Gun America

Gun America

Apr 12, 2023

As I am continually reminded of that other Marjorie, the one from Georgia, let me in part attempt to redeem my first name (albeit with a slightly different spelling!) with the quote above, of Marjory Stonemason Douglas. Just over 5 years ago, her namesake school in Florida was the site of yet another school shooting. Last week, a school in Tennessee was the site of yet another one, and this week – two days ago – there was a mass shooting at a bank in Kentucky, a state – like Tennessee and Florida – that is very gun friendly, and that ranks 13th out of 50 states nationwide in deaths from gun violence per the CDC.

I am numb to it all, yet – still I rage against gun huggers and their enablers in various governmental bodies across this country. And, I will do a dance of joy if and when (knock wood) the NRA is forever bankrupt and destroyed. I also live in a rural part of New York State where I was roundly criticized for, while acting a county legislator, not voting to condemn the NY Safe Act, a law that was passed in the dark shadow of the Newtown Ct. murders of 26 children and adults, twenty of them first graders. First graders.

Thoughts and prayers aren’t working. Banning assault weapons, weapons of war, does. The U.K. suffered one – one – mass shooting in an elementary school in Dunblaine, Scotland, in 1996 and as a result changed their firearms laws. Since then – crickets. It makes me ashamed to be an American, watching legislators prioritize guns over the lives of children, of adults, of all of us. Where next? Grocery stores, movie theaters, synagogues, churches, schools, concerts, dance studios, yoga classes have all been visited with mass murder, rendering them at least in part unsafe ~ where will we be slaughtered next because the selfish, stupid armed minority have bullied the majority of us into a state of resignation?

Charlie Sykes is a conservative pro-lifer whose anti-fascist, anti-trump podcast, The Bulwark, I occasionally listen to because while a number of his positions make me wanna scream and beat him over the head with a styrofoam donkey, it’s important to me to break my bubble with the views of others (and, he’s left the GOP, good choice, Charlie!). Plus, I am a big fan of Tim MIller whose 2022 book was an excellent autopsy of the road to the transformation of the Grand Ol’ Party into the GQP/Trmp party. Plus, he’s funny. But, back to Sykes. He recently penned the following, which I share here because he is 100% correct; if these mass killings were carried out by ISIS, imagine how quickly we would act. Instead, our mind-numbing almost daily rate of domestic terror attacks barely make an impression. Shameful. ‘Murica! We can and must do better. If I were growing up now, and saw shooting after shooting after shooting as well as how intransigent legislators were regarding gun safety laws, I wold be terrified, confused, and enraged, certain that the people in charge – the supposed adults in the room – were saying, to me and my peers, you all don’t matter. Guns matter. Sorry, kids!

The quote from Sykes’ newsletter, and good food for thought:

Instead of talking about the routine slaughter of children and our fellow citizens in schools, banks, nightclubs, and grocery stores, imagine we were talking about terrorist attacks. Imagine that there had been 145 attacks from members of the Sinaloa Cartel, or that dozens of airplanes had been hijacked and hundreds of passengers killed. Would Rick Scott merely offer thoughts and prayers? Would Ted Cruz suggest that we need more locked doors? Armored backpacks? More armed guards? More bans on drag queen story hours?

 

We must vote these assholes TF out.

The First Time: Bloody Sex

The First Time: Bloody Sex

Apr 11, 2023

*Here is the 2nd submission out of the universe I have contacted regarding this on-going project of ‘The First Time”. I invite any woman reading this, or the original post The First Time, to participate in the project, initiated toward a female centered sexual conversation and narrative about ‘the first time’ we – women and girls – had sex, because if I read or watch one more adolescent male story of cherry popping, I might start screaming, or – fall asleep, I’ve seen and read so many. BO-RING!!!

From A., mid-30s

He was sweet.

His room was warm, I was ready. At least I thought I was ready but I’m sure that I was propelled by the desire to graduate to some variation of adulthood by way of “losing it”. I wanted to be able to relate to everyone else and their talking about sex, I wanted to be desired, to be worthy, to fit in, to be relevant.

I didn’t make a sound.

I buried my face under the pillow in my pain and I pretended that it wasn’t so bad through the curtain of the pillow. He carried on as I bled and I don’t think that either of us said a thing for however long it lasted.

I bled so much I am sure this boy had to run his blankets out to the trash cans before his mother caught a whiff of it. I wonder to this day if he saved his high school money to buy a new duvet or if he had to make a grandiose excuse, maybe no one asked. I thought that maybe I had had bad timing and I just got my first period the same day as giving up my virginity and the keys to the younger realms. It was a lot. A cherry stream of blood amounting to the size of a small dead animal, into a tin can or a dumpster, and excommunicated from a memory.

After the act was over I remember feeling like I needed to go home and lock myself in my room. I had him drop me off at the top of the driveway and I ran upstairs, darting off my mother. I felt like everyone could read it and smell it on me, that if they saw me they would know that I was different now. I couldn’t let anyone see me, they would know and shame me. I didn’t want to talk about it after all. All that blood, sexual behavior, pleasure or pain. Hush, hush.

Despite the young lad’s tenderness it was rather traumatic and it took me almost a year to recover and try “it” again. I couldn’t bare to look at him anymore and I certainly didn’t want to touch him, so I broke up with him after a few silent weeks. He didn’t really do anything wrong but I was traumatized.

Blood didn’t come again during that time of keeping my legs closed, and so I started to take birth control to help induce my cycles. I felt that I had only earned this rite to womanhood with the power of the drug, but whatever, I could relate to my peers and was ready to be having “regular intercourse”. At the time I was sixteen and ready to grow up. I have always been an animal after all despite our society’s discomfort around the topic. I wanted to know what all this sex stuff was about for real if I was to be accused of being “a slut” after all.

I was eager to know, to experience, to check the box, to accomplish, to “feel good” so I started being sexual again but I still didn’t actually enjoy it. I don’t think it was really until my mid twenties that I started to understand how to enjoy sex. Partially because I was giving away my own power so therefore was attracting poor power-dynamics. Choosing the kinds of guys who would strangle me at parties while we made out, or all kinds of disgraceful things. Maybe because I was too easy, too ready and available, or because I had a bullseye on my vishuda, whatever it was was wafting from me and helping to create some pretty raunchy experiences.

__________________

From The Archive

From The Archive

Apr 10, 2023

*Hard to believe this journal of my father’s last months on earth was written over 10 years ago. This is the beginning. Thanks for reading, and if you want to pay tribute to a very good man, have a margarita! I turned him onto them in his last years on the brown and blue orb, and he really loved ’em.

Jan 30th, 2010

My father is sick and in the hospital with pneumonia and as a result I could not sleep last night. He will be eighty-two this July; I love him very much and last night this daddy’s girl got herself crying so hard over his eventual and natural demise I could not rest, relax and let go. Ridiculous and real, natural and foolish as I need to get my sleep so I can better support him; yet this is reality and while I feel sure we are many years from that hard and sad event, my imagination (blessing and curse) made me go there.

We had dinner this week; he was unnaturally exhausted but the evening before was his bowling night. He said he had stayed up until 1a.m. which is five hours past his usual bedtime. After bowling he goes out to the local pub with his best male friend, the one of few remaining close friends of his who is still alive, and they have a beer or two and a cigarette or two (I know, I know, I wish he wouldn’t but he is eighty and at this stage of his life…) but although he got home at 11:30p.m., he could not get to sleep. I now wonder if it was the illness already making itself known.

Last night he was immediately blossoming under the ministrations of several nurses who, as is right and natural, were instantly enslaved by his charm. My dad’s sense of humor is wonderful; he is also as smart as a whip. I have to get going if I want to fit in a visit with him before work and make sure his dog is okay. I hired a walker who will also be feeding my dad’s favorite female…Zelda Lou Miller, 7 years old with a delightful under bite and great gobs of long hair. Daddy, I love you. Do this for me, would you: get well soon.

February 2, 2010 — Another Letter to my Dad I will NOT sent. Probably.

Dear Dad –

You are not well but you will live, I gather, even if your life will be somewhat limited by your now 24/7 need to be hooked into an oxygen tank. This is very hard for me to see – you, less able, more infirm, unable to breathe without visible effort on your own – but I am pretty sure you will make the adjustment well (as will I, I hope) to this change. You have spoken, and spoken much too soon, about giving up bowling. I may have to drag your sorry ass there as to give up one of your great pleasures, and the social contact, the joy therein, would be a grave mistake, and it is early yet – maybe bowling will be possible and still fun for you. Wait and see; try it. I know it will not comfort you to hear that your sister-in-law, the bossy one who has lived in a retirement community since she was 49 years old, says that down there “people go everywhere and do everything with their oxygen tanks!” but I will tell you anyway. I know you don’t want people to see you with your tank, especially the women you especially like.

Last week I asked you about your dreams, if you dreamed, and you said you had been, lately. What about, daddy dear? My father is in them. Oh? And what was my esteemed grandfather doing in these dreams? Being a father, you said. I know you loved and respected him, and that you feared him, but I was very struck by those words, deeply. I now want you to know how like a father, and a great one, you have always been in my reality, in my life as well as in the lives of your three other children and your nine grandchildren. You do have a gruff exterior, you do like to grouse, to bitch and moan, yet you are a total softie within. You are smart, funny, and you will do anything for a laugh. You worked hard, so hard, in order that we all could have whatever lives we wanted, no college debt, and access to the best life had (has) to offer. The best life had to offer us was you: rolling us up and out of a giant towel back onto our bed as kids, telling us jokes or stories about life on the farm when you were young, playing gin rummy or spoons and puffing on your (goddammit) ubiquitous pipe, all while listening to us argue or tell stories of our own, and – loving our mom.

One of the best things you ever did for us was not take us personally. We were and are, as are your grandchildren, our own creations – not extensions of your ego. Though I have often sensed you were bemused by us (and always, always amused), I never felt our choices, our successes or failures – our lives – were taken in any way as a reflection of your accomplishments (although you could take much more credit than you do) and that has been very liberating, a real gift. You delight in our successes, you are proud of us, I know that, and you feel our failures when we fail, but you never, ever have made any of these events, circumstances, choices, good or bad, about you.

Thank you. Except for the fact that I am so angry with you right now for smoking all these years, I need you to know how much I love you, how much I respect you and always have, and that you are an amazing man. I also want you to know that I can live with your anger because, regardless of the fact that you told me I wasn’t to do so, I am throwing out your god-damned Parliaments before you get home from the hospital!

Toward a New Religion

Toward a New Religion

Apr 9, 2023

*or better yet, none at all.

The New Ten Commandments – 2023 Version (because we fucking need new, updated commandments, brother fuckers)

1. Everything begins and ends with the Self. No outside force or person is above you, or below you; you contain the universe in each and every cell in your own body. And, you are governed by your thoughts. Control your thoughts, control your life. Remembering that ‘Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind’. – Ralph Waldo Emerson or, to put it more succinctly, per Rene Descartes: Cogito ergo sum, which in French is ‘Je pense, donc je suis.’ In English, ‘I think therefore I am.’ You do not need anyone to do your thinking for you. Read, FFS, get off the internet, and stop giving away your power to priests, ministers, pastors, rabbis, and a shit ton of other false money hungry dick-wad so-called prophets. Take all leaders, all persons in positions of authority, with a healthy grain of salt. Trust, yet verify. That’s Ronald Reagan, and I can’t believe I just quoted that old fuck.

2. Honor yourself, and then, and only then, honor your neighbor as if she were yourself. In simpler terms, be kind, forgiving, tolerant, and compassionate with yourself, and with all other beings, but especially yourself, and then, if you can do that, extend yourself to your neighbors. How can we have peace on earth if we cannot first get along with ourselves, and then, get along with our neighbors? We can’t. So be nice already, brother fuckers.

3. Don’t kill other people, and don’t kill animals or bugs or whatever else living that’s around you either, and if you must eat meat, try to minimize your consumption, because meat production is one major item on ‘the killing our planet’ list. And try to stop being such pigs. JHFC. Americans are fat. I include myself in that, so don’t get all self-righteous on my cottage cheese ass.

4. Do not – hear me now – do not perpetuate or in any way use violence in the home, or outside it. This includes keeping your fucking hands off your children, your husbands and wives and girlfriends or boyfriends, your parents, grandparents, cousins, siblings, and FFS keep your fucking hands off of other people’s children. This prohibition includes all forms of domestic violence, including emotional and psychological violence.

5. Stop participating in, supporting, or in any way committing state sanctioned violence, a.k.a. war. War is evil, and unnecessary. Here’s an idea: let’s turn arms manufactories into toy and playground equipment manufacturers, into medical equipment manufacturers, into construction parts manufacturers. 70% of the weapons used in Mexico are sold, trafficked, stolen, traded, or otherwise procured in the U.S. Arms sales are a multi-billion-dollar business, and the five largest arms manufacturers are in the U.S., Great Britain, France, Germany and Russia, and people all over the world, but particularly in the so-called 3rd world, are dying because other, incredibly sucky people in the so-called developed world, are greedy and don’t give a flying fuck about anything except profit.

6. Do not fuck, molest, or in any other way mess with other people’s children, or your own, and that includes teenagers and those in their 20s who are not yet fully emotionally or psychologically grown. Stop abusing and taking advantage of youth, ignorance, and opportunity. Treat all children to the age of 25 like goddamned babies, because – in effect – that’s what they are.

7. Don’t steal shit, especially from children and the elderly.

8. If you must fuck around (and you know you will, or that you really, really, want to), at least be honest about it.

9. Don’t be an asshole to those who are not like you. This is an extension of being kind to your neighbors. Not everyone sees the world as you do, or has the same experiences. Don’t be a dick to those who are different, and that includes people who don’t look like, live like, or fuck like you. Respect other people, even those whose beliefs and actions make you want to puke in your shoes. I’m looking at you, Evangelical Christians, so think about it, and I’ll think about how your crazy-ass beliefs make me want to puke in my shoes.

10. Do not make, create, or in any way propagate laws, policies, blogs, articles, or ANY form of written or spoken words that seek to minimize the bodily autonomy of women and girls. Just don’t.

Moj has spoken. Now go, and be nice, brother fuckers.

A Miscarriage ~ of Justice

A Miscarriage ~ of Justice

Apr 8, 2023

This week has been a total shit show in every sense of the word. Good and bad, including my dog being sick after I fed him a treat sent by a friend, still stuck somewhere in his digestive system and knock wood soon to pass through completely (N.B.: beware any doggie treats not made in the U.S. and shame on me for not checking the label before letting him have it). And now, on Good Friday because of course he did, the reactionary, conservative activist Federal judge in Texas who was chosen for this express purpose made his ruling that the longtime miscarriage and abortion drug Mifepristone is not to be sold throughout the U.S. – not just Texass, but the entire country. Okay, yes, he also put a immediate one week stay on the order to give the Biden Administration an opportunity to appeal, but FFS. Mifepristone has been used for twenty-three years, twenty-three, thus, declaring it unsafe, while also refusing to refer to fetal tissue in his poor reasoned ruling as – um – fetal tissue because it’s a human life, is likely to make my head explode. His anti-LGBTQIA stance is also well known and documented. In other words, this guy is a right-wing nut, a ‘Christian’ who hates women and anyone who falls even slightly outside the ‘safe space’ heteronormative bubble he occupies. A ‘Christian’ who hates is making (bad) law to control women’s reproductive choice, and their options when spontaneously miscarrying. Happy Easter, y’all!

And then there’s Tennessee. WTAF. The state where the KKK was born ousts two young black men from the legislature because they ‘broke decorum’, failing to similarly expel a white woman who did the exact same thing at the exact same time. You could argue that it’s nice when racists just say the quiet part out loud, but that’s cold comfort to the two-hundred thousand constituents these men represent whose voices have now been expunged and silenced along with their duly elected representatives. Their constituents aren’t the only voices being ignored as Tennessee lawmakers shun these young men – they’re also ignoring thousands of peaceful protesters demanding sensible gun safety laws with whom the ‘Tennessee Three’ marched after yet another mass shooting at a school. And then there’s the legislature’s recent ban on drag shows in public places – where else are drag shows meant to be? Underground caves open only to trolls, woodchucks and moles? Show is show, show means show, not hide, you neanderthal numbnuts. Don’t like drag shows? Don’t go to one. Sigh.

I have a cousin in Tennessee who occasionally emails me articles about TN as the superior of the two different states in which we have chosen to live. I’ve shown amazing restraint in not reaching out to him this week, asking – no, telling him to eat crow, but I may not be able to hold out much longer. He’s the guy who, when I confronted him about his and his dad’s racism, said about his dad, ‘but he wasn’t a mean racist’, which made me laugh out loud as I read it in his email defense of his unapologetically, openly racist, sexist, homophobic, anti-semitic father. You mean he didn’t lynch anyone? Didn’t burn crosses on lawns? Racism by definition is mean, as well as cruel, stupid, ignorant, and damaging – particularly as white men have used their power over and over again to turn racism into policy, and into law, embedding it into institutions of all kinds. Don’t get me wrong, I loved my Uncle Hubert, who has been dead since I was in my twenties, but Hubert (and his son, for that matter) was old school Tennessee, even down to what my cousin described as another (bullshit) example of his dad’s non-mean/soft-racism, ‘the only time I ever saw my dad weep was at his black nanny’s funeral’. Of course. JHFC. The truth is, my verrrrrrry privileged cousin only cares about one issue: the legalization of marijuana, which Tennessee – unlike New York State – has failed to do. He’s one of those white, wealthy libertarian boomer bros who is blissfully ignorant of 97% or more of what actually matters to those who weren’t and aren’t as blessed as he has always been. Grrrrrrrr. I’m fond of him, and – I won’t change him. I could, however, make him eat some crow…

Deep breaths. We can and will root out and defeat this authoritarian christo-fascist, white supremacist misogynistic nonsense. And, it will take time, and effort. I’m all in.

The good news? We outnumber the hateful by a lot, Janet P (I won’t even attempt to spell her last name) won her Supreme Court race in Wisconsin by a lot, and the progressive Dem candidate won the Chicago Mayor’s race, a young rising star who – like AOC – reframes the issues powerfully, necessarily, and with straight-talking common sense a resident of any city could understand, and support, knock wood! Yay. And, the tributes to my friend Dennis – so deserved – are pouring in, his services will be held this week over a 48-hour period that might, might give those who loved him enough time to pat their respects, and the best news of all? I knew him, loved him, and he knew and loved me. I was so lucky to be his friend. How great is that? PDG.

I include the graphic below as the complainants in the TX case like to say that abortion and the abortifacient drug Mifepristone (and contraceptive meds, in case you’re wondering what they’ll go after next) are ‘harmful’ to women and girls, are a kind of ‘violence’ toward women and girls. Fuck all the way off, you misogynistic pieces of shit.