“There’s a wonderful Japanese term, for which there isn’t a precise English translation. The term is Mono No Aware ( mo no no a- war -ey ) loosely means, a sensitivity to ephemera; the bittersweet feeling of seeing things change. Mono no awareis a wistful awareness of the transitory nature of existence. Since everything we see all around us will one day be gone, we must appreciate every millisecond. According to this idea, cherry blossoms are not only beautiful despite only blossoming for two weeks once a year, they are beautiful *because* they only blossom for two weeks once a year.
When you notice yourself fearing or resisting change, perhaps you can remember the concept of mono no aware, and find harmony with the impermanent nature of all things. As Jack Kornfield [1] said, ‘Like a sandcastle, all is temporary. Build it; tend it; enjoy it. And when the time comes, let it go.’ ” ( from Daily Calm morning meditation, 7-22-26 )
* * *
Department Of Apropos Of Nothing…
…or at least the nothing that now seems so important, or at least, memorable. Recently, both a book I was reading and a podcast I was listening to, on the subject of the history of the radical undergrounds [2] in the 1970s-1980s, mentioned an incident in Chicago where the boxer Muhammed Ali ( “the most recognizable man in the world” ) joined in on an action to disrupt the eviction of a poor Black family living in a Chicago tenement. I didn’t know about that incident; while I admired his acting on behalf of that family, hearing about it got me to thinking of the impressions I carried of Ali, and still do, to this day.
My parents were not very interested in boxing. Moiself actively opposed and was confused by its very existence: why were select men given money and medals for doing something that, if they did it in the streets instead of in a sporting arena, they’d be arrested ? [3] I refused to watch any boxing matches as a matter of principle, but when it came to the Ali-Frazier competitions I – like the entire country, it seemed – was well aware of the pre-matches hype and the post-matches analysis.
When it came to that classic rivalry – the three Frazier-Ali matches known as The Fight of The Century (1971) and the rematches Super Fight II (1974) and the Thrilla in Manila – my parents, like most Whites of that era (so it was assumed), supported Joe Frazier. Joe Frazier was shy, respectful, softspoken, and humble; those traits of his were ridiculed by Ali and his supporters as being more palatable to White people whom, they sneered, saw Frazier as a Good Negro®.
I admired Ali for how he stood up for himself and was willing to go to jail for his principles. I’d never heard of a Black man talking back to White people like Ali did. It wasn’t so much that Ali talked back, it was that he unapologetically stood up for himself. I lovedthat. And I hate hate hated the way Ali talked about, and to, Joe Frazier.
Joe Frazier supported Ali ( both publicly and financially ) after Ali refused induction into the US Army and was subsequently stripped of his title, banned from boxing, and threatened with jail. Frazier even lobbied the boxing powers that were ( and President Nixon! ) for Ali’s being able to return to the sport. Here is what Frazier got in return: Ali boasted about how “pretty” he himself was, and contrasted his own handsome visage [4] with the features of Frazier, called Frazier “ignorant” and “dumb” and “ugly,” and actually compared Frazier to a gorilla.
Those astoundingly racist epithets would’ve been called out as being just that if they had been uttered by a White person instead of being brashly spewed by the self-proclaimed [5] “Greatest.” You could try to excuse Ali’s taunting by saying it was part of the boxing culture’s pre-match hype; but Frazier didn’t, and never forgave Ali for the taunting and bullying he (and his family) endured from Ali supporters.
Robert G. Ingersoll (1833-1899) was the celebrated agnostic orator of the 19th century, sparking what became known as The Golden Age Of Freethought. A Civil War officer, abolitionist, civil rights and women’s rights advocate, author, and skilled orater, Ingersoll’s lectures attracted thousands, and he was the person most responsible for the flowering of Freethought in the USA.
Although I knew *of* Ingersoll I did not encounter Ingersoll’s vow until after my own coming out as religion-free. Moiself got goosebumps, the first time I read this essay of his, to think of how the experiences of a someone of over 100 years ago so paralleled those of my own. It’s as if he was emptying my thoughts onto his pages.
The *news,* was not what Ingersoll realized he was convinced of ( e.g., the natural, not supernatural, origins of our world; the fact that religions are mythologies ) but rather of his ability – his*need,* his obligation, even – to express this openly.
When I became convinced that the Universe is natural – that all the ghosts and gods are myths – there entered into my brain, into my soul, into every drop of my blood, the sense, the feeling, the joy of freedom. The walls of my prison crumbled and fell, the dungeon was flooded with light, and all the bolts, and bars, and manacles became dust. I was no longer a servant, a serf, or a slave. There was for me no master in all the wide world, not even in infinite space. I was free –
* free to think, to express my thoughts; * free to live to my own ideal; * free to live for myself and those I loved; * free to use all my faculties, all my senses; * free to spread imagination’s wings; * free to investigate, to guess and dream and hope; * free to judge and determine for myself; * free to reject all ignorant and cruel creeds, all the “inspired” books
that savages have produced,
and all the barbarous legends of the past; * free from popes and priests; * free from all the “called” and ‘set apart;’ * free from sanctified mistakes and holy lies; * free from the fear of eternal pain; * free from the winged monsters of the night; * free from devils, ghosts, and gods; for the first time, I was free.
There were no prohibited places in all the realms of thought – no air, no space, where fancy could not spread her painted wings – no chains for my limbs – no lashes for my back – no fires for my flesh – no master’s frown or threat – no following another’s steps – no need to bow, or cringe, or crawl, or utter lying words. I was free. I stood erect and fearlessly, joyously, faced all worlds.
And then my heart was filled with gratitude, with thankfulness, and went out in love to all the heroes, the thinkers who gave their lives for the liberty of hand and brain – for the freedom of labor and thought – to those who fell in the fierce fields of war, to those who died in dungeons bound with chains – to those who proudly mounted scaffold’s stairs – to those whose bones were crushed, whose flesh was scarred and torn – to those by fire consumed – to all the wise, the good, the brave of every land, whose thoughts and deeds have given freedom to the sons of men. And then I vowed to grasp the torch that they had held, and hold it high, that light might conquer darkness still.”
* * *
May you remember, or soon discover, the first time you realized that you are free; May you know the wistful joy of appreciating ephemera; May you feel free to spread imagination’s wings; …and may the hijinks ensue.
Thanks for stopping by. Au Vendredi!
* * *
[1] Jack Kornfield is a Jewish-American writer and teacher of the Vipassana style of Theravada Buddhism. He holds a Ph.D. in clinical psychology, trained as a Buddhist monk in Thailand, Burma and India, and has been teaching mindfulness meditation since 1974.
[2] The Weather Underground, The Black Panthers and the Black Liberation Army.
[4] Which, as more than one White and Black pundit pointed out, was the result of having some European ancestry in his lineage – specifically, an Irish ancestor from County Clare.
[5] “To be a great champion you must believe you are the best. If you’re not, pretend you are.” “I am the greatest, I said that even before I knew I was.” Muhammed Ali In His Own Words.
[6] “free-think-er n. A person who forms opinions about religion on the basis of reason, independently of tradition, authority, or established belief. Freethinkers include atheists, agnostics and rationalists. No one can be a freethinker who demands conformity to a bible, creed, or messiah. To the freethinker, revelation and faith are invalid, and orthodoxy is no guarantee of truth.” Definition courtesy of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, ffrf.org
MH and I have been re-watching the TV series ER. Aside from some older technology artifacts – the hospital records and procedures are not fully computer-integrated (e.g., the staff keeps index card files on certain patients! ) – the issues, both medical and personal, remain, IMO, compelling and contemporary. Except for wanting an old-fashioned schoolmarm’s stick to whack George Clooney’s character on the back ( “Stand up straight! Look people in the eye! You’re a doctor, FFS!” ), the performances are spot-on. Although (for moiself at least) Clooney’s hangdog/horndog, mannered performance as Dr. Doug Ross takes some getting used to, I’ve been pleasantly surprised by how… fresh… everything seems. It’s fun to rewatch a great episode I haven’t thought of in years, and turn to MH and say, “Oh, wait, I think I remember this…no I don’t/no, wait – something weird is gonna happen here….”
Someone who’s on the cusp of being a ginormous movie star and making an obscene amount of money should have better posture.
* * *
Department Of Why Isn’t This A Thing Yet?
Percussive energyis the thing that isn’t, yet. And it should be. After all, moiself blogged about it four years ago ( The Clean Energy Source I’m Not Yet Inventing ). And yet the eyes and ears of the scientific community remain blind and deaf to my far-fetched ranting well-thought proposals?
I wrote aboutpercussive energy as the counterpart, or rather compliment, to solar and wind energy. Short recap: utilizing all that tap, tap tap [1] of raindrops – as in, designing a surface, which could capture that energy find a way to use or store it (an answer to the old school people who decry “clean” energy by saying, “Yeah well solar only works when it’s sunny/wind power only works when it’s windy….” ).
The world is still waiting for, still needing, youth science fairs and contests to challenge and/or incentivize their entrants to…basically…save us from ourselves. Or at least help us out with our existing problems, rather than translate their budding scientific and entrepreneurial skills into designing yet another mind-numbing gaming/entertainment app.
Lilly Downs, eighth grader from Osteen, Florida, wins Lemelson Early Inventor Prize winner at her 2025 science fair. [2]
* * *
Department Of Gems Discovered While Seeking Something Else
That would be a blog segment from five years ago, specifically 8-20-21 ( The Butt I’m Not Kicking ) where in moiself wrote about MH’s colonoscopy:
Department Of Post-Procedural Updates
Background info: MH has never been able to roll his rs, which is the main reason, he told me many years ago, that he took German as a foreign language in high school. He’d thought Spanish would be more useful/practical, but he simply could not roll his rs as is required for the correct pronunciation of many Spanish words, and he was somewhat intimidated/embarrassed by his lack of being able to perform that particular linguistic feat. And it’s true: over the years, I’ve tried to get him to do it (or trick him into it), and he simple cannot roll his rs.
Dateline: Thursday, 10:50 am. MH is back home after his colonoscopy. He thinks he’s fine, but it’s obvious to moiself that the effects of the Versed (the sedative used during the procedure) are still reigning. [3] He’s… goofy
He stands at the kitchen counter, looking at the color printout he was given at the hospital, which includes a map of the lower intestines. He begins reading off the “map sites” to me:
MH (in a voice much higher than his usual range): “The ilium! The cecum! The rrrrrrrrrrrectum…”
Moiself: What?!?!?! Holy crap; did you hear yourself?! You rolled your rs!
MH (in miffed toddler mode): “No I didn’t.”
Moiself: “Oh yes you did!”
MH proceeds to say “rectum” over and over, drawing out the rsound without rolling it. But for one glorious, Versed-induced moment, them rs were rolling like a river.
* * *
* * *
Department Of Not Completely Different But Similar, As In, Involving A Memory
MH and I met in a Lutheran Church. Yep; yours truly the flaming atheist, Humanist, Freethinker, Skeptic, religion-free apostate/heretic was raised by Lutheran parents and was herself, like her now equally religion-free ( but less flaming [4] ) spouse was once an active church member. But that’s a story for another day (preferably, a day involving cosumption of gin and tonics by both the storetellers and story listeners ).
A momentary digression for Educational Purposes®: moiself has been referred to, by other active and former Christians, as both a heretic and an apostate. Neither word is one I consider pejorative; both are arguable as to their applicability as labels for my beliefs and experiences. [5]. In general, both labels refer to someone’s rejection of the religion they are/were “in” and/or were raised in. The difference is in the degree of rejection. Apostates totally reject or renounce their religion; heretics stay (or attempt to stay) within their religion and/or religious community but openly hold and assert beliefs that contradict their religions’ theologies and doctrines. [6] (interesting factoid: at some point in time, every new religion/demonization has been accused of heresy/apostasy by their onetime co-religionists).
Moiself recently overheard a tidbit of a conversation in which one person was relaying to another their experience of being challenged as to their worthiness of ascending to a certain position in their work. This reminded me of a story shared with moiself by one of the pastors at Grace Lutheran Church in Palo Alto, the church where MH and I met.
Grace Lutheran was a congregation in the ELCA synod, the most liberal synod or wing of the American Lutheran churches. At that time (when MH and I were attending) Grace Lutheran had two co-pastors, one male and one female. I became friendly with both of them, in particular the female pastor, SK. This was in 1986, and although the ELCA had been ordaining women pastors since 1970, their acceptance was a slow process, and women pastors were not automatically welcomed with open arms. One afternoon a few months after I’d joined the church SK and I met for tea in downtown Hillsboro. During our wide-ranging conversation the subject of her being called [7] to Grace Lutheran came up. Specifically, I asked her how smooth the process had been: did she feel accepted by all of the congregation, or at least the majority?
SK told me that her call to Grace Lutheran went smoothly, although she was aware that the final vote of the congregation (to accept her call to be one of their pastors) was not unanimous. On her first Sunday at Grace Lutheran, the leaders of the congregation held a reception for SK in the church’s Fellowship Hall, after the worship service. The reception wound down after about two hours, which was a relief to SK, who, although grateful for the warm greetings she’d received, was beginning to think her petit frame could not bear another well-meaning handshake or congratulatory hug from the throngs of parishioners who introduced themselves to and welcomed her.
SK headed to the Fellowship Hall kitchen, intent upon helping the staff with KP duty, when one of the few parishioners remaining in the Fellowship Hall approached her. A Tall Elegantly Dressed Older Woman (TEDOW) smiled broadly at SK, introduced herself as a “long-time” Grace Lutheran member, and said, in a friendly tone of voice that belied the rebuffing sentiment she was about to utter, that she would like to take SK to lunch to tell SK why she had “voted against your call, as I don’t think you belong here.”
SK kept her composure, smiling in return as she thanked TEDOW for the lunch invitation…which SK declined.
Moiself was impressed by SK’s graciousness under fire, so to speak, and even more so by the rational simplicity of her response:
“No, thank you. I *am* here; I don’t have to defend my being here.” [8]
May you have fond memories of a loved one’s post-colonoscopy rantings; May you enjoy binging an old favorite TV series; May you never have to defend your being where are you; …and may the hijinks ensue.
[3] I suggested he go upstairs and sit or lie down, as he was rather wobbly standing. He wanted to go up the stairs by himself; I insisted he hold on to the handrail, which he did, while vaulting up the stairs two at a time. When I snapped at him to slow down he said, “It feels better this way!”
[4] Except when he’s high on Versed and flamboyantly rolling his r’s….
[7] Being called refers to the process by which churches find and employ their pastors. It varies between denomination and churches; here’s the link to ELCA call processes.
[8] I never met TEDOW. She (and her husband) left the congregation before I began attending. According to another congregant whom I quizzed about the incident, TEDOW and her husband were opposed to female ordination and also had problems with the other ways in which they felt their church was embracing heresy/leaning more liberal, and when they left Grace Lutheran they made sure that certain people knew they were leaving and were “taking their money” with them (implying that they were generous financial supporters of the church, which, that person I spoke with said, they were *not.*).
[9] “free-think-er n. A person who forms opinions about religion on the basis of reason, independently of tradition, authority, or established belief. Freethinkers include atheists, agnostics and rationalists. No one can be a freethinker who demands conformity to a bible, creed, or messiah. To the freethinker, revelation and faith are invalid, and orthodoxy is no guarantee of truth.” Definition courtesy of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, ffrf.org
Dateline: Circa 7:45 am; taking my morning constitutional. In a neighborhood where I sometimes walk, I pass a house that is heavily trashed accessorized: its front yard décor includes a multitude of plastic multicolored flowers, garden gnomes, smiling animals, faux garden implements stapled to the house’s siding, etc.
A sign on the front door of the house reads, “This is my happyplace.” My first thought as moiself reads the sign:
The Very Nice Exterminator Man (VNEM) tried unsuccessfully to stifle his laugh when, as he followed me on the pathway around the side of the house to the place where the squirrels were using our trees to access our roof, he told moiself that the traps he was going to set were kill traps, and I blurted out an enthusiastic, GOOD!
“Wow, it’s a squirrel howitzer,” I said, when I saw the first trap.
“Your attitude,” VNEM chuckled – then quickly added, when I turned around to see if he thought I was A Terrible Person ® , “I like it. It’s, uh…very different…when I’m in Portland.” He explained that when he’s setting up traps in optimal places ( for where the squirrels are accessing the house ), his Portland clients often ask him – whisper to him, he said – if he can “hide them (the traps) so the neighbors don’t see.”
I correctly surmised that was because they don’t want their neighbors to know about the kill traps. “Let me guess,” I replied. “Portlanders fear their neighbors’ judgement because they, like their neighbors, are misinformed. They think it’s somehow better or more humane to trap the squirrels and ‘relocate/transplant them,’ when they in fact know nothing about squirrels, including that
* squirrels are highly territorial; thus, depending on how far away they are transplanted, they will find their way back to your property and continue to be a problem/do the damage for which you wanted them gone in the first place, or
* they will be beaten and harassed by other squirrels into whose territory they have been released, [1] not given a moment’s peace to establish their own territory, much less forage, and they’ll starve to death;
* the majority of Oregon’s squirrels are *not* native, but are introduced species which, through being larger and more aggressive and via spreading new diseases, have taken over the native squirrel population…”
“You *do* know a lot about squirrels,” VNEM said, as I finished my Why It’s Okay To Hate Squirrelsharangue explanation.
“Enough to loathe them,” I said. “Look; I love animals; my diet is 99% plant-based; I escort spiders from our house (even bought a special device that traps, rather than squishes them)…and I detest squirrels.”
Ater one week with the traps up: the body count is two traps, two dead squirrels. [2]
The following is not a picture of a dead squirrel. The Picture That Does Exist But That I’m Not Showing You [3] is of a squirrel tail trailing out of one of the bazookas, the tail waving in the slight breeze, like a flag of surrender…. [4]
She’d never want us trapped in a sloth bazooka, but then, we’d never chew on her house or electric wires and cause hundreds of dollars worth of damage….
* * *
Department Of Traditional Foods Whose Existence I Acknowledge…
…but will not touch with a ten-foot pole. Or narwhal tusk. Or whatever is available to push the hákarl as far away from moiself as possible. The idea that you can call such a thing “food” is, IMO, an insult to all which is considered edible.
You’ll be safe with me, lady. Let’s order the tuna casserole instead.
Y’all may have heard of hákarl, the infamous Icelandic “delicacy.” If not, videos of people chunder-spewing immediately after having tried it are just an internet search away.
Ahem. Written by the person who, attracted by the title, purchased, Does Anyone Actually Eat This?Nanna Rögnvaldsdóttir, Iceland’s “best known food writer,” wrote this slim ( 73 pages ) but mildly intimidating book about 16 peculiar Icelandic delicacies. Besides the better known hákarl – Greenland shark meat that is fermented (read: putrified) in a way to remove the copious amounts of uric acid (read: piss) in the shark’s flesh so that you may eat it and not vomit blood (a common reaction to piss-shark-flesh eating) – curious culinary minds might want to read about other Icelandic delicacies, including
* Svið (a sheep’s head, halved and singed, then boiled with the brain removed;
* Súrsaðir hrútspungar (sour ram’s testicles) – yep, just that: sheep’s testicles, boiled, pressed into blocks and preserved in fermented whey. Some Icelanders consider it rude to call the dish by its name; thus, several euphemisms are used to refer to it, including millifótakonfekt( “between-the-legs candy” );
*Hverabrauð, a hot sprin- baked, dense, pumpernickel-rye bread, which at first sounds rather tame until you get to the details: “the bread…has a reputation for causing flatulence and is sometimes nicknamed, þrumari, aka, “thunder bread.”
Dude, a chase of thunder bread will absorb the urine/blood vomit aftertaste.
* * *
Department Of The Idealism Is Nice, But Your Age/Gender/Privilege Is Showing
Datelimne: earlier this week; listening to Clear + Vivid podcast, of 6-30-26. Host Alan Alda’s guest is American journalist, editor and biographer Walter Isaacson. The episode: Walter Isaacson: Are These Truths Still Self-Evident? From the episode’s description:
On the eve of our nation’s 250th, Walter Isaacson takes a deep dive into the second sentence of the Declaration of Independence. It’s what he calls “the greatest sentence ever written.”
After discussing the history of the declaration and the interpretation and implementation of that so-called “greatest sentence, [5] Alda and Isaacson discuss the current fragmentation of our nation and the fact that we seem to have lost our ability to compromise, which is what led to the crafting of Declaration, and later, key elements of the U.S. Constitution.
( Excerpts; my emphases ):
Alda: Now, what about the big question…how can we accomplish the return to this great sentence…and make it no longer merely aspirational or largely aspirational, but make it truly happen? What kind of things need to be done…can be done?
Isaacson: …Among them is look for ways where we can have shared national service, whether it be being part of civic life in your town or teach for America….
We should form the type of civic organizations that, when you and I grew up …you’d go into town, there’d be the Kiwanis Club, and the Rotary Club, and the bowling League, and the Elks and the Moose.
We all had whatever our religions, whatever our ideologies, we all rubbed elbows together. And so I think in our daily lives, we can say, how do we do it at a local level? We can’t do this at a national level now….
My reaction: Gawd, does he (Isaacson) ever sound old/white/male/upper class!
The community and social institutions Isaacson lists – it’s not a bad thing, IMO, that they’ve faded away and/or drastically lost their impact. In their heyday they exerted great influence in the business and social lives of their cities, and membership in them and other “fraternal” organizations were steppingstones for business and political success. But, the we all rubbed elbows togetherideal – what orifice did Isaacson pull that out of?
“My orafices are none of your beeswax, sweetie.”
Those institutions, whether community/civic or fraternal, were *not* welcoming and inclusive. They required an invitation and/or sponsorship from current members for your membership application to be considered. If you were white and male (and had an “in”), you had a chance.
Many a story I’ve read about those organizations’ resistance to change. In particular I remember a community newspaper article about the blowback faced by an Oregon Coast man, a longtime member of his local fraternal organization (Elks, maybe?), who lobbied his fellow members to allow women to join the organization. He pointed out that his wife and other wives of members already did the lion’s share ( maybe it was the Lions Club!? ) of the work when it came to organizing, setting up (and – surprises! – cleaning up after ) the group’s yearly fundraisers and other events, and that they and other women in the community had expressed interest in joining…. But, no. His fellow Elks/Lions were content to keep the ladies in auxiliary status. Women were capable of doing the work, but heaven forbid they get the recognition (and status and influence) of membership.
Two personal examples: Over a decade ago I congratulated an acquaintance of mine when I saw an announcement in the local paper about how she’d joined the local branch of a nationwide service organization (ala Kiwanis Club). She was one of three businesswomen who’d been invited to “integrate” the previously all male [6] club, which had gained a reputation among newer-to-the-area, younger and nonwhite/nonmale city residents as stodgy, elitist and out of touch. Two years later I saw her at a city event, and told her I’d once again [7] intended to support her in the group’s annual fundraising sales, but that I didn’t find her name on the group’s roster. She rolled her eyes in disgust and told me she’d resigned from the group, as she was tired of banging her head again the proverbial wall. “All those old men are going to have to die[8] before anything will change,” she huffed. [9]
Another friend of mine started her own business in her small Oregon town, and as her success grew she joined her local Chamber of Commerce. Her C of C experiences…
* being either ignored and or patronized by old time (read: white male) COC members
* her ideas dismissed/discounted by her male colleagues one minute, then ten minutes later appropriated by another COC member, who presented them as his own
…spurred her to rally other women business owners in her town to form the ____ (name of town) Women’s Business Association.
So yeah, definitely encourage people to get off of social media and find other outlets for personal connection. But before advocating a return to those old organizations, a remaking of them is in order.
And, BTW, what’s so bad about having bees that don’t wax?
* * *
Department Of A Documentary I’ll Have To Get Back To
A friend recently sent me a link, along with this message:
I don’t know if you’ll like this, but this week’s independent lens is about a woman dealing with her father who is the last creationist in their family. I appreciated her struggle.
The episode he linked me to was released earlier this week by the PBS documentary series, Independent Lens. Its title and description: Flood, directed by Katy Scoggin: A filmmaker revisits her evangelical roots to find connection with her estranged father.
I thanked him and wrote that I’d watch it later. I did, then sent this reply:
Oh… Holy crap. Figuratively and literally.
I love the Independent Lens documentary series, but I could only get about 20 minutes into this particular documentary before I had to stop watching it. I know there had to be a setup of the filmmaker’s conservative evangelical background in order to establish the estrangement between the filmmaker, who left those beliefs behind, and her father, who still holds them, but still…ICK.
If I never again, no matter the context or pretext, have to hear grownass adults serious singing/discussing about being “washed clean by the blood,” then I will have lived a happy life and can possibly withstand even global warming.
Listening to children reciting the gibberish of theology provokes a physical reaction in me. It actually twists my stomach, to hear children spewing things they’ve had to memorize but have no idea what they’re talking about. [10] Particularly retch-worthy was the scene at the filmmaker’s father’s dinner table, when one of his cherubic blonde granddaughters (maybe four or five years old?), chirps, “I know all vowels: A E I O U!” Then, smiling, she recites in a sing-song voice the first four letters of the alphabet, which she has been taught to link with bible verses:
“A – All have sinned and gada fada baba… ( it’s hard to make out many of the words, as she lisps and runs the words together [11] )…the glory of god
B – Believe in the lord jesus christ and thou shalt shall be saved
C – Children obey your parents in the lord for this is right
D – Depart from evil and do good….”
It’s child abuse; it’s emotional and intellectual child abuse. And I can’t watch that, any more than I can stand by and watch someone beat a child and not intervene.
* * *
Department Of Damn, It’s Inevitable, But They Rip A Piece Of Your Heart Out When They Go
May your bees continue to wax; May you remember to never eat a slice of thunder bread before yoga class; May your sweet tooth steer clear of between-the-legs candy ; …and may the hijinks ensue.
Thanks for stopping by. Au Vendredi!
* * *
[1] I have seen some epic squirrel territorial battles in a nearby park which I regularly walk through/around – battles that have drawn blood between the combatants (and which unnerved me, years ago, when I didn’t know much about squirrels) and which would make MMA combatants envious.
[2] Upon completing his inspection the VNEM thought one or at most two squirrels were accessing our roof, trying to chew their way into our attics. Which was somewhat better than the last invasion, which included an entire squirrel family.
[3] But which I sent to select friends/family, who almost certainly wouldn’t rat me out to PETA.
[4] I did send the picture to the exterminator (when he asked if we knew if either of the traps had been sprung), with the caption, “My heart soars like a hawk.”
[6] And mostly all White, despite the city’s growing Hispanic population.
[7] I had donated to the group’s yearly fundraiser only because she was in it.
[8] A lot of them did…but then their nepo-stodgy sons “inherited” their memberships, so change as continues to be slow.
[9] And she even had an “in” – she was the former mayor’s daughter-in-law.
[10] And I have a similar aversion to kids reciting loyalty oaths, such as the Pledge of Allegiance, in schools. I stopped saying the pledge when I was in the fifth grade.
[11] It’s likely the Christian tenet, “All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of god…” from Romans 3:23
[12] I was so NOT able to even type that last week.
[13] “free-think-er n. A person who forms opinions about religion on the basis of reason, independently of tradition, authority, or established belief. Freethinkers include atheists, agnostics and rationalists. No one can be a freethinker who demands conformity to a bible, creed, or messiah. To the freethinker, revelation and faith are invalid, and orthodoxy is no guarantee of truth.” Definition courtesy of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, ffrf.org
MH and moiself recently received this text from daughter Belle:
“Mom and Dad; you guys raised me to be such a safe driver that I am being urged to drive more dangerously by my friends.”
She then sent a copy of a message from a coworker…
…and added, to us:
“but don’t worry, you also raised me to not give in to peer pressure “
* * *
Department Of The Things We Rarely Do Via Venues Which Could End Up On Social Media
That would be tell the truth about knotty issues – truths that may not present ourselves and/or our loved ones in the best of light.
Sub-Department Of The Unflattering Memories I Did Not Write
On The Post Right Before And Then Right After My Late Mother’s Birthday… [1]
That was because it felt wrong to complain about her on or near that day…although my truth-telling was not so much complaining as it is realizing.
Department Of Self-Analysis
Dateline: a weekday some time ago; circa 7:30 am-ish; morning walk while listening to NSQ ( No Stupid Questions ) podcast. It was a repeat episode: How Can You Stop Comparing Yourself With Other People?[2] The main topic the hosts [3] were discussing was – wait for it – comparing yourself to other people. They of course mentioned social media, where it’s very easy to feel yourself dull and/or unfulfilled [4] when you look at the posts of other people, and see their pictures of them and their well-mannered, high-achieving children travelling to beautiful, exotic places …
These images came through my earbuds as I was about to take (and then post) a picture of the morning sunlight glistening off the top of the waves at Manzanita beach. I snickered at moiself, and resolved to do my part to fight this trend: Instead of posting a picture of this enviable costal sight I’ll return home, take a picture of the cat litter box, and post that instead. But before I could make a note to moiself to actually do that, the NSQ hosts distracted me with their comments on aspects of Social Comparisons Theory[5] (specifically upward and downward comparisons).
“Having more fun than you’ll ever have – I mean, wish you were here.”
“…the upward comparison is what people worry about with social media. You go on Instagram and it’s always sunset, and the wind is always blowing just so, and everyone looks amazing…. that is the dark side of upward social comparison. ‘…
schadenfreude, the idea of taking pleasure in somebody else’s misery, is kind of a form of downward social comparison. When we look down on other people and that, at least temporarily, boosts our self-esteem…”
The talk of upward/downward comparisons brought back a not-so-pleasant memory. Since I have included in this space ( in, e.g., The Summers I’m Not Forgetting, 6-28-19 ) an epic moment of my mother’s parenting (making me my favorite “fresh” apricot pie for my December birthday), equal time will now be given to an epic parenting failure of hers.
Backstory: From junior high through high school, the girls in my circle of friends were good-looking. As in, ranging from beautiful/cute to down-right-gorgeous, in both the face and “figure” departments. I didn’t befriend them for that reason; that was merely a fact, which was born out by another fact: they each had several of our guy schoolmates either lusting after or sincerely smitten with them. Moiself, I had conversations, and phone calls. Initiated by those guys. About my friends. With the phone calls, it would typically take the guy who called me many minutes (sometimes over an hour – no exaggeration) to get around to the real reason for his call.
The most memorable of those calls went on for two hours, during which time Guy Friend® AC and I discussed, among other pointless diversions topics, the possible interpretations of the rock group Chicago’s song, 25 or 6 to 4. [6] AC was the most prolific phone caller: from his first call, [7] to every single time he called, I found out I had to talk around the reason he’d called me. If I asked him to directly confirm why he’d called, it would take even longer to get to the point – I would finally get around to dragging out of him what he was really after. [8] Which was always something along the lines of: was (my friend) RR going to be at the JV basketball game after school tomorrow, and if not, could I figure out a way to get her to stay after school and watch the game with me, so AC could at least see her there and maybe even get up the courage to talk to her by coming up to the stands after the game to talk with me ( he had no qualms in doing that because, he said, I was “easier to talk to” )?
After that 2 hr marathon of a call I had a case of dry mouth and brain. I schlumped into our kitchen, shaking my head to (I thought) moiself as I reached into a cupboard for a water glass. My mother was at the sink doing something. [9] She noted the puzzled look on my face and asked me what was up. I told her about AC’s most recent phone call (she was aware of his series of calls), and my other conversations with male friends about my female friends whom they had crushes on/wanted to date. I told her that I found it all so…odd, and silly. I couldn’t understand the obsessions; certainly, my friends had positive – and in some cases, outstanding – qualities, which is why I was friends with them. These guys are missing so much! They’re intimidated by, for example, LM’s and RR’s beauty or MB’s body…if they’d just talk to them, they’d see how much more they have to offer than their…uh, pulchritudinous-ness….
I was just sharing (what I thought of as) the cluelessness of my male friends and acquaintances. My mother either misheard or misunderstood the situation, and jumped to the conclusion that instead of being bemused on behalf of my friends I was disappointed by the fact that moiself was not the object of the same kind of attention. In an oh-so-awkward, cringe-worthy, kinda-joking-but-kinda not manner, she began to give me advice I’d not asked for, which began with: Perhaps I needed to find myself a less attractive group of girlfriends?….
Oh yes, she did.
I didn’t let her finish all of her thoughts. I walked away, once again gobsmacked by how someone I’d lived with for all of my life could seemingly not know me at all. Was I adopted by aliens, or I was I the alien, whom my parents had adopted?
A tender motherly insight, shared with her daughter:
If you hang out with homely girls you’ll look more attractive by comparison.
Gotcha. Message received.
Gee, thanks Mom!
When contemplating the phone call scenarios, never-had-I-ever thought about my own appearance vis-à-vis that of my friends’ until *you* brought it up. But now, I certainly (and forever, gawdammit, ’cause that’s how memory works [10] ) will.
Decades ago, when I first heard (what was to be a series of comments from friends and family) someone mention my mother’s and moiself’s facial similarities, I blurted out, “Yep, I got my mother’s bones – she’s 65 now, and I’d like to give them back.” My mother and I were the two in our family (of six) who looked the most alike, in terms of general facial structure. When I look back on her boner-of-a-mother-daughter-moment, it is because of this physical similarity [11] that I can forgive her ham-handed comments. I interpreted them as a reflection of her insecurities about *her* own appearance.
All these years later I realize how significant her blundering “counsel” was to me at the time. Fortunately, all these years later it doesn’t sting with freshness of that moment, but now and then I still feel the wispy, wistful regrets, re the fact that she never really knew me…and it’s too late now. There can be no answers to the questions I would like to pose to her, given the chance.
Also, once and again/as she was wont to do, my mother had failed at Communications 101. That could have been an intimate, kitchen-sink-conversational-moment between the two of us. I was not asking for her guidance; why couldn’t she have just listened, instead of providing the totally unsolicited (and truly wretched, ego-deflating) advice that in order to make myself seem more attractive – which BTW was not my goal in life (which she would have known had she paid the least bit of attention to *who* I was, and what kind of person I was striving to be) – I should hang out with homely females, or at least ones even less attractive than moiself.
For that incident, and a few others which followed over the years, I am soooooograteful for not growing up in the world of social media. I mostly put that situation – and my mother’s unintentionally [12] yet nonetheless degrading comment – out of my mind. Although it later reared its ugly head several times. [13]
Particular head-rearing examples from the After College Years®: on more than one occasion a man with whom I had a passing acquaintance/lives-down-the-apartment-hallway/met at a mutual friend’s party/co-worker kind of relationship, asked me about a friend/acquaintance/coworker of mine (or in one case, my younger sister). As in, he found her attractive and wanted my advice re asking her out.
Not for the first time I was bemused by the request, and not for the first time, my answer was hardly earth-shatteringly original: I encouraged him to approach her directly. Strike up conversations in the hallway and/or at the mailboxes; pay attention to cues…DUDE, just ask her. And not for the first time, such basic, straightforward advice of mine was countered with, You just don’t get it, followed by his confession that he found talking to “girls” difficult, to the point of being intimidated. “But, we are, at this very moment, are talking,” I would point out. To which he and all the other he’s over the years, would respond with a version of:
“Yeah but, this is different. I don’t know what it is,
but I can’t talk to a girl I find attractive.
Sure, I can talk with *you,* no problem….”
Each time it happened, I decided not to further enlighten the clueless Date Fail Men – [14] all of whom, with their obliviously demeaning comments, reminded me of my mother, in ways I didn’t see at the time.
Another reminder came from the source itself, from a letter my mother sent me when I’d been married for less than two years. Not long after MH and I had visited my parents at their home in Santa Ana, I received a four-page letter (two pages of a yellow legal pad, written on both sides) from her, the gist of which is that she and my father had found my then-current hairstyle unattractive.
Really. Four pages.
Some of the page space was devoted to examples of people she knew (mostly her age) who’d found a flattering hairstyle in their twenties and stuck with it. [15] Was it a matter of money, she posited? If so, she offered that she and my dad would be happy to pay a competent stylist…. Also, after my and MH’s visit, she felt moved to get out her favorite picture of me, the one where I’m waving goodbye to her and my father after they’d helped me move into the UC Davis dorms the fall of my freshman year. How sad, she wrote, that I now looked “ten years older” than I did in that picture.
Holy epitome of obliviousness. I look ten years older? Uh, yeah, I’ll take that. Mom – I am, as of this writing, almost *fourteen years older* than I was when that picture was taken. Cutting/styling my hair in *any* way ain’t gonna change that.
(And that wasn’t the worst comment/jab. She also wrote that the way I was currently wearing/styling my hair wasn’t how I had it when MH first met me…and implied that if I looked then how I looked now, he wouldn’t have been attracted to/married me).
After I got over my initial WTF!?!?!? shock, I xeroxed her letter, circled and numbered the major points she made ( so that she could see – and not deny – what she’d written), and wiped the floor with her obtuseness addressed them all in a letter of my own, which I attached to the copy of her letter. I was brutally upfront: Your opinion about my hair is the forest you can’t see for all the straggly trees in your way. Imagine how I felt, getting a four-letter page from my parents essentially telling me how old and unattractive they find me.
I reread the letter one more time before I sent my response, and realized what was at the root of the hairstyle red herring. Of their four children, I was the one who lived farther away from my parents. Several times I’d discussed with my siblings how, when I saw our parents in person, I was very cognizant that they were getting older. [16] This can be jarring for an adult child to realize, but it is also the Natural Order of Things ®. What we don’t often think about is that it can happen the other way. When I’d made the trip to SoCal (which prompted the haircut-diatribe letter) it had been almost a year since I’d seen my parents. For whatever reasons, I looked older to them. Now, if a parent notices that their adult child is getting older, what does that say about *their* own aging?
Here is the gist of how I ended the response to my mother, followed by my signoff:
I get it, Mom, even though you obviously don’t. Since we share some bone structure/facial similarity, if you notice that I seem older to you, well then, what does that say about *you*? I hate the be the one to break it to you, but you are – surprise! – getting older. And you need to deal with whatever issues you have about that before dumping your own insecurities onto one of your children.
I love you because you’re my mother, but I don’t like you very much right now.
She telephoned me as soon as she received my letter. She apologized, said she was so embarrassed for having sent the letter; she asked me to throw it away, and she promised that she would throw away her copy.
I can’t remember how I phrased my bald-faced lie. [17] I agreed with her request, even though I had NO intention of throwing that letter away – Are you effin’ kidding me? This is exhibit A. No way was I giving her the nonexistence of the letter as a proof of her likely denial ( “I never said, would never say, such a thing” ! ), should the subject ever come up again.
“If the veil of self-condemnation, inherited shame, religious fear, and psychological self-rejection were finally pulled back, we might discover something terrifying to systems built on control: that human beings are not cosmic mistakes in need of metaphysical cover-up. We are expressions of existence itself, carrying immense depth, creativity, consciousness, relational capacity, beauty, and becoming within us.”
May your safe driving inspire (or intimidate) your friends; May you talk to people you’re crushing on directly, instead of going through mutual friends; May you share the hidden meaning (if you figure it out) behind Chicago’s 25 or 6 to 4; …and may the hijinks ensue.
Thanks for stopping by. Au Vendredi!
* * *
[1] Those blog posts would be either the last Friday of June or first Friday of July.
[3] Psychologist and author Angela Duckworth and economist and Author Stephen Dubner.
[4] The FOMO experience…which sometimes seems to be the primary purpose of social media.
[5] Nutshell presentation: Social comparison helps us evaluate ourselves by comparing our traits and abilities to others. The upside: – upward comparisons may push us to improve; downward comparisons make us feel better about ourselves. Either way, comparing ourselves can also lead to misleading judgments about our abilities.
[6] (aside from it’s amazing guitar solo, what was the song really about?)
[7] We were somewhat friendly and were in a couple of classes together. The first call came as a surprise, as he’d never asked for my phone number. He must have gotten it from that retro form of information dissemination, the phone book.
[8] I never hung up on him; the calls – thanks in great part to MY conversational skills –wandered into some really interesting and entertaining territories (e.g. music and art and politics)…. Or so I thought when I was seventeen.
[9] Not the dishes – that was my after-dinner chore.
[10] Many a psychological and/or neurological study has shown that “…insults linger longer than praise or compliments….” (“Spoken Insults Stir Up More Brain Activity Than Compliments And Linger For Longer, Too,” sciencealert, 9-4-22), and that humiliation is the strongest emotion we can feel (“Does This Brain Research Prove That Humiliation Is the Most Intense Human Emotion? Wired.com)
[11] Which I always found ironic, once it surfaced, as we were the two least alike (re interests, personalities, worldview) in the family.
[18] “free-think-er n. A person who forms opinions about religion on the basis of reason, independently of tradition, authority, or established belief. Freethinkers include atheists, agnostics and rationalists. No one can be a freethinker who demands conformity to a bible, creed, or messiah. To the freethinker, revelation and faith are invalid, and orthodoxy is no guarantee of truth.” Definition courtesy of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, ffrf.org
Department Of Things I Love To Say ( Or Even Think )
This one came to me after returning from an early morning walk and passing the fruit tree in our front yard: “It’s time to pare the pears.”
Gotta make sure the branches stay healthy and will be able to do their holiday duty, supporting the Partridges we host in our pear tree every Yuletide.
* * *
Department Of What Would Sir Paul Do?
If it had been anyone else’s post, I might’ve sent a private message along the lines of,
“Check your account. I think you’ve been hacked. Someone posing as you posted an embarrassing, cringe-worthy, face-palmingly clueless, humble-brag-of-a-tone-deaf…”
Why did I keep reading after the first sentence, of theyou’ve-gotta-be-fucking-joking-but-no-apparently-it’s-serious post I saw on a friend’s social media page? I’m still asking moiself that question: Department Of Why Didn’t I Just Scroll Past After The First Line… Like I’ve Done 1000 Times Before?
As for the post’s last sentence/request: “I would love to hear what others have experienced!”
Really. I really doubt it.
I loathe that which makes me experience one of my least favorite states of mind: being embarrassed on behalf of someone else (if you know what I mean and I think you do)…
…regardless of how strong, or so-weak-as-to-be-essentially-nonexistent their connection is to moiself .
Readers of this blog, and anyone spending a modicum of time on Social Media Sites, likely have at least one acquaintance among their group of SMS friends fitting this criteria: they are someone whose friend request you accepted on behalf of a childhood/long-ago friendship you had with them, even though your present relationship is for all intents and purposes nonexistent, or merely social media functional…. [1]
So, why not, Department Of I Should Just Let It Go, Right?
Instead…
Department Of Yep, I’m Gonna Do It
A burning bridge is perhaps not the best, or most apt, idiom for the situation. But for someone whom I (used to) respect, who posts such claptrap and then solicits responses…are they to get off Scott-free?
BTW: why is the expression Scott free, and not Andrew-free, or Thomas-free or Ian-free? A brief bit o ‘web research shows me that, first of all, the phrase is actually “scot-free” (one “t; not capitalized”), and is used to imply that one had escaped punishment, blame, or penalty for a wrongdoing. The idiom goes way back; it refers to medieval European financial penalties and has no relation to, say, a tax cheat named Scott.
Yet again, I digress.
Here is the claptrap post that frosted my butt:
“I thought it might be kind of cool to share some of the wonderful things that God has done for me in my life. Here’s one of my favorites:
Several years ago, at a very challenging point in my life, the upper hinge of a frequently used kitchen cupboard broke in half when I went to open it. Not knowing what to do and feeling utterly overwhelmed, I asked God to please send me some help for it. I assumed He would soon bring across my path someone who could fix it, a common enough answer to prayer. But a few minutes later, as I went about my tasks in the kitchen, I gingerly went to open the broken cupboard, only to find that the metal hinge was now completely fixed and restored to an unbroken state. My Miracle of the Hinge 💖
I would love to hear what others have experienced!”
Yep. That’s it.
Again, regarding that last sentence: Unless the what others have experienced would be self-delusional -reinforcing, along the lines of the proverbial choir singing to itself ( “Jesus found my lost car keys when I was late for the PTA meeting *and* removed that pesky grass stain from my husband’s trousers!” ), it’s strongly likely the poster really doesn’t want know what others are experiencing.
The poster is someone I knew from…
…and our current relationship/only point of contact for the past decade plus is that we’re social media friends in, as I earlier mentioned, The Way That One Often Does® with old friends who have morphed into acquaintances. It’s because of posting like the above that I’ve had to silence this person’s posts every once in a while. But this one….it felt patronizing to *not* respond in some way.
But Paul’s currently on tour and doesn’t return my texts. So, here’s the reply [2] I wanted to make, but didn’t:
Are you fucking kidding me?
* All over the planet, sincere and desperate people are appealing to their god(s).
* Many (if not the majority) of these prayers for intercession/assistance are directed to the deity whose belief in/worship of they share with you (aka Yaweh; “The Christian” god; Jesus Christ ).
* Many (if not the majority) of these prayers for intercession/assistance are asking for help in situations far more dire and consequential than that of malfunctioning kitchen hardware. They’re asking for help in surviving/preventing/healing from
– chronic, fatal, debilitating, painful and humiliating illnesses; – horrendous, disfiguring and disabling accidents; – vicious physical and sexual assaults; – persecutions based on religious, gender, sexual orientation and civil rights identities; – soul-crushing betrayals by loved ones; – death and destruction from hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes and other natural disasters; – school children gunned down in their classroom; – the devastation caused by wars, armed conflicts, and acts of terrorism
There are recordings of terrified passengers on the Sept 11 United Airlines flight 93, praying with a 911 operator, a family member, and even telephone answering machines…. Despite those prayers for help – as heartfelt and sincere as ever such a plea could be, considering the circumstances – their hijacked plane plummeted down, killing all aboard.
Your god, [3] whom you believe has the ability to act in the natural world (which you believe it has created), has dropped the ball on countless of these and other “please send me help for…” requests – requests which so many of my friends and family and neighbors and coworkers have shared with me. These people are/were true believers in your same god, and had to/have to juggle and justify the devastating silence from that same god, as they, their loved ones, and the entire world continue to suffer.
Your fellow Christians call out for help to your god, both alone and in groups, as the false comfort of scriptural promises lie flaccid on the pages of their holy book. [4] Their god, your god, idly stands by, effectively deaf when it comes to rescuing the displaced Nigerian Christian woman, who screams Someone help me! Help me Jesus! as she is beaten and gang-raped in the refugee camp…and yet this god somehow found time to save you from the hassle of your allegedly broken cabinet hinge.
‘Twas interesting to do a bit of self-analysis on my reaction to this post, on why moiself ultimately decided I needed to write about it. Is it because I used to be a part of that world – or, at least I let everyone think that I was – and I carry guilt over not speaking up sooner/more often at the ultimately harmful (even if surface-seemingly silly) ideas that were propagated by it?
Translation: I should’ve called bullshit more often than I did, and I didn’t.
May you examine your criteria for what constitutes a miracle; May you take Sir Paul’s advice better than I did; May you remember that it’s never too early to prep a soft landing spot
for any partridges that may want to nest in your pear tree; …and may the hijinks ensue.
Thanks for stopping by. Au Vendredi!
* * *
[1] As in, every now and then they do post some adorable animal videos.
[2] language toned down, if you can fucking believe that.
[3] Whom you believe exists so I will write as if it does…but I do not capitalize the name god, seeing as how it is not a proper name…and even if your deity existed its name would not likely be, god.
[4] “Whatever you will ask in my name, I will do it, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. (John 14:13; World English Bible; ) “Again I say unto you, that if two of you shall agree on earth concerning anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for them by My Father who is in Heaven.” (Matthew 18:19 KJV )
[5] “free-think-er n. A person who forms opinions about religion on the basis of reason, independently of tradition, authority, or established belief. Freethinkers include atheists, agnostics and rationalists. No one can be a freethinker who demands conformity to a bible, creed, or messiah. To the freethinker, revelation and faith are invalid, and orthodoxy is no guarantee of truth.” Definition courtesy of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, ffrf.org
Active, reliable, sarcastic, affectionate, bipedal, cynical optimist, writer, freethinker, parent, spouse and friend, I am generous with my handy supply of ADA-approved spearmint gum and sometimes refrain from humming in public.
