Hip Replacement

It has been almost a year since I left Oakland, California, in a wheelchair. Before I left, I had been misdiagnosed by three orthopedic doctors. Not one of them could find what was wrong with me, except that I couldn't walk anymore. A little thing like that didn't bother any of the doctors. They gave me a handful of awful bitter pills, which made me dizzy and upset my digestion.This was all the help they offered. The pills were supposed to take my pain away, but they didn't. I was crying from pain and sometimes my teeth chattered like in an electric shock.

What upset me most was how come the daughter of an orthopedic surgeon couldn't find competent doctors to diagnose me in the old USA. I started praying to my dead step-father who spent more time with me than my biological one.

Dear Doki! Please help me get medical help. Please lead me to the solution.

As I cried and cried, a little voice started up in my heart. It said "No problem. Just come home to Budapest to my Clinic, We fix these things there all the time."

Doki's recognition filled me with peace.

Doki's recognition filled me with peace. This was Doki’s advice. He was watching. Doki was not my real father, not the biological one. However, I knew him since i was four years old, and when my mother married him i was eleven years old and lived with them six years. This was longer than i lived with my real father, which was just two years plus time in the diffrent boarding schools where my parents put me when I was four years old.

Doki apeared to me as a stable kind of man. He was a respected doctor and a devoted one who put kids back on their feet.

He used to argue with me about Communism. I was only nine years old but I could talk and I was already well read. Now that I think about it, he was the only person who said he was an actual Communist. He actually believed the concept of Communism. He overlooked the fact that it was what had impoverished us all and made all of us proletariat. Some equality! He thought Communism was worthy of trying out, of giving it a shot. I was deeply against it, but not in principle -- only the practice. He sang with me Sundays when he was home waiting for dinner. He gave me books to read that he still had from his sisters. I got a lot of self-respect from the way he treated me. I also got into reading books for pleasure. He gave me his sisters' youth books about adventurous girls and different types of tomboys and rebels. A good read at eight years old. This of course whetted my mind for more and I have never stopped reading. This was his most precious gift to me, the books.

But back to my hip.... Once my head cleared, and I accepted that the USA will not help me get better, I bought my airline tickets to Hungary. A word about insurance here. I used to have Kaiser Health Insurance, but their doctor too spent only two minutes with me and just asked: "Is anything broken?" I said, "No, it's my back. It's my hips." The Kaiser orthopedic doctor didnt even lay hands on me. I had waited three months for this appointment. "Nothing broken? Oh, that's all we do here," he said.

This was five years ago, and this was the point when I decided not to pay Kaiser a penny more and they dropped me, So I had no insurance. MediCal normally gives help when you have no money and a big health problem, but not me. After they counted up my monies somehow I was just a little bit over the 2,000 dollar limit, so MediCal was out, I was too young for Medicare. Three years too young. I couldn't wait that long to get fixed. My life had collapsed already.

I fought my way across the Atlantic, across the airports, I changed planes at Heathrow, a horrible experience because the airport had no more wheelchairs available. Malév, the Hungarian Airlines, was very far from British Airlines. A nightmare of bus rides, and the pain was so bad in my hips i had to stop to sob. Sobbing helped a little. An Englishman saw me crying and promised to come back for me, which he did. Finally I was seated -- in the last row of the airplane .Emigrants say "I am leaving home and going home." Two countries in my life, bilingual culture in my blood, I have an accent in both languages.

Hungarian was being spoken all around me, The airbus glided into the airport at the Feriegy (Feri Mountian), which is not really a mountain, nor is there anybody famous named Feri.

My cousin Andris found me first, He embarced me and i felt good in his strong arms. Then my brother came, too, He was a little shocked seeing me in the wheelchair.The important thing was I Was Home! Now, I thought, I will get help.

It wasnt only my hip that was hurting. My mother's sister, Aunt Titi, was dying in the hospital. She was hanging in there until I would show up to bury her. Before I could focus on me I had to go and see her in the hospital.

I have never seen anybody wasting away to the last breath before. Titi, 88 years old, was once a spectacular beauty, and proud of it, and now she was in diapers, thin, with veins so visible on her hands I could count them. Titi, the baker of pastry and maker of great soups, now refused to eat. She was dehydrated, weak, and couldn't hold her head up on the pillow. I was sitting there holding her hands and singing to her. I loved my Titi. It was a sad goodbye, but she refused to live any longer. "I'm 88," she said, "Nobody lived this long in our family." She was almost ashamed about her longevity.

Titi died at midnight, six days after I arrived. She slipped away. I never saw her again. If you die in the hospital in Hungray, the body is taken down into the basement and kept cold, then cremated. I saw only a box of ashes at her funeral. Who knows whose ashes they were, but ashes cannot be so different from one body to the next.

Titi wanted a mass and a Catholic funeral in a place she had already picked out. She had all her hole in the wall, all paid for.

The only man of cloth I found who did burials wasn't even a priest. He said the wrong name for Titi, her ex-husband's name. He had died long ago. But she wanted this, and she got this. I understood why she chose this Urn Plebania, because here there were funerals and masses said daily, all day long.The air was filled with the scent of fresh flowers left at the urns by relatives. She had company. This was a long lasting pain in her life, loneliness. She wanted to die because of it as well. She was too much alone. She suffered. I come from a long line of lonely people. I have this pain myself as well. It doesn't matter that I was once married and had two kids, Now in my old age I am alone. Titi was married twice, no kids, Also alone .Motherhood is no guarantee to have company in the later years. Unless you have daughters. More likely, but I am not sure.

My bother took me to a doctor for MRIs of my hips and it was immediately clear to the first Hungarian doctor who saw me that my hips needed to be replaced. "Prosthesis," they said, "and fast."

A new feature enetered the picture. My brother started bahaving like a stranger to me. For example, he didn't choose to sit next to me, He wandered about while waiting for the doctors, He struck up conversations and entertained himself with strangers. I saw a very different kind of man. He was jovial. He was kind, polite. He joshed with this old man or that old lady, but he would not talk to me or even share a seat next to me.

Finally i said to him, "Brother, is anything wrong? You have not one kind word to me, yet you bounce around like a puppy with strangers." Finally, still fresh from California, I pressed him into confrontation. "What is it? What's going on?" His face changed. For the first time an auhthentic self became visible. He hated me.

"You are the most selfish person i have ever met," he said. "You only think for yourself."

This was a stunner. Here I was totally maimed, barely able to walk, facing a heavy opeartion -- two of them. My aiplane tickets were for two months only and now it looked like I was staying for a year. Plus, my brother knew nothing about my life nor what was in my head. Nothing about my years of voluteering for women’s causes, years of free work (make it thirty years), staffing womens centers, organizing festivals and confereneces. All for free. I certainly wasn't selfish. But this is how he saw me. I felt so bad I could not even defend myself. All I said was "You are so wrong."

I had to let it go, but it hurt my heart. It hit me like the proverbial ton of bricks, This kid was only four years old when I left the country, thirteen years younger than I. We were not raised together. Now in later years our age difference is not that big, and he is judging me. I was in too much shock to put up a decent fight. It has become like a post-fight running in my mind, where I continue arguing with him about this selfishness issue. But the truth was, he didn't love me at all. He resented me for coming home for help when my new country let me down. He has forgotten that I have the right to come home to the old coutnry, I didnt stop being Hungarian and loving my homeland just because I had to leave in 1956 to save my life. Now it was his country alone. Mine was the USA. He felt I was intruding.

Yes, he is helping me get to the hospital like a good boy, He has a car and knows everybody. But he continued to seat himself seperately from me and to pretend not to know me. But he was there. We went to his biological father's Clinic and there I was examined by Professor Szendroi who scheduled an operation of my left hip for the end of Novemeber.

Imre, my brother, found me a place in a Home for the Elderly. This was a strange gift, back into institutions again, Always my fate in the old country. I have been put into nunneries, put out to live with peasants, and sent to boarding schools. And now, the Home for the Elderly. I was by far the youngest there. They scared me. This place was in his pocket. He was the head of the Second Kerulet that dealt with institutions like this and he knew the owner. He arrived at a good deal for me, 60K a month in forints. 215 forints make a dollar. Cheap. This place was filled with very old ladies and a few gents and had nurses around the clock, They cooked for and fed the oldsters three times a day. Washed clothes, cleaned the rooms. A good deal. I had a place to rest.

Brother dutifully took me to the hospital on the appointed day, and left me there. I got into room 116, a room with eight women. First floor.

Our day started with a nurse taking temperatures, asking about our night's sleep. Then a doctor showed up and tended to the complaints. Then around 11am the entire floor's doctors, about five of them, came for a visit. The visit was when everything was communicated to all doctors and the decisions were made about the operations and the order in which they would be done.

I was taken the next day which was great because this meant I had to spend fewer days with nothing to do here. If you are not working on getting better it's pretty boring in the hospital.

When i was dressed in my green gown, head covered, and wheeled towards the operating room I realized how close my father Doki was to me. I felt his soothing care, as if he wheeled me himself. I prayed to him to make sure the operation was successful. Doki and I knew each other since I was 4 years old, way before he married my mom and way before my brother was born. Doki and I had an exclusive relationship in his youth. He corrected my shoes when I was a teenager, and now he was there in the operating room with me.

In my veins drips were placed, antibiotics and sleeping potions to make me doze off. A light sleep, Nothing like a major anesthetic. An epidermic in the base of my spine and I felt no pain at last.

I dreamt i was in a smithery. Sparks were flying, Machines were going, Totally like a workshop. When they pulled aside the green curtain, I saw Dr Kiss (the name means little, not kiss). He was checking me and then declared that i was up and could now be wheeled into the Orzo (the safe room).

This is for the first 24 hours after the operation and is brutal. You are thirsty and would sell your soul for water.They don't let you drink a lot. A nurse takes blood pressures, checks temperatures, urges you to pee into bedpans, which of course I cannot do with so many strangers around me,. So i got cathetarized. Don’t worry if you don’t know what that means, I will not be explaining it to you.

After 24 hours they wheeled me back into room 116. My post-op sisters welcomed me, What a great room. We did this to all the members of the room, When they came back to their beds, we all cheered for them.

Room 116 I have renamed the Crone Cave. Mostly rather older gals in here. Country-woman Julcsa nenei who cursed freely, Elisabeth who was a church-lady, prayed to Jesus, Magda neni with knee surgeries who had trouble having a BM, Agi who had bunions removed. She taught me the culture of the hospital. She had been here often before, And of course cigi-smoking woman Vera who was first up after her surgery and walking the same day just to get to the smoking-allowed space in the hall. I considered her a freak. I didn't take a step til the fourth day.

The food was surprisingly tasty. Soup with every meal and meat and potatoes or noodles, but always delicious. It was slimming food. I lost 2 kilos in two weeks. Medications to go with every meal. No radio, No TV. But eight lives, talking truth to each other. For Hungarian women this is a therapy session that lasts two weeks, not just surgery that fixes the body parts. Many of them never had this many women listen to their storiers. They are brutally honest, They tell all. When their relatives showed up for a visit we knew all the background, We knew who they were and what they did good or bad. Visitors, of course, no matter how low they speak they are audible in the room to everybody. We pretend we are not listening, but it's impossible.

I was reading a lot of poetry. Read a book a day. Time crawled slowly, but finally it was over and I was allowed to go "home."

I took an ambulance ride back to Senctus, the home for the elderly. They received me without much fanfare. I fixed my bed up with an extra mattress, installed the toilet heightener so i dont sit down to deeply, which is dangerous with a prosthesis. (I bought it in the hospital along with the frame walker and crutches.)

Hospital Costs: 2ooo dollars, with everything included. Great success with the operation.

I rested a lot for the first two months, You need a place to kick back, let go, and be served. Senectus was the perfact choice after all. Brother did good with this choice. It slowly dawned on me how wise it really was.

The only problems i had here was boredom and loneliness. Brother only came if there was business to be done, like the inheritance matters from Auntie Titi.But once that was over, he didn’t come anymore.

I had made some new friends. I have a gay cousin Andras and he gave me some contacts. Martika, for example, An art restorer, She was supposed to know everybody. This might have been true. Martika introduced me to Agota Gordon, a lesbian novelist. A beautiful writer and poet. Both introduced me to Ini, a gay guy who worked with computers. He scored me a Zenith computer and installed it in my little room. Installed the Internet. Costs About 5K in forints .Time went by much better after this. It would take six months before my other hip was fixed up as well.

Time flew after i could walk without crutches, which happened after about three months, By the fourth month, nothing hurt. I was free of all pain. All Pain gone!!!

As a reward, I flew to Malta, I walked about a bit, celebrated a normal life. I didn't walk too much, but I could walk without any help. The only thing that hurt was the unoperated leg. Soon six months was up and i had to repeat the process with the right leg. I could say things about Malta, not all good. The tourists ruined it for me. Fighting for quiet nights, The hotel noise, The rude americans on the cell phones yelling up the halls and gardens late at night, The cold water in the advertised swimming pools. The food was fine, buffet-style breakfasts and dinners.

Willow from Goddessing and her friend Marie took me around a bit, Not too much to see in Malta after the four big Megaliths. After that it's three churches per street block, Tourist trinkets and visible poverty. Willow organized a small party from the few Goddess people, We watched the Marija Gimbutas video, which brought the sweet lady back into my conciouness.

Back to the hospital.... Totally different expereince with Room 110, Fewer women, but larger personalities. I realized how good it was the first time around. Now it was spring, birds were singing outside the hospital windows, especially mornings when i frame-walked to the toilets, I could hear the birds mingled with the snoring of the different rooms as i walked by. The large personality I had to contend with this time was Bozse, who was a pale peasant lady from Northern Hungary. They have an accent and they have no couth. Bozse, however, liked to talk and she was rather interesting at first. I learned about her upbringing, her strict abusive father, They had to wash the cows' behinds so when the old man checked them by sniffing their tails he could not detect any bad smells. Imagine sniffing a cow's behind! But this was the rule to clean stables.

They wore folk dresses to church which were made hard as boards with some kemenyito. Ironed and worn with many skirts hard as boards so they swing out like flowers. I never knew the price for these folk customs. She said it made their legs bleed.

But after the second week the stories started repeating, and i had to cut her off by finishing the story so she would believe it was already told.

The other personality this time was another countrywoman with hip operations also. She was a fussy neat-freak. She lay across from me in full view of my bed and tablés, which were just in survival mode, not neat all. I placed everything close so the things I needed were within reach. Cups, tooth-brushing equipment, books, soups, towels, All just there withiout any order. It drove her nuts.

She exploded at me once. "You are so messy!" she yelled. "Look how your place looks like!"

I had to smile.

You have no idea how low neatness is on my priority list! I am still working on daily regularity.

All was forgiven me, however, when they realized i still know the old folksongs and we sang them in one moment of painless abandon.

Again, I took an ambulance home, using my brother's energy as little as possible. He still didn't tell me why in particular he stopped loving me. It still hurts because now all I have from blood relatives with heart is his son Martin. He is only 2o years old and goes to the University. We talk sometimes, and he did come out to celebrate Lammas with me. The kid's got witchy potential.

My country is filled with festivals, cultural ones, Wine tasting ones, Horse fesstivals. Even stork festivals. It's a way of remembering community. It fits into the new image of EU members.

But I am viewing it all through the TV screen. Best seats in the events, but none of the bustle. On May First they had three bridges turned into festival places, One was covered with grass, one with waterfalls, and the other one ... well, I forget what else. Book festivals, Food cook outs, Hungarins are mad with festivals. Right now we have the Sziget festival, a kimd of Woodstock on the island in the middle of the Duna river.

I am only two months and a couple weeks away from the second operation, and this is not without comp;ications like the first one. I had to return back to get my wound syphoned out from fluids it built up, The pain is not all gone yet, but it's getting less. Especially in the mornings my thighs feel like lead. As I use them it gets lighter. The good news is that I am off painkillers.

I'd rather know how I am than mask reality with pills.

Another 2ooo dollars for all services. Two weeks, meds and operations, follow-up visits, XRays. 2K. So for 4K I had both hips replaced, My old country had given me a repair job when the USA wouldn't even diagnose me.

Cultures are judged by how well are their healing arts?

USA not too good. Many bad doctors afoot. Costing to much undeserved money.

Hungarian doctors are very well trained, Great hospital culture, Overwhelmingly successful operations and follow-up. Bad equipment, Old-fashioned unpleasant toilets.

Still I recommend this health tourism to you all. If you have no insurance and can travel, this is a good option. You don't have to be Hungarian to partake in this.

Write to me if you want to know more.

Blessings and good healing.

Zsuzsanna

Z Generation

At long last you have arrived! At long last you made it to the center stage, You crawling little grandchild, you're now in suits demonstrating for peace. Peace! After 30 years finally a new generation takes on the mantle of history makers. Not an easy job. The spells it took. The love of history and taking responsibility for one's times is brave. And very American.

We can be proud again.

Do not ever doubt that you don't matter. Smaller groups of souls cultivating community are even better, Undisturbed for a long time you germinate new ways to live on earth. Ways of peace. Bake a lot of breads.

Inaugurate Generation Z's presence with big public sharing of bread. Bake bread, There is wisdom in that activity. You have to knead the dough, You have to hurt your knuckles to get it right. And then you have to be patient. The bread needs to rise in a quiet cool place. It’s the bread aborning.

Such it is with Peace. You need to just bake the bread or buy it baked, and eat it as in worship.

Bread is the symbol of peace. Sharing bread together is communion. Communion makes you strong, puts you in touch with spirit.

Gather together, Hold peace in your hearts and make bread or buy and eat it. Wash it down with something red.

Members of Generation Z have already absorbed all that we have learned since the seventies. and we've grown up in the culture of multi media awareness. WW2 is fought on the educational channels over and over again, and you can catch up with any war on video. 9/11 played for months. War is already a video game format. But until war becomes a regulated sport it will not be safe, like fencing today.

The war model exists as a leftover from our reptilian brain. This brain enjoys war in images just as well. So we don't need war in real life. War games works fine. That’s ok.

Generation Z have seen the reruns. They have seen history on documentaries -- onsite pictures and moving stories. In the beginning, probably still in the womb, generation Z has imagined a better world, Just better. Not worth. They wanted more. They wanted back the innocence. The fun. They tried to have Woodstock again. The peace was missing in all the recreation.The first Woodstock was built on peace. Generation Z can make it come back.

Generation Z can escape into their visual world of high tech imaging and the brain is satisfied. As long as you could imagine it in detail its like you have done it. Then you can go home and plug in the new light bulb. The one with swirls take less electricity. Better for the world. The past and the future never before existed side by side with this clarity. You can live in all the decades you missed out by your late arrival, Cool, It's on TV in the afternoon. You can wear any decade’s fashions, too. Retro fashions. Generation Z lives in many realities at the same time. Generation Z can be in many centuries at the same time. Their world is all the living we have done so far, all the history we have created so far.

I wish we had peace for you to live in and only the surplus to spend .Not burden you with debts, poor dears.

And you could start the Aquarian Age with a full deck. But that is not the case. All you have is the stars on your shoulders. The alignments. The Aquarian sub age. Now we are a good forty years into it. We still have a lot of time, It takes 179 years, so in fact its is still early. Historically early. But we have a cross generation resonance from grandma to grandchild. There is no generation gap. We need to
figure out how to use the celestial favorable chances.

Sub age of Aquarius, The stars, The Human flowering. Human flowering is Woman flowering.

If you are a member of Generation Z, you are the One! You are the seed. You are the winning combination. You are the new reality. Spend your mind on thinking about peace, wisdom, women, You are protecting the humans. Our species has been misled with wars and generations are missing out lifetimes of joy. Too much suffering. It has to end. And you are it.

What about us women? We have created/given birth to all these bad leaders, what is our responsibility in there?

You generation Z will catch the last bad spasms of patriarchy and deal with it. You will with your bare hands dismantle the dangerous plans, the bombs. Because on the subliminal level we can do as we wilt. And we are regenerating the old Peace seed and sprouting a new course.

It is good so. We deserve this honor. Lets just have a good laugh right now. See the divine ridiculous. Hahahaha! Cackle too. It’s a soul thing. Cackling. Feel your emotions just looking back up to you saying, We are fine. Just for a moment be happy for no reason at all. Just because you can do that to your head. The heart is next to follow. Try to make irrationally happy moments like this. I'll be thinking of you.

Advice to the Newly Old

If you thought you will be young forever ... and you no longer think so ... Welcome to the newly old.

If you get up, in the morning and take your first look in the mirror and you wonder for a moment whose is that face, yep, you are one of the newly old. Congratulations, you are not dead.

What happened to your face at night? Did some gnome sit around on it dislocating your jawbone? Pulling it down? Making your cheeks flatten out like pancakes? Yep, you have stepped into the worlds of the newly old. Do you have a double chin? Oh you just noticed it today? Yep. Newly old. But most of all do you have to sit down when you are dressing in the morning? Yep, you got it.

In the Goddess community we have made a great deal about “old is good”. Old is wise. Hail to all crones! We read books about the juicy crones, the nimble and fast footed dancing crones. Well that’s fantasy. Hopeful thinking. And all out fibbing. Aging sucks big time and everybody knows it.

First Advice (not very holistic advice but why not):

Go into total denial. Denial works at this stage. Make the most of it. Later it won’t. Things will be too obvious.

We can always use philosophy. Getting old is not really age related. It's true, some teenagers are older then you. Hey there are some pre-teens who are older then you. Cherish this. As long as it lasts.

Denial of age is wonderfully aided by a multibillion-dollar beauty industry. If you think you have money to throw away, go ahead. Get worked on. I would not.... In a few years the fat is back, but not your money, the sagging is back but for awhile you didn’t have to think about mortality. If you did all this to get more love you will notice that being fat or slim has nothing to do with getting love. It may have to do with getting attention, but hey, attention is cheap if you desired love in the first place. That’s the point, of course — not the better looks. The looks you had, you had to hand back into Life like rented shoes at the bowling alley.

Denial works when you act “young”, body aches permitting. Body pains of course grow like weeds. But be careful, when you take the painkillers and work out in denial, you may wake up with more troubles than just aging. Like a broken bone or pulled muscle or a ruined liver. You may end up in spasms. In which case we go into the next advice.

Advice 2

Avoid pain at all costs.

Our entire culture is set up for ’no pain no gain'. For the newly old it’s just the opposite!! "No pain, all gain" is our motto A day without pain is a day enjoyed. Get a lot of meds that actually kill/prevent/modify pain — alternative meds or not. Investigate and get them. The meds industry is next to the weapons industry. Our culture can kill very well sometimes — even kill the pain. But they cannot cure a thing.

Nothing got cured since the invention of antibiotics. We are powerless against viruses. Aging??? Forget it. Its not meant to be cured.

Don’t suffer. Suffering is for the young.

Advice 3

Relearn to play.

When you are newly old you are not yet clever about the ways to spend your time with the most pleasure. You worked all your life, you have forgotten how to really play. This is important to reclaim this skill, play.

Playing begins with the important skill of doing nothing.

Doing nothing is fraught with difficulties. The most disturbing of this is Guilt.

Remember that the guilt you feel about not working is false guilt. You have already given society back all you can. Your youth was spent in the serving of society, raising kids was giving back to the future. if you had no kids, you served society by being birth control. You own nothing to anybody. Get rid of guilt by practicing doing nothing every day for about five hours. Once you are good at this, proceed to...

Advice 4

Play for free.

One part of the education of the newly old is to find out what is offered to old people, and to take advantage of it immediately, even if you are not quite a high senior age.

I get lower price movie tickets and go to Yoga for free. Senior centers have lists of services and entertainment opportunities. Sign up for the most expensive gigs. Feel good looking better then anybody else around you. Amongst the real seniors the newly old can enjoy the illusion that you are still young.

Advice 5

Most of your energies must be used to develop a group of Friends around you for friendship and care. Make sure they are a little younger than you. In case you get older ... it's good to have friends who are just beginning their journey on cronehood and still have energy to take you out, drive with you to places, and make your life a little easier. Of course you cannot make “old friends”. They are inherited from your well-spent queenhood, you earned them like frequent flyer mileage. Old friends are holding your youth in their memories. In their eyes you cannot age, you are eternally young. Old friends must be carefully tended and kept close to the heart.

Advice 6

The newly old has to have its dose of entertaiment. Don’t, let the culture forget you. Write letters to networks and complain if you don’t find what entertains you. Letter writing is a big power both in politics and entertainment. TV networks cater to the young because they drink Coca-Cola or Pepsi and have disposable income. Write a letter and explain to them you are buying stuff too, get advertisers for stuff older people need: mattresses, fine linen, comfortable clothes, healthy vitamins, herbal teas and coffees. We use spas, massages, body oils and dietary supplemrets. Candles and produce. Online shopping. Healthcare items.

Instead of showing up in person to concerts, now that you need to be
comfortable, attend the concerts from the best seat in the house, your couch. The couch has now risen to crone altar status in your life. Make sure you are very comfortable in it. Tend your couch with care, clean it, reupholster it, and make it the best you can.

Advice 7

Get rid of all mirrors in your house except in your bathroom. Mirrors lie.

When you look into mirrors you don’t really see you as others see you. You see yourself looking suspiciously into the mirror. That’s not reality. You bring a lot of attitude to that look in the mirror. You are critical of your body, your fat, and the lines on your face. You condemn yourself when you look into the mirror. So don’t.

Live as your humanity, not as the mirror tells you. Live for the day. Your humanity is all you have and have earned.

Let’s take a whimsical look at the wonderful world of the newly old. This is not what’s in my latest book Celestial Guide to Every Year in Your Life (published by Redwheel, coming out in the spring). Celestial Guide is helpful but it is still PC and wise. Its about astrology and the big celestial picture projected on the smaller personal charts. I find myself having more than just the wise woman point of view and see people in-groups of:

a. The non-old.

This group is eternally old. No matter what age, they were old at birth. They had been around the old solar system many times. You ask them a question and you get tired, weary answers. How are you? would get you Who cares?

b. The brand newly old.

These people are still in their twenties, but they have noticed the march of time. Many need eye glasses, which are new to them; many need drugs to cope. These people think life has passed them by already. They gave rise to the ancient saying of “youth is wasted on the young.”

c. The newly newly old.

This group is thirty something, but they miss their twenties. This group is in deep denial, they step up their workouts, and they spend the most money on looks. Yet they are frightened every day as they see their faces in many many mirrors reflecting back their humanity. Where are the eternally jogging lap types now? They have no more kneecaps! They are on crutches while you, who didn’t jog, have both knees still and are walking. Stop all strenuous exercise.

d. The newly old.

Forty something’s.

This group is the main target for the plastic surgeons. This group has the money and the desire to be young again. They look good, but they are still over forty. The body is underneath the tout skin aging.

Actors in this age group tighten their faces like sitting in a gale of windstorm. Don’t bother. Think of the beautifully lived-in faces of European actors, their every reflection tells a story. Faces tell their life story. Have one. Now is the time to start treasuring your humanity and not your looks.

e. Newly oldish.

This is the over fifty group. Since we live a longer time then ever before this is a group I call the young cronies.

CRONIES HAVE A CLUE. The aches and pains and their relief now ranks above the way we look, and more like how we feel. We now don’t care how we look as long as we feel good. Internal realities have taken over external superficialities. Who can enjoy looking good when your back is aching? It's like being praised in the funeral home about how good you look dead!

This is a rapidly growing demography, millions of boomers are coming into this group. This is the generation that gave us Woodstock. The real Woodstock, not the following ones with pills and booze and expensive waters and no shade. The first Woodstock with marihuana and juices and mushrooms and acid. That was the only true Woodstock nation gathering, even thou we felt there may be more coming. We actually thought that would be the mode of the new culture.

Where are they now? I wonder if we could ever call back the old Woodstock nation for a reunion. Many tired, the younger ones have a nostalgia for those freedom times, but the drugs have changed and rage has built up and now its hell at those gatherings. Young people are righteously outraged when they are exploited.

f. Truly old

Here is everybody over 8o. This group is remarkable. They get a third wind at 84 and fly off the chart. I know many people in this age group and I hold them dear as role models. There is no BS at this age group. They are truth tellers and if they are blessed, sharp minded. I don’t know if I will ever make it that far. My aunt Titi is 88 but still lies about her age. She said she is 86. Nobody cares.

Aging still sucks. My auntie is getting ready for her death every day. She gives away her books to friends. When the day comes, she will be the best-prepared dead person in Budapest. I don’t want her to go. I don’t want her to die. My last ancestor. So many questions still to ask. So many answers that will never happen.

November 2002 / Woodstock Nation

Aging sucks!

There is nothing more frightening thing to hear about yourself then you are now disabled. Even if its temporary, you know the goddess of death has kicked you in the butt. And she is not done yet.

Life has trained you, oh yes, those occasional flues when you were down for ten days or more, oh yeah, that was just bootcamp for disabled. Get a practice going, know how to pull in your life force, go down, go deep, and don't come back up unless your fever was broken. I have done those thousands of times. And when you are rising again, and humanity receives you back into the fold, what joy it is to be able! on the streets, to dance oh gowd that was long ago!

But now disabled is different. It's no fever it's a loss of mobility. The spine is misfiring, the muscles get crammed from mixed up messages from the spine, and pull the bones apart into the wrong places. I look at my still great legs and they soon be old legs, lack of exercise, lack of walking, my poor muscles will sag.

-So this is how you take me down! I cry to the heavens -Bit by bit one leg at a time one muscle at the time. I am only 62, can't you wait a little more? Can I have a run at the third destiny? Can't I just do one more mission of worth and honor? Please?

No witchcraft can halt this march towards death. No witchcraft needs to. This is normal life/death and soon its my time to turn it all back in, give back the legs and the muscles, the blue eyes and the gently rising breasts, the innards and the outers, the entire package.

I hate it when books about aging talk about how wonderful aging is. Lies! Total lies!

Aging is horrible. I don't think the 'wisdom" I gained is worth diddlysquat. Wisdom is ours yes, but who cares? I want to take a long walk with my dogs, I want to climb a mountain. Life without an able body is a burden. Being confined for hours and hours to a couch, worrying about having to go to the bathroom like a journey to India sucks. I a refuse to lie about this, wise woman as I am a truth teller. Aging is not for cowards NOR IS IT FOR PEOPLE WHO HAVE A LOT OF PURPOSE IN THEIR LIVES.

Everything I yet have to do needs my body well. I need my body to sit and type my words, my brain to think up new thoughts, my heart to fuel me with passion. When the meds kick in all of my edge is dulled, I am in stupor from the meds I have to take now. I write this before I have taken them today. Soon I have to however if I want to see noon without pain.

I know there are many more serious sickly people who don't complain, who take it nicely as natural decomposition from life into death, but this witch/bitch is going to scream all the way. I know there is a dignity to dying, dying like a natural weather change, from one day it's raining to the next its snow. I know many sickness/painful conditions take you on the fast track into death, others get operated on and get better, others don't get better. Lets face it Mother nature no longer cares once we are past our childbearing age, hey, all she cares about is the young and the breeding mare of our own species.

Mother nature is obsessed with cells multiplying, cells meeting and creating new formations, she doesn't even much care about whose cells are doing the dividing and the multiplying, she can cull from totally bad people perfectly wonderful descendents. Who would have believed it?

To the goddess of nature we are just bundles of cells; we manifest only to leave our DNA and bones behind for the next generation to stand on. And somehow it's fair game.

Of course when it's you is turn to go down its not looking all that "fair" game.

What fair about interrupting your life mission and stop? Whats so fair about lying in agony and pain? Whats so fair about falling apart like an overcooked omelet?

I am fantasizing about my father's death and my mother's death, they both died quickly and hardly felt pain. What blessing.

My dad was on the streetcar number four, going to an appointment, all dressed up, and he got suddenly ill and died before they have reached the next stop. Mother followed six months later even thou they were not married anymore for a very long time. Mom had two other husbands since my dad, but they died together. Sort of. Mother suffered a heart attack and died. In one fell swoop I was orphaned at the age of 38.

Now I am the same age as mom when she died. I felt the fear of death, but I have greater fear of long suffering. I am praying to the goddess to take me in my sleep when she has to, like Kay Gardner the friend and holy goddess musician. There was a wonderful way to leave this earth, just go to sleep and not wake up anymore. If we needed proof that she was a favorite of the goddess her death surely was an exceptional blessing.

I THINK WE the AGING GENERATION, WE the FAMOUS BOOMERS, Woodstock nation BECAME TOO DOCILE IN OUR OLD AGE. Wake up brothers and sisters! We could still do a lot of good, by just staying alive and well. Failing that we should teach or rabble rouse. Nobody please teach giving in, enjoying the defeat of nature, and passivity of any kind.

Remember Maggie Kuhn? She started the Gray Panthers at the age of seventy. Good ol' girl, she has gotten the attention of the country, her office is still open in Washington DC. I imagine its still funded, but they don't answer their phones, their machines give out more numbers. The local group in the Bay Area doesn't answer their phone either. What if the Boomers streamed into the Gray Panthers ranks?? Revive the movement, revive the power????

What would we demand?

For that we should dig into the old dreams goodie bag and see what comes out. I always wanted a world without wars, the Boomers as a voting block could achieve that. Women as a voting block could also achieve that.

The country is divided into the two coastal areas and the northern lake side areas, who are educated and have more fun, and the middle 'fly over" parts where there is little hope, a lot of exploitation by big polluting companies,(go see Bowling for Columbine), and anger being left out of the good times. Middle America gets its news from right-wing radio shows, TV preachers and TV. All their information is managed.

So is ours on the coasts, but we have more education and can find alternative forms of information. And we are not shackled to churchianity like the middle of the country.

But all of the anger has nothing to do with anything like Democrats or GOP's, it has to do feeling "left out. " This is the true couse of all discontent, those who feel left out always feel hatred towards those they perceive being privileged and happier. This is of course pure perception. But that's is what we need to form our reality.

Let's start with making ourselves happier.lets begin to rabble- rouse one more time. Wake up my beloved Woodstock Nation! Wake up and boogie the last dance in style!

October 2002 / Halloween

This month is so loaded for me. Spiral dances used to be my main joy and burden. Now it's optional. My daughters do such a fine job, I am thinking I should just go to the cemetery with my dogs and burn a lot of incense. I love my cemetery, the Mountain View. It's actually on the hill sides overlooking the Bay. The old monuments give grace and class to the place, it's not just wall to wall bones. They have pyramids from the turn of the century, and so few crosses that it's amazing. Even if there is a cross, it's the Celtic one with intricate stone weavings.

I am a little frightened by my deep love of cemeteries. Why am I so attracted to that place? I sit on the stone seats, watch the trees. I speak to my favorite oaks, elders, hug them and kiss them. This is my true hollowe d ground. Empty most of the time, yet the new dead are coming in at a steady pace. The living bury them and bolt from the cemetery. They cannot stand to look in the face of death. Sometimes they drive off so fast I worry they will crash.

Then me and my two little black curly angels meander home. I feel refreshed like I had been to church. I think this is true, it is the only church I can attend with a full heart. The cemetery, where nobody is present, just the bones, and the trees, the lake and the birdsong.

Happy Halloween to you all.

Zsuzsanna

September 2002 / Post Fest Marinating

Almost unpacked now. The brand new puple lace scarf the sisters bought for me is hanging on the hanger, clothes I have never worn finally retrieved. I always overpack. Why? I take two weeks worth of changes for a four-day camping trip. It's all part of the survival issues that came to light. I am suffering from repressed WWII memories. Add to that the revolution in 1956 and the great escape across the swamps and have it all sitting there as the events of 9/11 tore up the scab. Rip! The anniversary was no less traumatic. In the last year all that happened was that I realized one year is not enough time to pass to truly marinate out the wisdom from 9/11.

The healing circle with Vicky Noble brought out the need to heal powerfully. I am normally not on the receiving end of the grace we dispense at the festival. This was a very different event, and I benefitted directly from its collective energy. I lay down; I opened up and felt safe. Afia came by with her drum and punctuated my pain bubble. A young priestess at my head said "I sense many survival issues" but she didn't need to mention the floods of deep deep sobbing that were opened up. I cried for a long, long time in a happy way. Unloaded a lot of bad repressed pain; but not all. The healing circle worked for me.

Thank you Vicki Noble. Thank you Afia Walking Tree.

I suffered a wicked sciatica attack, which got better. Especially when Monica Sjoo told me to just squat. I practiced squatting, realized how little I squat compared to when I was young. It hurts but must be done. I feel better each time.

I roomed with Susan Weed, she also showed me a yoga stretch for the back. Diana Paxson was doing the late night shift, the prophecies at midnight. But that's where prophesies should be practiced, around midnight. However, she came back after we were all bedded down and sometimes Ffiona locked her out, so we all had to be woken up. Not I. I slept through much of the ruckus in my cabin.

The Peace Circle was the most awesome. The women filed down on the paths of the four directions in the Well and exchanged words of pledge. The woman standing there would say to her upon arrival "The whole world is weeping." and she answers "if we don't speak of Peace. I will"

One by one the women took the pledge of speaking for Peace.

Monica invoked the three fates in Swedish. We passed the bowl of seawater around and pouring it in front of our faces we talked to water. Each woman privately. Deep private prayers were said.

Leilani and Leticia collected the waters and we handed the bowls to the main prayers. Susun Weed was praying for the Green things and animals, Diana Paxson prayed for all women and children, and Afia prayed for humanity. The harmony of the species. Finally Vicki prayed for healing. The bowls of water were poured all around the the fire. We chanted and the drums moved our bodies to dance.

As an act of high magic, Macha Nightmare cast a spell of confusion on all those who would bomb the world. We wreathed the sword into olive branches. We transformed the symbol from war to peace. I left my sword out overnight until next night to communicate to the universe the meaning of the spell. I think she did that. Next night we removed the branches and burned them in the clean fire.

It was done. And done well.

The Procession of the Generations was yet another big circle for Saturday night's ritual. I was wracked with pain, but led a huge procession into the well. My steps became sure and purposeful, with each step I was forging ahead for the future generations. It's an awesome feeling. I became more then just one woman; my psychic body gets blown into hundreds bigger more. Beyond the boundaries.

You here about the chants of the different destiny sisters. They made it up themselves what they present to us during their private destiny sisterhood sessions. The women's divine sense of self showed with humor and beauty. I laughed myself silly at the "lala more.. " group. But the others too, the queens ripped. Still a little to tired. More later.

Now it's a week later. I had an acupuncture treatment from Dr. Chung, and I feel totally back. I am rested, and bracing for the systematic stretch of the small back and two more treatments against spasms. The Chinese doesn't cure sciatica. Frank admitted as much. But he can help spasms. They don't have sciatica. Why? Because culturally they squat. Squat every day! Yeah next year on the blue ball, we will squat together. It's the Aquarius way.

Love to you all

Zsuzsanna

August 2002 / Here I am sitting in the fog...

Here I am sitting in the fog, week after week, during my entire vacation, all the long gray summer long. Cold, and yearning for the sun to defeat the fog, burn it up like always, like every morning. But this summer the sun didn't win. The summer was taken away by the thick cloud we live in. The cloud sits on the earth, tired old thing, but won't rain out, no. This cloud holds onto the low pressure, and sits and spreads out, pulls in a little but not too long and it's back.

My thoughts grow inward from the cloud, condense and diffuse. Mentally I am over stimulated with the projects on the table. I will finally learn how to have a web business. Yes. The goddess has come to that. But before that glorious realization, I needed to create products and not be engaged in writing anything new. Of course with that demand I want to write something new terribly bad. But if I don't learn to market what I have already created then how do I move forward? So I am an old dog who loves to learn new tricks.

Creation number one: "Summoning the Fates" (formerly with Random House) will come out as a Print-on-Demand book. After exploring this for a while we found somebody local to do this venture with. We have no idea what this means, but just knowing the next step is good enough for me. Players in the Universe. Creation two: Grandmother of Time on CD. Tatata! A young friend actor from Berkeley U read the entire book on disc. I now have to learn to edit it, because nobody else can. Imagine. An other new trick!

Now its two days later and the sun has finally come out! Already I am more hopeful. The festival will have lovely weather! My prayers have been answered.

Very pleased as the festival women are coming together. Still working on the Sweat Lodge part of the Thursday night. It's not easy. Beverly Little Thunder said we should all gather the twigs and logs for it ourselves. I said, that's not practical. City women let loose to gather sprigs in the dusk hours in a strange forest with poison oaks? I don't think so. Can we just rent the little sweatlodges? There must be somewhere where they are prefab. Beverly Little thunder almost died listening to me. Sweatlodges are not prefab! She cried on the phone.

So I am now investigating the truth of this. We have never tried to have sweat lodges before, this is our first. Wish me luck!

I am sending this off now,later musings come as I get turned on to do them.

Love to you all

Zsuzsanna

March 2002 / Spring is here in California!

The fumes from the cars on the busy streets are miraculously overwhelmed by the scent of flowers. Birds are singing their eternal songs of joy. The local Oakland zoo is advertising sightseeing tours to adults about the sex lives of the animals. I guess they are busy with the resurgent life force!

I have finished my latest book "90 Chances" It's still unusual that I have nothing more to do on it. Diana Paxson my co-writer is still laboring. It should be in the stores by fall. I have high hopes for this book. I think it's mainstream -- a book about 90 years of our lives. Each year has a page with astrological components and its meaning. We included a ritual for each decade. DP (Diana Paxson) writes more to the witty reader; I write more mainstream. I feel really fortunate that this book is happening now at the time when it's the hardest to sell any written matter due to the imploding of the publishing industry. Nobody knows what will sell after 9/11. The American psyche is having a seachange and we don't know how the pieces will fall yet. I hope things land on the side of the spirit.

So now I am returning to all the other unfinished business on my plate. Many women are asking me for mentoring. This is first on my agenda, to create an online mentoring service. I wonder what you think about this. There will be a system set up, where you can register, and then weekly we talk either on the phone or online about how you are doing in your life and spirituality. I'll give you homework. Everybody who registers gets a free Fate reading. This is still formulating. I am lucky to have good women to help with this, Teri and Sage from our SIGs elist.

This week we'll finalize the Kids Camps staff and gather their info and pix to put up on the Website. We think this will help parents as they think about sending their children to our camp. They can see whom we have lined up for this first camp. In April, look for Camp ads, and please send some good vibrations towards this endeavor. I have not seen anywhere else a literary camp. Have you? So this Granny Zs Witches and Wizard's Camp is unique. It is fantasy and reality mixed into a harmonious brew. Real witches are teaching the love of story/books/play…and Harry Potter!!

My own Yoga teacher Pondi Das said yes, he is 74 years old. He will do gentle Yoga but his life philosophy is great as well, so I have to come up with something else for him to do. I need to find Oberon, from the Church of all Worlds, who I thought would make a great Professor Dumbelore. He agreed to do it last time I saw him, but now is the time of signing on the dotted line. Hagrid the giant was found but now is the time to talk to him.

I had hopes to have bungie jumping but I have given this up as too dangerous plus no staff to supervise it. Lynette Duerkson of course could supervise it; she has done a lot of stilt walking and bungie stuff. But she is our nurse. Lynette is an emergency nurse form Kaiser Permanente. She's also a dancer and mother. The women so far helping out are the mommies, bringing their kids to camp. As you see, the event is taking glorious shape. I'll muse some more later.

Blessed be!

Z.