I must have been about ten years old when I went for a bike ride.  As I labored up the hill in front of our house, I thought about children in other countries and wondered if they had bikes.  I wisely decided that some probably did and many in the poorer countries did not.  As I peddled along, one thought led to another, I came to a very wise conclusion.  I decided that the children in other countries were probably a great deal like myself. They didn’t much care about politics or the world outside their immediate concerns.  I went on to realize that people everywhere must be mostly concerned with family, friends and a job.  I decided that what humans want is to love, and to be loved, and to have friends.  My childish thoughts included all people in my musings without particular thought to the color of their skin or the language they spoke.

As an adult, I find my childhood musings rather amazing.  At the time, the US didn’t speak to Communist China.  They were evil. We were trying to pretend that we didn’t think Japan and Germany were evil for WWII.  Jim Crow laws still ruled our south.  We were getting wound up in the cold war, and children were often warned that Russia would nuke us at any minute.  When they did, we were supposed to crawl under our desks at school or under a table at home.   Perhaps I thought about these things and other people because my father worked in a classified job.  Several times a year the FBI would come and investigate us to make certain my parents were sufficiently loyal to the USA. 

As I grew older, I became a supporter of the civil rights movement and later a protestor of the Vietnam War.  My childhood conclusions that all people are basically the same led me to believe that there must be a better way to live than to be constantly at war. 

So, for almost sixty years, I’ve looked for what that better way might be.  I’ve seen stunning examples of how wars are fabricated out of fears and lies in order to make a few people very rich.  Men and women march off to foreign lands in pursuit of freedom or the path of glory, hoping to make someone free when those so liberated may not want to pay the price of the type of freedom we offer.

I am still convinced that there has to be a better way.  Perhaps the better way is really very simple.  Perhaps we the people need to stand up to the greedy power elite and say, “No. We won’t kill so that you can become richer.”  Maybe instead of laying flowers on a soldier’s grave in a cemetery far removed from the source of the conflict, we ought to line the streets up to Halliburton headquarters with crosses bearing the names of those who died for their profits.  We could decorate them with flowers and light candles.  We need to make those who profit from war uncomfortable rather than troubling the poor woman in some far away land who just wants to buy some groceries and go home to put her feet up.

Another thought to consider as we call ourselves exceptional for enforcing justice around the world, just maybe, a country that condones the murder of unarmed black children in our streets does not have the moral high ground to enforce our brand of freedom upon other countries.

No, I am not particularly naïve.  I know that where there is true injustice there can never be lasting peace.  Still, I look at the wars around me and notice how often my own nation seems to be on the side of the injustice rather than those who are looking for a better way of life.  Perhaps the world would have more peace, if we minded our business of cleaning up our streets and let other nations find the level of peace and justice that they can live with.

Just maybe, the best way to honor those who have lost their lives in our continual wars is to take a good, hard look at why we fight and ask what we can do different.  How can we have peace?

When Marina and Hau returned home from the city after trading the capes, they arrived with more than their trade goods.  Marina’s mother insisted that she wanted to see her other daughter, Sabrina, and help her before the baby came.  She insisted that her oldest daughter, Ulaylee must come too to keep her company on her return journey.  Nobody believed that she intended to bring the unmarried Ulaylee back home, but they nodded wisely every time Mama E’KuN said, “Ulaylee should come with me, because I will want her company on the road when it is time for me to come home.”

Before they left her parent’s home, Marina argued with her husband to leave Ulaylee behind, but he only commented that there were many unmarried men in their valley.  “It is good to form alliances.  If we have a big family, others will not attack us to steal our food during times of famine.”

“Ha! Ulaylee will lead the attack.” Marina hissed.

As Marina and Hau followed by Mama E’KuN and Ulaylee climbed the hill toward home in the evening dusk, Sabrina wasn’t happy to see her older sister.  She snarled to her husband Rue, “Can we put them in the goat shed?  Ulaylee is mean, and I don’t want her in my house.”

Rue sighed and put his arms around his wife.  “We need a bigger house.  Tomorrow I will put a new roof on the goat shed.”

Sabrina looked at the scowl on her twin’s face and knew that she had not had an easy trip with Mama and Ulaylee.

Still, both Rue and Hau knew the value of family alliances.  Papa often warned them to watch that neighbors didn’t encroach on their hunting grounds.  Ulaylee could be useful if married to an honorable man.

After two days in the same house with Ulaylee and her Mama, Hau and Rue walked down the hill to where their papa lived with their step-mama.  They laid all their troubles out on the table while their step-mama served them pottage seasoned with herbs from the hillsides.

“And Ulaylee has a sharp tongue.” Hau almost whined.

“And she told Marina to start the fire.  I won’t have her telling my wife what to do in our home.”

“And she ate my second bean cake.”

“She’s a terrible cook.  Won’t put an onion or bit of fish in the dinner.

Papa S’TO nodded and listened until his sons ran out of complaints.  Finally, he added his own observations.  “And, in addition to having a voice that grates on a man’s ears, she is scrawny.”  The men shook their heads and prepared to face the reality of not being able to marry off Ulaylee.

Papa’s new wife looked at the discouraged men and volunteered.  “She will not do as her younger sisters tell her.  I will invite her to come here.  I can at least teach her how rich people cook.”  The older woman wrinkled her brow and skewered her husband with her eyes, “And you will do something about her horrible voice by teaching her to sing.”  Next, she turned on her step-sons, “You can make the young men in the valley curious by introducing your beautiful wives to the other families in the valley.  Tell the neighbors that Marina’s and Sabrina’s sister is staying here.”

So it was, that Ulaylee and Mama E’KuN moved out of the goat shed and in with Papa and Step-Mama S’TO.  Step-Mama made certain that they all spent the day laughing and singing.  If she talked about being rich once, she said a hundred times.  “Of course the S’TO’s are so rich, that we can eat all the fish we want, or rich men like a bit of dried berry with that, or rich people always serve more than they can eat.”

Intimidated by the older woman and having no knowledge about what real rich people do, Ulaylee quickly learned ways that were different from the poverty of her father’s household. 

Marina and Sabrina gave thanks over having their house to themselves again and prepared to visit their neighbors.  They tore the fabric Marina brought from the city into skirt lengths and stitched together a new set of clothes.  Rue and Hau encouraged them to sew and let Step-Mama cook their dinner, since she had help.

On the first day Rue intended to visit a neighbor, he took the wheelbarrow with some tools to help plant the fall crops, and Sabrina danced along beside him in her new finery.  The next day, Marina wore the pretty new clothes and visited another neighbor while Hau helped repair their fences. 

With the goal of getting rid of their elder sister, both girls knew enough to take gifts of hair ribbons or a pottery cup with them to visit the neighbors.  They lied through their teeth and said they could take a day to visit because their sister worked so hard and cooked all their food.  The mothers with unmarried sons accepted the gifts and listened to Marina or Sabrina with their convent manners praise their sister.  They smiled and planned to return the visit soon.

The S’TO men congratulated themselves on the progress of their plan to present an acceptable Ulaylee to the community.  They still shook their heads every time they looked at the scrawny, slightly stooped older girl. 

Finally, Rue and Hau decided to take their lovely wives for an evening stroll and unburden themselves.  Rue started, “Hauk is interested in meeting Ulaylee.”

Hau affirmed, “More than interested.  I met Kam by the creek.  He hinted he’d be willing to help us build an addition on our house.”

“And, Young S’Tng would be the best possible match for Ulaylee.  His mama seldom leaves her bed, so his wife could rule her own home.  He isn’t opposed to getting married.  Trouble is…” Rue paused.

“Trouble is…” Hau tried to explain.

Marina snorted, “Trouble is Ulaylee is ignorant and ugly.  I’ve tried to teach her the letters, but she doesn’t want to learn.  Papa has tried to teach her to sing, but she complains about that.”

Hau scratched his head.  “I know you’ve been working hard to make new clothes for yourselves, and you deserve them.  And, you’ve been generous with Mama S’TO.  Can you do something to make Ulaylee look…well…more like a woman?”

Marina and Sabrina paused in the path, looked at each other then said, “Maya!” at the same time and burst into giggles. 

Rue and Hau stood in the path staring at their wives who continued to giggle and wink.

Finally, the twins explained that Maya was a woman who “worked nights” near the convent.  “The men seemed to like her well enough.”

Thus it was, that the two sisters set to work with their needles and fabric to construct a new dress for their older sister.  Ulaylee, knowing nothing about Maya, accepted the attention from her sisters without question.  The new dress became a reality of ruffles and bright embroidery.  If the white bodice appeared a little sheer, the generous ruffle around the neck disguised the real size of the attributes slightly visible below its hem.  To Ulaylee, who’d never owned a new dress, this one appeared to be the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen.  She even became quite proud of her sisters’ convent education, such as it had been.  She resolved not to screech at them.

Both of the young wives worried that an unhappy husband might return their sister to their doorstep, so as they sewed, they giggled and talked to their sister about the wonders of keeping a husband happy in bed and how to get baby for herself.

The whole family hunted, harvested, and cooked to prepare for the day when their neighbors would come to build a new room onto the S’TO’s house and to meet the sister of the beautiful S’TO twins. 

For their part, the mothers in the valley sent their single sons to the creek to wash.  They brushed and groomed their sons much the same as Ulaylee was being oiled and trussed.

Finally, the dawn came when the S’TO family arose before the sun to prepare to meet the neighbors who would help with their building.  Ulaylee with ribbons braided in her hair and her bright ruffled dress, stood at the gate as her sisters told her and, as each guest arrived, offered them a cup of water she’d bent forward to dip from the big black pot. 

Ulaylee had never had a man take an interest in her before.  She suddenly realized that today was her opportunity to escape a lifetime of servitude in her parents’ home or the scowls and rolled eyes of her sisters in their home.  She rose to the occasion beautifully.  She curtsied to the older women as her sisters had taught her.  She smiled sweetly at the young men and cast her eyes down when meeting the married men as her mama taught her.  At mid morning, she served the workers more water. 

While the workers rested after the mid-day meal, Papa S’TO stood beside Ulaylee and surprised his guests by singing a beautiful love song.  For good measure, he sang a second song about a beautiful maiden looking for love.  He hoped the young men would get caught up in the song and take the hint that Ulaylee might be beautiful.  Finally, he asked his daughters to sing a folk song with him.  Ulaylee had a small solo part that she performed quite well. 

Before the sun left the sky, the S’TO house had grown to include two new rooms enclosing a small courtyard; Hau and Rue had received compliments on their lovely wives and men had poked Papa S’TO and called him sly for marrying The Widow S’PU.  Finally, the neighbors gathered up their belongings and scraps of food the S’TO’s wrapped in a’rk leaves for their journey home. 

As the last of the workers trailed down the hill, Mama E’KuN placed Ulaylee’s hand in Young S’Tng’s strong hand. The whole family wept tears of joy as the smitten young man led his bride to her new home. Ulaylee, almost floated as she left her sister’s house.  She felt enchanted with her strong husband, and she knew herself to be more fortunate than she’d ever dreamed possible.

****

Note:

Mama E’KuN had been wise enough to hint to Kam and Hauk that she had more daughters at home, so nobody ended the day carrying home a burden of disappointment.

Our granddaughter graduated from Washington State University May 9.  Hubby and I visited our Alma Mater to see her graduate, eat the best ice cream in the world, and buy some fantastic Cougar Gold cheese.  We had fun visiting with our daughter and son-in-law as well as spending time with our granddaughter and her young man.

I’m thankful I made the effort to attend the graduation.  It was an effort since Hubby is still in a wheelchair after falling off the garage roof.  Anyway, I found the event to be uplifting and hopeful.  The speaker for the graduation was a Washington State alum who described herself as an ordinary student.  Her grades had been okay but not great.  She went on to describe how through a series of opportunities based on being in the right place at the right time, she was able to change hospital protocols to reduce the rate of in-hospital infections by forty percent.  I felt impressed by how she emphasized that she’d been an ordinary student much like the three thousand graduating from this state college.

When we look at the news, we see the injustice and corruption that seem to rule our country.  We hear about this person or that who graduated from Harvard or Yale.  We never hear about the thousands of people who graduate from our state universities where like at WSU integrity and high moral standards are the expected norm.  We never hear about the thousands of young people who just may find themselves in the right place at the right time to find the key to solving a significant problem.

As I listened to the speakers, I was reminded of my own education.  My experience in my field has changed my understanding of the causes behind behavior a hundred and eighty degrees.  However, my basic state university education taught me more than the prevalent theories of the day.  I learned how to recognize valid, reliable research.  I learned how to think critically.  I learned how to learn and the importance of continuing to learn throughout my life.  The same values that I learned as a student at this humble state university are the same values that those three thousand young people are leaving here with.  I see hope in seeing a crowd of people who can think and learn.

So, I learned something.  I learned that we really do need to turn our backs on the mainstream media and engage with our communities to find the hope for our future.

Quantum Physics becomes very confusing for a writer when we look at all creation as energy.  Do our characters really exist or are they what the rest of the world calls imaginary?  Then again, all imagination is energy.  In fact, those of us who call ourselves real as opposed to imaginary are mostly energy and very little mass when you stop and think about the spaces within each atom.  If we are energy and our characters are energy where does the difference lie?

Authors often talk about how they get started writing a novel, and at some point, the characters take over and the author becomes nothing more than a scribe who writes what he is told.  I experience this every time I start a new character.  So who are these people who take over our lives in order to tell their stories.  To what extent to they exist separate from the author? 

As I said, quantum physics makes life very confusing, or perhaps life is confusing and quantum physics explains it.  My heroines in my books are the source of my confusion.  Well…Jake doesn’t help either.  My heroines do many of the same things I do.  We have the same interests.  However, I don’t think the difference between Celia and me is in what we do.  I am not Celia.  She is a different entity with different energy.  Well, she has energy.  She is energy.  When I write or talk about Celia I experience her energy, but when my reader reads about Celia they experience her energy and I have no knowledge of what Celia is up to at that moment.  Does the difference between an author and the characters they create arise in the difference between pure energy and mass?  I have mass that ties me to time and space.  Celia does not have mass, therefore Celia and I will always be separate individuals.  Oh dear, and then we get into the relationship between energy and mass. 

We, who have mass like to construct ideas of reality.  We say this is real and that is not.  We’re wrong, but it does make life more comfortable to say those things that I can see are real.  Of course this brings up the question of what happens to those things you can’t see.  Are they still real?  For years I’ve lived and worked with people who have brain damage.  When they don’t see something, it doesn’t exist for them.  If they don’t see Mom, Mom and her rules no longer exist for them.  Perhaps working with people with no concept of conservation of matter has caused me to look at the topic of imagination from a different perspective.

Let’s take England as an example.  I live near Seattle.  I don’t see England.  I’ve been there so I remember being lost in Bath.  Yet, my memories of being lost in Bath and of eating the most fantastic scones with clotted cream in a small shop in Canterbury are just energy in my brain.  Is England more real than the characters in my stories?  Consensus reality insists that England exists, but the England of my memory doesn’t exist.  Perhaps if I returned to Bath, I wouldn’t get lost.  Is the little shop where we had scones still there?  If I understand quantum physics at all, the answer is that no, for me, England is just energy the same as Celia is energy. Both my memories of England and my relationship to Celia are energy.   In this sense Jake’s country is just as real as England.  Those living in Bath might say the same about Seattle, because for them Seattle is a memory or something they imagine.  Even as consensus reality Bath and Seattle are always, always changing.

So, why do I even think about these matters?  Well, I find my relationship to my characters curious because I cannot manipulate them at will.  Jake may hug me, but he never thinks of me in a romantic light because Celia is the love of his life—his soul mate.  I am not Celia.  I’m not Maudy.  Maudy is a different energy from Celia.  This brings me to the horrified and awestruck question of what exactly are we authors doing?!?  What energy do we cause to coalesce?  Or are we just scribes working to express the energy around us? 

Life is so simple without quantum physics, but perhaps we need it to understand our power and responsibility.  What are we doing?  We manipulate energy to create people and worlds.  Others can visit those worlds and interact with the energy we’ve manipulated.  Do we create good or evil?  There is no question that what we create influences all of existence.