Time To Go...

Everyone has embarrassing coming of age stories. Starting your period when you weren't expecting to and bleeding through your outfit. Having a random erection right as you needed to stand up and walk to the chalk board. Having your voice crack in the middle of presentation. A giant zit blooming on the tip of your nose just in time for class pictures. 

She had a few of those and also the bonus stories that only other necromancers understood.

Hers were, luckily, much tamer than some of her cousins' stories. She got the spirit portion instead of the physical portion. No dead pets sitting at her bedside after digging themselves out of the back yard grave. That was how her mother started. It's actually so common that she wondered why any necromancy family would have a pet. 

But it was typical for necromancy powers to come to full bloom during puberty. The surge of hormones seemed to flip the switch from, well, dead to Dead. 

Her first few encounters were with older spirits. Ones who had made their peace with staying in this realm for a little, or a lot longer. They were the ones who enjoyed watching humanity pass through the ages. The ones who didn't feel a need to see what was the next life as they liked it where they were. And they really liked to chat. Among her normie friends she was the only one to start having invisible friends at age 13 instead of 5. 

And she really didn't count it as cheating when they helped her on her history exams, just for the record. 

She was grateful for those easy encounters and their stories when she had her first traumatic experience. Not traumatic for her, though some of them were, but meeting up with the spirit of someone who died traumatically and suddenly and hadn't really been prepared. Sometimes a sudden death is met with quick understanding, sometimes it's met with just terrified confusion. 

She was 16 and at a slumber party. They were telling ghost stories and trying to scare each other when she saw him. The 19 year old brother of her host. Who was away at college so couldn't possibly be standing in the hallway. He was standing with his back to them, not moving. She got up mumbling something about using the restroom and went to talk to him. As she approached he turned toward her and she could see the damage. His face was a bloody mess. Part of his scalp had be severed and was hanging loosely over the opposite ear. He was staring at his hands which were covered in blood as well. His or someone else's she couldn't tell. 

"Who are you? Why are you here?"

"I'm Sherri. I'm a friend of your sister's and there's a slumber party happening. Can you tell me what happened?"

He blinked slowly. Blood flicking off his eyelashes as he did. She tried not to flinch away.

"I don't know. I mean, the last thing I remember was Pete and I were headed to the movies. I... PETE? WHERE'S PETE?"

She reached out and put a hand on his arm. Or technically she reached out and put a hand where his arm appeared to be. There was nothing physical there to touch. Just an image she could see, and an energy he could feel. "Pete isn't here with you. I don't know where he is."

"We were in the car. We were...oh god...the light. The truck wasn't going to stop. We could see him coming but it was too late. He wasn't stopping...he..."

"He hit you."

"I don't remember. I don't know. I didn't feel it. But, look at me. And how did I get here? I couldn't have driven here. Or flown like this, they wouldn't have let me on a plane like this right?"

"I'm sorry. I really am sorry." She ran her hand up and down his arm. Sending as much soothing energy toward him as she could. 

His breathing slowed. The panic in his eyes started to recede. "I'm, I'm dead, right?"

"Yeah, you're dead." She didn't know how to put it more gently, or even if she should.

"So why am I here?" She watched as the wounds on his face healed. The blood on his hands started to disappear. He now looked almost exactly like the senior picture that was hanging on the wall behind him. His face a little more mature, but not much. 

"You didn't know where else to go. This place, this is home. You knew you'd be safe here."

"Now what? What's next?"

"That's up to you. You get to decide. Do you want to stay around here, watch your family, your friends? Do you want to travel this world and see anything? Or do you want to let go, move on, leave?"

"If I leave where do I go?"

"I don't know. I only know that some people leave and some people don't. But if you want to leave I can help. And if you decide to stay you can always find me later if you change your mind."

The phone started to ring. 

"I don't want to rush you but I have a feeling that phone call is going to mean the end of this slumber party so I'm going to be going home soon. You can find me there, or I'll be around here sometimes as well, checking on your sister."

"No. I mean, no, don't go yet. Do you have time to help me? Now? I mean, I don't want to stay. I want to go."

She took a deep breath and closed her eyes. She didn't need to close her eyes, but she didn't like watching when they left. "Okay, put your hands in mine, hold them tightly for a few seconds, and then just let go."

She felt him leave. It was like a breeze against her face. 

"Oh well done!"

"Graciella, I didn't know you were here."

"I was in the neighborhood and thought I'd pop in just incase you needed a little help. These cases can be a little different than the old souls you've helped in the past. Sometimes they get a little belligerent. Helps to have someone who really understands to talk them down if they get difficult."

"He wasn't difficult. Just confused."

"And you handled it all brilliantly."

The sounds of sobbing reached them. "Oh dear. I always hate this part. I'll see you around, sweetie. You did good, know that."

And with that Graciella was gone. 

She soon wished she could go too.

It was easier to help the dead stop living than to help the living deal with death. 

Staying...And Leaving...And Staying...

I'm sure my parents must have fought with each other. They were married for over 60 years, they raised a lot of kids, some of them more difficult than others. They both had tempers but different flavors. My mother was a quick short fuse. She would get mad, spark at you, then was over it. My father was a slow long burn. It took a lot to get him mad but once he was mad he didn't get over it quickly, if at all. 

They also came from very different backgrounds. When we were visiting my mother the year she died she told us a story about her mother reacting to someone basically calling my father's family white trash. Now they, by definition, probably were, but my grandmother was having none of it. "Marshall is a lovely boy, very responsible, I'm proud that Ruby is going to marry him." It made me think highly of my grandmother and gave me more of an insight into my dad as well. I knew he had been the responsible adult in his family from about the time he hit double digits, his dad was an alcoholic and my grandmother was a bit of a mess but in a totally different way. Dad worked and supported the other kids. My mother grew up on a working farm. Her oldest sister was the favorite child and was treated as such. She and my Aunt Dorothy talked about resenting it, but dealing with it. 

Different backgrounds so they had to have fought. At least at first. 

I came into their lives when they had already been together for 16 or 17 years. By the time I have very many memories at all of them as a couple it was at least 20 years into their marriage. They had figured some things out by then. But still...we were broke. Everyone worked a lot. All of the time. And, as I mentioned, some of us were challenging kids to raise. 

But I never saw them fight. Ever. 

So my assumption was that a good marriage was between people who never fought.

Yeah...well...

Brent and I got married at 18. I always said I had the worst of my parent's blend. I was a hot head with a short fuse who held a grudge. Brent's parents fought all the time. For fun. Arguing and being snarky to each other wasn't a bad thing, it was their way of communicating. They didn't take it personally. I was not used to this type of communication. At all. And for Brent his actual angry stance is leaving the room. He doesn't want to say something he can't take back. He doesn't want to ever cross that line, since it was crossed in his house growing up and he hated it. That didn't work for me. I wanted him to argue with me, hash it out and move on. It took us awhile to figure out how to balance it. 

It still is a challenge at times, not going to lie. But now I know that he's not giving me the silent treatment when he's angry (and to be clear it's not even angry at me, it's frustrated with the world and he doesn't want to take it out on me) he's not punishing me, he's protecting me in the best way he knows how. 

I know that now. 

But when we were first married it would just make me angrier. And then it would shut me down. I stopped telling him when things were upsetting me. I figured it was on me to figure it out. My parents never fought so clearly we should not fight. And because I knew this, it was up to me to swallow down anything that might lead to a fight and just deal with it. 

Which works really well. 

I mean, it doesn't. Not at all. 

There were two times in our marriage that I knew for a fact it was over and one more where I wasn't sure, but it didn't look good. Brent might have more or different times. But I have three.

And all three started from the same place and were due to not dealing with an issue but just pretending it would go away. In fact I could make a case for the second and third times being directly related to the first. Because I never, we never, dealt with the problem. You can do that with some things, and you can't do that with others. It's tricky sometimes to figure out which type of problem is which. 

The first time was about 8 years in to the marriage. Brent had just gotten out of the Navy. He hadn't found a job yet and we were living with my parents. I had gone back to work through a temp agency and we were at a company Christmas party. I wanted to dance and he wouldn't. I thought, "If someone asks me when I knew my marriage was over, this will be the moment." Sounds horrible right? That I would mark the end of my marriage because he wouldn't dance with me? It wasn't the dancing. It was that I felt like he didn't love me anymore. That he didn't want to spend time with me. That he resented me. He was so angry all the time and I just couldn't deal with it. 

Did I mention he had just gotten out of the Navy, hadn't found a job yet and we were living with my parents?

See, when we were planning on him leaving the Navy everyone was getting these great jobs with great pay. We could leave, I could still stay home with Katie and we would have more money and no more 6 month cruises. Then right before he got out the economy tanked. Bottomed out. Instead of a few weeks with his parents as we decided where to go, we ended up living with them for a month, then up to Albuquerque to live with my folks so I could get a job easier. The whole reason Brent joined the military was so he could support us. So we could get married and stay together. His parents had told him it was a mistake and he needed to go to college so he could have a real career. Now here we were, and Brent felt like a failure. He had no job, unemployment and detachment pay were going to run out, I was back at work, we were living with my parents. 

Looking back I can see this all really clearly. I can also see that there was absolutely nothing I could have done to make it better for him. I couldn't come sweeping in from the future and let him know that in a couple of weeks he was going to interview with Intel through their veterans hiring initiative and get a job that would lead to a "real career." That he wasn't anywhere close to being a failure. That his wife didn't view him as such even right then, she was just getting quieter and quieter because she wanted you to not be angry. 

But at the time? I was just hurt. I didn't understand why he was so angry. I mean, I obviously knew it was hard, but I grew up broke. I grew up in a family where everyone worked. Where if someone was laid off, someone else picked up an extra shift until things got better. It was fine. Brent viewed it as a time he wasn't holding up his end of the bargain and I just wanted him to see it was our burden not his. But since I couldn't talk to him about it, I just kept pushing those hurt feelings down until that moment when he wouldn't dance with me at a party and I thought, well that's it then. He doesn't even love me anymore. 

Then he got the job with Intel, things started to get better financially and that stress lifted. 

But we never talked about it. I never told him how much it had upset me to be shut out like that. I just squashed it and resented it. 

Fast forward a few years and he is working and going to school to get his bachelor's degree. It was hard. I worked full time, he worked full time and went to school. It was such a stressful time. Then finally we were at the end of it. A break! We got transferred to Colorado Springs which was less expensive than where we had been living in Oregon and I would be able to go to part time work and we could take a breath.

Then the house in Hillsboro didn't sell. I hated Colorado Springs. And Brent went back to school. Again. I can remember the phone call when he told me he wanted to get his Master's Degree. I told him I understood that it would help him at work but that I really needed at least a year breather before he did it. There was a long pause then he let me know he had already signed up for classes.

Now, again, looking back from where I am I can see it all pretty clearly. It was a program through work, just like his bachelor's degree had been. An opportunity to get an advanced degree without the college debt. A chance to further his career instead of stalling out at the level he was at. I was working part time so I had the space in my schedule to pick up the parenting slack, and honestly I was already handling most of that since he was working 70 hours a week or so. It was too good to pass up and I would clearly see that. 

I did not. 

I do now, but I did not at the time. I was furious. I was living in a city I hated, stressed about the expense we took on having the house in Hillsboro not sell for so long. Trying to shuffle Katie around to all of her extra curricular activities and doing it all by myself. The whole reason I didn't want to have kids until he got out of the Navy was that I didn't want to be a single parent and it felt like he was asking me to be a single parent. But, it was already done. So I swallowed it down and took care of things.

With a huge dose of resentment. 

And he was stressed during that stretch. I was clearly tense the whole time, he was working insane hours and going to school. Katie was having some adjustment issues (odds are she was picking up how tense I was and reflecting it through her own behavior). 

Then I told him I wanted a divorce. 

He was not expecting it. 

He had just gotten transferred back to Oregon. He was this close to finishing his degree. Life was finally going to relax again. And I wanted out. 

As soon as I asked I regretted it. 

I knew it was a mistake and that I didn't want to be without him. I just didn't want to be in the life we were currently living. It was too hard. I was too miserable. I wanted him, I just didn't want that. 

He took me back. But we didn't deal with the issue. We didn't talk about all of it. I took the blame since I was the one who asked for a divorce. I carried the guilt of shattering his trust that I would always be there. I made promises to change some things I was doing but took all of the fault. 

With a lot of resentment.

Oddly enough, that didn't work.

It took a few years for it all to blow up again, but it did blow up again. I have the worst blend of my parent's tempers; short fuse long grudge. I had never worked past the first round of hurt from ten years earlier, and now I was trying it ignore all of the shit I had piled on top of that. 

But that last time? When it really looked like we might not make it through? Because I had already left once, I knew if I left again it would be for good. And I knew that I didn't want to leave. Not really. I wanted to fix what was broken between us and stay. So we did something weird and talked about it. What we each needed from the other. What worked and what didn't. And then we did the work. The little and big things that are important to each of us. We know what works and what doesn't for the other one and we try to make sure we are doing the right combinations. 

Because even when things were bad, we still liked each other. We still had a good friendship. And when you are looking at losing your best friend as well as your spouse? Well you do what you can to not have that happen. And to do it without resentment.

That's the key. 

My parents never fought that I know of. So I never learned how to do it well. I just learned how to keep quiet and resent the fact that I wasn't getting what I needed. I don't recommend that. 

We still argue, not often, but it happens. He still leaves the room when he's mad. I still would rather hash it out and move on. But now we both know that there are some things you can just let slide, and some things you need to deal with.

And he's still my best friend. 

And I will always be grateful he took me back when I left. And I will always be grateful he did the work with me when I stayed.

Should I Stay or Should I Go?

New week, new theme! Staying and leaving. 

"We hold these truths to be self evident..."

Brent tuned in to NPR this morning to hear their annual reading of the Declaration of Independence. He really felt like it would be good to have a reminder. A connection. NPR did something different this year instead. They spoke with a descendent of Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson about the "all men are created equal" portion. What that meant at the time. How it has been used since then. 

It was an interesting listen and I recommend it. 

It's very strange to be contemplating leaving the United States on the Fourth of July, but here I am. 

We talked about it when Trump was elected. That maybe it was time to go. Who wants to live in a country that would elect someone like that? And who knew all of the damage he would be able to do in four years? We went as far as looking into what it would take to immigrate to Canada. Get a work Visa to move and be able to stay. 

Then we decided not to. We decided to stay. Why should we leave? It's our country. We should stay and continue to support those people and causes we believe in and vote to make the changes that are necessary and hold on. It's a Republic for as long as we can hold on to it. We decided to hold on to it a little tighter.

And now here we are five years later looking again at if we stay or if we go.

We've seen the damage that four years of Trump did. We had an attempted coup. We have an activist Christian Nationalist Supreme Court that for the very first time in our nation's history took rights away from a group of people. Not just denied rights, which the court has done in the past, but actually took something that was considered a settled right away. And they are signaling that they are not done yet. 

We are losing our country. It's being dug out from under us. 

Five years later, we are even more worried. And it's not abstract worry this time. Hundreds of anti-trans bills have been proposed and passed. Trans people are the big bad of the Republican party. They are bringing out all of their old greatest hits that they used against communism, people of color, gay people, and those scary liberals. They found a new target to focus their hate. And then added back in the old targeting of gay people and people of color, and people who believe it's wrong that in one of the richest countries in the world we have people who are starving while we have people with so much money they can pretend to be astronauts with real spaceships. 

So what do we do?

The debate is the same. Do we stay and continue to fight for what is right? Not right with a capital R but right as in morally right. Not the kind of morals dictated by misinterpretation of an old religious text, but the kind of morally right that you know is true because it's self evident. Self. Evident.

And trust me I know that even being able to contemplate leaving is a huge privilege.  

There are people who cannot leave. Who cannot even temporarily leave a conservative state for medical care let alone a country to live somewhere else. 

And because of those people it feels right to stay. To continue to fight. To continue to vote and donate and speak out. 

And we live on the West Coast in a liberal enclave so really how bad will it get?

The court is taking on a complete dismantling of our voting rights next term. Looking at handing over who wins and who loses not to any sort of popular vote, everyone gets to vote, system but to a small handful of people who can just declare a winner. So voting, which has always seemed like such a tenuous way to gain freedom is now even more limited. 

The court is taking away the separation of church and state. They are more and more using religion to dictate laws. 

The court is taking away any sort of regulatory powers. You know how your food and water is safe? Well...

The court is right now performing a coup. A take over. Minority majority rule. And Rule is the right word. There is no interest on the Right for voting by the majority, because the majority doesn't follow what they want. Rule by strength, punishment, a police force that cannot be held responsible for excessive force. This is where we are. This is where it gets bad. 

So how bad will it get where we live? 

How bad will it be for our daughter? 

Do we stay and fight or do we leave for safer enclaves? For ourselves and for a path for her?

It's a weird thing to be contemplating on July Fourth, but in a way it's completely appropriate. After all the Declaration of Independence doesn't start out with "We hold these truths to be self evident..." It starts:

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America, When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

It might be time to dissolve those political bands. 

Rotten to the Core...

Wrapping up the core theme for the week! And as promised I'm going to talk about why I identify more with the villains than I do the princesses. 

There are a few parts to it. First off as someone who thought for a few years that they wanted to act, villains always have the better parts. They get the better lines. They get the more dramatic scenes. They are just more entertaining. Check off one for the villain. 

On the flip side of that heroes tend to be boring. Or at least traditional tales of them are. Part of that is that we hold our good guys to rigid roles. First off, most of the time, good guys are guys. The heroes. If we do make a woman the hero we are being "edgy" or in today's parlance "woke." So male for the hero. I'm out. But also we force them to be perfect. If they have any failings at all we strike them from the hero book. Nuance isn't strong with the hero story. Not if you start there. 

You can be a villain and have a redemptive arc and become a hero. People love that shit. 

But if you are a hero most likely people are going to dig around until they find something awful about you so they can turn you into a villain. 

Watch the way the internet works. It's just this dynamic on fast forward. WE love you! Oh my gosh you're the greatest! (dig, dig, dig) OH MY GOD! IN THIRD GRADE HE RUBBED A BOOGER ON AN AMERICAN FLAG! BURN HIM!!! And done. 

But if you started out knowing that in third grade he was a booger rubber and now he's Captain America? What an arc! Even though it's the same fucking story. 

Villains get more leeway. Check another one off for the villain. 

Of course that only matters if you want to become the hero. I never have. I mean, I want to make sure I'm helping those that need help. People I went to high school with (when I was at my meanest and scariest) will tell you I was a pretty strong proponent for the underdog. If you were a bully you were in my sights. I have never been a believer that if you ignore a bully they will stop. All that happens if you are ignoring the bully is you get hit on your blind side. And I also don't think you should always stand up to the bully. Remember when I talked earlier about being hit in the face? Bullies will hit you in the face. If you aren't able to take that hit, and to hit them back, then you need to either walk away or find yourself a villain. 

Ta Da!

I'm also not nonviolent at all. A seemingly big requirement for heroes. If they are violent it's a last resort and causes them great concern. Hmm...well...I've talked about this before. I think there are people who could use a good ass kicking, or more.

I don't believe in the death penalty only because the State gets it wrong more times than it should. Zero being the correct number of times you should get that sentencing wrong. It also becomes State sanctioned premeditated murder. I'm not in favor of it. I don't think people who did not intend on ever killing someone should be tasked with the process. I think the weight that executioners have to bear is too much. Unless they enjoy it and then it's a different problem.

But not being in favor of the death penalty doesn't mean that I don't think some people should die. If there was a way to make sure it wasn't abused, some way to take the other side of the human toll out of the procedure, then I would say for sure we should have a death penalty. And I would expand who all it would pertain to. The recidivism on child molesters makes it very difficult for me to believe in rehabilitation in that instance so if we could know for sure who would reoffend and could not put the burden of their death on someone else then death penalty for sure.

But there isn't a way to do that so I say lock up certain people for the duration of their lives and call it a day. 

Check another one off for the villain. 

And as most of you know I have a particular affinity for Maleficent. I mean, how can you not like her? She's a gardener, she's an animal lover, she's got a great fashion sense. I was already a fan when I met someone with a gorgeous Maleficent tattoo. I commented on it and she said Mal was her favorite because unlike other villains with convoluted stories Maleficent just wanted to be invited to the party. She said once people heard her reasoning she was always invited to every party. 

Check another one off for the villain, I mean, that's a great line. 

Of course I don't want to be invited to the party. Or well, I do. I just don't want to actually go. So it's a good reason to add to my list. 

But if you look at my other reasons look at Aurora. She falls in love with the first dude she meets (common in the princess oeuvre), she is has no agency at all, and she can't even get a good nap in without someone disturbing her rest. She's boring. 

Maleficent? Not boring. She can turn into a dragon after all. And she's strong enough that the curse she lays on the family can't be lifted, it can only be modified and she still just bided her time knowing that they wouldn't bother actually keeping an eye on the princess for the one day in her life they needed to. I mean, honestly, you lock her away in the woods for 16 years but bring her back and don't watch her on the day the curse is supposed to be activated? What? 

The new movies bug me. At least the first one. One of the things I like the best about the original cartoon it's that there is no back story. Maleficent is named MALEFICENT for goodness sake. She didn't need a reason to become "evil" or mad at the fucking King. She is who she is and should be dealt with accordingly. I hate stories where there has to be a rape (or rape analogy) to turn a woman into a villain. There are so many shitty things that can happen to someone that it's just lazy story telling and reductive to women in general. 

But it's not just Maleficent. When we watch TV the number of times Brent shakes his head and says, "Is it bad that she reminds me of you?" is very high. Alice in the Luther series was one that he thought should probably really worry him more than it did. We agree that I deserve credit for every time I don't go on a psychotic rampage and burn down the world. The times I use my powers for good instead of evil.

And that's really it. 

I get painted as the bad guy by a large number of people because I don't follow the traditional rule book they would like me to. I don't believe in your god or your religion (any of them), I don't believe in your limitations and rules (I'll follow a rule if I see it as reasonable, but I'm not a rule follower by nature), and the piece that gets me called a lot of names; I am not quiet. I speak my mind. I don't just hope for the best. And if someone needs popped in the mouth I'm okay doing it. Actually popping them in the mouth or more often doing it verbally. I will shut your shit down. 

I'm a bad guy...duh. 

And I'm really comfortable with this. 

This morning a friend of mine commented on a blog from earlier this week and it reinforced that she gets it. She sees me. She is one of those that I've let in more than others. We don't stand in the same place in the world but we stand in the same way, if that makes sense. If she hears you are struggling she doesn't send thoughts and prayers; she'll pray for you and buy you a hot meal. One of those Christians who actually follow their own rulebook. I have a few of them in my life. I think if your religion makes you a better person and motivates you to do good things it's a good choice. It's not the choice for me but it works for her and for others around me. 

Today this is what she told me:

"Warriors don’t spread peace, love and light along the way. You, my friend, are a warrior. You don’t back down from a fight and you don’t compromise. I LOVE that about you. We don’t always agree 100% but you are one of the few people whose perspective and opinions matter to me, even when I have the “yeah, buts…” 

Standing firm for what you believe in does not mean you are evil. It doesn’t make you a villain. Our society has forgotten that submitting and compromising doesn’t create lasting peace - some times peace can only come on the blade of warrior’s sword.

And I will take this opportunity to recall that the Biblical analogy to the sword was the word."

I am comfortable being the villain, but I agree that being the villain doesn't always equate to being evil. 

But sometimes it helps. 

Kidding.

Maybe. 

Now excuse me while I go polish my sword.

Halfway For Real...

And we've reached it. Halfway through the year. So what did I decide?

And yes, this is totally on theme for the week. I mean part of the core of me is these goal lists.

And I know they are silly. They aren't life shattering. Nobody but me cares if they are done. They aren't even that hard to accomplish (usually). But they are a huge part of who I am. Brent says I can make anything a game. And it's true. I've always been that way. I am constantly playing some game or another in my head. I never outgrew "hot lava."

Something I figured out a long time ago is that my game playing is tied directly to what we talked about yesterday. I needed to have a story in my head all the time when I was younger. I was a voracious reader (that hasn't changed much), but I also made up elaborate stories with my Barbie dolls and other stuffed toys. There was drama. It's a way to disassociate. When you don't know what is going to happen day to day with your caretaker it's much more pleasant to have a story you are either pretty sure will all work out (books) or are in control of (toys). 

And I just never stopped doing it. 

I tell stories. Some of them even end up here in this blog for fun. But I have a running story in my head at almost all times. I anthropomorphize EVERYTHING. When I let anyone know the running dialog in my head that is happening at all times I get looks that vary from amazement to amusement to shock that if I'm not institutionalized I should at least be medicated.

And a lot of the stories I tell in my head as I go through the day are wrapped around a game. Or an impromptu dance party. Or both.

(Reality check break here: I am using always language here because my normal swing is between slightly manic and even keel. When the pendulum swings toward the depressive side the voices and the games get quieter. They don't go away completely until I'm very much in the down swing, but they do die off. Thankfully those swings are generally short lived, and when they haven't been I've considered that I should be medicated as well, but I want to be medicated to get the voices back so...)

So anyway...goals/games are a central part of who I am. 

And what are we looking at for July? 

Not a lot. Like I mentioned before we are still settling in and there are times where my schedule blows up because of work that needs to be done or calls that need to be made or me reaching a point where I am OVER IT from dealing with work that needs to be done or calls that need to be made. So I'm doing goal light, but still have some things on my radar.

Basically easing in to a new routine and new schedules with the move and Brent heading back into the office. He is planning on being on site three days a week. Monday and Friday working from home. So I will need to meal plan and errand plan around when I have the car and when I can sort of plan on him being home. 

I'm going to switch up my workouts. I'm going to do timed body weight moves for July. Super short but constant motion sort of things. I will plan those out over the weekend and not actually start until Monday. I hate starting a new routine on a Friday so I'll finish my June schedule and then move on. Along with the body weight stuff I'll do cardio daily. Just because I cannot wrap my head around working out 10 minutes a day and calling it good. I've already doubled up from where the idea originated, they did five. Which worked out to three minutes of work and two of rest. I'll do five of work and five of rest. Then a half hour of cardio. 

Writing, I'm going to stick with this theme idea. Assuming I can come up with some themes. I put the call out on my Facebook page and if you have suggestions please leave them as well! I think 20 blogs in July. If I wander off theme then I don't think I'll count those toward the total, those will be bonus content. 

I'm also going to do a round of Picture of the Day. I haven't done one in ages, but the July list is really good so I'm going to pick that back up again. 

And then like I said, setting up a new schedule framework. What needs to be done on rotation to take care of the house? What meals work best for unpredictable home arrivals? And also working on those last lingering items that will make the house feel more settled. 

As July rolls on I'll think about the rest of the year. What do I want to aim for? And of course I'll also be thinking about my new hashtag. I didn't use my 53 one much, in fact I used it so little that I can't remember what I settled on, was it #MeAt53? That seems like it might have been it...but anyway...on to a new one soon! #54MoreYears? 

Maybe not...

That's My Story...

The theme I've been trying to follow this week is who are you at your core. I've been sharing who I am for years. That's kind of been the over arching theme of this blog. Navel gazing and political rants. I know who I am. And when I try to become someone else I get reminders that that is not who I am. I am pretty comfortable with who I am most of the time, except for those times that I think I want to try to be someone else. And as I mentioned, that never works.

And who I am, who all of us are, is our story. Your life so far. What is your story? How did you get here? How did you become who you are? Why do you think the way you do? Why do you act like that? I mean seriously, why do you act like that?

I mentioned in a blog earlier this week that my foundation is broken and that's why I don't trust people. I've written before about why it's broken. Cliff's notes version for anyone who hasn't read that piece:

I was abused as a kid by an older sibling. It was because of a drug issue she had. Once she was clean we didn't talk about it in my family except in the rosiest of terms that "God handled it." My parents never acknowledged the abuse or the fact that they knew she was unstable and left me with her anyway. It took me years to even understand what had happened wasn't normal. It took me more years to reach a point where I forgave my family for the abuse, the neglect and the gaslighting. 

I was really angry for a lot of years and I didn't really even understand why. I didn't realize that what I had been through was abuse, not just normal sibling issues. I didn't realize that part of me understood that my parents abandoned me in those years and that wasn't okay. I just choked it all down (with a good amount of rum) and seethed inside. My late teens and early 20s I worked through it (mostly) and by my 40s even came to a place where I have empathy for what my sister had to go through. It wasn't fair to her to have to deal with a much younger sibling while she was clearly going through her own shit. 

Now...

That's my story. 

When I was home visiting my mother the spring before she died I was talking to my sister and we started to touch on what went on when we were kids. She said that everyone has a version of their life growing up and they don't always match and that's okay. It doesn't have to match. And that was the end of the discussion. I was a little stunned.

Later she was talking about something to do with my father and told a story that doesn't match at all with the man I knew. Like I wouldn't have liked this guy she was talking about and I adored my dad. The words she put in his mouth were nothing like anything I had ever heard him use. It was really disorienting. I talked to Brent about it and said that she had lived with my parents for much longer than I did so was this really who my father was? Brent basically said something similar to what she had earlier, everyone has their own version of their stories and sometimes they don't match. 

He said it was fine if I never considered that story, the one she told, canon. 

It was a wonderfully geeky way of looking at it. 

The version of our childhood that my sister now holds, the one that sprung up because we weren't supposed to acknowledge what happened to me, that's her canon not mine. That's her story. That's central to who she is. What she believes about herself and her life. And it has nothing to do with my story. 

Even though we both lived it. Both experienced it. Both would swear in a court of law that our version is the correct one. We have different stories. Different pieces are canon. 

And it's okay. 

She was right. I don't need her to believe my version of life. I don't need to believe hers. It doesn't hurt me that she has a different story. And it's none of my business who she thinks she is. 

See how that works?

Years ago I needed someone to acknowledge that what happened to me wasn't right. Wasn't okay. Wasn't my fault. But I didn't need it to be her. I didn't need to it be my parents. It might have been quicker and smoother healing if it had been, but it didn't work that way. And in the end the person I needed to believe all of that, it wasn't okay, it wasn't right, it wasn't my fault, was me. That took awhile, but I got there. 

Knowing that I can trust myself, believe myself, love myself, that's all part of my core now. 

That's my story. 

My foundation is broken, but I'm still standing. 

Have a Little Grace...

Brent and I had a conversation this weekend about how little grace there is anymore. In all situations. It was triggered as we were driving someplace and witnessed at least a half dozen near miss accidents. Everyone is super aggressive on the road right now. For awhile it seemed as though it was residual hangover from the isolation time in the early pandemic. People who were out driving got used to having a lot of road to themselves. They could (and did) drive faster without much worry about other cars. Once more and more cars came back on to the road those that had gotten used to the space seemed to resent it pretty heavily. 

But it's more than that. There is this sense of taking it personally if someone gets ahead of you on the road. Like if you let someone merge into traffic ahead of you, you lost. That if someone needs to join the roadway from a driveway they are just a big old loser who should have never gone in the driveway in the first place. And heaven forfend if it's a Subaru with a Love is Love bumper sticker trying to merge into traffic with a truck flying a Don't Tread on Me flag. Then it really is personal.

And it's not just in driving. 

You see it with a lot of interactions right now. People come in to them with the assumption that the person they are speaking with has ill intent. Or is an idiot. Or is actually evil. It makes it impossible to reach any sort of resolution to problems and turns things that aren't problems into problems.

And most of the time just a little grace, not even kindness but just neutrality can temper a situation. 

I've been dealing with a lot of contractors lately. And a lot of them don't call back or are not exactly timely with work estimates. I have to keep reminding myself that they aren't trying to piss me off. They are just extremely busy right now. Sometimes it works. And I can say that the times I am understanding when talking with people scheduling work or calling to tell me that work has to be rescheduled the response I get from them is amazing. Like not me being overly kind, but just me saying, okay, sure, we can push that out to Wednesday. The relief that they aren't getting yelled at is palpable. And it's not like me yelling at them would make the part come quicker, or the schedule free up sooner, all it would do is make us both like each other a little less. 

Just a little grace could solve a lot of issues. Don't assume people have bad intent.

And for the rest a huge dose of Mind Your Own Business would be helpful.

So many issues out there in the world don't have anything to do with the people debating them. The people getting most riled up about them. The level of wanting to control other people is amazing. 

You see it in debates around abortion. It's a private medical decision that is nobody's business but the person going through the pregnancy, possibly their partner, and a medical professional. That's it. That's the circle. And as I said, the partner is only a possibly not a definitely. Because you and I don't know what the situation is with that partner, because it's none of our business. Abortion rights are privacy rights. Medical and bodily autonomy rights. And that's what bodily autonomy really boils down to, mind your own business. The Dirty Dancing move...my space...your space. Keep to your space.

It holds true with LGBTQIA+ issues as well. Sexuality, gender, presentation, none of that is anyone's business but the person who is dealing with it. If someone asks you to use different pronouns or a different name it does not hurt you at all to do so. It is not any different than Susie growing up and wanting to go by Susan. "She's changing her name from Kitty to Karen." It's none of your business. It doesn't affect you in the slightest. 

Stop thinking the world revolves around you and your comfort zone. It doesn't. Ask yourself the simple question, how does this hurt me? Then follow it up with the question, If someone else told me this excuse would I roll my eyes and think, get over yourself? And generally that gives you the mind your own business framework. 

There are things that other people do that do affect you. Those things you should put your energy toward. There are people out there who have proven themselves to not be worthy of the benefit of the doubt. Don't show them any grace. 

Now, I know you are saying, but what about speaking for others? Fighting for rights that don't pertain to you? 

For instance marriage equality. I'm in a heterosexual marriage. Gay marriage doesn't affect me, right? Ah, but see, taking away rights always affects us all. Because none of us are free until all of us are free. 

It does affect me to see rights limited. We should not be taking away rights. 

It's why I will tell you over and over that I am all for comedians being able to say what ever they want under First Amendment guidelines. You should be free from government persecution to tell your jokes. I'm also for consequences of actions. And if what you are saying is hurtful to a community that is already facing real issues, and you are just normalizing being a dick to them? Well I think venues should feel free not to hand you a microphone. It's why I won't buy a ticket to go see you. Or to go see people who are featuring you. (specific example there, I know, but he's the face of anti-trans sentiment right now so he gets the spotlight, so to speak)

And now my gun people speak up, oh but what about the right to bear arms? I'm not one who wants to take that away. I have family that hunts. I have friends and family that live in remote areas where a call to the police would never matter if they needed protection right then. As I mentioned yesterday I am not positive I trust the police to protect me anyway. And they don't have to. (Look it up, they don't have to protect you, that's not their job.) So I own guns myself. BUT...I do think that we need to lean a little more into the responsibility part of that right. The Second Amendment has a whole clause that certain people ignore. The well regulated part. I'm all for tying your right with your responsibility. You want to be a "good guy with a gun" or a "responsible gun owner" or any of the other blahblahblah that comes out around these topics then argue for more regulation.

Where does this hurt me? I think the better question is how does it not hurt you to see another classroom of children slaughtered?

So there you have it. Another core piece.

Give a little grace to people. Go into situations, if not pleasantly, at least neutral. 
Mind your own business. If it's not your business, don't fight against it. 

and then flip that...

Those who have shown they don't have good intentions do not deserve any grace. Fuck them.
If someone is losing a right, or is unsafe, or needs an ally, then it becomes your business. Fight for them like you would for yourself. 

It's always a balancing act, and I don't always get it right, but that's my baseline try. Show grace, mind my own business. And be prepared to not do either if the situation deserves it.