My Magic Bus
I finally made up my mind about what I want to do when I grow up. It’s the same dream I’ve had since I was a teenager in the turbulent sixties. I want to board my magic bus and head out on my transcendental journey. I just bought this rig for $5,400, it’s got 23k miles and everything I need to become the roving eco-terrorist, antipharma journalista I was meant to be.
I have many reservations about buying a gas-powered motor vehicle. I gave up my car in 1990 because I realized that petroleum was poisoning the planet and I’ve been running on that moral currency, feeling just a little superior as I cart my grocery basket around town and and use public transportation to wherever I can’t walk to. I guess I want to limit the “roving” part of the dream and use the machine to get me to a plot of land on a mountain somewhere where I can live in the bus while I am building my yurt and chicken coop & goat shed and planting my garden.
I’ve been researching solar power for RVs and it looks pretty reasonable to put solar panels on the roof. There are windpower units available also. I’m considering retooling the engine to accept used cooking oil. I wish I could run the engine on solar and wind. Maybe someday.
What this means is that I will no longer be Mad In Vermont. I will still be mad, but it’s time for me to move on from Vermont and go out and meet the wider world. I came to Vermont 28 years ago, running from the dirty air and rivers of western New York State. I came with the desire to be close to nature and to grow my own, but this dream got sidetracked in the struggle to feed myself and my kids.
I sued my male parent for incest in 1985. My boyfriend at the time was my lawyer. Unfortunately, he cared more about making a name for himself than he did about me and my children so the lawsuit and the relationship got lost. I was a wreck in the wake of all the publicity and poverty. My ex-husband responded to my losses by suing me for custody of my kids on the grounds of my psychiatric labels (depression and post-traumatic stress). I kept custody but I was defeated. John Matthew at the Plainfield Death Center was experimenting on me with psychoactive chemicals. He poisoned me and I almost died several times from out of control bladder infections and antidepressant akathisia induced suicide attempts under his “care.” In 1992 I agreed to give custody of my learning-disabled daughter to my wealthy ex-husband and his new servant, I mean wife.
That’s all behind me now, all the loss and sacrifice that I endured in order to be able to live in Vermont. I am ready to move on. With my iPhone and my 12 inch laptop I am able to do my work anywhere, space & time have essentially collapsed. I’m setting up a new blog at Madam Nomad, but I’ll keep working on Mad In Vermont’s resource pages and news about the pharma biz and survivor stories.
Right on! I am happy for you Jeanne!
regarding “I wish I could run the engine on solar and wind”. I built a homemade electric bike and know a bit about the energy required to move a vehicle. The energy amounts are tremendous. Remember we humans used to use horses? Engine power is judged by how many horsepower it has. Horsepower measurements can be converted to electrical measurements. Once you do the conversion, you would want to own a horse and have it pull your RV rather than use solar and wind.
I don’t think that suing individual doctors is the answer. First of all, as a mental patient receiving the “standard of care,” it is unwinnable. But I also think that it is too polarizing, and will only put psychiatrists on the defensive- and that is going to make them less open to those who are questioning. It bothers me that things have become so polarized, it seems you either have to support the status quo or be “anti-psychiatry” these days. I do think that the analogy of mental illness as a physical illness has been taken way too far, and way too many people are being treated (but look at the push to get everyone on statins). But I don’t think that means there aren’t people who have such severe episodes that they don’t benefit from treatment.
Yeah, if you don’t allow for the “medication loophole” no-one takes you seriously – even my own peer group does not want to hear that they have been massively betrayed by the psychiatric drug paradigm. Individual doctors attempted to murder me and almost succeeded. They disabled me out of ignorance, arrogance and greed. The oppressors and abiusers always try to convince you that resistance is futile and the fight is unwinnable. I’m not so much trying to win a war as to live with joy and authenticity. I’m not trying to win the hearts and minds of psychiatrists. I am trying to stop them from disabling and murdering people.