This Is Where It Always Gets Me...

In the past few weeks:

I've grieved with a friend over the loss of her father. 

I've celebrated getting the bank loan for a house and dream property for horses and chickens and a dog and maybe even a cat (maybe, let's not get too crazy) with another. 

I've marked the passage of time from what seemed like devastating, soul wrecking news, to look at you now with another.

I've watched a friend shatter a glittery glass ceiling and become the first cis woman to do what she did. 

I've grieved with others over passage of bills in their states that are trying to outlaw themselves, or their children. And talked with them about the real possibility of what moving looks like. 

I've watched a friend open the taps on her creative output and realize that a degree in art wasn't needed to do what she wants to do. 

I've seen birthday celebrations and anniversaries and children's birthday parties and play openings and closings and date nights and quiet moments marking the passing of summer or the start of Spring.

I've gotten better about ignoring the strangers and even those that I know. 

It is always those things that keep me hanging on to my online life. 

I've talked about it before, Brent dropped Facebook completely a few years ago. It wasn't good for him. It made him mad more than it did anything else. He misses the interactions with a few friends, but not enough for the pain of seeing so much negativity and nastiness. 

Katie stopped following a lot of news feeds a few months ago because it wasn't good for her. With the slew of hate filled legislation that is specifically targeted at trans people and the horrific things people say about them it was just wearing her out on a deep level.  

Those both make me really sad. Not that they did what they needed to keep themselves healthy and happy, that is a good thing, but that the only way to make it through the world with your soul intact seems to be to shut out a majority of it. 

How awful is that? 

I want to hold the idea of loving everyone in my heart but some people make that impossible. 

I want to hold the idea that most people are good and decent in my heart but more people need to speak up against the shit going on in the world for me to believe that. 

I think about walking away, to see if it would make me feel better, then I see all of the things I would miss and just tighten my circle a little more. Hide this feed, block this person, don't show me these things... We worried a few years ago about us all living in our own bubbles and that being detrimental, but if your bubble is full of fart smell I don't want it near my bubble. 

And a lot of bubbles out there are just sewer gas floating around...

The good still outweighs the bad for me, but only because I've been actively avoiding the bad. I've been tightening my circle. I've been cultivating my garden. I've been curating my feeds. I've been blocking the bullshit. I'm not sure if it's a good thing to do that, and of course I can't do it completely. I need to watch the anti trans movement, it's important to know where that is. I need to watch the entire anti LGBTQIA+ sentiment in fact. I need to know who is running for office places and what they are running on. I need to be able to make solid arguments for what I believe and why and part of that is seeing what other people believe and see if it's got a basis in fact or if it's all just hooey. 

I have to find that balance, but I don't want it to tip too far over to just a constant bombardment of "that's not what that means, that's not what any of that means!" railing against people who only read headlines or opinion pieces. But right now what I need is a tighter circle of people who I trust to be decent. 

And so many in my circle are. It's what keeps me hanging out in those spaces. You. You are all my people and I love you all and you make me think the world is a good place full of decent people. So thank you for that. 

Watch your own bubbles. Don't let the farts in.