I Was Wrong

 

I don't want to read books written by a favorite author with some other writer. Sorta like having lunch with a best friend and have another person bust in and interrupt.

Thus, when I started Mad Honey by Jodi Picoult, whom I adore as a writer, I was a chapter into it before I saw that Jennifer Finney Boylan was also a writer. By then I was hooked.

The books I like best are those I live in. I've been a librarian at the American library in Paris in WWII. (I actually did a reading there, but right before Covid) I've eaten bread in Roman times, walked across the Pyrenees escaping the Nazis, lived in Palestine. In New Hampshire, I raised bees in Mad Honey.

Besides the story and as a writer, I was intrigued in how the two writers worked together. They told me in the notes. Try as I might I couldn't figure out who typed the original words, corrected typos, rearranged sentences, added a detail.

Several characters, flashbacks worked on two levels . . . for me as a reader while admiring them as writers, craftswomen.

I want to fly to New Hampshire some day when I can reenter the United States, and sit down with the characters. I want to ask Olivia, Jordan, Asher, Ava what has happened to them since the book ended.

It's 8:55. My husband is walking Sherlock the dog and buying fresh bread from the boulangerie. I'll shower, we'll have petite dejeuner before going to l'Hostalet for our morning tea and hot chocolate. We may see neighbors who will join us. This is not an interruption. 

My husband and I need to get back to our writing at some point. Olivia, Jordan, Asher, Ava are still with me, a reminder that I was ever so wrong about jointly written books.

  

   

Free Write --The Wine/Champagne Glasses

 

Rick's prompt was a photo of glasses. Champagne glasses? Wine glasses? Why a spot of light? What did they represent? 

Rick's Free Write

When the waiter set the two glasses on the table, there was a flash of light, the afternoon sun reflecting through the liquid. I took it as a sign that we had made a good choice to sit and chill under a thatched umbrella. Not because it was too hot. Indeed, it was just right, to channel Goldilocks. A respite from the weeks of borderline terrible weather. Wave after wave of rain and gloom and leaky skylights, followed by days of Tramontane winds, cold air rolling off the Pyrenees at highway speed-limit rates. It seemed winter would never end and we were already in May. This was the first day of decent temperatures, dry, only a slight breeze. The perfect time to re-start our personal café culture of people-watching.

Turns out it was our one day of Spring, as the whole of Europe has now fast-forwarded into summer with record-high temperatures. Two weeks ago the forecast for the entire summer was for nothing more than 30C. Today 36 in the village, 39 for some places nearby (+100F). How could they get it so wrong?

In the heat, the villagers shift from their normal turtle pace to snail. The heat saps the energy. Even the dog gets more lethargic, and he sleeps most of the day under cooler conditions. Maybe he’ll bark less. (And on cue, off he goes!)

Julia's  Free Write

Imagination can be a wonderful thing, but it can also be a terrible tribulation!

There they were: at a crossroads.

This summer, ok, late spring - but since the climate has gone bonkers it felt like mid-summer already – taking a “break from it all”.

Life had been a bit rough lately and it was time to reflect, to look at the options, to discuss the future – or lack thereof – and to try and make some decisions.

At this point, seated on a terrace, the story could go anywhere:

y) a break-up of a friendship; an engagement; a marriage

b) a celebration of any of the three above? As in the beginning of a friendship; a proposal of marriage; a wedding celebration

c) simply two same-sex friends finally catching up

d) two just-became-of-legal-age kids celebrating with their first out-in-the-open Prosecco?

You can see a writer’s problem – too much imagination!

And that with only the shadow of champagne glasses! 

D-L's Free Write

She filled his wine glass.

She filled her glass.

They picked up their glasses. 

Santé

Cheers

Good Health 

They barely touched their glasses.

He looked at her eyes. He saw whom he imagined long ago. What he had seen was there but wasn't,

She imagined in his eyes what she had seen in him long ago, but now saw nothing like it.

Neither were bad people.

After five years they just wanted different things.

What now? she asked.

Call our lawyers, I guess.

Sad.

Rick's Free Write

Rick Adams is an aviation journalist and publisher of www.aviationvoices.com, a weekly newsletter reporting the airline industry  top stories . He is the author of The Robot in the Simulator. AI in Aviation Training.  

Visit D-L.'s website  https://dlnelsonwriter.com, She is the author of 15 fiction and three non fiction books. Her 300 Unsung Women, bios of women who battled gender limitations, can be purchased  at https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/300-unsung-women-d-l-nelson/1147305797?ean=9798990385504 

Visit Julia's blog. She has written and taken photos and loves syncing up with friends.  Her blog can be found: https://viewsfromeverywhere.blogspot.com/ 

Coat Hangars & Knitting Needles

 More than one doctor, who went against the law, expressed the reason it would save the women from the back alley or a knitting needle which led to many women’s deaths, so the concept of saving the woman’s life was not a total falsehood.

Miss Sherri on Romper Room had to go to Sweden to get a safe abortion. 

The doctor in A Private Matter ,a 1992 movie about Sherri Finkbine Chessen’s) fight for a therapeutic abortion after taking Thalidomide, said his Arizona hospital performed around 300 abortions a year during the time when abortion was illegal. The alleged reasons were to save the life of the mother.

The number shocked me: three hundred, one hospital, one city.

Doctors found a way around the law to help women, claiming that the procedure would save the life of the mother. The woman needed to see a psychiatrist, certifying she wasn’t stable.

I had friends who would take their daughters to a psychologist just in case they needed an abortion in the future. They would have a track record of psychological problems to increase the chances of being given a legal/safe abortion.

More than one doctor, who went against the law, expressed the reason it would save the women from the back alley or a knitting needle which led to many women’s deaths, so the concept of saving the woman’s life was not a total falsehood.

Thalidomide, Too Dangerous for Pregnant Women

The German company Grünenthal Group developed Thalidomide and began marketing it under the brand Contergan in 1957. The drug was said to relieve insomnia, anxiety and gastritis. It was also effective against morning sickness. Because it was impossible to overdose, it was declared safe. Distillers, a United Kingdom company, manufactured and sold it under the name Distaval.

Reports of nerve damage and malformed babies surfaced between 1959 and 1961, all of which were ignored by the companies making the drugs. According to estimates, some 10,000 babies were born deformed worldwide. Half are reported to have died.

Two doctors—a Scott, Leslie Florence and an American, Frances Kelsey of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration—were first to sound the alarm. Florence was concerned about the damage and Kelsey because she was uncomfortable with the involved companies not mentioning potential nerve damage.

The drug was withdrawn in 1961.

A TV movie is not necessarily the most authoritative source for a book like this. Nonetheless, though the happy dinner scenes and backyard BBQs in the movie might not be exact, the damage from the drug and the difficulty Chessen had in getting the abortion were real.

The major points in the movie were backed up by articles in newspapers and Chessen’s own testimony in documentaries such as From Danger to Dignity (https://vimeo.com/24810848.)

Miss Sherri Caught in a Trap

Sherri Finkbine Chessen was a busy mom with four children, the wife of a school teacher and the star of the local Romper Room on KPAZ, Channel 21, Phoenix, Arizona, where she was Miss Sherri to pre-school viewers and guests in the studio.

She had trouble sleeping.

Her husband, a teacher, while leading a school trip to England and the European continent, came across the drug Distaval and brought the pills back to the U.S., where it was unavailable. He wanted to help his wife get her needed sleep. Chessen took 36 of the tablets. At the time she was happily pregnant with her fifth child.

In July 1962, Chessen became aware of the problems with the drug when she read about the effects in the newspaper. The headline read, “Woman Doctor Curbs Newborn Tragedies.”

Her doctor recommended a therapeutic abortion after conferring with other doctors in the

U.S. and Europe. Chessen was unsure at first, because she wanted the child, but photos of deformed babies convinced her.

At the time, abortion was illegal in all the states unless it was necessary to save the woman’s life. Her doctor had to diagnose her as a potential suicide and then Chessen had to convince a psychiatrist of her instability, so he could perform the abortion legally at the Good Samaritan Hospital. She succeeded in convincing the psychiatrist.

The abortion was scheduled.

Not wanting other women to take the drug if they came across it, she talked to the local newspaper, the Arizona Republic, several days before her scheduled operation. Reporter Julian DeVries broke the story 23 July 1962 under the headline, “Pill May Cost Woman Her Baby.”

Chessen was supposed to be anonymous. It didn’t happen.

The next day her doctor called to say the operation had been cancelled. Chessen thought she was unknown, but the news went out on the Associated Press wire. Calls had been made to the hospital from all over the world, including threats, and it caved to the pressure. One person tried to make a citizen’s arrest.

Chessen was fired. Any woman getting an abortion was obviously unfit to stand before children after giving them milk and cookies and say, “God is great, God is good. Let us thank him for our food. Amen.” Even more, she certainly couldn’t teach them what was right to do and what was wrong.

On 30 July, a judge decided that any doctor who performed the procedure could be charged criminally. When Chessen asked for immunity from prosecution if she obtained an abortion in Arizona, the Arizona Superior Court dismissed the case. Judge Yale McFate said there was no legal controversy and denied he had the authority to decide.

She searched for a doctor in and outside the U.S. to legally proceed. Japan, which did allow abortions, refused her a visa.

Sweden gave her the visa she needed: the Chessens flew there. After the abortion on 18 August 1962, the doctors reported that the fetus was deformed, lacking legs and an arm.

On the couple’s return to the U.S., the press mobbed them as they walked down the plane’s stairs. “I don’t want to get back at anyone,” Chessen said at the time. “I just want to do what is best in our case.”

There were death threats. The FBI was called in. The officers had to walk her children to school because there had been threats against the children’s safety. One person threatened to cut off the children’s arms and legs.

 

Life After the Abortion

Miss Sherri loved children. She had two more children before divorcing her husband. Adding six children belonging to her second husband created a large mixed family that outdid The Brady Bunch. She adores grandchildren.

Her professional life has continued.

• She did voice overs for cartoons.
• From September-December 1970, she had a one-hour variety show on television in Phoenix.
• She authored children’s books to address the issues of gun violence, sexual abuse, and bullying: The Gorp’s Gift,  The Gorp’s Secret, The Gorp’s Dream

Chessen is still alive at 93. She has often been a spokeswoman for women's rights.

The steps she had to go through to prevent the birth of a deformed child had it been able to survive would have had an incredibly limited life were horrifying. The couple knew what they were capable of doing and not doing in caring for a disabled child.

What right did the state have to add to their pain?

Note: this chapter is from D-L Nelsons Coat Hangers & Knitting Needles about abortion prior to Roe v. Wade.

R.I.P. Monsieur Livre

 R.I.P. Monsieur Livre

On Wednesday and Saturday mornings he sat at his own ground-level window. His house looked out on the Place La Republique filled with the olive, clothing, food, flower and other marché merchants. His window sill was covered with French books. In front of the window was the cart he pushed to the supermarket. On marché days it was filled with English books and sometimes a German or Spanish book. Each cost three euros.

Sometimes we couldn't find any books we hadn't donated. Other times we might buy one or more. When we bought three we would give a ten euro bill but wouldn't accept change. 

More than once I apologized when I bought English books saying in French that I was too lazy to read French that week and that I was so grateful to get English books.

Then for three weeks he wasn't there. Then today we saw the piles of books and a friend told us how one morning he had never woke up.

Note: The 13th century village church is at the end of our street. We probably heard the funeral bells not knowing they were for him. When I go into the church next time I will light three candles: for my stepmom, for Ingolf and for Monsieur Livre.

Polls, are they really worth anything

 

I once worked with a brilliant researcher, not medical but opinion. I was his client, he was mine and we shared a couple of clients. He also had tremendous insight garnered through polls, focus groups, reading and observation.

I have not talked with him for years, but I'd love to know his opinion on polls.

Politics, Policy, and Polls all begin with P Pol but there the resemblance ends. Politics can change our lives for good or bad depending on the politicians and policy. Polls seem to replace hard news and the need for the stories behind the polls. 

I don't want to know the percent of people who want to know what is in the Epstein Files. I want to know more about what the files say and why they haven't been released. Who is behind the block and, of course, who is in them. Every name of an alleged leaders. 

TELL ME THE STORY!!!! Don't waste my time on who might or not agree with me.

I would like a study on why in the last couple of important elections the polls were wrong. And why.

I question who was asked. If it was 1000, 2000 or even 5000 people asked, how can they  represent the 348.6 million people of the U.S.  How similar would a Maine farmer, a Boston history professor, a New York upper level finance manager, a Kansas school teacher, a Florida retiree, a Georgia factory worker, a Colorado ski instructor, a California wine grower, and a Seattle techie be representative of a the U.S. population even if they give the possible error rate. 

It does make sense that they could be representative of their own demographic group as in 45% of the teachers in New England think. . . But the polls do not give me the criteria of those questioned. If you have to poll, list the age, gender, occupation, location of each respondent, then divide them by party. Maybe that would make the poll leass valuable if I could say, not one person in the poll is anything like me.

Polls are published by the media. The American media is shrinking with a few billionaire owners and/or the companies they own. They have the same investors. Many own many newspapers, cables, magazines. It's a barrier cutting access to information.

Some of the biggie owners are:

• Jeff Bezos
• News Corp. (Murdoch family)
• Sinclair Broadcast
• Patrick Soon-schiong
• Lauren Powell Jobs
• John Henry
• David D. Smith
• Mark Berioff

These people control between them everything the public learns, not that they always agree. They also have access to government people from local politicians all the way up to the president.

Are you scared yet?

You should be. 

Carpe Diem is More Important Than Ever

 

One of the problems of aging is people around us succumb to old age. Friends, relatives, and those we admire simply leave the planet.

One of the joys of Argelès is the variety of people who not only live there and share their rich Catalan culture, but those from all over Europe who love this tiny village and visit as often as they can. There's joy when we know Peter, Pauline, Chris, Kay and many more are coming for a week or a month or even more. And they come from Ireland, Scotland Sweden, Germany and elsewhere. What fun to share a coffee, a glass of wine and play catch up.

We've watched their children grow and take on the cares and joy of adulthood and then watch their children do the same. 

The downside is we also watch them age, contract illnesses and die.

I'm still feeling the loss of Ingolf Gabold, a Danish television producer, musician, playwrite and author. When he and his lovely wife descended on Argelès often with their friends from the Danish entertainment industry, 

We knew him as a warm and magnanimous friend. Always with a smile, a hug and a two-cheek kiss with the scratchy beard.

We looked forward to the next time we would greet Ingolf and the love of his life, Kikke, sometimes one of his lovely adult daughters, even his adorable grandson. 

We'd sit together at L'Hostalet café, or in their modest apartment over an apero or dinner, and discuss topics ranging from literature (he was a writer as well) and global politics.

Christmas eve 2025: Ingolf's wife, one of his daughter's and grandson who tops the adorable chart came together in an Irish friend's home. It's less than a first home but more than a second as they hop back and forth. Also at the table were a Greek friend, an American who everyone had just met and was considering moving out of the U.S., a French-Catalan and other locals. Everyone brought something.

As I looked around I felt incredible lucky to celebrate this evening because I knew the moment was for now and only now. Carpe diem is more important than ever as the moments descend into memories to be taken our and recaptured to be put back in their box.

How DARE He?????

 

Marco Rubio criticized WHO (World Health Organization) for not acting as quickly as they should on the Ebola outbreak in Africa. 

Perhaps he forgot the U.S. Administration cut WHO's funding. But then again perhaps he's forgotten the chaos Trump and friends are causing all over the world.

Or maybe he just doesn't care like his boss.

Free Write - An Alpine Scene

Todays prompt was a tiled coffee table, the scene almost identical to a village next to a chalet where we all have spent time.

D-L's Free Write

Why can't we live like this all the time, Ellen wondered. "Bobby wait for me," she called to her eight-year old son galloping across the bridge over the creek.

Next week would be their last week before going home. She was trying to make every minute count. Today they were going hiking up the mountain to where the wild asparagus grew. She'd serve it for supper.

She turned to look at the creek, the trees, the cows. Well, their smell was less than wonderful.

She and her husband had escaped the hectic rush of jobs in Boston with too much to do. Not that they were work-free here in this Alpine paradise. They still spent hours working via the internet. That was the price of being able to do the hikes, sit among the garden flowers and breathe the clean, sweet mountain hair.

Jason, her husband, caught up with her and Bobby. "Thank goodness for the time difference. Fred will be able to get my stuff when he wake up."

Ellen didn't want to go back home. "Do you think . . . work . . . full time from here . . . It's just so . . .

Julia's Free Write

What a lovely day it was!

High summer, and they had taken a few days to head for the mountains.

Stayed in a cabin, enjoyed the fresh air and being away from “normal” life.

That last hike saw them truly out and about. Rivers in full spate, they came to a clearing where there was not only a wooden cabin, but totally unexpected, also a church. What was it doing so far from any village? Any city? It didn’t look abandoned though. Still, as it was mid-afternoon, they didn’t have time to linger and explore.

They were faced with another more difficult challenge: crossing the river! Fortunately, there had been other hikers who had built a very rudimentary “bridge”. It certainly wasn’t the beaver standing there watching them.

And there they were: 70 years later, approaching 100, both in comfortable chairs, flipping through old albums of their youth… Thank goodness they had kept the photo!

It brought back wonderful memories.

Rick's Free Write

Switzerland, oh Switzerland.

It really is a postcard. Everywhere.

The snow-blanketed Alps, of course. But also the mountain streams, placid lakes, centuries-old glaciers (sadly receding).

The cows in the meadows, bells tinkling in a pleasant cacophony.

Vine-covered slopes.

And the cities. Vibrant. Large enough to be significant, compact enough to be comfortable.

Chocolate. Cheese fondue. Rosti. An abundance of homegrown foods – just around the corner – fresh.

A proud history. Independent. Neutral. A mediator for the world.

I was not born here. I did not choose to live here. It chose me. And made me one of its own.

An immigrant. I learned the language. The customs. The laws. The culture. Visited every canton. Became a citizen.

Switzerland, of Switzerland.

Home.

Rick Adams is an aviation journalist and publisher of www.aviationvoices.com, a weekly newsletter reporting the airline industry  top stories . He is the author of The Robot in the Simulator. AI in Aviation Training.  

Visit D-L.'s website  https://dlnelsonwriter.com, She is the author of 15 fiction and three non fiction books. Her 300 Unsung Women, bios of women who battled gender limitations, can be purchased  at https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/300-unsung-women-d-l-nelson/1147305797?ean=9798990385504 

Visit Julia's blog. She has written and taken photos and loves syncing up with friends.  Her blog can be found: https://viewsfromeverywhere.blogspot.com/