Why I Hate the Dinner Dilemma

So, I’m totally down with the fact I’m not the June Cleaver or even the Claire Huxtable of motherhood.  In fact, I’ve made it my life goal not to be. And, I’m in a little bit of trouble with The Sha over it.  I don’t care.  I hope she learns something from what I did. 

In the last week, I’ve had people tell me to get over feminism, and one that accused me of hating my people and wanting to change people’s way of life because I had the vagina to point out we need an Equal Rights Amendment because there is much case law over the years pointing to how equal protection under the constitution isn’t the dream some envision.

A LOT of my thinking in this regard has been ingrained in my head since before I can remember.  My great-grandmother was a proud first-wave feminist.  Except even our family, no one used that word.  It was women’s lib.  

Her stories are personal to me.  When she was told she didn’t need the same pay as her male peers at her teaching job, because she had a husband, she fought. Marching herself to the state capitol, and she got what she was after.  

I’m a Title IX baby.  I was always able to play little league, and lived for sports in school.  In fact, sports is one of the reason I’m not straddled with student loan debt. My great-aunt came to all of my games.  She would tell me how much she loved playing basketball, but half-way through high school, they quit letting girls play, because they thought it would make them unable to have babies.

When I was told by a boss his wife never worked when their kids were young, and maybe I should think about that, I quit and found a new job.  Shocked that being the third generation after my great-grandmother’s fight, here I was looking at someone who claimed to be a social progressive questioning my motherhood, because I worked.  

I’ve stood toe-to-toe with my husband, demanding he help clean house without being asked while I worked and finished my degree (thank God I had only had one semester after we got married, or the ship might have sank).  “I do more than most!” he would say.

“Who is ‘Most’?”  I would demand.  “Tell me who?  And he better not have a housewife!”  I would yell while throwing dishes into the sink in a snit because the house was a disaster. I worked hard to be able to contribute to my families economic well-being,  be able to stand on my own feet if I have to, and I’ll be damned if that means I have to do everything around the house, too.

My great-grandfather always told me, “Never let a man tell you what to do,” and when he met B-Rye, he looked me in the eye and said, “You don’t let him boss you around do you?” Brian laughed at the little white-haired, VERY spiritual Mormon man who was 99 at the time. 

We got in the car and he was still laughing.  I said, “I hope you know, he’s dead serious.” 

And, let me tell you how much we’ve fought over him trying to tell me what to do. :-) 

My point being, its been ingrained in my head since before I can remember that women’s equality is serious, important business.  From my own struggles with mommy guilt to wanting to raise my daughters to be strong women, I take sexist shit personally.  If you really want to piss me off, tell me how much it doesn’t matter.

A major debate in feminist circles these days centers around a conflict between second and third wave feminists.  Mothers who don’t think their daughters appreciate the struggle, don’t fight enough, don’t realize the world they live in and take for granted, was shaped and formed by serious battles.   

And, that is how I got in trouble with The Sha on Wednesday.

I came home from work, and was sitting at the table and asked how her day went.  She laughed and told me I would have come unglued in her health class. She knows these things because she thinks I’m on par with some woman who doesn’t shave her armpits and barks at the moon…well, I wouldn’t put it past me.  BUT, she knows this because I HAVE pointed out she could tell the DARE officer to “suck a fatty.  Girls don’t have to wear dresses to be professional, and when he wears one when its ten below, he can dictate you do,” and I did kind of go on a tirade on a test her history teacher sent home for me to fill out—there was a spot to write in your gender, and I wrote “gender is a social construct that needs to be squashed like the patriarchy” and some other things regarding colonialism and hegemony that were probably pretty radical.  He got a kick out of it though, and told me so at P-T conference. 

I get it I’m radical.  There was a time I really thought everybody just knew and accepted this stuff.  That time passed a long time ago.

But, at least I’ve gotten one thing across to Sha—I’m not gonna stand in silence about this stuff.

See, it’s the start of a new trimester and she is telling me about her health class.  The teacher is lecturing on fast food and asks if anyone in class knows why the consumption of fast food and its horrible health effects have become such an epidemic in America.  No one answered, and the teacher apparently said it happened when women started working, so no one is home to make dinner anymore.

My jaw hit the table.  “She said THAT?  IN CLASS!?”  Sha started laughing, a huge belly laugh.  “Did you tell her men are perfectly capable of making fucking dinner?!”  And she laughed harder.

I got up and started pacing the kitchen, determined I wasn’t making dinner just to prove a damn point.  She kept laughing at me, and told me how she loves my reactions. 

I’m pretty much myself around my kids.  I can be professional and lady-like, but if anyone knows how I really am, its my girls.  Mostly, because I want them to know its ok to be loud and have an opinion and take up space.  They deserve that.  They’re entitled to a voice, and I hope they find it.

“Well, did you say anything, Sheridan?!”  I asked.

“No!”  She laughed. “But I knew you would have.”

I guess a little part of me is glad she even noticed the sexism, even if she was too afraid to say anything.  I told her, “You really should point out that stuff.  By not, you’re letting people think its alright to think those things.  You don’t have to call it ‘bullshit’ like I would, you can say it in a nice way.”

She just laughed again as I finally sat back down, and she pushed some papers in front of me.  She explained to me I needed to read the curriculum for this health class, talk it over with her, and sign a paper agreeing she could learn about sex and STDs.  “She going to teach you about birth control?” I asked.

“No. She said that’s too touchy around here.”

“Figures,” I said and left it at that.  I’d been on my soapbox enough.  “I’ll sign them before I go to bed.  I want to look over them a little more.”

So, later, I signed and dated the paper, and left a P.S. at the bottom.  It said “Please don’t blame the fast food epidemic on women.  Blame it on the still unequal division of domestic labor.” And left a nice little smiley face.

Sha’s embarrassed, and told me yesterday “I’ll just have dad sign my papers from now on!”

“Fine.”  I said.  Dad can sign those papers, because we agreed a long time ago to split chores and share parenting. I kept my mouth shut about how that still doesn’t happen at some houses.

This morning, as Brian was getting Schmoo ready for school, like he has every single day since she was two and I quit working from home, while he was warming up her clothes in the dryer like he does every day so they are warm for her, I asked her if I could fix her hair today.

“I want Daddy to do it.” She said.  “He does it better.”

I sipped my coffee, and watched them get ready for the day (picture above).  In the past, the mommy guilt over this has almost killed me.  As I watched, I’m thankful he’s as involved in her life and every aspect of it as he is.  There’s no way in hell I’d have ever thought to warm up her clothes every day.

I’m lucky.  He IS better than most I know.  I work with women who do everything and have to do it.  Some don’t have anyone to help. Some don’t stand up and demand help.

I was outside the building the other day, and a lady said to me, “You’re a good mom.  You do awesome things with your kids, especially with the hours you put in here.”

I was a little embarrassed, but it was probably one of the best compliments anyone could give me.  “Thank you.  I have a great husband,” I said.  “He helps me a lot.”  And, its true.

He shakes his head at me a lot, just like The Sha does.  “Think about where we live.  You think a lot different than most people,” he likes to tell me.

Well, that doesn’t mean it can’t or shouldn’t change.  So, I won’t fight with my daughter over how I think she should handle things or where she should take women in her generation, and I'll do my best not to be an embarassment to her.   

After all, the point behind it all is I just want her to have choices and opportunities in her life and not be limited by something as trivial as being “just a girl.”

I don’t want her to feel guilty for not making dinner by following her dreams. So, every time someone says something to make her think she's "just a girl" or that dinner is her job, I'm going to say something.  For her.

I DO wonder

This, this is my dad:

he's a pretty cool guy, but he's grown accustomed to being not a topic of the blog, while laughing at everyone else.  According to most, I tend to take after him.  Apparently, I have my mother's eyes...my behavior, however, tends to be all Buddy  (according to my rebel mother).

It really is his fault I'm a liberal ass and a feminist.  He won't admit it, but I DID get him to stop giving money to the NRA.  After he convinced me to stop being a vegetarian.

See, when that man up there was in charge of the children, he drove out into the middle of the dessert, kind of like in the movie "Casino", and you  just weren't quite sure if you'd ever come back.  He always bought a six pack of beer and you got a red Fanta and a burrito, and if you were lucky, he stopped to fish before "The Doors" on 8-track got through the whole album.  Then, he set up his pole, set you free, and he napped.  AND, despite fishing your ass off, he always got the biggest fish..which made me think beer was the trick.  That, or he was a total dick for stealing a panther martin and making his kids worm squirm the lawn for bait.

While our mother convinced us the wind would take us away and a rattlesnake lurked behind EVERY sagebrush, just waiting to send you to the painful depths of death, dad was always, "This is my spot." Like, "Find your f*king own!"
 
Honest to god, it was the only time I ever felt free.  There he was, watching the river...telling us, "Its a big river...find a hole."  And he let us be.

Its probably good Tammy wasn't there.  She has enough Blattner in her to freak out at the thought of anything even remotely close to involving danger (those women DEFINED hysteria).  She used to tell us there were alligators in the canal to keep us out of it, then wondered why we went to look. 

See, Buddy is a redneck version of a hippie.  He gets hauled to court, and the judge deals out the punishment..."Cut your hair!" 

Sunday drives were ALL the rage back then.  Smoked oysters and some easy cheese.  Drive over the mountain.

We usually went over Champagne Creek, where Dad and my brother could get a shit-ton of rattlesnakes and I would lock myself in the car.  There is still a pine tree growing near the summit.

I told Buddy, "That is an awesome Christmas tree!"

He looked at it, looked me right in the eye, and said, "THOSE trees, growing all alone, they have spirits looking over them.  Don't screw with it. Silver crows."  I didn't get it until Oliver Stone did that movie.

Then, he wonders why I hug trees.

Here is an adventure with Buddy:

"Gloria Steinem is evil...but take after her."

" I NEVER said trees have spirits!"

"The Nuge!"

"I voted for Nixon..to end the war."

and best of all:
"how did YOU get so radical??"

hmmm...I wonder

Driving With Miss Tammy

This is my mom:

It is highly likely after she reads this, I'm going to get a phone call. 

See, my mom is a lovely, wonderful, kick-in-the-ass-fun, woman.  I could write about how wonderful she is--how when my anxiety hit overload last week, she refused to take no for an answer: "Pack your shit and get ready," she said. 

"If I can't work, I sure as shit am NOT going on a road trip, walking all over Denver, and being stuck in the car with you driving for 12 hours!"

"We're not walking anywhere.  We're gonna veg at Nikki's, and you can't go to work anyway until you go to the doctor."

Its an argument I lost--mainly because my husband, and everyone else with whom I live, is sick of me and pretty much pushed me out the freaking door. And, to be honest, it saved me from a bad bout of depression.

I should probably write something deep and profound, involving learning something about my inner being, or how much I love my family for putting up with all of my shit.  But, its been a trying day--the one where I fretted and frayed about how SWAMPED I was (I actually got a lot done), the kid faked sick, and the doctor had to reschedule, so I get to sit in the freaking house for a few more days before I can again enjoy the world's shittiest coffee and enjoy learning how much I haven't got done while laid up.  Honestly, I'm more excited than a kid at Christmas to be getting to go back to work and drive---oh, thank you GOD, I finally get to drive!!

So, I need a laugh today (and mostly because I spent the entire time in the car praying "hail Marys" to have much time to contemplate anything deep or profound), and I'm gonna write something that will make my mother wish she never sent me to school.  I'm going to tell you about her driving.  That way, we can all laugh together.

I'm at the age where I've started worrying about my parents.  They're in their mid to upper 50's, and they're starting to do really crazy things, like take off for days at a time like they have no responsibility.  I'm convinced this is a diversion from the empty nest from which they are suffering since my sister decided to abandon them for something called "her own life."

And, I've heard from older friends and relatives how hard it is to take away driving privileges from the elderly, but I think my siblings and I are close to an intervention with Tammy on the subject of operating a vehicle.  Its to the point we have to do something--even if its just a safe driving course so the authorities can tell her and we can avoid responsibility.

The hardest part is she is in denial and truly believes she is the most awesome driver. This is despite the fact I once witnessed her blow through three consecutive red lights in downtown Salt Lake City at a cool 45 mph.  I've seen her hit a 3' high fire pit she had walked by all weekend in a campground. 

See, it starts out like this: she gets in the car with her phone, and everything else vital to her being all within easy reach for a good 10-12 hour drive.  Inevitably, Buddy (that's my padre) calls within 45 minutes to make sure she's answering the phone, but MOST importantly, to ask what she's doing.  Because, God forbid, she might not be driving.

This is terrifying 1) because she swerves like a raging drunk without yacking or trying to dial numbers without her glasses, 2) it takes away the precious little attention she gives to driving, and 3) it never fails to occur whilst passing an overloaded semi, on ice, and she thinks she HAS to answer the phone. For the record, I am a pansy ass when it comes to passing trucks, but on a scale of scared to shitting-my-pants, when Tammy does it, I'm off the charts at a nice "OMG!! WE'RE GONNA F*ING DIE!!!"

She will go on like this, answering the phone numerous times, completely oblivious to the fact she has crossed the center line 5,472 times (because she hugs that sucker to avoid getting a ticket for something called "following the fog line") or the fact that the rumble strip has been rumbling for 5 minutes. 

Then, it gets really scary.  She'll actually hang up, and not talk on the phone for about 20 minutes, and then it starts.  We have termed it, "Tammy aerobics."  Despite not having gotten out of the car, she becomes convinced she has lost everything but her mind.  While driving, she begins looking for the phone, a lighter, her cigarettes, her purse, papers for the first house she bought in 1974. Then, as she's swerving and everyone in the car is white-knuckled on the oh-shit-handle and screaming like its a Shanghai taxi ride, she blames it on the wind blowing the car or ruts in the road.

Instead of waiting to pull into the parking lot of the truck stop, she will begin putting on her shoes while she is driving up the exit ramp.

While trying to determine if she spilled the General's Chicken she had for lunch, she contorts into positions only achieved by Beijing acrobats.

Somehow, by the grace of God, we survived.  So, please excuse me while I take this phone call about being a backseat driver.

All Aboard The Crazy Train

I have always hailed myself as not quite a girly girl.  I detest shopping to the point that a couple of years ago, Tammy tricked me into shopping with her by saying she’d pick me up for lunch.  I was so pissed, I pretended to be a special spirit and sat down in the middle of the store and started crying for my mom.  No more shopping when I say no.  

I get my nails done, because otherwise I chew them until they bleed, and, let’s face it, my hands are huge and it adds a little feminine factor.

Sure, I like to get dressed up and look good every once in a while, but for the most part, I’ve always kind of prided myself on being pretty low maintenance.  I’m perfectly fine with not wearing make-up or fixing my hair—in fact, this is the first job I’ve ever had where I actually try to do it every day.  Before, my job mostly entailed being your average granola-crunching, Birkenstock wearing tree-hugger.  Well, there was that two year stint where I worked from home and rarely put on anything more fancy than a t-shirt, too.

Anyway, I like beer.  My idea of a hot date is live music and a trip to the burrito wagon. If I’m really splurging, I might by some Kendall Jackson Cabernet to go with a Totino’s pizza for Friday night Netflix. 

I’ve always been convinced I’m not one of those drama mama’s who constantly have something to rave and bitch about.  

This, my friends, is a LIE of epic proportions. Perhaps THE biggest lie I am guilty of telling myself. A huge lie I came to realize yesterday when I went FULL-THROTTLE, balls to the wall, certifiably, one-way ticket CRAZY trainwreck.

I want to be clear here, I’ve had my hormonal moments when the McDonald’s commercial made me cry, or that one time the cute guy in my Technical Writing class broke up with me, and I spent two days skipping class and work, while eating ice cream in my sweats and watching “Sense and Sensibility.” (O.K  MAYBE that should’ve told me I’m more girly than I thought).  

Anyway, I’ve been pushed to edge of irrational anger (like the time I cleaned the toilet with my ex’s toothbrush because he wouldn’t aim), but never quite took a flying, double swan dive over the edge into the abyss of insanity quite like I did yesterday.  See I have a really long fuse and it actually takes a legitimate reason to make me blow.  I HAVE reasons when I have these moments and all those other girly girls are just being stupid and need to find some intestinal fortitude and buck the f*k up.

Not so much yesterday.  I’m talking “The Yellow Wallpaper” almost creeping around the room, Cameron Diaz-at-the-end-of-Very Bad Things-running-into-the-street, bat shit insane.

Before you rush to a harsh judgment, I DID have a hysterectomy, bladder surgery, and MCL reconstruction on the same day (like a true moron), have been OUT of my house, aside from Physical Therapy and a drop-by the office to pick up a computer, 3 times in 6 weeks.  I have read nearly 10 books, watched 2.5 seasons of The Walking Dead, play over 600 games of mah jong, completed the application from hell (otherwise known as the Federal Electronics Challenge, which actually was a challenge after 4 weeks of nothing to feed my brain but helping with 1^st grade math), watched the neighbor lady lock her husband out of the house and him scream at the window for a full 30 minutes, pinned God-only-knows how much shit to Pinterest, and had a couple of babysitters Brian called after I did things I am not supposed to do.

I have been unable to bend over to tie my shoes or pack a bowl of cereal to the couch, been so doped up I saw the bats from Fear and Loathing (not EVEN kidding), and been unable to do pretty much anything but sit and get up to use the bathroom.

On a positive note, I am pleased to report I can now sneeze without pissing my pants, but that has seemed a small consolation to missing fresh air, or walking outside, or just walking…or being able to take my pants off unassisted (which is fine when you're 22 and drunk; not so much when you're almost 40 and stone cold sober).

So, you can maybe see a little bit of why I fell a little short of Charles Manson psychotic. 

I actually think I broke the world record for longest hysterical sob-fest, and it all started a week ago when the hubster loaned me his phone while I went to physical therapy, because I can’t drive and needed to call a ride and my phone refuses to hold a charge.  While I had said phone, I got pissed (again, irrationally, over a phone call he missed and I saw who was calling).  This was compounded Sunday when I lost a $5 ring I bought in the Grenadines in the car and he wouldn’t let me look for it (something that TOTALLY reminded of me of an aunt who went nuts over a comb she had “had since childhood").  

 Further compounding the situation was that no one bothered to do the dishes for three days; I went to feed the dog and three sacks of garbage were sitting next to the back door; and my living room looked like something out of hoarders, not to mention the phone started ringing off the hook about work.

Well, I got up at 2:30 in the morning because all I could think of (after Brian has done everything, and I do mean everything, for the last month) during a hot flash, was how much I hated him for not doing a goddamn thing.  So, I did the dishes and stomped, as best as a mad woman can on one crutch, through the living room, picking things up, and I got madder and madder at orders of magnitude every second. When he got up at 6:00, I went back to bed—unable to walk and back to two crutches.

At 9:30, I decided to take the trash out, fell flat on my ass trying to descend the icy mess that is the back steps, and commenced a crying session that lasted a good seven hours.  When the poor soul got home, I layed it on.  *this is to be read in your best sobbing, whiny, poor-pitiful-me voice* “You never think about what I need or want.  You never do anything for me. That ring was special!  Why was so and so calling?  How much of MY money did you give?” And a list of just about everything he had said wrong, when he’d moved wrong, and even when he’d breathed wrong in 14 years.  

I even pulled out the MOTHER of kindergarten tantrum threats, “I’m going to my mom’s!!”  Which is hysterical comedy seeing as I cannot drive.

Then, realizing I was in the middle of the most irrational moment of peri-menopause, I cried even harder because I had “gone crazy.”

About a week before my grandmother died, she fell down in the middle of night, and, not wanting to wake anyone with her Life-Alert, she laid on the floor by her closet all night until someone showed up in the morning.  I’m sure, trying to will herself up.  Later, when my mom and aunts told her she couldn’t do something, she threw her walker across the room and cussed. 

 

I laughed at the time, but now I understand.  I STILL want to throw these crutches through a plate glass window.  I don’t want any F*ING help.  I wanna scream “I DO IT!!” like my Schmoo did when she was a toddler and you tried to help her, but on the other hand, I want someone else to do it without me having to ask. 

I’m stuck in this totally bizarre world of contradictions…and I don’t like it.

I have survived one girl child making it through puberty.  I watched my mom go through menopause.  Through all of it, I will never forget thinking, “Dear Lord Jesus, can we get any F*ing crazier?”

The answer to that question was staring at me in the mirror this morning—with puffy eyes from the world’s greatest cryfest.  

 So, please excuse me while I go laugh at myself for my behavior, humble myself and apologize to my husband who really did nothing but be totally awesome, eat my words about crazy women, scrub the sweat stains out of my shirts, burn some incense while trying to meditate through this, and rely on my sisters who have been there.

To all the women out there that may be wondering…puberty was a piece of f*ing cake compared to this shit. And, if you aren’t laughing, you should be; I’m convinced it’s the only thing to get a person  through this.

To all the men, we really don't practice this level of crazy.  We hate it too...and you sometimes.  Don't take it personal.

Don't be a dick

There are times I have a hard time making sense of the world.  I’m not talking about your average, daily waiting at Starbucks, in line, for 30 minutes when the bitch in front of you STILL hasn’t decided what the hell she wants, when grabbing her by the hair and explaining how ALL 50 people behind her NEED coffee seems totally and completely rational .  No, I’m talking more along the lines of why in the hell does bad shit happen.

Granted, Aunt Flow showed up, so I’m my normally, monthly, hormonally, teary-eyed mess.  Its one of those times that “Lilo and Stich” would probably make me cry harder than “Schindler’s List” and that shit lasted days…all ‘cause of that little girl in red.

Anyway, ‘tis the Season, and I’m stressed out, maxed out, tired, and already almost in tears every moment of the day…over sentimental shit, happy shit, sad shit, and the missing-people-that-aren’t-here-anymore shit.

Yesterday, for some reason that verges on crazy and involves estrogen, I was remembering my first Christmas without the Sha.  The first Christmas after my divorce that I faced a Christmas without my baby, when Brian and I lived in that teeny house in Monteview. I got up, turned on the tree lights, and proceeded to bawl my eyes out for hours.  Christmas is about kids, and by God, her not being there just ruined the whole thing.  It was my first “Christmas.Fucking.Sucks.” moment.

My mom-in-love showed up to head to Arco with us, and we spent the day with Buddy and Tammy and my Grandma Jeneane.  I have a picture of us together that day, and I am laughing…which is a good reminder that my day got brighter.  But, it reminded again that Gram J isn’t here; made me wonder how she dealt for years with Christmases alone as her husband loaded up and left to spend the day with his kids and ex-wife; and I remembered her eyes that last Christmas she was here, when she kept nodding off, as she was watching soccer in Spanish, and begging me not to leave.  So, I cried again like I tend to do at the drop of a hat this time of year.

I often go back to that day, thinking of that Christmas I had to spend without Sheridan, and it pales in comparison to the one day, she got up early, a week before Santa came, and I had to tell her her dad was gone…forever.  

I remember it so vividly.  I remember trying to put up the tree.  Trying to wrap presents.  And in the midst of all of it, I realize that the tree, the snow, the presents…none of that shit really matters.

I was hit with this huge ball of selfish guilt.  How you can love someone, then hate them in the marrow of your bones, find forgiveness somewhere, learn to be friends again, and eventually learn, in the scheme of it all, YOU really don’t matter.  Babies matter.  Innocence matters.  Safety matters. LOVE matters.

As an adult, you learn to deal with hurts and heartaches.  You gradually learn that the world can be a fucked up a place.  Bad things happen to good people.  Sometimes, the best and most good, most honest, the things we love the best are jerked away from us.  As we grow we learn this. 

I learned it at 22, again at 31, and most profoundly at 32 and 35.

I didn’t have to learn it at 9 like Sheridan.  I missed a Christmas with her, but she’ll never get another with her dad.  I still have Buddy and Tammy, both.  I have yet to lose a parent, and maybe THAT fear is what brings me to tears every year when I take Sheridan to lay the wreath.  She’s always hated it.  

Yesterday, she asked to go.

So, I woke up this morning, thinking of all the things I had to get done, and I sent my children to school.  I told Schmoo I would pick her up at car line.  We were planning on hanging stockings.  This weekend meant family get-togethers and baking. 

I got my nails done, and when I got in the car, to go shopping after, Brian sent a text telling me to check out the news.  Twenty babies gunned down in school.

Babies who probably wrote letters to Santa and have presents under the tree. 

I drove to the school, 20 minutes early to be first in line.  When I saw my baby run out of the building and laugh and wave at me, I totally, and completely lost it.  I’m still in tears.

I don’t understand it, and I don’t think anyone else does either.  I’ve listened to asshole pundits screaming it’s because we kicked God out of schools and a few dickhead atheists crying it’s all because religion is evil.

Let me be clear, I’ve been on both sides of this fence.

I believe in love. 

I don’t think anyone needs a higher power to have a moral ethic; in fact, if hell is the only reason you do what is right, you lack character.  On the other hand, I know what it’s like to go to my knees and have nothing left but faith in believing things will get better.

And it ALL reminded me of what is wrong with us as a country today.  

I BELIEVE in LOVE.

We have become a people that look too much at our differences instead of looking at our common experiences.  We have become a people that define ourselves not as who we are, but who we are not. Too many of us are ready to pounce on the differences instead of embracing an open and honest dialogue about what we all want out of life.

Babies died today.  The innocence of childhood and a belief in the goodness of humanity was lost today, to young people who had all the optimism in the world before them.

I BELIEVE in LOVE.

I believe everyone that crosses my path has a lesson to teach me.  To open my mind to a new way of thinking, as uncomfortable and asinine as I might have previously believed it to be, is what I owe the world. I owe it to innocence, and hope, and love….and to all that is good in this world, that stands in the face of evil, sick people, to open my mind to other ways of thinking is a duty we all have.

I BELIEVE in LOVE.

Love says not to fear.  Love teaches us compassion.  Love tells us different isn’t bad; it just is.

Tammy used to call me the rainbow child.  I don’t believe any human is instrinsically evil.  Call me naïve, but I refuse to believe it.

I BELIEVE in LOVE.  I believe we all want the best for humanity, we just disagree on the means to get there…and that is why we need an open space to discuss these things together…not polarization and labeling difference as evil.

I come from a long line of outspoken women, and Tammy had this saying when we were growing up that some may find harsh.  She would tell us, a lot, “Don’t be a dick.”

It’s probably some pop-culture thing from the 90’s…remember the shirts?  But, it has stuck with me.  You mouth off...”Don’t be a dick.”  You don’t give up your chair for an elder, and she’ll grab you by those tiny hairs on your neck and whisper in your ear, “Don’t be a dick.” 

Dicks don’t gun down classrooms full of children.  Sick people do.  Dicks attack others for seeking solace and understanding in a crazy world, in a way some view as different.

So, I guess the whole point of this rambling mess is this…believe in love.  Love doesn’t hurt others.  Love discusses things openly and honestly and truthfully.  

Its Christmas.  Saturnalia.  Hannukah. I could give a shit.

Cherish what you have.  Practice love.  Don’t be a dick. Best.Advice.EVER.