J'Espere

 Over the last few weeks, I have heard the term "misogyny" more than any other specialized word in the English language. It has been all over the news, the internet , and of course Facebook. Misogyny: the hatred or dislike of women or girls. The word has come up more and more in the last few weeks because of a terrible crime in the US, but also the world. In the last month, there has been the kidnapping of hundreds of Nigerian girls, the stoning death of a pregnant Pakistani woman fighting for her right to marry for love, and the shooting of seven people in Santa Barbara by the now known Elliot Rodgers. What did all of these have in common? Hatred of women.     I hate the word hate. It's so strong and sounds so final. But I also think it perfectly describes all three incidents. Originally I didn't think much about the connection. They were so horrific individually that it was hard to fathom that there was a connection. But there is, and since I now have a sweet, prec...

Our tree is finally up. It was a debacle of sorts that started at Thanksgiving. On the way to Thanksgiving dinner we passed one of those lots that is essentially a strand of lights surround some fir trees. "We should get a Christmas tree." I commented. "We should get one geographically close to our house." was M's response. On the way home from Thanksgiving: "You know, Christmas is coming pretty soon. We should get a tree." "We should wait not get a tree from there." - M pointing at the same tree lot. In his defense it would have meant driving most of the way home with a tree across our car. Fast forward a week and there is still no tree in sight. "We should get one this weekend. We should all go out to the Farmer's Market as a family, maybe have breakfast...and pick out a tree." That was me living in my fantasy world. Saturday we had a wedding to go to, and SL was a hot mess most of the morning and it was freezing an...