Bedlam Farm Blog Journal by Jon Katz

Cynthia Daniello, whose exploits we have been following for a few days now, is in computer Hell and needs some additional help. She got a blog up and posted, but she is having trouble calling it up and the url she has doesn’t seem to work.

If there is anyone else out there who might help her – she is 84 and this is  her first bout with setting up a blog, it is never as simple as we think it will be – please e-mail her at [email protected].

The good souls working with her are stumped, and  have asked me to see if there is any other help out there. Cynthia lives in Virginia.

She is frustrated and wanted to do this herself, I know what that’s like, I’ve been there. But sometimes you just need help.

Cynthia is working on Blogger.com, a site I’m not familiar with. If no one out there can help her tonight or tomorrow morning, I’ll locate some professional computer help in her area and work with her that way.

We might need to get somebody out there to see her, and if so, I’ll be responsible for that.

She is determined to get her blog up, it’s called The Never Ending Story. Her e-mail address is [email protected].

We’ll make this happen.

Frances Brummer, a member of the Army Of Good,  sent me this dress from Ontario, Canada, it arrived yesterday. The dress is from India, it belonged to her late sister, who never got to wear it.

She thought it might be something Ruth might want to wear for her Commitment Ceremony. It will happen, Frances, I thank you, so does Ruth.

Ruth had told me she had a Commitment Ceremony Dress (this new one  came with pants and a beautiful shawl,) but I went right over to the Mansion and she just lit up when she saw it.

Ruth always asks me four questions when I give or offer her something.

How much will it cost, and will she have to pay for it?

Can she keep it after she wears it?

Can she really keep it after the wears it?

Does she really not have to pay for it?

I think Ruth has not been given many things in her life for free, she is always incredulous when she gets  something nice for free. And she has little money to buy things.

I imagine she has no idea who I am or where I came from, but she and I have formed a strong and open bond.

This is a very special gift. “I’ve never worn a thing as  beautiful as this is,” Ruth said, disbelieving.

She immediately told Wayne to close his eyes and get out of the room – at these kinds of ceremonies, she said, the man is not supposed to see the ceremony clothes before the ceremony itself.

Ruth is very keen on ceremony, she wants this one to be special. I will try to honor that.

We are grappling a bit with the wordage of a Commitment Ceremony rather than a Wedding Ceremony, I am now the official event planner. I’m planning a 20 minute ceremony that is simple.

I’m selecting poems and readings, I’ll write an oath just for the two of them, but as I’ve explained to them, a Commitment Ceremony is not legally binding, and there is no wedding certificate, they each are free to separate at any time. There is no need for a divorce.

I’m also collecting some poems and writings about love and commitment.

My oath will go something alone these lines: “…do you promise to love and respect one another, and share your lives for as long as you can, and as long as you wish…?” As Best Man, I’m also holding the ring, since Wayne can’t hold a ring steady.

I was happy to see Ruth so excited. She said the dress was perfect for her. She wanted to show the dress to the Mansion aides and her friends. It fits her very well.

It think it is wonderful and quite beautiful that these two people are celebrating love in a place where love sometimes fades. The other residents are excited. Ruth was married for 22 years, her husband Ken died last year. Wayne has never been married.

The ceremony feels very real to me, nobody can predict the future, surely not me, but they both are very clear about it, and I am determined to prepare a simple and lovely ceremony for these two. Wayne in particular has no one in the world to worry about him or care for him.

I want him to relish this ceremony, Ruth will, I am sure. I’ve found a good florist, baker and singer. I’ve got poems and commitment quotes to give to the wedding party – staff and friends –  to read.

If you wish to contribute to this Commitment Ceremony, this celebration of love at any age, you can donate via Paypal, [email protected] and also by check, Jon Katz. Commitment Ceremony, P.O. Box 205, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816.

People are welcome to send decorations cards or congratulations or banners posters and  favors to: Commitment Ceremony, The Mansion, 11 S. Union Avenue, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816.

Bud is teaching me that ugly can be beautiful.

As many have testified, prejudice is subtle and ubiquitous. I’ve always had an image in my mind of what beauty is in a dog. Red is beautiful to me. Fate is beautiful, full of grace and style. Lenore was beautiful to me, so was Rose.

But is not a dog I ever considered beautiful, and I never considered getting one. I saw all of these Big Men In Trucks riding around with small dogs they loved dearly, and I wondered what the attraction was.

Looking at Bud’s flat face and bug-eyes and squat legs and body, I just never saw Boston Terriers as beautiful. When they run, their legs fly out in all directions, and they are as or more active as border collies.

Yet there is, I see, a beauty in Gus, and it is not about proportion, it is about character. Bud has a lot of character. He is independent, affectionate (when there is no food around), he loves everyone in his family, shows loyalty and connection. He has a fearlessness about  him that has helped him overcome brutish hardship and cruelty.

He is forgiving, he loves to play and he makes us laugh quite often. When I nap or rest, he lies or naps with me, an act of trust and intimacy for both of us. He wants to please, even though he just can’t much of the time.

He has a regal bearing, he is King Bud, the ruler of all he surveys. So he has become somewhat beautiful to me, in the way dogs have of becoming beautiful to the people they live with.

Mostly, I still think Bud is pretty ugly. Look at that squished-in face.

But he is also beautiful.

The word “courage” comes from the Latin word for heart, which is “cor.” In its earliest form, and to the Romans and Greeks, courage literally meant “to speak one’s mind by telling all one’s heart.”

Over time, and largely in the Protestant religious theology, the definition changed. Today, courage means being heroic, to have courage in the face of trouble or danger or fear.

We often associate courage with soldiers in war. Bruce Springsteen sings that the real heroes are the ordinary people who go to work every day, feed their families, and live their lives.

I have always struggled with the idea of courage, and what it means for me.

The modern definition has caused many people to lose touch with the idea that speaking openly and honestly about who we are, what we’re feeling, and about our very real  experiences is the true definition of courage.

Author  and scholar Brene Brown says that true heroics are about putting our lives, stories and vulnerability on the line and out into the world. That is perhaps the core definition of what my writing is about. I would never call myself a hero, and neither has anyone else.

I am not a hero, but I have probably suffered more from being honest than from any other source. Honesty can be the greatest relationship killer in the world. It is threatening to a lot of people.

Sometimes, courage means accepting yourself in spite of the consciousness of guilt and condemnation, wrote philosopher Paul Tillich.

“The courage to affirm oneself in spite of our anxiety (and self-doubt) is the courage which we have called the courage of confidence,” Tillich wrote. “It is rooted in the personal, total, and immediate certainty of…forgiveness.”

For me, this is an important idea. I have made so many mistakes, lost contact with so many people, been enmeshed in so much unwanted conflict, been so inept and confused about friendship, been so crippled by anger and fear, that I lost the courage to accept myself, to accept who I am. If I can’t do that, why on earth should anyone else?

The courage to be is, in my mind, the courage to accept myself as accepted, not just by a God, but by me. The spiritual challenge is to accept the unacceptable, in myself and in other people.

Faith, wrote Tillich, is the state of being grasped by the power of being.

The courage to be is an expression of faith, faith in me and my worth as a human being struggle to find meaning. I can’t say I’m there, but there is something heroic about that quest.