The ex's girlfriend needs a 'name.' I'll call her the Commandant. It suits her. And which she is, most certainly. One of my strongest images of her is her standing with her arms crossed, twaddling one finger on an elbow, in an Authoritarian pose, a la Milgram. Though she is a very buxom Barbie bleach-blonde who isn't skinny by any means and is quite tall and wears short mini skirts even though she's about 50 or something.

Anyway, "the Commandant" told my daughter to call her Dad for cab fare to and from the doctor.

Meaning=1) the Commandant knows exactly my financial situation and the detrimental effect getting my ex to cut child support will have on my family (she appeals to his cruelty, she knows him well). She thinks leaving 3 people without enough to pay rent, bills or eat is a fun thing to do, as any authoritarian personality would. She knows that I have a legally binding Separation Agreement where it is clear the ex must continue paying child support for my son and she knows I can't afford a lawyer who would stand up for me. She's laughing all the way to the bank.

And 2), to suggest that my daughter call her Dad for cab fare before she even dropped her off today tells me loud and clear that she knows exactly what she did to my daughter's foot when she drove over it and that she truly is behind manipulating my daughter into deciding 'not to' wait at a clinic or emerg for medical care (then the Commandant's 'traffic accident' would have to be reported and then her insurance premiums might go up, but let's care more about money than people) and how bad it really is since she knows my daughter cannot walk even the 2 blocks to the doctor (a 10 min walk at most under normal circumstances).

Could she have driven my daughter to her own doctor in the city where her Dad lives this morning? The one she took the poor girl to to get a load of anti-depressants that I assume she wanted to make the poor girl more docile and manipulable. Of course not. That would be to admit she ran over her foot and did not report the accident to the police as she should have, who would then report it to her car insurance company.

A highly manipulative woman who is extremely vindictive, oh it would make your hair stand on end to tell of some of the 'punishments' this woman has meted out to our family over the years!

You know, I wonder if the sense of ethic, compassion and fairness is a genetic trait that some people have, and others, like the Commandant, and the ex, don't have. While they treat my daughter as a weak little neurotic failure of a child, my daughter is in fact stronger than anyone in that house. My daughter has a strong sense of ethic, and for that she is amazing.

The Commandant's son, who was a heroin addict, on methadone now for 4 or 5 years, de-flowered my daughter mere weeks into her 16th year when he couldn't be charged with statuatory rape, and my daughter fell in love with him and was taken down the garden path of drugs by him and we nearly lost her, and my son, both in that house of doom, the Commandant's house, and yet her son's recovery only came about due to my daughter's strength and insistence on a drug-free relationship. I couldn't imagine living under the Commandant's rules and regulations and infinities of punishments, of which she mets out tons from what I hear, and I can well understand why no-one can live there without becoming dependent on drugs, street drugs, alcohol, prescription drugs, they all have, just to survive, as I understand it, because the core is bad, without moral understanding, without an ethic of care. I accused them of being terrible parents and so she had my ex cut child support to 'punish' me.

This is the commandant, her methods. How she 'controls' people. She particularly hates me because I refuse to be 'controlled' by her. She has never been able to manipulate me. She has hurt me and my children in innumerable ways to 'punish' me when I speak the truth about what goes on in her house but she has not been able to bully me into submission. For a decade she's been trying to take over the reigns of running my life through my children. I refuse to talk to her; I will only talk to my children's father when there is anything to be discussed regarding the children. It incites her to fury, I'm sure, that despite everything she's done, I remain a free woman raising two children alone, and I'm doing a damn good job considering what I have to deal with.

They are terrible parents and my daughter's foot is yet another example of how dangerous the situation is in that house.

I write too much. The story is so shocking.

The situation has worsened. My daughter's foot was run over on public property, outside a "Sport's World." I can only assume medical treatment was not sought because if the accident was reported it might affect the ex's girlfriend's car insurance. It is my belief my daughter was manipulated into deciding not to receive medical care due to 'the time it would take.' The girlfriend would know that if she could convince the girl that she did not want to go through the hassle of waiting for 5 hours at a clinic, or longer at a hospital, at 18 years of age, and therefore capable of making a legal decision on her own medical care, there is nothing I could do legally about the fact that she didn't receive care. I did have quite a long conversation with a police officer located in their city last night and I decided not to put my daughter through the stress of having the police go to her father's house to see if she was alright because, like everyone else, I fear what the girlfriend would put my daughter through.

While it sounds like a normal sort of thing to say about ex's girlfriends, in my experience, this one is a highly manipulative and extremely vindictive woman. I have what I feel is a horror story of examples of what she's done to me over the years he's been with her. She will strike, and she has in this case. He hasn't paid child support this month. This would not be the sort of thing he would normally do given what has happened, but at her direction, or perhaps threat, he would. That child support covers half the rent on a 2-bedroom apartment. Without it, the rent is 85% of my income, leaving scant money for only a portion of the bills and no money for food.

With this loss of income (taxable in my hands, he surely is luckier than most ex's in that regard), I can only cover a third of January's rent now because of the bills and cannot pay the remainder until later in the month, and the City, for that is who I rent from, at market rates, there are no subsidies given to me, will begin eviction proceedings within 3 weeks of any unpaid portion of rent that was due on the 1st of that month. They don't wait, and they give you no reprieve.

My daughter's foot is somewhat swollen but she is able to walk on it and claims it's not painful; it is quite bruised on the upper arch. She came home and after a conflagration between us over her either working or going to school, went to bed. I decided to let her sleep and made a doctor's appointment for tomorrow. The rub is that I actually cannot afford cab fare to the doctor's for her, for this is one of the dire consequences of her father suddenly and radically cutting child support, surely at the bidding of his girlfriend since this is her sort of thing to do when anyone crosses her.

When the girlfriend (they've been together about a decade and live together but she claims him on her taxes as "a boarder" thus avoiding the legal implications of the actual "common law" relationship they have and thus I call her "the ex's girlfriend") comes across these blog posts, I expect her to mount an armoured tank against me. But what can she do? I persist in telling truth; I do not manipulate; I do the best I can to take care of my children against what often seems unbeatable odds with what goes on in the other household.

Over my years of blogging I have endeavoured to keep the 'messiness of reality' out of my posts, preferring to focus on my art. I am not sure why I am now breaching my code, but it seems unstoppable. And if I must break the silence and speak, then speak I must.

At least I have this blog. Blogger keeps legal records of whatever's posted when.

I am too scared to call the police because I am worried about the emotional and psychological ramifications for my poor daughter at her Dad's house. She already carries such a burden, I wouldn't want to make it worse for her. I care for her and love her very much.

I cannot do what is right because I am afraid of what they will do to her if I do.

There have been other injuries where medical attention was not sought for my daughter and I have been concerned about her safety for this reason at her father's for some time.

A 2000 lb or 3000 lb car runs over a foot, your child's foot, and you don't take her to the hospital and make sure nothing's broken or strained, that she doesn't need a cast or crutches or even bandages? Surely it's not just me who finds this reprehensible?

Yet I can do nothing for fear of what they will do to her if I do.

Catch 22. Kafka's reality. It sucks, let me tell you.

If I call the police and request that they visit the ex's house to make sure my daughter's foot is okay, at least it'll generate a police report on an unreported accident. Then if there are any broken bones or other serious consequences to not receiving any medical care when the accident occurred there'll be a police report, a validation that nothing was reported or done for the girl who was injured.

I'm inclining towards asking for help from the police but fear what the ex and his girlfriend will do to my daughter psychologically if I seek the help that I believe she needs.

It should not come as a surprise to the readers of this blog that I left my ex in 1997 due to domestic violence, not towards me at that point, at least not physically any more, but towards my children.

It seems a continuation of that story, how her Dad's girlfriend ran over her foot with her car and her not being taken to the hospital - they apparently 'drove' by a clinic and decided it was 'too crowded' - it would obviously have taken up too much of their Saturday to make sure no bones in her foot were broken or that she didn't need crutches.

If the woman had run over a stranger's foot and had not reported it to the police and had not sought medical care for the person she hit she would be charged.

How is what has happened any different?

Because my daughter is 18 and thus legally capable of making her own medical decisions, there's nothing I can do about the fact that they did not seek medical help when the girlfriend ran over her foot with her car. But it was a traffic accident and not reported. I can get the regional police in the city in which they live to go over tonight and check on my daughter's foot and make sure she is alright.

Thankfully the ex and his girlfriend are not making her take the bus home by herself tomorrow, but are driving her to Toronto, where they have told her to get me to take her to a doctor.

What are my legal options if any bones are broken? Or if there are serious consequences to not receiving medical care when the accident happened? An accident that was not reported, as the law requires.

And if I get dispatch to visit their house tonight because I am worried sick how will the the ex and the girlfriend take it out on her? And on me (he still hasn't paid the child support I am legally entitled to this month)? Will they make it difficult for her there if I get the police to go to the house, and make it difficult for her to tell me of further infractions against her well-being and safety in their house?

I am a mother whose child has been hurt and for whom no medical care was sought I am more than worried. As you can imagine.

My ex's girlfriend ran over my daughter's foot with her car on Saturday, supposedly an 'accident,' though the ex's girlfriend apparently wasn't being very careful at the time, and they did not take her to the hospital, did not get it x-rayed, and, while they iced it, at least that, my daughter phoned and said they wanted me to take her to a doctor when she returns on Monday. I am, as you can imagine, beside myself...

Three photos, taken with my simple cell phone, then photoshopped to change the colour. I'm not sure what to do with them yet. They remind me of different things. I like the first two, yet can't abandon the third.

What are your resolutions for this year?

Or, rather, what do you foresee?

When I look into my crystal ball I see...


That birds will roost in the clouds and oceans will sweep over mountains;

That life will endure and we will continue our exploration of it all; we, embodied mind, conscious body;

That we will become fascinated with a model of a rebounding universe that blossoms like an opening flower and shrivels to a seed and blossoms again;

That love is, always was and always will be. That we will laugh and cry and be born and die.

On the blue-green pearl that orbits.

This year will see a crop of superb leaders emerge, but there won't be any major revolutions;

There may be food riots, many more homeless people, it won't be easy;

Continued economic upheaval for the Industrialized nations, that we are in the midst of a massive redistribution of wealth due to outsourcing, which is restructuring the wealth of the world;

Continued warfare between the Palestinians and the Israelis, peace won't be successfully negotiated this year;

That our connections to each other through the Internet will continue to develop at incredible rates with information flying globally even as leisure and fitness while still centred largely in the gym will also involve the quiet arts of meditation, yoga, flow workouts, walking and hiking, easefulness.

That progress in understanding and halting Alzheimer's will make old age a more appealing process;

And so on, and so forth, it's a very busy crystal ball...


(Impressionist photographer, Gertrude Kasebier, posted by Lotusgreen at Japonisme.)

While I wait to go to Toronto Tam Tam, my favoured New Year event, and after having done many dishes left by my children, laundry, walked the dog in the frigid winter air, I find myself ruminating on the year that's just passing.

It was a year of shocking revelations for me. Yes, that characterizes 2008.

And a huge amount of work healing what those revelations revealed. It's been a tumultuous year in many respects. I feel as if I've spied the interior of Vesuvius. I hope I rose to the various crises with valour, goodness, respect and help, and things have certainly begun to even out now, but it's been rough going for sure. In that respect, the shock, and yes, denial, revulsion, horror, pain, grieving, all those negative responses, oh they are hard to express, but I am emotional, are not aspects of life I'd like to experience again, at least not to the extent that I have this past year.

I began the year in a contract job at a bank head office with people I loved, and was laid off, the recession already making itself evident as the US sub-prime began its collapse. Then I had another contract position at another bank answering technical emails all day, which was a little bit intelligent, and which I enjoyed, and again, working with wonderful people. Since that ended I haven't worked, which is hard, and takes its toll on the spirit, mind and body.

In November I wrote a novella of something like 57,000 words. I did a few paintings this year. And I began a venture into something I've wanted to explore for half a dozen years - videopoems. While I haven't yet produced anything I'm happy with, I am at least doing something I've wanted to do for a long time. I'll be taking a course on Digital Video Editing in January, and so this exploration will continue.

I haven't been involved with anyone this year since I've been reeling from what happened with the last one, a situation definitely among the "revelations." A couple of men have passed my way and expressed interest but I have to say nothing I would consider - all being married, and that doesn't interest me at all.

And in 2008 I crossed the threshold of menopause, and so am into my third great phase of life: that of the crone. I'm not yet sure about how I feel about it since there are many changes in my body that surprise me and which I wasn't aware would happen, but I accept it as readily as I did menses when that occured at the age of 13.

Both of my children are living with me, my daughter, who's 18, and my son, who's 21. We're very close, the three of us, in good and supportive ways. I am very glad I am able to be here for them because they've really needed that.

I'm sure there's more to this past year, but those were the highlights.

I joined Twitter, and Facebook. Both of which I enjoy. I saw way more movies this year, which was nice. I still have all of my old friends, am blessed in that way, plus some new ones.

It was a year of sweeping up the pieces, and sweeping them up, as calmly as possible, a year when I had to remain grounded and loving above all else, a year when I learnt not to reject what is difficult or painful, another year of living and loving.

In its own tumultuous way, 2008 was beautiful.