She is graceful. She is beautiful. She doesn't ask for much. She is shy.

She hesitantly called and asked if I would like to be involved in the pre-wedding parties. I was thrilled. Of course I would like to be part of the joy. I am so glad she is becoming part of our legal family, since she has had a place in my heart for a long time now.

So I said I would love to come to the brunch and the wedding shower. And then …

Last weekend, we found out the hinting at embarrassment and innuendo included in the invitation was real tyranny. Apparently the hostess knew enough not to actually tell us what she planned because the answer would have been a resounding "No, thanks!" Probably screamed at high decibel level. So stealth strumpet went on with her plans.

Last week I knew it was going to involve a sex toy party so the hostess could make money off her 'friend's' (and I'm not really sure about that title) upcoming nuptials. She entrapped Sarah's friends into attending a party for Sarah that turned out to be a party for the hostess, Jaclyn.

I can be a good sport about most things. I graciously (at least I hope I was gracious) met Sarah's friends. I talked with a few guests. I took pictures of all the smiling beautiful young women. I enjoyed one Mimosa and then had to fend off proffered alcohol with several demurs. I'm not sure why my not drinking offends people, but that is a different issue.

So the sex toy people finally arrived. I placed myself in a position across from the bride so I could photograph her opening her real shower gifts. It put me at the beginning of the line and I was handed countless vibrators and assorted what-nots.

The first thing we were told by the sex toy party people was that "what happens in this room, stays in this room." And the second thing was "if anything makes you uncomfortable, you can leave the room or we will stop." Since they didn't stick by the second, I'm not feeling all that compelled to follow the first.

Side note: they passed out a few toys that were advertised as able to use "while in the car." I thought people on cell phones were bad drivers, but apparently little vibrating finger covers will help pass the time while locked in rush hour traffic (exacerbated by the wrecks caused by inattentive drivers).

We played a game like Hot Potato and the two sex toy reps contrived to make sure the Mother and Mother-in-law were the last two people up. I mean, what can be more fun that showing grandmothers playing with sex toys? Amy won a vibrator and I won the chance to be totally humiliated and any last shred of dignity take away from me in a public place and in front of relative strangers and my son's bosses' wives.

As Bitch (I'm sure she told us her name, but I have no idea what it is) came to me to put a black plastic 'leatherette' harness with a pink penis sticking out of it over my head, I crouched and covered. I kept saying no. She kept trying. I explained I was old and might have a heart attack. She told me she was a CCU nurse and could revive me. (I wish I knew her name so I could get her license revoked. This person should NOT be around patients.)

No matter what I did, she didn't leave me alone. I managed to just sit there holding the disgusting toy while everyone took my picture and laughed because there is nothing like total humiliation. Nothing.

Of course, it wasn't only about me. Bitch also humiliated my lovely, sweet, kind, precious daughter-in-law. She was forced into participating in a second humiliating and cruel game. But because she is lovely and didn't want to embarrass Jaclyn, who seems totally beyond embarrassment to me, she participated with far more grace than I could muster.

Since we were permitted out of our seats for the second humiliation fest, we managed to avoid going back to the room. This should have been a hint to Bitch and Co-Bitch, but not so much. They were now passing out a tingling gel on little tongue depressors. But of course, this wasn't to go on your tongue. We were to go to the bathroom and put this crap on our crotch. I managed to avoid Bitch and yet she tracked me down and proffered the offensive goo. I declined. She tried again. I politely declined. She insisted. I reminded her, no longer politely, about her rule to not force anything and I didn't want the shit. She left.

Bitch and Co-Bitch then insisted we come and all sit down for more 'fun and excitement' while they went through the rest of their product line. As soon as B&CB left to go into the back room to take orders, more than half the women fled the scene. This upset Jaclyn. I'm not sure why. If she thought this was such a wonderful idea for a brunch, why wasn't it listed on the invitation? She knew this was a bad idea and did it anyway and then was upset when no one wanted to cooperate. No kidding.

My next hurdle will be meeting most of these young women again on Tuesday. There will be a real shower with real shower games. Colleen will be permitted to attend because it won't be offensive. But I will be there meeting women who will remember me as the old woman with a plastic dick on her chest. Great. I can hardly wait. Humiliation au duex.

That Crazy Prediction Game

I'm reading a book where 60 of 'the best minds' in the world predict where we will all be in 50 years time. If these are the best we got, it's no wonder we are in such a mess.

Many of the essay authors are Nobel Laureates so they must know something. The trouble comes when they try to predict globally instead of within their little specialty. The first essay was so Pollyannaish I almost quit reading.

According to the first writer, there will be 11 billion people living on Earth and her colonies and everyone will be fed, clothed, and sheltered. There will be no menial labor because it will all be done by robots and humans will be engaged in 'information processing' of one sort or another. No word on what happens to the below average intelligence humans – or half the population.

Several other authors bemoan the serious reshaping of the continents due to global warming. The one person who claims there will be perhaps a six inch rise in water level worldwide and says it is impossible to tell what will really happen in the next 50 years regardless of what is done to pervert the world economies is the expert on Climatology. What John R. Christy does believe is "that the accumulating economic development throughout the world will not be sidetracked by calls to 'stop global warming,' which are ultimately designed to inhibit access to affordable energy." Especially for a high tide.

The expert on heart disease tells of a future with no more heart attacks. He laments the recent increase in heart disease, but is happy about the drop in cancers. Hello, Mr. Expert. But you see, we all have to die of something. When we started to halt demise from cancers, we got old enough to die of heart disease and stroke, both results of the aging vascular tree. What exactly does this expert think we are going to eventually die of?

And almost everyone in the book – so far anyway – has talked about increased lifespan. We are all going to live for 125-150 years or so and this isn't going to harm the population of the planet in any way. Only one person – again, so far – has noticed that an aging population is going to be somewhat detrimental and that we are going to have to do something drastic to halt the birth rate if we are postponing the death rate.

One author who has apparently come down out of his/her ivory tower has noticed that not only Americans, but everybody is getting fatter. We are eating an unhealthy diet of too much this and that, but mostly too much. Where we used to be plagued by scarcity, now much of the industrialized world is plagued by abundance.

One tree hugger opines that the world population will stabilize at around 8-9 billion and we will all be eating organically grown food and all will be healthy as horses. The person who actually understands farming points out that organically grown food means scarce food and without the technological advances of agribusiness, there won't be enough food even for the 6.5 billion people here today, let alone another couple billion here or there. That doesn't even account for the nincompoops calling for ethanol made from grain crops to fuel cars.

What I seem to be seeing is a bunch of smart people who are only smart in their one little area of expertise but without qualms about predicting what will happen across the board. Not understanding what they are talking about doesn't even seem to slow them down. It is no wonder the man-on-the-street can't keep up with where we are headed. Even the people in the upper reaches of intelligence can't seem to figure it out.

It is amazing to me how stupid these very smart people can be. They don't seem to be able to see beyond their own personal causes or agendas. They can't seem to figure out that their specialty isn't the whole ball of wax and there may just be a few other points to consider.

We are in a world of hurt here.

Not Just Americans

The Daily Telegraph reported on a British couple in trouble with the community. Adam Hinton, 32, is banned from the apartment belonging to his girlfriend Kerry Norris, 29.

It seems the couple is not very decorous. The neighbors have been complaining for years, since 2006 in fact. They play loud music, headboards bang, and there are screamed obscenities. Also, Norris sunbathes naked.

Residents went to the Brighton and Hove City Council and asked for an injunction for the couple to tone it down a notch. They did not comply and so a second request was made. Now Hinton is not permitted within 100 metres of Norris' home.

And, of course, children and their sensibilities were invoked in the complaint with a neighbor pointing out a small child should not be subjected to the obscene verbiage.

Well, how did this happen? I thought the United States was the only country worried about the sex lives of other adults. Here it turns out other countries can be just as worried as the Puritanical Americans.

Brighton and Hove is located in southern England and the article was found at The Australian.

It seems to me, we Americans are pointed to as the quintessential up-tight idiots of the planet. Yet I've never read about a community banning two adults access to each other. Oh, we sensationalize sex at every opportunity. The headlines are full of public officials in extra-curricular sexual mishaps. It seems having a 'love child' is pretty standard fare from Jesse Jackson to John Edwards. Then there are Governors who tell the world and their wife at the same time they are leaving to join their gay lover – cuz who doesn't want to hear that in front of live cameras?

No, sex is the same around the world. And nosy neighbors and voyeurs are the same around the world. We love the stories of sex gone wrong for those people because it makes us feel better about the sex at our house, which is usually less spectacular than in the movies. Or novels. Or poetry. Because it is the normal everyday experience to think someone somewhere is having more fun, we like to make sure those fun-loving folks get their come uppance.

So all you loud folks out there, don't use louder music to cover the noise, move the bed away from the wall, and for goodness sake, stop screaming – especially dirty stuff. WTF is the matter with you?

Purpose

Living a life of purpose is a goal or maybe just a skill. Finding meaning in the purpose is the job of religion or philosophy. Contemplative tasks don't seen to provide much meaning.

My purposes are many. I am daughter and sister, keeping memories of family of origin alive. I'm wife and mother, creating a new family. I'm grandmother, passing on the stories to small children.

I am a nurse, although no longer licensed. It is something one can't get over or past. The information that was essential to my job will not abandon me now, even though it is no longer needed. It does have some value when I do my volunteer stint at the hospital. I'm still asked for medical advice fairly often.

I am a teacher, although no longer in a classroom. I'm still asked for technical advice fairly often.

I am a writer, perhaps even an author. I've written about trips to Ireland, Alaska, and across the country. I've written essays about events for each day of the year. I've written accounts of fictional characters trapped in a different space, time, or dimension. I've written up some of the stories about my family.

And yet …

I feel adrift, purposeless. I have no hard and fast schedule of events to point to when I say what I do with my days. A neighbor is absolutely amazed that I don't work and sit at my computer all day. I have no answer when he asks what I do. I write, but not all day. I read, but not all day. I do laundry and cook, but not all day. I do this and that. I keep the house running and functional. I make sure there is toilet paper and potato chips, whatever is needed.

After years of juggling ten things at once and managing to work, play, read, and raise a family I'm now 'retired' and free to do what I want. The problem with that is figuring out what I want. I write, but I don't want to do the work involved in getting the writing published. I don't know if it is fear of success or more likely fear of failure. I don't want to learn how to market myself. I just want to write.

But I want people to read what I write so I have to learn to market myself and get my work published on a larger scale than it is currently. My website is okay; but rarely visited. How many others have websites with the same problem. With 6.5 billion people, one would think an audience would be easy. But as in real life, more people want to talk than want to listen.

So I drift through days with time weighing heavy on my hands. I could have used some of this time years ago when I was juggling the ten things at once. Then I didn't have enough and now I have too much. There seems no happy medium.

I would have thought that by this time in my life I would have figured out what my purpose is. But, apparently not.

The Boy Who Cried 'Wolf' or The National Weather Service

Edouard hit Galveston to much fanfare – for a thunderstorm. Usually these aren't named, but if they form over a body of water, then they can be. Especially if the Weather Service needs to glorify itself.

Because there is a television station that spends all day, every day telling us about the weather, it must be glorified. Instead of just having weather like we always had before, now we have Weather. Important. Rain. Snow. Sleet. Hail. And everything gets a Severe Weather Warning.

I get severe weather warnings if it is sunny and hot. I watched all winter when northern states were issued severe weather warnings when it was cold. Hot and cold are problems, but they aren't severe. They might be if you are caught outdoors without access to shelter. But that means every day is full of severe weather.

Yes, according to the National Weather Service, that would be just about right. Everything is a crisis. Everything needs our immediate attention. And funding. Money is important. Weather is important. Weather has its own television station, so it must be Very Important.

This was supposed to be a huge hurricane year because of the global warming caused by mankind's use of fossil fuels and cows farting. Just because there have been Ice Ages and glacial retreats since before mankind came down out of the trees is no reason to believe that there is a cyclical weather pattern that has increases and decreases in temperature.

And we, as a race of selfish, piggy beings with the world revolving around us, must be the cause. We are behaving like five year olds who believe their parents' divorce is somehow their fault. The world is huge and we can abuse natural resources. But even nasty, grubby humans can't change the weather on Mars, who's temperature is also rising.

Anyway, back to the Weather Service. In order to appear important, they issue warning for heat, cold, rain, rain elsewhere, fog, and any other reason they can think of. Then, when something really bad happens, people don't listen. Katrina was just one more storm with the Weather Service up in arms yet again. Ho hum.

But that time it was real. After screaming "Wolf!" over and over and again and again, it isn't really any wonder people don't listen. Since Ed, the Storm, blew in with sustained winds that are lower than some of our afternoon showers here, we can assume there have been five named storms so far this year. On the Atlantic side. Storms big enough and bad enough to rate a name. And so far, they have been pretty much a bunch of nothings.

This year, there is an added feature on the National Weather Service's Hurricane Watch page. They are putting little yellow or orange circles on the map about areas that are pre-storm or forming storms. But you have to look quickly because these forming storms peter out into nothingness. Just one more way to keep poking at us.

There are storms out there, but not daily. Even though the TV needs to have something to say for the 24 hours per day they are on the air. And there is really very little to say about the weather. Unless there is something devastating. A tornado blowing through, a hurricane with real hurricane-force winds, tsunamis, hail the size of baseballs.

But the weather isn't all that co-operative. Meteorology isn't that exact. And so the weather folks don't keep saying maybe and perhaps a storm will hit. It might not and it could well be mild. That doesn't sell airtime. Nope. There are Storms approaching and You should Beware – and listen to the Weather Channel. Because you know, we have weather every single day.