Andrew Cuomo for President?

The New York Governor's recent victory with the passage of the Marriage Equality Act in his state has people talking about a presidential run in 2016. Indeed, Mr. Cuomo has managed to vault over all the other emerging leaders in the national Democratic Party.

What a minute. What other emerging leaders? The Republican Party keeps tripping over itself with all of the relatively young and new hopefuls crowding the field, as well as those--like Jeb Bush--who wait patiently in the wings. But among Democrats the field is thin, and old. Think Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and John Kerry.

A new breed needs to emerge. Here's to Governor Cuomo for taking the lead.

Summertime Joie de Vivre

The pool closes for the day in about 20 minutes. Most everyone has gone home. Those who remain enjoy the water for just a little longer: the child perfecting her dive, the adults laughing in the shallow end, the toddler sitting on the steps.

One of the lifeguards wants to do a flip off the diving board, a feat she's never accomplished. The experts, including a 12-year-old, give her advice. She tries once and belly flops on her back. Ouch. More advice. The second time she spins in the air, tucking her legs, and lands fine. Cheers and applause erupt from everywhere in the pool--all of us drawn to the efforts of the young woman and forgetting our own concerns.

What a perfect way to end the day.

Afghani Rhetoric

Listening to the president last night as he announced troop withdrawals from Afghanistan, I was struck by how un-soaring his usual soaring rhetoric was. True, I listened to him on the radio and didn't see his expressions, but his sentences were short and repetitive and included no rousing moments.

This war--along with its twin war in Iraq--has been a disaster. That anyone can continue to defend our presence in Afghanistan, when our own country remains in shambles and declines day by day, is beyond me.

The fact is, there is no soaring rhetoric to describe our ten unproductive years fighting a war that was never worth fighting in the first place.

Talking Trash

Now that Anthony Weiner is gone and we await the next sex scandal--which will arrive as surely as summer follows spring--I find myself wondering why these events have to occupy so much space. Every time a scandal erupts, I ask myself the same troubling questions: What was he thinking? Why didn't he expect to get caught? Where did he find the time? Why do we invade others' privacy so relentlessly? And what about the children, who should never have to learn such details about their dad?

In the end, these events make me sad, and I felt even sadder when I watched Anthony Weiner resign. For as he spoke that day, a heckler shouted him down, calling him "a pervert" and talking trash that had no place in public discourse. Which is what these events do: they cheapen the public discourse.

You might say, as my husband did, that Senator Weiner "deserved this." I understand the sentiment, and I don't defend Weiner. Yet such spectacles involving private behavior--particularly when no laws have been broken--coarsen our already shallow and mean-spirited society.

Maybe we'll get a break this summer, and it will be too hot for anyone to act out. Or maybe our press will miss the next big story. For every time we obsess about the latest sexual transgression among us, we lose sight about what really matters: the health and well-being of all of us, the humanity we share, and the urgent need to take care of each other and of our planet.

Cousins. . .

what more can you ask for?

A Dog's Life: Margie Has a Little Dog

Sing to the tune of "Mary Had a Little Lamb":

Margie has a little dog,
Little dog,
Little dog.
Margie has a little dog
Who isn't feeling well.

And everywhere that Margie goes,
Margie goes,
Margie goes.
Everywhere that Margie goes
The dog is always there.

He follows her around the house,
Round the house,
Round the house.
He follows her around the house
And doesn't let her go.

It makes her family laugh and say,
Laugh and say,
Laugh and say.
It makes her family laugh and say,
"You've brought this on yourself."

The Crown Jewel

This recently-watered caladium at the Durham Garden Center reminded me that the most precious gem of all is not a stone.

Water. We wouldn't be without it.

Stuff

At our neighbor's yard sale on Saturday, we put out our usual array of unwanted junk and made about $36. In preparing for the sale, I realized that I had too much stuff when I found things I didn't even know I had and didn't know where they'd come from.

Too much stuff doesn't clutter just the house. It also clutters the mind and the body and probably the soul. (Not to mention the earth.)

Early Summer in the Yard

The gardenia is named for Alexander Garden, a Scottish-born doctor and botanist who lived for many years in Charleston, South Carolina. During the Revolutionary War he sided with the British; his property eventually confiscated, he moved to London in 1783. Though Dr. Garden never actually studied the gardenia, he was honored by the naturalist Carolus Linnaeus, who named the plant--previously called Cape jasmine--for him. Its scent is intoxicating.


The abelia is also named for a doctor, Clarke Abel, who traveled with Lord Amherst on a diplomatic mission to China in 1816-17. While there he collected seeds and specimens of the abelia, which were unfortunately lost at sea in a shipwreck and pirate attack. He holds the distinction of having been the first western scientist to document an orangutan living on the island of Sumatra.


Pansies are often said to have faces. This one looks a little sad, perhaps because it will die soon in the North Carolina heat. The word "pansy" comes from the French word for thought, penser.


Ligustrum is the Latin word for privet, which is a shrub in the olive family. It is a great screening plant; however, "it is often mis-pruned into green meatballs"--according to Cyndi Lauderdale, NC Extension Agent. Green meatballs! I know what she means.


Roses are everywhere and speak the universal language of love. They are decidedly not mistaken as green meatballs.