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About Baker City herald. (Baker City, Or.) 1990-current | View Entire Issue (July 16, 2020)
8B — THE OBSERVER & BAKER CITY HERALD THuRSDAY, JuLY 16, 2020 COFFEE BREAK Mom’s ‘friends’ abandon her after third child is born DEAR ABBY: I recently wel- comed my third child, a baby boy who was wanted and planned. We are overjoyed. Our two daughters are just under 10 years old. Over the years, my social circle has consisted mostly of the parents of my daughters’ friends. Abby, my news was met with mixed reactions. Some were thrilled for my pregnancy, while others were shocked. One woman even told me, “I’m just not in that phase of life anymore.” After my son was born, I didn’t get visits or even a phone call from some of them. I announced his birth on social media and mailed out a beautiful announcement, but he hasn’t been acknowledged nor have I been checked on. I know he won’t really be affected by this and I’m trying to focus on the positives. We have a big family on both sides, and many people within our commu- nity have warmly welcomed him. But I have been a good friend to these women, supported them in their times of need and even reached out during this pan- demic to check on them in an DEAR effort to reconnect. ABBY I’m so dis- appointed. What am I supposed to say to these “ friends” when I run into them again? — NEW MOM AGAIN DEAR MOM: When you encounter them, be cordial. Make polite conversation and ask how they and their families are doing. If they inquire, tell them you and your family are well. Then move on, recognizing you are dealing with individuals who are solely centered upon themselves. Do not attempt to revive a relationship with anyone who cares so little about you that they would treat you as they have, but DO recognize how for- tunate you are that you know not to invest more of your time or yourself in them. DEAR ABBY: I divorced my abusive ex-husband and am hap- pily remarried. I have a son and daughter from my first marriage. They saw a lot of physical and emotional abuse when they were young. I stayed in the marriage to keep the family together until I realized my children were being hurt in the process. My son wit- nessed more of the abuse than my daughter. My son has constantly brought up the past and has never been able to make a decent living. He’s married with three children, and they have lived with his mother-in-law for years. I have apologized many times for what happened in the past and asked for forgiveness. I don’t know what else I can do. I always send birthday and holiday money telling them that I love them, but for some reason they have stopped answering my calls or responding to my texts. I call them three or four times a year. They used to call me when they needed money, but now they don’t call at all. Should I stop sending birthday checks? They missed Mother’s Day and my heart is broken. I don’t know what I’ve done wrong. — PAYING FOR THE PAST DEAR PAYING: You will never know what you “did wrong” unless one of your adult offspring decides to tell you. I hope you realize that you are being abused again, this time by two pas- sive-aggressive adults. You are not the reason your son lives with his mother-in-law. As to your daughter, who knows her reason for radio silence? Please stop flogging yourself. Start living your own life. Bind up that broken heart and focus on happiness with your new husband because, as things stand, you’re not going to find much with these two. Send cards if you must, but omit the money. If you do, I’m sorry to say you may hear from them sooner. Look out, Mars: Here we come with a fleet of spacecraft By Marcia Dunn Associated Press CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Planet Earth is about to invade Mars — big time. The United States, China and the United Arab Emir- ates are sending unmanned spacecraft to the red planet in quick succession begin- ning this week, in the most sweeping effort yet to seek signs of ancient microscopic life while scouting out the place for future astronauts. The U.S. is dispatching a six-wheeled rover the size of a car, named Persever- ance, to collect rock samples that will be brought back to Earth for analysis in about a decade. Each spacecraft will travel more than 300 mil- lion miles before reaching Mars next February. It takes at least six to seven months for a spacecraft to loop out beyond Earth’s orbit and sync up with Mars’ more distant orbit around the sun. Scientists want to know what Mars was like billions of years ago when its rivers, lakes and oceans may have allowed simple, tiny organ- isms to flourish before the planet morphed into the barren, wintry desert world it is today. “Trying to confirm that life existed on another planet, it’s a tall order. It has a very high burden of proof,” said Perseverance’s project scientist, Ken Farley of Caltech in Pasadena, California. A one-month window when Mars and Earth are in ideal alignment dictates the timing of the launches to minimize travel time and fuel use. Such a window opens once every 26 months. Only the U.S. has suc- cessfully put spacecraft on Mars, doing it eight times, beginning with the twin Vikings in 1976. Two NASA landers are now operating there, InSight and Curiosity. Six other spacecraft are exploring the planet from orbit: three U.S., two European and one from India. Photo by J. Krohn/NASA via AP Engineers in December 2019 monitor a driving test for the Mars rover Perseverance in a clean room at the Jet Propul- sion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. The robotic vehi- cle is scheduled to launch July 30 and land in an ancient river delta and lake. The United Arab Emir- ates and China are looking to join the elite club. The UAE spacecraft, named Amal, which is Arabic for Hope, is an orbiter scheduled to rocket away Thursday from Japan on what will be the Arab world’s first interplanetary mission. The spacecraft was built in partnership with the University of Colorado Boulder. Controlled from Dubai, the weather station will strive for an exceptionally high Martian orbit of 13,670 miles by 27,340 miles to study the upper atmosphere and monitor climate change. China will launch its rover and an orbiter some- time around July 23. The mission is named Tianwen, or Questions for Heaven. NASA is shooting for a launch on July 30 from Cape Canaveral. Perseverance is set to touch down in Jezero Crater, an ancient river delta and lake. China’s smaller rover will aim for an easier, flatter target. To reach the surface, both spacecraft will have to plunge through Mars’ hazy red skies in what has been dubbed “seven minutes of terror” — the most difficult and riskiest part of putting spacecraft on the planet. Perseverance’s cameras will shoot color video of the rover’s descent, providing humanity’s first look at a parachute billowing open at Mars, while microphones capture the sounds. Jezero Crater is full of boulders, cliffs and sand dunes, any one of which could end Perseverance’s mission. Brand-new guid- ance and parachute-trig- gering technology will help steer the craft away from hazards. Ground control- lers will be helpless, given the 10 minutes it takes radio transmissions to travel one-way between Earth and Mars. Jezero Crater is worth the risks, according to scientists who chose it over 60 other potential sites. Where there was water — and Jezero was appar- ently flush with it 3.5 bil- lion years ago — there may have been life, though it was probably simple microbial life. But those microbes may have left telltale marks in the sediment layers. Perseverance will hunt for rocks containing such biological signatures. The rover also will attempt to produce oxygen from the carbon dioxide in the Mar- tian atmosphere. Extracted oxygen could someday be used by astronauts on Mars for breathing as well as for making rocket propellant.
