Silence Toasted

Greeting Brothers and Sisters, and thank you for casting your gaze upon these scribblings. I hope this moment finds you well and well-tended. Time to toast the silence again with a question for those who have pondered such things - what, exactly, is a family made of? The obvious first answer is borne of biology and then expands out to unions, but how can we move beyond these boundaries or even knock them down and allow ourselves to choose who we want to live our lives with and not be shackled by traditional definitions that often trap us in situations that we would ordinarily not willingly embrace? These questions arise due to a looming issue with a "family" member. I use quotations because by definition, this person is a part of my family but is also the type of person who I would avoid at all costs and certainly seek to shelter my children from. We are talking about a person who has spent a lifetime seeking the "easy way", and now finds herself in the position tha

"Life's the same, I'm moving in stereo, Life's the same, except for my shoes Life's the same, you're shaking like tremolo, Life's the same, It's all inside you....." Well, that really about sums it up - thanks for dropping by! But seriously, what can be said at this point? This point of "nothing is as it was (or appeared to be) and anything goes" we have arrived at seems poised to rewrite the rules of existence and the question then becomes "what'cha gonna do about it?" I can tell you what I have been doing. Absolutely nothing. The past 6 months of winter were spent emulating a large bear or possibly a hedgehog, with only short periods of activity (mostly shoveling snow endlessly) interrupting the stasis. A sort of half-aware state that offered a great deal of reflective space and an opportunity to get dragged off on some pretty interesting paths by the ceaseless actions of that old reliable friend, the Mind. I will observe