Freedom versus Failure

I've been seeing a lot of articles about how people who now have the freedom to do things are failing at those things. Marriages between gay couples ending in divorce. Women unable to hold marriages or careers together at the same time. Women who fail to become president. Ariel Levy just wrote a book about how she blames her miscarriage on herself and her ambition. People are overworked, stressed out, and feeling like they haven't accomplished what they needed to accomplish.

Okay, fine. You failed. It's also possible you may not get the chance to correct or change it. There are some things that are beyond our ability to fix. We get too old. We lose our uterus. We are too tired to try again. We're too tired to handle another marriage. It's over and it didn't work. You did fail.

The problem is, some people are taking these failures to mean that the whole idea of people being allowed to do these things is failing. Oh look, gays can't stay married. Clearly, that whole thing was a bad idea. Oh look, some women are failing at their jobs or failing their marriages or failing to be parents or failing all of it. Oh look, some of them are failing to amount to anything. Clearly, feminism has failed.

No, feminism has not failed. Gay rights have not failed.

This has never been about success. This is about freedom. This is about having the opportunity to make your own decisions and take your own risks. Or not take risks. if that is what you want. Having rights means having the chance to decide what moves you will make in your life. Not all of those moves will work. Many of them won't, honestly, because that's just how things go.

The point is, you get to be the one who decides. You get to be the one who makes the decision. Ariel Levy lost her baby when she was 38. She delivered him prematurely in a hotel room in Mongolia. She was by herself and there was nothing she or a doctor could have done to make him live.  I know that is painful for her and I know it sucks.

You know what would have sucked more? If she had not been allowed to make any of those decisions. If a husband had decided she would wait until she was 38 before having a baby and would have taken her with him to Mongolia when she was 5 months pregnant without even asking her how she felt about the idea. It would have sucked more if she had to deliver that baby and watch it die all on her own while he drank in a bar with 'the boys' and then looked at her in disgust when he returned to the room, commenting that she made a mess, that women were weak, and that she had failed HIM.

She may have lost her child and I know she feels horrible and alone, but I doubt there is anything as awful as the loneliness one feels when one is subject to someone else's decisions.

Folks, we are going to fail here. Even with feminism, there will be women in poverty. There will be women who make shitty choices. There will be women who make what others would see as the best possible choices who still end up with nothing because our choices are not the only thing that determines our success. There wil be gay couples who wound each other and harm each other and fail each other. There will be people who end up alone and who end up unhappy and who end up broken. We will fail.

Always, always, always, however, it is better that we find failure in freedom than even complete success while subject to someone else's rule. These are OUR lives and OUR experiences and OUR moments. We're not here to play a secondary role to someone else.

More Storms

The massively scary aspects of the storm didn't last long. We have a few moments of disturbingly rough winds, but they died down. It's been steadily raining since then, which means a lot of the bridges are starting to flood out. We have a lot of waterways around here and some of the bridges over them are shoddy. My usual route to the store will not be happening tomorrow. As for any trips into the city, I'm just not sure how that will go. It depends on how bad this gets.

The humidity was nasty. We had to open all the windows and keep fans going all day. I was hoping the rain would keep us cooler, but that doesn't seem to be happening. It wasn't an unpleasant day though. In fact, it was rather peaceful and nice.

I've had this urge to do my makeup all day. I might just mess with that for a while. It's not so much doing it as just wanting to see if I can get some techniques to work for me. I've been watching tutorials by heavier drag queens and I'm picking up some tips on handling my fat face. We'll see what I can do.

Storm

About the time the sirens started, my best friend, half an hour or so away, said hers were going off as well. With lots of storms, sirens, tornados, and weather nastiness, I think this is about all the updating I'll be doing. Stay safe.

I Need a Weekend

My attention span must have been pretty good today because I managed to watch two movies. That is so rare for me lately. I'm shocked when I can get through just one half an hour episode of something. I know it's the medication, but knowing that doesn't make it any less frustrating. Having said that, while I liked the setting in one of the movies, anything with Hiddles and Jax fighting over the main character should be a lot more fun than it was.

It's gloomy and cold right now. I'm not really that upset about this and I won't be unless the power/internet goes out. The longer we keep the hot weather at bay, the better. I would rather not sweat and be miserable, besides, the rain makes my allergies less tweaky. I need that. I also need sleep.

Broken Roots

It seems that a lot of younger people are opting out of the normal trappings of society completely. Instead of going to college (or even finishing high school in some cases), they are leaving home, opting to have no home, and just wandering from city to city, squatting where they can and taking what jobs they can.  They don't plan on ever buying houses, or even owning more than what they can carry in a backpack. They don't plan on having kids or back accounts or any kind of roots. They just want to explore the world until they die.

It's a dangerous way to live. Homeless people are high targets for violent crimes. In some ways, it helps that the people who are in this group are younger and often not mentally ill, but sleeping out in the open is never easy. When one is living illegally in a house, it's difficult to go to the police if you get raped or have your stuff stolen. If you can't find a place to stay, you're at the mercy of the elements.

Even still, to some people, this seems like a better deal than living a life of debt and financial uncertainty. They've watched their parents lose jobs, homes, cars, and everything else. They've watched careers that seemed stable and secure disappear into nothingness. They've watched people work their whole lives and nothing to show for it.

For the longest time, there was this basic belief in the US that people would grow up to be more financially stable and successful than their parents. I never thought I would live in a time where that wasn't the case, but that's where we are now. It's sad and it's really scary. I wish those on the road safe journies.

Wind Switching

The new therapy room has no window, so while the weather permits it, we will be keeping the door open. Today while we were talking, the wind began to switch from blowing from the South to blowing from the North.  It was a pretty neat thing.

In a weird way, I think it also improved my mood. I'd been so depressed the last few days, but now I am feeling oddly hopeful. Then again, there are things to look forward to. I'm seeing my best friend on Thursday and American Gods starts this weekend. Yay for the wind.

Early Post

I'm writing this early because I plan on going to bed early.  I've been oddly sad all day and I think I need some extra rest to try and muddle through the week. Spring weather can really get to me, with all the allergens in the air.  I'm about to face summer. This is a rough time of year for me because I know very little good will happen until Fall. I know that isn't the case for other people and I wish it wasn't the case for me, but I just don't see a way around it right now.

With that in mind, I have kind of forced myself to start crocheting again. The meditative side of working with yarn was enough to get me through this last year. Maybe it can do it again. Maybe the depression will lift.

The End of the Feud

Feud ended tonight and I am quite satisfied with the whole experience. Murphy handled the show with a lot of respect and maturity. It should win lots of awards. It tackled a lot of topics about being a woman, including some of the drastic measures people would take to stay beautiful, the vulnerability of old age, and the various terrifying things people will do to be loved.

One of the things Crawford said on the show before she died was that she spent so much time creating "Joan Crawford" for everyone else that she had no idea who she was when she was alone. I think it's very important that we encourage people to know themselves, to be by themselves, and to value that time. People need to know who they are when they're alone. They need to cherish that time and view it as a blessing.

Being alone means no compromising with anyone or listening to their complaints.  It means not having to deal with their demands or moods or ideas. I mean, it's good to know how to handle other humans too (I guess), but it's best to love your alone time. After all, you will have more of that than anything else.

For Once

It was storming earlier and as always, I warned the people I was chatting with that I could, at any moment, disappear. Between my bad internet service and the crappy electrical lines, it's almost a given that I'll lose communication during a storm.

That didn't happen tonight. Instead, I was watching out the window because some car was making a lot of noise. I could see my neighbors lights on . . . and then suddenly, I couldn't. The power went out on the block below us. The suddenness of it was spooky.

It was also really shocking because it wasn't my house. In fact, I looked around to make sure I wasn't just imagining things were still on.

For a moment, I considered calling to report the outage but then I remembered they always ask for the account number of the house where the outage has happened. That kind of sucks because what if no one had the means to report? I get that is unlikely these days, but it's still possible.

Anyway, I would like to note that for once, my power didn't go out during a storm.

Before the Rain

It hasn't started raining yet, but Suddenlink still had to cause problems. The internet was out for hours. It was, honestly, probably out longer than we realized because while it usually knocks off my internet, it didn't this time.  I have no idea why, though I was somewhat happy about it because I was rather enjoying what I was doing. It sucks when I have to leave my Sims in the middle of a game.

The second season of Magicians ended last night and it was really good. It's been a solid season and I'm going to miss it. The season even ended really well and it was smartly handled. I'm leaving early tonight, but I'll blog more about that later.

The New Room

Today was my first time to have therapy in the new location. I like it.  Downtown has a certain charm, but it's always really busy. I also hate trying to back out from the parking spaces. It was just a matter of time before something bad happened. My therapist has a room with a private entrance right beside the handicap space. Because I can enter that way, I really don't have to interact with anyone but her. It's very nice.

The room doesn't have a window, but with the door open that didn't bother me. She said she didn't like the noise of the traffic, but it was far enough away that I found it somewhat soothing. I tolerated the room from the building downtown, but I never really liked it. It felt too industrial and the light had a constant, rather louder than comfortable hum. I find the new room to suit me better. When one is having a therapy session, a good room can make all the difference. I always felt hurried in the last place, but I found this one quite relaxing.

I had a lot of grief dreams last night. The more people who die in my life, the more aimless and unanchored I feel. Death always strikes me as a kind of uncontrollable drifting. Given that I have a rather adversarial relationship with the element of water, this doesn't surprise me. Less foundation, more unsettling depths. I need to dig in my anchors.

One of the Great Ones

When I was a little kid, we lived in a small community where there was really only one church. New Providence Baptist church was a large part of my life when I was growing up. When I was little, it was just something I took for granted, as children do, that the church was a portion of the larger definition of me. It was what we did on Sunday. We would go and sit in the pews. We would sing to the clamor of the old, always out of tune piano. Brother Wright would preach.

Brother Wright was always the preacher when I was little. From what came to understand later, his service to the church was a true service, because the 12 or so people who went there weren't exactly paying him enough to have this qualify as a job. In fact, the running joke was that he tithed more than he was paid. I'm pretty sure he did.

He was a cool guy. He was short and round. He always had a smile on his face. He truly believed what he preached and would sing his love for Jesus with a voice that held more passion than actual talent. It didn't matter though. It was always beautiful.

He had a complicated life. He wasn't raised a Christian and went through 20 years of Marine service and other jobs before he found his calling and new life. Once he was saved, he became a preacher and a therapist. He lost his first wife after he began to preach at our church and they had buried two of their four children before that. He married again, to a woman who also had four children. In the years to follow, they would bury four more and a grandson.

He loved my grandparents. Even though he was younger and more educated than they were, he held them in a kind of awe. He saw my grandfather as a very wise man and considered my grandmother kind, charming, and funny. They took care of his and his wife's youngest daughter while they both finished college. Later, after my grandfather died, Brother Wright and his family would drive my grandmother to church.

In fact, they are part of the reason I ended up in the town where I live now. It was where he was from and when my grandparents had to leave their community, they decided to move closer to him. He was someone they knew and that was helpful when starting over. Oh and see that was another neat thing about him pastoring New Providence. He would drive 15 minutes to worship with people who didn't even pay him. It was really a labor of love for him.

I know he is one of the people in this world who truly loved me. He knew I was smart. He knew my life was complicated because of all of Mom's stuff. He accepted my faith with the sincerity I felt at the time and accepted it later when this cooled. In fact, one of the things I always loved about him was that after I left the church, he never asked me why. I think he knew I'd sorted things out in my own way and on my own terms. He knew it wasn't his place to demand what those were. He trusted I knew what was best for me.

You may have noticed I'm speaking about him in past tense. He passed away today and the world is a darker place for it. Goodbye, Brother Jim. You made such a beautiful difference in so many people's lives. You were an awesome person and one of the finest human beings I ever met. The little girl me will miss you, the broken child me will miss you, the complicated teen me will miss you, and the wandering adult will miss you. God bless and goodnight.

The Rats in the Cellar

When I heard that Ryan Murphy was going to do a show about the feud between Bette Davis and Joan Crawford, I knew I had to watch it. Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? has been a favorite movie since I first saw it and I knew a lot of the show would center around that. I knew it would be entertaining. I didn't expect that it would be one of the best feminist shows I'd ever seen.

I suppose I should have realized this. After all, this feud happened in a time where the conditions were becoming needed for a modern feminist movement. Women were in the workforce and knew they were smart and capable, and yet still being treated like shit. I started to put being treated like shit 'by men' but it wasn't just men. With very few exceptions, women were pretty horrible to each other as well. This makes sense. Being awful to men had consequences. Being awful to other women rarely did. A lot of that is still the case, I suppose, but at least we have some level of knowing better now. At least, we do on occasion.

In this last episode, Crawford and Davis asked each other what it was like to, at one point, be known as the best (Crawford the most beautiful woman in the world, Davis as the most talented actress). Both of them acknowledged that while this feeling was wonderful, it was also 'not enough.' Now while this could be taken as it wasn't 'enough' to satisfy them, I took it to mean that it wasn't 'enough' to satisfy everyone else. No matter what they accomplished, it would never be 'enough' to earn them the respect and job security they deserved.

In this same episode, Joan Blondell says that women of a certain age start being ignored by everyone. I remember telling my roommate how odd this sounded to me because, in my life, the older women were never the people who were ignored. Then again, even though those women did not grow up in a feminist society, by the time I was born, we were living in one where feminism was certainly an open idea. You did not ignore the older women. They held power and deserved respect.

I am really impressed with what Murphy did here. He shows a lot of depth and understanding to his main characters. And while I came in being #teamBette, I certainly have a better understanding of why Joan Crawford was so batshit crazy. It's certainly no excuse to beat children with wire hangers, but, still, I have more sympathy now.

A Ron in Trouble is a Temporary Thing

As you can see, Ron has experienced a new transformation of sorts. For the first time in all of the times I've played him, he is with child. A while back, he was abducted by aliens. Ron knows a lot of aliens, so my guess is that he just had a good old time on the ship. Clearly, a better time than he anticipated.

Sims 4 always puts aliens in separate households. I felt that was out of character and took the time to put 8 of them together. They dress like wanderers and travel in a caravan. To me, this makes more sense than the sterile ships and clean lines. Why would we assume that? It's altogether possible that the first aliens who arrive will be merchants, traders, and entertainers.

Anyway, when the baby is born, I'll know who the other parent is. If it's one of the aliens from the caravan, I'll have Ron start going over there and stealing stuff from them as a way of child support.

Being Prepared

This week on Survivor, Zeke Smith was outed by another contestant as being transgender. Zeke handled it as well as he could. In interviews, he talked about how he was asked if he wanted this knowledge to even air on the show. He worked with GLAAD and producers in making decisions about how it would be handled. It wasn't sensationalized. There was no 'next week on Survivor, a BIG SECRET IS REVEALED' or anything like that. The situation was salvaged the best way it could be.

I read an interview with Zeke and he discussed a lot of things, including the way that watching Survivor helped him through the depression he was in while trying to transition.  I know that a lot of people get upset about the idea that music or shows can be a saving grace, but when the people around you walk away, you have to turn to something. It's one of the reasons why I will always believe that the things we call 'entertainment' can be so much more than that. Hell, when I was recovering from the Hellblood, I watched a show about snotty New York prep school kids. That show helped me immensely.

Zeke talked about how when he decided to really take the idea of going on Survivor as a serious option in his life, he began to prepare for it. He started training his body. He would swim. He would acclimate himself to the heat. He stopped drinking alcohol and coffee. He worked on puzzles and tied and untied knots. He watched the show over and over again. He also listened to the Hamilton soundtrack as a way to build emotional fortitude. And see the thing is, while he is a person who did transition, that is only a small part of the article. A lot of it is about things like this, as his life is about more than just gender identity. Of all the stuff he talked about, it was this paragraph about preparing himself for the show that struck a chord with me. He was someone who really WANTED to win the show.

So later in the week, I watch RuPaul's Drag Race. One of the two people in the bottom was awful in the lipsynch. She didn't know the words. She didn't try to dance. She just stood there. Her excuse was that her kind of queen doesn't lipsynch. Okay. That's fine for her kind of show where she usually does them. This is season nine of Drag Race. Everyone knows you lipsynch if you're on the bottom. If it's a skill you don't have, it's a very good idea to learn it before you apply, just as it is a good idea to learn to sew, do choreography, and take some acting lessons. All of these things are going to happen and we all know it. If you want to win, learn them.

It sucks that Zeke was outed like that. I'm not saying that because he should be ashamed. He most certainly shouldn't. The problem will be that if he wins, people will always assume it was for 'pc' reasons and ignore anything valid he may have done in the game. That isn't fair and I'm sure it's for that very reason that he didn't want this made public. It's out there though, so he has to make the best of it. At least he knows he was as prepared as he could be for the game.....if, perhaps, not the certain move on someone else's part.

Random

I am so random tonight. I'm just kind of out of it, really. My eyes won't stop watering and my mood won't stay fixed. I think most of my conversations with people have been in nonsequiturs. Sinus stuff just needs to settle down.

Green Ginger

First of all, congrats to my roommate. He is two weeks out of the hospital today! The weeks of recovery after being in a hospital are hard. Some days you feel like you're actually getting healthy. Other days, you wonder if you shouldn't go back.

The other thing that happened today is why I have this picture. Sims decided to give us a nice little miniquest treat. For like 20 days people can look for plantsims and ask for seeds. Once they have the proper sequence of seeds, they can grow a tree that will allow them to become a plantsim themselves for a few days.

The picture is of Ron Weasley. He actually looks far less doofy as a plant than he does as his usual simself. No matter what his lifestate, he always insists on wandering around in his underwear. That was the only pair I could find that had some level of animal print on them and I always assume that's what Ron Weasley would wear.

I don't think I've mentioned this but Ron Weasley is a pretty frequent victim for my simming pleasure. He's somehow still Ron, so he always finds a way to get killed, but before he manages that, he usually fails upwards pretty well. When he dies, I always just upload another copy of him into the game. It's so funny when he sees his ghosts.

I haven't found out if plantsims can die. I'm sure if they can, Ron will find a way.

The Portraits

I never met my dad's mom. I just have stories about her from various people. I know she was pretty fierce. I know she had very little patience for people's bullshit. I have been told, over and over again, that she never would have 'let' me get as fat as I did. Then again, my dad had a weight problem, as did she. Also, I'm a grandkid and that usually implies special rules.

My dad told me a story about her today. This was one I'd never heard. My grandmother worked in a bank and would get discounts for annual family portraits. She would put down a deposit and tell my dad, my aunt, and my grandfather when the setting would take place. Somehow, on that day, always, one of the three of them (or more) would manage to screw the whole 'family portrait' thing up. When this would happen, she would just leave the three of them at home and go to get pictures of herself.

After a while, it seems she gave up. This isn't surprising as I've never actually seen a family portrait of them but have seen many pictures of her. I think it's so funny that year after year, this new picture of her would be hanging in the dining room for everyone to see how she persisted, even when no one else would cooperate.

I'm glad she did this. In a time when so many women just allowed themselves to shrink submissively into the background, my grandmother was a force of nature. She had opinions and followed through with her plans. You knew if you crossed her, there would be consequences. That's awesome. I wish I could have met her.

The Struggle IS Real

I feel marginally better today. I got enough rest last night and that helped. It's still not enough. I can feel the strain of exhaustion behind my eyes and in my legs. It's a start. Maybe this weekend I'll really start catching up. I'm so bad I'm reduced to just waving my arms and moving my ankles as exercise. Then again, that's still better than the days when I do nothing at all.

So far this year has really been a struggle. I know that isn't just happening in my household. A lot of people have suffered losses and are having to start over, sometimes against their will.  For us, it has mainly been a slow and steady grind down of all of our resources. Things are tough. There are elements of my life that I didn't have to worry about last year because things were more financially stable. After the pipe redo and the new fridge last year, that stability is basically gone.

So along with the physical exhaustion, there has been a lot of mental exhaustion too. I sometimes find myself in a fugue state, just shutting everything out, shutting myself down, so I don't have to let all of it press on me. It helps. If you see me staring off into space, it's my way of blanking out in self-defence.

Honestly, all of this would be easier if I could completely shake the sick. I'm still having coughing fits and nose issues. If anything is a constant wear on me, it's that.

Wow

So apparently the state of Oklahoma has budget-cut itself out of being able to have science fairs.  I'm sure a lot of people won't give a shit about this, but it bothers me. Oklahoma keeps being ripped apart, piece by piece, with nothing to show for it. There was a point when we had a budget surplus but then they let Republicans run things and the whole state fell apart.

The motive for cutting taxes is always that they are doing it to attract businesses, but honestly, what businesses are going to come to a place that has turned into such a shithole? The schools suck. The hospitals, except for the ones in a very few places, suck. This is a pit and until people wise up and vote these bastards out, it won't get better.

I'm just shaking my head right now.

Blah

I had stuff to blog about but now I'm just tired and hurting. I hope my best friend had a happy birthday. I'll post more tomorrow.

The Passive Ending

I think there is a point in certain people's lives where they become passively suicidal. It isn't an active thing. They're not going to buy a gun or start researching the best ways to end their lives. At the same time, they also stop really trying to do anything to really keep themselves alive. They just go through the motions.

In the last years of his life, my grandfather was passively suicidal. He had emphysema and a whole host of other breathing and lung issues. He was told, over and over again, that the worst thing he could do was keep smoking. He went through the motions of quitting. He went to the doctor appointments and the other motion of staying healthy, but all of it was just to pacify my grandmother.

He never actually stopped smoking. He would smoke out in the barn or when he was alone in the car. To hide the smell of smoking, he stopped bathing. Once a week, the night before church, he'd take a shower. The rest of the time, nothing. Best way to hide his smoking. On one hand, I'm sure he felt really desperate and lonely about this. On the other hand, I bet every time he smoked, it relieved him because he knew he was that much closer to ending this mess.

By this point, his life was really miserable. My mother had disappeared and taken my brother with her. He had been told everything he enjoyed in life, which was basically hanging around outside, working on stuff, and smoking, was going to be taken away from him. My grandmother was being a martyred, self-righteous pill about the whole thing and she was constantly talking. The idea of spending more years listening to that was probably enough to convince him it was best to just let things end.

I had a dream about a friend of mine last night. We were sitting in a car and he was telling me all his plans he had now that he'd finished his latest degree. We teased each other about this and that like we always did. I remembered being happy for him. It was good to see him be so excited for his future. It hurt all the more when I woke up and remembered he'd killed himself a few years ago. His wasn't passive and I still have a lot of questions about why it happened. I also know it isn't my business.

I'll never be one of these people who would judge someone about ending their lives, passively or otherwise. Maybe because I understand. I know there are moments when there is so much pain or so much discomfort or so much hopelessness that there doesn't seem to be any reason to go on. I get the idea of being horrified at the idea of being trapped where you are. I know a lot of people see no other way out of their situations. They don't know how to get rid of the people who won't shut up or the people who won't leave them alone. They don't know how to cope with the fact that the pain pills aren't enough or that they will never do the things that make them happy.

I understand.  That doesn't mean I won't miss you, but I do understand.

The Illness

Though there are some exceptions, basically everyone I know has been sick for months now. They're still functioning, but it's slow. It's painful. They have to just drag themselves along with pockets full cough drops and tissue. A good day is a day when they don't spend it coughing more than conversing or when they don't end up with diarrhea more than three times. A good night is one where they sleep through it, can wake up with some level of renewed energy, and aren't in pain.

Pain seems to be a constant. Backs hurt. Eyes hurt. Feet hurt. Sinus headaches. Chests aching from the damage of so much coughing. Noses are raw and swollen. None of it is overt misery, but it is misery never the less.

I'm not sure why we're all sick. Maybe it's just some nasty bug that caught up with us and never went away. Maybe we keep infecting one another. Maybe it's something they did to us, some kind of experiment. If so, we should get paid for it, dammit.

I'm sick of being sick.

Desk Drama

I have this ancient old utility cart that my grandma used to leave out on the porch to hold plants. A few years back, we moved it into the house to hold inside stuff.  It's been sitting by my desk as a landing spot since I got the desk two Christmases ago. Last night, officially BECAME my desk.

The leg on the usual desk just would not stop wobbling. I started feeling uncomfortable with my computer being on it, so I switched everything over to the white metal cart. Now we have stability.

Also, I really like the way it looks. It' possible that my solution here may be to just switch out the desk as being my landing table and use the cart for my computer. Everything just seems to fit better this way. I'm not sure how functional this will be yet, but it terms of the way I feel about it, it's pretty nice.

I've been having this want to streamline everything in the house. My roommate and I both feel awful so we probably can't do that for a long while, but in the meantime, maybe just the desk situation will be enough.

Stormy Day

A week ago today, my roommate was spending his first night in the hospital. Tonight he was home and said something so funny I almost peed myself. It's amazing the difference a week can make. We're both still straggling along, but I have hope for us. Tomorrow we have to run some errands, but I think we have them planned out in a way to minimize the spoon loss.

It stormed tonight. I love my car Blair so much that I fretted about how she was handling the storm. I guess we'll see in the morning. This is the first time I've ever really LOVED a car and it's kind of an intense thing for me. If someone damages her, I am not sure how I'll control my temper. Not that I'm doing such a good job of that lately anyway. I've had a sinus headache all day and it's making all the noises louder. Hate that.

My desk's wheels are starting to mess up. I thought it was me, but my roommate pointed out it was something in the design that wasn't made properly. I'm going to have to make decisions about how to handle this. I love this desk, but I can't deal with it wobbling and knocking things off. I may end up with it being a lot shorter.

Trusting my Gut

I am so glad I called the water department. They sent someone over to look at the meter and come to find out, it had been read incorrectly. No leak, not yet anyway. No plumber and expensive hell. I am so happy about this. I mean, I know it's coming, but not today, Satan! Heh!

Anyway, we got the stuff done today that needed to be done. My roommate is really tired, but he managed to get through all of it. Healing from sickness is almost as exhausting as having sickness, but at least he's on the mend.

I had a Facebook friendaversary with one of my friends and we sent each other pictures of crocheted penises. Just as a general rule, when someone sends you a picture of a penis, you should always send a picture of a penis back. That's only polite.

The Face of Art

An Anti-feminist group put out this video trying to make feminists look like hypocrites. The woman in the video (one of their actresses) was talking about how she expected men to pay for her dinner because she had painted her face and done her hair to look good for the date. I guess the point was supposed to be that women shouldn't want men to pay for their dinner because they're all independent now. I get that. And honestly, if paying for a date was just about the man paying because women have no money and this is how he proves his worth to her, I would completely understand why people are against it. The thing is, that isn't all that is going on here.

One of the biggest problems for women when it comes to art is that many of the artistic things we do aren't viewed as art forms. Men cooking meals could be Art but women were just making food for their families. Women making blankets out of scraps or yarn, well that was 'just' providing warmth for the family. And making oneself look beautiful? That's just . . . well it's the rent you pay to live as a woman, right?

It's just that, it isn't. As I have written about before, there is the kind of beauty where you are accepted for how you really look and valued for your uniqueness. Then there is the kind of beauty where you aspire to fulfill a certain archetype of beauty, usually one beyond what people look like naturally. How does one achieve that archetype? With painting (makeup on the face), sculpting (the body to look a certain way, via exercise, surgery, certain types of undergarments, etc), shaving this, painting that, wearing certain clothes, making sure you smell a certain way, and creating designs with the hair.

This is art. The act of making one's self look conventionally beautiful is a multi-media work of performance art.

People should be paid for their art. If you want to partake in part of their performance, if you want to enjoy it, if you want to have the experience of it, then you should pay. It isn't like men aren't getting currency out of dating women who meet this kind of archetype fulfillment. Their social status is rewarded for it. Men see them as able to obtain time with a beautiful woman and look on them favorably. Women will view them as more attractive....or if it is obvious that they aren't attractive, it will be assumed they have money. This kind of social gain is worth far more than the cost of a dinner, as is the enjoyment of being with the artist who created the beauty illusion.

RuPaul said, "We're born naked and the rest is drag." This is very true and it applies to everyone. So, again, why is it that when men go out of their way to meet the beauty archetype of women we see no problem in paying them for their art (because drag queens do get paid), but when women do it, we find ourselves dismissing it with a 'it's just' because it is never a 'it's just . . ." Art is art and people who do it well should be respected.

Fixing Things

I thought we'd had enough issues going on, but apparently, that wasn't the case. When the water bill came today, it was far higher than it should have been.  Looks like the pipes are finally going and leaks are starting. I'm holding out hope that when I call the water department on Monday they'll say it was an error, but I doubt it. I knew the new pipes were a thing that was going to have to happen.

The gas thing got crazy and more stressful than I should have allowed it to be. I've decided to be chill about the water pipe replacement and embrace the idea that it's going to be one big complicated bastard of a project. It seems safer for my mental health than stressing over every little detail of shit I can't control anyway. I don't need that. No one does. I'm not going to think about the 'what ifs' I don't want to discuss them, and I don't want to hear about them. If I can do nothing about the situation, I am just going to let it go.

My roommate is improving. He is eating better than he has been in over a week and he is able to sleep. It's always ironic how the things we need to do in order to get past an illness are the very things the illness keeps us from doing. I'm really in awe of how well he's doing now as opposed to the day he was admitted to the hospital. I will always be in awe of the healing capacity of the human body.

This next week will involve appointments, bill paying, and now this water issue. I was hoping for an easy, peaceful week but it looks like that won't be happening. Oh well. As I said, there is nothing I can do about it.