Town of Mercia

2012-02-17T08:00:00.000-08:00

New hope for “super-responders” on the horizon
Empaths get their own how-to guide; diagnosis may follow

By Elizabeth Norton

Caitlin remembers it like it was yesterday.

A freezing rain fell from the predawn March sky. The schools had a 90-minute delay, so her children stayed home late. By the time she’d completed three Sun Salutations, she knew she’d never get in her yoga practice with all the noise and interruptions. Later that morning she had to go to the doctor for an annual physical, and the woman sitting next to her kept coughing and sneezing. Then her mother, who lives in a retirement community, needed a ride to the supermarket.

Over lunch, her best friend went on incessantly about problems at the office. After school, Caitlin had to deal with soccer, piano lessons, homework, dinner, and bedtime. To top it all off, that night when she fell into her own bed exhausted, her husband wanted to have sex.

“It was then that I realized: I’m just not like everyone else. I’m so exquisitely sensitive to other people that I get hyper-attuned to their energies, and then I have nothing left for myself,” said Caitlin, who spoke with the Lantern on condition that her last name not be used.

Luckily for Caitlin, help came seemingly by chance. She was browsing at the Books of Kells, Mercia’s independent bookstore, and came upon The Empath’s Handbook: How Super-Responders can Protect Their Energetic Space and Get Through the Day.

Written by acclaimed psychologist and life coach Juliet Ostrov, the book was developed in response to the many clients who came to her feeling overwhelmed by the universe.

Ostrov says that if you are often accused of being too emotional, if your feelings are easily hurt and your nerves frayed by loud voices or heavy perfume, you may be a super-responder or, as she prefers to say, an empath.

“Empaths are a species unto themselves,” Ostrov told the Lantern in a telephone interview from her office in Taos, New Mexico. “They’re emotional tuning forks, responding to life with such intensity that they often find other people difficult to tolerate.”

In her book, Ostrov advises empaths to communicate their needs, likes, dislikes, and phobias to loved ones. This discussion is vital when starting a new relationship. In an emotionally fraught situation, like a first date, Ostrov advises bringing a written list. “Anyone who’s really into you will understand; only an insensitive clod will think you’re being neurotic,” she assured the Lantern.

Other tips from Ostrov’s book:

When forced to be in a public place, sit as far away from others, and as close to the door, as possible.

Establish energetic boundaries by putting your purse, coat, briefcase, or yoga mat on the seat next to you. This is essential in a doctor’s office (since empaths are more susceptible to germs) and when riding the bus or subway (especially during rush hour, when other people’s stress levels are likely to ratchet up the negative vibes entering your space).

For maximum protection, avoid public transportation entirely. Even carpooling should be limited, since you are likely to want to go home earlier than everyone else.

If you must share a hotel room with someone, bring an extra sheet from home to hang between the beds. (If you’re with your spouse or lover, this can be done after sex, obviously.)

“One of my former lovers actually swiped a ‘do not disturb’ sign from our hotel so I could hang it on the bedroom door when we got back home,” said Ostrov. “That was when I knew he truly honored my empathic needs.” Unfortunately, she added, they broke up soon afterwards.

A journey full of challenges

If an empath has not fully awakened to her heightened level of awareness, depression or panic attacks can ensue, Ostrov said. “When ensconced in a family, some empaths protect themselves by overeating. The extra weight helps buffer them from the intrusive energies of spouses, children, and parents.”

Other empaths are unable to commit to any kind of relationship, Ostrov said. They crave the intimacy of love, friends, and family, but they fear being smothered. “Sadly, the relationship usually ends after only a few dates—often because the empath doesn’t show up.”

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Super-responders are common enough that many people who fit the description are beginning to seek counseling, even medication. The American Psychiatric Association is considering adding “chronic empathic hyperresponsivity” to the forthcoming edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. The manual, known by the abbreviation DSM-5, is currently under preparation and is slated for release in May 2013.

The manual was previously known as DSM-V; however, the APA decided to abandon Roman numerals because so many people were calling their local Department of Motor Vehicles for psychological help.

According to Lola Geiger, the sole employee at the DMV branch office in Mercia, people call to discuss personal issues more often than might be expected.

“You hear it all in this line of work,” Geiger explained. “If we’re not busy, I try to be supportive. I went through one woman’s entire divorce with her before she realized she’d been dialing the number for registering vehicles that require placarding under the Hazardous Materials Regulations.”

Chronic empathic hyperresponsivity, said Geiger, is a new one. “But if wanting people to stay out of your face is a disease, then I’m guessing it’s endemic.”

It's all about perception

Mercia-based psychotherapist Jane Vaughan has mixed feelings about elevating what may be a perfectly normal, albeit exaggerated, trait to the level of a clinical mood disorder. “But unfortunately, if you’re going to bill an insurance company for treatment, you have to provide a diagnosis,” Vaughan told the Lantern.

Asked whether super-responders may simply be self-absorbed whiners who don’t want to hear about anyone’s problems but their own, Vaughan replied, “What am I supposed to do, tell my patients to get over themselves? I’d go broke if I limited my practice to people who actually have something wrong with them.”

Ostrov maintains that super-responsivity is a gift, not a disorder, and should be cultivated as such. “Once an empath learns to embrace her sensitivity, she can allow her own personal resonance to blossom and catalyze her sense of the wondrous.”

Until the DSM-5 comes out in 2013, anyone wondering whether she is a super-responder can check out the extensive questionnaire in The Empath’s Handbook. Ostrov’s book is no longer available in Mercia, however. Bookseller John Kells has stopped carrying spiritual and self-help books since acclaimed spiritual memoirist Terri Postlethwaite was injured at a reading and later sued both the store and the town (though the lawsuit was subsequently dropped). Kells also limits book signings to writers whose work is less apt to provoke violence, such as union leaders, commandoes, and bounty hunters.

For copies of The Empath’s Handbook, Kells recommends looking online or in any of the fine independent bookstores in neighboring towns.

2011-09-12T12:20:00.000-07:00

Ask Dr. Diogenes

Dear Dr. Diogenes,

As part of a state-sponsored required reading program, my fourth-grade daughter has been assigned one of those “dystopian” novels. This one’s called Among the Splattered, part of a popular series entitled The Bludgeoned Children. A faceless, totalitarian government has taken over following an unspecified catastrophe, and a group of children is reduced to living in horrible circumstances which I won’t weary you by describing.

I understand that spoiled, self-obsessed teenagers may derive grim pleasure from reading authors who truly understand how miserable life is. But my daughter is only nine, and she and her classmates are perfectly good kids. Not only are these books inappropriate for the age group, but they’re poorly written to boot. Literary style and “voice” are nonexistent. There’s no sense of place (the children live in a generic housing development), no landscape, atmosphere, or even any weather to speak of. The characters are interchangeable, except for one feisty girl who exhorts her friends to rebellion and eventually gets shot by police. Worst of all is that, although the teacher insists that the stories are suspenseful, there’s no action and hence no dramatic structure. The entire book consists of the author telling us things. We’re even told about the shooting after the fact.

The other required books are just as dismal, with children living in war-torn regions, working in factories in countries with no child-labor laws, or running away from home to escape forced marriages. An alarming number of them seem to get gunned down at the age of thirteen. Does fourth-grade reading really have to wallow in violence and dysfunction? My favorite book in fourth grade was Anne of Green Gables, for heaven’s sake!

I’ve brought my concerns to the teacher and principal, only to be told that books for young people must be relevant to the present, carry a strong social message, and speak to the issues that contemporary readers face today. I would gladly tell my daughter that she has my permission not to read any of this junk, but she will be graded on her (required) book reports.

I should add that she is a bona fide bookworm, so giving her books that she doesn’t like takes some doing. Any advice?

Sign me….
Irrelevant Mom

Dear Irrelevant,

This calls for an update to the old adage: Those who can’t do, teach; those who can’t teach, teach gym; those who can’t teach gym, write novels; and those who can’t write novels get jobs with the state government and draw up mandatory reading lists.

I’d like to say that the days are gone when books used the power of language to dazzle, transport, amuse, and otherwise beguile the reader...that books today are written by social workers, not writers, and the power of language has become as irrelevant as you or I. But I hated the books I was assigned in school, and that was decades ago. So those days were gone even then.

The only crumb of comfort I can offer is that although your daughter may be required to read this drivel, she cannot be required to like it. She is perfectly free to write a report explaining why she didn’t like the book, as long as she expresses herself with courtesy and style and backs up her arguments with sound reasoning. She might get an F for disagreeing with the teacher no matter how courteous and reasonable she tries to be. But this will help her prepare for college.

If you and your daughter have a rebellious streak, you might take a long passage of authorly explanation and help your daughter rewrite the scene using action and events to tell the story.

If you and your daughter are women after Dr. Diogenes’ own heart, you could summarize classic works of children’s literature as they might appear on a state-mandated reading list. For example:

Pippi Longstocking has superhuman strength, a horse, a monkey, and no respect for authority--until a totalitarian government turns the Villa Villekula into a clog factory, where she is forced to work long hours before being gunned down at the age of thirteen by security guards for taking an illegal lunch break.

Laura Ingalls loves playing on the banks of Plum Creek and running barefoot across the prairie. But when she is kidnapped by the Lakota Sioux, their wisdom teaches her that her carefree life was made possible only by the expansionist policies of a racist government. She becomes a valued member of her adoptive tribe until she is gunned down at the age of thirteen by Confederate soldiers who mistake her for a Native American.

When Matthew and Merilla Cuthbert adopt an orphan, they’re expecting a boy to come and work in the fields of Green Gables. But the arrival of winsome, imaginative Anne Shirley leaves them baffled. They let her stay on because the orphanage is really a secret government research center where girls are forced to be organ donors. Toiling in the bitter winds of Prince Edward Island, Anne works long hours on the farm for many years, before being gunned down at the age of thirteen by Mounties trying to quell an uprising of impoverished fishermen.

Your daughter doesn’t necessarily have to hand these in, but please let Dr. Diogenes know what happens if she does. On second thought, don’t bother—it will probably become a townwide scandal. Who knows, you might end up in the newspapers and find yourself suddenly relevant!

Good luck, and hope she enjoys reading The Chronicles of Narnia under the covers with a flashlight.

Dr. D.

2011-08-05T14:57:00.000-07:00

Omega-3s linked to higher stress levels, surprise study shows
Users may be uptight in the first place, experts say
By Elizabeth Norton

In a paradigm shift that has rocked the scientific community, a new study shows that the polyunsaturated fatty acids known as omega-3s—long touted for their health benefits—may actually ramp up the biochemical underpinnings of stress-related disorders.

After tracking a group of omega-3 users for six months, neurologist Richard Wakeman and colleagues at Granite Hill University, Mercia, found that common measurements, or “biomarkers,” of stress-related conditions were actually higher in subjects who took omega-3s than in people who opted for ordinary daily vitamins or did not use supplements at all.

“These results overturn months of scientific dogma,” said Wakeman. “Clearly it’s time to re-think the role of omega-3s in diet and health.”

Found in abundance in fish, nuts, flaxseed, and leafy green vegetables, omega-3s are thought to stimulate blood circulation, reduce inflammation, boost brain and immune function, and protect against cardiovascular disease and cancer.

But in the new study, published online this week in the journal Psychoneuroimmunogastroenterology, omega-3 users showed elevations in the most common biomarkers for stress-related illnesses: blood pressure, triglycerides, fibrinogen (a clotting factor that sets the stage for coronary artery disease and stroke), cortisol (a stress hormone), and C-reactive protein (a sign of inflammation considered to be a risk factor for heart disease).

“There’s no biological mechanism to explain these findings,” said Wakeman. “The only possible interpretation is that people who are willing to spend northwards of $50.00 on a bottle of fish oil are so uptight about their health that they end up stressing themselves out.”

Study design challenged

Critics of the study, including the National Association of Nutraceuticals Manufacturers and the American Alliance of Whole Foods Marketers, were quick to call the researchers’ methods into question.

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“It wasn’t a representative cohort,” said Philippa Pelkin, senior vice president of public relations at the Boston-based NANM, referring to the group of people studied. “There were only 15 participants, and they were all of similar age, weight, and socioeconomic status. It looks very much like the researchers hand-picked their subjects to get the result they wanted.”

“The cohort was totally representative of the type of person who goes around flogging omega-3s,” Wakeman said. “They were the most insufferable bunch of twits I’ve run into since medical school. I’d be stressed out too, if I were them.”

But endocrinologist Roger Waters of The Salk Institute, La Jolla, Calif., cited another caveat. The study was not a randomized, double blind, placebo-controlled trial (in which neither the subject nor the investigator knows which individuals receive the test substance versus placebo—an inert compound used for comparison, usually a sugar pill).

“You can’t infer anything from a small number of people who are all using the product on a regular basis,” said Barrett, who is also the editor of the journal Pseudopsychoendocrinology.

According to one of Wakeman’s co-authors, immunologist Chris Squire, attempts at a double-blind setup went awry when none of the omega-3 users would agree to the possibility of being in the placebo-treated group.

“They all said they spent a lot of time, money, and hard work on their bodies and they weren’t about to ingest something that might not be what was best for them,” said Squire. “Plus, none of them would risk eating anything with sugar in it.”

Asked whether the elevated stress biomarkers might be related to the subjects’ personalities, Squire declined to comment.

An omega-3 personality type?

Privacy rules prevented the Lantern from obtaining the names of study participants for interviews. But an informal survey in the supplements section of the Mercia Enlightened Market yielded a consistent profile of the typical omega-3 buyer. All were women between the ages of 25 and 40; weighed an average of 110 pounds; and wore Capri pants, Merrell sandals, and T-shirts with Sanskrit characters. Only a few agreed to be interviewed, and these gave only their first names.

Andrea, 30, bought an expeller-pressed, North Atlantic mackerel-based blend of oleic, linoleic, and Aramaic acids. “I jog ten miles a day, hit the gym four days a week, and grow all my own vegetables,” Andrea told the Lantern. “I don’t do meat, gluten, or dairy. Oh God, look at that chunky woman over there buying whole milk for her kids. No wonder they all have runny noses.”

Saiorse, 26, opted for flaxseed oil with lysergic acid. “I’m a vegan, and I eat only raw food because cooking makes it rot in your digestive tract,” she said. When asked about her stress levels, she replied, “Stress is a sign that the mind has not yet broken free of ego-based attachments. I do have $1500.00 worth of credit card debt after I bought a bamboo and hemp meditation chair, but that will enrich my spiritual life. Excuse me, I have to find a bathroom.”

Donna, 39, wondered which supplement to choose. “With the fish, you have to worry about toxic mercury levels. But the flaxseed capsules are big enough to choke an elephant. Goodness, is that the price?” As Donna began to show symptoms of a panic attack, a store employee quickly offered a free sample of an acai-yogurt slushy with probiotics and diazepam. Donna ultimately decided on a box of Paul Newman’s Own Whole-Grain Ricotta Macaroons and a bottle of organic lavender shower gel.

Questions still remain

So do omega-3s directly activate the physiological pathways of stress? Or are the people who take them a bunch of smug, sanctimonious tight-asses who drive their bodies past the breaking point in pursuit of beauty and fitness?

Wakeman, Squire, and colleagues are designing a follow-up study to solve the conundrum. “It will take some doing,” Wakeman admits. “In addition to tracking down all the jerks from last time, we’ll have to come up with a group of good-natured, easy-going omega-3 users for comparison. Where we find those is anybody’s guess.”

Pelkin still maintains the study was slanted to discredit the whole-foods movement. “Scientists from the medicotechnopharamacological establishment can’t handle the fact that natural products are superior to what they synthesize in their labs. I and millions of others use only products made from organic, locally grown, sustainably harvested plants. Excuse me, I have to go to the bathroom.”

2011-02-17T16:16:00.000-08:00

Best-selling author drops lawsuit, buys business, residence
By Cornelia Quirke

In a turnaround that her lawyers describe as striking, acclaimed spiritual memoirist Terri Postlethwaite has called off her multimillion-dollar lawsuit against the Town of Mercia and instead has purchased a Main Street store and a Victorian-era mansion a few miles from the village center.

Postlethwaite is the author of OMG That Is the Coolest Thing I Never Heard: How I Kept Silence, Found Myself, and Saved My Marriage. The memoir, a 793-page account of a week long silent retreat in the Himalayas, has been on the bestseller list for three years.

The writer had filed suit against the town following injuries sustained during a book signing at the Books of Kells, Mercia's independent bookstore. She was reading from her follow-up memoir, Actionable: One Woman’s Account of a Bitter Divorce and the Lawsuit that Followed, when an unidentified audience member hurled a copy at her. The author suffered a mild concussion and a laceration requiring three stitches.

Postlethwaite initially claimed that the injuries had adversely affected her writing, causing her to sound “ditzy and narcissistic.”

But during subsequent visits to the law firm of Firkin, Grabbe, and Wynche, she became enamored of Mercia’s rural New England character and wished for a “synergistic” relationship with the town.

“The mountain energies will nurture my writing, and the yogic items I sell in my shop will help raise the consciousness of any residents who have not yet begun to make the spiritual shift,” Postlethwaite told the Lantern.

The author added that although her writing has transformed the lives of millions of readers around the world, being bludgeoned with one of her own books is relatively unusual.

Postlethwaite’s new boutique at the intersection of Lantern and Main Streets will offer jewelry, books, rugs, and candle holders—as well as her own line of OMG fragrances and cosmetics, named after her first book. She also plans to sell artisanal pieces from the countries she toured for her book and has already placed an order for a pair of twelve-foot-high, seven-ton stone elephants from Indonesia.

Local reactions mixed

Few town residents would comment on Postlethwaite’s decision, fearing they might end up in a lawsuit—or worse, another of the author’s memoirs.

A source at Firkin, Grabbe, and Wynche told the Lantern that despite public statements to the contrary, Postlethwaite’s change of heart came as no surprise. “Town attorneys were building a convincing case that her writing after the head injury was no more vapid than it had ever been,” said the employee, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

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Meg Frobisher, mayor of Mercia and a lifelong resident, said, “Of course we’re happy whenever someone opens a new business instead of suing us into next week.” The mayor added that she is personally unfamiliar with Postlethwaite’s work. “I don’t read spiritual memoirs—I gave them up for Lent.”

Reminded that it is only February, Frobisher clarified: “This was Lent of 1992. I’m very devout.”

Bookseller Francis Kells, who was also named in the lawsuit, expressed relief that Postlethwaite would not pursue legal action. As a result of the recent unpleasantness, Kells no longer hosts gatherings related to yoga, spirituality, or raw food. Book signings are now limited to writers whose work is less apt to incite violence, such as ex-Green Berets, bounty hunters, labor union leaders, and televangelists.

Kells spoke with the Lantern while setting up for “Monday Night Illuminations,” at which former U.S. Marshall Savannah Stanforth will read from her memoir, Nice Try, You F***er: Ten Years on the Road Catching Deadbeat Dads.

He said the location of Postlethwaite’s new shop (across the street from the Books of Kells) should pose no threat to his bookstore. “Her boutique’s appeal is, uh—well, let’s say it’s specifically targeted. I’m guessing there’ll be enough business to go around.”

Next on the horizon

In addition to unveiling her downtown store, Postlethwaite has begun renovating her new home, the crumbling Victorian mansion on Granite Hill Road built in 1894 by the duck-boot magnate Beachtree Manningcroft. The house has stood empty since the early 1980s, when the millionaire’s great-great grandson, Jason Manningcroft, leaped to his death from the widow’s walk after more than 1,500 publishers rejected a memoir of his days in the Peace Corps.

To transmute the negative energies accumulated during the house’s past, Postlethwaite is installing a Japanese soaking tub, an exercise area covered with tatami mats, a Mexican palaver sink, and a circle of hand-quarried floor tiles embedded with Devonian-age fossils in the foyer.

“The tile at the very center is imprinted with the flagellum of a glyptodont,” said Postlethwaite. “It's the first thing my guests will see when they enter the house—if they’re looking straight down, that is.”

Neither the house’s dark history nor the injuries from the book signing raise any real concerns for the future, Postlethwaite says.

“The town of Mercia sits at the center of a powerful energy vortex, which could very well provoke hostility in the less enlightened. I feel it’s up to me to channel these forces and re-direct them toward the highest good.”

The highest good will soon benefit from the movie version of OMG, now being adapted by Postlethwaite for the wide screen. Actress Noleen Shackler, formerly of Mercia and now living in Los Angeles, has reportedly screen tested for the leading role.

“It would be awesome if a Mercia actress played me in the film,” said Postlethwaite, “provided she’s able to convey the psychological complexity of my character.”

A more personal goal for Postlethwaite is to learn more about the local flora and fauna, especially birds. “But I want to do more than make lists of names,” she says. “I want to know the lives of the birds of this place, how they live and sing and work within their part of the universe.”

Mercia Bird Club President Jane Thornwell, contacted by phone at the Heron Pond Nature Center and Land Trust, was happy to comment and did so at length. Unfortunately, none of her remarks could be printed in this newspaper.

2010-12-26T16:32:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas, Angus Podgorny

Late on Christmas Eve I was outside looking for a cat. There are lovely legends of the animals on this holy night—that the beasts in the stable kneel down at midnight, that between dusk and morning all animals have the power of human speech. But I was not hoping to creep up on a miracle. Only walking along the edge of the woods in the bitter cold, under the blue-bright stars--rattling a cup of dry food like a Salvation Army Santa ringing his bell, trying to get Angus to come in for the night.

He had shown up on our property at the end of the summer wearing a white flea collar on which someone had written “HELP ME ADOPT ME TAKE ME TO VET.” So like idiots we did, even though we already had two cats and Kevin thinks three is “critical cat mass”— any more qualifies as peculiar. And it does seem that people seldom have four cats; they either have three or fewer, or ten or more.

Angus was perfectly friendly at first, running from the woods to greet us whenever we came out of the house or drove up in the car. But once we started letting him inside he became truculent, curling up in the dining room where the other two cats never hang out, avoiding eye contact, and emitting a high-pitched tone of complaint when petted too long.

It’s true that Angus does not like the other cats and hisses any time they pass by—though he has never had any problem with the dog. It’s also possible that he’s a wanderer at heart and feels insecure in a house. He was, of course, abandoned—he had a note.

But Kevin thinks the cat is mentally subnormal. After a few false starts we named him for the shop owner in the Monty Python sketch who sells 48 million kilts to a giant blancmange from the Andromeda galaxy (which is turning the inhabitants of England into tennis-impaired Scotsmen so that it can win Wimbledon)--causing his wife (Terry Jones in a dress) to exclaim, “Och, you’re a stupid man, Angus Podgorny!”

Once Angus was officially ours he spent as little time indoors as possible—first sleeping in the hayloft or on a blanket in the garage, and ranging even farther afield as the weather grew colder. When an early, light snow fell in October he took off as usual after breakfast, and we found his delicate pawprints heading straight into the woods.

This even I began to take personally. Throughout the fall, as Angus became more sullen, giving an ever-clearer impression of coming back only when absolutely necessary, I reflected that man’s love for animalkind is contingent on the animal’s behaving in a way we find pleasing. I wondered whether it’s possible to truly love a cat who not only doesn’t like us but is at pains to pretend he doesn’t live here.

Angus turned up on Christmas Day, shortly before we left to have dinner with friends. He scurried through the door without looking at us and reported to the corner where we keep his dish, walled off from the dog by two dining room chairs. After I fed him he jumped onto one of the cushions. I stroked him very gently. He purred almost inaudibly for a brief moment, then bit my hand, but not too hard, and curled up with his face to the wall.

If I had found him on Christmas Eve, and he did have the gift of speech, I’m not sure I’d have wanted to hear what he had to say.

--From the journal of Cornelia Quirke

2010-11-19T11:54:00.000-08:00

Ask Dr. Diogenes

Dear Dr. Diogenes,

I recently completed a comprehensive program of training in Vindalu Yoga, and I’m now looking for a place to teach my classes. When I contacted a church in Northumbria to ask about renting their Fellowship Space, they declined because they see yoga as a “false religion.”

I feel all religion is false, with its unquestioning adherence to doctrine and emphasis on division and exclusion. Yoga, by contrast, teaches compassion and respect for all sentient beings. How can I help the church to see how wrong they are and embrace a truly spiritual path?

The more open-minded churches in Mercia already offer yoga programs. And the only yoga center in town, the Granite Hill Ashram, is run by a woman who teaches Tandoori Yoga and won’t hire anyone trained in a different method—even though Vindalu Yoga is an older and far superior discipline. I for one spent a month studying in India and received Bhaji Awakening from the fully released master Masala Dosa Ram.

Any insight into my present situation would be appreciated. It’s difficult to remaining one-pointed in the face of so much ignorance and intolerance.

Namaste,
Ananda Caitlin Ma

Dear Ananda Caitlin,

You’re half right. All religion is false—if it is merely an attempt at ego gratification that’s taken on a religious or “spiritual” guise. Unfortunately, the same is true even if your religion happens to be yoga, atheism, environmentalism, art, or anything else.

As long as you have to be right, and make wrong those who do not agree with you—as long as you must establish the superiority of your own path—you are in the grip of the ego. It makes no difference which form the ego assumes. Whether you have accepted Jesus Christ as your personal savior, or can stick your leg behind your head in yoga class, or don’t personally feel the need for organized religion, is irrelevant—if you feel that this distinction puts you above someone else.

With regard to your problem: Since every church in town already hosts a yoga program, Dr. Diogenes is inclined to wonder whether Mercia really needs another one—or whether Northumbria needs one at all. But if you must, and if your own brand of yoga is so superior, nothing is stopping you from starting a yoga studio of your own. A church is entitled to limit its activities to those that are congruent with its beliefs. In any event, no one has ever succeeded in convincing anyone else how wrong they are.

Sorry not to be more help, but the only real advice I can offer is to do yourself a favor and stay the hell out of Northumbria, where yoga instructors are shot on sight.

Later,
Dr. D.

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2010-10-18T12:47:00.000-07:00

Accepting what is

Two animal crises within the past week. On Thursday night Angus, our most recent cat, didn’t come home. I found him mid-morning Friday, curled up in the hayloft with the left side of his face slashed and bloody. All I could see of his eye was a thick white glop. Luckily it was just inflammation and the nictitating membrane. The vet thought he must have put his head down a hole that was already occupied, coming away with some bad bites to his eyelid, nose, and muzzle, but nothing worse. He’s still on pain medication and antibiotics.

Then on Monday our Lab mix, Oscar, began vomiting. The vet prescribed anti-nausea medication but warned us to bring him back if it didn’t work. By Wednesday morning when I had him out on the leash, he was still retching and grimacing. I tried to keep him walking, as one does with horses, to help the digestive process along. But he gave me the mildest, most courteous look out of his soft brown eyes, and graciously lay down in some leaves.

It was then that I brought him back to the vet. Two days and nearly $3,000 later, he’d had emergency surgery to remove a piece of corn cob which had previously been eaten and excreted by a deer and was now lodged in Oscar’s duodenum—along with deer hair, droppings, and a toxic broth of the sort of bacteria that allow deer to digest the rough, barky things they eat. The vet said another six hours and Oscar would have died. The pain must have been extreme.

I had been brooding for weeks about that which was lost, unachieved, or otherwise unacceptable in my life. But when my animals got into trouble I was brought back to earth, struck by the difference between human and animal suffering. Humans are the only species to suffer because of what is not happening—a relationship not realized, a child not conceived, a novel not published, a desired self-image insufficiently upheld. Even though pain cannot be caused by something that isn’t there, but only by the perceived unacceptability of that thing’s absence.

My dog, on the other hand, went about his day with a load of sludge in his belly, without reference to what he might deem acceptable. He lay drooling and grimacing on the floor by my desk and walked on the leash as long as his legs would hold him up, while misery rippled out of him and his mild gaze became only more luminous. Even the cat—who is normally concerned solely with what he wants or doesn’t want—instead of crying and scratching at the door for help simply gave himself over to his pain and curled up on a hay bale.

Strange that a human being, with the power to supply whatever is needed, will go on clutching at a wholly unnecessary grief when something longed for fails to materialize—while an animal in the grip of a very real pain asks only to be allowed to lie down.

--From the journal of Cornelia Quirke

2010-09-10T08:27:00.000-07:00

Stem cell transplants grow penis on man’s forehead
Groundbreaking therapy goes horribly wrong
By Elizabeth Norton

Doctors were astonished, and friends and family distraught, when Mercia resident Orville Blucher underwent a revolutionary stem cell procedure to treat a brain disorder, only to awaken one morning weeks later with a full-sized penis growing out of his forehead.

The protrusion is believed to result from the stem cells’ having differentiated into the wrong type of tissue.

Blucher had received the transplanted cells as part of a treatment for Kramden’s Syndrome, a condition characterized by aggression, intolerance, impulsivity, and below-average performance on an array of cognitive tests. Imaging studies show that in patients with Kramden’s syndrome, a part of the brain known as the mixolydian prefrontal cortex is smaller than normal.

Because this brain region is associated with “higher” functions, such as reasoning, empathy, and self-control, researchers believe that boosting it with a new supply of neurons could help to reverse some of the deficits of Kramden’s syndrome. Blucher was among the first patients to qualify for treatment.

“In layman’s terms, we were trying to make him less of a jerk,” said John Q. Bonham, neurobiologist at Granite Hill University Medical Center, Mercia, and leader of the transplant team.

To replenish the neurons in Blucher’s brain, the researchers used a new therapeutic approach, called induced pluripotent stem cells. Ordinary skin cells (fibroblasts, in scientific parlance) were gently scraped from the palm of Blucher’s hand, then cultured in a bath of genes used to steer differentiated cells back into an immature, highly versatile state. The genes used were noggin, lethe, googoo, and nanog (the last named by its Scottish discoverers after Tir-nan-og, the land of eternal youth in Celtic mythology).

The team then used a group of neuron-inducing genes, including bax, hox, einstein, nerd, and sonic hedgehog, to nudge the newly made stem cells into becoming brain cells. The resulting culture was injected under local anesthesia into the fluid surrounding Blucher’s brain.

Questions abound

The doctors are at a loss to account for the penis sprouting from Blucher’s forehead. Bonham maintains that the original tissue sample must have been contaminated. “There’s only one way for penis cells to get into the palm of somebody’s hand,” he said. “It’s obvious the guy was wanking off in the men’s room when he was supposed to be getting prepped for the biopsy.”

Blucher, reached by phone at an unnamed hospital where he is shortly to undergo corrective surgery, denied engaging in such activity. “And anyway, what were all those magazines doing in the men’s room?” he added.

Many scientists doubt that skin cells obtained in the manner described would result in the development of genitalia.

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“A fibroblast is a fibroblast, regardless of which part of the body it comes from,” said molecular geneticist Dwayne D. Allman, also of Granite Hill University. “You’d have to add some of the genes that are expressed at a specific point in pre-natal development, while the embryo is differentiating into a male.

“That’s the only way you could end up with a willy,” Allman insisted.

To test his theory, Allman used microarray technology, also known as a DNA chip, to scrutinize the cell line used in Blucher’s treatment. His suspicions were confirmed when the injections given to Blucher proved to contain significant levels of genes involved in the production of male genitalia, including dong, dingus, and rodA—as well as high levels of a protein known as Johnson-initiating factor (JIF).

Groping for answers

Bonham’s team is now left trying to explain how penis-producing genes could have found their way into an extract meant to treat a brain disorder.

Said Blucher: “It’s obvious the lab is developing a secret, stem-cell-based member enhancement therapy, and they got their test tubes mixed up.”

Bonham scoffed at that idea. “We aren’t working on any member enhancement therapy. I’d be the first to know if we were.”

None of Blucher’s ex-wives, friends, or family was available for comment, and phone calls to his lawyer, Ted Wynch of the Mercia-based firm of Grabbe, Grabbe, and Wynch, were not returned.

An ex-girlfriend, actress Noleen Shackler, formerly of Mercia and now living in Los Angeles, commented via e-mail: “I sure hope the new one works better than the original.” As of press time, the penis did not appear to be functional.

Blucher is suing the Medical Center, and Bonham personally, for an undisclosed sum.

Allman believes the mishap to be an anomaly that will have little impact on the future of stem cell research. “But it sure brings new meaning to the word ‘dickhead,’” he said.

2010-08-29T14:06:00.000-07:00

St. Igneous launches upscale consignment shop
Absentee churchgoers may lack the right clothes, priest says
By Cornelia Quirke

Silk scarves, cashmere sweaters, designer suits, and stylish pumps are only a few of the items now on sale at The Paraclete Parasol, a newly opened consignment boutique at the Church of St. Igneous on the Mercia Town Green.

The unveiling of the shop is one of several efforts by the church’s new priest, the Reverend Samantha McTeagal, to reach out to members of the parish and the larger community and to expand the church’s membership.

“Church attendance has been on the decline for many years, and new members are few and far between,” says Mother Samantha, as she prefers to be called.

“Part of the reason may be that, due to ongoing problems with the economy, some parishioners may just not have the right clothes,” she says. “St. Igneous is an affluent parish, and people do dress with care to attend worship.”

To help bridge the fashion gap, The Paraclete Parasol will offer high-quality, gently used dresses, skirts, and sweaters, as well as suits and shoes for both men and women. The shop’s product line will soon expand to include jewelry and pottery handmade by several church members.

“Our parishioners have really stepped up to answer the call,” says Mother Samantha. “People are bringing in the loveliest things to be sold at very reasonable prices. Some of our members have donated their clothes outright. We even have one lady who’s scouring the Internet for overstocks and other bargains, and is actually buying discounted clothing to give to the church.

“The commitment to serve one another is alive and well at St. Igneous,” the priest says. “Our parish is united in the belief that no one should have to miss worship because they’re ashamed of their wardrobe.”

But Mother Samantha adds one caveat. “Of course, the shop wouldn’t carry the latest fashions. And some items may be offered in discontinued colors. But that won’t be held against anyone. This is a community of faith, after all.”

Then and now

Fashion is an area in which Mother Samantha has some experience. Before entering the ministry, she worked for many years as executive editor of the women’s magazine Moi.

She then worked for several years at Planta Genesta Investments, a hedge fund based in Greenwich, Conn., before ultimately being called to the ministry. Mother Samantha was installed as the tenth Rector—and first Rectress—of St. Igneous shortly before Lent.

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Some of Mother Samantha’s earlier innovations at St. Igneous got off to a rocky start, according to members of the parish who spoke with the Lantern on condition of anonymity.

Her first effort, the Agape Meal, was poorly attended due to confusion over the name.

Agape, pronounced to rhyme with Hog at Play, is a Greek word meaning divine or altruistic love, as distinct from friendship (philia) or romantic love (eros). The earliest reference to the Agape Meal is thought to be in Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians. Nowadays, the term refers to a tradition of gathering together for a simple meal after a service or feast day. The Agape Meal at St. Igneous was a simple supper of soup, bread, cheese, and fruit following the Maundy Thursday service.

But because parishioners first learned of the Agape Meal by reading about it in the church’s newsletter, without hearing the word pronounced, some feared they would be required to try to eat with their mouths wide open.

One unnamed church member said, “I thought it was some Lenten exercise in getting beyond personal vanity and not being judgmental about what other people look like when they’re eating. That was just too intense for me.”

Meg Frobisher, mayor of Mercia and a lifelong communicant of St. Igneous, did hear Mother Samantha describe the supper in the announcements portion of the church service. But Ms. Frobisher, who is 92, is slightly hard of hearing.

“I thought she said ‘agave,’” says Ms. Frobisher.“Well, there’s no way I’m going to eat an entire meal consisting of cactus, I don’t care if it is Lent. I know Our Lord wore a crown of thorns, but this is ridiculous.”

Mother Samantha’s next outreach effort, a wine tasting costing $125 per ticket, fared better. Some 50 people attended, though all were current members of the church. Proceeds went to buy new vestments; the old ones, according to an anonymous source, “were getting pretty ratty.”

Charting a path forward

Regarding the non-success of the Agape Meal, Mother Samantha admits that since St. Igneous does not consider itself particularly “high church,” bringing in too much theological terminology too soon may have been a misstep. The name of the new consignment shop also drew blank looks, at first. “Paraclete is a Greek term for the Holy Spirit. Nobody got that, either,” she says regretfully.

But she adds that the shop is beginning to catch on, and purchases are on the rise, although no appreciable change in church attendance has been observed. Mother Samantha is optimistic that St. Igneous will soon see more crowded pews.

“I’m sure people will feel more welcome once they’re stylishly dressed,” she says. “At St. Igneous, we want everyone to feel good about the way they’re turned out.”

The Paraclete Parasol is open on Saturdays from 9 to 11 a.m. and for two hours on Wednesday immediately following the noon Eucharist. Consignment items are accepted by appointment only.

2010-08-10T17:43:00.000-07:00

White-nose syndrome

A few evenings ago I went outside with my husband to count bats. The night was humid, the trill of crickets adding a kind of audible glitter to the air. The sky was dark in the east, fading through a length of silvery gray to a lingering patch of lavender pink, with a single star, in the west. A clump of Queen Anne’s lace looked ghostly in the twilight.

Kevin takes little interest in animals that aren’t furry. Rodents don't count. And because a bat has wings it qualifies as a bird, and any bird larger than a sparrow, which is not a bluebird, cardinal, or robin, Kevin refers to as a grackle. He hadn’t given bats much thought since one got into our house several years ago. I bolted myself and the dog in a bedroom, fearing rabies (even though Oscar was vaccinated), leaving Kevin to deal with the bat. This he did by opening a window, and the bat flew away.

Now as we stood in the garden and I wondered whether there even were any bats in the area, one obligingly flew from the surrounding woods, across the pinkish swath of sky. “That’s a bat?” said Kevin. In my mind I saw the classic bat profile, with pointy ears and neatly scalloped wings, though the animal was flying too high and too fast to see in such detail. But a bat just doesn’t fly like a bird. While a bird’s flight seems an effortless expression of its being, a bat flies earnestly, with more bustle in the way it flaps its wings—as if it knows it has a mammal’s body to keep aloft.

We were counting bats as part of an informal effort to track white-nose syndrome, a mysterious plague that is wiping out whole colonies of bats throughout New England and as far south as Virginia. The disease was first identified in 2006, when New York State biologists conducting a routine count found dead bats and colonies reduced by almost half. Within the next year, mortality in many caves reached 100 percent. Homeowners across New England began to find dead and dying bats in their yards. In midwinter 2008, researchers at Aeolus Cave in Vermont reported the pitiful sight of bats leaving the cave in broad daylight, flying about shivering and disoriented, and ultimately dying.

White-nose syndrome gets its name from the telltale fungus found on the snout and wings of the affected bats. Whether the fungus is the cause or one of the symptoms has not yet been resolved. Fungal infections are seldom fatal, unless the animal is already weakened by a virus or bacteria. But a condition that might merely annoy a dog or a human could kill an animal that must hibernate until warmth and food return. Some researchers believe the bats may be so itchy that they rouse from hibernation too early and their hunger drives them out into the harsh winter’s day. I find it poignant that a bat’s cave is called a hibernaculum. I feel for the animals, leaving their dim sanctuaries for what they suppose is a spring evening, only to fly out into bright, bitter frost.

Most scientists believe there’s more to white-nose syndrome than discomfort, that the fungus is a secondary, opportunistic infection following something more grave. In any case, finding the cause of white-nose syndrome, and finding a way to prevent it, is crucial. In this week’s edition of the paper we reported a recent Science study predicting that the little brown bat (the most common in New England) may be extinct within fifteen years.

The bat count undertaken by Kevin and me didn’t prove terribly helpful. We had no way of knowing how may individuals we were seeing. We figured we’d spotted at least two, since our second sighting was of a bat flying from a completely different patch of woods from the one into which the first had disappeared. We ended up keeping count of how many times we said, “There!” while the lavender light faded to gray and the mosquitoes bit our ankles. Kevin had brought a camera, and he held it facing the pale wedge of sky, waiting for a bat to fly into the picture. Whenever one did, it was too fast for him, of course. Finally the mosquitoes defeated us, and we resolved to bring insect repellent and a tripod next time. We had only a photo of the empty night sky with a single star, and an abundance of mosquito bites, to show for our efforts.

I hope the day won’t come when these are the only reminders that bats were ever here. And I hope that when tonight’s bats enter their hibernaculum for the last time this summer, they won’t emerge into a frigid, white, alien world.

--From the journal of Cornelia Quirke

2010-07-09T09:54:00.000-07:00

Editor's note. Once again, the Lantern apologizes for a recent column by Dr. Diogenes, in which he implied that those who participate in Healing Drum Circles are likely to be grotesquely murdered. The opinions expressed by Dr. Diogenes are his own and in no way represent the views of the Lantern or its staff. In addition, the Lantern's science reporter, Elizabeth Norton, confirms that many of the facts cited by Dr. Diogenes are incorrect. The Lantern would like to make the following clarifications:

A survey of published medical literature finds no study of therapeutic drumming in any peer-reviewed medical journal.
There is no journal entitled Psychoneuroendocrine Acoustics.
The "researchers" named as study co-authors are in fact dead British rock stars.

Any advice given by Dr. Diogenes is meant as entertainment only, and should not be used to diagnose or treat any disease, disorder, or condition. "Dr. Diogenes" is a pen name; the columnist has no medical qualifications. He did graduate from college, but he isn't saying where, and furthermore he doesn't think it did him a damn bit of good.

The Lantern regrets any confusion or offense.

The Books of Kells

Francis Kells, Bookseller
7 Lantern Street
9 to 5 Monday through Saturday

Recent book signings include:
Roddy Doyle
Terri Postlethwaite

Come Be Illuminated

2010-06-29T11:09:00.000-07:00

Ask Dr. Diogenes

Dear Dr. Diogenes,

My next-door neighbor is training to be a massage therapist, and as part of her work she recently started up a Healing Drum Circle. They meet for two hours every Sunday afternoon in a labyrinth in her backyard--banging away on bongos, conga drums, South American rainsticks, you name it. Sometimes as many as a dozen people show up. The noise is deafening, and it has my two dogs shaking with terror. It’s like living in a war zone. Going inside and closing the windows doesn’t help, and anyway it’s the middle of July and we don’t have air conditioning.

Of course I’ve discussed the problem with my neighbor. She says they need to do their drumming outdoors to resonate with nature, and I should be grateful for the peaceful healing energies that are being released. I can sure use the healing energies. I’ve broken out in a heat rash.

I commute to work all week, and this is a residential neighborhood. I should be able to spend my Sundays in peace. Any suggestions?

Signed,
I Got Rhythm (And Can’t Get Rid Of It)

Dear Rhythm,

As long she’s only studying to be a massage therapist, she’s nothing but a loud neighbor, so you’re out of luck. Mercia does have noise ordinances, but they only apply between the hours of 11 p.m. and 6 a.m.

Once she gets her license and tries to open a business, you might have grounds for complaint. According to the Zoning Commission, a home-based business is permitted in a residential area only if it doesn’t affect the quality of life in the neighborhood. Any noise must be limited to the hours during which the business is actually operating, and it can only be noise that’s incidental to the work being done. You could make the argument that banging on drums not only isn’t germane to massage, but might even injure the therapist’s hands.

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Come Worship With Us!
God will speak to you...

The Church of St. Igneous
Mercia Town Green
Sunday Eucharist 10:00 a.m
Christian Fellowship & Biscotti 11:15 a.m.

...even if no one else does

If she’s running some sort of healing, wellness, or peaceful energy workshop that she’s charging money for, you could point out a recent study that challenged any link between therapeutic drumming and health.

In study published in the April issue of the Journal of Psychoneuroendocrine Acoustics, neuroacousticians Sidney J. Barrett, Brian M. Jones, and Keith R. Moon followed 300 men and women between the ages of 25 and 50 for a period of 10 years. The researchers examined lifestyle factors including exercise, weight, alcohol use, smoking, and participation in Healing Drum Circles. After the 10 years, the drummers were no more or less healthy than any of the others. Intriguingly, though, there was a small but statistically significant increase in death by homicide, suicide, and unexplained accidents among the Healing Drum participants. One had been reported missing for several weeks and was finally found in an advanced state of decomposition, with both feet protruding from the skin of a hand-painted Brazilian conga.

Whether this will sway the Zoning Commission is anybody’s guess, but you could give it a shot. For now, though, your best bet is to take up the electric guitar, get yourself a serious extension cord, and jam along in your own backyard to whatever beat they’re drumming. To counteract the peaceful healing energies, I suggest the following songs:

Psycho Killer (Talking Heads)
Rock the Casbah (Clash)
Immigrant Song (Led Zeppelin)

I recommend the Fender Stratocaster for maximum obnoxiousness. Oh, and Gold Bond Powder for the rash.

My sympathies—and good luck,
Dr. Diogenes

2010-05-17T14:48:00.000-07:00

Store founder's sudden death due to risque new products?
By Cornelia Quirke

Marola Buchanan Rymph, founder of the Mercia General Store and Mail-Order Catalog, died yesterday at the Heron Pond Nursing Home outside Mercia. She was 101. Almost immediately, and despite Ms. Rymph's advanced age, the death was deemed by some to be suspicious.

In her obituary, which appears on page C3 of this issue, Ms. Rymph’s family declined to give a cause of death, saying only that she died of natural causes.

Within hours after her death becoming public, however, rumors began flying that the store’s founder and guiding spirit suffered a stroke resulting from her great-grandsons’ decision to offer sex toys in the catalog.

“I nearly had a stroke when I found out—and I guess you could call me the competition,” said Farley Landesdottir, proprietor of the more upscale Peak Outfitters here in town. Some of her camping and sporting goods and outdoor apparel overlap with similar, though less expensive, items offered by the General Store, Landesdottir said.

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None of Ms. Rymph’s grandsons was available for comment. A store spokesperson said only that she died peacefully in her sleep. Regarding the General Store’s new line of Personal Life Enhancers, the same source referred the Lantern to a statement on the inside front cover of the summer catalog.

The statement appears below in its entirety.

The Mercia General Store
Summer 2010
A Note From Our Staff

Recently a good many folks have written in protesting the General Store’s decision to sell high-quality marital aids through our mail-order catalog. One longtime patron laments, “Of all the catalogs I didn’t expect to have to hide from my kids!” Another asks, “Why can’t you just stick with what we’re used to—bay rum aftershave, Mary Jane candies, Flexible Flyers, and socks with no bulky toe seams?”

The answer, purely and simply, is that times change.

As you, our customers, continue to grow and gain in life experience in the green hills of New England and beyond, your needs change too. And our product line changes right alongside to meet them.

The Mercia General Store first opened its doors in 1931 to sell things people needed. Pickles, peppermints, corsets, guitar strings, snow shovels, and every kind of shot imaginable. These were the same goods everyone else was selling, but until the store was founded by our great-grandmother, Marola Rymph, you just couldn’t get them in Mercia.

The Rymph family might have kept running a sleepy little town hardware store indefinitely, had not our daddy, Romulus, noticed in the 1970s that something odd was happening. Many of what we considered day-to-day necessities had suddenly become objects of nostalgia. People were having a harder time finding well-made, useful, reliable things. And even if you could find them, they just weren’t the same.

So in 1973 we sent out the first Mercia General Store Mail-Order Catalog. We quickly discovered that the world is nothing more than a great big small town, and you all want the same kinds of products.

We sold whole-wheat pancake mix and canned organic soup in the days when vegetarians had things thrown at them. We sold sturdy walking shoes when the word “pedestrian” referred (in the words of Pulitzer Prize-winning naturalist and longtime customer Edwin Way Teale) to someone who’d just been hit by a car.

When our clientele started turning into aging hippies looking fondly back on younger days, we responded again. We unveiled our line of shampoos and cosmetics that smell sort of like those ones back in the seventies. At any rate the package design is similar.

Now some of you are facing another time of change. It may not be a change you’d have wished for, but here it is regardless. Some parts don’t work quite as well as they used to. Some things take longer, or rub a little more scratchily, or need a little extra help in the hydraulics department. And who do you turn to in a situation like that? Not a tacky store in the big city, or a shady website that might send you embarrassing e-mails that your wife could see. You look to the people who’ve always provided you with trustworthy, high-quality goods.

Our line of Personal Life Enhancers is made with pride and discretion right here in the U.S.A., from natural materials you’ve always known and trusted. Wood. Olive oil. 100 percent cotton chenille. And honest-to-goodness, pinkish-gray New England granite. All of it backed up with our no-argument, no-buts guarantee of total satisfaction or your money back. (Satisfaction with the product, that is. We can’t guarantee everything!)

So the next time you find yourself…stymied…know that help is close at hand. Call our 1-800 number for tactful, knowledgeable assistance. Or order online without even having to sign in. We know what you’re going through. It hasn’t happened to any of us personally, but we’re very understanding.

The Mercia General Store Personal Life Enhancers.
Just like the ones you grew up with.

Strength and peace,
The Rymph Brothers
Alton
Wharton
Malachi

2010-04-19T08:25:00.000-07:00

Roddy Doyle releases final book in hobbit trilogy

The Booker Prize-winning Irish author Roddy Doyle will appear at The Books of Kells on Saturday to read from his latest work. Entitled The Lord of the Rings, the novel is the triumphant conclusion to a a trilogy that follows a group of creatures called hobbits in their quest to destroy a magic, evil ring. Mr. Doyle will sign copies after the reading. The following excerpts are reprinted with permission of the publisher.

The Lord of the Rings

by Roddy Doyle

--We have to find Gandalf, said Frodo. Gandalf will know what to do.
--That fooker, said Sam. Where is he, then, Mr. Frodo?
Frodo hadn’t seen Gandalf lately. But Gandalf knew what was what. He’d started slagging on Bilbo’s ring long before Bilbo realized it did anything more than help you piss off when you wanted to. And now there were hunting-horns blowing, and dogs howling, and black-robed bastards riding on horses and asking for Baggins all over the fookin’ Shire. Gandalf would explain everything. He knew his stuff, when he wasn’t prickin’ about with fireworks.
--We’ll ride to Rivendell, said Frodo.
--I will in me hole ride to Rivendell, said Sam. All them fairies.
--Not fairies, eejit, said Merry. They’re elves.
--The Valley o’ the Queers, wha’.
--Shut the fook up, yeh fat fooker, said Pippin.

*****

So they rode east to Rivendell, and that was grand, galloping under the stars. One evening they went down the pub and met up with that Aragorn. He seemed a right prick in his cloak and boots, but he got them safely to Rivendell. Except for the time when the Black Fookers caught them. Frodo got a knife up his arse but Aragorn pulled it out again, most of it anyway, so that was all right.

*****

--Your man Gandalf’s at the top of a fookin’ tower, said Elrond.
--What bleedin’ tower? What the fook yeh talkin’ about? said Aragorn.
--Isengard, eejit. Stupid shite went to see that Saruman. Got a curse slapped on him and now he’s perched up there like mad fookin’ King Sweeney.
--Fookin’ eejit, said Aragorn.
--Elrond the King of the Arse Bandits hasn’t been much help, has he? said Sam.
--Shut the fook up, yeh little fooker, said Elrond.

*****

Gandalf showed up finally, and they all headed south. It was grand to see Gandalf again until the stupid bollix fell off a cliff. Aragorn wanted to make for Gondor, the eejit, but then Frodo and Sam ran away to Mordor together. Frodo had been moody, what with the Ring on a chain round his neck and the piece of knife up his hole.
--Never thought young Frodo would turn queer, said Pippin.
--He’s for throwing the Ring in the Cracks of Doom, said Merry.
--He can stuff it in his crack, said Pippin, --leaving us here with a gang of talking trees. And your man Aragorn’s after ridin’ off to Rohan.
--Fookin’ eejit. What’s he gone there for?
--He’s gettin’ himself a ride, wha’.
--Is Arwen in Rohan, then?
--Arwen, me bollix. Arwen’s back in Rivendell with the rest of them fookin’ elves. I’m talking about that little soldier girl.
--Eowyn? Is she a ride?
--Jaysis.

*****

--Mr. Frodo! Hang on, Mr. Frodo!
They’d been on the move for weeks, dodging Orcs, with nothing to eat but bleedin’ Elvish crisps, and the water running short. Now they were on top of a mountain and Frodo was walking faster.
--I see them, Sam. The Cracks of Doom. We’re almost there.
--Why are we after bringing Gollum, the slimy little shite? said Sam.
--Shut the fook up, yeh fat fooker, said Gollum.
--Shag off, yeh fook, yeh.
Frodo started running with Gollum slimin’ along behind him.
–Where’s nasty hobbit goin’ with me fookin’ precious? said Gollum.
Frodo disappeared.
--Oh, good Jaysis, said Sam. –He’s after puttin’ on the Ring. Now that fooker Sauron will get him for sure.
He saw Gollum scuffling, the eejit, and heard two voices screaming. Gollum went over the edge, and there was Frodo bleeding like a pig.
--The Ring’s gone, Sam. Gollum bit my finger off.
--Never mind, Mr. Frodo. He didn’t bite your prick off, anyways.
--I was after keeping the Ring for myself.
--You were in yer hole.
--It’s the truth. Gollum bit off my finger, Ring and all, and then he fell in the fire. I’m no hero, Sam. It was all an accident.
--Accident, me bollix. It’s fookin’ brilliant. Come on, Mr. Frodo. The Ring’s destroyed and Sauron with it, the gobshite. And look—here come Merry and Pippin and Aragorn, and that little arse-bandit Legolas.
--Sam! There’s Gandalf behind them, all in white!
--That eejit! I thought he got killed fightin’ the what-d’ye-call-it, the Warthog.
--Maybe we’re all dead, Sam.
--Jaysis. Are you alive, then, Gandalf, or are we all just a bunch of fookin’ ghosts?
--Shut the fook up, yeh fat fooker, said Gandalf.

2010-04-14T22:11:00.000-07:00

Lines of tolerance

There was a funeral at St. Igneous today. Admiral Benson died after a courageous battle with lung cancer, as we wrote in his obituary in the Lantern. He left four children, ten grandchildren, and three great-grandchildren. His wife had passed away several years ago. The service came as close as possible to being a true celebration of life, a term I often find fatuous. There were marvelous stories, laughter, and tears. I wept for the Admiral myself. He was one of the few people at St. Igneous who went out of his way to offer me his friendship.

The Admiral had served on a destroyer in World War II, and in honor of his long career in the Navy the congregation sang “Eternal Father, Strong to Save.” With all due respect, I can’t help thinking this must be one of the most lugubrious pieces of music ever written. I don’t understand how any sailor could love a tune that keeps going down. Every time you expect the melody to soar upliftingly, it sinks. My husband always hums the Navy Hymn when he flushes ticks down the toilet. My husband doesn’t have a reverent bone in his body.

Outside of the numerous family members, the service was not as well attended as I’d expect for one of the mainstays of the church. I fear this was because the Admiral had opposed the appointment of an openly gay priest as Bishop, and St. Igneous is a liberal parish. It would be unjust and inaccurate to describe the Admiral as a homophobe. He was a devoted patron of the Books of Kells, Mercia’s beloved independent bookstore, and a good friend of its gay proprietor, Francis Kells. He was a regular at The Two Honest Men, our town pub, of which the life partners Richard Winter and John Varian are permittees. All three men are members of the church, and all were at the funeral. It was the liberal heterosexuals, most of them legally married for decades, who made themselves scarce.

I’m fairly sure that the few conservatives at St. Igneous have no problem with friends, parishioners, even the organist being openly gay. It’s the naming of the Bishop at which some have drawn the line. Perhaps they resist having a homosexual put in a position of spiritual authority—though I doubt this was the case with the Admiral, who acknowledged the spiritual authority of no man. I suspect they feel that a new orthodoxy has been imposed on them, and if this is true, I wonder if any real healing can take place.

The problem is the need to draw lines. I feel the desire to outlaw same-sex marriage is really just an attempt to put ourselves on the right side of the line and “those other people” on the wrong one. I don’t buy the argument that same-sex unions make a mockery of the sanctity of marriage. In my view, a relationship is sanctified either by the people in it, or not at all—and this is true whether it’s a marriage, a friendship, a business partnership, or a purchase at the supermarket. A ceremony, a certificate, has no meaning if we do not honor what is sacred in ourselves and in one another. How many women in emergency rooms are put there by their lawfully wedded, male, heterosexual husbands?

But the Admiral probably felt that by forcing the acceptance of a gay Bishop, the Church is still drawing lines--trading in an older intolerance for a newer one. And though I support gay marriage, I share his concern. Last week, buying some tomato seedlings in McAllister’s, I ran into two women from St. Igneous. They were discussing a parish over in Northumbria, in which a small group tried to splinter off in protest of the Bishop fiat. Ultimately there weren’t enough people to sustain a separate church, and they’re now meeting in someone’s home. “Get over it,” said my friends of the parishioners-in-exile, their mouths twisted in contempt. Meanwhile both women have resigned from the choir after some sort of musical flap. Now they sit in stony silence and won’t even sing the hymns. “Get over it,” I’m sure, is how a lot of people at St. Igneous feel about them.

And still the words of Jesus go unheard. It was with the people on the wrong side of the line that he spent his time on earth, and his message was unequivocal. He didn’t say merely that there is no wrong side: He said there is no line. In God, we are all One. Not equal, not as good as, but One. Maybe some day we’ll have drawn so many lines that there won’t be room to be on any wrong side, and this is what will pass for tolerance.

As long as our “tolerance” isn’t just another line.

--From the journal of Cornelia Quirke

2010-03-18T06:50:00.000-07:00

Would-be mayor’s mistress “appalled” by raunchy photo spread
Thought cameraman was gynecologist, tearful starlet says
By Cornelia Quirke

When Noleen Shackler, 22, arrived for her interview with the men’s magazine Prong, she expected to be asked her thoughts on the stalled peace talks in the Middle East. The photographers assured her the only photos used would be head shots.

“That was why I agreed to take off my skirt,” stated the actress.

But after scorning Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s statement that he had no idea his country was building 2,500 luxury condos in Palestinian territory, Shackler was asked to remove the rest of her clothes and spread her legs.

“They told me it was part of a federally mandated medical checkup for insurance purposes,” said Shackler. “Well, of course I could see where that was coming from. Everybody knows the health care industry needs reform, and the insurance companies are way out of control. That’s one of things Dirkie was going to fix when he became President.”

She was referring to Dirk Firkin, 57, senior partner at the law firm of Firkin, Grabb, and Wynche, whose campaign for mayor of Mercia was derailed after his relationship with Shackler became public last fall. The law firm’s initial statement that Firkin was on a silent retreat in the Himalayas came under fire when the two were caught on camera, frolicking around the private miniature golf course at Firkin’s $2.5 million estate. Shackler was dressed in nothing but a pair of lime-green chaps decorated with navy-blue miniature alligators.

Shackler said she first became uncomfortable at the Prong photo shoot when the associate editor for geopolitical affairs handed her a pair of fishnet stockings and a garter belt. “He said they were safety devices required by OSHA,” she sniffled.

But when the magazine’s Tel Aviv bureau chief, flown in specially for the interview, brought out an abbreviated French chambermaid outfit, followed by a diminutive schoolgirl uniform, Shackler reached for her own clothes (a plaid Prada miniskirt and form-fitting cashmere V-neck sweater). She then grabbed her briefcase and stormed out of the Prong office.

A spokesperson for Prong deems it unlikely that Shackler was misled about the nature of the interview. “For one thing, we don’t have a foreign affairs desk. I mean, come on,” the employee said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The same source calls the misunderstanding a result of Shackler’s repeated references to the Gaza Strip. “We thought that was the club where she performed,” the staffer said.

Shackler said she has not worked as an exotic dancer in several years. “I’m a serious actress now, so I was just appalled when I saw those photos,” she said. Shackler made her film debut as the Second Corpse in the cult horror classic Staple Remover 3. Other screen credits include A French Chambermaid in Hotel D’eath and Third Schoolgirl in The Wisconsin Weed-Whacker Massacre.

Requests for comment were unreturned by Firkin’s campaign workers, and a visit yesterday found the offices locked and deserted. Firkin’s bid for mayor, once viewed as a stepping stone to the White House, is now thought to be irreparably damaged—especially since Firkin’s wife Deidre, 30, had just been diagnosed with gluten intolerance when the affair with Shackler became public. Firkin has been quoted as saying he only began dating Shackler when his wife’s doctor said the test result could be a false positive.

“He comes from a long line of randy little bastards,” said Meg Frobisher, 92, Mercia’s incumbent mayor. “Once I had to punch out his grandfather at the Armistice Day parade. That was back when I was young enough to be legitimately wearing one of those schoolgirl outfits.”

Shackler says she is considering legal action against the magazine.

Firkin did not return repeated calls to his law office, his mansion, or his yacht.

2010-03-10T07:43:00.000-08:00

Spiritual author sues town into next week
Says writing "abysmal" in wake of book-signing assault
By Cornelia Quirke

Best-selling author Terri Postlethwaite has filed a multimillion-dollar lawsuit against the Town of Mercia for head injuries sustained at a recent book signing, which she says have left her “ditzy and narcissistic.” Postlethwaite suffered a mild concussion and a laceration requiring three stitches after an unknown audience member beaned her with her latest journey of self-discovery. The thousand-plus-page memoir struck the writer in the forehead.

Citing brain impairments that she fears may be irreversible, Postlethwaite is seeking $2 million in compensation for lost earnings, life coaching expenses, and remedial writing classes, plus a further $10 million pain-and-suffering award.

“I look back over the day’s writing, and it’s just abysmal--it’s full of all these cutesy little tics,” said Postlethwaite. “‘Now, don’t get me wrong.’ ‘To be perfectly honest.’ ‘Am I ringing any bells here?’ And no matter how many rewrites I do, they keep cropping up. It’s like writer’s Tourette’s, or something. But don’t get me wrong, I don’t mean to offend anyone with Tourette’s.”

Postlethwaite is also suing the Mercia Medical Center for failing to correctly diagnose her injuries.

A spokesperson for the Medical Center stated that when Postlethwaite was brought to the emergency room, her neurological exam, EEG, CT scan, and MRI were normal.

But Postlethwaite’s life coach, Libra Moonflower, feels there must be some underlying brain damage that the tests didn’t pick up.

“Terri was a student of Eastern religion for eight whole months before the accident,” said Moonflower. “ She believed in tolerance and compassion toward all sentient beings. Now whenever anyone disagrees with her, or hasn’t read her books, or tunes out after she’s only been talking for twenty minutes, she gets all snippy. Last week she walked off a panel discussion when she found out that one of the invited speakers was a Republican.

“It’s almost as if she can’t cope with anyone who doesn’t reflect back to her the image she wants to have of herself,” Moonflower said, adding that only a sudden traumatic brain injury could account for such a drastic change in behavior.

Postlethwaite herself fears that her disabilities may extend beyond her prose style. “A few days ago I was teaching a writing class for a group of pregnant inner-city teenagers, and I told them to be sure to choose life partners who complement their personalities,” she said. “I can’t believe I said something so crass and idiotic. I mean, these women have real problems.”

Postlethwaite’s symptoms are likely to be psychological, according to her former therapist, Dr. Eva Silver, who has diagnosed the writer with “acquired situational narcissism” resulting from her sudden rise to fame and fortune.

“She went from being an obscure journalist to an international celebrity with millions of women asking her advice on everything from yoga to marriage to fashion. You’d have to be an exceptionally intelligent, well-grounded person to handle a life change like that, and Terri was always pretty much of a dipstick,” said Silver, whom Postlethwaite is also suing.

Postlethwaite’s former agent, Paul Carey of Paul Carey Literary Agency, says he has noticed no change since the accident in either the content or style of Postlethwaite’s writing. Asked if he has been named in any legal action, Carey declined to comment.

Postlethwaite is currently at work on a book recounting her struggles. The advance, negotiated by the law firm of Dunning, Dunning, Pierce, Blodgett, and Hack, is reported to be in the seven figures.

2010-03-05T08:27:00.000-08:00

Editor’s note. More readers than usual have written in to protest a recent Dr. Diogenes column, in which he remarked that “acclaimed is the new mediocre.” The Lantern would like to take this opportunity to state that the opinions expressed by Dr. Diogenes are his own and in no way represent the views of the Lantern’s editorial staff. Many of Mercia’s leading citizens are acclaimed novelists, artists, and sopranos, and only about half of them can be described as mediocre. The Lantern regrets any offense that Dr. Diogenes or his column may have caused.

Science writer joins Lantern
News coverage expands to include medical, environmental issues

Acclaimed science journalist Elizabeth Norton will join the staff of the Lantern beginning next Monday. She will report on science, health, medicine, and the environment.

Ms. Norton is the former Public Information Officer at the Eulalie McKechnie Shinn Charitable Trust, a philanthropic organization that sponsors biomedical research. Currently a freelance science writer with a specialty in neuroscience, she is the author of many books including Biogenic Amines from Dopamine to Serotonin, Fun with Releasing Factors, and Everything You Always Wanted to Know about Ligand-Gated Ion Channels (But Were Afraid to Ask). Her articles have appeared in such prestigious periodicals as Slime Mold Monthly, The American Journal of Surfactants, Psychopharmacology, Neuroendocrinology, Psychoneuroimmunoendocrinology, Neuropsychoendocrine Immunopharmacology, Proceedings of the International Academy of Psychoimmunoneuropharmacogravitomagnetic Oncology, and Gut.

Ms. Norton has a Bachelor of Arts from Sarah Lawrence College, where she majored in medieval French literature.

2010-03-01T19:18:00.000-08:00

Ask Dr. Diogenes

Dear Dr. Diogenes,

You were right to warn "Coneflower" not to take echinacea supplements if she has a lot of allergies. But by the time you got to the part about scientific rigor and objectivity, you were way off base. As the former Public Information Officer at a foundation that sponsors biomedical research, I can attest that scientists are just like anyone else when it comes to believing what they want to believe--or rejecting what doesn't fit their dogmas, even if it happens to be true.

Some of the cornerstones of medicine were once rejected for decades by the medical community until the supporting evidence became irrefutable. In the first half of the nineteenth century, the Hungarian-born Austrian physician Ignaz Semmelweiss advised doctors to wash their hands when going from the autopsy table to the delivery room; he became a laughingstock and ended his days in a mental asylum. More recently, the idea that new neurons are born in the adult brain was rejected until 1998, when Elizabeth Gould of Princeton and Fred Gage of The Salk Institute supplied incontrovertible proof--even though research had suggested the possibility since the early 20th century.

We have all read of doctors on the take from pharmaceutical companies, drug studies suppressed when the findings displeased the manufacturers, and FDA-approved gadgets that go poof in people's chests. It's true that conventional drugs have been extensively studied and are probably a safer bet than herbal remedies whose safety and efficacy is supported only by advertising copy. But the fact remains that there are a lot of quacks out there, and sadly, some of them have white coats and stethoscopes. Let the patient beware.

Yours truly,
Elizabeth Norton
Freelance Science Writer

Dear Liz-O-Rama,

What do you mean, you're a former PIO? How did you manage to get yourself let go from a nonprofit?

You've got me with the neurogenesis, and you're right that patients have a dispiriting amount of responsibility for their own medical care. But I still think that if you were such a hotshot, you'd be a science reporter on a reputable newspaper. Also, I'm not sure it's possible to have more than one cornerstone.

Poof!
Dr. Diogenes

2010-02-21T07:48:00.000-08:00

Ask Dr. Diogenes

Dear Dr. Diogenes,

For the past few days I've felt like I'm coming down with a cold. A good friend recommended echinacea, saying it would be good for my autoimmune system. I found some in the drugstore, but the label said people with allergies and autoimmune disorders should check with their doctors before using. Now I'm confused. Isn't my autoimmune system what I'm taking it for?

I do have a lot of allergies, but there's no point in checking with my doctor, who denounces all forms of alternative medicine. My friend, an acclaimed novelist, is writing a memoir on faith and healing, so I can't believe she'd give me misleading information. She swears that whenever she feels a cold coming on she can prevent it with echinacea supplements--and if she still catches cold she doesn't get as sick as she would have without the supplements.

What do you say?
--Confused amid the Coneflowers

Dear Coneflower:

There is no such thing as an "autoimmune system." You have an immune system; you can only have autoimmune diseases. If someone refers to your autoimmune system, its' a clear sign that they don't know what they're talking about and have no business giving medical advice.

Auto is a Greek word meaning self. An auto-anything is something that works on itself (an automobile, for example, can move itself, without having to be pulled by a horse). The immune system's prime directive is to distinguish self from non-self--to sort out what's supposed to be in the body from what isn't. So if the immune system is functioning in an "auto" capacity, it's attacking what is "self"--mistaking a healthy part of the body for a disease-causing intruder, like a virus. An allergy is a related condition; here the immune system is not actually mounting an attack against a part of the body, but it's overreacting to something that's not really a threat, like dust or cat dander.

Getting back to those coneflowers (Echinacea purpura, a lovely plant, I must say). Echinacea does indeed stimulate the immune system. But in people with autoimmune disorders or allergies, the immune system is way overactive already. So stimulating it further is the last thing you want to do. And your friend's avowal that she doesn't get as sick as she would without the supplements is highly questionable. How can she tell how sick she would have gotten? No one is ever told what would have happened, as what's-his-face the lion says several dozen times in the Narnia stories. Your friend ought to know that, being a novelist.

It would be nice to treat all illness with flowers directly out of the garden, but pretty fantasies are no match for scientific rigor and objectivity. Sorry, but you should listen to your doctor on this one.

Get well soon,
Dr. Diogenes

PS--I'd also worry about your friend's calling herself an "acclaimed" novelist. In the professional opinion of Dr. Diogenes, acclaimed is the new mediocre. Assuming her being a novelist wasn't enough of a red flag.

2010-02-18T08:41:00.000-08:00

Ash Wednesday

Yesterday I stopped into St. Igneous at lunchtime. There was no noon Eucharist, but the sanctuary was open. According to the Sunday bulletin, Imposition of the Ashes would be available from nine on. The ashes had been thoughtfully placed next to the baptism font, in an attractive pottery bowl hand-thrown by one of the parishioners. The Imposition was do-it-yourself. I took it on faith that the ashes really were from last year's palms, not swept up from someone's fireplace.

By the roughly equal number of hybrids and SUVs in the parking lot, I judged that a yoga class was going on in the Fellowship Hall. The class is taught by a woman from town. Her husband is something called a cosmetic dentist, which means, I believe, that his patients pay cash. She is thin and blond and just got back from India. Not to be confused with the thin, blond spiritual writer who just got back from India and was bludgeoned with one of her books. I have no problem with women going off to India whenever they get in a funk. They keep coming back, is the problem.

The swamiettes look down on organized religion. They roll up their sticky mats and make pretty moues at the rich women in fur coats intoning meaningless rituals and rote memorizations. The yoga class consists of rich women in unitards chanting Sanskrit words whose meaning they just learned from the cosmetic dentist's wife. But this incongruity seems not to trouble them.

There is no reason it should trouble me, and the fact that it does probably makes me as much a snob as any of them. As I pondered this truth, sitting in the empty sanctuary, I felt more isolated rather than less, without even the luxury of grievance. If I dislike people because they're jerks, that implies there are other people somewhere else who aren't jerks, and if I could just meet up with them, I'd be all set. But others annoy us in proportion to the faults of our own that they threaten to expose. Once I acknowledge there's nothing wrong with anyone else that isn't also wrong with me, I'm left in a powerfully uncomfortable place. Perhaps a step closer to enlightenment, the holy men of either tradition might say. Any spiritual path should lead to the death of the self that looks down, sets apart, makes wrong--so that the true self, which need do none of these things, can be reborn.

The winter sun shone through the yellow-white windows, casting a glow on the stone floors, the ceilings of dark wood. Our church is neither wholly dark like a Catholic shrine nor crystal bright like the Congregational church across the street (the Congo, as they call it at St. Igneous). The softly stained glass brings light into a place of less light, hinting of the God who is not praised or visualized by people in any mode of dress--but sought, longed for, shining steadily beyond and through what is dim.

Before I left the church I took up some ashes in my hand, then let them sift back down into the tasteful pottery vessel. To trace a cross on my own forehead, in the absence of a proper service, seemed as great an affectation as the Sanskrit and sticky mats. Two crosses are carried in on Sundays, one of gleaming bronze and one of wood. This is so we don't think so much of the golden cross that we forget what happened on the wooden one. I die daily, St. Paul wrote to the Corinthians. If I endured in life the death of all that is false, all that is wrong in myself, I wonder what I would see born.

--From the journal of Cornelia Quirke

2010-02-10T08:24:00.000-08:00

Bestselling Author Brained with Own Memoir

New Age Gathering Marred by Violence
By Cornelia Quirke

Acclaimed spiritual memoirist Terri Postlethwaite, author of an internationally bestselling, 793-page account of a week long silent retreat in the Himalayas, was injured last night at a festival known as The Confluence. Postlethwaite suffered minor injuries when a copy of her latest book was flung at her by an unidentified member of the audience, striking the writer.

Witnesses said Postlethwaite, a member of a panel discussion entitled Word and Spirit, was reading from her memoir when another panelist became disruptive. Sittcham Lobsang Rinpoche, formerly Murray Beamish of Hempstead, N.Y., claimed he had observed silence for ten years at the Temple of the Seven Chakras outside Mercia. "The purpose of keeping silence is to know when to shut your big yap," Beamish said.

Several members of the audience began cheering but were shouted down by Postlethwaite's far more numerous fans. In the confusion, someone hurled a copy of Postlethwaite's memoir into the area roped off for speakers. The book struck Postlethwaite in the forehead. She was taken by ambulance to the Mercia Medical Center, where she was treated for mild concussion and a laceration requiring three stitches.

Meanwhile, a skirmish broke out between two women attending the discussion. According to witnesses, Tara Healey of Burlington, Vt., confided to Fran Mathers of Boston that Postlethwaite was "a fully released master who had opened up new energies" in Healey's life. Mathers replied that Postlethwaite was a "self-obsessed New Age dingdong who needs a pie in the face." Healey then asked if Mathers was calling her a dindong. Mathers said, "If the Birkenstock fits, wear it, you freak," and seized a handful of Healey's hair. The women were separated by fellow attendees, and no injuries were reported.

"When I found out what the festival was about I couldn't believe there'd be violence," said Steve Cranmer, owner of a local glass and tile showroom, who went to the event thinking it was a rock concert. "I expected to hear what's left of the Grateful Dead or at least pick up some good dope, but nobody had any. That's probably why they got unruly," Cranmer added.

According to organizers, The Confluence is a ceremony convened by local yoga teachers, massage therapists, and whole foods marketers to enable attendees to "align with the powerful new energies now reaching this planet." The gathering was held at the Books of Kells bookstore at the intersection of Lantern and Main Streets.

Postlethwaite's first book, OMG That is the Coolest Thing I Never Heard: How I Kept Silence, Found Myself, and Saved my Marriage, catapulted her into bestsellerdom several years ago. Her new memoir is entitled Actionable: One Woman's Account of the Spiritual Lessons Gleaned from a Bitter Divorce and the Lawsuits that Followed. Currently number one on the New York Times Bestseller List, it is available from area booksellers or for $3.98 at Amazon.com (1,037 pages, hardcover).