My Own News?

So sort of tied to my post yesterday about not watching the news, I've been posting less frequently about politics and social issues myself. Part of it is since I'm a little more out of the loop it's a little less top of mind. And I'm also trying to remind myself that I'm not the only one burnt out on all of the stuff going on so I should probably not try to add to it. I've been trying to focus on "Am I making the world better or worse on a daily basis?"

But...

I am me. So sometimes I can't help it. 

But sometimes I talk myself out of it. 

And sometimes I fail at that part.

And that's okay. 

I still have to honor who I am. I still have to pay attention to what is going on in the world. I still feel the need to say something when I disagree. If I think it will make a difference. Or even could make a difference. 

I mean, there are people I don't bother with. There is no point. And there are times when I write out a well thought out careful response and then delete it without posting. And there are times when I write out a complete swear word filled post telling them just exactly what I think about them, their ancestry and their progeny, and then delete that.

And then there are times I walk away and it simmers and sits with me for long enough that I write a general status update about it, or a blog post about it, and deal with it that way. 

Last week was one of those. I had three different people in the span of a day and a half use a phrase (or similar phrases) that drive me nuts. I ignored it from the first one. I know they meant no harm and at some point in time we could talk about it in a different way. Then the second hit and that person is one that cannot be reasoned with so I just left it alone as well. Then the third hit and I hit my breaking point and posted a status. 

Now the interesting thing is that once I did the broad shot post the first person who I saw it from actually commented on the post. Looking for "how should I have said this?" The other two? Nothing. Which could mean that they didn't see it, because Facebook. Or it could mean that they don't agree with my point of view and believe I can't be bothered with. Or it could mean that they posted a long rant with a lot of swear words and then deleted it. 

But it made me wonder. Did I add anything positive to the world or did I just make it bad for the one person who I knew I meant no harm? Did I just add stress to an already stressed out place? Or did I do some good by reminding people to watch their words. To think about what they are saying. And frankly, to get it out of my head so I didn't see the fourth time it was posted and unload on whoever that might have been. 

Because that happens as well.

We all reach our NOT THIS FUCKING THING AGAIN point. Where someone gets the full blast of our frustration who didn't really deserve it. They were just the last drop of water that broke the dam. I'm trying really hard not to do that, but it's hard. And sometimes I still do it. Sometimes I send a text to a friend with the can you believe this fucking thing is here again? and move on that way.

But it's always a balancing act right?

Are we adding worthwhile things to the world or are we just making it worse? 

Are we asking actual questions to learn something or stirring shit? 

What am I? Am I good news or am I just ugly noise?

I'm trying to be as much of a break to you all as I have been taking for myself. More jokes, fewer issues. But...

Just like I am still getting the top stories and sometimes a little more than that, I am still me. And it's not always just sunshine and rainbows. Sometimes it's NOT THIS FUCKING THING AGAIN. 

And that's okay. 

It has to be. 

I'm still me. 

The Idea of It...

As you all know I dropped watching most news in June. Dropped news programs and political figures from my Facebook feed as well. And I didn't pick them back up in July. And I don't think I'll pick them back up in August either. 

I really miss the idea of it.

But I don't miss it.

I like being well informed. It's actually really important to me. I want to understand issues and why I should or should not believe certain things. But the news doesn't really help there. They are all about ratings and market share and eyeballs and advertising revenue and the way to get that is to inflame emotions not to appeal to rationality. It used to be that there was less of that. But it works, so the sources that weren't giving you your opinion instead of just flat facts did not get the views and the numbers that the emotional driven shows and print pieces were getting. 

What sells is what gets produced. Even where news is concerned.

I don't want that sort of infotainment. 

I'm still keeping half an eye on Jessica Yellin and her News not Noise feed. I feel like she's giving me a lot of good topline information. And I read Heather Cox Richardson daily to see the historical echoes of current activities. Though I am amused by the comments section on HCR's posts. Almost daily there is someone who posts about how much they appreciate that she gives the facts without being biased. Then someone else comes in to blast them about that saying that she's completely biased, there are no facts! And the argument is on!

Which is stupid. She's both. She gives facts, she gives history, she gives nothing that isn't true. And she also is biased and has a point of view she is supporting and often editorializes with her own opinion. All of us do this. All of us have bias. The thing that we as a society have gotten away from is that you don't have to be unbiased to be factual. You don't have to lack an opinion to talk about facts. Just because I don't agree with you doesn't mean you aren't telling the truth. But we've gotten to the point that we think "I wish that wasn't true" or "I really don't like this" are the same as "FAKE NEWS!" They're not. 

I am a hard core liberal. I believe in certain things. I want certain things for our country. That's my bias. But when I say that Joe Biden is president, that's a fact, even though he's a democrat so he aligns with some of my biases, it's still a verifiable fact. I know that there is a certain percentage of our population that doesn't agree with that. That's their bias. BUT...it doesn't make it untrue. 

This disregard of facts has been coming for a long time. There has been a concerted effort by certain groups to turn us into science deniers so they can continue to operate unfettered by regulations. And once you start to deny science in one area you are much more likely to deny it in others. So now we have a large group of people who aren't getting the vaccine. And won't wear masks. And believe that the whole Corona Virus thing is not a big deal, even though we've lost hundreds of thousands of people in our country alone and millions world wide. But, yeah...

And the news doesn't help fix those issues. They will put on people who espouse those views as if they should get equal representation. And you get people arguing that they should get all the facts and be able to make up their own minds and how dare anybody say what is and what isn't a fact, they can figure that out for themselves. And, well, they can't. They don't know the difference between anecdotal evidence and peer reviewed double blind studies. They don't understand statistics and that 90% chance of something means 10% chance of not that thing. But that 10% is MUCH less than 90% so... They believe in their feelings very strongly and disregard any fact that might contradict those feelings. And then claim that their feelings are facts and they are just as right as everyone else. 

The news likes to blast click bait headlines but the problem is people have stopped clicking. The bait is all they see. And they form their whole position based on the sensational bullshit headline you put out there. And will tell you that the Washington Post said...blah blah blah...and it's because they only saw a headline. That was a bullshit headline and didn't actually agree with the article, but hey, the Post got a few more eyeballs that day.

Then you get talking heads who are "just asking questions" because "just stirring the shit" doesn't sound as good. And they know that using weasel words keeps them out of litigation (or in Fucker's case lets his lawyers make the argument that nobody would actually take him seriously) but his and other talking head's audiences do take them seriously. They think those questions are statements of fact. They entrench around bad faith arguments and when you try to give them facts they tell you that your facts are not facts and only what THEY want you to believe.

And then, heaven forfend, when a new discovery is made that changes old recommendations it's used as "proof" that they were right and the whole scientific community was wrong. Well...no. That's how science works. It keeps investigating and discovering and changing. That's part of the process. When you get new information sometimes that changes what you thought the conclusion was. It's actually how you know things are working.

And I totally get it, there are things we all thought we knew as a fact that were actually lies and distortions told to us to get us to believe certain things, or buy certain things, or act certain ways and so we are all primed to not believe things we don't want to. Which is where having a solid news organization would come in handy. 

One that only reported the facts and left it up to you how to feel about those facts. 

But we don't have that. 

I don't miss watching the news and reading the news. 

But I do miss the idea of it. 

Remembering...

I've forgotten her name. 

I remember how I felt the first time I heard it. I remember the times I couldn't get it out of my head. 

I remember reading the words on the paper. Hearing his voice in my head as I read. The words he said to her. The feelings he had for her. 

But...

I've forgotten her name. 

I remember jealously guarding the phone when it would ring. Watching the caller ID. I remember hating being the type of person who jealously guards the phone watching the caller ID.

I remember counting the minutes on the clock when he was late coming home from work. Wondering if it was a meeting or her keeping him out. Was he on his way home or parked down the street clutching a cell phone to his ear? I remember the seconds ticking so slowly. 

But...

I've forgotten her name. 

I remember the times she was in my house. In my car. In my bed. Sitting between us on the couch in the counselors office. Not physically there, but taking up so much space. 

I remember wondering what she was like. What did she have that I didn't? Was she prettier? Thinner? Younger? I remember looking in the mirror wondering what she saw in hers.

But...

I've forgotten her name. 

I remember being angry with her for taking what didn't belong to her. Not him, he wasn't taken, he left. Me. I remember losing me for so long. I wasn't prepared. It wasn't fair. 

I remember me. The me I was the day before I first heard her name and the me I became the day after. Clock watching. Caller ID checking. Mirror watching. I remember being a stranger to myself.

But...

I've forgotten her name. 

I remember when I left. When I packed what was left of me and left. I remember carrying her with me when I went. Still. She haunted my dreams. 

I remember the day I didn't think about her. Then the week. Then the months. I remember the day I met you. 

And you helped me to forget her name.

Breasts So Nice...

 ...they had to look at them twice.

I hadn't even made it home yet. Now, granted I had a few errands to run after my mammogram, but I hadn't even made it home yet when the phone call came. I was walking down an aisle in QFC and saw the caller ID. My first thought was that I left something in the dressing room. But I was looking at my phone, I was wearing my mask and clearly the car key was in my pocket or I wouldn't have been able to leave. My phone is also my wallet so I did a quick check of the pocket to make sure my driver's license and credit cards were there. Yep. So I wasn't sure what to expect when I answered the phone. 

Which looking back is really kind of dumb. I mean, what else could it be if they are calling you after you leave your mammogram? 

"This is Rachel and I just did your mammogram here at Epic Imaging. The radiologist has reviewed the scan and there is an area of concern in your outer right breast that they would like to look at further. I need you to call and schedule an appointment for an ultrasound as soon as you can...."

"I'm actually still out running errands right now and don't have a pen to write down the number. Can I have you call back and leave it on my voice mail?" Remarkably still voice. No trace of panic. Or even emotion at all. 

"Um...yeah, sure, absolutely. Do you have any questions for me?" Concerned voice from her. Which wasn't helpful right then, at least for me. 

"Not right now, none that I can think of." How would I have questions except for how are you telling me this in the middle of grocery store, which was completely my fault not hers. She didn't know where I would be when she called.

And then the mantra of "don't freak out" started in my head. It was joined by the very rational voice saying, "You don't have any of the BRCA genes. You don't have a family history of breast cancer. You lead a fairly healthy lifestyle. You've been told you have dense breasts in other mammograms." And those two things, the don't freak out, and the list of reasons why I shouldn't freak out repeated on loop as I finished my shopping. 

And proceeded to have a mini freak out.

I got home and got the ultrasound scheduled. Two days out. Not bad at all. I had to laugh because I had doctors appointments every day last week except Friday. Until then. Now it was every day. When I told Brent he was very nonplussed. "Probably a bad picture." 

"No, they said there's something wrong."

"I think that would be a mistaken word."

"She said there was an area of concern. There is something there. It's not a bad image."

"Still. We don't have enough information just yet to worry at all. In fact everything we know says we shouldn't."

He then began to list all of the things I had been listing in my head for an hour. 

Which was accurate. But still...

Don't tell me not to freak out. I know I shouldn't freak out. But I am going to freak out because I'm a woman and breast cancer is one of our big scary demons. We've been taught for years to do our self exams. We go in for mammograms and get our boobs smashed and screened. We've almost all had a friend, or multiple friends who have had it. Some who've gotten better, and some who haven't. Even knowing that it was probably nothing I was still going to freak out a little. 

He didn't bat an eye that I didn't want to cook even though I had just been to the grocery store. 

Friday.

It was actually my third appointment at Epic in a week. Last Friday I had my hands x-rayed. Wednesday I had my mammogram. Back yesterday for an ultrasound. Just checking out all of their services. The receptionist was apologetic that I had to fill out the paperwork and answer the Covid questionnaire again. 

So here is something funny, when you are getting the ultrasound you can tell exactly where the "area of concern" is. As she ran the wand over my breast it was glide, glide, glide...back up...gliiiiiiiddde...stop...type type type type type....glide, glide, glide.... Okay, so I know where you're looking. But what do you see?

"Here's a towel, you can wipe off the gel. Please don't change out of the gown incase I need to take another image. I'm going to go see the radiologist and they will tell me what to tell you before you leave."

Okay...I'll wait.

But what a weird thing to say. They will tell me what to tell you. Is that a blame shifting move? Or a responsible party move? Or a word from on high thing? I don't know. But tell me what to tell you just seemed really odd to me. 

Of course while I waited I looked around. The image wasn't still on the screen which was a bummer. But apparently my breast is #1 so I've got that going for me.

I opened my Kindle app and read while I waited. 

And waited. 

And waited. 

Right about now I was starting to do deep breathing, relaxing exercises. Because the longer it was going to take the deeper they were looking at the image. The deeper they had to look at the image the worse it was. Right? I mean that has to be it. If not she would have been back by now. Stop freaking out. You don't have any of the BRCA genes. You don't have a family history. You live a fairly healthy lifestyle. You do your exams and haven't felt anything concerning. You have dense breasts so they are just really making sure. No worries. Just read your book and wait.

And so I waited.

And waited.

And waited.

Finally, *knock, knock* 

"I am so sorry that took so long. Both radiologists were tied up with biopsies so I had to wait for one to be free. It took much longer than I had anticipated. I am so sorry."

"It's okay. Everyone is doing what they need to do." What else am I going to say? Of course a biopsy takes precedence. That's the well the ultrasound is bad next step. If I have to have a biopsy I want to be the #1 priority during that time. Don't freak out. Don't freak out. 

"It's a benign cyst. Totally normal. Really common. Nothing to worry about. Almost zero chance of it ever turning cancerous. If it starts to give you any issues, or you feel any pain, let Dr. McCormack know and we can talk about draining it. Otherwise we will see you next year for your scan. Totally benign."

And then she left. 

Nothing to freak out about at all. 

*deep breath*

I have to say that I am really impressed with how quickly they let me know I needed to come back in. If there had been something there they wasted zero time in getting me on a path to taking care of the issue. That's important. 

Get your scans. 
Get your tests.

Even if you know you have nothing to worry about. 

Doctor, Doctor...

I made a quick gratitude post last night for a doctor that actually listens to me. Then I thought, why is that something to be really grateful for? Because I am really grateful for that. But shouldn't that be such a normal thing that we don't even notice it? 

It's not.

Not at all.

I've been really lucky to have had two doctors in a row that are good at listening to what I'm saying and not dismissing me out of hand and I still have to brace myself before I go to the doctor and tell them when something is wrong. 

Because I'm pretty sure I am going to get told there's nothing here. 

Or it's just part of getting older.

Or lose some weight. 

Now, I will admit that even with doctors that listen sometimes the answer I've gotten is you're just getting older and you should lose some weight. It was pretty much a standing joke between Brent and I that Dr. Kwon was going to give me a clean bill of health at my annual and also tell me to lose weight. "Take calcium, vitamin D and lose some weight" was pretty much etched on my chart. Sometimes I lost some weight, sometimes I didn't. I was never going to be as petite as she was and I think that was part of the disconnect there, but she never really made me feel badly (I mean, I always have weight issues) she just would let me know that as I aged weight would be harder to get rid of so I should do it now. Or Now. Or NOW. I didn't. And she was right, it's harder to get rid of and you get more added to it. 

And now there are things that are just age related. Or menopause specifically related. I'm not getting hot flashes for some mystery reason. My skin isn't drying out because I'm not hydrated. My midsection isn't getting thicker because I have an alien growing in my belly. It's because my hormones are totally out of whack as I go through peri and menopause. Though the first year I talked about it Dr. McCormack did run a thyroid test just to make sure that we weren't ignoring something else. Because thyroid issues become more common as you get older as well. So sometimes the answer is you're getting old. 

I had decided last year to get some chronic things looked at again. That it's pretty ridiculous that I've just accepted the first diagnosis on my toe from seven years ago without seeing if there was something else I could do. And the fact that I've dealt with Achilles issues for around 25 years is insane. But I have a high pain threshold and a real problem with being told to suck it up. So I just suck it up on my own. 

Which is insane.

But then Covid hit and the thought of seeing a whole new raft of doctors was not on my hit parade so I didn't say anything at my last physical. 

Then the massive joint pain hit this year. And the food made it better. And that blew my mind. But I still have joint pain. It's just not as much. It's not limiting me anymore. But it's still there. And when the weather was going crazy my joints went crazy. Which did make me feel super old, not going to lie. But clearly there is still something there. 

So I took a deep breath and told my doctor about my elimination diet and how that helped, and what my chronic foot issues were and could we see about doing something there? And she listened. She asked a few questions. She took a ton of notes. She mildly chastised me for not bringing up the issues with my feet before (they both were things I brought with me to her practice, not things that cropped up after I started seeing her) then she did a blood test for Rheumatoid Arthritis, another Thyroid test just incase, ordered a set of x-rays for my hands to see if there is any joint damage and got me a referral to a podiatrist. 

We may not figure out what is going on. Or we may end up landing on you're old. But at least she listened. She took me seriously. She worked toward finding me some answers. 

I'm lucky. 

Not all doctors are like that. 

When we lived in Colorado Springs I saw our primary care doctor ONCE and it wasn't a great visit. His attitude was basically that I was lucky he was making time for me in his day and in his practice. And from that point on I saw the Nurse Practitioner. Which was great, she was wonderful and was the one who figured out how to cure my vertigo, so screw the great and powerful OZ, I'll deal with the woman in front of the curtain, thank you very much. 

I have friends with serious chronic health issues that cannot get doctors to take them seriously. Friends from all over the country so it's not a regional thing. Friends across a wide age spectrum so it's not an age thing. But all female friends so...

Women's health has been discounted for years. Medical testing and drug trials haven't always been done on women so we know that something is safe for men but how does it react to estrogen? How does it work with a different body shape? 

We also have a lot of men in the medical field who have that attitude (and I think it's partly taught in school) that women are looking for attention when they go to the doctor, not actually help. I had a medical corpsman in the Navy ask me if I was feeling unwell because Brent was out to sea. Umm...no, asshole, I'm pretty sure I'm feeling unwell because I have strep, now run the damn throat culture.

So yes, I feel gratitude that I have a doctor that listens. That takes my issues seriously. That is going to work with me to figure out what's going on. And if the answer is "I don't know" or "You're old" then at least I know we got there honestly. 

It's important to have a doctor who listens. It's important to be able to rely on the medical advice you are given. I trust my doctor. But part of why I trust her is because she doesn't discount me.

That's what I'm grateful for. 

Seriously...

So one of my focuses for July was to write more and as it's the 14th and this is my 5th blog you can see how that's going. Brent's been out of town for four days and it would have been just the perfect time to sit down and crank out a ton of words because there was nobody else in the office that I would be bugging or would be bugging me but...

Honestly sometimes I don't even know what to do with myself. 

Brains are such weird things. 

We do it to ourselves all the time. Only want to shop when we don't have the extra money or nothing is the right size. Make huge future plans for ourselves only to think "nah" when the times comes to do them. The disconnect between planning Denise and daily life Denise is so vast I don't think they even know each other!

I know what part of my problem is. I'm working on something that isn't going to go up on the blog, at least for now, and I'm at a point where the next part I want to write, I also don't want to write. So it's jamming up the works. I need to just sit down and crank it (and the three sections after that that are waiting) out and free up the flow. But again, planning Denise knows that is what needs done, daily life Denise is like...yeah...but maybe not today. 

What else was I going to do while Brent was gone?

A lot of cleaning. The house is clean but it's not CLEAN you know? I was going to do a lot of the noisier cleaning things that I can't really do while he's working and I don't want to do on the weekend when he isn't. So those were going to get done...but you know...it's a hassle. And the cats are in the way. And really, with the cats things are only going to look clean for about a minute anyway before there are cat prints on everything and tumble weeds of cat fur rolling past so...

I mean, what is it with the cat fur? I know George shed. I can remember finding black cat hair in the fridge and freezer and thinking what the actual fuck, dude? But I swear with these two it's a constant losing battle. I run the sweeper almost daily and I still cannot even come close to keeping up. There is a fine layer of cat hair on EVERYTHING. Maybe it's just the switching to wood floors instead of having carpet like we had with our other cats but it seems like there is just so much more cat fur!

And add to all of that the cats have been super pains in the butt while he's been gone. They are needy and whiney. When Tig is upset he gets into and onto everything. Climbs the fridge to the top of the cabinets, which he then needs to be gotten down from, which is a whole production considering even standing on our countertops I can barely reach him up there...

It amuses him. And gets him all of the attention. 

Tux waits until night time. Then he wants attention. And apparently he wants it from both of us because he gets some petting from me then mrrowows his way all over the house looking for Brent. It would be sweet if it weren't 2 AM. 

And I really do need to do some major closet and pantry sorting and I thought it might be a good time to do that. But what I really need is a time where Brent is home and the cats are travelling...They are not as good at helping sort things as they think they are. 

But all isn't lost I did finish a couple of books I was working through. And I finished a season of Ink Master that I have been in the middle of for about 4 years. Our cable package changed one year at about episode 5 and we lost the channel it was on. Paramount+ is streaming it now so I went back and picked it up. I should have let it be. I am not happy with who they chose for part of the winning team. It was wrong. Like objectively and clearly wrong. Art is subjective, but blown out lines in a tattoo are forever and....

Brent comes home tonight, or tomorrow considering I just got a text from him that his flight has been delayed so it will probably be after midnight by the time he gets here. But he's home tomorrow. So today is the last day to crank through EVERYTHING I was going to do over 5 days. Which...well...

At least it motivated me to sit down and write something. 

History...

This blog will be the 98th blog of the year. Which means at the beginning of July I am past the number written all year on my worst five years. Now, to be fair, the first three probably shouldn't count. I hadn't really committed much to this space. I was doing a lot of other things as well. I hadn't really started to look at this as someplace I should spend time, I should commit to, I should post frequently on. So if I drop those three out and look, I'm still better than my worst two years. And, okay, one of those two years I was pretty damn depressed and teetering on the edge of losing my shit completely but still... If you take that year out I've passed my worst posting year.

So no matter what happens with the rest of 2021 I know it won't be the worst I've ever done. So I've got that going for me...

It's interesting to me to have all of these blogs at my finger tips. It's my own history at a glance. And because I refuse to give them titles that might actually help me sort them I am always surprised when I dip in to a past blog to see what I was writing about that day. Oh look! It's an existential crisis about what I'm doing with my life blog! Those are always fun!

But it is nice to see where I've been consistent and where I've shifted my beliefs. Sometimes there is even a blog about that shift. A thing that happened. A piece of knowledge gained. Meeting someone who completely shifted my thoughts about a situation. All of those things can change my opinions. Can shift my beliefs. And I generally write about them when it happens. 

I tend to circle around a lot of the same ideas. I've even written about the fact that I have all of this information before. Things that are important to me get multiple showings over the years. You can tell a lot about who I am and what I care about by reading these pages. 

Which is the point, isn't it?

We all want to be seen. To be understood. Sometimes it's just as simple as understanding that some people want to be left the fuck alone, but that's still seeing and understanding. 

I use my blog for that. Not the leave me the fuck alone part. I use my side eye for that... For the see me, understand me part I spend time writing out paragraphs of why I believe what I believe. But even with writing out paragraphs and paragraphs there are times when I get a comment from someone who has clearly missed the point. Or who has gotten hung up on one or two words and then spun a whole different narrative around those words. Who clearly wants to have an argument with someone else but since I'm here I'll do. 

Those are the most frustrating times. Because it shows that clearly I have not been seen. I have not been understood. I might as well have not written at all. 

And that's how you get years like 2013 and a paucity of blogs. 

But this year, after this blog, I'm at 98. 

See me. 

Waiting...

She wheeled the grocery cart toward the car. The one wonky wheel that spun in circles without ever seeming to touch the ground had been a minor annoyance in the grocery store but now it was proving to be practically a safety hazard as she had to manhandle the cart in the direction she needed it to go.

Manhandle. 

It's an interesting word really. Forcing something to do what it doesn't naturally want to do. She wondered what the womanhandle equivalent would be. Was there one? Using your feminine wiles to manipulate someone she guessed. Why was it that women had wiles and had to manipulate while men just forcefully handled things? Then she thought of the word mangled. Manhandled to mangled. She'd have to look them up later to see if they came from the same root.

The discourse in her head, along with the hyperfocus on getting the cart to go in the direction she needed it to kept her from looking at her car, really looking at it until she was at the trunk ready to load in her groceries. 

She startled. Then moved a little to see if it was a trick of the light. It wasn't. There was someone sitting in the passenger's seat. The silhouette of their head clearly visible. Her heart started to pound. She reached toward her back pocket for her phone. Should she abandon her cart and run toward the store as well? Probably. But dammit it had taken so much effort to get it out here. Not to mention how much she hated shopping in the first place.

But clearly that was the smart thing to do. Leave the cart. Head back to the store. Call 911. Let someone else handle it. Manhandle it. Mangle it. 

A drop of sweat made its way down her cheek. She felt every fraction of a centimeter that it moved. A light tickle really. Interesting that sometimes you could feel your own sweat and sometimes you couldn't. Like she wasn't aware she was sweating until the drop started to move. But to form a drop it takes a lot of sweat. And now that she was aware of that one drop she could feel the dampness everywhere. Sweating from the effort of manhandling that cart. Sweat from the fear of someone in her car. 

Fear.

Was she afraid? Or was she pissed off. How fucking dare someone break into her car and just sit there. Waiting for her. Because that had to be it right? If they had broken in to steal it they would be on the driver's side trying to hotwire her ignition. If they had broken in just to steal things from the car they would be rifling the glove box and center console not just sitting there. Waiting. 

No, she wasn't afraid. Or not just afraid. She was pissed. Definitely pissed. And sweaty. 

And she had a cart full of groceries that didn't just appear. She had to make a meal plan, make a grocery list, go to the store, expertly steer a broken cart around to collect everything and then force it through the parking lot that honestly could they repave it? Sure it's just a parking lot, but do they really think a string of cracked asphalt holding together 20 pot holes was the best idea? Why were grocery store parking lots always so bad? Maybe because they were always open so there was not time repave. Or maybe because it was mostly women still who did the shopping and women didn't complain about such things. They might apologize to the store manager, "I'm sorry, the giant pothole out there seems to have wrecked the suspension in my car and flattened two of my tires, I know it's probably not your fault but could you possibly put in a notice to whoever is in charge? Thank you so much."

She was still holding her phone in her hand. She hadn't even started to dial 911. Calling 911 was not in her DNA. She hadn't grown up in a neighborhood that automatically called the police for problems. Most things were handled on their own. 

Manhandled.

Mangled.

But it's not like the police always did a better job. Now you weighed the problem. Is there a chance the person you are calling about could end up dead. The answer to that question seems to always be yes, there is a chance. Is what they are doing worth their life? Generally the answer to that is no. But...they were sitting in her car waiting for her. That can't be good. Who breaks into a car and waits for the driver for good reasons?

Just to chat reasons.

Surely they had noticed her standing there by now. They could see her in the rear view mirror or the side mirror if they looked. But they hadn't turned their head. Hadn't bothered to make eye contact. Or maybe they were like her daughter was when she was little. When she thought if she held really still she was hidden. As long as she didn't move nobody could see her. Whoever was sitting there could think she hadn't noticed them yet and as long as they held still she would just get in the car without ever seeing them. Unguarded. At ease. Vulnerable.

She felt something hit her shoe. Plop. Fuck. Her ice cream was melting. Had melted really. Drip. Drip. Drip. Mint chocolate chip. She had been looking forward to it all day. Her treat for going to the store. For planning and shopping and dealing. She had been going to have a scoop of mint chocolate chip ice cream for dessert. Just one. Nothing too big. As all the articles said, just a spoonful was enough to stop a craving. Eat like the French. Just one bite. Maintain that figure at all costs! That's what she told herself. Really she was planning on taking the whole pint in to the bathroom and eating it while she soaked in a tub full of bubbles. Well maybe not planning, but experience said that is what was going to happen. Subconscious plans?

Now it was melted. Dripping on her shoe. She was never going to be able to get out the stickiness. Her ice cream was gone. Her shoes were ruined. What else was quickly going bad in her grocery cart out here in the heat while she stared at the back of a head that wasn't supposed to be there? Thinking about the ruined groceries. The planning that had all been wasted. The fact that she was still going to need to come up with dinner in a few hours. And breakfast tomorrow. And lunches that would need packed. And dinner again. And snacks. And another trip to the store and another wonky grocery cart and another round of off roading to get it to her car and...

Another bead of sweat coursed down her face. Dripping off her chin to join the ice cream at her feet. It was a mess. All of it was a mess. 

She tucked her phone back into her pocket and walked around to the passenger side door. 

Manhandle this, motherfucker....

Religious Thoughts...

This past month I've read two different queer centric stories where the person telling them was religious. And then it happened again today. I was watching a sort of Ted like talk with iFit and the trainer was giving his talk on acceptance (he's gay) and he was religious as well.

It's always startling to me when this happens. First off how prevalent religion still is in our society. It's not this way everywhere. My European friends, for instance, rarely if ever mention god or prayer or even church. It's just not part of the conversation. While here even among people you wouldn't think are religious they are asking for prayers, or hashtagging God is Good or Blessed, or any number of things that are just casual religion is part of their makeup things. 

But secondly one of the big things that started my leaving the church was the stance on homosexuality. I didn't and don't think they are right. I just couldn't reconcile the religious beliefs around it with what I knew to be true. So when I see people who grew up in the same sort of religion as I did, hearing the same messages but they are gay so it was very personal, completely directed AT them, and still came out religious I just have a hard time wrapping my brain around it. 

I guess that's just faith. Deep faith. That they believe so deeply in the foundations of the religion that they are willing to believe that it's just the interpretation of the teachings that got put down in to the bible are wrong. But how do you then sort out the wrong and the right? I mean, that's where I got tripped up. And I have even seen the scholarly articles on how homosexuality isn't actually what was being preached against. And I will trot those out in religious arguments but...

Once you see that you have been taught wrong in one area how do you trust that anything else is right?

And I get it. Being religious can be a huge comfort. It gives you something to lay your problems on. When it all gets too heavy you "give it up to god" and just let him handle it. Well, I can do that through meditation and understanding that I don't have control. I don't have to give it up to god, I just have to accept that I can't fix everything. But I guess that's the extra step that is more difficult. I don't get to say that god is fixing them, and I'm getting out of the way. I just have to deal with the fact that some things can't be fixed.

It also gives you someone who loves you unconditionally. Well sort of. I mean there are a lot of rules to that love. Which brings us back to the whole how are you gay and in the church? Because you are supposed to believe AT THE SAME TIME that god loves you unconditionally but he is going to let you burn in hell if you have sex with your same sex partner. So...you know...what? But again, they've reconciled that part. I just never could.

I don't get it. 

I don't really have anything deep or more to add, I just am puzzled by this and have had a lot of examples lately so it seems like something I'm supposed to be paying attention to. Or it could just be a coincidence. Or it could be, and I think this is it, people are scared right now and when people are scared they get more religious for comfort.

So as we are dealing with the pandemic, and climate change, and economic uncertainty, and what still looks like the brink of another possible Civil War people are looking for comfort. Or reason. Or some way to not feel the mounting pressure. I don't think it helps. Not in the long run. Not really. If you believe you have a better world waiting for you why bother to fix the one you are in right now, right? And if you believe or can be persuaded to believe that what you are doing is ordained by god? Well then you can be convinced to do pretty much anything. 

Everyone wants to be the hero of their own story and it's so much easier to believe you are the hero if you are sure god told you to do something. 

I'm just not there. I was at one point. But once you see the cracks in the foundation it's not a place you want to build your house.

July...

And June is done. 

As I left you all on the first of June I didn't really have any specific goals for June. Just working toward the end of year items. 

A week later I added another workout challenge to the normal monthly one. I hadn't really mentioned the monthly workout challenges because they aren't anything more than what I normally would do. I use the treadmill to get my cardio and iFit does these challenge series things where you do their package series "Beaches Around the World!" or "Best Christmas Markets!" and then when you are done they send you a magnet saying, YAY! You did it! So OF COURSE I have been down with doing them. They fit into what I normally do anyway and I get a gold star in the form of magnet? Hells yeah I'm doing it!

So anyway on top of their Summer Challenge one they had a Climb to Everett Base Camp one. It was 18 extra work outs and I didn't get the email about it until the second week of June so I wasn't going to, but...magnet. So I started it. Then I threw out my back and didn't work out at all for almost a week so there was no way I could finish it and the Summer Challenge, though technically the way they have the Summer Challenge structured although there are three sections for June, July and August as long as you finish all of them by August 30th you get credit and...

So yeah, I doubled up my cardio last week and got through both of them by the end of June. DOUBLE MAGNETS! 

But other than that I didn't really have specific June goals. Just working toward that end game. 

And so...

Yeah.

July Goals! 
Reading, Writing and Arithmetic!

I was 5 books behind in my reading at the end of May and I'm 6 behind now. I was 20 blogs ahead in my writing and I'm 16 ahead now. I needed to get three submissions in for the year and I still need to get three submissions in for the year. I wrote exactly one fiction piece for the month...

Which funny story...

That fiction piece actually was a story prompt for a contest. My friend Terri and my friend Justin both tagged me to get my attention on the post thinking it was right up my alley. I looked at the submission process and it's a sort of writing club you join and you post things and everyone who is part of it critiques you and...well...I'm not really up for facing group rejection right now so I passed on that part. BUT...even though my first reaction was that the prompt was really more Dana's style than mine I had a story forming in my head within an hour of reading the prompt so maybe my friends know me better than I know myself? *gasp* Long few sentences, sorry. 

So basically as you can see I need to focus on the reading and the writing or my math is not going to work by the end of the year. 

So this month there will be a bigger effort made to get my ass in here and write more. And when it's not in here writing it will be sitting someplace with a book. I mean, along with working out. (July's iFit challenge is Mountain Climbing. Seriously? I just hiked to Everett Base Camp and you want me to climb more? Fine. Whatever.) And I will keep working toward that last pound and a touch that I wanted to lose this year. (yes, I'm actually thisclose to that goal which is really exciting and frustrating because I've slowed to a crawl on the losing portion, it's still going down, but instead of a couple pounds a week I lost just over a pound last month and the month before, but it's down and that's what counts, and the fact that I was down 17.7 pounds at the end of May and down 18.8 at the end of June really amuses me)

And of course POD and DG will still be happening. Though I've gotten less worried about hitting those every day. Or at least hitting the public DG every day. I do a private listing at night before I sleep so I will always have some sort of daily practice, but I've been less focused on the public posts. Some of my gratitude isn't really the sharing kind and I try to stay away from too big of generalities for those so if there isn't something really specific I've been less worried about getting that post in. Might take the same bend toward POD. If I see something that grabs me for the prompt I'll do it, but if not...eh.  Maybe. 

And of course I still need to take care of the house and the cats and keep us fed BUT other than that...

Basically I want to catch up where I am behind in the reading and at least get to even ground. So breaking out The Sandman series I want to reread should help there. And really making sure I write. And trying really hard to get some fiction in there as well. AND finding some submission places that seem a little less ego slashing. I had considered just throwing in the towel and saying I was clearly not ready for submissions this year, but I've got 6 months left in the year so giving up right now seems a little premature. 

The year is halfway over. I need to get my groove on. 

OH! And the last July goal to work toward. My new hashtag. 

#50IsNifty worked great
#51derful that became #51DamnThingAfterAnother was accurate after the change
#52PickUp has actually been kind of on the nose what with the weight loss and the diet experiment bringing some much needed relief. We will see what my blood work looks like here soon. 

But 53 has me stumped. #53CardMonte...find the Queen? #53TimesTheCharm, just don't know what I'm doing in 3s. #53NothingGoesWithThree?

Hmmm....Maybe I'll take that whole last paragraph and post it as a status and see what people suggest. 

#53FaceMcThreeFace here we come...