Go Greenbelt - Karen Rides for Open Land

Dear Salinger Family,

Whew!!

I’ve never really been a numbers person, but this year, I have done the math.

I rode Go Greenbelt for the first time in 1992, at age 39. You can do the adding and subtracting here; I already know how old I am.

I bought a new bike for the ride in ’92, a Specialized, Allez. It had 18 speeds. It seemed like I would never need more than that for going up hill or down hill.

The first year of Go Greenbelt, 500 miles in a week seemed like it would never end. As I remember it, I didn’t want it to end. By day seven, I wanted to keep riding.

By the end of the ride in 1994, familiarity with the route began to make things feel a little easier. I knew where all the rest stops were and I had definitely figured out the best places to eat along the route. I had understood that it was NOT a good idea to have a burrito before the climb up Metcalf Rd. (a 1.5 mile hill that climbs 1500 feet in elevation) and not to bother with a double espresso before climbing Spring Mountain Road. Ah, Spring Mountain Road, switchback after switchback, each steeper than the last.

In 1997, I added 9 gears to my bike. Mid-way through my 40’s, 18 gears were no longer enough, particularly on the up hill. Looking back now, I don’t know how I ever did it with 18.
1999 marked the beginning of the longest stretch. By the end of this year, I will have completed 8 in a row.

In 2002, I splurged and bought the bike of my dreams; a titanium frame custom built Seven. Humm, another number.

So, here we are, 2006. This will be year 13, lucky 13.

My goal this year is to raise $1 for every past mile I have ridden and continue my efforts to support the Greenbelt Alliance’s mission to protect and preserve open space in the Bay Area and to work towards sustainable urban growth. Over the 13 years I have been riding through both rural and urban areas, I have witnessed many green hillsides and valleys that had been slated for development, successfully remain in the category of open space, thanks to the work that Greenbelt does. Sadly, I have also seen acres of farmland changed into acres of houses. Once farmland is lost to development, it is lost forever.

I need your help. I’m asking each and every one of you to reach into your pockets as far as you can and help me on my 13th year of Go Greenbelt.

Here's how to donate.
Visit the Greenbelt Alliance website, www.greenbelt.org and click on sponsor a Go Greenbelt rider today, and donate for Karen Salinger.

Donations are greatly appreciate by April 31st, but gratefully accepted until June 1st.

I appreciate your help and support. Keep me in your thoughts the week of April 23rd and wish me tailwinds!!

By the way, I guess I should say a few words about the photo. I’m sure you are wondering. I ride lots of my training miles by myself. I have a few imaginary friends who keep me company and make sure I don’t spend too much time talking to myself.

Karen

My Religious Week

I'll be the first to admit that I have issues with religion, especially the dogmatic views that seem to be at the forefront of most of the discussion today - whether it be fundamental Christianity, fundamental Islam, fundamental (very Orthodox) Judaism or any other view of the world that is predicated on rules that subjugate one group of people to another based on some group of writings that is highly open to interpretation.

I think there is a mystery to life, and whether you believe in science or a form of a God or nothing at all, there are certain moral tenets that should apply - doing good vs. bad, love vs. hate, respect vs. degradation, etc., and how we attempt to apply those things to our lives is what makes a difference in the way the world sees us and the way we feel about ourselves.

William Sloan Coffin died this week. He was a leading activist in the anti-war movement from the Vietnam era, as well as a social activist, but even more, he was a priest who understood the power of, as well as, the limitations of religion.

There was an interesting interview with him today on Fresh Air http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5342517
and I like a lot of the points he had to make about how people see God and that regardless of how you view God, we do have free will and actions matter.

All of this is to say that I've had an interesting week. On Monday, I attended a Catholic mass for a friend of mine who had a very serious heart attack recently and nearly died, but who is now home and doing extremely well, and even has returned to work as of yesterday. We had had a mass for him when he first had the heart attack and was still in the hospital and that was more about asking for his recovery. This mass was more about thanksgiving. There have been numerous stories recently about debunking the power of prayer in healing people and I've seen stories about how prayer can be broken down into prayers of asking forgiveness and prayers of thanksgiving and that these are appropriate, but that asking for something specific - asking "God" to take some specific action or intervene in some way in how life is playing out, just isn't the way to use prayer.

I don't pray, but I have to say that I like the approach of thinking about and reflecting on certain things without any particular trappings of religion attached to it. I understand why some people pray though.

Anyway, Wednesday, I attended a Seder with Karen's cousin. And tomorrow, it's back to Catholic Mass to hear my father sing.

All of this has been kind of fascinating - to watch the trappings of organized religion, the rituals, the words and all and reflect on it. And, to reflect on the discovery recently of the Gnostic Gospel of Judas, and recognize, again, that we think we know things, but there is always another side to the story, or another interpretation that might be worth exploring and that taking almost anything literally, can be dangerous and lead to a lot of demagoguery.

The Bible, The Koran, The Greek and Roman myths - all great stories, with a lot of useful information and some moral guidance, but also a lot that might be questionable, and when religions or people using religion as an agenda use them to pull things out of context, then we're all treading in dangerous waters.

Here's an interesting column from today's SF Chronicle that talks about it:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/04/14/DDGBEI8CTU1.DTL

Life is a mystery and I'll continue to treat it that way and explore all the possibilities that make me human.

Another Birth Announcement (a year late)

Ross, Marilyn and Dylan Salinger proudly announce:

Miranda Sage Salinger
April 24, 2005
6 lbs. 9 oz.

"O Wonder!

How many goodly creatures are there

here!

How beauteous mankind is!

O brave new world that has such people in't"

-Shakespeare's "The Tempest"

Happy Birthday Miranda!

(and as soon as I can figure out how to get your picture posted, I will.

Wagging the Dog

Saw V for Vendetta over the weekend. An interesting film to see right now in light of all that is being foisted upon us in the political arena - from fearmongering over illegal immigration to continued justifications for what is becoming more and more a war that we were misled about and lied to about to new rumors about how and why Bush could get us into another conflict before we're able to get him out of office (invading or bombing Iran).

http://select.nytimes.com/2006/04/10/opinion/10krugman.html

I would recommend V for Vendetta, not because it's a great movie (it has flaws and is overtly violent), but because if there are things we should be fearful of, they probably stem more from what our governments want us to believe and the demagoguery of those with fixed belief systems and a penchant for absolute power than we do from knowing the truth and deciding for ourselves where our allegiances should lie - and the movie does do a good job of protraying that moral dilemma.

Jo Jewell on body parts

My Constitution's Rights
by Jo Jewell

Having recently had knee surgery it has come to my attention that a discussion on body parts and their thoughts is somewhat past due.

Let's discuss this thing know as Meniscus. The Meniscus sits at the point where the upper and lower leg bones meet, and along with a bunch of other parts join to form the knee.The pillowy meniscus is a pad that sits between the bones, behind the kneecap delegating power, maintaining balance and a general feeling of well being.

We all have two of them, just like we have two eyes and two ears, and still only one mouth. As in the song I hear Olivia sing from time to time, "we have two ears and only one mouth, we should use our ears twice as much."

Perhaps we should insert the use of our meniscus as an option as well.

In non-violent communication protocol we could edit it to include the following steps before responding to an upset person! :• Stop,• Count to ten,• Think of the other persons point of view,• Breath through your meniscus,• Walk around and see where that takes you.

The meniscus can be fragile; my doctor said mine was frayed. At first I thought he meant afraid, and I felt so deeply for this little, never considered little body part of mine. My meniscus was afraid? Then I thought about all the stress it is under just to do its job. Especially after I put on those last ten pounds, my God! No wonder it was afraid! Then my Doctor corrected me; "No, it is frayed, not afraid." I thought, "Well that sounds much better, I bet it has kind of a nice look, sort of scalloped around the edges, much more feminine than just a plan old round edged meniscus. Why that just sounds lovely! "My meniscus is frayed." I could drop that into almost any conversation I found myself in, whether in Marin, San Francisco or Berkeley. Maybe I could even use it in a grant!

But upon the last inspection, the Doctor had decided it was a flap - a piece that gone out on its own and now was getting in the way. I had very little sympathy for this latest image. I could worry and sing songs to an afraid meniscus, and a frayed meniscus almost seemed like a new fashion accessory for spring.

But I have plenty of flaps already. So, where do I sign? Let's get this operation scheduled maybe he could get rid of some of the other flaps as well. It was very handy to fix this problem as was it was done in a "Specialty Clinic," right next to the mall. They washed my knee, each nurse asking which knee it was, which made me laugh and hope for lots of post surgery drugs, to be prepared for the screw up that might be coming. I had to smile when the last protocol prior to surgery (before you walk into the surgery room) was to put the Doctors' initials on the correct knee with a smiley face with an ink pen.

So I walked into the surgical room and was covered with a sheet connected to warm air blower, which I think made us all feel better. The anesthesiologist said "Nighty night," and off I went to dream land, thinking it would be so nice if they would knock you out like this for a haircut w/full highlights. I woke up and it was done. I batted my eyes and started crying BECAUSE IT HURT LIKE HELL! "IT HURTS EVERYBODY, IT REALLY HURTS!"

Fortunately the nurse was standing by with Demerol, of which it took two doses to ease the PAIN.Then comes the Doctor, this lovely man who had fixed my daughter's broken arm without hurting her more. And he told me that my meniscus was not afraid, not frayed, not even a flap. My meniscus had been torn.

"Oh my, no wonder it hurt!" he said. Awe, I thought, it was torn; torn about what? Is it kind of like me these days, thinking and wondering what life is all about? I wonder if it is ready to do something new, something more with itself. It could be torn over the all the hardship in the world, the political strife, the war in Iraq. It was torn. My meniscus was not some vain, frilly thing to mention at a whim at dinner parties- it was torn, it had issues!

But not any more, my Doctor sewed it back together. Now it and the whole land around it is fully enclosed in a brace: a large black strappy thing, imposing, impenetrable, and unopenable. Beneath the contraption lies the sewn meniscus whose job is now to become one with itself over the next 4 weeks. It cannot bend, at times it can bear some weight, but it is under close supervision, or dare I say surveillance. I wonder what took place while I was off snoozing in ecstasy and the arthroscopies were in there. Did they do any counseling, talk through the issues? Or was it a "You must comply! Now pull yourself together." ! I guess the only way I will know is if this meniscus becomes torn again.

But you better believe I am going to be much more in tune with my cartilages and such in the future. If I hear so much as a part of me is afraid, frayed, or even a little flappy. I am going right over to Spirit Rock for some immediate dialogue, some sweathousing, cranial therapy, hot rock massage, whatever it takes. We are not going to have an Animal Farm come about within this body, this is 2006, not 1984 and every bone, ligament, synapse and muscle fiber shall have its day and its say!

Birth Announcement - from Stephen and Tanya

“What gift has Providence bestowed on man that is so dear to him as his children?” (Cicero 106-43 BC)

It is with great pleasure that Tanya and I announce the birth of our daughter, Anastasia (“Tess”) Labouré, born on March 13, 2006 at 4:17 PM. She was named in honor of her great grand-cousin, Anastasia, the youngest daughter of Czar Nikolai Aleksandrovich Romanov II, and her late great-great-grandmother, Saint Catherine Labouré, and father, Stephen, former nude model at Les Beaux Arts and Bon Vivant Extraordinaire. At birth, she weighed 6 pounds 12 ounces and was 19 inches tall.

Congratulations Stephen and Tanya!! We can't wait to meet her in person.