He was abducted from his homeland at the age of two, right before the eyes of his family, while his mother shrieked in what can only be called gut-wrenching agony.  He was put in a habitat smaller than a jail cell with other captives who bullied and beat him.  He watched on as other youngsters wore torn away from their mothers by captors with the same motivation, to make money.  These mothers also screamed trying to connect with their babies as they were shipped far away.  When their calls went unanswered they went into a state of paralyzing grief.  Adding to the unfathomable situation, many of these babies were created by his sperm after he was forced to lie on his back, his penis stroked by his captives until he ejaculated.  

He performs for his captives in order that he can get food and his captives can stuff their wallets and retirement funds.  Does he get frustrated?  You betcha!  When he reaches a point of frustration he can no longer contain he is known to do more than bite the hand that feeds him, he brutally lashes out at the person who feeds him, sometimes resulting in death.

He is now 32 years old now and he is still being held captive in America, of all places, the supposed home of the free.  Who is this being?  His name is Tilikum.  He is a captive Orca in Seaworld, and the star of the documentary film, Blackfish, now playing in theaters and generating major Oscar buzz and the beginning of what could be a revolution.  

Blackfish stands to raise the consciousness of humans.  The research in the movie challenges that we may not be the highest emotional being on the planet.  We humans may have created the most inhumane form of entertainment thinking whales and dolphins are just big fish.  But let's hope that when we know better, we do better.  Let's hope that Marine Parks and Aquariums will no longer capture whales & dolphins from the wild, no longer bread them in captivity, and begin rehabilitating the ones in captivity for release or transfer to ocean pens.

How can you help Tilikum and his fellow cetaceans?  

1.  See the Movie Blackfish or The Cove.

2.  Boycott visiting Aquariums, Marine Parks, Vacation spots that keep dolphins and whales captive unless they have been deemed injured so badly that releasing them in the wild would result in death.

3.  Re-educate our youth that whales & dolphins live in the sea, not a tank.

Hang in there Tilikum, there are a bunch of us trying to help you.  To learn more about Tilikum and the movie Blackfish, please visit: http://www.magpictures.com/blackfish/

Would you like to share an inspirational story about someone you admire?  In 500 words or less, tell me about that person or persons (or animal) who not only managed to climb out of a deep canyon, but went on to hike to a mountaintop.  I will select one guest blogger who will win a $25 Visa gift card and their entry will be posted on my weekly blog.  The entry deadline is September 30, 2013.  Email your blogpost to SusanAllisonDean@aol.com.  

When life gives you lemonade, add Vodka- TED

What happens when life hands you more than lemons?  When it doesn't just hand you lemons, it hands you watermelons, and hurls them at you, over and over relentlessly?  When you feel like the ship featured in the Perfect Storm being battered from all angles.  When prayers don't get answered fast enough and you're not sure how much longer you can hold on?

Jill Bradley, the protagonist in the novel, I Know You're There, experiences such a season in her life.  When life hurls watermelons at her repeatedly, she finally makes an impulsive escape to a Caribbean island to seek refuge.  Does it work for her?  I would spoil the book for you if I told you.

We all have either experienced ourselves, or know of someone who has, a time when we had to do more than weather a Perfect Storm, we had to survive it,  sail towards the sunny weather and we chose to bring along some others with us.  Over the next several weeks, I will be blogging about some of the inspirational superheroes that I admire.  I am going to challenge you to sail further past your comfort zone.  Lastly, I am looking for your examples of inspirational superheroes.

Would you like to share an inspirational story about someone you admire?  In 500 words or less, tell me about that person or persons who have not only managed to climb out of a deep canyon, but went on to hike to a mountaintop.  I will select one guest blogger who will win a $25 Visa gift card and their entry will be posted on my weekly blog.  The entry deadline is September 30, 2013.  Email your blogpost to SusanAllisonDean@aol.com.  

For many of us, there was a time when we managed our lives just fine without phones strapped to our bodies, mail shooting at us non-stop via a computer box, and pictures we need to upload quickly before our friends miss that moment in our lives we want to share.  I was reminded of this fairly recently when I sat next to my bulldog, Bubba, on the couch and my phone slipped out of my pocket.  He is past the chewing stage, but for whatever the reason, my phone must have been just too tempting or perhaps it emitted an annoying sound so he decided to chomp on it.  His fangs puncture it just enough, before I found him doing it, that it was destroyed along with all the data-contacts, photos, memos, …that were stored in it.

At first I was shocked, outraged, alarmed, lost, "What am I going to do?".  My mind tried to recall all that was in there, how would I get in contact with my family?  I don't even have their phone numbers memorized.  Who ever would have thought that day would come?  Precious contacts that I entered into my phone rather than take their business card-gone.  Slowly I began to realize, that I could do some searching and get most of what I lost back, but uggg,  Tedious hours it was going to take to enter all that back in a phone.  I took a deep breath, my anger melted as I looked at my dog's face too cute to not hug, and accepted what had just transpired.

Being Sunday, there was nothing I could do, I would have to wait until the following day to go to the phone store and start over.  As the day went on, a freedom that I haven't felt in years set in.  The yank to check for tweets, texts, emails was gone.  The urge to reach out and say, "Hey" to a friend or ask my husband when he'll be home, evaporated.  I began to contemplate, do I even want to get a phone?  No more constant interruptions, no more need to be caught off guard and sign myself up for something I really didn't want to do, no more helping people solve problems they could solve themselves if they tried a little harder.  No, maybe I just won't get another phone, I dreamed of the blissful new existence I could live.

Then, of course, the yang pushed over the ying.  What if there is an emergency with one of my loved ones?  What if someone is trying to call me with an exciting invitation to do something fun?  Ying-Yang, Back-Forth, Ok, I'll enjoy the rest of the day without it, but tomorrow, off to the phone store I go. 

I did indeed surrender and got back on the technology bus.  You may not hear from me much over the next couple of weeks, and it may take me a while to get back to you, however.  I'm purposely going to gear down for the rest of the summer.  I'm going to enjoy juicy cantaloupe, scrunch sand between my toes, lower the stack of books that look like a jenga stack by my bedside table, meditate, give paddle boarding a try with my husband, anything that doesn't require a plug. Go out and live life so there will be more stories to tell.

If the thought of adding one more social media platform to your repetoire sounds daunting, I get it.  I'm not one to just jump in because everyone is doing it.  The more I have talked to women who have enjoyed my debut novel, 'I Know You're There', however, the more I realized they really like Pinterest.  So, I began to dabble in it.

Before I knew it, I created several boards.  Basically, each board is a different virtual 'cork board' to 'pin' pictures, quotes, recipes and more.  I have one for my bulldog, Bubba.  One for gardening, another for travel, and healthy ideas.  As I begin my next novel, I am thinking of creating one for that to aid me in my visual descriptions of scenes and characters. 

The board for my current novel, 'I Know You're There' includes pictures of the type of scenes I envisioned when writing the book, the book's cover, some book quotes and more.  As I reader, I know the power of a picture to capture my interest when choosing a book.  Check it out and tell me what would you add? http://bit.ly/14Mc1bx

If you like the images , you'll love the book!  Order or download a copy of 'I Know You're There' today.