Long Time

I just realized I hadn't posted in almost a month. Things have been going a little insane here. We're back in the full swing of school. In the time I have had off from blogging I finished my winter quarter which included a senior thesis in a subject which is not my major (political science) and I was not a senior. So, it was a little tough. It was a 15 page paper on the Nigerian civil war (Biafran war). I ended up with an A- so I guess I did alright. I had a week off where the hubby and I decided to sell our house and move back to the city. Actually there's a story behind this decision. He had applied for a job that would have moved us from Illinois to Sacramento (two hours from where I grew up). I was really excited at the prospect of living near my family and friends. Unfortunately, it didn't work out. But, it did get us to thinking about our present living situation.

We love our house but not so much in love with where we live. On a good day it takes me about an hour and fifteen minutes to get to school. I've been driving into Chicago (and Evanston) for the last 7 months or so which has been long and arduous. Once Frank knew he didn't get the job we had already evaluated the possibility of selling and moving. One thing we both agreed on is that we love Chicago. It would put us near school so the commute would be about 30 minutes from school. The neighborhood we lived in before, Lincoln Park, is near the lake, zoo, and tons of parks. There are families all over the place and it's relatively safe. So, we've been cleaning, painting, and getting rid of the "extra" stuff that has accumulated during the last four years at our current residence.

This quarter is Frank's final quarter in his masters program (he's at Northwestern also). I'm taking 3 classes- (Philosophy) classics of ethical theory, (Philosophy) business ethics, and (Political Science) International Organizations. So far they seem to be interesting and I am looking forward to a lot of reading and interesting discussions. Promise to be more diligent on my posting and hopefully it will be interesting to people other than my husband :)

So I was reading an article on Huffington post the other day about the decline in number (or percentages I can't remember which) of married couples with children. Some people commented about how it now takes 2 working parents to raise 2 children when 50 years ago a single worker (Dad) could support 5 children. What they were driving at is the decline in real wages from then to now. Boy, they couldn't be more wrong and here's why:

I have had many conversations with my grandmother and mother about what life was like when my mom was young. Firstly, both of my grandmothers worked (my maternal grandmother was a nurse and my paternal grandmother was a school teacher). When my mom was growing up they lived in a modest house that was pretty much middle class. They lived in Indiana and my like I said my grandma was a nurse and grandpa was a Cop. They weren't rich by any standards. My mom had an older sister and a younger brother (and much later a fourth child but the age difference between my mom and her youngest brother is 16 years). So for most of her youth, there were 3 kids in the family.

The lifestyle they lived was pretty simple. They cooked dinner and ate together every night. Only on very special occasions did they eat out. My mom made her own clothes and apparently my grandmother would give each garment a serious inspection. If a seam was wavy or wrong my mom had to rip it out and fix it. This insured that my mom was making clothing that would last and no fabric was going to waste. They grew their own vegetables in their garden which cut down on a grocery bill. They cleaned their own house of which my grandma Reva would have a weekly white glove inspection. They did their own yard work- they never hired anybody to do something they could do themselves.

They didn't have a lot of frills. Only one television (OK it was the 1960's) and one phone. They only had an antenna so I don't think they had a cable bill either. No cell phones, no ipods, no computers. Everybody in the house didn't have their own personal electronics. They didn't buy new books, they went to the library and checked books out. Because they lived in the country they had two cars but it wasn't uncommon at that time period for families to only have one car. They attended public school and rode the dreaded and very uncool school bus. My grandparents didn't buy them a car on their 16th birthday. And frankly, they didn't send them to college after they graduated from high school either.

When I hear people complain that it's too hard to raise children on one paycheck I think about these things. One lady I know in particular was whining about these things a while back. Both her daughters had cell phones. They had a brand new car sitting in the parking lot even though they lived in town and really only needed one car. 3 televisions. College funds. A brand new kitchen. Their daughters wore nice brand name clothes. For somebody who's crying poor mouth, they were hemorrhaging cash. Oh, and don't even get me started on grocery shopping. Buying boxed prepackaged meals is almost as bad as eating out. It certainly costs more and than cooking from scratch and they put nasty preservatives in boxed food. (I laugh at myself when I'm "making" dinner and all it entails is opening a box of something and putting it in a pan and heating it up. Like that's cooking.)

What's the moral of this story? I think we can look to the 1950's and 60's as simpler times because they were. People saved their money. Today we spend on some foolish things (I am totally included in that statement). We have gotten so used to paying for convenience that it seems normal to us. I don't think all this "convenience" has made us any happier, either. While I occasionally get caught up in the convenience life I am trying to open my eyes to the things that are a waste of money and cut that stuff out. Every time period has it's down side and the 50's and 60's certainly are no exception. But, I think we could all use a little lesson in simplicity.

My Puss Won the FIFA World Cup

I almost died laughing when I saw this.

10 questions that every intelligent Christian must answer

This answers some questions about my views toward and my journey away from religion. *Note* This is kinda harsh so people who are sensitive probably shouldn't watch.

Going Good

Things are good but busy here. My Political Science class is turning out to be pretty good. The course title is religious and ethnic divides in the modern state. 75% of my grade will be based on a research paper about a case study (that we aren't going over in class). I have chosen to do mine on the Nigerian civil war, of which I know almost nothing about. It's a 15 page assignment and it's due mid-March. I haven't found too many books on my subject but I have found a ton of journals. One of the best things about being at NU is the access to the library resources. I can log in from home and have access to tons of articles. I have recently found out that NU has the largest library on African studies in the country. Apparently, people from all over the world come to the University to use our library. Also, my professor and the grader have extensive knowledge of African history so there's really no pressure for me to do a good job- and no excuses. With that in mind I have been hitting the books pretty hard.

After watching the movie on Sierra Leone I came to a realization, philosophy was a good fit for me. The other option I had considered was Political Science and I realized this: sitting around thinking about the existence of God sure as hell beats worrying about real things like genocide. Besides, weather or not God exists really wouldn't have much of an impact on my life. If God suddenly existed I would still be the same person I am now. I'm an Atheist who believes in honesty, helping people, compassion, being sincere (I know, I'm a regular freaking Mother Theresa over here). I think if I tried to make a career of figuring out why people hurt each other I would probably go crazy.

Well that's all my pearls of wisdom for now! TTYL

O' Crappy Day

Can I just unload for a bit? Thanks!
Well, it's Saturday and I celebrated by getting up at 6:30 AM so I could drive to the city! Actually I woke up early and lay in bed until I had to get up and tried to sneak out of bed because Ethan the Interloper was there and I didn't want to wake him. I got in the shower and not only did Ethan come following me but Alex had woke up and came in too. Without too much detail, they are a pain to take a shower with because they hog the hot water.

I got to school for my 9 AM class and the morning was fine. Except, I had forgot to put deodorant on and I started to get a little stinky about half way through. Unfortunately for me (and everyone else) I didn't have an extra shirt to put on :( My crazy Russian teacher droned on and on about the French Revolution for an hour and a half and then made us watch some GHEY movie with Gerard Depardieu.

My break wasn't bad. Northwestern Hospital has a pretty good cafeteria even if most of it is shut down on the weekends. They still had their salad bar open and some hot food available (they normally have a great variety of food and it is not only good, but has all the nutritional information listed, too). After I ate I ran into my afternoon professor who is really cool, he eats at the cafeteria too. We sat and chatted for a bit and then headed off to class.

*This Part Gets Really Bad*
My afternoon class is about racial and ethnic divides in the modern state (think Rwanda, Darfur, Iraq) and today we saw a movie about the civil war in Sierra Leone called Cry Freetown. The documentary maker was a native of Sierra Leone and was the only journalist left in the country when the war broke out. He made this movie from the parts that "were not fit for TV." There was this part where the Nigerian "peace keepers" were being fired upon by a sniper in a four or five story building. When they were able to storm the building they found a young child (about 10) and a man. The boy was beat up and stripped naked and with his arms tied behind his back(they thought he was the sniper because children were also forced to fight in this war). The man was beaten and shot. Luckily, there was some official there and he stopped the boy from being executed. Samura, the film maker, found the boy a year later to see what had happened to him. He found him in a rehabilitation center for boys who had been forced to serve as soldiers. It turned out that the boy was mentally retarded and had lived at the same center (it had served as an orphanage before the war). He had the mentality of a four year old and was unable to speak-let alone fire a gun. I was crying in class. I couldn't help it. Hearing this kid scream as he was being beat up by twenty-year-old men just killed me. He sounded just like my son and seeing them kick his little body with their combat boots and punch him just made me so upset. I bawled on the way home several times, I just kept thinking of Alex. I still can't get that boys face out of my head.

When I got home I held Alex (for as long as he would let me) and have been having sporadic crying fits. PMS and this movie DO NOT mix!!! I've had two glasses of wine and I think tonight I might down the whole bottle. Tomorrow has to be better.

Updated Links and Stuff

Wow, the new year is almost here. We barely made it through the holidays in one piece, whew! Franklin just informed me that Hussein was hanged. I'm not sure how I feel about it but I am glad it's over.

I had to update my links list as it seems so many of my friends have run out and gotten new blogs. Sorry guys, shiny new blogs taken *smirk* I want a new blog too but mine still has that new blog smell so I think I'll hold on to it for a while. Enough with the sarcasm, I know how liberating it can be to start over. It feels like you give yourself the space to go in a new direction with your thoughts. When I was in my early twenties I went through some hard times. I used to keep a journal and write in it almost every day. At that point, I had a few of them filled up and frankly they were pretty depressing. I decided I couldn't get out of my funk until I did something drastic so I went to my back yard and threw them in the bar-b-que. Lighting them on fire and watching years of writing going up in flames was on of the most liberating moments of my life. I felt like I had turned a corner and had (somewhat) of a clean slate to restart with. I have never regretted doing that.

Looks like my break is coming to a close. School starts next week and I think it's going to be pretty hectic until the end of May/early June. I am taking a lighter load this quarter so it won't be quite as bad as last quarter. I am also thinking of getting a part time job for some extra spending cash. To be quite honest, I don't get much done in the mornings and I end up chasing the kids around and getting mad. Ethan is coming up on 3 (in April) and he is in desperate need of preschool. I think getting him (and me) out of the house a few mornings a week would only do us some good. It's just a though and I have no idea what kind of job I would get. The thought of slinging coffee at 5 am kind of scares me, even though I've done it before. I don't know, it's just a thought at this point.

Anyway, I have been doing quite a bit of myspaceing lately so you can check me out there, too. Take care all! Happy New Year!