May 25 is National Missing Children Awareness Day

Statistics from the U.S. Department of Justice help shed light on the problem.


Missing children

•An estimated 797,500 children were reported missing each year.

•More than than 2,000 children are reported missing every day, but thankfully the vast majority of them are recovered quickly.


Non-family abductions

•An estimated 58,200 children were taken in one year by someone outside the family

•An estimated 115 children experienced a stereotypical kidnapping, the rarest type of abduction potentially posing great risk of serious harm.

Parental and Family abductions

•More than 200,000 children are victims of family abduction, where the child was taken by a noncustodial parent, EACH YEAR.

National Missing and Exploited Children

http://www.take25.org/page.asp?page=54

US State Department notes "epidemic" of child snatching

"Parental kidnapping is one of the worst forms of child abuse." --US State Department

The U.S. State Department has recognized that parental and family abductions in the USA are occuring at epidemic rates and provides information (see excerpts) through the web link below:

"Sixty percent of all children in the United States now spend some time in a single parent home. In these single parent families (354,000 cases reported in 1988), one parent has taken unilateral action to deprive the other parent of contact with the couple’s child, in half of these cases (163,200), according to one study, the intent of the abducting parent was to alter permanently custodial access by concealing the child or taking the child out of the state or out of the country."

"The rise in international child abduction can be attributed to the increase in marriages and divorces between bi-national couples. These marriages, by their nature, come with cultural, ethnic, and religious differences. The ease of international travel and the fact that many dual national children possess two passports facilitate abductions."


"When non-custodial parents resort to kidnapping, they believe they are acting in the best interests of their children. Although a minority of parenta1 kidnappers may actually save their children by taking them out of the reach of the other parent, the motives of most parents who steal their children are not at all altruistic. Parents find a myriad of reasons or self-justification for stealing a child from another parent Some abductors will find fault with the other parent for nonsensical transgressions; others will steal a child for revenge."

"Although most parents who steal their children attempt to justify their actions as the only way to ensure the best interests of the child, the child’s best interests are usually not considered. In fact, the best interest of the child mandates that parents ask themselves what the consequences of the abduction will be on the child. If parents had the foresight and emotional empathy of the impact of lying to a child across time and deriding the custodial parent, then they would not do it."


"Parental abductors have several common characteristics: the abductors are likely to dismiss the value of the other parent to the child. They believe that they know, more than anyone else, including a judge, what is best for their child. Second, the children abducted are likely to be very young (2-3 years old), since they are easy to transport and cannot verbally protest or tell others of their history. If older, such children, often manipulated, have colluded with the abducting parent. Finally, the abductors work with an extensive social network of other persons for practical assistance and to keep their whereabouts hidden."

US State Department: Parental child snatching "one of the worst forms of child abuse."

Jim Pepper Lives!...Let's celebrate!

You are going to want to be in Portland in early October 2010. Jim Pepper Arts Festival announcements coming soon!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YnBdaYKqMUs

On the Republican Oregon Governor Candidate Debate

By Sean Cruz

Portland, Oregon—Ha ha ha ha haha haha…ha ha ha ha… haha…ha haha haha ha haha…ha ha ha…wheeee….ha ha haha ha ha…no no no….I can’t stand it…ho ho ho…help me, please…ha ha ha…I can’t get up…ha ha ha…please stop…ha ha ha…no…ha ha…my stomach hurts…no…don’t say that... ha haha ….

Here's the link to the debate. Be forewarned....

http://www.katu.com/about/events/92241644.html

I hurried to my son's gravesite

By Sean Cruz


I hurried to my son’s gravesite as the sun was coming up

Today was—would have been—was, and now forever will always be was, nevermore is, his birthday, and I would mark it with a vigil until sunset, with a vigil and a song, with a song and a lament, and with these words:



I hurried to my son’s gravesite as the sun was coming up

I brought him flowers, a glass vase, music and incense, an orange

I hurried to my son’s gravesite as the sun was coming up

I brought him photographs, dried fruit and nuts, and my blind Airedale Rex

I hurried to my son’s gravesite as the sun was coming up

I brought him a painted stone, and sips of tequila to share on his birthday

The sun was coming up



My son lies near the top of the hill

Among strangers he lies near the top of the hill

My son lies near the top of the hill

Among strangers he lies near the top of the hill



In the late afternoon came a grieving father

To a grave nearby came a grieving father

A son forever four lay beneath a marble racecourse

An oval with his fifty favorite cars embedded forever

Selected personally by the grieving father

Maintained personally by the grieving father

He worked in silence with his brushes and oils

The headstone cut racecar shape, a heart broken forever

In the late afternoon came the grieving father

Father of a four years forever child



Like a sailor who lies buried where he washed ashore

On this lonely knoll far from any semblance of home

My son lies near the top of the hill

Among strangers he lies near the top of the hill

My son lies near the top of the hill

Among strangers he lies near the top of the hill


----------------

The vigil took place on March 21, 2010, Aaron’s birthday, at a cemetery in El Dorado Hills, California. The four-year-old’s father was one of the few persons to visit the cemetery that day, and no one came to remember my son but me.

I wrote this piece on April 20, 2010.

It was five years ago today, on April 20, 2005 that I received a phone call from the police in Payson, Utah, who told me that my son was found comatose and unresponsive there in his mother’s vacant former home. Aaron had a serious seizure disorder aggravated by years of medical neglect, emotional abuse and abandonment inflicted during his kidnapped years in Utah.

He was pronounced dead on April 25, 2005, and buried near Sacramento on May 3, 2005, a location convenient for his mother and her fifth husband, Aaron’s 3rd stepdad, a man who never knew my son.

There is no closure on a kidnapped child. The death of the child does not create closure.

The death of a kidnapped child only adds another dimension to the tragedy, to the trauma.

A kidnapping is a continuing crime, and so are its consequences.

Aaron’s grave lies no more than twenty miles from Sacramento, from the state Capitol, and it is there that I will seek the introduction of legislation making California the second state in the nation to adopt Aaron’s Law.

Watch me work!

Jim Pepper Live at Raab on cd

PAO Records has issued this live performance of Jim Pepper with the Amina Claudine Myers Trio on cd, titled "Afro Indian Blues"

Recorded May 19, 1991
International Jazz Festival
Raab, Austria

http://www.pao.at/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=54&Itemid=80

My copy just arrived in the mail.

Portland celebrates Cesar Chavez Day in grand style!

By Sean Cruz

Marching bands! Salsa! Viva Cesar Chavez!

The newly-renamed Cesar Chavez Boulevard was the place to be in Portland on March 31, Cesar Chavez’s birthday, where members of the Committee-Once-Bent-on-Renaming-Interstate led a parade of marchers, floats, drill teams, puppy dogs and candidates for public office before exultant throngs of celebrants who lined the Street Also Named 39th Avenue.

The event went a long ways towards establishing Portland’s reputation as second to none in the honoring of the late Mexican American civil rights leader, and one can only hope that next year’s 2011 Second Annual Cesar Chavez Day Celebration will come close to matching the fervor expressed in this one.

The Hispanic Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce won the Best Float award with its entry, a block-long bean burrito (which happened to be the only Mexican food available along the entire length of Cesar Chavez Boulevard) on wheels.

The list of speechmakers is too long to be listed here, but let it be said that what was lost in inaccuracy and misinformation was made up for in me-tooing, hiney-smooching and vote-begetting, just like during the campaign to rename a street—any street—no matter what any street—even this one--for the Chicano civil rights leader.

Cesar Chavez Day Grand Marshalls Luis Ornelas and Sean Cruz presided over the parade, riding in a chopped and channeled yellow ’57 Chevy lowrider with California license plates, red flames and Chicano art painted on its sides, giant foam dice hanging from the rear view mirror, bumping up and down just like in the Cheech and Chong movies.

The event’s organizers ran into an unforeseen problem when the parade reached the neighborhoods in NE Portland where Cesar Chavez Boulevard is only five feet wide, but it is hoped that they will figure out a solution before next year’s 2011 Second Annual Cesar Chavez Day Celebration,when it is also hoped that Mexican American comedian George Lopez will accept an invitation to serve as Grand Marshall.

-------

Cesar Chavez was a Mexican-American migrant farmworker, the son of Mexican migrant farmworkers, who became a civil rights leader of national importance, beginning with his work to ban the backbreaking, crippling short hoe then in common use from California to Texas.

He is regarded as a transformational figure in the international struggle for human rights, noted for his Ghandi-like non-violent tactics and self-sacrificing approach.

His many long fasts no doubt shortened his life.

Ancestors, Penance, California and Aaron's Law

By Sean Cruz

Portland, Oregon—

I arrived in Fairfield California on Monday planning first to visit my parents’ and grandparents’ gravesites and then look up some old friends, but my itinerary changed as soon as I arrived at the cemetery and saw the condition of the graves.

A pile of green glass shards, the remains of a broken vase left by one of her friends, lay beside my grandmother’s tombstone, needed immediate attention, and as I reached down to collect the pieces one of them bit me hard on the end of the finger, cut me so deeply it was still bleeding the next day.

“Ow!” I said. “Lo siento mucho, grandma. I am sorry.” Thus began a daylong conversation with my ancestors.

“Where have you been, mijo? What took you so long?” she said, silently but directly, pointedly.

“I am sorry, grandma. I love you.”

I know she was glad I had come, had returned home.

The Cruz family plots are located on a hillside in the old section of the cemetery, where the dense, irregular clusters of upright monuments and above ground tombs make upkeep difficult and more time consuming for the maintenance crews. There’s an Old California feel to the place, many of the names Spanish first and last, and there are many old shade trees scattered throughout and houses in the surrounding neighborhoods with red terra cotta tile roofs.

Blood on my clothes, on the side of the car, gushing out of my finger, sopping up the blood with paper towels, I cleared the graves where my grandparents lay side by side, where my parents lay side by side, where my beloved uncle Victor lay, he of the movie star good looks, idolized by all of us children, whose tire caught a patch of gravel in the valley one summer night in 1960, spun him out of control to an early death at the age of 26.

I had returned to Fairfield only twice in the last ten years.

Ten years ago we laid my mom to rest here beside my dad, who had preceded her by twenty-five years.

I came here for a funeral visit five years ago also, the day after we buried my son Aaron in El Dorado Hills, north of Sacramento. At the time of his death, I had refused to argue with my former wife over where Aaron would be buried, and she had chosen a place convenient for her and stepdad number three, who had never known my son, a story for another day.

This is an ancestor story, an elders story, a generations story, a story of gratitude, of paying respect, not the story of a young man lying alone on a hillside among strangers, a son as abducted in death as he was kidnapped in life.

I will get to that story in a few days.

The headstones all faced east into the warm morning sun. The ground was baked hard, the crab grass tough and difficult to dig out. I worked with the one tool that I happened to have with me, a folding shovel with a 12-inch handle.

I was aware that I could call any one of several friends and borrow landscaping tools, and a maintenance truck festooned with real shovels and other equipment was parked no more than fifty feet away, but I elected to work with what I had brought with me.

My ill-preparation was part of my conversation with my folks, particularly with my Dad.

“If you had thought this through, son, there wouldn’t be a problem with the tools.”

“Yes. You’re right, Dad. Next time, I will come prepared.”

The ground was so hard that the shovel was mostly useless as a digging tool. I adjusted the handle to use it as a hoe to chop at the edges, and I thought about that, too.

A hoe with the short handle. El cortito. The short one. Short hoes similar to this one had ruined the backs of countless millions of mostly-Mexican farmworkers before Cesar Chavez organized the effort that resulted in its ban from the gringo fields, and I was reminded of how hard that labor was, down on my hands and knees as the sun rose on my back.

A couple of hours into the work, the hard ground separated the blade from the handle and I finished edging the sites chopping with the blade only, held between my two hands.

Tools hung in racks on the maintenance truck nearby, and friends were only a phone call away, but there was a certain amount of penance to be paid this day, and devices that would ease the work or shorten the time would interfere with the process and intrude on my silent conversations.

I broke for lunch, drove to meet old, old family friend Chuck Johnson for cheeseburgers and reminiscence. I had brought with me a Christmas card that his parents had sent to mine decades ago, with it a photograph of the Johnson family on it, and I had wanted to return it to them, this too in the spirit of paying respect to our elders.

I returned to the cemetery with bags of topsoil and live flowers to plant in the ground.

I had brought glass vases from Portland and fresh flowers cut from my friend Michael Iverson’s Sacramento yard for the graves, and I had brought a rock from the Columbia River, a chunk of basalt with my son’s name and yellow flowers painted on it to place with my parents, the grandson whose name now references Oregon’s Aaron’s Law, the only law in the nation whereby persons who abduct children can be held accountable for the damage they cause in the lives of innocents.

I’ll have more to say about that, too. With this trip to Sacramento, I began the work to see Aaron’s Law take effect in California. I brought several Columbia River rocks with Aaron Cruz’s name painted on them, and I place the rocks where I plant the seed of the Law.

As I molded the new soil with my hands, planted and watered the new flowers, completed my conversations with the folks, with grandma and grandpa and Uncle Victor, I was aware that this day marked a new beginning for me.

I will be back. Soon. Often. There is a foundation to build on here.

Family. Generations. Ancestors. Past…and the future.

My parent's headstone reads: "Sunshine, fresh flowers, green grass. Together at last."

That California sun spoke to me. I drove on those California roads and highways with the windows rolled down, just like in the old days, just like home.

Remembering Ben Westlund

Portland, Oregon--

I think it was Ben Westlund's enormous humanity and the openness with which he shared his feelings, his sincerity, that made him larger than life, so widely respected and so effective as a legislator and as a public servant.

I remember watching his House speech when he shared his cancer diagnosis with us all. It was one of the singular, most remarkable events that took place in a legislative session during my six years as a Senate staffer.

I hope that the video of Ben's speech becomes widely seen and appreciated as we consider the life and achievements of this great Oregonian, and as we consider how the State as a whole should move forward.

Ben, you left us too soon.

Here’s the link to Ben’s “Return from the hospital” speech:

http://www.benwestlund.com/

My last word on Portland Cesar Chavez street renaming

By Sean Cruz

Portland, Oregon--Cesar Chavez was a Mexican-American migrant farmworker, the son of Mexican migrant farmworkers, who became a civil rights leader of national importance, beginning with his work to ban the backbreaking, crippling short hoe then in common use from California to Texas.

He is regarded as a transformational figure in the international struggle for human rights, noted for his Ghandi-like non-violent tactics and self-sacrificing approach.

His many long fasts no doubt shortened his life.

He is recognized in Portland Oregon in some vague sense as a Latino or Hispanic, where his memory is marginalized by the renaming of a street of minor significance, noteworthy by its utter absence of any feature that would link it to Chavez or to the people for whom he struggled.

The street-renaming effort fed not one hungry child.

…actually, come to think of it, this might not be my last word on the subject.

Support for Oregon annual legislative sessions

By Sean Cruz

Portland--Some people don't much want government to function at all, and in Oregon they are generally unified in opposition to annual legislative sessions.

Any idea that sounds like it might have the effect of reducing the size of government, even at random, has a built-in constituency among the yahoos….

Take the kicker, for example—please….

But what problems do you solve in your workplace or in your life by dealing with them every other year? Only in Oregon and five other states….

The state should have made this move decades ago….

Point to a biennial system that works in the 21st century, and to an example of a right-sized government at any level, and explain how that fits Oregon, there’s a challenge for you….

But some people cannot be reached with a logical argument….

You have to outvote them in November.

Not Guilty!

by Sean Cruz

A Vancouver jury returned a verdict of Not Guilty yesterday on charges of assault and harassment stemming from my confrontation with my children’s kidnapper in the lobby of the Hilton Hotel last October (Happy Valentine’s Day!).

The outcome became a dicey proposition during pre-trial motions, when the prosecution successfully moved to prohibit any discussion or mention of my children’s kidnapping or Kory Wright’s participation in the abduction during trial.

The prosecution’s motions also disallowed any references to Aaron’s Law, or to the contents of the envelope (which contained a copy of Aaron’s Law), or of my motives for the encounter other than the embarrassment factor, or of what exactly was said during the event. Consequently, the jury only heard that there were “some papers” or “an envelope” involved, and never heard what was actually said or exchanged between my children’s abductor and myself.

Also during pretrial, the prosecution moved successfully to bar my blog writings or any mention thereof while the jury was present.

I’m telling you, it was really difficult to answer some of the questions posed when I was on the witness stand without crossing into forbidden territory. At several points, I was concerned that it might appear that I was avoiding answering some questions, when I was trying to figure out how to answer truthfully with the handicap that answering the question fully was not going to be allowed. I’m sure that worked to my disadvantage.

The jury never learned that my children had been abducted, which was the whole point of the encounter in the first place, to force Kory Wright into a courtroom where he would have to testify under oath to events that he had previously lied about.

The outcome I was looking for all along was a perjury charge against Kory Wright.

Ironically, the prosecution relied on statements I had written on Blogolitical Sean as their basis for pressing charges without ever telling the jury where the statements came from, since the blog writings were disallowed at their own insistence.

The language I had used to describe the incident was intentionally insulting and inflammatory, but was largely rhetorical. It was never intended to be a literal account of the confrontation.

I had written that I had both slapped my children’s abductor with the envelope containing Aaron’s Law and had thrown it at him, bouncing it off his face, but had actually done neither, although I had flipped it in his direction.

This was bait.

I was aware at the time that security cameras in the Hilton would capture the incident and thus I could describe the sequence of events with great latitude.

When Kory Wright filed his complaint against me using the identical language from my blog, “slapped” and “bounced”, I was extremely pleased. The language I had used rhetorically was being taken as a literal description, even an admission of guilt, which could easily be disproved.

After posting my description of the confrontation, I had felt compelled to call or email a number of friends to clarify that the slap was rhetorical, not actual, but otherwise let the writing stand unaltered as a continuing insult, just as an abduction is a continuing crime.

My next focus was to get the earliest possible trial date, to get Kory Wright into a courtroom as soon as the law would allow, and as I navigated through the process of hearings and conferences, representing myself, I never stated to anyone in the court system or to law enforcement that the language was rhetorical. I let it stand. I wanted to be taken seriously.

I was focused on my day in court like a laser beam, and very frustrated at the length of time it took to get there.

An unexpected complication arose when just before trial I finally saw the Hilton security video, taken from two perspectives in the lobby, neither ideal, and taken as a series of stills rather than as a running documentation of the confrontation.

The entire encounter, from start to finish lasted only 42 seconds, long enough to get through my brief talking points, serve Kory Wright with a copy of Aaron’s Law, and leave for my intended interview with a reporter from the Vancouver Columbian.

The stills, however, showed me with the envelope in my hand and then cut to where it was lying at Kory Wright’s feet.

I did not anticipate this at all. The stills showed an obvious heated exchange of words, me pointing my finger at my children’s abductor, but did not clarify whether contact occurred.

This caused me great concern at trial, as the prosecution sought to convict me with my own words, “slapped” and “bounced”, which I had stated to just about everyone, including a Vancouver police officer, who testified to that effect.

The fact is that I had indeed used those words to describe the incident… which was backfiring on me in an unexpected way…somewhere in here there is a lesson for me….

Kory Wright testified that I had reached out with the envelope in my hand and slapped him in the face with it. A bitch-slap encounter.

His witness testified that I had thrown the envelope and that he thought it had struck my children’s abductor somewhere in the chest. He was largely confused.

You really can’t have it both ways, although the prosecutor tried to prove that I had done both.

The bottom line is that the prosecution had to prove that an assault took place and that there was intent on my part to assault my children’s kidnapper. Same for the harassment charge.

My attorney, Mr. Blake Doré of Vancouver Defenders did a remarkable job. It gave me great comfort to watch him work. This man has a bright future.

The judge was tough but fair, and had an immensely likeable personality (ideal characteristics for the bench); nonetheless, I promised the Honorable Verne Schreiber afterwards that he wouldn’t see me before him again!

As for the prosecution, your narrow focus did nothing to advance the cause of justice. Every witness swears “to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth”, but you did your best to see that the truth did not get into the record or before the jury, and in that lies your only success. Choke on it.

POINT OF CLARIFICATION: The foregoing statement regarding choking is
meant rhetorically, not literally.

There’s a difference.

Lastly, the one point of satisfaction for me, apart from the acquittal, was to cause my children’s abductor to at last suffer a consequence for his criminal acts, even if it is only some embarrassment and time taken off from work to appear in court.

If he doesn’t like what I have to say, then he’s free to sue me.

I’m waiting for you, motherfucker.

The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth…that’s my defense.

Count on it.

Sarah Palin: Greatest Hits from Blogolitical Sean

Portland, Oregon--

“Moose-fed Sarah Palin stands poised to take the helm in 2012, ready as she will ever be. The mere thought brings cheer to millions; guffaws and foot-stamping warm the most threadbare spots in the soul, protect against winter’s chill, a place for her towards the end of the book (see link), splayed unpunctuated against the tide of reason…. What, me worry…?”

--Sean Cruz, November 2008

http://blogoliticalsean.blogspot.com/2008/11/decline-and-fall-of-american-empire.html


“Notes on the Vice-Presidential Debate:

“Governor Palin’s sentences are mostly unpunctuated by commas or periods, words fly out by the bucketful....

“She changes direction mid-paragraph, mid-sentence, mid-thought, without appearing to notice that she is genuinely superficial across a wide spectrum of issues....

“For the first time in my life, I feel reasonably qualified to assume the duties and responsibilities of the Office of the Vice President of the United States of America….”

--Sean Cruz, October 8 2008


http://blogoliticalsean.blogspot.com/2008/10/portland-oregon-sean-cruz-thanks.html


“You heard it here first! Sarah Palin's new book will be bundled with crayons! Recognizing that the people most likely to appreciate "Going Rogue" are unfamiliar with actual books, the publishers are tossing a box of crayons into the deal. The thing is, all of the colors are red....

--Sean Cruz November 13, 2009

http://blogoliticalsean.blogspot.com/2009/11/breaking-news-sara-palins-book-to-be.html


“According to her new book, “Going Rogue”, Sarah Palin is planning to find a suitable cabinet post for Joe the Plumber, ‘where he can do lots of thinkin’ and stuff’.

“In a late breaking development, still steaming from her prank telephone conversation last year with 'the President of France', the former Governor of Alaska is reported to be in discussions with Carrie Prejean, on the short list to join the Palin team as press secretary.” --Sean Cruz, November 14, 2009

http://blogoliticalsean.blogspot.com/2009/11/sarah-palin-prospective-cabinet-taking.html

On non-voting candidates for public office in Oregon

By Sean Cruz

The Oregonian’s Susan Nielsen wrote “Oregon candidates who don't vote should skip the race”, here:

http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/susan_nielsen/index.ssf/2010/01/those_pesky_elections_oregon_c.html

I agree wholeheartedly.

A poor voting record is a strong indicator that a candidate lacks real engagement with the issues that are important to Oregonians.

Failure to mail in a ballot in an Oregon election speaks to more than just a missed deadline, especially for candidates for public office. It tells you that nowhere among the slates of candidates and ballot measures put before the voters was an office or an issue important enough for this non-voter to become informed enough to make a choice.

Year after year, election after election....

That the voting record plays out over time is far more reliable an indicator of a candidate's commitment, engagement and reliability than any blizzard of campaign rhetoric can match.

This is also a valuable measure because the playing field is completely level. Every candidate has the same opportunity to cast a ballot. No fund-raising is required beyond the cost of a postage stamp.

Once elected, candidates gain the power to make decisions that affect the lives of others, even all of us, even all Oregonians.

I'm supporting the candidate who never misses an opportunity to become informed and to make an informed choice, the candidate who has the habit of engagement in Oregon civic issues.

In the Oregon Governor’s race, that candidate is Bill Bradbury.

Max Cleland, depression, the cosmological constant and me

By Sean Cruz

Portland--

Former U.S. Senator Max Cleland recently stated that his episodes with depression were more painful than when both of his legs and an arm were blown off during the U.S-Viet Nam war.

Quoted in his new book, he said: “…I go into a massive, deep, dark depression and I get to where I don’t want to live…When your brain is compromised, and your body is riding high with massive anxiety and you can’t shake it, it’s a terrible feeling. And you cannot concentrate. You cannot read.”

I know this part well.

By the time ten months had passed after my four children had disappeared into theocratic Utah, my depression had become so severe that I lost the ability to read.

Reading was my lifelong escape, my place to go in good times and bad and in every other spare moment, but the depression took that away. No escaping from this!

Reading (and writing) was also how I made my living at the time, working as a newspaper editor, and the depression took that away, too, by the end of 1996, ten months into this long nightmare.

The reading didn’t come back for more than a year, gradually, short pieces only, maybe a paragraph or two and then the heartache would take over again.

Loss of concentration, waves of stomach pain…hopelessness….

For any person, the loss of four children is a question of survival.

I had the honor of meeting Max Cleland in 2008, a quiet moment at Portland State University, where he was appearing in support of soon-to-be U.S. Senator Jeff Merkley.

I told him about my two sons, Aaron and Tyler, who I’d seen off to the war in Iraq, and how neither had come home, and he hugged me with his one arm….

The best part of many days has been escaping into sleep at night, even more important when reading is not an option.

But sleeping has its dangers, too…dreams of my missing children…they remain young forever…can’t quite find them…frantic, looking for them…heart pounding, high anxiety…starting to wake up…fighting that, I want to keep looking, keep looking…keep looking…try to rescue them…heart….

I wake up and the nightmare is real.

Every day, nearly 14 years now.

Sometimes the insomnia takes away the sleep and sometimes reading is difficult.

The only constant is the heartache, that never dims, infuses the universe like the cosmological constant….

My children remain out of reach….

Sleep beckons….