David,

Ron,

Just seeing David's post. Absolutely, positive agree. You're not alone. You're one of us.

Ordinarily I wouldn't post my email address, but rarely do I have a few minutes for either forum. That's not said in hubris, instead truth.

Between demanding clients and a moment of insanity last summer when, with faculty approval, I began auditing med school classes, (Covid made it easier via on-line, Im always racing for time. Never able to catch up. Making it worse these courses are grueling, each effectively kicking my well exfoliated butt.

I wish I'd gone straight from nursing school to med school, but I didn't. It wasn't until I began investigating individual/group health providers and hospitals that "interest" gradually morphed into a passion for medicine. I'm only auditing the classes. I have no illusion of a respective med school taking someone at my age and that's okay. It's knowledge I want.

My reason for detail is clarity: I want you to have my email address as it's rare-to-never that I check private message on either forum. Mostly because I forget.

Whether seasonal, chronic, exogenous or endogenous depression it's a beast. For too long marginalized. For too long dismissed. For too long, misunderstood.

Anguish, despair, like physical pain and all psychic pain, can feel overwhelming, feeling it will never end. As though there's no expiration date on the pain. But there is. There is because everything is temporary, Ron. No exceptions. You will come through this. You'll see.

I love your courage, Ron. Your honesty. Your willingness to share. Only because of people like you is there hope for everyone else.

Yes, I stay busy. Crazy busy. But not too busy for you if you'd like to chat. Be safe. Stay well. :) hollyhobby100@gmail.com

12/25/20 12:04 AM

#19723

Holly,

I know what those boots are made for besides protecting your skin.

12/25/20 12:48 AM

#19724

Steve,

Yeah. Walking all over men. You know what Joseph Conrad said, right? "Women have a terribly difficult job since it deals principally with men.

The trick, I think, is letting men think they're the one in control until it's patently clear it's gonn'a take a woman to get the job done. Merry Christmas, Stephen Keene.

12/25/20 01:30 AM

#19725

David,

OMG. So exhausted can't bear the thought of my 1,496 pre-bed beauty routine. However. Unless deathly ill, in a coma or half way there, I'll do it.

By now I should be somewhere b/t "application of the "elixir" for youthful skin" and "gentle exfoliation from head to toe" instead of scanning posts. Such lack of discipline is unlike me. But totally worth it.

Died laughing seeing pic of Mrs. Lomax's class. Martha tried to warn me but I forgot. Frightening-looking little Jewish girl standing next to her bff. Devastating too, realization Martha was not only smarter, but cuter.

Martha would never have broken her nose before first grade. Martha was too sensible. Almost forgotten how I broke my nose before first grade practicing to be a circus trapeze artist on the backyard swing set. I'm not kidding here. Suddenly it's allllll coming back to me. Desperate, fervent hope of growing up to be a trapeze artist. My life's goal!

All I needed to do was practice! Practice! Practice! Practice climing to the top of the swing set and flying through the air in reasonable proximity of the chain holding the swing. As evidenced in the photo, I missed.

Can't remember whether it was my mother or I who couldn't wait until I was 16 at which time she rounded one of Dallas' most elite surgeons pleading he return my nose to pre-trapeze days. If only she could have done something about that hair.

Thanks so much for posting, David. You and my husband are the only two people I've ever known so organized. So meticulous. So able to hold on to things the rest of us would've lost years ago.

12/25/20 01:52 AM

#19726

David,

RJ was only half asleep so I forced him to wake up and look at the pic. Together we laughed so hard. Looking a little closer RJ said, “WHAT was the matter with your hair!? Notice you’re all buttoned up barely smiling while your best bud there is grinning, decked out in a v-neck top.”

Squinting to get a closer look I replied, “yeah Martha was a real little hussy back then. She started early. Lol

12/25/20 08:27 AM

#19727

Ron Knight

Thanks Holly for the support of SAD - Seasonal Affective Disorder or "Holiday Depression"

I have your email now. I was really just reaching out for my niece Amy who has gone through a long and bitter divorce last year and just before Thanksgiving this year her ex sued her for full custody of the kids and won. I have healed in a sense with my issue, but Amy is just at the beginning of her ordeal. I had just recieved a Christmas card from my brother detailing an all too familiar scenario of custody loss and the holidays!

Ron

PS - we woke up to 3" of snow this morning here in Asheville,NC!

12/25/20 10:21 AM

#19728

Santa left something extra under the Cordell Christmas tree.

Merry Christmas! Tissue season to be jolly! Fa-la-la-la-la, la-la-la-la!

12/25/20 02:04 PM

#19729

Wayne Gary

Here is a vedio with Nancy walking

12/25/20 03:03 PM

#19730

So sorry, blanket response to text/ emails. Gotta get back to Christmas.

I could be totally wrong. easily be work of disgruntled employee. Spurned lover. Anything. My thoughts are nothing more than hunches based on experience.

That said, day/time/warnings indicate perp(s) had no intention to harm. If so, no, not dealing with classic DSW-5 sociopath or sociopath comorbid narcissism. In essense psychopathy/sociopath interchangable but some mental health care providers aren't so sure.

Either way, only a hunch perp(s) does not fall into classic DSM-5 for either. We'll see.

Merry Christmas everyone.

12/25/20 04:06 PM

#19731

Ron,

Got it. Thank you. Whether you, your niece or anyone else I think it's so cool, your courage. You're honesty. You're very core being. Continue in fearlessness to bring light, not darken the path of others. Merry Christmas, .

12/25/20 10:12 PM

#19732

OK. We sent the Christmas tree photo (in #20,281 above) to several non-RHS people, and some didn't get the key part of the photo/joke -- the toilet tissue from Santa! So, that's my (hopefully unnecessary) explanation of the punchline.

12/26/20 10:03 AM

#19733

The more Christmas candy I eat, the more I feel like watching Hallmark Christmas movies. The one I'm watching now (although really my MO is to listen while looking at my laptop screen) stars Jane Seymour. In the "Famous People I Have Met" category, I did have the opportunity to talk with her. She was a special guest at a fundraiser at Dallas's Museum of Biblical Art for the Open Hearts Foundation, which she founded. She made a very lovely speech that included the story of her mother, who was in a Japanese internment camp for three years. Anyway, we had the chance to chit-chat with her for a few minutes, and she was quite charming and unassuming. She is also an artist!

12/26/20 04:02 PM

#19734

Lance.

More details of how you got rubbed off by the Dallas mayor's wife, please. I bet that made your skyscraper go up.

Holly,

Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah to you also!

12/26/20 04:24 PM

#19735

Hull,

Congratulations! I just watched Sterling City High School defeat May High School in the 6 Man Division 1 UIL State Championship game. They won the game 67 to 22 and the game was stopped by the Mercy Rule after only three plays in the third quarter. They said this was Sterling City's first State Championship in 6 man football.

12/26/20 06:21 PM

#19736

Lance,

Yes, there was one particular famous person whose act of kindness I will always cherish. I posted this six years ago.

The photo below: Lauren Bacall with Roddy McDowall and my son Christopher, who played Tiny Tim to McDowall's Scrooge in A Christmas Carol at Madison Square Garden. Opening night. November 22, 1997. McDowall died the following October.

As you may know, Roddy McDowall was in scores of movies, perhaps most famously in Planet of the Apes, and was a famous child star in the early 1940s. He starred in How Green Was My Valley, and many others, and we felt that he was an excellent role model for Christopher. We even rented a couple of his old movies so that Christopher could see the work of a really excellent child actor.

My mother-in-law was especially excited that Christopher was going to appear in a show with Roddy. She was 90 at the time, only partially ambulatory and with failing eyesight and hearing, and we thought she would never leave the Houston area for the remainder of her life. But we talked her into making the trip because of Christopher, and perhaps because of Roddy, whom she had admired since How Green Was My Valley. She made the trip--by plane, car, train, and wheelchair.

We were able to buy Eugenia a house seat at the intersection of the side-to-side aisle and one of the center aisles. Before the half-hour call, I took Christopher into the theatre and pointed out the exact seat that she would be sitting in. I was hoping for a special favor from Roddy.

During the finale of the show, Scrooge leads a parade of cast members through the theatre, traversing the length of the side-to-side aisle, right in front of the seat we bought for Eugenia, before returning to the stage. Hoping to make her experience even more special, I urged Christopher to ask Roddy if he would wave at Eugenia, whom Roddy had not met, as he passed her seat during the finale. I knew the likelihood that it would happen was small -- Christopher could forget to ask Roddy; Christopher could forget the seat location; Roddy could decline because the parade is so closely timed; or Roddy could forget, either accidentally or on purpose.

I was sitting behind Eugenia during the show. Of course, she was thrilled to see her grandson featured in a beautiful staging of a wonderful story in a gigantic New York theatre. The evening was certain to be a success anyway. Then came the finale.

With the bright spotlight trained on him, Roddy beamed as the spiritually transformed Scrooge, leading the parade over the side-to-side aisle. Suddenly, he stopped in front of Eugenia's seat. He took her by the hand, looked in her eyes, and warmly greeted her with, "I'm so happy you came to see the show," before whisking off to hit his mark on time. Eugenia was, at first, dumbfounded, but then happy tears began flowing down her face. I knew I had experienced a simple act of kindness that I would never forget. Roddy's passing a few months after the show closed was all the more sad for us because of what he had done for Eugenia.

12/26/20 08:29 PM

#19737

Lance said, "So what did you give Christopher for Christmas."

David responds, "Clothing and a specialized machine used in tailoring."

12/26/20 08:42 PM

#19738

Seriously. Pic is not supposed to be so big! Nothing I did resized!

Inspired (or guilted) by David’s use for ancient photos, RJ dug through box after box of ours, finding this one. Taken almost 40 years ago, RJ and I were walking up the court house stairs to apply for our marriage license. Suddenly he said “stop! Turn around!" All these years I’d forgotten he’d kept it safe behind glass in a frame. (looking closer I should have removed from glass before uploading. But I’m too lazy).

I met RJ only weeks after Ted Turner dumped me for Jane Fonda. It was on a dare at a media launch for CNN that I walked over to ask Ted a question. The place was packed with media, advertising exec, network execs, management and sycophants. W-h-y I had no qualms about sashaying over to Ted Turner, then the epicenter of the world, asking the stupidest question, I don't know.

Later he said the "attraction was immediate” That is so not true. The truth is Ted was immediately attracted to my cleavage. Amazing he didn’t get whip lash when finally, he looked up at my face.

In spite of media reports Ted was caring person. Abundantly generous. Even thoughtful on occasion. When he wasn't, his yacht made up for it. Even then, there was no real investment on either our parts. Okay. Not an emotional investment. So dumping me for Jane Fonda wasn’t a tear jerker. It was however, perfect timing.

Shortly after I met RJ. In spite of stultifying arrogance and women constantly flirting with him, instinct told me he was the one. Instinct also told me I could and would bring his arrogance down to size. The women constantly chasing him…I took care of myself.

“Timing,” they say “is everything. While I’ll always treasure knowing Ted, I chill thinking how, had timing been off, I'd likely have missed meeting and marrying the love of my life, RJ. Chilling too is realizing how quickly time flies. How, the older we get, we can only hope of a forever with those we love, knowing of course, there is no forever. At least not this side of eternity. So. We cherish every second, every minute we can with them.

12/27/20 12:15 AM

#19739

Holly,

Damn you were a hottie back then! Not that you still aren't, but you would have been enough to make me abandon Rush and join CNN myself. I wish you could have gotten away from Ted with at least an eighth of Montana and New Mexico. I think he owns a quarter of each.and some of Wyoming and Texas too.

12/27/20 11:20 AM

#19740

Lowell Tuttle

Posting to word first so if this gets too long, it does not delete or go away before I hit submit.

Reading and thinking of those times just after we finished high school and in the 4-5 years after while away for the first time how we came back to parents’ in Richardson and then rolled away from their homes to make contact with our group of friends…for me, many of whom are still in contact and close to me.

A phone call last night from Rusty Shields. His next door neighbor and best friend Mike West is not doing too well. He expressed thanks to me for urging them both to get to the reunion.

Mike was reluctant to go because he had just had quite a few scars on his face and ears from skin surgery.

He’s suffering from Parkinson’s, skin cancers, and psoriasis but also because of the severe medications they have had him on in treating of these conditions.

Rusty and Mike have condo’s near Greenville and Park Lane. Just down the street from (if you’ll remember) the apartments centered around the Ebola infection. I have stayed in touch from here in Houston by phone calls. Try to get them to upgrade to contact technology, but it has been fruitless.

I guess I first got to know Mike in 7^th grade. His Dover Elementary boys (that didn’t go to West Jr. Hi) used to hang out in the area between C and B wing at the lunch room exit. I think it was watching them eat cinnamon rolls in one swallow and then throw pennies against the C wing cement blocks and then scramble for them, that got me to notice him (them.) Hank Dubey was the ring leader. Sometimes a dime and sometimes a quarter. And sometimes they would throw a quarter into the screened drain and whoever went down there would get trapped by the crowd, unable to escape until the bells rung for post lunch period.

When the Burning Bush opened, West, Rusty, Dennis Matthews, Pam Russell (Taylor) and others (younger females) would hang out together and somehow I became the designated driver because I had a more restrained common sense.

Typing class races with Mike and Sam Duncan.

Lighting up together. Canoe camping trips. Concerts. Living in a big old rent house in Oak Lawn and then again off Forest and Stults Lane in the 70’s before Houston.

Hanging out at the Ale House and Richmond Arms here in Houston in the 80’s and 90’s.

Part of the NFL six (a precurser to fantasy football) 80’s and 90’s.

He married loved and suffered with one of my best friends from Dallas, Joann Fletcher (West)

Mike ran cross country….that in itself should be a story one of them could relate. Coach Harris, (the mole) Chuck Korvelas, Lee Clepper, Johnny Powell, Sam Duncan, Jim Lintner…et all.

Off to UT campus vist with Mike, but he and Dennis decided to go to UH. Freshman year my trips to Houston and then onto Freeport (Surfside) monthly.

Mike gets married. I move back to Dallas (72) He moves with wife back to Dallas. Fire and safety business (OSHA) mandated, oil and gas industry too inconsistent for ancillary businesses, so he goes into insurance business a couple of years after we both move to Houston in 78.

All of my employees over the years gain so much knowledge in this business, they get too high priced for my little agency, so Mike moves back from Houston to Dallas and works my Dallas office, but gets too good for that one and moves onto State Farm becoming a trouble shooter of sorts for their marginal agents who can’t cope with the public problems of being an agent.

Anyway, it’s tough right now (Covid) to get all these complications fixed. He has a couple of friends who help out. I think the issue is mostly delusions at this point. Think it’s the medication.

So, think of him if you can. Things could get better, I hope. But we are all getting old. I am calling him today during the Cowboys game. He should be available.

12/27/20 07:43 PM

#19741

Lowell Tuttle

Well, he signed the stimulus package. What a great leader.

12/28/20 12:55 PM

#19742

Kurt Fischer

It's all because Pelosi allowed the bill to finally be approved now that Trump lost the election.

What a great leader.

12/28/20 01:12 PM

#19743

Janalu Jeanes (Parchman)

Good one, Kurt!

12/28/20 04:26 PM

#19744

Kurt Fischer

Lowell and Lance:

I fully agree with Lance that my comment to Lowell was not uplifting and was on the rude side. I apologize.

I am getting to the state where I feel like "A pox on both their houses".

Both parties recognized the need for additional assistance was extremely important. But the Republicans wanted a more limited bill. For months the Democrats declared a 3T bill was necessary, but somehow agreed after the election that a 900B bill would be okay. And then President Trump decided to pop up with a new request (The art of the deal...) at the last moment. Everyone playing politics while the nation tumbled downwards. Everyone is deserving of getting bad marks on this one.

12/28/20 05:40 PM

#19745