Dean's World

First, let me re-introduce myself. I’ve been away from the blogging fray for awhile, for a variety of reasons which I’ll go into another time. It seems, though, that some will look at my name at the bottom of the post and wonder whodaheck is that???

I’m Trudy Schuett, writer, blogger, part-time library aide (at a Marine base library) and rebooted activist. I once had so many blogs the Blog Herald referred to me as a one-woman network. No longer. I’ve only got one blog active now, The Elementary Chef, http://www.elementarychef.com which as the title suggests, is about cooking at basic levels. I tell people how to read a recipe, use a stove, things like that.

I say rebooted activist because I was all but done with my advocacy of men’s rights issues, when a local event got me right back into the thick of it. I’d been of the opinion that things were moving forward in a positive fashion, and I really wanted to devote my spare time to my three new grandchildren. Then on August 11, my 55th birthday, a local man (local to me is Yuma Arizona) was killed by his girlfriend.

One of my activist projects has been to keep after Yuma’s newspaper to provide accurate reporting of domestic violence issues. While they did not fall into trap of parroting the often-used, but incorrect factoids so often accompanying these kinds of reports, our TV and radio stations did. I sent off some thank-you notes to the paper, and corrections to the others, and figured I was done with it.

Then in October, I attended one of those “candlelight vigils” that are often held throughout the US to mark Domestic Violence Awareness Month. I fully expected to hear some mention of the year’s most-publicized DV incident in our county, but no such luck. It was all “men are pigs and women are idiots.” It was like we were in a time warp and we’d reverted back to 1976.

I was so ticked off, I had my Letter to the Editor written in my head before I even got home. All three of the orgs that sponsored the event get public funding, (one of them was Yuma county itself) and they don’t get to ignore any of the victims.

It took the Sun until early November to publish my letter, but the responses I got were stunning. Not only did I get phone calls and e-mails from people who supported my position, as I usually do, I also had men calling to ask where/if they could find help. Most remarkable were the e-mails I got from the son and brothers of William Kirkham, the man who’d been killed, and who was ignored (as were all male victims) at the October event.

So I decided I was going to get the ball rolling and set up an agency that actually serves male victims. It won’t be easy, and it won’t be fast, but at least I can make a start.

Well, this is going on pretty long for a blog entry, but I wanted to provide a bit of an idea of what you might expect to see from me. My interests and opinions are actually many and varied – it’s not all food, or men’s rights. Working for the Marines while not being one has its moments, and the fact I live a mile from the Mexican border also might provide some blog fodder. One never knows.

Last, but certainly not least, I’d like to thank Dean profusely for showing up with the invitation to post here, at a time when I was looking to flex my writing muscles and write about something other than cooking for a change. You are a real sweetheart!

And for the rest of the group – well, have you got your copy of Methuselah’s Daughter yet? ;>)