Linda Z

DWBH, my point exactly. I believe Ms. Rivenbark is the epitome of two-faced, clawing, manipulatove, ladder-climbing ambition. It's my perception that she played along with VPW to carve out a nice chunk of power for herself. Despite her syrupy talk about "obeying the man of God, right or wrong" and her sickening (IMO feigned) adoration of him, she even lied to him. I know for a fact she told the Way Pub receptioninst to say she didn't know where Rosalie was if he called...a flat-out lie. She played LCM, too. I imagine she was nicey nice to his face until she had enough "goods" on him not to have to fake it anymore. Comments I heard her make with my own ears, in 1985 or early '86, made it perfectly plain she didn't think very highly of him, no matter what BS she doled out in public. Foxhaven indeed.

Oakspear asked: That's an easy one. She did.

Twinky, I'm sure you're right, in that the death of a child was much less of a surprise in the 19th century, but I don't think a mother could ever quite get used to losing a child, as your grandmother's experience would indicate. I like to think that perhaps the words in the old family Bible that sits on my shelf helped to encourage her so she could carry on.

Wow, that's a new one on me, too, jellybean. (Welcome, by the way.) Last I knew the place had been turned into a big resort complex for soccer players and their families. Pretty strange stuff! I was never Catholic, so the whole worshiping Mary thing is something I don't quite get. I will refrain from making wisecracks about someone else's religion. All I can say is I spent 2 years at that place, and I never saw "Our Lady of America." I was probably too preoccupied with stringing chairs or washing dishes or something. I guess Uncle Harry Hill has been renamed Holy Family Hill and the statues are back. What goes around comes around, eh?

I haven't looked at the last Bible I used in twi for many years, but I still have it. I'd never throw it away, not because I value all the notes in the margins, but because it represents a big chunk of my journey through this life and my search to know God. My favorite is the Bible my great-great grandparents carried with them on their voyage from Liverpool, England, when they came to America in 1853. Listed among the births and marriages and deaths on its back pages are the names of my great-grandfather's two young brothers who died on that voyage and were buried at sea. Any angst I've ever felt or hurt I've experienced in life, whether related to twi or not, fades in significance when I think of my great-great grandmother having to see her two precious little boys' bodies lowered from the side of the ship into the ocean, never to see them or hold them or hear their voices again. I can't imagine the strength it took for her to carry on, in a new country, with only 2 of her 4 children. I have others that mean a lot to me, too--an old, battered copy of an 1881 English Revised version I found in a junk store for a quarter while I was in the middle of Donna R's class. In the next class session after I'd bought it, she mentioned that version and said something like, "You'll probably never find an original one of those today." I was practically jumping up and down in my seat, because I'd just found one! For a quarter! I always felt that was a blessing from God just for me. I also have a little red leather New Testament I bought at a garage sale in New Knoxville that was printed in 1860. I wondered if it was carried in a soldier's pocket during the Civil War. Then there's the little two-volume New English Revised New Testament that a friend gave to me before I got into twi, which his father had given to him. That's still one of my favorite versions. I have lots of others, most bought in used bookstores or at garage sales that I used for studying over the years. I don't read them all as often as I used to, but like exsie, I could never throw them away.

I've seen some of the younger GSers talk about how we old timers were just into sex, drugs, and rock and roll. Well, yeah, but there was a lot more to it than that. Rewind to the world some of us were living in as a prelude to our twi involvement: Mid-1960s: My church let me down. When I wanted answers, the minister didn't give them. Church was a social event, but not much more. I pondered whether there was a God and, if there was, if He cared about us individually. Did He see me? Was I even a tiny blip on His divine radar screen? I sorta thought I wasn't. 1964: I was 17, a freshman in college, when my president was shot and killed. This was something I never expected to see in my lifetime. Assassinations were ancient history...or so I thought. Bob Dylan was singing "The Times They Are a-Changing." He sang a mouthful. 1964-66: I watched my friends go off to Vietnam, wondering if I'd ever see them again. The war was in my living room every night on the evening news. Too many body bags came back, and too many young men who, although alive, would never be the same. My soon-to-be husband was one of these casualties. Summer of love, 1967: Went to California to "get my head together" and found out people's heads were just as screwed up on the West Coast as mine was. :huh: I saw police beating peaceful antiwar protestors bloody and couldn't believe this was happening in America. At the same time, I found out not all the leaders of the antiestablishment were an improvement over those they opposed. It was also the summer of my disillusionment. Idealism had died, but I got married anyway. April 4, 1968: Martin Luther King was gunned down in Memphis. June 5, 1968: I was sitting in my bed watching Bobby Kennedy on television. I was about 3 miles from the hotel where he'd been speaking when Sirhan Sirhan murdered him. 1969: I met some hippie Christians in LA, and my doubting-God days were over. But then my new friends moved away one by one. Later that year, I had my heart broken by one of the hippie Christians--ironically, the very one who knocked on my door saying, "God told me you needed help," just minutes after I cried out silently to God for help. Enter personal prophecy. My skepticism toward God was still gone, but my skepticism toward people speaking for God skyrocketed. 1970: I thought partying would fill the hole. It didn't. I also learned how much cleverness and wisdom my partying friends lost when I viewed them through sober/straight eyes. 1971-72: I tried a few churches and home fellowships. Still, no answers that really reached my heart. I knew God was real. I knew He saw me. I wanted to know how to "see" Him. The times they were a-changing, alright. It was like trying to swim in a whirlpool. I wanted answers. I was attending a church for the last time, to say goodbye to the people there I'd grown fond of. One of my friends who'd been witnessed to by some twi people handed me a note, saying, "This fellowship is near your house. Maybe you'll want to check it out. I did. I wasn't looking for a family. I had a great family already. I wasn't looking for friends. I had great friends. I wasn't looking for a boyfriend or financial prosperity or a reason to feel superior to anyone else. I was looking for answers about God. I was looking for something stable in this crazy, upside-down world I'd been living in. So that's why I bought it. If anyone else had been teaching the Bible (not fire and brimstone or the other end of the churchy spectrum) in my vicinity, perhaps I would have "bought" some other ministry or organization. But twi was where I ended up for the next 16 or 17 years...the good of it, the bad of it, and the ugly of it. In the long run, things didn't turn out in twi world as I'd expected, and when I left HQ in '86 and drifted completely away over the next couple years, I thought, "Here we go a freekin-gain. Another let-down." Then it hit me. It wasn't twi that had spoken to my heart. It wasn't twi that had rescued me from this tumultuous world. It was God. Thanks to Him, I'm still here, and I'm not a grease spot. :P

It's good to hear from you, Roy. You're sounding better all the time. I'm glad you've found a better place to live...enjoy your new home. God bless your sweet soul.

I see the price has been cut in half...only $2500 now, although the seller says it's worth $5 million.

The "Book of Life," to the best of my recollection, was simply a mailing list containing the addresses of all active Wayfers. There were sublists, like Way Corps and WOWs, so that those groups could be sent mailings specifically for them, but whenever an "all mailing" was sent--for example, a letter from LCM or a promotional flyer for the ROA or whatever--it was sent to everyone in the "Book of Life." After I parted company with twi, I asked a friend who still worked at HQ in Word Processing to get me some addresses of some friends. She printed them out directly from the "Book of Life." I don't think there was any info in that file besides names and addresses, Corps number if you were in the Corps, and maybe phone numbers. I did get my Corps file 10 years after graduation. There was nothing too interesting in it--evaluations from Lightbearers and LEAD, my "Birth to the Corps" paper, stuff like that. I was long gone from twi by the time I got it. I never went to HQ after 1987, and I think the year I achieved "Dropped from Active Corps" status was 1989. But I still got the file in 1991. I would think twi would be reluctant to keep a lot of files on people. Couldn't such files be as incriminating to the current honchos as to anyone else? The idea that there might still be a file on me, which I highly doubt, doesn't worry me. I was a peon in the grand scheme of things. What are they going to reveal to the world? That I sometimes skipped mandatory meetings? That I broke curfew while in residence? That I refused to eat lunch at HQ when I didn't like what was on the menu? Gasp! The shame of it all.

I just looked, and it was still there, with 3+ days to go.

C'mon, RR. My saying I don't like Glenn Beck was "rampant politicization"? I'd say using this fine woman's life story to make a political point, as Beck did, was rampant politicization. I didn't mean to get everyone in an uproar with my initial remark, but it was no big, heavy political statement. I clicked on the video, and instead of seeing what I thought might be an inspirational story, I saw Beck's mug So I wisecracked that I can't stand watching him. Back to the topic at hand: I can't imagine the courage it took this woman to do what she did. Love really is stronger than the forces of evil. That's the message I came away with after viewing the video.

What a courageous, loving woman. You can see it in her face, in both the photos taken in her youth and in her old age. That video is also a great reminder that each of us can make a difference in this world.

Catcup, my sincere condolences to you and to all those hurt by this loss. I certainly don't discount the fact that the WayGB monitors this site. There's been plenty of proof of that in the past. I just wonder, though, if perhaps the executor or another family member who knows you post here looked in and saw your post? Either way, it stinks. I think putting a Memorial message in the newspaper on the anniversary of her death would be an excellent way to honor her memory and her wishes.

RR: My tongue was firmly planted in my cheek, but I guess my little smiley face didn't make that clear. Sorry, RR. Lazy, I'm not, thankyouverymuch. Well, maybe a little. But it's not laziness that prompted me not view the video. I'll probably watch it later. I'm trying to watch Dancing with the Stars. If I told you to kiss my derriere (and I say this with affection, a very evil grin, and only because I know you in real life), would that be a personal attack? In that case, I'd better not say anything like that. :P <-- tongue released from cheek now

Happy b'day from one old hippie to another!

Sorry, RR, but that Glenn guy aggravates me too much to watch the video. There are lots of conservative commentators I like, even though I often disagree with them: George Will, Pat Buchanan, Tucker Carlson, Joe Scarboro. But Glenn (Beck, is it?) is someone who rubs me the wrong way. Can you post a synopsis? :)

I wonder if maybe you're hearing these reports because you live in a state that borders Mexico. I admit that I'm not a big news hound and don't read/watch the national news all the time, so I might have missed it, but I've heard nothing like what you're describing.

Rascal said: In that case, you can have my share. potato, my comment about legal nitpicking wasn't meant disparagingly or directed at anyone in particular. Those of you who are into that are probably making good pro and con points; it's just not my thing. My point, without trying to back it with some sort of legal "proof," was that although the tapes/videos are owned by twi I doubt they're interested in tracking them all down.

To the best of my knowledge, the only period when PFAL class tapes were being handed out to individuals was during the fallout after Passing of a Patriarch, and I'd be willing to bet they weren't given out with the Way International's blessing. Was it during that time, Galen (around 1986-89) that you were given the tapes? There was a whole underground "vibe" during that time. I know in Ohio, leaders still on twi's payroll were scrambling around trying to "save" PFAL one way or another, either by stashing the sets of class tapes or whatever, because they were caught up in Geer's thing and expected to get fired and lose access to the materials. During that time I almost got roped into transcribing the class to "preserve" it , but then I decided it was silly, since we had our Bibles and most of us had sat through the class a bunch of times and had all the reading materials anyway. I think I only got through the first tape from the first session. VPW might have occasionally (more likely, rarely) given a set to someone for the purpose of running classes, but it wasn't a common practice. Ham, I was around from '72 until the late 80s, and I never heard of the tapes being given to AC grads. I doubt whether the twi of today would bother to try to force anyone to give back any of the PFAL class tapes or videos. They don't even offer that class anymore, do they? Seems to me with all the time that's passed since anyone got these materials, and with the number of times they've changed hands, that it would be too costly in legal fees for twi to bother. All legal nitpicking aside, the tapes and videos belonged to twi, not to individuals or individual states. They were loaned out, not given out, for the purpose of running classes.

Wow, DogLover, I never heard about that. I was on staff during that time, and if I'd known, I never would have stepped foot in that place again. I hardly ever went there anyway. There were much better places to eat in New Bremen and St. Marys, and certainly with friendlier staffs. Of course you can't judge all the people of NK by that incident. I knew some wonderful, warm-hearted, generous people in that neck of the woods. In fact, someone I still consider one of my closest friends is a guy who was born and raised in NK, and lives there still when he's not traveling to other parts of the world for the military. My landlord was another one. He and his girlfriend would come by and put home-grown veggies in my refrigerator whiile I was at work, and the one time in 4 years he raised my rent (I think by 5 whole dollars), he was extremely apologetic. The local auto repair guy was cool, too. He had the dead-pan demeanor that a lot of men in that town had, but I think that was just a cultural thing, the way men there were expected to be. He went out of his way to be helpful, and he would extend credit for repairs, at no interest, as long as you'd never stiffed him in the past. Good guy. For me it was like living in any small town. You had your local A-holes, your super-nice people, and the indifferent ones in between. :) Seldom did I discuss twi with any of them (the Bible, yes, twi, no), but my impression was that for the most part, they were used to twi being on the outskirts of town and didn't think a whole lot about it one way or the other. Of course I was an outsider, so I might have read it all wrong, but that was how it struck me.

I can't say what it's like now, but when I lived in New Knoxville, the attitudes of the local people ranged from fear, to loathing, to respect, to affection. Some people did nothing to hide their disdain for us and our children. There was one teacher at the school, in particular, who went out of his way to give our kids a hard time. Other teachers were great. The people who owned the grocery store in town were very unfriendly toward twi people...very, even though we spent plenty of money in their store. The guy who owned the little party shop/pizza place/game room was friendly. Some members of the family who owned the gas station back then took PFAL, but they were always very sweet to us even before that time. I liked living in NK. In fact, I regretted leaving that little town much more than I regretted leaving twi hq when I quit my job there. Aside from a few small-minded, stand-offish people, for the most part the people were the salt of the earth, in my experience.

Twinky, no one's approached me on that site about returning to twi or the Way Corps. Either I've managed to avoid anyone who would ask such a thing (using my finely tuned Waydar), or they've managed to avoid me (using their finely tuned non-Waydar). Either way, it works for me! I have no animosity toward any of the innies there, except for a couple who gave me a really hard time way back when. I actually like the fact that the ex-wayfers and the current wayfers can coexist without ripping each other's heads off. Waysider, I don't see the site in the way your song would lead people to believe....not at all. There are a handful of people in the "everything was rosy" camp, but they're in the minority, IMO. You've got everything from ordained ministers in mainstream churches, ordained ministers in some not so mainstream churches, people in twi offshoots, people doing their own thing as Christians, people doing their own thing as non-Christians...the whole gamut. There are some pretty lively discussions there, but for the most part people seem able to disagree without being obnoxious. So anyway, Twinky, did anyone approach you about going back? Oh, I just noticed your other question, about what it's like to e-mail, etc., with innies. Dunno. I haven't done that.

Something occurs to me after reading this thread. Don't many people turn to a life of crime because they were abused, mistreated, humiliated, and/or tortured during their childhood and youth? So what on God's green earth does this Arizona cowboy Joe think abusing, mistreating, humiliating, and torturing inmates will accomplish, really? Seems to me this sort of treatment would simply serve to fuel more anger and lead to more antisocial behavior. Many of these individuals have known hate all their lives. More of the same isn't going to make them better citizens if and when they get out of prison, that's for sure. (Why does that song from West Side Story..."We're depraved on accounta we're deprived...." keep running through my head?) I'm not saying convicted felons should be coddled in prison, but c'mon. Living in tents in the Arizona heat? Eating crappy food. They don't need steaks but they should get nutritional meals. Back to the original post... I do think the dog-training program is a great one. Someone besides Joe A must have instituted that one, if all accounts of his usual approach are true! I've seen documentaries on similar programs at both men's and women's prisons, and I think they're fantastic. They teach the prisoners responsibility, give them someone to care about and take care of, and give them a productive, rewarding way to spend their time. In turn, dogs love them unconditionally, as only dogs seem able to do, and the dogs ultimately get homes instead of being euthanized. Everybody wins! I know by experience what a dog's love can do for a person. At particular a time in my life when my heart was really hurting, one of the things that got me through was a beautiful little rescued mutt who came to share my home and steal my heart. So for prisoners, many of whom have never known unconditional love, I can't imagine the depth of healing that can take place when an innocent, frightened dog looks up at him or her with trust and affection and gives a cuddle or a happy wag or a a big slurpy kiss on the cheek. So I'll give Joe a thumbs-up for that, even if his motives were only to help the bottom line. The rest of his antics are worthy of the Jerry Springer Show, from what I've seen.

Congratulations Raf and Mrs. Raf (more to the latter, since she did the really hard work :)) Leonardo is gorgeous. And that second photo is spectacular. Tell your wife that few women look that beautiful so soon after giving birth!

About 10 years ago, after a long night of too many tequila shots, I had to endure a ferry ride over a choppy Lake Erie. I'm getting too old for that chit, so I don't do it anymore. People I'd like to sip a couple glasses of wine with: Jesus Christ (I'd ask him which things in the Bible [as we now have it] he really said and which he didn't) Noah (I'd ask him what they did with all the animals' poop) George Harrison (met him once, but only got to say hello and shake his hand) Bob Dylan (although I don't know if I could understand him without being wasted) Mrs. E.D.E.N. Southworth, Victorian authoress of many novels (her books are studied in many colleges' Womens Studies courses) a Tibetan monk My hippie Christian friends from my pre-TWI days Several of my ancestors (they could clear up a few "brick walls" in my genealogy research!)