(no subject)

What present is Ana happiest about when asked by other care providers? Hairbands. She loves her headbands. All four of them, and described them in detail to counselors and students no less than three times before I left for work. Not the bike. Not the Nutcracker (which she adored). Not the piles of books. No. Headbands.

When asked last night what she liked most about the last three days she said, "Everything. All of them." She really did have a wonderful time these last three days.

We ended up at Toto's, a much more pleasant restaurant than I was expecting being so near to our home, after returning from The Nutcracker. We were doted upon by Brighita and served food that reminded me quite sharply of the times my mother took me by train into Italy. At home, I washed another load of dishes, made lunches for us both, and together we completed the Wizard of Oz puzzle I bought her. She had me read all of the short story books she had been given, and we stacked up all the new books together so I could put them away later. Ana and I went to bed at 9pm last night, and I didn't wake once until 3am, and then not again until the alarms went off.

Problem is, I dreamt fretful dreams. Dreams of needing to move with only two weeks' notice and not finding anything in-city within any sort of reasonable price range. And to top it all off, in the midst of my housing search, I ended up needing three surgeries on different parts of my body ALL AT ONCE! When I came out of the hospital, most of my hair had been cut and no one was around to help care for me during my recovery. And I still had to look for a new place to live. I'm not sure who was caring for Ana during the operation/recovery period, but it was a very stressful dream and it's left me rather introverted and withdrawn today. Not unhappy, just ... so much to sort through in my own head.

Thanks to those of you who helped in any way to make this weekend a success. Much love. I'll leave you with a quote I found on an anthropological web site concerning the questions surrounding ancient matriarchal societies and so on.

The present state of studies about hunter-gatherer societies which are still numerous around the globe is, nevertheless, summarized as follows by John Gowdy (1999):

1) the economic notion of scarcity is a social construct, not an inherent property of human existence,
2) the separation of work from social life is not a necessary characteristic of economic production,
3) the linking of individual well-being to individual production is not a necessary characteristic of economic organization,
4) selfishness and acquisitiveness are aspects of human nature, but not necessarily the dominant ones,
5) inequality based on class and gender is not a necessary characteristic of human society.