The Place...

Her fingers slowly caressed the detail, the molding, and pondered over who used to sit here every day until their death... 

This ancient chair had withstood where so many others were lost to compost and sawdust. She glanced across the grass to what looked like it used to be a recliner... beside it, a love seat of ghastly floral fabric, looking quite newer compared to most of the others. 

She released the back of the steel chair, it's cushioning long since disintegrated, and resumed wandering through the field, pausing over whatever seat caught her eye, wondering at the past lives who sat upon them. A small high chair of sky blue brought a tear, but it was by no means the only chair here meant for a child. She paused under an old oak, a small stool top, its legs seeming to have long ago rotted away from beneath it. She bent down, brushed some decayed leaves and dust from its surface. Her fingers traced some of the faded painted lines... 

A sound.

She glanced up and, a few yards away, spotted an elderly woman tenderly resting a hand upon a dining chair of some sort. Probably lost her husband, the young girl thought. I hope someone else helped her carry the chair here... looks quite sturdy and heavy for someone of her age...

She stayed, bent over the stool top under the oak, just watching, not wanting to disturb the woman in her grief.

She wondered if the old woman had someone to watch over her... someone to carry her chair here when she passed on. This is a morbid place, isn't it? She glanced around the field, the chairs of all sizes and variety, hoping the woman had some sort of caretaker that had walked her here to remember her loved one. Ah, yes, that must be her son, she thought, spying a sturdy fellow a few more yards past the senior.

She stayed silent. To do otherwise would have seemed rude, and this long? Like spying. No, let the old woman grieve in peace, she'd be leaving before too long.

And almost as soon as the thought had crossed her mind, she did realize the late hour. A darkening of the light, a slight chill to the air. Glancing back, she realized the others were indeed gone. Did I doze off? 

Standing, brushing the leaves from her dress, careful not to disturb the stool top, wrapped her shawl a bit more tightly about herself. Mother would be wondering where I've gotten off to. She sighed, did a small turn, trying to get her bearings...

She started off, darkness seeming to fall much faster. Fog began to roll in, and she stepped a bit faster. How did it get so late? Mother will kill me! Hurrying faster now, the strange sounds of night invading. Did she pass that chair before? It didn't look familiar... Was she? Did she get turned around?

"Sophie?"

She turned quickly in the direction of the sound.

"Sophie? Is it you?"

It was the old woman from earlier! She was sure of it. Spotting a shape in the fog, she cried "It's me, yes," and started down the small hill... None of this looks familiar! "It's me, Sophie, you are?"

"Sophie?" 

Further away now. She paused, confused. This dastardly fog was helping anything! Started forward again and ran straight into a chair!  "Ouch!" Oh god I hope no one saw that! She grabbed the chair to stand it back upright. 

"Oommph!" Backed right into another! Stop this, Sophie, just stop, you're frightening yourself! Stop, breathe. Focus.

She stood, re-wrapped her shawl. "Hello? Is anyone still there?" 

No response. She turned slowly in a circle. Peered through the fog. There! She saw the path! The path back home! Stepping carefully, feeling for chairs in front of her, she made her way to the edge of the Place as quickly as she dared. She could see the torches, dim, but getting brighter as she neared the path, the path that headed back up the side out of the valley. 

So foggy! was still on her mind as she finally reached the edge of the field, through the metal gates, and began following the trail up. She didn't help Mother with the younger ones, so she'll be cross about that. She wasn't there to put the chickens up either, but her brother was getting old enough to handle some things on his own. She hoped. 

She stepped quicker.

Past the Meyers... There was Squid's cabin, yes, yes... Okay, getting close... Oh dear, a chair outside of the Cranshaw's door, she'd have to inquire who passed, she couldn't remember anyone being sick... The old sawmill, okay, getting close! It couldn't be too late, the torches were still lit down in the Tomas' barn... 

Ahh, home! She raced up--why is the door latched?! She tried it a few times, wiggled. But I see light... Mother must be cross! She stopped, composed herself. Walked over the side to the window where generous amounts of light poured out--

Was that the old woman? From earlier? What was she--?

Sophie knocked on the glass, "Mother! Mother, it's me, I'm so sorry!"

She could see the old woman holding her mother's hand across the table, but neither of them looked up or acknowledged her. She tapped harder on the glass, "Mother! Mother! It's Sophie! I'm ever so sorry I'm late, please let me in, please!"

"Mother, this isn't funny, please open up, I'll catch a chill!"

Oh, she is cross! Sophie leaned against the glass with both hands, "Mother! Please!"

They glanced up and she waved at them excitedly! "I'm sorry, Mother, I'm so sorry, I... Mother?"

"I don't understand..." They were ignoring her! They just turned away, started talking again as if she weren't standing right there! 

Getting angry... 

"Mother! Let me in!"

***

"She's here, you say?"

"Yes, very close now... Closer than earlier."

"Is she all right?"

"Not at peace, no... no, not at--"

tap-tap-tap!

"That was her! At the window, just now!"

"Oh no! My poor daughter! No-no-no-no-no-no! Why? I don't understand?"

"Her chair, you know it's her chair!"

"But it's all I have of her! I can't let it go, I just... I can't..."

The old witch placed a consoling hand on the sobbing mothers head.

TAP-TAP-TAP!

"Oh god, oh god, why doesn't she stop?!"

"Until you place her chair in the Place, her soul will try to come back! Always! It's why we started the Place! The souls will always come back to their chair! By keeping it here--"

"I just wanted to keep a memory..."

"I know, dear, I know..."

BAM-BAM-BAM!

"The whole house! She's--"

The front door slammed open--

"Sophie! Stop this at once!"

A cold wind howled through the door, putting out the candles, pitching the house in blackness...

Unlearning...

He was upset. Visibly upset. I hovered on the edge, like I do... Think, Jason, what can you do? What can you say? How do I make this better?

I had nothing though. Absolutely nothing. So I just sat. Listened to him talk. Reached out a hand...

And as I sat there, just listening, unable to fix the issue, it dawned on me.

---

I wasn't being yelled at.

---

I had to stop listening to him as my brain asked me to listen to it. He didn't seem to notice. It seemed to be enough that I was just sitting there, listening, Uh-huh-ing...

I'm not being blamed either... Huh...

This was new and exciting for me, though I hesitated to show it. I mean, he was still upset, talking about his issue. How odd would it be for me to start grinning like an idiot during his time?

I shut my brain off, kept listening...

And he just talked. I offered some advice here and there, a word of encouragement...

But it was all so... non-dramatic.

Bizarre, right? No screaming. No yelling. My animals were all just laying around, pricking an ear in our direction every now and then. Phoenix yawned from the coffee table. Merlin napped peacefully in his lap as he spoke. Gizmo slept on the cushion behind my head. The other cats, Beaux and Artemis, were off being all catty, content with their god-like status for the moment...

I was still baffled, but another part of me whispered, This is how it's supposed to be...

I'm usually the calm, chill dude. I'm not a wave-maker. (Maybe that's why I never cared for Wind Waker? Nah... too much of a stretch...) I go silent when upset, will spit out a short sentence or two, and I'm done for the most part. It's rare I nurse a grudge (consciously), I'm just "go with the flow," as it were...

To have someone else responding in a similar manner? I was a bit off guard. For the next few hours, he was fine. I was waiting for another shoe to fall. "Sure you're good? Nothing else you want to say?"

"Nah, I'm good."

"Okay," I replied warily... I wasn't trained for this... this calm. This serenity. This "I had an issue and I processed it and I'm good" scenario... Surely a storm was coming, right? 

For the next few hours--okay, okay, days, who am I kidding? I waited. Surely something would be thrown, a verbal insult. An attack on my character. A blame for something I had no control of yet he did... I played whole scenarios in my mind, coming up with plans to prevent the issue, a snarky comeback or three, I argued with him in my head, so I would be prepared, you know? I'm supposed to not only be prepared but fix, mediate, control! That's what I do!

---

Nothing.

---

The lack of drama was... disconcertingly nice... Strangely epic, if I can use so grandiose a word for its antithesis. The next day, the day after even... Zen...

"Thanks honey."

What?

"Thanks for listening the other day. I really appreciated it."

And that was that. The end.

I wanted to cry, oddly enough.

I'm still fighting the demons of the past, as we all do. The demons we gather in life, through trials and tribulations, through troubles and scars. We are trained, taught, conditioned...

And something comes along and doesn't add scars. Doesn't add pain. Doesn't create storms. Doesn't add drama for dramas' sake.

It's disorienting.

I'm left dizzy because nothing happened.

I have some unlearning to do.

What is Love? Baby Don't Hurt Me...

---

Love is like oxygen!

---

Or so we're led to believe, aren't we? When you're growing up, love is a weird lesson to learn. Even as a small child, kissy faces, being told to tell people you love them (we even start this with babies learning to talk--"Do you love momma? Say I love you Momma!"). Then the movies, stories, television commercials, billboards... Love is advertised as everything and anything, the most ultimate prize and goal, the way things should be, with that special person, your soul mate...

As you get older? First crushes... teases and questions from family... more movies...

---

Love lifts us up where we belong!

---

And let's not forget other factors... Eternal love and all that... Unconditional love... Unrequited love... So many kinds! It's like you go from the simple shit most of us experience (parental love, sibling love, etc...) to all these other loves... boyfriend or girlfriend... best friend... random acts... And so you filter these through your brain while others growing up around you (and not around you, the world over) get their definitions of "love" through their cultural examples and families and friends... Everything is tainted and rose-colored-lensed and culturally based and you run in to more and more differing types of people with differing backgrounds and different concepts...

And the whole while you are supposed to find your "perfect match," your "one and only."

The romantic in me loves (there's that word again) that notion... The realist in me scoffs at it. The jaded grumpy old man in me says "Pshaw! Get off my lawn!"

---

All you need is love!

---

 I am a firm believer in unconditional love. I think if you profess love, and dissect your feelings and find a person you may be compatible with, you take them, faults and all, to the end...

Or, at least, I used to. My defition has changed a bit after this last go 'round...

Not that I think you can't love unconditionally. But "love" is not "like," and "love" is not "love" if said love makes you unhappy... And I'm also not a proponent of happiness being a goal either--happiness isn't and shouldn't be anyone's goal, in my opinion. Contentment? With what you have? But being able to still desire the best you can have while content with what you already do possess? It's a mix of all that, sure...

But one thing is clearer to me now, something no one had ever told me until very recently... You can love someone and still not put up with behaviors and actions that are harmful to them and you--especially you. You can love someone and not have to live with someone. You can love someone? And sever all ties with them.

And that's okay.

And it's also okay to find love again, as long as you remember lessons of the past, while keeping hope for the future...

What is love? It's a complicated fucking ideal that is simultaneously unattainable and still realistic. It's scary and weird and childish, yet still one of the most adult choices you can make. It leaves you strong AND vulnerable, nervous AND confident, giddy AND somber...

And as I once again embark on a new chapter and journey, fear-filled, anxious, excited, vulnerable, and stronger? I once again ask myself "What is love?"

And my heart whispers back Baby, don't hurt me... don't hurt me no more...

Once Upon a Time...

No, no... scratch that...

It was a dark and stormy night...?

No... Definitely not that...

Remember back in the day, before a buffoon was in charge of the United States?

It's hard to remember sometimes, I know.. and it's only been ten insanely ludicrous months...

Feels like forever... And writing? Well... it's a lot like exercise. You don't do it a lot, you get kind of rusty and creaky and before you know it, you sound like Rice Krispie cereal waking up in the morning...

Okay, I sound like Rice Krispies anyway when I wake up in the morning.

---

Jason 3.0: Now With Sound Affects!

---

So getting back in to this isn't quite like riding a bicycle, but also not quite like how a three year old knows instinctively how to reprogram and update your latest smart phone. Life has changed so drastically from the minute details all the way up through the grand picture of the forest, sometimes it's hard to know where to begin. Change the look and feel of the blog? Find a new blog platform? Just write long statuses on facebook so people can "TL/DR" it?

But I missed this. Quiet evenings, breeze from the west, traffic moving in the background, cats lounging, dogs (if Chihuahuas still count as dogs, that is) on either side pressing against my hips, sipping an iced coffee, and writing whatever pops into my head, whether a story, something religious or political, a short "Dear Diary" type entry...

I did this for me. Only for me. This was mine... And is again mine. I have the quiet moments again. Have reclaimed my time, as it were, from the chaos and imminent and spontaneous problems and issues that seemed to happen weekly, if not daily...

To be able to just sit and be...

I used to think it was silence that I valued above all else. Having grown up in a quite (not chaotic but) loud home, silence was always hard to come by... four other siblings all close in age, most (if not all) of my mother's immediate family on the same country road (in spitting distance, as they say), there was never a shortage of family and loudness...

I find it's actually a lack of chaos I crave most. I can block out noise pretty good, ignore sounds, other people, music, video games... (Thanks, family!) One thing we never had to worry about growing up was imminent danger or unexpected chaos. Our home may have been loud and with spontaneous moments large families always create, but there was never a worry about disasters and emergencies, not that I was aware of anyway. Most drama surrounded who was arguing with who in the family, or what sibling had taken another siblings toy or item without asking. There was a steady rhythm of stability. Not calm, not silent, but stable.

I like stable. I crave stable. I need stable.

And coffee. Obviously.

And while I cannot create a stable, normal, calm government for my fellow Americans (or the rest of the world), I can, and am, creating a stable environment for myself, in so much as I am able. I can't tell what the future holds. I know Mississippi now thinks people can willy-nilly discriminate against The Gays because "Jesus" (see here), and given the current political climate, who am I to say whether my world here in Florida will remain calm and stable? The oh-so-poor-and-persecuted "Christians" may target my lovely state next for a fascist rebellion against fellow Americans...

But until then?

I shall be calm. Stable. Serene when I can... and blog...

Once upon a time...

Jason 3.0

Life...

& Otherwise...

It still amazes me how life twists and turns unexpectedly...

But then again, I'm not crazy... And I have a therapist to prove it... However, my taste in men notwithstanding, 10 months post-breakup, 6 months post his moving out (hella long story there)? If anything, I'm a hopeless, helpless romantic...

The therapist said I wouldn't be single long... not because I'm all that and a bag of chips, not because I get lonely, not because I have emotional issues around being with someone... I tend to make up my mind quickly when I like something... I'm not one to stay on the pot, as it were. I'm there, I shit, I move on. Lessons learned, but as we all know, some lessons need to be relearned in under circumstances, with new kinds of crazy...

Are there new kinds of crazy? Well, new to me... After years with a paranoid-schizo, this last time with bipolar ADHD, the new one seems to have the same issues I do. We like what we like, we don't take compliments well (though we try), we've both been burned by the exes and dealt with drug abuse, emotional abuse, mental abuse... It sucks that I do tend to have battered wife syndrome, constantly apologetic, increased heart rate and concern whenever a car drives by with uber-loud speakers at any point of the day...

What the fuck has happened to me?

Ugh. Making it through. Dealing, talking, finding the me moments again... Can I just say how stress-free it is to be able to walk around my bed again? To have books on bookcases again? To see my floor, even though I still hate that it's white and always looks dirty?

I can see my dirty floors and that makes me happy.... File that under sentences you don't hear every day...

I don't have near the patience I used to have. Not even close.

I still have a trusting naive streak, to be sure. Sometimes I love this part of my personality, sometimes not so much.

I still love sitting outside and listening to the rain.

I love my chihuahuas, even though they aren't mine by choice but by circumstance, and I'll still tell you they are the most annoying little shits ever created by mankind... but I love them regardless. I will have a real dog again one day, though, and never again own a dog under 20 pounds. Fucking chihuahuas...

I still have dreams. I will own a house, though I've certainly been set back. I will marry a man I love one day, and he will love me back the way every human should be loved.

I'm still afraid of failure.

I'm still afraid of getting into "trouble," though at 41 years old, you would think I'd have kicked that stupid fear to the curb by now... Ugh... grow up religious with a meek, naive, trusting personality... you'll understand.

I still love to read, draw, and garden. I'm sprouting three avocado trees as I type this, along with a myriad of tropical and subtropical plants I still don't know most of the names of six years later after moving to Florida, but I love growing them nonetheless.

I still love love.

I still adore upbeat music with a steady beat and a catchy melody. I also still love a good angry rock song when the mood calls for it.

I still like me, although I don't think I've ever really loved me like I do these days. It's rough growing up thinking you have to be perfect as Jesus was perfect. You hear it every day for 18 years, it does something to a brain. Religion fucks with everyone though. (Cue excuses about religion versus "spirituality" and the like... and then insert my mega-eye roll...)

I will always, always roll my eyes. That much I can guarantee is unavoidable and genetically ingrained into my being...

What is it to be a normal, functioning human?

I'm not sure anyone knows, but a lot of people like to pretend to know.What I do know is that I'm about as normal as I'm ever gonna be.

I'm still going to need the Lady of Shallot print above my couch in the living room, no matter where I live, as long as I live...

I'm still going to need to have bookcases filled with books, with subjects as vast and different as there are subjects to write and read about.

I'm still going to have to have pizza every week.

I realize these aren't needs and are very much first-world problems, as it were.

Saying "need" when it should be "want" is also a pet peeve unless it's me doing the needing/wanting... But we're also all a little hypocritical sometimes too.

I am Jason 3.0.

I am me. I am not perfect. But I'm doing the best I can.

What else is there to do?

This is Life... & Otherwise...

Battle for the Jade Dragon (Part 1 of ___)

He stared grimly through the bushes atop his mount... Seven? No, there were eight guards, the usual. Their bright green skin was an offense, to be sure, no less so than the very metals purged from the earth that made up their armor and weapons...

So he gazed beyond them, upon the sacred Jade Dragon...

Forged from the stones and metals deep in the belly of the earth, by his kin, it now stood as beautiful as ever, in the temple of the sky lizards. Sunlight, wind, rain... all of the elements that were the enemy of the earth and her rocks and minerals, beating mercilessly upon it's exquisite jade surface... Even now he could see how the wind had eroded some of the scaling features of her sides, the rain mercilessly rubbing down the fine points of the horns of the Dragon's crest.

Treasonous. No, sacrilegious.

Even still, breathtaking...

Disgusted, one last look toward the guard to make sure they hadn't spotted him among the leaves, he steered the mole away and gingerly, quietly, crept back to the entrance below, to the warm and comforting tunnels of the earth.

"Well?"

"Dragon's scales, let me at least breathe deeply among the dirt before you badger me, Gillian!" Onyx swept down from his saddle. He pulled a few root shoots from a pouch on his side and fed them to the mole as he patted her down, the dusty crumbles beneath his toed claws giving him comfort.

Gillian tapped his own feet impatiently while his hatchtwin went about his routine.

"Not heavily guarded, not even by upsider standards," he suddenly said.

Gillian looked up quickly. "Doesn't that seem... suspicious?"

"Of course it does!" Onyx snapped disdainfully. He wrapped the mole's reins about a larger root jutting from the side of the tunnel before he pushed his way past his brother. "Everything about this seems suspicious! The building and placement of the temple, how we got the information that they were placing the Dragon there, our sister--our sister--marrying one of those disgustingly bright green creatures! I can't even begin to think..." He stopped walking abruptly, Gillian almost running into his backside.

"What?"

"Have you heard from her?"

"Our sister? Ha! How would I even! The very coupling that was supposed to join our peoples has done nothing but drive us further apart! Like an Earth Lizard of the dirt could ever join with... with them!" Gillian spat out the word and the poison from his mouth singed the dirt at their feet. "If father had been alive, never would we have witnessed such a ridiculous spectacle, let alone entertained such... ugh."

"Still, three moon cycles of watching, the guard watch never changes. Always eight guards, one at each pillar of the outer circle. I thought briefly today they were missing one, but no... Even as they congregate to bow before Jade Dragon and offer the statue fruits and leaves--pshaw! Fruits and leaves... As if! But always... Always eight guards..." he trailed off thoughtfully.

"Perhaps they think we've given up on getting it back?"

"Don't be such a hatchling, Gillian. No... No, they are quite aware of our desire to see our prize back... I suspect a trap of some type... It's too... Too..."

"There you are!" From the darkness approached a guard. "The queen wants to see you both right away, the upsiders are amassing troops--"

"Get up!" Onyx shouted and grabbed the lizard by his cuff, pulling him up on two feet. "You are a member of the royal guard, you slithering skink! Next time I see you running about like an upsider on all fours I will gut you from fangs to tail, do you hear me!"

Gillian stifled a giggle.

"S-s-s-sorry, my prince, sorry, I--"

"Silence! Stay here--on TWO FEET, skink!--and guard this entrance, collapse it if needed, if any of the upsiders get too close. Gillian, let's go..."

***

She sat upon a throne carved from part twisted trunk roots, part jet-black coal. Rubies and diamonds adorned the sides and back of the seat while floating orbs of light made them glisten and shine in the dark grand cavern of the queen. Long folds of rat and mole hide covered her scales, small gems embroidered into the hems and cuffs. Upon her crest horns sat a gold crown intertwined with roots of the oak.

The queen herself, however... It hurt Onyx's eyes to see such a fat, slovenly thing upon his father's throne... He could only assume she had been beautiful once, enough to catch his father's yellow eyes and seat her beside him... Her dull scales, grotesque jowls, bits of unshed skin clinging between scales here and there... While the war with the upsiders had made life a bit harsher, unshed skin? Dull scales? Her claws were twisted and overgrown, and the fur robes did little to hide the mounds of flesh that squeezed against and between the gaps of the throne itself...

He and Gillian bowed low before their stepmother. "My queen--" he began.

"About time you skinks got here! Do you have any idea what has been happening?"

"My queen, Gillian and I were scouting--"

"Shut up, I don't care about your silly quest for that silly statue! Onyx, you and your cult have been nothing but a thorn in this campaign against upsiders with your stupid obsessions and superstitions--"

"My queen--"

"Do not interrupt me again!" She lunged forward with a quickness that betrayed her size, several claws suddenly against his throat. He could smell the venom on her breath as she leaned in close. "You forget yourself, Onyx. Do not try me."

She dropped him to the dirt floor and leaned back once again into the groaning throne.

She continued as if nothing has happened. "Your stupid superstitions... That dragon statue is nothing if our kingdom continues to be invaded from upsiders as they dig and mine for more of our dirt and stones and metals! And now--now they have amassed near the topside of the lake! Our lake!" she screamed the last, slamming claws down upon the throne. "I need not remind you what happens if the earth top collapses down into our main water supply?"

"No, my queen."

"Forget about your silly statue. You are a prince. Military trained. Skill trained. Kill trained. By the venom of my ancestors, you will do your duty and protect this kingdom."

"Yes, my queen."

"Then go. I do not want to see your skinny scales again until that lake is safe."

"Yes, my queen." Onyx stood, grabbed his brother and exited.

***

(To be continued...)

The Broken States of America...

I continue to cry off and on since the news of the shooting in Orlando in which 49 of my fellow LGBT Americans lost their lives... I haven't felt this way, honestly, since 9/11... I imagine this is what it may feel like to have ADHD--constantly losing train of thought, drifting out of my mind on even menial tasks... While I personally knew no one who was affected (thankfully!) and, as far as I know, none of my friends were either, we have all seemed to express a melancholy, an effervescent intangible weight of sadness... 

And now Trump is fucking talking... I hate this man... If anyone embodies hate and vitriol, who piles wood on the pyre just waiting for someone to light a match? It's this man. Much like Kilgrave never owned up to how he forced people to kill, never owning up to his personal responsibility, Trump just...

Ugh... this isn't supposed to be about this goddamned motherfucker.

Our safe space was violated. Not for the first time, not at all... between New Orleans in 1969, the Stonewall Riots that same year, to the hundreds of other group and individual attacks on our person throughout the ages... We have been attacked, murdered, for... why? What is it LGBT persons do to threaten the rest of the community? What is it about the very existence of those whom are in a minority that enrage, anger, and upset others to the point that our deaths are required?

I just... I feel so lost and adrift... a tad afraid, truth be told. This maniac lived just one hour north of me, yet drove himself two hours further north to reign death upon my people, my fellow humans, my LGBT brothers and sisters... An American killing fellow Americans...

For what?

Hold on--#TRUMP!!!-- this is NOT about immigration, this is NOT about #Hillary or #Obama or #syrian refugees!!! Sweet Odin's ass, SHUT UP YOU STEAMING PILE OF SHIT!!!!

Ugh! Anyway... I shouldn't be surprised, I suppose. Our lives are politicized over marriage, housing, bathrooms, jobs, equal protection under the law--why should I be shocked our deaths are as well?

Forty-nine more lives lost. Forty-nine brothers, sisters, sons, daughters, children, parents, uncles, aunts... Humans. Lost.

Should this conversation be about the intrinsic homophobia of the nation, the world? Gun control? Self-defense? It is usually said after something like this that it's "too soon." Don't mention these things yet, wait til passions and emotions have died down... It's not guns, it's a mental health issue... It's not Muslims, it's extremists... it's not religion, it's something else... it's not ______ (insert excuse of the day here...)

And I just can't anymore... My soul aches... My heart feels like it's bleeding out... I'm exhausted from the death... From when we as a nation said, "No, no, it's not guns" after Sandy Hook, where twenty young children died... when we decided the right to bear arms were more important than the next generation being educated in safety... Where every other industrialized nation on earth can not have this happening weekly, yet we do? And we think it's not about guns? At all? Not even a smidgen?

I'm also scared... Not terrified, but scared... Who is next? Where is next? L.A. almost had a similar incident to Orlando but for pure luck...

Pure. Luck.

I don't want to feel "lucky" to be alive. I don't want to be scared to be alive.

Who does?

From the posts celebrating the deaths of these people to the posts screaming to spread "God's love" to all the gays in the aftermath...

And it's a twist of the knife, honestly... Don't sit there and tell me how loving your Abrahamic god is when another just used his Abrahamic god to slaughter us. Don't tell me how much your god loves me when he just allowed forty-nine of us to be senselessly slaughtered, and certainly don't give me that freewill bullshit. The way I see it, the biggest difference between myself and your god? I'd have prevented their slaughter if I could have. Don't tell me you suddenly care about me and my people when you've been actively--actively!--been trying to pass legislation and laws that treat us as less equal, less deserving of rights and benefits, less deserving to use a fucking bathroom...

Don't even try to fucking tell me about your god when I expect YOU to be the decent human being you purport to be when all I've ever heard from you is condemnation, legislation, and hellfire preaching mixed with conditional love my whole fucking life.

My biggest fear right now? Is some of these poor people have family that don't even care that they are dead. Who won't claim their bodies. Who will bury them hastily, if they bother, and ignore or even lie, about who their loved one was, where they were when they died, who they loved in life... Right now, that's my biggest fear. Or that some church will refuse to give them a service because of who they were. Will refuse the family comfort and grieving services. Will refuse to acknowledge every facet of who these people were...

My second biggest fears are already reality--there are people celebrating this massacre, of every religious stripe. Muslims and Christians who are thinking, "good! they had it coming, living in sin like that!" Some of them are thinking it but too cowardly to say so... Others, if you have checked the links above, have no problem being overall assholes at this time...

And I weep even harder.

This country is broken. It is not the United States of America at all. Indeed, we are the awkwardly-living-together-refusing-to-be-a-melting-pot-any-longer States of America.

Better? The Broken States of America.

WWJS: Who Would Jesus Shoot?

We can't keep going like this. The mass shootings, the prevention of equality, the legislating of laws to prevent equality and opportunity for even the least among us... the systemic racism, misogyny, sexism, the purposeful class warfare...

We can't keep limping along, making excuses, and burying our dead every single fucking day, and claiming we can't fix this. Claiming we can't do anything about it. That we can't talk about it until tragedy stops happening.

Because at this rate?

Welcome to the Broken States of America... we'll get around to burying you sooner or later after we're done talking about how much we love our god, our guns, and our country--not in that order, and never in any meaningful way that's helpful to anyone else...

Newness...

This is your couch:

This is your couch on pets:

Any questions?

---

After 10 months of living in South Florida, I finally bit the bullet and purchased a sofa. Mind you, please: This is the first couch I've ever purchased. Not only is it the first couch I've ever purchased, it's the first couch that hasn't ever been owned by another family member or friend. (At this realization, I wasn't sure whether to smile or be a little sad, so I smiled a little sadly... I think you can understand...)

It's a step. Albeit only a $35 step, but I've always been a bit frugal and a lover of a great deal--not to mention my fair share of dumpster diving, but something about getting my couch out of an actual dumpster made me a bit squeamish, so I hit up craigslist and garbage nights in the area looking for curb deals, not dumpster deals, and found this navy-blue beauty, complete with queen size sleeper, no tears, no holes, no wear, no smells...

As I look back over the last 10 months here in the so-called Sunshine State, a lot of growing pains were to be had. I could no longer lean on my family except by phone; I could no longer count on my friends except by phone; I had to make myself vulnerable in ways I hadn't since the Army and college, putting myself out there to meet people, make friends, begin a new social network among the living--and it differed even then, because at least in the military and college, everyone there was there for a common purpose (defending country; higher learning), which of course allowed for a foundation of sorts for bonding with these strangers. Here? We had a common plot of land.

I've been hurt, yet I've been rewarded. I've been disappointed at times, and happier than I've ever been at other moments. Depressed beyond my own understanding of self, and elated at coming out knowing myself better. Finding out in news ways how I think, how I feel, what has made me who I am, and what I will allow to continue to make me into who I want to be, or perhaps even what I should be.

And to start with, I have a new couch.

Hell Week ...

A smattering of thoughts:

• My uncle tried committing suicide this week--although he claims not to remember doing any such thing.
• No one but preachers use cross references in a bible, and no one but preachers and those trying to impress others even read the god-damned thing from cover to cover--so why the fuck is it the best-selling book in the world? Vanity, pure and simple.
• People are assholes, which is why school shootings occur. It's at times like these where I agree with Ebeneezer Scrooge in that we need to rid the world of the surplus population--beginning with the shooter in Connecticut today. Although I will say
  • I am against the death penalty and
  • we would start with people like the shooter in Connecticut who did the world a favor and took himself out--just too late to save the non-surplus population
• Russia sucks. Yes, I said it. I mean it. Those poor god damned Russians...
• That last point had nothing to do with anything.
• But I like bulleted points, and I've had a full bottle of pinot grigio... That makes my opinions fact. You didn't realize?

Regardless--or, irregardless, which means the same thing but just sounds plain fancier--in less than 15 days I get to see my mother and father again. And my siblings. And my friends. I'm considering calling the ex for breakfast or lunch or something, but I'm, not feeling exactly charitable, despite the time of year, so that's up in the air... We'll see...

---

And I still miss my dog Hawthorne something terrible...

---

But there is a new one taking his place. Not that I don;t love Gizmo--the lil guy just tugs a heart-string I didn't know I had! But Maybel... My dear sweet Maybel... Kind, sweet, quiet, shy, gentle Maybel, of unknown parentage (excepting the mother, a black-and-tan German Shepherd whom she doesn't resemble in the slightest), of gentle nature and bottomless heart... I didn't know emotionally (although logically I did) that I could fall for another so soon--dog, that is. Smart as a whip, loving as a--well, a dog? I'm too tipsy to think that much outside the box at the moment, LOL!

IRregardless, it's winding down the end of a long, emotional year. Just a month ago last year, I started a new life filled with anxiety, worry, not just a bit of turmoil, and a hell of a lot of gumption, if I do say so myself. After all, who leaves an unhealthy relationship by moving across the country? Probably those of us too sick in the head to face life head on... Or maybe it's those of us who like to take things to the extreme by going to the exact opposite of what we had been doing for thirteen years? 

Perhaps I should just get a new goddamn therapist already and be done with it. Ce la vie... 

Now French--that's a freaking sexy language!

I've also decided to UNsubscribe from all the right-wing newsletters and bullshit. After all, it does nothing for my mood and everything for my high-blood pressure (which I don't have but would like to avoid, if it's all the same to you...), the breaking point being that asshole from the not-so-much "Family Research Council" using the Connecticut school shooting as a Christmas message! Really? Death to 5-year-olds makes you think "Now is the time to preach about baby Jesus!"? Seriously?? Talk about your surplus population. His ilk should be the next against the wall when the revolution comes... Given humanity's track record, however, that's still too far away... 
 
But where was I? Oh, yes... Surplus populations, amnesiac suicidal tendencies, and a partridge in a fucking pine tree.... 'Tis the season, my lovelies! Embrace the chaos, thrill in the weirdness of life, realize you cannot choose your family even though you can choose to love, and know this--it ain't over til the fat lady sings, and I ain't but sure that unless she top's the Guinness Book of World Records? She ain't the right fat lady... 

Until next time, my friends... I leave you with this tree, which the Blue-eyed Devil and I got for free.... :)

My First New Thanksgiving...

It's my first Thanksgiving that I'm not hosting...

Because my family is 1,200 miles away...

I'm used to two large banquet tables and a circular dining table added to one end. I'm used to two large turkeys cooking overnight, both easily over 25 pounds, started on Wednesday evening. I'm used to having 20+ guests--sometimes over 30!--coming to my home, eating, drinking, laughing...

To go from that, to just now unthawing a 10 pound turkey and cooking it for two...

With 80 degree weather outside....

It's odd, to say the least. I'm unsure if I'll have that experience again, honestly. How many stars would have to align to get the 16 people of my immediate family to come to Florida for me to ever do that again? How many heavens would I have to move, how many gods would I have to sacrifice to, to ever host in that way again?

I find myself missing the most poignantly, albeit of my own doing, starting a new life so far away.

***

But for a moment I shall digress and hop on my soapbox because someone just pissed me off with this photo:

1. It is *not* something to feel guilty about to want to spend time with your family on a holiday that has been around for 200+ years
2. It is *not* the same thing to be a soldier fighting for U.S. interests overseas (or even on home soil) and selling crap made in china at a national retailer
3. It is DEFINITELY okay to be PISSED that GREED on behalf of U.S. businesses are making you work--and probably threatening you with your job if you question it--on a day that SHOULD be spent relaxing, enjoying food and family, when there are 363 OTHER days of the year that people can enter your 24 hour a day establishment and buy cheap goods that are not supporting U.S. factories, let alone paying a wage above the poverty rate...

I can only assume that a Republican who thinks his right's are violated if he can't make slaves out of other Americans made such an asinine, stupid, insensitive poster...

Assholes.

I would wish you a hellish holiday, but that's not very nice, as the B.E.D. would say, so I'll simply say to the creator of this image?
FUCK YOU.
Fuck your greed for making your employees work just so you can make an extra buck when you barely pay them shit. Fuck your inhumanity for taking away one of the few days of the year when FAMILY should take priority over all else. Fuck you for trying to equate wanting to spend time with family with "unAmercanism" and "unpatriotism", especially because the wages you pay and the fact that you ARE making people work simply for your bottom line is the MOST unpatriotic, MOST unAmerican thing I can think of.
FUCK YOU.
***
Anyway, missing my family while staring at my paltry frozen turkey...

Luckily, I have an employer who pays a decent wage, allows me time off to spend how I wish, and has no urge to try to make me feel guilty about it.