mermaidcamp
Keeping current in wellness, in and out of the water
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Race Riots
March 11, 2013
Tulsa race riot 1921
Race riot Tulsa 1921
My father, Richard Arden Morse, was a bit of a racist, but did not have any idea of his own pedigree. His great-grandfather came to New York from Ireland during the potato famine with his O’Byrne parents and siblings, who dropped the O’ to assimilate. When asked, my father would say he was Scots Irish. This American term refers to the Ulster Scots, who have all those Orange issues in Northern Ireland. A little flash of orange ribbon drives these people, and their neighbors, completely batty. You would need to be born in Ulster to understand this, I think. The troubles are a completely local phenomena, although both sides have supporters elsewhere.
Richard Arden was born in Independence, Kansas on Feb 18, 1920. In December of 1920 armed violence broke out between white and black citizens of that town. It was a very small town, and this had to be a big impact on the area. In 1921 the city of Tulsa, where I was born, was host to one of the most violent of race wars of all time. The Tulsa racial violence of 2 June, 1921 was distinctly ignored by Oklahoma official history until very recently. I only lived in Tulsa for about 4 years, and my dad also left Independence with his family to live near Ponca City, Oklahoma during his school years.
He was for sure Irish, and when Mr. Scott married Ms Byrne, he was trending Scot again. However, I do not think he knew what any of this meant. I believe that my father’s racial prejudice was a karmic and cultural affliction. He did not openly dislike anyone because of race, but his actions betrayed his deeper ethics. To his credit, he and my mom made an effort not to pass the racist culture on to my brother and me.
Bridget OByrne (1808 – 1880)
is my 3rd great grandmother
James Oscar Byrne (1840 – 1879)
son of Bridget OByrne
Sarah Helena Byrne (1878 – 1962)
daughter of James Oscar Byrne
Olga Fern Scott (1897 – 1968)
daughter of Sarah Helena Byrne
Richard Arden Morse (1920 – 2004)
son of Olga Fern Scott
Pamela Morse
I am the daughter of Richard Arden Morse
Bridget O’Byrne was typical, but lucky. She survived the passage to New York, and most of her kids did also. She had a home in upstate New York. Sarah Helena, her daughter in law, wrote the notes I used to start my tree. The O’Byrnes of Wilna, Jefferson, NY gave their estate to a Catholic church there, and left the records of their family history with that church. A treasure hunt awaits me in upstate New York that may reveal all the Irish information I can handle, including Bridget’s family name. The Catholics of Wilna have my bingo card, and I am grateful.
Divine Family of Archtetypes
March 9, 2013
— 1 Comment
What is your relationship to God? Your archetypes will define and expose your spirit. While we may all want to be a visionary or some very special rare spiritually gifted being, our story may be stronger than our experience. If you know the spiritual archetype, you will also have some experience with the shadow of it. Spirit does not bring along only happy good time feelings. It brings lessons required for our own wisdom and advancement. If you really are a martyr you have used your own suffering to manipulate others. The depth of the reality depends on how truthful and open you are. None of us worships like our parents before us…well, very few. Do you give your spirit a rich practice or a platitude?
Fracking Pennsylvania
March 9, 2013
— 6 Comments
PA and Penn State Teach Fracking
In 1947 you could obtain from the Pennsylvania Mineral Industries Experiment Station a paper written by my father. It cost 25 cents to learn the science behind water flooding from The School of Mineral Industries. He and his friend, Pete Terwillager, a co-author of this paper, would go on to work together to frack many a well.
Science Behind Fracking
This was the work my father did to earn his masters degree before I was born. Water flooding is the subject of this research. When he graduated with his masters he went to work in Tulsa for Stanolind, and so did Pete Terwillager. He obtained a patent for fracking together with Stanolind. Now they were done with water injection as the displacement method, and had moved on to an oil like substance.
Fracking explained
My father grew up on the Cherokee Strip seeing all kinds of explosions done to procure petroleum. His father, Ernest Morse, drilled for oil with a crew before the invention of the rotary bit, so they were desperate. The fact that he eventually became the first man to make a numerical model of an oil field on a computer made him brilliant. It did not change his relationship with the resources of the earth. The wild-wild west, boomer sooner attitude is the reason they both lost and won. These barons of resources saw themselves as saviors of society. It was years after my father’s death in 2004 that fracking became a subject the public discussed. It came up as if the practice had recently been invented and applied. Not hardly.
Be Adventurous, Creative, and Open Minded
March 8, 2013
— 2 Comments
The Zappos fourth core value is about creativity and adventure. This aspect of life is my driving force. I enjoy being creative in everything I do. I have had great work environments with all my marketing partners. I was an outside sales travel agent , an independent contractor teaching at fabulous spas, and sometimes I would combine the two. I was a potter before that who had marketing partners in galleries. I supplied the creativity, sometimes the product, and they provide the infrastructure, like accounting. I embrace failure by being very productive..moving beyond errors by making lots of them. This core value at Zappos is an acceptance of failure as part of success. Without courage to fail you also lack courage to change anything.
I want Zappos to be my next marketing partner because I believe it can work very well for both of us. I think the product Floatli will be popular if marketed well, and that the sport, Floatli, can be a thinking, training, cooperation activity at Zappos. It can be totally non competitive, or mimic another game like volleyball wearing the equipment. By reversing gravity, the participant usually regresses and feels like laughing. If you loose control you just float to the top of the water, so injury is extremely unlikely while practicing Floatli in a pool, river, or lake. It can also feel good to move underwater with support when injury makes walking or running impossible. Prehabilitation is a great use of the Floatli system. With good range of motion and enhanced flexibility from movement n water, you are a lot less likely to hurt yourself at an active sport like skiing.
I am not looking for a job at Zappos, but a partnership, to sell the most innovative system for staying fit and flexible in the water. I will fly to Vegas, Tony, and give you a demo any time you feel adventurous and open minded enough to give me an opportunity to show you how it works. I believe we have very similar core values. I always love your products, and on my visit I loved the atmosphere at the office in Henderson. I admire the way you handle business and the happiness of all involved. I believe I can make a positive contribution to that mission, and add even more creativity to their already very zesty mix.
Health of our Wealth
March 7, 2013
— 8 Comments
If you ask a group of Americans to raise their hands if they consider themselves to be middle class, almost all of them will raise them. The economic sophistication of our citizens is not adequate to survive. Lingering debt, choking all hopes of prosperity, is a driving force in most households in the United States, and yet concern is focused on government debt and misconduct. There are some fundamentals that are not at all understood, such as how money works and where it goes. If we were better educated I wonder if we would have a different outcome. The rose colored glasses are much rosier than we previously believed.
Retired Cowgirl, Sandra Day O’Connor on iCivics
March 7, 2013
— 2 Comments
My hero was interviewed by PBS’s Charlie Rose tonight. Sandra Day O’Connor was feisty, and classy and well spoken. Yesterday she was on NPR radio, making the publicity rounds. She is promoting her new book, Out of Order and her project, iCivics. She points out that we have public education to teach the students to be good citizens, but there is no longer civics instruction in public school. Her humility is as impressive as her continued public service. She does refer to herself as a retired cowgirl, which is typical of her style. Her mission to keep the government of the people, for the people, and by the people from perishing from this earth is a Supreme gift to the American people of the future.
Rebel Archetype
March 2, 2013
— 2 Comments
If I am classified by others I imagine the rebel archetype is used liberally. I have both cast myself in this role, and have been asked to play it. Rebels are catalysts for change. They reject conformity. Steve Jobs made the misfits trendy and to disrupt is now an honored business method. Disobedience or disrespect of authority is not as evil as we are taught by those same authorities. Revolutions are brought about in all corners of the earth by people who are willing to risk and step outside the norm.
Many revolutions in history have been brutal and angry, while some of the grandest have been almost sneaky. The digital revolution has a cutting edge that must be driven by rebels because it takes that spirit to continually disrupt and change the current methods. We may soon have Google glasses and internet TV at home because of the rebellious among us. I have to tend my own rebel, who does not do homework, who procrastinates, and who takes shortcuts. She is not terribly evil, but she does give my teacher archetype a whole lot of flack. If I have an internal war, it is between this teacher and this rebel. They are both persuasive and have great achievements to show for their particular philosophy. Both study and patience and completely out of the ordinary gambles have worked out for me. I need to honor them both because they are sticking with me for the rest of the flight, it seems. The rebel must be unleashed with care and proper consideration for best effect.
Congress Hoist with Own Petard
March 1, 2013
— 1 Comment
If only the congressional lemmings were left to their own devices I believe we could be rid of them. Their herd has lost all healthy instincts, all survival skills. If we did not support them they would not survive on their own. They appear to be determined to do anything to blame somebody else for reality. They have all this lobby/campaign money and ethic that leads them directly away from the people’s work. They are transparent as they fatten up every piece of greasy legislation with porky-hambone-chops. The have no shame about their intentions, which are to be sent back to live the life in the nation’s capitol at our expense. They have gone on a long weekend break, having been exhausted by non stop refusal to cooperate. Why are we overpaying toddlers to fight with each other? Why are these reckless petardiers still loose on the town with our money?
Hoist with their own petard, they run home to whine to voters about the contents of this mess. Is there anyone who does not wish the Congress would just stop bickering and start working? The whole thing looks like a cartoon each night on the news. In dreams the Roadrunner deals with their crazed, inflated-ego selves, as he does with the delusional Wylie Coyote.
I Once Was Lost, But Now Am Found
February 28, 2013
— 1 Comment
Handicrafts Club
I have been found by a group of people I would never have guessed were looking for me. My classmates from elementary and junior high have tracked me down to invite me to the reunion of the graduation I would have had with them had I not moved. I am blown away in many ways. First, I always admire good detective work. Second, I am touched and pleased and thrilled to be remembered for so long. Third, in am in flashback mode, laughing hysterically. Stories and pictures have been produced that take me back to Oakmont, PA in the 1950’s and early 1960’s. These were very fun, if somewhat unfashionable, times. In the above picture I am in the front row with jazz hands crossed on lap at the left end. Nobody remembers what kind of handicrafts we made. Another sexist ploy like home ec, where I received the one and only D of my academic career for stabbing the seam ripper through the pocket of my apron sewing project. Mrs. Gallashun, you can shove your apron….because I still have it for some perverse reason.
Jr high cheerleaders
In the photo above I am seated in my Oaks sweater, which was green and white. I am third from the left, leaning conspicuously to the left in some body language clue about my feelings about my fellow cheerleaders. This one is very funny to me because it brings on total recall of the games and the cheers and getting my collar bone broken playing tackle football with the high school boys when my parents were out of town. In fact it brings back floods of nostalgia and appreciation for the really excellent place we had to live as kids. We had Roberto Clemente, and life was very easy.
These are the people with whom I built snow forts, went sledding, ice skated, sang, baton twirled, and played dodge ball. These are the people who taught me to speak with a very heavy accent I no longer have, but do enjoy hearing. I am into the Amish Mafia on TV because I like to hear them talk. I can’t believe they have changed so much, but still sound the same. The Oakmonters are having a party which includes a tour of the high school, which happens to be the same building where I went to elementary school, two blocks from my house. I think I have to go. I think the past is calling loudly, and I have to answer. It is just too funny.
Civilized Dining Near Death
February 27, 2013
seasonal food
“The preparation of good food is merely another expression of art, one of the joys of civilized living…” Dione Lucas
Survival depends on finding a source of nutrition. Today there is a trend to look to restaurants for food service. In the distant past the household was challenged to grow, kill, store, and otherwise provide the food for a family. Now by driving through, it is possible to leave the drudgery of dietary delicacy decision making to the folks at Dairy Queen. Restaurants now exist in giant chains with processed ingredients provided by the central supplier. This has given rise to a slew of cooking shows and networks, and celebrities. These celebrities enjoy food and know how to prepare it. That is why they are out of the ordinary in 2013. They remember, or have been trained, to eat and enjoy a variety of seasonal foods. They may have even visited a farm. No wonder we regard them as very special beings.
The McRib is not a seasonal food, although Americans believe it is. The pumpkin spice latte is not either. Pumpkins themselves are seasonal, growing outside in fields and needing to be picked at a certain time. Latte flavoring is forever. It is possible it will remain in your organs forever also. How is it possible that America is so far removed from grow it, kill it, eat it, that they have no idea where their food has been, or by whom it has been handled? I am not a stuffy or a picky eater, which might be challenged, since I am a vegetarian. What I want when I pay another entity to feed me is attention to detail, each and every detail. I want to feel the careful work that has been done to please my palette every time I put a bite into my mouth. When I cook that is what I hope to achieve. Of course, I do not always succeed, but there is never a doubt that I have made the effort. I would rather fail royally in my own kitchen than to be fed by the careless.
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