Yenta's Summer of Love Story

Yenta, as you know you made me "The Love Blanket" in 2011 (shown here in a recent photo where we began using it for our Safe Water is Great/SWIG group, as we're being kind of 'rabbel rousers' about fluoride being added as mass medication to the water, essentially).  

The "Peace Fleece" had been such a nice addition in 2011 that I wanted to continue the tradition this year.  For those who haven't been following along in the past, Yenta sent me the most beautiful, magical tie blanke for the Holidays in 2010, asking that I use it to raise awareness (and money evenutally) related to fibromyalgia and over "Lumigrate awareness" so that we can all keep doing what we're doing and not have to go to work serving wine or something.  

I'm glad I thought to grab The Love Blanket on my way to meet outside at a downtown Grand Junction restaurant with a lovely patio (and safe bottled water as well as safe wine, from a fluoride-added perspective). 

You can read about it at and see a group photo with it at:     

www.lumigrate.com/forum/swig-safe-water-great-our-special-interest-group-named

You'll see that I folded it up and used it as a seat cushion! It was not at all cool out but it would come in handly for that as well, it makes me realize that maybe Linus is smart and not just insecure carrying around his blanket in 'Charlie Brown'. 

I'm going to let the SWIG group know about this as well.  We have the rough sketches for a logo already!  So STAY TUNED, we have much to kibbitz about water and wellness/illness, so to speak.  (I hope I used that word correctly!)

You are the COOLEST YENTA EVER, and I think everyone can use a Bubbie (grandmother) in their life! Thank you for the blankets these last two years, and for all you do to support us at Lumigrate. I hope we return the love to you, Bubbie Yenta.  

I'm glad in your younger years, during your summer of love in '67, you found a Bubbie to add to your life, think about what you had to learn from her and she from you!  Who would have thought back then that in 2009 you'd be an older, wiser woman and actually get recruited to write on a website like Lumigrate! We need our elders and their wisdom from being at the FIRST Summer of Love for this similar era we have today on this SECOND time around in our lifetimes for a Summer of Love!  And we need our young people who are filled with new ideas and enthusiasm.  And we all can benefit from getting the wax out of our ears and hearing each other, talking to each other, particularly those who think differently.  Thank you for sharing this story, Yenta.

Live and Learn.  Learn and Live Better! 

Mardy

Mardy bubbeleh, you should come to mine shtibele (small house) so I can feed you.  That way you won't have such a little tuchus and maybe won't need so much cushioning as a folded fleece blanket. Just a thought, dawlink.  So tell me, How are Jim and Jeff? Did you have a good meeting? 

It's said, supposedly by Ben Franklin, that he'd rather drink beer than water.  Water was filthy during his time.  Truth is, it was filthy when I was a child too, but we still drank from the faucets, the hoses, the rivers, the streams - Oy!  Never gave it another thought.  Then comes along the lovely government that says, "This stuff can kill you!  We're going to keep you safe by adding chemicals to it."  Makes you want to scratch your kop (head), doesn't it? 

Next came the "Flouride War".  It's in the water, it's in the toothpaste, at some point I remember it being in the milk, or maybe in something you could put in milk.  That chocolate powder that the neighbor boy put in his hor (hair).  Took his Mame (mother) days to get that washed out, and the animals in the area just loved following him around.  Perhaps that's another bobe-mayse (story) for another time.

Mardy, krasavitse (beautiful woman), thank you for creating Lumigrate and giving your Yenta a home.  You are very much appreciated, loved and revered.  Keep smiling Libling, It couldn't hurt!

Your

Yenta

It is interesting that we drank water out of anything or anywhere when we were all kids in the 1950's and 60's, and no one got sick that I remember. We drank from the hose, the lakes and rivers, the faucet, shared glasses and the dog drank from the toilet.

Now, water everywhere is bad for you since the government has made it "safe" for us. We also ate dirt and put almost anything that we found as little tykes in our mouth. Again, we didn't get sick.

My grandmother said to my mom "don't worry about your children eating dirt, they will eat a peck of dirt before they grow up." Grandmother grew up on the farm and had that great intuitive wisdom.

Jim Bubeleh,

Your Bubbie (grandmother) knows best, but back then there weren't so many chemicals in the erd/ground as there are now.  Back then, things were made differently - not out of this shlok/cheap material companies use to turn a fast buck that, in turn, eventually poison us; so yes, we were able to drink from faucets, hoses, even fire hydrants. 

My Mame (mother) always made us keep the toilet seat down so the dogs never got the gust/taste of toilet water. I wonder if they were missing out on anything. 

I remember going to the city pool and accidently swallowing water there... mind you it was purely umglik/accidental but again, I never became krenk/ill. 

Today I use a filter at home, I carry a filter water bottle everywhere I go, and I don't allow restaurants to put ice in anything I drink.  Not because I'm so careful, I don't like the gust of it. But now I am learning from your SWIG group's writings here at Lumigrate that if I go to an area that also adds fluoride as well as chlorine, my filters won't work on that as they do the chlorine.  Oy, vey! It's always something.

Libling, tell me; what measurement is a "peck", and where did your Bubbie grow up?  I've heard this saying before but never knew what it means.  At my age now, I finally have the khutspe/nerve to ask someone so young.

It couldn't hurt!

Your

Yenta

Now that you've asked the question about defining "peck", Yenta, I'm curious while we're at it, how that compares to a 'mess'.  These little things that I realize I've never understood.  

I have a slightly different perspective than your life, Yenta, raised in the Jewish temple and traditions and Jim Kennedy is, we are not surprised, a faithful Catholic man. I only went to two church services in my entire 'formative years' of birth to going to Univeristy. One was a wedding and the other a Christmas Eve service, because someone we knew was playing as they did every year but for some reason, this ONE year my parents took me.  That was a nondenominational, 'community' church in our mountain area/town. 

So when I went to University in the 'big city' of Fort Collins, Colorado (population 75,000 at the time perhaps), I learned of Lent from a friend in the dorms who gave up soda pop with dinner.  The next year a coworker at my job typing statistical reports came in late with a smudge on her forehead one Wednesday and I embarrassed myself thinking it was ink from her IBM Selectric ball that she'd gotten on her hand then forehead.   

I didn't know that many of the names I'd heard all my life were Biblical names -- it was all a 'foreign language' to me! SO MUCH of what we 'know' today is based on what our yesterday was, and in order to most effectively move into the future, it's ideal to not only talk with those similar to you but ALSO to those who have diversity from you. Respectfully, and with the heart of a listener, then speaking with peace and well-being in your heart as well.   Thank you all for doing that here at Lumigrate! ~~ Mardy

A peck is 1/4 of a bushel. My grandmother grew up on a farm in Ontario, Canada, and always referred to a peck of potatoes or beans. But Yenta, I had to look it up because I realized I never really knew exactly what it was until you asked!

Jim dawlink,

There was a song from Guys and Dolls, vunderlekh (wonderful) show, called "I Love You A Bushel and a Peck".  Now you know how much that is.  So, this isn't vogik (important), what is vogik is you just furthered your bildung (education); this is gut (good).

One of the reasons your Yenta doesn't grow old so fast is I never stop lamdones (learning).  As a young hippie we figured that out.  Bildung wasn't all in books, in classrooms, paid for by "the man"... It's everywhere.  Even you, my doctor dawlink friend, need to keep lamdones. 

Your Bubbie would be proud, I know I am.  Now, go impart some klugshaft (wisdom) and take in something new you didn't know before.  It couldn't hurt!

Your

Yenta