Author Archive | Martha Shelley

In Part 1 of this post, I wrote that in 1969, when I was 25, I had sworn never to pay a landlord more than $100/month (ignoring what I knew about inflation). Since then I had lived in a series of slum apartments and thrown myself into a life of radical activism, thinking I could […]

After a year of exile in Etna, California, with my lover, Max, we returned to the Bay Area in 1979. My plan was to continue delving into the history and customs of the ancient Middle East and eventually to write a book about the life of Jezebel, Queen of Israel. I should say that Max […]

This is the season when we exchange wishes for peace—and yet we keep making war. Why? Looking Across the Willamette Every December some householder, up in the wooded hills on the other side of the Willamette River, lights an enormous peace sign. It must cover the entire side of their house. Sylvia and I can […]

Dear readers, today I’m going to blow off a little steam—first about platitudes that I find particularly irritating. Every time I hear one of these, it’s like brushing up against a leaf of poison oak. It’s not enough to send me to the hospital, just enough to raise a few blisters. And second, I’ll be […]

In the previous post, the reader learned that an uncanny premonition warned me that my left ankle would be broken that day–a message from??? I will never know. But wrapped in the plaster cast I wore post surgery were two gifts: *          *          * Upon returning to work I discovered that it was extraordinarily difficult […]

Do actors still use the expression “break a leg” to wish their fellows success before going on stage? I don’t know. But one day I did break a leg, and it changed my life. *          *          * For seven years I’d been in a relationship where both of us had settled, after previous romantic disasters, […]

Over the years, I’ve been blessed to meet quite a number of courageous women. Elizabeth Feng was one of them. She was the mother of Alex Feng, my martial arts teacher in Berkeley, and did the bookkeeping for his school and acupuncture clinic. I would chat with her sometimes after an acupuncture session, and she […]

I don’t remember the incident, maybe a rape in our neighborhood, that prompted me to bring up the subject of self-defense lessons. But when I did, Anat lit up. She was seven at the time, with honey-colored hair and liquid brown eyes that could melt granite—a spunky kid with a passion for painting and drawing […]

This is the last of the series. I’ll start by quoting some of the rhetoric political leaders have used to stir up outrage against those they label enemies, and drum up support for wars. Then, let’s look at what those leaders really do—what deals they make with the devil. The Great Satan Shortly after the […]

Why Women Supported Khomeini The Iranian monarchy presented itself as having made great strides towards equality between the sexes. Then why did the majority of Iranian women support the Islamic revolution? As always, there were a number of factors. Women’s progress under the Shah wasn’t nearly as large as depicted by the Pahlavi regime or […]