The Genesis of Anne


Anne’s family had always been wealthy. Her Father had been a well-known Botanist in his youth. He had helped to pioneer certain ideas within the botanical community, which created a much broader scope with which to recognize specific variations within each species.
He spent his later years designing gardens in urban areas in the States and Internationally, creating quite a name for himself.

As a child and into her teens she would join him in his green house while he worked. She would watch him closely as he cross-pollinated roses or grafted trees. He was never casual about the tasks he performed and treated even the simple act of watering as a science.
He never referred to flowers as "flowers" or trees as "trees". He insisted that each specimen be called by its proper name. Even when Anne was a small girl,whenever she asked her father what something was, the way that children do, he was specific and told her in scientific terms. Plants were always referred to by their Latin names; such as Rosa rugosa etc.

“Shakespeare’s quote regarding the rose is foolish nonsense! ‘A rose by any other name’ and so forth…indeed!”

He once told her,

“Roses may smell similarly but they behave nothing like one another and deserve to be individually recognized. After all, if God intended for us to refer to every Rose simply as "Rose", he would not have created so many different varieties now would he?"

And on he continued, as he always did, creating philosophy out of science.

"Since Eden Anne, it has been mans job to discover and name the creations of God. Thereby honoring his creations by recognizing their distinguishing features, the very features that God himself has seen fit to include within their nature. So one can either regard it as an annoyance or an honor to call a rose by it’s proper name, it matters not to me Anne, but in this house we, in reverence to God himself we shall never simply call a rose a rose…no matter how sweet its fragrance.”

Self reliance

Seattle 1932. The "Changing of the guards". FDR has just been elected President, replacing Hoover. The country is in the deepest part of the depression.
Both men had very differing views regarding the role of government during the Great depression.
Some say that Hoover may have been villanized during those dark years. His "hands off" approach, discouraged government aid, and relied heavily (if not solely) on the neighbor to neighbor approach of poverty relief.
Still, others claim that FDR may have invented the practice of "careless" governmental spending, thus prolonging our nations depression.
Today the debate continues. Some say aid should be provided hand to hand. Others insist on governmental intervention. Yet all can agree that something MUST be done. Whatever you believe, I pray your actions are passionately compassionate.



The following event is true. Though I have juxtaposed a few quotes from President Hoover, this is not a political piece. It is a lens with which to analyze both the personal and the collective responsibility we as fellow members of this great nation share in honor of one another during hard times. This event is true. These people really endured the tragedy you are about to read. It is my hope that in sharing this very difficult account, we would all be reminded of the responsibility we have to one another.

Empty streets, hobos huddled up together passing booze to help fight off the bitter cold. We arrive at a village of paper homes near the shipping yard referred to as "Hooverville". They are the shacks of people who have been evicted from their homes, people who lost their jobs and could no longer afford to pay rent. These “houses” have been built out of old boxes and scrap plywood, containing what few possessions people were left with.

We arrive at one family’s shack just as dawn breaks.
A bed, a crude bucket for a water basin, now frozen over. Thin blankets and old quilts cover a family sharing a single bed.


(President Hoovers voice)
“The way to the nations greatness is self reliance”


A young black man rises from the bed of his makeshift shack. It has been built from thin scraps of plywood and old cardboard kotex boxes. It is the dead of winter in Seattle. His breath shows a strong fog in the biting chill of the early morning. He hesitates as he rises, as though to brace himself for the bitter cold he is about to face.
He puts on his cap, a light jacket, and a pair of worn out shoes. Slipping on a heavier wool coat, he looks back at his wife. She is still sleeping in bed next to their two-month-old son. He drapes the heavy coat over them instead.
Two other children are also in the bed. His sons. He moves his boys close to their mother; perhaps the body heat will help keep everyone warm. He leans over and kisses his wife on the forehead. The faint sound of a tiny cough from the infant child causes him to pause for a moment. He shivers off a dreaded premonition and exits the shack.

(Hoovers voice)
“It is solely a question of the best methods by which cold shall be prevented. I am willing to pledge myself that if the time should ever come that the voluntary agencies of the country, together with the local and state governments, are unable to find resources with which to prevent hunger and suffering in my country…
I have faith in the American people that such a day will never come.”

We follow the man as he walks briskly down the street. His shoes are more than tattered, the soles are worn thin.
As he turns a corner, he joins a handful of men. They all seem headed in the same direction. All are poorly dressed and cold. They fall in line like a procession toward their destination.

(Hoovers voice)
“All the evidences indicate that the worst effects of the crash upon unemployment will have passed during the next sixty days”

As they all arrive at the docks. They join a hoard of other men in front of a building with a ‘Help Wanted’ sign. A man emerges from the building. He will choose a work crew for the day. He quickly points to five men from the crowed. The man we have been following has not been chosen.
All the remaining men leave. Imagining the doom that awaits him,the man remains motionless for a brief moment.



(Hoovers voice)
“We have now passed the worst, and with continued effort we shall rapidly recover”

The man walks out of a soup kitchen. He holds a roll, a bit of milk and an apple. He arrives “home” to his family. It is evening and he has found no work.
His wife mashes some bread and water into a soupy-paste and puts it into a bottle. Malnourished, her breasts have dried up and become slack. She attempts to feed her baby the mush. The infant coughs and seems unresponsive to the feeding. The mother looks up at her husband silently; she is rocking the baby on her warm mantle, humming a hymn.
The notes she hums are deep and heavy with sadness. The song vibrates within chest and seems to cry ‘Mercy’ to the heavens as though reckoning with the most high; using the voice of her soul to contest the fate of her newborn child.
A tear rolls down her face as she and her husband stare at each other, exchanging a sorrowful look.



(Hoovers voice”)
“There is something about too much prosperity that ruins the fiber of the people”
“No one has yet starved”

The Man awakens to the sound of his wife weeping. It is half way through the night; she has awoken to find that her child is no longer breathing. The man and his wife weep helplessly together.

As morning breaks they walk down the street. The father carries a small narrow cardboard box. Their faces are blank as they pass people on the street on their way to the cemetery one block away.

(Hoover’s voice loops one final time)
“The way to a nations greatness is self reliance”

Star Formation

The following is a tale from the accounts of the Studdeman family.
(As created by the author A. Bloom).
It takes place in 1931, during the Great Depression and Prohibition. The scene is set on an apple orchard on Whidbey Island in the Puget Sound.

Most people on the island were self-sufficient. Mr. Michael Studdeman in particular took pride in telling folks that there were only three things he spent money on: Sugar, coffee, and yeast. Everything else he claimed he grew, killed, caught or built with his own two hands.
The topic of self sufficiency came up a lot in his home, most frequently when he had company. Michael would hold up both arms,flex his muscles in a show of strength proclaiming “What do I need that these two beauties can’t make for me”?
The joke of course was that Michael was a tall, rail thin man with scrawny limbs.
His wife, Christina, was a round, short, petite woman, who fit perfectly under his arm. She would chuckle, roll her eyes and lovingly play along, “Oh Michael! That’s why I married you. Nothing but Muscle and charm on this one.” She would add, winking at the present company.
He would then reach his long skinny arm out toward her pull her near and whisper, “All brawn, no brain…eh love…?” patting her bottom as she bashfully walked away.

He and his family lived on 15 acres, most of which was covered with apple trees. He was a joyful soul whose tendencies boarded on the side of lunacy from time to time, (particularly when he had consumed too much whiskey).
On several occasions his wife had go out looking for him well past midnight. She often found him stark naked with an empty bottle in his hand, far off from the house on a rock he referred to as The Moonlight Café. He was never an unkind drunk, just untamed. Christina, feigned irritation on nights like that, but deep down she knew he needed her and she didn’t mind dotting on him.
She would find him on the rock wearing only his boots, face down, with his arms and legs spread out in a position he belligerently referred to as the “Star formation”.

The first time she found him like this she was shocked. His arms and legs were spread so widely that it looked unnatural. He seemed to be attempting to make his limbs lay perpendicularly. Looking down on him with her hands on her hips she demanded, “Michael Studdemen WHAT on earth has come over you?”
Without moving or looking up, he drunkenly responded, “It’s a tribute my love. I call it the 'Star formation'. Do you like it?”
Shaking her head, afraid to ask, and yet how could she not? “What are you talking about Michael?”
It was difficult to make out his entire theory behind what he referred to as “The Star formation”. He slurred his words and his face was still smashed in the moss of the rock as he spoke. Somewhere in between the heartfelt mumbles and enthusiastic proclamations of a drunken zealot she made out the following statements: “…Thousands of years…going about our days…thankless to the moon and stars…ashamed of ourselves…perfectly placed my limbs...North, South, East, West... so you see," raising his head to look at her,"it’s the least I can do Christina…” Attempting caused his head to spin making him vomit on the mossy pillow where he lay.
When he had finished being sick, his head slumped down next to the massive pile of slop, causing him to be sick all the more.
Christina walked back to the barn to fetch the wheelbarrow and some rope. She pondered getting a blanket for poor Michael, then thought to herself that he didn’t deserve it and would probably vomit on it.

Upon returning to him, it took her a good forty minutes to hoist him into the wheelbarrow. She used the rope underneath the heavy part of his shoulders to lift him.
His head was at the front end which meant that the weight was poorly distributed. When she hit a bump in the path she lost control and the wheelbarrow took a nose dive, plowing Michael's limp body into the ground face first.

On her second attempt, she loaded Michael’s body face up with his head by her hands and feet in the front. Halfway home she heard him start to mumble something.
Then suddenly she felt his hands on her bottom as she walked. She started walking faster. She let out a yelp as he started to nuzzle the top of his head between her legs. At this point he was now softly singing “Danny Boy”, and exhibiting the first sign of arousal just below his waist. Walking faster still, she was just yards from the house. On she tread.
Leaving his left hand on her bum, he raised his right hand to her bosom and gave it a pet. She spotted the water trough just ahead, she was not 50 yards from it.
He nuzzled his head a bit deeper into her loins, a gesture that obviously aroused him because he was somewhere around "high noon" in his nethers. Just at the creshendo of the song,he began raised his voice to full volume while flailing his hips wildly into the night sky.
But alas, the spell was broken. Christina had reached the water trough and swiftly dumped Michael into the freezing water. She then slipped the rope under his arms and fastened him securely to the side. She went inside and fetched some soap and a good coarse scrub brush.
Upon her return he looked at her lovingly and began to recite her a poem. She looked at him squarely and gave his face a swift hard swat.
“Drunk or sober Mr. Studdeman don’t you ever take your liberties with me like that again!”
She began scrubbing him, head first with the coarse soap brush, really working up a good lather. Obviously in pain, he cried “Christina! You’re hurting me. Is that the horse's brush? You’ll take my skin off!”
Without letting up she replied “Good! We’ll scrub the heathen out of you! Now hold still!”