Tuesday, October 31, 2017

Happy Halloween, 2017 version


Real screams today
Pillow screams the rest of the year

Monday, October 30, 2017

A Motley Crew

Now, all that being said, it is pretty amazing how obvious the collusion is, when you dig into the details.

Also amazing is how brazen they are, this motley crew occupying the White House, considering how obvious their lies are, the Sarah Huckabee Sanders of the world. It's become their form of shtick, how angry they are (how angry they pretend to be) at Secretary and Senator Clinton. They could at least find a new foil, a better villain, one more in keeping with the current timeline. They've been quiet about Congressman Adam Schiff for the most part. I'm a fan of his even-keeled explanations, a refreshing quality in the current...whatever this is. Someone keeps throwing paper towels at disaster victims and that makes it hard to think or categorize, and for them to survive. It's like slow moving murder, the total lack of aid or support from the White House for Puerto Rico. They're flinging items and running public relations campaigns, while threatening imaginary enemies both foreign and domestic, as people struggle with no electricity or water.

This would never have been the case under a Clinton presidency and if you can't see that it's because you don't want to. She would have known how to deploy aid and resources and would have done so in a reasonable, effective, timely manner, period. That is a lot more than anyone can say about the current head of the White House. I've always respected and liked Secretary and Senator Clinton, if not certain Clinton behaviors, and think she would have been a better president than her husband. I voted for her in the 2008 primary, if not the 2016 primary, and attempted to vote for her in the general.

When I got to the polling place, one wise helpful man and two idiots awaited me with the news that I had voted by mail when I had not, and after some insistence on my part gave me the dreaded provisional ballot, and you know what that means: my satisfaction at voting for a woman candidate for president for once (literally) was not based on a vote that was actually counted. I can console myself just fine: maybe your vote will be counted the next time a woman runs, self, which will be any never now, especially if the white male leftists don't stop trashing Senator Kamala Harris. File that anecdote under my issues with voting, as covered via one terse phrase in my previous post.

Speaking of Californians, I feel fortunate to live here again. But hey, home state: Enjoy Trump-hattan — suckers! You keep running around squawking that no one there voted for him and you have no idea where he came from as you shove and manhandle people on sidewalks, okay.

Next up, and Lord forbid I harp on this, but I can't help but feel at times like all men want to do is grab your boobs and yell "honk honk! I stopped you from doing something you wanted to do, honk honk!" as you're going to do something. So score one for them with their proverbial boob grab in not counting my vote, I guess.

On the other hand, yes, of course, who knows? There's a good chance the office administrator who decided to categorize me as a mail-in voter, for reasons that remain mysterious, was a woman. The overbearing guy at the polling place who kept trying to hit on me as I filled out my provisional ballot? Definite man. The other, younger man looked at my name on some list and said, with no questions asked, I had voted and would not be voting again. I assured him I had not voted since I always voted in person and hadn't filled out or turned in any ballot. He folded his arms and said I had.

This exchange played out a few more times, until I asked him if he had some ballot with my name on it or something? Is he referring to something tangible? Is this a Samuel Beckett play? Later, I couldn't help but wonder what he was basing this assumption on, other than some knee-jerk distrust, resulting in this familiar display of unearned authority, as if I'm lying of course and now must be put in line. The assumptions that drive these behaviors ain't great. Or particularly practical.

In the end, the wise man intervened and gave me a provisional ballot (better than nothing but not by a lot). The wise man didn't assume I was a liar, cool cool. Men seem lucky to me in that they can more often vote and do these things without That Guy showing up time and time and time and time and time again to thwart or assume or what, control? Is the need to feel in control driving it? Can't be a Beckett play then.

Of course there are man on man gender issues, too. And they stem from some of the same rotting beliefs about identity: anything to avoid being like a woman, right? The overall pattern of men and their shadow throwing at women strikes me in 2017 as super hard to miss or ignore, and it's not always, ahem, possible or practical or beneficial to miss or ignore something that is super hard. So...scale back on the rotting beliefs. Please? It's my new wish, my bedtime prayer. We could be having a much better time if you'd only unfold your arms.

Just listing examples doesn't really capture what it's like to function in a reality where half the population is socialized to view you as inferior based on your gender. A lot of it is subconscious, though the consequences of coping with motley crews are tangible as hell.

Leave Crowing to Crows

Suggestion, liberal social media:

Quit crowing over one indictment one year later, after everything, including his current threats of nuclear war.

He's as likely to be re-elected by the white majority as he is to be impeached; in fact, I'd rank his re-election chances higher than his odds of impeachment, given successful and racist voter suppression and gerrymandering, a longstanding effort on the part of Republicans, not to mention these shrieking denials of clear and obvious Russian interference from the white male left, too (Intercept bros).

This didn't happen overnight and it won't be resolved in that time frame, either, if it even can be.

Reality may be grim but I find facing it more comforting than playing pretend.

And these days, I find myself putting my energy into the people, work and pastimes that matter to me on a personal and spiritual level. I'm not interested in pantomiming the obvious in public, just as I'm not interested in the low level energy, anger and rotted values of the U.S. white majority that have brought us here.

Sorry/not sorry.

Friday, October 27, 2017

Being vs. Curating

Lately I've settled for old school blogger life: sporadic but quality updates.

Also, the more I'm writing offline, the less I'm writing online...

Also also, is it me or can online seem exhausting, this demand people seam to feel, this fascinating unspoken requirement to function in the form of daily public personalities...

At what point have we said enough?

At what point are we even saying anything at all versus curating?

At what point have we said too much versus curating?