Storytime Tapestry Newsletter

The newsletter devoted to spreading love and cultural awareness around the world.

October 13, 2007

Publishers Favourite Sites:

Rosanne Catalano

http://www.rosannecatalano.net/

Michael Smith

http://subs.zinester.com/86758/

Barbara Weymouth

penwormprayerwarriors-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

Helen Dowd

www.occupytillicome.com

Dean Perchick

http://symzonia.blogspot.com

I'd like to tell you about a new website that I discovered and now love where all of your favorite authors can be heard on video from your own computer!

The website is Bookvideos.tv and is coming to you from Simon & Schuster publishing. Check it out at: http://www.bookvideos.tv! You won't be sorry you did.

Today’s Announcement

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Today’s Stories

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What are My Intentions?

Peggy Ann Doak

Today on the Island of Mount Desert, the sun is out; a gentle breeze creates a lovely pattern on the grass, granite and moss. The air is so clean. I learned, quite a few years ago in Biology 101, that when the industrial revolution began, one of the first notable changes in the nature vs. nurture with the environment was the loss of lichen. Lichen grows on trees and rocks. It is a moss type little life form that is white and lacy looking. Lichen is highly intolerant of air pollution. Maine, especially mid state upward has a lot of lichen. When I was a youngster I used to make horse farms out of the terrain around our hunting camp. Tiny horse farms. The green moss was the fields. Between the moss and a different growth, were roads. There were little rednobbed growths that sprouted out of a shaggy type of moss. I thought of them as trees. And the lichen were shrubs. I could only use tiny horse figurines to make this scene plausible, though my imagination such as it is, could fill in any discrepancies.

I have always been sensitive to my surroundings. Especially the woods. When I was in college I would always come to MDl (Mount Desert Island) and hike Cadillac Mountain whenever I could visit Maine. The changes of temperature, flora, birch trees to pine, soft floor to granite was exciting to me. Getting to the top and looking all around at the vista of sea, towns and other mountains felt like a victory stance. The trees on the top of the mountain were tiny replicas of the same type further down. A birch tree up on the rocks in face of high winds and blustery cold weather, would not allow a tree to grow more than a foot high. It always reminded me of my horse farms at the hunting camp.

What happened to my thrill of living? It was not my childhood traumas. I sought out the natural world to feel solace. I was in my late thirties when I finished college. What triggered me to suddenly want to stay inside, out of the sun and languid breezes? Why if I loved Maine so much, did the returning to Maine continue to eat away at me? Why did I move, allowing my fifteen year old son to stay in Massachusetts with a friend’s family? He is my son and I love him so much. I did then. I always did. He is my only family, really. And I also loved Massachusetts. The western part of the state, near the Berkshire Mountains is beautiful. I was always riding my bike, lifting weights, goofing off with Gerod. He was my inspiration for many plays and short stories that I wrote. He has my sense of humour. And so intelligent! I learned soft ball and he and I played catch forever. We would find one or two friends and go up to the community ball field just to practice hitting and catching. In the evening on Friday or Saturday night, we would watch Dr. Who on PBS. We are both vegetarians, and I was before he was born but was converted by his refusal to eat anything healthy. Thus on the nights of Dr. Who, I would cook up a pound of bacon, he would open up the can of black olives and find the capers and we would sit right in front of the TV, so close we glowed, and stuff capers into the black olives all the while saying, "MMMMMM. Tasty" to each other. The other hand sought out a strip of bacon to add to beauty of this feast.

Now he lives in California, with his wife and three children. He told me that he had felt abandoned when I came back to Maine and left him in Massachusetts. But he wanted to stay there. That is what he said. He told me, on my only visit to California that a friend paid for last year, that the pain was horrible. And he is angry. What he doesn't know is that his pain came out as rage. I thought he wanted to stay. He had become angry and intolerant of me and without a man to temper things, I was

Is grief what is keeping me from being outside in the world? I think so. It is as though I do not want to remember that I am alive. My Mother was on oxygen for four years while she was also in a nursing home. When I visited her when she was on oxygen she was lucid and funny. And I believe that in some form we buried the hatchet of the past. Over a year before her death she chose to be taken off all medication and oxygen. She began to wither away, horribly. It took her a long time to die, but that is what she wanted. She simply lay in that bed and willed herself to die. Is that what I am doing?

I have no physical restraints, in that; I can still do a lot of what I used to do. I may suffer the pain a bit, but somewhere deep inside, I know that if I worked at it, I could get my body built back up to where it wouldn't react so strongly to physical exertion. I have never been one to not want to get out of bed. I have never been one to not want to take a ride on my horse into the woods. Yet I have no control over my actions. It is as though I feel hopeless in the face of my future. I kid around about a sole mate or Prince Charming in a frog, but in reality, I want to be near my family and I do not see how that can happen. Everyday I become less interactive with my surroundings. I guess I needed to say this, though it was not what I set out to say. I was going to write something more poignant, more enticing. Not whine about what isn't. But this is what came out this day. So it must need to find fresh air and other souls to spread the word, put me in their prayers and hopefully in God's mysterious way, help will come. Love will find a way. It has to.

Peggy Ann Doak

Pdoak333@peoplepc.net

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THE SUB PRIME LOAN CRISIS AND THE COSTS OF NON-REGUALTION

Duane Bates

We are constantly being warned by “conservatives” about the dangers of oppressive and costly government regulation and how it threatens business expansion, creativity and job creation.  There is certainly some truth in these arguments and it doesn’t take much effort for anyone to come up with a number of stupid and counterproductive rules, laws or regulations at any level of government to prove the case.

The ongoing sub prime loan crisis is an example of the cost and stupidity of the opposite case: little or no government oversight and the financial consequences to all of us of allowing irresponsible, and in some cases, outright fraudulent behavior by a relatively small number of persons and firms.  The loss in the equity markets as the result of the sub prime-lending crisis certainly exceeds $1 trillion.  Everyone who has a 401(k), pension, or any other assets that have investments in the financial market has lost money in the past month, and there is no way to know when the lost assets will be recovered.

At the heart of this crisis are the mortgage brokers and what is referred to as a “no doc” loan.  The revolution in the financial markets gave rise to the business of mortgage brokerage, a person or firm whos business is to locate home financing for individuals and families who cannot qualify for a conventional mortgage, one that has strict down payment and earnings requirements. The no doc loan often used by mortgage brokers interested in making a quick buck is a loan that requires no income verification, no credit report and a little or no down payment and normally carries a higher than market rate of interest because the borrower cannot qualify for a conventional mortgage.  The mortgage broker works on a commission, gets paid when the loan closes and has no liability if the borrower defaults.  The loans are bundled together and sold to investors seeking a higher than market rate of return. 

The heart of the current problem are ARM (adjustable rate mortgages) mortgages that were signed when market interest rates were low, but can be “adjusted”; raised when market rates increase.  The borrowers who could afford the monthly mortgage payments when the loan was new now can face sharp increases in the monthly payment that they cannot make, forcing them into default. Although the total impact of all the questionable mortgage loans is very small (1 to 2%) in relation to the total financial markets, fear and uncertainty have caused a worldwide drop in confidence about the stability of returns and market prices.  When the markets get unpredictable there is a “flight to quality and safety”, meaning that stocks and other financial instruments get sold and the guaranteed, stable bonds get bought.

Some friends of my wife and I illustrate the problem of no doc loans and ARMs very well.  The husband and wife both have small businesses, no health insurance, no savings and two children still at home. Their total annual income is less than $60,000.  Several years ago they scraped together enough cash to buy three acres of land.  During the recent low interest rate period, and using a mortgage broker and a no doc loan, they were able to have a $300,000 home built on their property.  The land was considered the down payment. 

I‘am sure they reported their income and lack of other assets accurately on the loan application, but they still had no problem obtaining a loan for a home that was five times their annual income. Every month they struggle to make their mortgage payment, pay their normal living expenses and pay the hefty property taxes and insurance costs.  The slightest financial reversal or health issue will cause them to fall behind on the mortgage payments and fall into default.  They are honest, hard-working people, but their lives are full of financial stress as the result of their decision to build a house they cannot really afford.

Multiply this scenario by millions of times and you have the current financial mess we have.  The real irony is that this couple previously owned a much more modest home that met all their needs and even included a in ground swimming pool, but they wanted their “dream home”.  Sometimes dream homes turn into nightmares when you don’t have the financial assets and income to make them come true.

I am reluctant to call for more government regulation in any area, but I think we need to re-think our whole approach when a lack of regulation allows a few unscrupulous people to “take the money and run” leaving the rest of us to pay the ultimate costs of their behavior. 

The globalization of the world financial markets and increasing rate of integration of business has great potential benefits, but with the benefits come greater risks.  The current credit crisis may be warning of worse problems to come.

Duane Bates

batesduane@yahoo.com

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Poetry Corner

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THE CONQUEROR

Helen Dowd

Based on Isaiah 40:31 & Romans 8:37

Stumbling along on a pathway one day,

Depressed and so heartsick, the man tried to pray:

"Oh, what have I done to deserve all this pain?

Why is the life I live now so in vain?"

For gone was the happiness once he had known;

Replaced was such heaviness-- He uttered a groan.

"Where are You, my God?  Oh, where have you gone?"

My loved ones have left me.  How can I go on?"

To his ears, at that moment, came a loud piercing cry--

The scream of an eagle, above, in the sky.

Like lightning he streaked to the earth in a dive,

Then soared up again, his capture--alive.

The man watched in awe, this wonderful sight:

He longed to be with him--that eagle in flight.

"I could leave all my worry.  I'd soar through the air,

And live like the eagles, with none of earth's care."

As he stood there and studied this powerful bird.

He turned his head sideways when a rustle he heard.

There, disheveled and dazed, on the crest of a hill,

Sat an eagle, just watching.  Waiting.  Still.

Too feeble to fly, the bird looked around--

So far from the sky, so close to the ground.

In a flash came the message: yes, he was like that!

Too weak to mount up, so dejected he SAT.

Sometime later he noticed a rather strange thing:

That eagle stood up, and he stretched out each wing.

Very soon--with great power--he took off in flight,

Gliding higher, and higher, 'til he soared out of sight.

A great lesson he learned from that bird on the hill:

"Be silent. Be watchful.  Be waiting.  Be still.

For God the Creator gives power to the weak.

And strength to the weary, if he will but seek."

© Helen Dowd

Hmdowd@telus.net

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