Four rings, three friends, bound in sisterhood.

I am truly blessed to have an enormous circle of friends and two very special ones who I met (and they each other) at the same moment, on the same day four years ago – Amy and Jennifer. To say that these women are like sisters to me would be an understatement – especially as I wasn’t born with one in this lifetime and those women from my sorority at university faded from my life more than 25 years ago.

My rings.

In 1989 my husband and I separated. To cope with my despair I ‘ran away to the sea’ and became the operations manager for the HMS Bounty, then owned by Turner Broadcasting Systems in Atlanta. I was disillusioned and hurt and perhaps a little angry and I bought myself an antique coin ring with diamonds on either side of a bezel set 3rd century AD coin featuring the profile of Emperor Constantine. I had it sized down to fit on my pinkie finger and decided to wear my great grandmother’s rose gold wedding band behind it. My accompanying explanation to all the lovely compliments received (for many years) had been “the only man worth having is one wrapped around my little finger”. It became, and remains, one of those signature pieces of jewelry each of us possesses – that we feel nearly naked when not wearing, and which people associate with our being. I didn’t realise how much until just before I was to leave for three months in Croatia – from where I write this blog post.

Amy’s ring.

Amy had taken me out for a quiet ‘chick night’ of Thai and a couple glasses of red wine. And she mentioned the ring and how ‘if I ever found one like it’ she’d love to have it to remind her of our friendship and me. (High praise that made me cry.)  I explained that the one I was wearing was actually an eBay find to replace the original one which, because of daily wear, had thinned down and required too much restoration to be wearable and that I had managed to sell the original for scrap completely paying for the replacement I was wearing (set with cabochon sapphires). That night I got on eBay and found three rings for Amy to consider – she chose, made an offer which was accepted and now wears the one most like mine and, on its receipt, was quick to drop me a note to say “Hi There! My ring came today! I love it – reminds me of you!!! Hugs!!” What could be lovelier? These are enough alike to be the ultimate sister rings without being icky and creepy!! Happy Anniversary Amy.

Jennifer and I also have sister rings though she bought ours for us two years ago – truly one of the grandest gifts I have ever received – following our mutual reading of Lisa See’s Snow Flower and the Secret Fan and then seeing the movie together; we are a remarkable parallel to See’s characters of Lily and Snow Flower.  Our rings are Halo from Lyndsay Caleo – 14kt gold, mine (shown) in Labradorite (alongside my Elizabeth Gage dolphin ring) and Jennifer originally with two of the smaller stoned ones stacked of Moonstone and the other of Labradorite (there was a mistake in the order so we negotiated).  The stones specifically chosen for the protection they offer for both of our respective astrological signs.

There is immeasurable comfort to me in having us wearing these rings now.  Small talismans to provide connection between us energetically that ground and nourish me as I embrace the next chapter of my life and Amy and Jennifer their own paths though we are 4400 miles apart from one another. It’s pouring down rain, the lightning and thunder just kicked in, my date cancelled because of weather, I am heating up some split pea soup I made the day before yesterday to take the chill out of me and the air and I am, quite frankly, missing the comfortable nest of my apartment in Rochester. So in looking down at my hands while I type my girlfriends you are with me; I love you both very much.

To everyone else – be the kind of friend worthy of such friendship regardless of your gender. Love fully without smothering. Don’t be ‘needy’. Be unconditional in your support. Be brave, be authentic, be “there” when no one else but you will do.

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Eh gads, I am a Feminist?

I very clearly recall a conversation between my parents at the dinner table in the late 60s or very early 70s. My brother and I were in school all day at this point, and while my mother had an expansive vegetable garden to tend, and read novels like, oh gawd, Mandingo (I remember sneaking a page and being mortified of the vivid description of a rather endowed man’s anatomy), she also sewed, baked and cooked, but she wanted to get a little part time job at the local pharmacy as a cashier, to have her own money and get out of the house. My father told her in no uncertain terms that if she went to work “it will put us into a different tax bracket” and that was the end of the discussion.  (Lord knows she’s never expressed her opinions to his face in 54 years of marriage. )

It’s notable that my father’s favorite TV show of this time was All in the Family, the parody of a ultra-bigoted, racist and sexist man, a man all too literally sitting at my kitchen table each evening. It pains my heart that, as so many of you reading this will attest, the telling line of the theme song “guys like us we had it made” reflecting a nostalgia for a different time when women stayed home (like my mother) is still with us and our collective humanity. And “angry old white guys” are making things difficult and ugly for so many because the world as they would like it to be doesn’t exist – exerting excessive control, spouting abhorrent rhetoric, always seems to escalate when this segment of society feels threatened. (My father peeled rubber down the driveway throwing gravel, stormed out of rooms with the toss of his chair, or gave you ‘the look’ whenever he was challenged or somehow something anyone else knew and expressed was contrary to his closely held view.)

Growing up in a childhood environment such as this, and with all the ills that remain for women to fight against even to this day, how is it that I have not actively and passionately embrace this moniker until recently?

I mean at 12 I was having a conversation about Roe v Wade with my priest and I have struggled against the barriers to equal pay throughout adulthood, the mere idea of human trafficking makes me quiver with anger, and yet it took a social media chat with a man of Latin heritage who can claim serious credibility in “enlightenment” to push me over the edge and realise, I AM A FEMINIST! (if you aren’t also you need to watch this video from the brilliant Lacy Green.)

This ‘title’ doesn’t feel authentic to me yet (there are women and men I know that truly fight the good fight every day, utterly committed, and they are damn loud about it) but (for clarity, just now) I called up Merriam-Webster online and according to their site feminism is “the theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes”, who wouldn’t want that? (Okay, other than the Republican Party in the United States and the ultra-Orthodox of any and all religions.) Feminism, in case you reading this were unaware, actually traces its roots back to the age of Enlightenment and the hero of said movement Jean-Jacques Rousseau. 

My claim to being a feminist came about because the aforementioned man posted an image on his Facebook wall entitled ‘Tennis Sweets’ (not a reference point to Sugarpova) which  featured a nubile young woman in (ridiculously) high heels, the shortest white pleated tennis skirt imaginable, lace panties, no shirt, no bra and a white sweater draped in such a way as to just cover her nipples. This was in such a stark contrast the Universalist mindset of love he had presented that I was compelled to call him out on it, and he responded that he took it down but not for me (okay, fine, whatever).

What’s odd is that in his posting the image he did me a huge favour, so I thanked him and expressed: “my reaction told me something I didn’t truly realise about myself – eh gads, I am a Feminist!”

And then he wrote: “That’s not healthy… Be human first… Your sex is not you…”

If you think about it, this is kind of funny because the image that prompted this personal discovery for me was about sex, a woman’s sex, and objectifying her rather than seeing her ‘in fullness of being’; and that has ALWAYS been an issue for me, the objectification. (How one woman balanced the ‘creepy man syndrome’ – do click thru, it’s brilliant!)

Equally so, I suppose, is the assumption that he made earlier (and men often make) that unless a woman has a partner, a lover, a man, there is something wrong (with her). Because despite the fact that he freely acknowledged my “great soul” and later in our text conversation wrote “enlightenment will disable all thoughts of need of equality between man and woman.. That’s my point… I believe your higher then you believe so…” he had pointedly asked: “How you survive the nights? in terms of sex? or companionship? You have a active lover?”

Sigh. So even when we have reached a higher level of consciousness, our souls having a human experience, it ever comes down to ‘who are you spending your nights with’? And if you aren’t spending your nights with someone that somehow either makes you a freak, diminishes you in the eyes of humanity or evokes pity. Does anyone express such about monks, nuns and sadhus?

So let me be clear, Madison Kimrey is the kind of chutzpah packing feminist I wish I was and she’s not yet 13 years old (I sincerely hope no one is asking her who she is spending her nights with)! I absolutely love that she has taken on uber-conservative Phyllis Schlafly  in the common ground of a bra to eloquently express that equality really means having choices. My choice, as a woman and as a feminist, and more accurately as an evolved soul having a human experience, is not to share my bed simply for the sake of doing so.  The energy in the sacred sanctuary of our sleep needs to be nurturing, protective, harmonious, inclusive and yes equal – and I am unapologetic about abstinence and exclusion until I find that singular person unquestionably worthy of aligning all of my chakras as I take responsibility for the care of his.  

There will be consequences for your stupidity! 😉

In the meantime there’s something to be said for being a feminist, a humanist, a mindful sensualist and for not suffering fools. (Yes, I unfriended the Latin man. )

If you enjoy my blog please share it with your friends on Facebook, Google+ and Twitter – I am @TeresaFritschi. To order my book, please click on the cover art of my book below, thank you! 

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Nostalgic and guilty pleasures found in marshmallow Peeps, honouring Mrs. Dwyer

I am a hypocrite in my food choices for the span of time each spring that it takes me to eat one four pack of Just Born (always the yellow ones) Peeps. I succumb to this guilty pleasure to remember and honour Mrs Dwyer.

Argh, sugar, corn syrup, gelatin, and various food dyes – but I don’t care (though I wish I KNEW IF the sugar was GMO-free). 

Mrs. Dwyer was my 1st grade teacher.

Easter-time 1967, I was 6 years old and had a stabbing pain in my right side and a slight fever. Mrs. Dwyer sent me down to the nurses’ office. I remember hobbling the seemingly endless distance over the terrazzo floors, wincing with every step. Within the hour I was in the Emergency Room and headed for surgery to remove my appendix which they later told me had nearly ruptured. When I woke up Mrs. Dwyer had sent a bouquet of flowers – peppermint striped and white carnations, a couple of red and white paper straws bent to ‘take a sip’ all served up to resemble an ice cream soda. It was the first time (and obviously memorable) I had received flowers! I remember that they smelled like cinnamon, and to this day I can’t see red and white striped carnations without having my heart clench, getting a lump in my throat and thinking of Mrs. Dwyer. I have a chair that I reclaimed and refinished in my early twenties that I finally recognised years later was a tribute to her love – I am about to sell it after living with it since 1983 – but what is in my heart and head ties this to her and who she helped make me.

In retrospect there is no doubt in my mind that I was one of her favourites (after all the woman also came to my wedding and rushed the altar to bestow her blessings and kisses and hugs when I was pronounced a married woman at 23) but then, I was a scared little kid with a huge bloody incision laced with cat gut  who had just been soothed and affirmed as special by someone I thought (still do) extraordinary.

When I came home from the hospital three or four days later Mrs Dwyer magically appeared with an enormous (to me, at the time) Easter basket and amidst the floss grass were speckled eggs, jelly beans, a chocolate bunny and PEEPS!  I am pretty sure she had taken the Peeps out of their cello wrapper because I remember their being just a little crunchy on the outside. The yellow sugar coating and the evaporating moisture of the gooey middle forming a crust. It is still the only way I can eat them – poke a hole in the package wait 24 hours and devour! Each one makes me 6 again and knowing fully and completely that someone (outside of my family) loved me. I was (and still am) the single yellow Peep in the sea of pink, purple and blue Peeps, utterly unique and special because Mrs. Dwyer made me so!

Our childhoods are filled with such sweet pleasures that we rarely recognise for just how special they are at the time (or later) and whilst I don’t live in the past, sometimes these extraordinary moments appear like a rainbow with all the associate blessings and I am so very grateful.

Recently another iconic brand of my childhood has been making quite a bit of social media noise for its “Wholesome” ad campaign launched a month ago (today). Honey Maid Snacks produces the ubiquitous graham cracker used for S’Mores and cheesecake crusts (like my Aunt Wanda Novak made) and made so famous (for a certain generation of us) by Bill Cosby in his routine on Kindergarten (timestamp 2:00). And, like many of the nearly 6 million people who have watched the commercial on YouTube and witnessed the ‘haters’ response to it, I applauded and cheered (and yes, Tweeted) when their response to the ugliness of a (very loud) but narrow minded minority hit the circuit about a week ago – entitled LOVE. But to the two artists whose efforts turned all the comments on the Wholesome ad into art – a special shout out. I noticed that the ugly comments you rolled inward, while the beautiful responses you rolled outward, yeah, I noticed. Love, should always be radiated outward and (though it pains me) let the ugliness destroy itself in its own shadows. We are one, and your art united all of our hearts – thank you.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I know it seems like I got off track from Mrs. Dwyer and Peeps – I have not, I assure you. Because while I have been thinking about graham crackers and Peeps, and the joys of childhood and nostalgic longings for what ‘was simpler’ I found a S’Mores recipe – made with Peeps! Coined S’meeps! And I thought OMG that is SO COOL – so I Tweeted that out as well!  Now, a tower of smushed, melty chocolate and Peeps is a far cry from Bill Cosby’s Kindergarten but truly, emotionally anyway, as intrinsically innocent and perfect as my long ago Easter basket.

No Peeps or Bunnies were harmed in the writing of this blog post!

I wish you beauty in everything that touches your life, and hope that today (and every day) you will find a way to bring some memorable sweetness to your own and someone’s life who least expects such. Go forth and Peep!

Sending you love in Heaven Mrs. Dwyer, and an enormous heart filled with gratitude.

 

If you enjoy my blog please share it with your friends on Facebook, Google+ and Twitter – I am @TeresaFritschi. To order my print or ebook from Amazon, please click on the cover art of my book, ebook also available through Barnes & Noble and Lulu, thank you! 

 

Greenwashing does not make your company a pillar of #CSR or sustainability! – Guest Blog for Ethical Value

 Guest post for Ethical Value, co-published simultaneously

The Coca-Cola Co. ‏@CocaColaCo  “We believe investing in women is the absolute key to economic growth.” Charlotte Oades @USCCFBiz4Good #5by20. #Inspire2Act #IWD2014

Shortly thereafter came this retweet ‘love’ from a very smart man that I respect (who will remain nameless):

RT @CocaColaCo Fm producers #suppliers #distributors #retailers & recyclers we aim to empower 5M women http://CokeURL.com/l2me8  #Inspire2Act

I saw these Tweets and my stomach convulsed.  Not that empowering women is a bad thing, no, THAT IS A VERY GOOD THING, but, as Collective Evolution (and many other sources) so aptly points out:

“Coke uses “public relations propaganda” to convince consumers and entire nations that it is an “environmental company” when really it is linked to pollution, water shortages, and disease.”

‘The smart man’ I mention, in RTing this particular Tweet, seems to have bought into the green-washing of Coca-Cola courtesy of their marketing team (as do hundreds of millions of people on a global basis), and this not only stuns me because it is so contrary to “his brand” but also makes me sad and angry.  But it is this sentence, from Coca-Cola’s own website, that pushed me over the edge:

“As we move toward our 2020 Vision of doubling our business by 2020, enabling the economic empowerment of women will undoubtedly be an important contributor to our success.”

Let’s be clear, Coca-Cola’s #5X20 initiative isn’t REALLY, altruistically, about lifting women out of poverty it’s about market share, doubling their business, and in doing so, contributing to the health decline of 80% of the worlds’ populations whose average household income is less than $10 (USD) a day! Think about that for a second when the vending machine at your office is likely asking $2 for a single 20 ounce bottle of Coke! So I Tweeted:

#CSR? @CocaColaCo’s #5X20 is actually #causerelatedmarketing NOT #empowerment for #women! #LiesToldOnTwitter

Artwork by Miranda Coss

Just so we are clear this isn’t a prejudice based in a Coke versus Pepsi (or any of their respective other beverage brands) preference; I am not and have never been a big cola drinker, while I do enjoy the occasional Dr. Brown’s, Izze or Orangina I would be willing to bet that my consumption of these amounts to less than a total of ten 16 ounce servings in any given YEAR. I think you should read this about what drinking Coke and Pepsi actually do to the body, and I can only hope you start to view your habit with a little more caution toward your health (or that of your kids and grandkids.

But I digress; this post is not primarily concerned with our beverage choices but the use of public relations to obfuscate the reality of Coca-Cola (and other multinational corporations) when it comes to legitimate social responsibility practices.  By leveraging social media, optimization of search engine results with technical acumen, strategic thought  and proactive and diligent management Coca-Cola is, to a large degree, successfully controlling its message.  To underscore my point, I just did a search on Google “Coca-Cola environmental impact” of the 3.3 million results, (Google is the most popular SE in terms of use – see graph) on the first page of results ‘above the page break’ Coca-Cola has ensured their placement in three of the top five results – Wikipedia comes in at the #2 spot and at #5 is KillerCoke.org. (According to MarketShareHitsLink.com, October 2010, 75% of users never scroll past the first page of search results, which is why having a strategic communications plan that includes Web 2.0 for brand enrichment is so critical in our hyper-connected world.)

So what results are you, the consumer or a journalist doing research, going to get when a desire suddenly seizes you to learn more? Unless you are willing to dig deep – you would never discover that despite their “plant based” bottle PR campaigns that the resulting bottles which both Pepsi and Coke are hyping as being eco-friendly are STILL chemically the same, absolutely identical to the polyethylene terepthalate, or PET, and high-density polyethylene, or HDPE, that regular plastic bottles are made of: these carry the same negative human health and environmental impacts as plastic made from fossil fuels. And yet the messaging makes those of you drinking the 14 (yes, fourteen different) billion (USD) brands from Pepsi   or the 108 (yes, ONE HUNDRED AND EIGHT!) beverage brands from Coca-Cola with all those plastic bottles going into the environment, all those trillions of empty calories being consumed, all the resources used and subsequent negative impact on the planet – in particular water use feel a bit righteous in your consumer choice – my darlings you have absolutely no reason to!

http://www.casavaria.com/hotspring/groups/crisis-policy-forum/forum/topic/clean-water-scarce-for-3-billion-people-worldwide/

“Drinking” water in Ghana

I am not anti-Capitalism, but I have never, ethically, been able to use my skills and passion to promote an employer or a client whose business I did not fully respect (ie, prostitute myself for a paycheck).  I recently had a conversation with the CEO and founder of a technology firm whose platform is designed to help (genuinely) lift the bottom 3 billion of humankind out of poverty – the same number who also do not have access to clean drinking water or basic sanitation, the identical target market for doubling Coca-Cola’s business by 2020 for whom it will actually be cheaper to drink a cola beverage than to drink clean water! It’s fine to make money, it’s fine to make money in emerging markets, it’s a noble and wonderful thing to give a hand-up (rather than a hand-out), but in my mind’s eye it’s NOT FINE to sugar-coat actual objectives to make them more palatable to your consuming public and distort reality.  If Coca-Cola and Pepsi and the rest of their beverage industry brethren REALLY WANT to help empower women then I suggest taking 8% of their annual profits and fund opportunities for education previously unknown to all but a few of the bottom 3 billion of our neighbours or the various efforts to provide clean water around the world, their philanthropic and CSR departments can one stop shop for worthy projects at Charity Water, Water or in this blog post from Huffington .

Corporate Social Responsibility and the companion sustainability protocols are not ’cause related marketing’ (which is what Coca-Cola’s #5X20 actually is), what CSR ‘should be’ truly is the heart and soul, conscience and character of doing the right thing within a corporate environment.

If you enjoy my blog please share it with your friends on Facebook, Google+ and Twitter – I am @TeresaFritschi. To order my book, please click on the cover art of my book below, thank you! 

Infinite Gifts

My dearest girlfriend (ever) Jennifer turned 44.  As any thinking, right or left brain, person will recognise 4+4 = 8, or turned sideways, the eight becomes the symbol for infinity (created by John Wallis in 1655 the symbol refers to things without any limit, which Jennifer attempts to condition corporate clients toward).

I don’t have the market cornered on being an ‘old soul’ but through my filter I subscribe that we forget too much of what is meaningful by over-thinking and in the process we experience a loss to natural elegance, the gifts perpetually and abundantly present (into infinity) throughout the living of our lives which are often free for embracing.

By 44 we will have pondered the meaning of life, our connection to the universe, what gifts we have been blessed with genetically, what we have managed in cultivating our brains, polished our skills, and (hopefully) go about leaving the world a better place as a result of our embracing those gifts.

In truth it is the gift of our innocence and humility that creates more dramatic resonance than we can imagine – if we could just maintain that level of status quo whilst the rest of us ‘develops’.  A child of six will pluck handfuls of dandelions with only the desire to ‘surprise and delight’ someone s/he loves. These are always presented (if you pay attention) with ‘hope’ which can be read in their body language, of hiding the ‘bouquet’ behind their back, the usual accompanying language of “I have a surprise for you” and a sweet expression mixed with anxiety (a desire to be worthy in the eyes of the recipient).  The appropriate response should ALWAYS be – “OH, darling! I love it!” But as we grow older, more cynical, more juiced up on our importance (always, I think, riddled with insecurities) and our role in the universe it’s so very easy to misplace the magic of tenderness, the beauty of humility (the thought or thinking behind the gift) with the bravado of bigger, faster, more expensive, flashier attempts of using our purchasing power for the purpose of validation and HEY! LOOK AT ME!

I am a ferocious gardener, but without a mindfulness of which each requires to live not a single plant will thrive – and even with that knowledge I still sometimes fail.  Yet I never tire of trying to instill this lifelong passion of being Mother Nature’s vehicle on Earth, for being a steward of the planet we inhabit to the next generation.  Gardening is an art infused with science, it is beauty cultivated or left to ‘run with scissors’ over  landscapes, it is a 16^th century Persian miniature painting accompanied by Rumi’s words, the scent of a ruffled lily, a tiny flower head of lavender on carpet of emerald green Irish moss.  The ‘quietude’ which finds its center in both a garden and the gardener is without question Divine. But the garden itself is a temple, a gymnasium (extreme fitness devotees would likely wilt after hauling compost for an hour) and an ashram. Only in existing within this quietude can we observe a bird pause to splash with wild abandon (and clearly gratitude) in a freshly filled bird-bath.  My greatest joy can be found in the reverence one of my ‘disciples’ has for protecting the life of a worm, delighting in the butterfly alighting a blossom or when they remember the name of a plant (taken out of the context of the garden where they had their first encounter) or asking if they can water the plants. Each of these is both ‘cause and effect’, the ‘pebble-in-the-pond’, a rich kinesis of our larger world, and a harmony we are charged with striving ever toward – whichever of our innate gifts are most useful to deploy to disrupt unfathomable conditions of ugliness, pain and suffering.

Whether a vacant urban lot or our soul, these canvases are gardens simply waiting to be reclaimed and nurtured, a gift of self that encourages others to connect and manifest a ‘greater good’ and so it shall (hopefully) be for infinity.

If you enjoy my blog please share it with your friends on Facebook, Google+ and Twitter – I am @TeresaFritschi. To order my book, please click on the cover art of my book below, thank you!