Magic All Around

Welcome to a Secret Subject Swap. This month 3 brave bloggers picked a secret subject for someone else and were assigned a secret subject to interpret in their own style. Today we are all simultaneously divulging our topics and submitting our posts. 

My “Secret Subject” is:

Do you believe in magic?

It was submitted by: https://www.bakinginatornado.comI

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 I believe in the magic we make and in the magic of living every day in a world where I can teach cats how to fist bump and gaze at the moon and watch a bee stirring among the flowering trees I planted in my front yard years ago.

There's magic in your brain chemistry changing because you share time and space with a particularly special human who isn't that particularly special to most other people. Magic happens every time I take a phone call from someone who has been in prison for 20+ years but is still able to laugh with me and at me for 15 minutes.

The pagentry in professional wrestling is a kind of magic. People waking up every day in this country and still choosing to loudly be who they are is magic.

Bob's Burgers is magic. Hearing a song that makes you time travel in the first 2 seconds? Absolutely magic.

Catching sight of dew drops clinging to a spiderweb in the stillness of those moments just before sunrise is so magical it hurts especially when the early rays beam off every tiny droplet.

Mr. Rogers was magic. Making someone smile using a well-practiced illusion is magic but so is making an orangutan at the zoo or a dog from a shelter freak out over a badly performed one.

Growing babies for 9 months who come out with all their teeth stuffed in their skulls? Magic. Cats who eat jellybeans but not turkey are extra special magic. The bond you can have with a tiny creature you dragged in from the side of the road who doesn't even speak or understand most of your language is the strangest magic especially when that creature absolutely hated everything in existence and now suddenly likes to curl around your lap 5 times before settling in and demanding attention.

Friendships that form over instantaneous messages that fly through the ether are magic and even more magical when you know every one of that person's good days and bad and their trauma and their biggest fears but you haven't even seen each other face to face.

Magic is everywhere you look. It's everywhere you exist. Living and breathing and fighting for a better world is all magic. I don't think magic requires the fantastical or spells or witching or wizardry. Every moment is magic if you're willing to see it. Every atom. Every particle. Every breath and photo and written word. We're surrounded every second of every day by all the magic we could ever need.

But it would definitely be nice if someone could actually pull money out of my ear. I need a new tattoo.

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Here are links to all the sites now featuring Secret Subject Swap posts. Sit back, grab a cup, and check them all out. See you there:

Baking In A Tornado https://www.BakingInATornado.com

Climaxed https://climaxedtheblog.blogspot.com

The Diary of an Alzheimer’s Caregiver https://thediaryofanalzheimerscaregiver.com/blog

Ok But I Personally Do Like Owls

Welcome to a Secret Subject Swap. This month 4 brave bloggers picked a secret subject for someone else and were assigned a secret subject to interpret in their own style. Today we are all simultaneously divulging our topics and submitting our posts.

My “Secret Subject” is:

What is the WORST present you’ve received?

It was submitted by: https://thediaryofanalzheimerscaregiver.com/blog

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I read an article a couple months ago that has stuck with me for awhile. It was unrelated to gifts actually and instead about weird or shocking deathbed confessions. 

One woman, near death, was surrounded by family who took the time, finally, to ask her what was the deal with owls. She had a house full of owls. Little figures and wall hangings and bigger sculptures and salt shakers and pillows... She had literally hundreds. Her answer? She didn't really like owls all that much to be honest. She'd bought one thing with an owl on it one time at a secondhand shop because she found it cute and every time she got a gift thereafter, it was an owl. For decades of her life she was surrounded by things she didn't really like all that much because she wanted the people who gave them to her to not feel bad, so she kept it to herself and displayed them over and over and over for all of her adult life. Finally on her dying breath she was free to tell the truth. She wasn't going to be there to face the hurt and bewilderment they'd feel for having not ever really bothered to get to know what she was actually into... The problem is sort of two fold here because maybe it would have been better to tell people the truth but I think the way we socialize women to be grateful for every speck of love they can grab onto, maybe she gets more of a pass than people who could have asked her at any time what she might like for a present. She was grateful for any gift. And I can understand that sentiment. We've also been taught to be grateful to be thought of at all.

I thought about writing a gothic horror about a woman being buried alive under her Nightmare Before Christmas knick knacks. I thought about writing about the few really bad gifts I've gotten like a ring from an ex as an apology for being a piece of shit, a last ditch effort at saving a relationship that he couldn't have saved without finally growing up some. Or the time my stepmom grabbed a $5 set of plastic earrings for kindergartners and gave it to me from my dad for Christmas when I was 16, for example. But I wanted to say it plainly instead of a metaphor in a story or talking about one gift because the problem is bigger than that. I see it all the time. We see one thing about a person and make it their whole personality instead of getting to know the real them. People are complex. I mean yes I do enjoy watching the Nightmare Before Christmas because Henry Selick is a fucking genius, an artist, absolutely crushingly underrated, but I also like everything else he's done. I like movies that aren't about animated skeletons or Halloween as shocking as it may be. I have a couple of very simple elephant tattoos BUT I ALSO LIKE OTHER ANIMALS which 3 cabinets of trinkets later would also shock some folks. I used to be able to have alcohol occasionally but really haven't been able to since getting sick with chronic fatigue syndrome. I've been sick for going on 7 years now and people still tag me in wine memes. I've openly talked about not being able to drink and not just once or twice...

The thing of it all... it IS nice to be thought of in any capacity but it also really fucking sucks to realize no one bothered to think of the real me only some version that they've created in their own minds so far from who I really am that it couldn't pass for my evil twin from the mirror realm. It's not like I hide what I like or who I am. A million times a month I probably share something I'd love to get myself if I had the extra money. I talk about things that are important to me. I live as authentically online as I do around people I see everyday. My family has easy access when they want to know what I'm into. It's all there online like some weird vision board for most to see. I'll answer anytime someone asks actually. Sit with me longer than 5 minutes and I will inevitably say something incredibly gay. It's all hanging out. 

I recently stopped writing a person I'd spent 4 years trying to help. Yes, a person in prison. I helped him work through some deeply wrong ideas he held about women including a specific ex girlfriend and his own mother. I got them to connect with one another about those thoughts he had and work through them together. I got him to appreciate fiction for the first time in his life. He even wrote a story! Just for fun. I had a visible impact on his life because I listened when he told me things and listened in between and we really did the work to pick it all apart. We aren't writing because he overstepped some serious boundaries but leading up to that point he sent me some things for Christmas last year that gave me a bit of a head scratch. A lot of guys at his prison crochet and sell what they make to other guys to send to family, friends, and girlfriends or whoever and he sent me an Olaf from frozen and a minion. I haven't even seen frozen. Ever. Not once. Never mentioned either movie. And like i have said a million times already yes it's nice to be thought of but it wasn't like he chose these things because he knew I'd like them. He just sent them to say he sent something and it showed all that time we'd been friends and through all the hard conversations we had and the work we did, he hadn't ever really got to know me. It wasn't really a surprise when my boundaries were violated. The version of me living in his head would fall head over heels because of a Disney plush, right? Obviously. And so then she'd totally be receptive to advances she'd spent years clearly spelling out she wouldn't cross. Great plan, right? Only I'm not that person, and the rejection made him angry, so now he's out a friend as well.

The point I want to make is to tell people. Tell them who you are loudly and lovingly. Tell them you don't want another owl. It's fine. No one should die surrounded by hundreds of trinkets they never loved that took endless amounts of work to keep clean. But more importantly, ask what the people you love are into, listen to them. Find out about the things they love no matter how silly you find it. No matter how at odds it is with the version of them you already created. Life is too short to do anything else.

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Here are links to all the sites now featuring Secret Subject Swap posts. Sit back, grab a cup, and check them all out. See you there:



Baking In A Tornado https://www.BakingInATornado.com

The Diary of an Alzheimer’s Caregiver https://thediaryofanalzheimerscaregiver.com/blog

Part-time Working Hockey Mom https://thethreegerbers.blogspot.ch/

Island

Today’s post is a writing challenge. This is how it works: participating bloggers picked 4 – 6 words or short phrases for someone else to craft into a post. All words must be used at least once and all the posts will be unique as each writer has received their own set of words. That’s the challenge, here’s a fun twist; no one who’s participating knows who got their words and in what direction the writer will take them. Until now.

Mt words are:

ordinary ~ help ~ funny ~ island ~ language

It was submitted by: https://www.bakinginatornado.com

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I don't have the language required to ask for help I guess.

Ok I think maybe trauma erased my ability to use the right words. The thought of admitting "I can't" isn't something easy to come by despite being aware I need to work on it which often leaves me on an island alone with my own resentment.

It probably also doesn't help that the majority of people I've been vulnerable enough with to ask for help have let me down completely or held it over my head. It doesn't create a lot of faith that anyone else I ask will be the one person who doesn't make me feel like shit about it.

All of that makes having a chronic illness pretty dang hard. Every time I think I have it figured out, something will happen and I have to find a new normal. Like how having had covid twice despite not leaving home and having the vaccines caused such intense insomnia I haven't slept for more than an hour or two at a time in almost 2 years. I can't even begin to explain the hurdles I now have to go through just to be able to write a couple sentences a day or maintain letters. Or just make a ridiculously funny wrestling meme. I can't even enjoy TV shows the same anymore. I can't see them. I can't read the subtitles anymore. I can't even process them most of the time. I just slip back into familiar ones that I know the plots to by heart or things that won't require a lot of brain power. The only thing I can read right now are things I've already read...and reading about new worlds and new people have always been my one method of escape. I have a whole fucking tattoo about it. I just can't anymore. At least not now...

But even with this new problem the world doesn't stop nor does my house. And my house is anything but ordinary. So by 9 a.m. I've gotten up, made the bed, medicated at least 4 animals, swept, mopped, argued with my kid about getting up to walk the dogs or about brushing his teeth or taking his meds (which I still make up for him in his pill minder) or whatever else the teenage angst is about that day, often shampooed carpet at least in spots that need it, washed dishes my kid left in the sink, cleaned up messes the cats made from at least one type of bodily function, wiped down counters and cabinets, made coffee for at least 2 people, made breakfast for everyone, cleaned up after breakfast, entered a bunch of online contests to try to win extra money because we're fucking poor, dusted, vacuumed, folded some laundry if I hung it out the day before... Sometimes there's extra. Sometimes I have help with one or two of these things. But this is just the first 2 hours of my day and it never ends. Every time I think I'm caught up something else needs to be done. I'm on my feet at home for at least 8 hours a day. Most days at least 6 hours at a time...with joint point from my cfs and plantar fasciitis making it impossible to walk. By 8 most nights, my pain level is so high I can't talk. I can't even cry. I'm too tired to fucking cry.

Every time I ask someone to do something and get told "I will" just for it to still not be done 2 hours later that island of resentment grows bigger and the next time I really need help, I won't ask. Why would I?

I keep thinking I'll learn to master my broken energy battery and only do the things that need it, but when your mom has broken into your house and tried to physically assault you over you insisting you have actually do keep things clean all because an argument started when you offered to take her on a spa trip for Christmas, could anything ever be clean enough? Probably not. Not when every time you've ever been in her house her husband still treats you like a 16 year old kid who is apparently utterly incapable and disgusting and conveniently forgetting you're 41 now and even when you were 16 with a semi dirty room you were also dealing with the aftermath of abuse and rape and were constantly threatened and bullied for being gay and weird without any support from the people who should have noticed you were drowning in a bog of torment. I don't exist as a real person to the people who were supposed to love me, and there's not any amount of time that erases the instinct to seek out worth with a clean countertop or scrubbed walls or being 3 weeks ahead on your weekly list of extra chores and thinking "I haven't done enough" and doing it all again anyway.

There's always a voice in my head. There's always trauma. There's always resentment.

And so here I am, dying for help, dying for a break... And what I get is more work.

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Links to the other “Use Your Words” posts:

Baking In A Tornado https://www.bakinginatornado.com/

On the Border https://dlt-lifeontheranch.blogspot.com/

The Diary of an Alzheimer’s Caregiver https://thediaryofanalzheimerscaregiver.com/blog

Part-time Working Hockey Mom https://thethreegerbers.blogspot.ch/

Molotovs > Fireworks

Welcome to a Secret Subject Swap. This month 4 brave bloggers picked a secret subject for someone else and were assigned a secret subject to interpret in their own style. Today we are all simultaneously divulging our topics and submitting our posts. 

My “Secret Subject” is:

How do you celebrate the 4th of July?

It was submitted by: https://thediaryofanalzheimerscaregiver.com/blog.html/

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I've answered this question before in a way, but that time I made it more or less about hating fireworks and having trauma related to my dad getting drunk and my parents fighting every holiday and especially the 4th because it's my mom's birthday. And that still remains true. Im not really big on the holiday at the best of times..

But I'll be honest here, what the fuck is there to celebrate anyway? Fascism? Loss of rights? Being terrified to be an out queer person for the first time in a fucking long time? No healthcare? Ignoring a pandemic? Essentially sending people to work in a pandemic to keep the capitalism train moving and then also removing access to free tests and vaccines? A president who won't even say the word abortion or at least didn't for his first 2 years in office much less have a real plan to address it? A president who, on the way roe was overturned and knowing it was coming like we all did, had plans to appoint a lifetime federal judge position to an extreme antiabortion Republican? A country that will make Juneteenth a federal holiday but won't let people talk about the implications of racism on this country's foundation and its presence in our system to children in history classes? A country who will give more rights to guns than people? A country that cares about the lives of babies unless they're shot to death in school classrooms? A country that will make every excuse possible for a police to kill an unarmed person especially ESPECIALLY if they're a person of color?

I guess it would be a lot easier to celebrate the birth of this nation if it wasnt so hard for those of us who live here and have been othered in it. If it didn't carry a risk of discrimination and death just for looking or being different. If it didn't mean old fucking losers with too much power didn't feel entitled to keep the poor begging for scraps and the othered to die with nothing. It would be so much easier to pop off some fireworks if Democrats didn't somehow hinge their 50 years of failures on Bernie once again or Susan Sarandon or those of us who ever vocally criticize one of their politicians....you know the same party that paid for ads for an NRA A-rated, pro life democrat in Texas in no danger of losing their seat the day after children were gunned down in a school while the police (which Democrats gladly keep over funding) stood by in the same fucking state.

Fuck this country. There's nothing here to celebrate.

Whenever this country slides further into fascism, so many people always share that quote that says "don't fall into despair. Let this radicalize you." But somehow that means vote for the same people who never gave a shit about you to begin with and share bullshit meaningless memes. I'm sorry but in an oligarchy, voting is never a radical act. It's the very least you could possibly do.

Celebrate what?

A country still deeply in the throws of Satanic Panic and antisemitism? That still falls for conspiracies build on the foundation of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion which we know was made up entirely to excuse antisemitism? A country so caught up in fear, exploitation, and the art of the grift that a man could spiral so far down the rabbit whole in a couple months that he became willing to kill his own children with a spearfishing gun? That could look his 10 month old in the face and think that was the best he could do for that child? 

A leftist spectrum that thinks making a Facebook profile named Lenin Bussy Marx and sharing low quality memes is praxis? The ones who have 392 comment threads on Twitter arguing about what a 200 years dead white dude would think about a grifting YouTuber who made millions passing off propaganda about the Syrian civil war? The same leftists who think any country that isn't the U.S. is fine and good no matter what they're doing to their own people?

And the worst thing of all is that we aren't actively attempting to address ANY of it. 

Will I celebrate? Do I?

No thanks. I'll be sleeping in and watching Scooby Doo and everything else can go fuck itself.

____________

Here are links to all the sites now featuring Secret Subject Swap posts. Sit back, grab a cup, and check them all out. See you there:

Baking In A Tornado https://www.BakingInATornado.com

The Diary of an Alzheimer’s Caregiver https://thediaryofanalzheimerscaregiver.com/blog.html/

Part-time Working Hockey Mom https://thethreegerbers.blogspot.ch/

Welcome to a Secret Subject Swap. This month 5 brave bloggers picked a secret subject for someone else and were assigned a secret subject to interpret in their own style. Today we are all simultaneously divulging our topics and submitting our posts.

My “Secret Subject” is:

Would you rather be the sand castle or the wave?

It was submitted by: https://thethreegerbers.blogspot.ch/ 

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 ...I'm not a philosopher.

Like I don't have enough time ony hands to really wonder what it all means or if life has a purpose or the existential threads of my existence. To be perfectly honest, I really don't even think about where this world came from or what's in space. The closest I get to wanting to solve a puzzle is maybe how the Somerton man died or what happened to Brandon Lawson or who the zodiac killer is. I don't really ever think about the bigger why are we here kind of picture, and at times I'm not even thinking  beyond the day I'm living. Every day life keeps me pondering enough. Why do people always blame a mysterious them? How do cults work? Why do we always fall for scams? How can we fix the many things that are broken? Why does one or my cats keep pooping in the sink drain? how the fuck am I going to make it through the day when I just used all my energy shampooing muddy dog prints off my carpet? When you're thinking about things that are not necessarily in your control but close I think the bigger things that might not ever have an answer seem to sink into the background.

I've written a lot of people in prison over the last 15ish or so years. I've definitely had my run ins with philosophical questions because of it. These are people who do have time, nothing but sometimes, and access to a library always full of philosophers if nothing else, and an aching need to ponder what it might all mean now that life takes the form of a highly controlled and caged environment. The big picture perhaps becomes essential to sanity because the everyday things are out of their hands and off their radar if they want to stay afloat. And I get that, but god does it grate on my nerves

I have to say even with the years of philosophy and the questions and the conversations and, well it's philosophy so... definitely some arguments, I don't really know how to approach this idea. The wave or the sandcastle? I don't care. I just want to be able to afford food this month. Do I want to be a thing shaped by human direction or by the moon? Do I want to be make the most of my environment and let it destroy me just to rise again or do I want to be the thing that shapes the environment? I don't think there's really an answer here that says anything about me or about my worldview or about existence because there are pros and cons to each way or looking at these ideas and these questions and the fascinating thing about being a human is that we can look at sandcastles and waves and take the best parts of those ideas while discarding whatever doesn't serve us, right? We don't have to have those kinds of metaphorical limits and if we don't want to be any parts of either one, then we don't have to do that either. Ask me about being a queer atheist anarchist in the rural South who likes antitheistic satanism and goes to a Christian church every week that rolls and has good conversations with the pastor who loves and accepts all those things--the parts of these things that serve me work together in a way that has made me a much better person than I would be otherwise. Things have changed a lot for me in the time since I embraced the church and anarchism, and I feel like I've definitely grown. I don't have to be limited by and either/or scenario. Ask me why I chose to write people in prison or why I homeschool my kid. Ask me how I found peace with my childhood. Every part of who I am is cutting out the parts of things and feelings and beliefs that don't serve me anymore and embracing the good bits that do. It's been work, but it's been worth it, and I ultimately understand the burning questions I do have all the more because of the journey. I don't have to choose any one thing...

Wave, sandcastle, hermit crab, dried out piece of driftwood, dunes, a horse running on the beach... I'm all of it.

_______________________

Baking In A Tornado https://www.BakingInATornado.com

The Diary of an Alzheimer’s Caregiver https://thediaryofanalzheimerscaregiver.com/blog.html/

What TF Sarah https://crazymamallama.blogspot.com

Part-time Working Hockey Mom https://thethreegerbers.blogspot.ch/

Cluttered But Happy

Welcome to a Secret Subject Swap. This month 5 brave bloggers picked a secret subject for someone else and were assigned a secret subject to interpret in their own style. Today we are all simultaneously divulging our topics and submitting our posts. 

My “Secret Subject” is:

Would you be able to live in a tiny house with very little stuff?

It was submitted by: https://thethreegerbers.blogspot.ch/ 

These Damn Animals

Welcome to a Secret Subject Swap. This month 4 brave bloggers picked a secret subject for someone else and were assigned a secret subject to interpret in their own style. Today we are all simultaneously divulging our topics and submitting our posts. 

My “Secret Subject” is:

Do you have pets? Tell us about them or if not what kind of pet do you would you like to have someday?

It was submitted by: https://thediaryofanalzheimerscaregiver.com/blog.html/

Hold onto your butts. There's cuteness incoming
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I have what some might call "too many" pets actually. I live in a very rural area without a lot of resources besides an overcrowded shelter, so I've taken in a few too many mouths to feed over the years not even limited to just the normal pets. I even cared for an owl temporarily while it healed. I'm not Snow White or anything but if an animal is in need I'll find a way to help. Just ask me why I'm taking care of a dog that got beat up in my yard recently. It's a lot of work. I have had most of these guys since before I got sick with chronic fatigue syndrome, and I try to limit what I take in to what I know I can handle now, but it's still a lot of work. Dogs get meds twice a day and medicated baths. The beat up dog is getting meds 3 times a day and bandage changes once a day and special food. I have two nearly blind cats I have to dose with CBD oil at the very least. Other cats that need daily allergy meds. One cat has asthma. And they all need one on one attention which is difficult to always fit in my day when I'm cleaning up their messes, writing people in prison, and homeschooling a teenager. 

I don't know what it's like to not be too busy to paint for fun until the weekend when I stay up later.

But they also bring a lot of balance to my life and force me to keep going. I don't have a choice but to get up and take care of them. I have often kept going even when I didn't really have any appetite for life because who else will give them their medicine. I have laughed until I cried at some bozo thing the dog did or marveled at a cat eating a jelly bean but refusing turkey. There's no predictable day no matter how monotonous your routine can be when you have a houseful of pets. Hell, I don't think it's too routine even with one pet. Each one brings unpredictable chaos to your life right along with their lazy naps. The world is worth it when you get to live with their little shenanigans and their unconditional love. There's not a day that goes by that some furred asshole doesn't make up for every shithead thing they somehow managed to do earlier. And when I sat shithead thing I mean, I've accidentally cooked cat pee because they pissed on my stove and I didn't realize until too late. I have to have 2 child locks on the fridge and 2 on the freezer. The amount of plastic that has been eaten in this house... My dog stepped in poop the other day then tracked it inside all over the floor. One of them peed in my shower cap once and I didn't find out until I put the son of a bitch on my head. Nothing is sacred. My trash can is booby trapped and so is the washing machine. And the stove now. And a corner of a rug. Oh and a shelf. The amount of absolute fuckery they get up to feels like a three stooges movie except I'm the only butt of the joke. And yet they still manage to make up for all of that and that's priceless. There is no value I could place on my time that they don't outdo over and over.

So without further ado, here are some pics of the asshole crew.

Here are links to all the sites now featuring Secret Subject Swap posts. Sit back, grab a cup, and check them all out. See you there:



Baking In A Tornado https://www.BakingInATornado.com

The Diary of an Alzheimer’s Caregiver https://thediaryofanalzheimerscaregiver.com/blog.html/

Part-time Working Hockey Mom https://thethreegerbers.blogspot.ch/




What TF Sarah https://crazymamallama.blogspot.com/

More Than a Slur

Today’s post is a writing challenge. This is how it works: participating bloggers picked 4 – 6 words or short phrases for someone else to craft into a post. All words must be used at least once and all the posts will be unique as each writer has received their own set of words. That’s the challenge, here’s a fun twist; no one who’s participating knows who got their words and in what direction the writer will take them. Until now.

My words are:

remember ~ forge ~ acquire ~ pan ~ configure

They were submitted by: https://www.bakinginatornado.com

Day After Day

Welcome to a Secret Subject Swap. This month 4 brave bloggers picked a secret subject for someone else and were assigned a secret subject to interpret in their own style. Today we are all simultaneously divulging our topics and submitting our posts.

My “Secret Subject” is:

Do you have a sick ritual? Something you wear when you’re sick, a place you prefer to be and food or drink that makes you feel better?

It was submitted by: https://www.bakinginatornado.com 

School's Out ForEVER

Welcome to a Secret Subject Swap. This month 4 brave bloggers picked a secret subject for someone else and were assigned a secret subject to interpret in their own style. Today we are all simultaneously divulging our topics and submitting our posts. 

My “Secret Subject” is:

If you could have a college do-over (or first time experience), money is no object, what subject would you choose to study?

It was submitted by: https://Bakinginatornado.com 

I Got Old

Welcome to a Secret Subject Swap. This month 5 brave bloggers picked a secret subject for someone else and were assigned a secret subject to interpret in their own style. Today we are all simultaneously divulging our topics and submitting our posts.

My “Secret Subject” is:

Today is my birthday. I turn 39. If you’ve turned 39, how did you celebrate the last year of your 30’s?

It was submitted by: https://crazymamallama.blogspot.com/

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Are people still celebrating birthdays in this panorama? This panini? This profusion of particulates?

I turned 40 this year, so I rang out the last year of my 30s sitting my ass at home like I have been since early 2020 which, you know, is fine. I like being at home. I don't like people much. I'm not into labels much but if the shoe fits I'm gonna wear that sumbitch, and I have to say introvert does fit. My happy place is home writing letters to the friends I've made in prison or painting or any other activity that involves me staying the right temperature and cozy in my house and unbothered.

My 30s were probably the best time of my life so far because I really learned to stop giving a fuck. Is it sad to be at home as much as I am? I'm sure someone somewhere thinks so but you know they can eat my entire fat ass if they make their opinion of my life my business. Otherwise they're perfectly welcome to think what they wanna think.

I wasn't with family much outside of who lives in my house because my 30s also taught me I don't have to put up with anyone's bullshit to keep the peace. And that's ok. I made new friends (yes mostly online) and learned so much. Seriously according to Spotify unwrapped I spent over 6500 minutes of my life listening to almost 100 episodes of Behind the Bastards podcast in 2021 and that's not even the only one I listen to. I found peace with endings--of relationships, of my 30s, of me not needing an eye cream.

I never expected to be this age so I'm certainly not going to be dragged into 40 kicking and screaming the way we're taught we should, do I spent my year being hopeful about my age--embracing it and being determined that my 40s are going to be even better than the decade before. I feel like I've grown more this past year than at any other time in my life perhaps.

Between churching it up with my atheist ass and embracing the big As without hesitancy (anarchism and abolitionist not adultery) Ive become a better person, a more empathetic and compassionate one. A healthier one. And I feel both terrified and optimistic about the future of society. I dont know that I could be here without the distance from certain hurts that only aging can bring.

But you'll have to pry my purple hair from my cold, dead hands because I'm not ready to embrace the grays yet. Just so we're clear.

_________

Baking In A Tornado https://www.BakingInATornado.com

Wandering Web Designer https://wanderingwebdesigner.com/blog

Climaxed https://climaxedtheblog.blogspot.com

What TF Sarah https://crazymamallama.blogspot.comPart-time Working Hockey Mom https://thethreegerbers.blogspot.ch/

Sometimes Comfort Sometimes Complicated

Welcome to a Secret Subject Swap. This month 5 brave bloggers picked a secret subject for someone else and were assigned a secret subject to interpret in their own style. Today we are all simultaneously divulging our topics and submitting our posts.

My “Secret Subject” is:

What is your go-to comfort food and why?

It was submitted by: https://Bakinginatornado.com

_________________________________


Having a chronic illness that comes with a lot of gastrointestinal issues really changes the concept of comfort food. I don't think it's wrong to ask this question by any means, but I do want to point out that food is such a big part of culture and society that we tend to take it for granted that everyone has access to their comfort food or could eat it. And I'm glad to have an opportunity to talk about how poverty and disability have impacted by my relationship to food in negative ways.

I've had different comfort foods in my life related to where I was and what I had access to, but they've always been shaped by how poor I was at the time. When I was a kid, it was boiled peanuts. My dad often had access to farms through his welding work and a perk of that was getting some food to help us make it through the year. Peanuts are a huge crop here, so my dad would bring home whole bushes, and we'd sit outside in plastic dollar store chairs pickinf off the peanuts and eating raw ones until we got sick. And then peanuts would be in the freezer all year long for any time I felt down and needed a little salty nugget of comfort.

In my early teens, it was chicken and dumplings. My grandma made it often when we were kids, and it was one of my favorite things back then, but after my parents divorced, she'd make them every year for my birthday, and it always gave me a warm, full belly and a reminder of better times. But hers were always made from biscuits in a can, and while she fancied hers up, learning to make them that way taught me how to make them cheaply. I can't tell you how many times I made a pot of them myself (when I could still eat them) for a few bucks. Chicken broth, a little butter, and can biscuits can make a good ass meal for several days for a person or few. Add chicken and eggs can add money but also make it more filling. The point being it maintained its ability to give me a full, warm belly and a bit of comfort.

After I moved out on my own, I was making just over $5 an hour and trying to make pay all my bills. It was rough, and most of the time I didn't know how I was going to eat and took napkins from the bathroom at work to use for toilet paper, but I would be damned if I was going back home. I couldn't. So I ate mostly groceries my grandma gave me when her cabinets got too full and ramen. If I wanted to splurge for a little comfort though it was chips and salsa con queso. If I couldn't afford the whole jars I could still get a pretty cheap nachos lunchable. The first time I saw High Fidelity, I was sitting in the middle of my little apartment's living room with a jar of each and some baked tostitos scoops. I was so entranced with the movie I forgot they were there after awhile. It was pure bliss. If I was lucky, I'd also grab a pack of twizzlers. When I had nothing, sometimes it was the junk food that brought me comfort. Things I took for granted when I still lived at home made me feel like things might be ok.

French toast was a thing I loved to make when I finally got a raise for training I did for the job I had at the time. Whenever I needed some company and comfort because life had been (and still is) very fucking hard, I'd invite all my friends over for a french toast night. The ingredients were cheap as hell and I could make some banging ass french toast. We'd sit around the table with a stack of it and a huge bowl of syrup in the middle to dip. Yeah yeah unsanitary. We didn't give a shit. Eggs, a couple of 75 cent loaves of bread, and a bottle of syrup plus the secret ingredients I kept on hand when I could, and we'd sit around the table laughing and with full bellies.

After I got married, I couldn't tell you... That part of my life just wasn't all that great, and I don't have memories with food because of it. We were always broke and eating ramen because he blew our money on unnecessary shit. We struggled to find time to cook. I was always dieting and quite honestly after working 14 days in a row sometimes all I wanted after work was a beer when I could afford comfort (or maybe some Chinese buffet). That's part of the reason I no longer drink. I stopped the moment I found out I was pregnant, but I never really drank often after that. I could have easily been my dad when things were rough. By that time, too, I'd had my gall bladder removed, so I couldn't have a lot of the things I previously loved without issues. They really don't spend enough time telling you how badly having your gall bladder out can change your response to food, and I wasn't in any way prepared. I really had no good relationship in those years with food between being sick for months when I was pregnant and the gall stones and problems after it was out. It hurt. My relationship with food was so damaged from years of being bullied by family and peers and then hating to eat when I was sick that I just lost all sense of comfort from it at all.

So it probably shouldn't be a surprise that being a single parent really didn't change that much. My kid ate well. I always made time to fix him something he wanted, but at most I maybe had a pouch of tuna or a couple of pop tarts. We didn't really have the money for fast food, and I was also doing school full time so I didn't have time to make anything fancy. I had trouble still eating the things I had always loved. It wasn't a great time. We made due. But every now and then I'd still take the kid to our favorite Chinese place. We'd get dressed up for no reason, and he'd talk to our waitress like they were old friends. He called chicken and broccoli "wet chicken" and that became our thing, a bright spot in a dull, stressful world.

And now? Oh lawd. Now my relationship with food is probably more complicated than it has ever been because I can't eat. I mean I have a few foods I can keep down but even those aren't consistent. One day I'm fine, the next it comes back up. And despite all that the side effects of being that sick all the time, I'm still fat. One of these days y'all might have to admit it's not as simple as calories in and calories burned. But at least for now, I do have one thing that brings a little smile to my face. Grits. I've embraced being from the South more and more over the years. We're more queer than any other region of this country. We have more marginalized populations. And we have a bunch of politicians who have worked really hard to make sure that we don't have a voice, but that never seems to stop us trying. Our culture is so intertwined with food--from making due with scraps the way I have all my life. It only took me over half of it to realize this. Every morning I get up and make breakfast. Usually we have grits as part of that breakfast. Maybe some of y'all don't know what grits are because for the most part they've always been a staple in the south and ignored until fancy restaurants realized how much markup they could get on a shrimp and grits dish. Grits are basically porridge made from cornmeal, but with the right cook and the right seasoning they become a divinely creamy, savory dish that sends your taste buds into a frenzy. They're good any time of day but getting your belly full on grits first thing in the morning just sets the day off right unless of course you're on the receiving end of grits used as a weapon. Just ask Al Green about that ;)

Food is complicated for most folks. Eating disorders are all too common. We're sold fad diets and cookbooks and new devices. Sometimes comfort just isn't possible and that's ok too. But also if you take anything from what I've said here, let it be that comfort food can look like anything. It can be a $1 pack of lunchables nachos or it can be the thing your grandma made you even if you were hurt by that same grandma. Comfort can be anything that nourishes your body to keep you going. Comfort doesn't have a look or a box it can easily fit in. Take it where you can get it.

___________________

Here are links to all the sites now featuring Secret Subject Swap posts. Sit back, grab a cup, and check them all out. See you there:



Baking In A Tornado https://www.BakingInATornado.com

Wandering Web Designer https://wanderingwebdesigner.com/blog

Climaxed https://climaxedtheblog.blogspot.com

What TF Sarah https://crazymamallama.blogspot.com

Part-time Working Hockey Mom https://thethreegerbers.blogspot.ch/

Perhaps You Are Mistaken

Welcome to a Secret Subject Swap. This month 5 brave bloggers picked a secret subject for someone else and were assigned a secret subject to interpret in their own style. Today we are all simultaneously divulging our topics and submitting our posts.

My “Secret Subject” is:

"Dear __..."

It was submitted by: https://crazymamallama.blogspot.com/

I don't expect this sentiment to be shared by everyone here reading but I also don't care about that.

There Is Still Room for Hope

Today’s post is a writing challenge. This is how it works: participating bloggers picked 4 – 6 words or short phrases for someone else to craft into a post. All words must be used at least once and all the posts will be unique as each writer has received their own set of words. That’s the challenge, here’s a fun twist; no one who’s participating knows who got their words and in what direction the writer will take them. Until now.

My words are:

daylight ~ see ~ bug ~ collapse ~ woods

They were submitted by: https://Bakinginatornado.com

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A lot of us look ahead and see the potential of a societal collapse.

I'm certainly guilty of that myself, but Im trying to get better. Obviously I get that line of thinking, though. We're in a post normal world now. The damage done to our climate and the related side effects from progressing climate change and atmospheric heating cannot be undone. Experts agree now that even if we went to net zero carbon emissions tomorrow, we couldnt erase the changes we are facing (and will continue to endure) before the end of this century, and we aren't even close to any sort of net zero emissions even as many countries are beginning to come together for timelines of when that may happen. Raging fires, ice storms, heat domes, lack of water sources, billionaires looking to space for the answers... it's all here to stay in our life times. Combine that with growing fascism in multiple countries, increasing street violence in those countries, civil wars, our fears about Afghanistan and the Taliban, weaponized unreality, the culmination of decades of science denial for the sake of profit, and a going on 2 year fight against a pandemic, and it's no wonder so many of us cannot see a future that isn't at least somewhat apocalyptic. Add in that it doesn't help when even the more "liberal" parties make promises of going back to easier times, promises that sound so good to many of us in theory but are outright lies in the face of climate change science, and you have a pretty heady mix of negativity. Yes, even without Trump or any of the other shit of even the last ten years, we would still be pretty royally screwed when it comes to being able to live and breathe easily from this point on. And constant promises of returning to a state of normal make it harder for folks to consider bracing for an ever changing future.

What I think we're getting wrong though is an end to everything as we know it being the immutable result of all this. I think, or at least want to hope, we can do better than that.

I live in a hurricane zone so I tend to keep some things on hand for emergencies, but I've made lists even on this blog for resources in case we do experience black and brown outs here and how to live off the land or pack a bug out back if things were to get really rough. I think there's a lot to be said for preparation, for the anxiety relief that tends to come with knowing you can weather most storms with a little know-how, work, and a few tucked away items.

But I think we also have to focus on the potential for rebuilding something new and better and to do that through mutual aid and community building. If there was one strong take away from the last couple of years at least, I would hope it's that we can, in fact, come together to handle most things for each other even while our politicians fight over which party can do as little as possible for the populace and get away with it. We can come together and build communities and mutual aid networks. We can be the hope we want to see in the world.

And perhaps most importantly, we can adapt.

Even if you just consider the changes that have come since 1900 when industrialization here in the u.s. was in full swing, our country grew, we got the automobile industry, plane travel, telephones and tvs and all manner of improved methods to listen to music, space travel, undersea exploration, the internet, computers that were as big as houses with barely any capabilities to computers we carry in our pockets. We've worked on defining human rights and adapting what those should be and who they should apply to. We've survived world wars and pandemics and companies hell bent on profit over people. And while some of us have done so with less grace than others here we are considerably better now than 100 years ago and still changing. It's entirely understandable to look at the last several years at the very least (and much of history for many folks) and feel like the pendulum has swung too far into hate and division and greed and destruction to be corrected, but the future is still wide open, and we could still make it swing the other direction with the right kind of work.

I'd love to run off into the woods and hang out with my pet alligator in a bayou hut far from civilization. I even painted myself one to look at every now and then. But there's still daylight at the end of this tunnel if we choose to make it that far, and I have to believe we can do better. There's no less reason to be prepared, but for all of us and everyone that comes after us, we have to build something different than we have, than we've ever had.

The challenge is in the not giving up, in seeing this through, in doing more than voting and going back to the day to day. We have to build not subsist on the same bullshit we've been fed all these decades. The challenge is in reimagining everything we know to be unchangeable and building something that works and not just a marginal step at best that will be undone every 4 to 8 years. We have to listen to the folks hurt by existing systems and who have always done their work to protect the world, and we have a limited time to stop questioning them and hear what they're saying.

We have to take "impossible" off the table.

There's still more than enough time for the future we have to be one of building a new way forward and not like you know being cannibals that eat each other to survive in a Mad Max landscape of hellfire and water shortages. We don't have to fight each other to the death for a bit of water. We just have to believe in how much better we can be and make it happen.

____________________

Links to the other “Use Your Words” posts:

Baking In A Tornado https://bakinginatornado.com/

On the Border https://dlt-lifeontheranch.blogspot.com/

Wandering Web Designer https://wanderingwebdesigner.com/blog

What TF Sarah https://crazymamallama.blogspot.com/

Part-time Working Hockey Mom https://thethreegerbers.blogspot.ch/

Hero Worship

Welcome to a Secret Subject Swap. This month 5 brave bloggers picked a secret subject for someone else and were assigned a secret subject to interpret in their own style. Today we are all simultaneously divulging our topics and submitting our posts. 

My “Secret Subject” is:

Who is your hero? Why?

It was submitted by: https://wanderingwebdesigner.com/blog

Can't Stop Us Being Loud and Proud

Today’s post is a writing challenge. This is how it works: participating bloggers picked 4 – 6 words or short phrases for someone else to craft into a post. All words must be used at least once and all the posts will be unique as each writer has received their own set of words. That’s the challenge, here’s a fun twist; no one who’s participating knows who got their words and in what direction the writer will take them. Until now.


My words are:

clutching ~ woeful ~ happy ~ stretched ~ hop

They were submitted by: https://dlt-lifeontheranch.blogspot.com/


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Ok I'm gonna need y'all to have some discussions with your friends and family who have full on gay panicked over Lil Nas X and every famous gay who didnt make themselves quieter for the straights' comfort before him if we're being honest. 

 
I hope they stretched real good before all the reaching and clutching of their pearls they've been doing about how gays will corrupt their children and how unnecessary his open gayness is and the devil and HIV and all the other little homophobic things. But now it's beyond ridiculous. Do you have any idea what it's like to wake up in 2021 as a gay, get on your phone, and wade through homophobic rant after homophobic rant? Woeful doesn't cover it, and a lot of this could be avoided if they got a little education.

First of all, if anyone is worried about music corrupting your children let's start with not letting your kids listen to explicit hip hop or any other genre of music for that matter. ALL of them except maybe gospel will have people talking openly about sex. Lucille Bogan's songs from the 30s have made even ME blush, and we all know how my mouth and mind are. There are dozens upon dozens of country songs about sex and sexualizing women. There's an entire subgenre of indie Americana called murder folk. No genre is safe, but these same people are the ones in hundreds of videos I've seen who are happy and think it's funny when the kids are singing along about their broken hearts or honky tonk badonkadonks until it's a gay man doing the singing especially a Black one. What will your kids learn? I don't know. That it's ok to love who you love? That sex isn't shameful? That their parents are wrong? That's the crux of this isn't it. If kids are exposed to gay people making a success of themselves by societal standards, gay people who are happy, who aren't tokens, who love no differently than anyone else, who aren't at all different than anyone else, that proves more than any bullshit lie their parents tell them and then they might think for themselves or *gasp* feel safe to come out themselves.

You can also happily report to them that their christian religion actually says nothing about being gay as a sin. The Bible discusses sexual exploitation. None of the passages y'all's folks point to in order to declare homosexuality a sin are actually about loving relations or consensual sex between same gender partners. These passages are actually mostly talking about assault of minors, rape, and exploitation. Homosexuality actually didn't show up in the Bible until 1946 as a bad translation paid for by christians in America who wanted to demonize homosexuality and knew the best way to accomplish that is through religion (the same happens with different sects of Christianity and abortion too actually). Jesus never once talks about same sex relationships in the new testament. If anyone does it's Paul. Jesus though did say the number 1 commandment, the thing we are to take to heart more than anything else to live the life wanted us living is to love one another. Above everything else he said, love one another was the thing he wanted everyone to practice.

There is no gay agenda to corrupt y'all's kids. I need your family and friends and, hell, some of mine to know that. These kids are coming into a changing world. Gayness is more socially acceptable now than it's ever been at least in some countries and while we still have a long way to go to equality, we have, through hard work and decades of activism, given space to new generations to come out into a safer place, to meet others easily just like them, and with a variety of labels to help specify their needs and wants in romantic and sexual relationships. Society isn't gayer all of a sudden because of some weird gay agenda to corrupt the kids (which is honestly just another facet of satanic panic). These kids have support now that they never knew was there before. They have people accepting and loving them as they are. They're coming into a world where yes they still face bigotry, in everyday society and systemically, but it's improved. Equality isn't now, but it doesn't seem nearly as far off.

That's the only gay agenda there is--that we get to live our lives in peace like anyone else. We want a world where being gay won't get us fired in any state, where we aren't denied adoptions, where homeless shelters for disowned gay teens aren't filled to capacity, where a small town judge can't deny a wedding because of his beliefs (yes it still happens here), where no one is worried about marriage equality being overturned by a stacked conservative court. We want a life that doesn't punish us for being born.

We don't need to corrupt any children to being gay. They already are gay, and they quite often get mentored by those of us who are out because their own parents failed them. They're gay and trans and asexual and fluid and beautiful in all the ways these identities co-exist. Whether you know get to know it or not and get to be a supporting character or a villian in their stories is up to you. And I can guarantee--and be sure to tell y'all's folks this part--hearing you verbally destroy a gay kid with a successful rap career for being unapologetically queer tells your kid a lot about how unsafe you really are and is a first class ticket to being the villian.

___________

Links to the other “Use Your Words” posts:


Baking In A Tornado https://bakinginatornado.com/

On the Border https://dlt-lifeontheranch.blogspot.com/

Wandering Web Designer https://wanderingwebdesigner.com/blog

Climaxed https://climaxedtheblog.blogspot.com

What TF Sarah https://crazymamallama.blogspot.com/Part-time Working Hockey Mom https://thethreegerbers.blogspot.ch/

language barrier

Welcome to a Secret Subject Swap. This month 5 brave bloggers picked a secret subject for someone else and were assigned a secret subject to interpret in their own style. Today we are all simultaneously divulging our topics and submitting our posts. 

My “Secret Subject” is:

Pick one person and tell them something you think they need to hear.

It was submitted by: https://Bakinginatornado.com 

__________________________________________________________

I'm typically the kind of person who says what they think and not necessarily bluntly or no holds barred either. If I think your partner sucks, I'm going to say that. If I think

there's a problem between us that we need to discuss, I'm going to tell you and open the floor for that discussion. And that's true for Facebook friends that ask me for advice, people I see every day acting like a butthead, and people I write in prison. If I think it and the friendship matters to me in some way, I'm going to say it. If I think something is important or somehow valuable, I'm probably going to make a post about it. If I want to talk about how much men being whiny assholes makes me enjoy the He-man remake even more, I'm gonna post that too.

But I also have boundaries on that. It's neither productive or useful to say some things to my mom. It's past the point of being useful to wish I could say something to my dad who died in 2006 and honestly the fractured relationship we had said a lot without words. There's not much left to say because it's been his absence from my life that let me find peace with who he was. The things left unsaid and unresponded to helped me find a way to accept the reality of our lives. I am better for the things left unsaid to him at this point in my life. And I certainly no longer drag out arguments with internet strangers for the sake of being right. If they're open to information, sure. I don't think it's productive or at all valuable to do what so many folks online do--tell someone to Google it. I give resources and information and help them understand with my own words. But a stranger? A stranger in the comments of a news story or public page who is hellbent on fake outrage and moving the goalpost and sealioning? Nah. Not worth my time.

And while there's a part of me that wishes I could gather some younger people around me old granny style and ask them what the fuck and request that they please stop using leftist ideologies as brands and for making monetized "content," I also know that generation grew up at a time when 10 year olds could become internet famous and they have to learn certain lessons the hard way. Nothing I could say will stick without personal experience.

So if I could say anything to anyone I think I'd like the opportunity to talk to my dog and have him understand not just key words but what is actually meant by the whole of my statement. And yes I do refer to him as a person as weird as that is. Just ask my kid who always points out when I call any animal a person in this house like I've lost the plot.

"Mother, that dog is not a person."

"I mean, I know but yes he is.

So here's to Fizz:

I did not realize I needed you til you were here. I had my big goofy buddy dog, but you're my anchor. My velcro. In the year you've been here you've grown into such a loving little guy who actually learned some tricks and how to calm down around feet and that humans won't just hurt you then give you up. But I need you to listen to me.

I have to cut your hair. Have you seen yourself without a haircut? I have pictures if you need them. Your hair wasn't cut when you got here, and honestly you could have been an extra in a star wars film. Your poop gets in it. Your food. Buddy, it's gross. You look like a toupee for Andre the Giant and I imagine that's what a toupee worn by Andre the Giant would have smelled like too.

Your nails? Also have to be cut, bruv. You click clack on the kitchen floor like all 3 Billy Goats Gruff, and it's a little annoying. And it will get painful. I'm not going to hurt you, bud. I've done it every month for a year and a half and here you are still alive.

You get ear infections like they're a new TikTok dance to learn, bro. How? And when you get them you do not help matters by being mad about the medicine and the ear cleaning. Got to do it.

Cats are not for humping. Now I know this doesn't happen very much but you know seeing your pup trying to literally raw dog a neutered cat in the middle of the living room doesn't have to happen *often* to be awkward. I know they're your buds and all that but, uh, buds don't hump. Ok some do but not you and the cats.

Yes you need baths. It's not up for debate, buddy, and while we're at it, I need you to know that you have to go outside even when it's hot. I know you'd rather just hold it because you're not pooping and peeing inside either but that's not healthy. Y'all all have to go outside rain, cold, hot, or even when, gasp, the grass is kinda tall.

Sleeping time is not chewing your ass time. I swear to God if you wake me up 5 times a night rocking the mattress to get a better grip on whatever is itching you like I've put 50 cents in a motel bed, there will be a reckoning. And while we're at it, going that hard on your itches is just going to make you more itchy. It's science.

Alright, buddy, I love you. You're doing good. You're my best bud. But you know let's just keep this in mind for the future. There's some chimkins and tacos in it for you.

_____________________________________

Baking In A Tornado https://www.BakingInATornado.com

Wandering Web Designer https://wanderingwebdesigner.com/blog

What TF Sarah https://crazymamallama.blogspot.com/Part-time Working Hockey Mom https://thethreegerbers.blogspot.ch/

Part-time Working Hockey Mom https://thethreegerbers.blogspot.ch/

The Beauty in Breaking All the Rules

Today’s post is a writing challenge. This is how it works: participating bloggers picked 4 – 6 words or short phrases for someone else to craft into a post. All words must be used at least once and all the posts will be unique as each writer has received their own set of words. That’s the challenge, here’s a fun twist; no one who’s participating knows who got their words and in what direction the writer will take them. Until now.

My words are:

cahoots ~ fox ~ recoup ~ stickler ~ wistful

It was submitted by: https://wanderingwebdesigner.com/blog

_____________________


I used to be a big stickler for using proper grammar for even the most casual communication. But then I grew the fuck up a little.

Ok let me say I don't ever think it's a problem if in your personal life you choose to use proper grammar all the time. Most of the time I still do. What changed for me and what I'm really talking about is dismissing and/judging other people for not doing so. A preference is one thing; mocking others over a preference is quite different. I want to talk about both these issues--grammar and preference. And I hope the time you spend reading this is more agreement than eyerolls, but we'll see. I mean it's about to get real geeky in here...

I've been rewatching Star Trek: The Next Generation lately (see... Geeky). And besides me developing a weird infatuation for Beverly Crusher, the fox of the future, it's been a fun way to think about people and humanity and social issues. Bodily autonomy, what makes a human different from anyone else, what might society look like without classes... And it is very much a intergalactic world without slang. Beverly do be talking all posh. Oh there's an alien race that communicates using an old epic poem about a battle the entire planet remains wistful about, but that's more or less about not treating someone less than you just because the two of you don't speak the same language at all which is a little different than bending and eroding rules to carve out a spot for yourself in a world where the dominant people carved and eroded societies and their languages in the name of imperialism. (Don't get me wrong, a whole lot of us need that lesson about different langues, too, but I still think that's different than slang and code switching.) It's interesting that on a show with unlimited races of peoples/aliens there is never an advanced culture that has developed localized slang in generations. To the people who created this show, in this world access to standards of grammar and syntax in the English language are equitable. Class is no longer an issue in Star Trek. Those issues have been resolved. And in that way, these creators decided slang would be eliminated. Everyone would have equal access to the same education and the same ability to grasp the written word, and humans, at least, would be more homogeneous when it comes to language as an aspect of culture. I do think judging someone for poor grammar at least in the U.S. is classist and ableist or can be as is the seeming belief of Star Trek's creative team. Our schools' funding is dependent on local taxes. It creates wide gaps in funding depending on the values of property in between the imaginary lines that create a school district, and unfortunately the powers that be have a way of keeping poor folks especially poor folks of color out of schools where a lot of higher class groups send their kids. Teachers already spend out of their own pockets even in some of the more funded districts with no way to recoup their money. So yeah in that way I think Star Trek is right about things. Maybe equal access and elimination of classes does change the evolution of language.

But that doesn't take into account how much fun it is to say fuck the rules every now and then.

Like that. And like that again. I'm not supposed to, according to the rules, use just one sentence in a paragraph. I'm not supposed to start a sentence with a conjuction unless it is following a sentence and makes a complete sentence. And then I followed it with two dependent clauses that should never stand alone the way I left them. We've become a society that communicates almost solely online at times, and because of that, we have learned to write/type with affectations and put fun into it. Words are written in distinct ways that change the tone and connotation of what's being said without it having to be heard. Slang words spread far more quickly beyond the small groups where they begin. Language evolves as we do with the times, with our needs, and because some of us want to have fun with our words when and where we can. That's part of the beauty of language. And that evolution does not mean you can't prefer to use grammar by the rules entirely nor does it mean there aren't spaces where a standard might be necessary so we all understand what is being said and the importance of the meaning behind it. But a preference one way or another outside of those limited situations should never come with judgement about the other person's worth or ability. It shouldn't mean we have to discount what someone has said because they don't follow arbitrary, prescriptive rules. If you can understand what's being said *if* it is being said to your that's all that matters and even if you can't understand, a polite request for explanation is fine. And if it isn't said to you, then it's none of your business anyway.

What I'm trying to convey here is that even if we somehow manage to escape the inherent faults of capitalism and have a classless society where everyone's needs are met, we won't be without slang, without linguistic cultural experiences, without blendings of languages and meaning, without new rules we can joyously break. I think slang is inherently part of existence and has as much value as precise academic speech and purists' opinions. The writers of Star Trek even understood that when writing Picard's detective noir episodes. The slang was part of the experience. As it should be.

So now that we all know we don't have to be in cahoots with the rule makers and justify mockery because of arbitrary standards, I hope you appreciate the more descriptive language around you.

Oh and live long and prosper. 🖖🏻

A Number 4, Hold the Patriotism

Welcome to a Secret Subject Swap. This month 5 brave bloggers picked a secret subject for someone else and were assigned a secret subject to interpret in their own style. Today we are all simultaneously divulging our topics and submitting our posts.

Your “Secret Subject” is:

Are you a fireworks person? How do you celebrate the 4th of July?

It was submitted by: https://wanderingwebdesigner.com/blog

___


No.

I feel like I could probably leave it there, but that wouldn't really make for an interesting read, so let me overshare some more of my thoughts and life. Why the fuck not?

I've never liked fireworks even as a kid. Cried over them every time. I startle easily, though--loud noises, someone just randomly coming around the corner or speaking to me when I'm in my own world, the most tame scene in a not even very scary movie. It doesn't take much.

Let me introduce you to my friend, Childhood Trauma. C.T. has been faithfully by my side for as long as I can't actually remember at all because, you guessed it, Childhood Trauma. She's pretty cunning but ever-present in my life. Honestly, she really shaped who I am as a person even this many years later. I don't know who I'd be without her. And the great part is no matter how hard I work at pushing her away, she pops back up at the weirdest times, and it's like she never left at all! And she definitely likes to give me some jump scares.

Seriously, fuck fireworks. I get little snatches of memories here and there about being a kid. There are things I know without remembering specific events, but there are many little blurs of things I can recall, and there are some terrible images of my parents having knockdown physical fights over fireworks especially on the 4th buried in my brain. July 4th is my mom's birthday, you see, and she didn't want my dad using the 4th as a reason to get drunk and shoot off fireworks (and his mouth) and pretend it was for her birthday. We couldn't get very many fireworks in a Georgia legally back then, and I remember crossing state lines to this little hole in the wall shop in Alabama with the tension thick enough it slapped against your body like a weighted blanket so heavy you couldn't kick it off.

So we'd drive back, the car either scarily quiet or loud with the fury of two people who didn't have a clue how to love or understand one another. By the time my dad shot the literal fireworks, the metaphorical ones had ruined the day. And unfortunately my feelings about fireworks are forever associated with those metaphorical ones my childhood was so often witness to. There's nothint but panic and fear and a desire to hide under the covers and pretend it's all okay.

As you can imagine none of this really lays a great foundation for celebrating the 4th, fireworks or not.

I didn't grow up in a very patriotic family. We were poor working folk. Money was a hard topic. We were rural and low class and in this part of America in the 80s and early 90s, that meant something different than it does now. It was outlaw country then, for us at least, real rednecks like the warring for unions kind. And outlaws like the we don't fuck with cops kind. American was just a small part of our identity, the smallest. Everything else was just so much more pressing, right? So this "holiday" that my parents would still have to work on was always more about my dad getting drunk on my mom's birthday than America. America took a backseat to my mom wanting a day for herself in a life slowly killing her and my dad wanting to let loose because being a fucking adult sucks bricks especially when you're killing your body for barely enough money to keep everybody dressed and fed. And as shitty as all that sounds, I'm very glad that on top of all the trauma my childhood gave me, I didn't also get brainwashed into blind patriotism or religion. I feel like it left me open, if I somehow worked through the trauma at least, to bigger, different ideas, to be curious, to ask questions, and to demand better.

What exactly are we celebrating anyway? America is rarely any of the things we were taught in school. And the older I get and more I learn, the more I realize how little there is to celebrate. We won a war for our sovereignty and immediately started doing the same exact things to other people that we started a war for in the first place. I think we have a lot of work to do before it's time to celebrate, but I certainly don't shun others for wanting to use time off or whatever excuse to have a good time with some good food, friends, and family...if you leave the fireworks out of it at least.

And even if somehow I could get past all that, my friend who was murdered back in 2002 had a birthday on July 3rd, and even this many years later, as I always say when I write about him, he stays on my mind. Loss and grief are weird things whether it's the loss of a friend in a tragic, unexpected, and senseless way or the loss of childhood to trauma and pain. They're always there. They're always the same size...you just learn to grow and shape yourself around them.

Halloween is the better holiday anyway.

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Here are links to all the sites now featuring Secret Subject Swap posts. Sit back, grab a cup, and check them all out. See you there:


Baking In A Tornado https://www.BakingInATornado.com

Wandering Web Designer https://wanderingwebdesigner.com/blog

Part-time Working Hockey Mom https://thethreegerbers.blogspot.ch/

What TF Sarah https://crazymamallama.blogspot.com/