MY COUSIN, BLESSED MARGARET POLE, MARTYR - MAY 28

 

Lady Margaret Pole

Countess of Salisbury

Martyr

14 August 1473 - 27 May 1541

Beheaded by King Henry VIII

My 6th cousin, 17 times removed, noble and innocent Lady Margaret Pole was beheaded in the Tower of London by the order of King Henry VIII for entirely specious excuses. She wasn't a particularly saintly person, in general, except that she stood up for the Catholic Church when King Henry destroyed it because he wanted an annulment from his first wife, Catherine of Aragon, who was my 9th cousin, 17 times removed. I am related to all the actors in this drama because they are all related to one another.  I am a cousin to myself 100 times over because the nobility intermarries so frequently.

Margaret is recognized as a martyr for the faith.

The official charge was treason, if "official" it could be called, because King Henry VIII (my 6th cousin, 16 times removed) was bypassing official legal channels in his country in a very similar way to the manner in which the head of our country is currently asserting his own will, while illegally circumventing the authority of Congress.

King Henry VIII of England

Henry VIII was using something called a "bill of attainder" to enact punishments against political enemies without due process of any kind. NO trial - only punishment. This is when a King behaves as a dictator instead of a civilized head of state. Henry would proclaim that someone had committed an act of Treason or something else and then send them to the Tower of London for an extended stay, which sometimes ended with a beheading.

An interesting factoid is that these pesky "Bill of Attainders" played a large part in why my English ancestors originally came to this country because the lack of due process and reliance upon the judgment of the king alone was all it took to get someone beheaded at that time, and the founders of this country had enough of that, thank you very much.

We know the names of the prominent people that King Henry ordered to be killed, but it was an era in which punishments were severe, even for relatively benign offenses, so it is hard to know how many of the beheadings of the less well known folks could be directly imputed to Henry.

Display at the Tower of London

Currently, our own president Donald Trump has been issuing a flurry of "executive orders" which operate somewhat in the same way as the bill of attainder and, since all three (supposedly "co-equal") branches of our government are in the hands of the Republican Party, for which Trump is the de facto leader, all of the weak willed Republican politicians are cowering in fear that he would kill them politically if they vote against anything that touches him. It appears to me that Trump is exulting in the power. 

There ARE people dying as a result of Trump's modern version of the Bill of Attainder, but they are all poor people, on the verge of starvation, whose promised aid from America has been stopped suddenly, mid-stream. Shipments meant for the Sudan or other locations are moldering away in warehouses, somewhere between the producers of the food and the promised recipients. This has been accomplished by the destruction of the USAID Department by Trump's attack dog, Elon Musk, who, without any legal authority, was given access to all Americans personal private data, as well as complete access to all the departments of the U.S. government. 

It is not just immoral, it is illegal. The funds and programs were approved by Congress, which holds the official "Power of the Purse." Trump's victims die, out of sight, except by those that die with them, and our good Lord, the saints and the angels - all of whom, I am sure, are looking down over the ramparts of heaven and weeping in distress at the sight of the brutal cruelty.

Photography by:

Mariola Grobelska on Unsplash.com

Henry VIII was actually murdering people by the direct act of state. The difference between him and Trump is that Trump's victims, so far, tend to be poor people whose deaths are caused by the destruction of agencies meant to save those poor people. And he hasn't actually killed any prominent people, being content to attempt to murder only the careers and personal reputations of the well known politicians and celebrities, instead. Slander is one of his weapons against anyone whose careers could be "killed" thereby.

Trump and Henry were/are each overly large men, sexually profligate, lovers of power and control, disdainful of the law if it interfered with his appetites and aspirations, consistently paranoid, a serial divorcee and the possessor of a victim mentality in which he continues to assert how much he has been wronged by so many.

Trump shared this picture on

his personal "truth social" account

 Henry's known victims were noble men and women whom he feared would interfere with either his lust for various women or his royal reign. 

Both of these characters were/are clearly unstable, as well as victims of their own overweening egos and their powerful appetites. Trump's willingness to punish anyone who defies his will, disagrees with him, or mocks him is well-known, thus his supporters cringe in their boots, afraid to stand up for justice. Many of my friends, who are nobodies (not celebrities or government operatives) are hiding their Facebook posts, as if they will be sent to Guantanamo Bay in retaliation for their Facebook posts about his corruption and cruelty. Few seem to have the courage to stand up for Truth and Justice. Faith in the First Amendment of the Constitution is getting a beating.

Another similarity between these two eras is the inappropriate mixing of politics and religion. King Henry actually made himself the head of the Church in England, for which he was excommunicated by the Pope. Trump uses the Christian faith in another way as, unlike Henry, he has never even pretended to be a believer until it became a calculated necessity. He would not put his hand on the Bible to take his oath of office, but he SELLS special Trump bibles in a cynical bid to both reinforce the belief of his Christian followers that he is a Godly man, and to make a buck on the side. 

Trump and cousin Henry have money problems in common. Each of them was born into massive wealth but, because of wanton lavish overspending, they both ended up in terrible debt. Trump even bankrupted six CASINOS, something that is hard to do. Henry ended up stealing Church lands and selling them to pay his debts, but he still ended up owing a vast sum of money when he died.

Because each of them had tremendous power to match their enormous appetites, each of them took advantage of and savaged a number of women in their orbit. 

Cousin Henry killed two of his wives but also ordered the beheading of my cousin Lady Margaret Pole for somewhat complex political reasons. After the fact, when Henry was making up reasons to kill her, her Plantagenet birth was blamed. The Plantagenet line of nobility had ruled England for more than 300 years. The Tudors (Henry's line) had snatched the country away from the Plantagenets during the Wars of the Roses. But that wasn't the problem.

Henry, like Trump, was arrogant and egotistical. You could not disagree with him without becoming the target of his ire. Margaret disagreed with him about Catherine of Aragon, his first wife. She supported Catherine's rights as his first wife, as well as the rights of her daughter Mary, the only living child of their union, and this infuriated Henry. 

The Catholic Church had refused to annul his marriage to Catherine, which he sought because she had been unable to produce a male heir, which is not a legal reason for annulment in The Catholic Church. So Henry made himself the head of the Church in England, kicking off the reformation. He appointed Thomas Cranmer the Archbishop of Canterbury so that Cranmer would annul the marriage between him and Catherine.

Shortly thereafter, Henry sold of many valuable church properties in order to pay off his debts.

Margaret never abandoned Catherine, and this was Margaret's downfall, for the most part. Her son was also involved in rebellion, but that was probably another convenient excuse to behead his mother.

Petty and dictatorial, King Henry had Margaret murdered, essentially, because she disagreed with him and he could not stand it - much in the same way that Trump despises anyone that makes him look bad. (He even had the visa of a student withdrawn because the student wrote something about him in a student newspaper that he did not like. The student was kicked out of the country.) Petty and vengeful - Trump and Henry are two peas in a pod.

Because Margaret continued to support the Catholic Church's condemnation of Henry's illicit so-called "annulment" from Catherine of Aragon, the church recognizes her as a martyr for the faith.

Trump could not get away with murdering his detractors, but if he could - if he had the power of an autocratic king like my cousin Henry - I have no doubt that he would.

I pray for all of us during this awful time, especially that our current iteration of King Henry VIII does not manage to grab enough power to start killing his enemies and any of us who dare to criticize him, otherwise, many heads will roll, like my cousin Margaret's.

God bless us all.

Silver Rose

SAINT DAVID I OF SCOTLAND, MY 28TH GREAT GRANDFATHER, MAY 24

 

SAINT DAVID I,

KING OF SCOTLAND

My 28th Great Grandfather

b. abt. 1080

d. 24 May 1153

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SAINT ELGIVA (AELFGIFU) OF SHAFTESBURY, MY 34th GREAT GRANDMOTHER, May 18

 

Saint Aelfgifu (Elgiva) of Shaftsbury

My 34th Great Grandmother

~ 

Prayer to Saint Elgiva of Shaftesbury

Saint Elgiva, who loved God and served Him with unwavering faith, we humbly ask for thy intercession.

Take under thy protection the Holy Catholic Church; defend it, and be always its consolation, its asylum, and its invincible fortress against every assault of its enemies.

 

Be our way to come to Jesus and the channel through which we receive all graces necessary for our salvation. 

We ask thee, in thy closeness to God, to intercede for us and guide us on our path. 

May thy example of faith inspire us to live a life pleasing to God. 

Through thy prayers and intercession, may we grow in holiness and become worthy of eternal life. 

Amen. 

~ 

FEAST DAY: May 18, 2025

BIRTH: About 924 in Wessex, England

DEATH: About 944 in Shaftesbury, Dorset, England

SHAFTESBURY ABBEY, DORSET, ENGLAND

As with many queens of her era who outlived her royal husband, Aelfgifu retired to Shaftesbury Abbey, where she had some connection with the place, probably through relationship to members of that community and/or benefactors. There is a theory that her mother was a resident, but this is only an educated guess on the part of experts.

My great grandmother was attributed with quite a number of miracles, specifically after her death, including a cure of blindness, which I could most certainly avail myself, so I plan to add her to my regular round of relatives to whom I appeal for intercession regarding my failing vision.

But she was also well known for great Christian behavior while alive, including considerable kindness. It is frequently mentioned that she gave donations of "costly clothing" to the poor, and this is an area of life in which I have some interest and which has impinged on my spiritual perspective.

First of all, during the the time in question, all clothing was technically "costly" since every garment was hand-made, and therefore labor intensive - including the fabric itself! But the sense that I get from it is that she didn't thrust upon the poor the rough and care-worn clothing that the poor were usually forced to wear.  This expensive clothing that she gave to the poor was, no doubt, clothing worn by what was thought of as the "upper classes" or the nobility.

CLOTHING AS A MARK OF SOCIO-ECONOMONIC STANDING

If you think about it, clothing is usually imbued with a certain amount of relative status. In the early middle ages, in particular, it was easy to see to which class one belonged, simply by looking at the clothing one wore. One's profession could usually be guessed at as well. I am assuming that in that age, as it is in THIS one, clothing that was given to the poor was serviceable but not particularly fine in quality or appearance because there is this idea that the poor do not deserve to possess anything really nice. 

DONATIONS OF CLOTHING TO THE POOR:

On this topic, I am going to hop back to present time and tell a story illustrative of the idea that clothing is only one of many methods by which we oppress poor people.

Throughout my early childhood, my mother would not allow me to have more than two dresses that were hand-me-downs from HER wardrobe because she claimed I did not "deserve" to have clothes because I was too fat. She told me I could not have new clothes of my own until I lost weight but, for the life of me, I had no idea, as a child, how I could possibly do that. Anyway, she managed not to buy me anything for myself until I was a teenager and we were finally allowed to wear jeans to school and she bought me some jeans.

This aberration of my mother's had a profound effect on me, and for my entire adult life I have had a  peculiarity when it comes to clothing. My wardrobe continues to grow bigger and bigger until I find myself with an unreasonable amount of clothes and I must divest myself. So I give most of them away. Sometimes, I have not even worn some of the items. I do this every few years.

Because I went my entire early childhood without clothes that weren't hand-me-downs from my mother, I take extremely good care of my clothes so that, even if not new, they appear to be fresh and new. When I give them away, I like the idea that, even if the person who ends up with them is homeless, no one will automatically know their socio-economic strata. The clothes will present a different image.

But I have had a very hard time finding a supposedly "charitable" organization that doesn't have volunteers that take those clothes for themselves, throwing a dollar or two into the till in exchange, so that the homeless and the truly needy never even get to SEE these nice things that I have donated.

I remember once taking an entire automobile FULL of clothes and household things to one of these thrift stores, only to go back two weeks later to find that not a single thing I had donated was in the store, on the floor. Everything was EXACTLY as I had seen it when I visited to give my donation. The place smelled of unwashed clothing and everything was very poor quality. You could see the dust on the shoulders of the blouses and jackets that hung on the carousels. I made an effort to find out what happened to all those things I donated but was unable.

My experience was the same as another person I know who told me the same story about a different thrift store whose purpose was supposedly to clad, shoe and furnish the poor with necessaries. The volunteers, all of whom had far more resources than the poor, would dismissively throw a buck or two into the kitty and then THEY would wear the beautiful clothes that I had intended to give to the poor.

In this way, these people are showing the utter disdain they have for the poor. They justify their selfishness and greed, of course, by saying to themselves that they are "helping" the poor with the dollar that they throw into the cash register. But the poor never get to make a happy purchase and proudly wear a beautiful Land's End jacket or sweater, or a Nordstrom's dress or pair of sandals. For THEM, only the dusty, old and worn-out Walmart shirt or pants made of sticky-hot plastic polyester is left for them.

I highly suspect that the car full of very nice belongings that I gave to the first organization I mentioned actually may have ended up in someone's garage sale. There was SO MUCH of it, and I can't imagine that every kitchen appliance and every shirt and dress was kept by one person.

Since those early years in this town when I had these terrible disappointments, I have worked hard to make sure that my donations of pretty clothes actually make it into the hands of the poor women for whom they are intended. I always keep my eyes peeled.  Because I know what it is like to go without clothing and to be stuck with hand-me-downs that are inappropriate and unflattering. 

I remember what it was like to have to go to school as an 11 year-old girl wearing a moss green polyester cowl-necked cocktail-length sheath dress of which my mother had tired! I know what it feels like to have other people insist that I do not deserve anything "nice." It is humiliating.

If I love my neighbor as much as I love myself, as much as I love God, I CERTAINLY want them to have the same joy as I have had just owning a decent wardrobe.

So, when I read that my 34th great grandmother gave "costly" clothing to the poor, it really thrilled me. I could relate to her in more ways that one!

WE LIVE LIKE KINGS AND QUEENS

Compared to the time of my 34th great grandmother, what they call "the early middle ages," having more than a few complete outfits would be very rare. Many of the lower classes made their own clothes, typically produced from either wool they took from sheep they raised, or linen they made from the flax plants they grew. Hemp was also used, though it produced a rougher material. (The wealthy had access to silk, but this would be a fabric the commoners would rarely have even seen with their own eyes, much less used or worn! It was reserved for the very wealthy.) 

Even in those early, rough years, there were merchants who sold fabric and garments. There were also weavers who had the larger "commercial" size looms. Serfs with some funds may have had their raw materials made into fabric at this local weaver if they did not possess the proper loom in their home.

Transformation of the raw materials was extremely labor intensive and specialized. 

After processing the raw materials, thin strands of fabric were created from the raw materials, using a spinning wheel or even by hand with a large "drop spindle," then they would take those strands and weave fabric. They would then hand sew the fabric into basic rudimentary garments, with an eye toward function of each piece. 

Clothing was one of the major investments of a family at that time. During those days, each outfit of clothing would be highly prized and meticulously cared for. When a piece was created, function was the first consideration, and even pretty embroidery was mostly used to reinforce hems or to hide worn spots. Every aspect of the garment had a purpose, even the decorative elements. 

The purchase of used clothing was common, since the items were made to be highly sturdy and long-lasting, sometimes outliving their original owners! A fine suit of clothes was like gold, but more useful.

In modern America, most of us live in a manner of the kings and queens of yesteryear, while we remain oblivious. Even those of us who are on the poor side manage to accumulate many possessions throughout our lives and we live in apartments that have heating and cooling. We even own things that are not strict necessities, and most people have at least one "treasure" such as a necklace handed down to us by a beloved relative. I often think it is too much, and I end up giving things away to someone whose income is less than mine. No matter how poor you are, there will always be someone more poor!

I would just like to say, in closing, that, in the interest of solidarity with the poor, many religious folk dedicate themselves to an extreme style of "simple" living. There is barely a picture on the wall, and all the surfaces are empty of decorations. I lived in a similar manner at various times of my life, with a mattress on the floor for a bed, and cushions in the living room instead of couches. I was physically fit at the time, and could get up and down off the floor, but more important was that I was living like a gypsy and had to keep my burdens very light because I never found a place in which I could foresee being able to afford the rent for more than just the immediate future. 

In my current apartment, I have many religious paintings on my wall, and there will be more in future because I am a painter. My apartment is a happy mess and I love it. I have lived in the same place for the last 20 years and the rent is not easy to afford, but I am disabled and my options are limited, so I remain here and I have built a life that includes many art projects that contribute to, rather than detract from, my spiritual life. Instead of seeing how plain, drab and undecorated I can live, I would rather elevate the esthetic to a spiritually beautiful appearance.  

Rather than demonstrate my solidarity with those poorer than myself (of which there are not a terribly large number) I would rather help the poor surround themselves in beauty, if they so choose.  I would like to show my love, not by living with empty walls but by helping the poor to bring loveliness to their lives so they can experience what it is like to live like little kings and queens, just as the rest of Americans tend to do.

So, if anyone in Albuquerque knows of a good charity to which I can donate some beautiful things that I can be sure will end up in the hands of those poorer than myself, instead of the "volunteers" tasked with helping them, please let me know.

In the meantime, God bless you all.  

Please pray for me, as I pray for you.

Silver Rose

Saint John of Ávila, Apostle of Andalusia - May 10

 

"I would rather live without skin

than live without devotion

to the Blessed Virgin Mary."

~ Saint John of Avila ~

On May 10, we celebrate the feast day of one of the saints who helped form the foundations of my Catholic consciousness and was, in a small way, responsible for my leaving the Hindu (Vedanta) convent in the early 1990's so that I could become a Catholic nun. This did not happen in the manner that I imagined it would, since it was years before I was welcomed into the Catholic Church and I never became a Catholic "nun," per se, but the inspiration for monastic life remained with me for all these years, and I have been an independent lay hermit since 2003. The outward form of what I wanted for myself did not materialize, but I am living the spirit of the thing in a way that takes advantage of the gifts with which the Lord endowed me from birth. God brings all things to the good for those who believe.

Long after my conversion, I continue to look to the saints for clues about how to live a life that is intensely devoted to The Lord. It seems as if a good third of the saints I read about in my daily studies of the saints of the day have, at some point, become hermits, at least for a time. But this isn't true of the saint I chose today, except that I sense an inclination toward the hidden life by certain phases in which he was drawn toward it. But he was mostly known as a beautiful orator, teacher, and  doctor of the church with missionary zeal. If you read his sermons and letters, his mental trend was somewhat mystical. His sermons were widely attended and usually packed the facility where they were given. He given the honorific title of "doctor of the church" in 2012 by Pope Benedict.

"Enlarge your little heart to the

immensity of love with which the

Father offered us His Son, and with

Him gave us Himself, the Holy

Spirit, and all things."

~ St. John of Avila ~

Whenever I read about the saints, I will compare the trajectory of their lives with mine, in the hope that I may learn something from them. Saint John of Avila and I both came from wealth. At least, my father was wealthy. He divorced my mother and then another woman and had a final wife that had me written out of his will after he got Alzheimer's so she could take my inheritance. Thereafter, he died a very suspicious death. When you live by the sword, you die by the sword.

Saint John of Avila was disconnected from the wealth of his parents when they died while he was still a college student and he sold the family property! He gave the proceeds to the poor and embarked on his clerical career. In my case, I was disconnected from my father's wealth by his avaricious third wife. In Saint John's, he sought poverty and created it for himself.

"He who relies on God does not

let himself be overwhelmed by

sufferings, anguish, death, or hell.

He who does not lean on Him,

how much fear he feels, how 

worried he walks!"

~ St. John of Avila

I do believe that God loves the poor and desires that his beloved mystics also be poor so that we depend upon him.  Either we are naturally poor, or we voluntarily opt for poverty, but the end is the same. We cling to God alone.

I hasten to add that in no way do I practice the "radical poverty" of Saint John. That is not my path. I am an artist and a writer, and the accoutrements of that type of career, and the instruments, tools and supplies that are needed for the painting and the writing, are many and varied. So I do not pretend to the total abandonment of resources to which Saint John aspired, nor do I believe this is the path for everyone. You may still actually cling to God alone while at the same time having in your possession those supplies that are necessary to your state of life. If you are a mother, for instance, it is not necessary to make your infant sleep on the floor on a rough hemp blanket. If you make and sell shoes, you don't walk around town barefoot. You get the idea.

Saint John himself lived in a style of radical poverty and advocated for it widely. This was the basis for his disapproval of the behavior of the "upper classes" of his day.

"Whoever has the truth and does

not profess it or behave according

to it is trapping the truth in injustice."

~ St. John of Avila ~

Saint John also had many years of progressively poor health at the end of his life, forcing him to go into semi-retirement. This is a situation one could bewail, or instead look upon it as a tremendous gift of the Lord, allowing us to be drawn into His arms, where we may rest during the last miles of our earthly walk. 

The Lord gives us the blessing of chopping us down so that we remain with Him. The illnesses that create our lack of mobility and force us to remain with the Lord are a divine dispensation.

"The cause that in a greater measure

stimulates our heart to the love of God

is to consider deeply the love that He

had for us."

~St. John of Avila ~

Saint John was the type of person meant to be a leader and a teacher, so even though he was attracted to a small modest house in Seville with another priest in the early years of his life as a priest, he quickly attracted disciples, and this often happens with the doctors of the church that the Lord gifts with great oratory and teaching abilities.

In reading about his life, a rhythm of first being drawn to a small hidden residence and then being called out into the world by his disciples and his superiors in religion shows itself to have been a tension string on which the music of his spiritual work was played.

"You think that by worrying too much

you will be able to keep up. Woe to the

man who does not lean on God but lives

thinking whether it will rain a lot or 

whether it will not rain!"

~ St. John of Avila ~

There were several phases in which he was preparing for one mission but was called away from that by his superiors, such as his planned-for but not taken mission to Mexico. He was talked out of that in order to do missionary work (which later earned him the appellation of "the apostle of Andalusia") in response to the urgings of the Archbishop of Seville and the Inquisitor General.

I don't think they anticipated that he would put himself under the critical eyes of the Inquisition by advocating strongly for church reforms and by his bitter invective against the behavior of the rich aristocracy, however! Having a talent as an inspiring orator was fine, as long as the wealthy benefactors of the church were not antagonized!

"Remember what you have done

offending God and what you have

failed to do in his service; go to

the confessor and throw away all

your sins, sweep and clean your

house."

~ Saint John of Avila

I find echoes of the American condition of the church in what happened next for our dear saint because he was imprisoned on a charge of exaggerating the dangers of wealth and insinuating that the doors of Heaven were closed to the rich! Doesn't that sound like something Donald Trump would do if he could? He would love to send people to prison for any sort of criticism of the wealthy class. So, we live in similar circumstances at the moment, with the exception that our beloved Catholic Church has almost none of the worldly power that it did during St. John's era.

"The good preacher and the good

confessor must go to the front. No

one should say a good word without 

first putting it into practice."

~ St. John of Avila ~

Saint John was ultimately exonerated and released from prison, whereupon he returned to teaching and preaching from a base in Cordoba. He also established schools and colleges in nearby cities. His University of Baeza became a model for the schools of the Jesuits. Wherever he went, a community seemed to want to spring up in his footsteps, but he encouraged his disciples to go and join the Jesuits! As accomplished and overflowing with spiritual gifts as he appeared to be, he was also humble hearted. He must have been a remarkable person to see and hear with one's own eyes and ears

Saint John was ill from his early 50's, (which is also the approximate age of my disability, though mine was at age 49, and it had been announcing itself for the previous 10 years.) He went into a somewhat retired condition at that time and died almost 20 years later, at age 70. He was buried in the Jesuit Church of the Incarnation in the town of Montilla, Province of Cordova, where there is a sanctuary to his memory.

He left behind a considerable amount of written material, including 82 sermons and a large number of letters. I find it fascinating that among the letters we find saints among the recipients, such as Juan de Ribera, Thomas of Villanova, Ignatias of Loyola, John of God and my favorite, Teresa of Avila! His was a prodigious talent that affected everyone from the clergy he helped to reform, to students of religion for whom he established schools and colleges, and to the laity who he attempted to catechize. I don't often find a saint who has such a wide range of talents. He was a remarkable man.

"I know of nothing better than to

meditate on the fact that our Lord,

with Whom we are to treat, is both

God and man, and to think over the

reasons for which He comes down

upon the altar."

~ Saint John of Avila ~

I plan to make a note to myself to review his letters to Saint Teresa of Avila and see if there is anything in there which could inspire me in my efforts to bear down on my spiritual life during this final lap of this race.

I also recommend familiarizing yourselves with this beautiful saint because, no matter what arena in which you are living your life, I suspect that he may have something inspiring for you!

In the meantime, I pray for you, as I hope you pray for me.

Speaking of prayer, here is a lovely prayer asking God to help us follow the example of Saint John of Avila:

"Almighty God, You chose St. John 

of Avila from among your faithful to

show his brothers the way that leads

to You; grant that his example may

help us to follow Jesus Christ, our

teacher, so that one day, together

with our brothers, we may reach the

glory of your eternal kingdom.

Through our Lord Jesus Christ,

Thy Son,

Amen"

God bless you all!

Silver Rose 

(By the way - I am tired of being plagiarized and having my work stolen for the use of other persons, so please remember that, although you may read my work for free in this blog, entirely without any payment for all research and my creativity, you may NOT copy it, in whole or in part, without my express written permission. You may reach me by writing a comment on this blog or contacting me on Facebook. ASK for permission and it will not be unreasonably refused.)