A long, long time ago, in one of my very first naive-to-the-bone adoptions from the foster care system, I'd had a fairly severe issue spring up from an angry teenager, after I'd verbally corrected the behavior of the troubled one, who would later cause all sorts of problems, but as we got through that evening and I called my caseworker to report, "All is well," in a tone of voice that clearly indicated smugness on my part, I was told, "Well please understand that this will happen again."

Because Sarah, my birth child, then in her teens, and I rarely had a spat...ever...I was totally unprepared for the next 25 years of my life, years in which kids think every issue is worth battling mindlessly and violently over.

I'll label kids, here within my blog, as birth siblings to each other only because their birth bond is so profound, and their later behaviors are either influenced, or reflected, by those ties.

Yesterday two birth brothers, both teens, both emotionally co-dependent upon each other to the extreme, got into a fistfight. They only fight with each other, mainly because they know it is emotionally safe for them to do so.

I can point out, until I'm as blue as a puffy Smurf, that my sister and I never ever physically fought. We just weren't raised like that, we were never that angry with each other, nor did we rely on physical aggression, as we both were oh so much more on target with each other verbally, snidefully even, because we didn't always agree with each other, but we'd never have dreamed of resorting to violence. Ellen in her pearls, me in my bell bottoms, would clash over political and social ideals, but always politely so.

Mayra and I leaped into the fray to break it up, she was slung backwards over a sofa, landing on a surprised Shadow, the weird terrier dog. I wasn't touched, and the combatants were pulling apart by the time Martin got into the living room from the family room. I'd hollered, "Get Chuy!" to Tony, who just stood there watching in shock, because there truly was no reason for this skirmish and, as such, it was immediately over, with only a few successful fists making contact. I sent the attacker to his room, and I stayed with the victim, although I use the terms loosely, as this particular victim could provoke a nun to cuss.

Later, after my family just about emptied the entire premier jar of Fire Hot Pepper Sauce, all of us swooning with joy to have it back on the table for meals, the two combatants went arm and arm to church for our Youth Pastor's GoodBye Party, then all going on a trip with him to Forward '10, leaving today, sadly knowing Sunday is his last day.

Another teenager was in tears by bedtime, lashing out in me, when the reality is The Losses of This Summer have been fairly overwhelming. We stayed up very late, yet another teenage son later sobbing on the sofa in commiseration, having lost two elderly dogs and our very beloved youth pastor is just too much for children with such terribly limited coping skills.

So blaming me for all of the above is standard procedure, but after the sob fest, I went upstairs and shut my bathroom door and cried until my face swole up, blaming the full moon for my tearfulness, so exhausted from being the emotional punching bag around here, so constantly emotionally battered. I did, for once, put down the toilet seat, as I've been known to just plop my butt down heedlessly, yelling in surprise when making contact with the water. Well duh, what did I expect?

I come running to you ladies first thing every morning, to process the previous events in the company of them that knows, my imaginary prayer group, like-minded individuals with the same battle scars and stressed out adrenals.

What's left of my mental faculties ends up poring over gardening and farming books, transporting myself to the side of these authors, it's as if I'm peering over their shoulders, watching them harvest, and I find it ultimately engrossing on every level. I'm particularly intrigued by the northern people battling the elements, who can work in such cold? I wrap myself into their words and command of the English language, laughing aloud at times, plunged into deep thought and reveries.

From My Empire of Dirt: Being a locavore in 2010 must be a very different experience from what it was in 1991. For one, the historically disinterested mew media is suddenly providing affirming details about the crisis in food production, constantly squawking about the global food crisis. In 1991, as far as the population was concerned, food described as organic was still the manna of the lunatic left.

No kidding? I became fascinated with nutritional concepts while in junior high school in Miss Winslow's Home Economics class, but I'd never have chosen to major in it in college, as the Feminist Movement was in full sway, you'd have to have lived through the 1950s to understand the resulting fury of women. I sure didn't wanna grow up to be a housewife...although some might point out, it's turned out to be so anyways, I'm a house slave now to complete ingratitude and wall-to-wall so-called women's work.

Alas the poor doomed organic foods movement, just as it moved out of the yurts and freak caves towards the light of general acceptance, Big Food swept in, co-opting the term, undermining accepted standards for what constitutes organic food, and plastering snack bags with shamelessly misleading claims:"Contents 70 Percent Organic."

Yurts and freak caves? I went into gales of giggles. "What's so funny?" JoJo asked and I read it aloud to him while he stared at me wordlessly. "You're kinda retarded," he politically incorrectly responded, "That's not even funny, it's stupid."

Stuff like this creates intrigue in my brain, it's all I ponder as I weed, rather than answering a reader's comment on Why do kids act like this? Since I dunno why, it seems so stinking illogical, yet it's all we ever see, even the therapists and psychologists scratch their heads, while we, the beleaguered parents, constantly struggle to cope with the emotional destruction and fallout.

I'm choosing to enter LaLaLand in my mind, where visions of perfectly developed pepper plants dance in my head, morphing into quart jars in my pantry this upcoming winter.

In The Seasons on Henry's Farm, the author's sister grows 100 varieties of fruit, selling them at the farmer's market, a line six deep always at her tables, as there's no comparison on earth for the discerning palate when one chooses organic strawberries with delectable flavors versus the fungicide-tasting orbs of commercially grown balls of tastelessness.

This same woman quilts all winter for therapy, just as I putter around watering hundreds and hundreds of houseplants, this world jangles us to our souls with it's illogical mindlessness whether it be in food production, raising children from the foster care system or a mind-numbing commute to a soul-stealing job necessary in order to pay the bills for stuff we don't really need anyway.

It seemingly all boils down to every human's basic desire for a stressless, meaningful life that is tempered only with joy and simplicity...something we adoptive parents would sell our blasted souls for maybe, and oppositionally we all went into this life with the simplistic desire to share our earthly goods with those in need, to give instead of take, to just to make someone's life better. We wanted a mindful life.

But that's not what we've got, so I'll brush myself off mentally this morning, I've now flushed out my thoughts, figuratively the toxins, and I'll smile at my children, clean the kitchen, help the seven pack up for their trip, and I'll serve a satisfying meal tonight to the remaining seven, who'll look at me hollow-eyed and nervous with half of our family gone, as we all know it tugs painfully on their crusty scabs covering their raging abandonment issues.

The picture today? Tony napped on the sofa, trying to shake a low grade bout of nausea, only to have JoJo post signs reading, "I'm gay," or "I poop in my pants," because JoJo's zero impulse control is limited only by his complete inappropriateness at all times. My troublemaker extraordinaire, no thoughts ever to the repercussions of his actions, no cause and effect link available for contemplation. Me in Smurf mode to no avail.