Jump to content

tiredofvampires

Platinum Member
  • Posts

    7,859
  • Joined

  • Days Won

    28

tiredofvampires last won the day on October 22 2013

tiredofvampires had the most liked content!

3 Followers

About tiredofvampires

  • Birthday 05/20/1968

Recent Profile Visitors

The recent visitors block is disabled and is not being shown to other users.

tiredofvampires's Achievements

Proficient

Proficient (10/14)

  • First Post
  • Collaborator
  • Posting Machine Rare
  • Week One Done
  • One Month Later

Recent Badges

932

Reputation

  1. Finally getting to catch up just a little here, with your journal...and so much has happened. But it seems I am not TOO too late to wish YOU a Happy Belated Birthday!!! Our birthdays aren't far apart at all! It sounds like you had a wonderful "you" time, shared with your beloved partner and friends. Sounds like it was yummy! I'm so happy for you. Glad you are doing so well. I am trying to fill in a few gaps here...you are now a married woman, is that so? Please forgive me if I've misread the posts when I've been more absent than here for the milestones... I'm very sorry to hear about your miscarriage. But I do think it's good you're trying again, as well as preparing for adoption, should it come to that (and even if you adopted, who knows, you might conceive one of your own after that! It's happened!) I know that personally, I would find IVF too invasive, and adoption has a social appeal to me that carries its own virtues. But, if you have the resources, I would look into working with a Chinese Medicine practitioner, one specializing in prenatal care, throughout your pregnancy. They are very useful for fertility issues, but also, to keep pregnancies healthy. I know I keep plugging Chinese Medicine around here, but it's such a brilliant and effective modality for so many (including myself). As for the puppet gift -- I would have loved getting something like that! Seems so personal. And now, you can really put it to use, and gives it another whole level of meaning, to say, "Talk to the hand!"
  2. Lolita, I made a point of saying I had no preference one way or the other. You said this journal had turned into a wreck since people started responding in it, in the last few posts, so I said, if that's the way YOU feel, you maybe should make it private or solo. It was an uncontrived, honest suggestion, given your reactions to people chiming in. Once it is in this section, it invites dialogue, so I was saying, if you feel it damages your journal to engage with dissenters, unless you tell them to please leave, those are the options. That is how this journal forum has worked. But everyone feels differently about how they want their journal to operate. Until informed otherwise, one can't know. It's an individual choice. I have been welcomed in my unsolicited critiques or advice, and i have also been told to please cease posting. But open journals here and unsolicited advice are a regular occurrence here, and it's not considered rude overall. The other subforms on this site are for topical advice on particular questions that are not ongoing life chronicles, but that doesn't mean journals do not contain loads of advice from people who participate. But, given what you have expressed, I will excuse myself as I don't feel my contributions here can further clarity or understanding. I was enthusiastic about your writing to begin, but when you started to speak highly of people I consider rogues in the world, and expressed views that I find disturbing, I felt the desire to articulate why, in a response to your own pondering of the animosity that occurs around such subjects. I shared my ideas because I felt they deserved sharing, as a perspective different from yours, and attempted to do so without being hostile, and yet being very frank. I do not feel apologetic for sharing what I did, but on the other hand, I would not venture to share more when you have expressly explained that such input is so unwelcome. Fare thee well. (P.S. -- I was under the impression that you are in England, not Scotland.) P.P.S. FYI, a "Solo" journal is public, but people can't post. So there's that.
  3. No offense taken. As surely, none was meant. Your rant was epic. And I do not hate you for it, or to repeat, you for your aces. I regret that you did not follow much of what I wrote. But I will say that I find it a defining quality of the "privileged" to say things like, "Anyone can win." It is literally the identifying philosophy of those in a seat of privilege. It is like a fish saying, "Anyone can breathe if you use the gills god gave you. I never drown, and you don't have to, either." So these types of discussions are always dead ends. Because they demonstrably evidence only a theoretical and intellectual understanding of certain world problems. I don't doubt that you can imagine them all. What is missing is lived experience, and therein, is the rub of true knowing, and the greater understanding that comes with knowing. I do understand how you might think my tone patronizing, but rest assured, I had no expectation that you be "enlightened" -- I was presenting what I felt compelled to present, and if it were not meant for you to ponder, I would have posted it in my own journal. So there was no other presentation for me to "dare" at. The fact of the matter is that there is no tone of civility I could take here while disagreeing vehemently with you without stooping the the levels of Facebook-inspired vitriol. So, we are stuck with that, and you may choose to interpret my attitude however you wish. I wished to object, and in a way that ENA permits -- but as you are a Brit, I would think a certain level of comfortable familiarity with "nose in the air" would be the case, if you read such a thing in. I am not knocking Brits, mind you -- I have a few good Brit friends, am quite familiar with the culture, and have an aunt who has lived there with her partner of 30 years (a wonderful Brit gentleman), not wishing to step foot ever in this country (the US) again. And none of these people would find me rude -- quite the contrary, they would be vocalizing what I have. My aunt will not even visit her sisters here in this country because she believes it to be so shot through with evil. She lived here in this country paved with gold until her 40's, and then chose where you are instead (only up north, in Scotland). (And incidentally, I would advise against you getting any sort of visa now, as people are being refused from your country and many random others just because that's how we roll right now.) I don't even "blame" anyone for lack of certain experience. You grew up with your own life, and it was yours to live. However, I don't believe there is much empathy in action, in the resulting orientation you have adopted and the ones you celebrate. Empathy -- it's not the ability to imagine; it's the ability to FEEL what another is feeling by way of a visceral resonance. And empathy is something I find essential to good character -- character of a person, and character of a nation. There is a shocking lack of empathy prevailing now and that is something I grieve over, because it produces people who abuse others for their own gain, or judge as undeserving and pathetic those whose stories aren't so easily pegged. This is the archetype we are working with here, in those you idolize. Aside from my not understanding the word "negative" as used in this sentence, I would say -- I agree! And then, we shall both agree that the reward system as it is now is depraved, and that your idols are beyond fiscal bankruptcy concerns, that they are also morally and spiritually bankrupt. Hear, hear! WEALTH ISN'T EVERYTHING, SO WHY ARE THE "HAVE'S" SO UNSCRUPULOUSLY OVER-FAVORED IN THE SCHEME, AND IN THE MINDS OF PEOPLE WHO HAVE SUCH WEALTH TO WANT TO USE AS A MEASURING STICK OF SUCCESS/HARD WORK/PERSONAL WORTHINESS? To repeat an earlier point as well, if you don't like feedback in your journal, make it a Solo or Private journal. I am not recommending it one way or the other, except to say that you invite comments in this section. So that is a choice -- and, a tacit invitation. Or tell people to leave your journal, which has been done here. Really, I hate ideologies, not people. So I wish you the best in your life. I can't help but wish sometimes that more people who think of taxes as tyranny would in fact give up their palaces or their cushy jobs or their big, stressful, corporate crosses to become milk men, so that their envy would CEASE and along with that, their vendetta. I know that everyone's life has its troubles. And as holocaust survivor and famed psychiatrist Viktor Frankl said, "...a man’s suffering is similar to the behavior of gas. If a certain quantity of gas is pumped into an empty chamber, it will fill the chamber completely and evenly, no matter how big the chamber. Thus suffering completely fills the human soul and conscious mind, no matter whether the suffering is great or little." I don't believe that we "make our own luck." Some people were marched to the chambers and gassed to death, and there wasn't a damn thing they could do about it. Today, many women live in societies where they are not allowed to go to school, to work, to even buy makeup. And there is not a damn thing they can do about it, save make the slightest protest and get beheaded. Yes, there ARE victims in this world. BUT. What I do also believe is that with the luck we are given, we can choose to act within those parameters with the grace others don't show us, or we can succumb to the indignity and shame that others would like us to feel. Choosing the former is my definition of wealth and power.
  4. Couldn't agree more with this paragraph. Especially the first sentence. I see it all the time. Which is why I think people who have either never been there, or been there and fall into the "some things coincided to make climbing out more possible" make a grave mistake of over-simplifying the problem when they start preaching about the failures of those who didn't make it, or say "If I could, anybody can", or "Anyone could have done what I did, they just didn't apply themselves." No, no, and no. That old cliche rises again..."until you've walked a mile in someone else's moccasins." It's as true as it is trite. Frankly, I think if I had to sum up what's wrong with this country in a nutshell, it would be, not enough people walking in others' moccasins and then having the audacity to profer an "educated opinion." The other problem is that there are a lot of people who are poor or close to poverty who are working honest professions, while there are extremely wealthy people working in some of the most dishonest, corrupt professions and circles. So in an accounting of what we value and call success, is it that money and means always trumps character and integrity? If "Character is destiny" (same guy who said, "Dogs, also, bark at what they do not know" and "Men that love wisdom must be acquainted with very many things indeed"), we have a collective destiny that is right now very dark in what we have chosen -- or at least, made room -- to idolize.
  5. (I deleted the above post because I was editing it when the time window ran out. This is the final version.) I was going to rebut PTH's post starting with the same sentence, "Anyone can do what I do and make what I make." But Seraphim beat me to it. Based on your own journal entries, now growing over with weeds, your history reveals an early life with a 2-parent home that put you in good schools, and advanced placement classes. From an early age, you were suckled on the expectations of high achievement, and these things were modeled to you to in an upper-income family with a beacon of respectable and career-accomplishment in your dad. Your father, a necessity to a young boy's development into manhood, was always there, always encouraging, unconditionally loving. No, things weren't perfect, and you had your growing pains and scars, much of it internalized from social messaging; but your foundations were solid, strong, and unwavering. You were encouraged by your teachers, you stood out in school. You were recognized with awards, scholarships, and commendations. Whatever your modest self-appraisal, you were deemed gifted and talented. You had a work ethic to match and to earn it, but all the way through, you shone in extraordinary ways. You applied to law school and were accepted into a highly ranking one. You could have been a lawyer, had you preferred that path to one that you are on now, which was fostered by family connections amongst big fish in the game, and a highly lubricated transition into the family business. So you did well by yourself, PTH. But the gods smiled upon you the day you were born. They gave you brains that few have to boast. They gave you comfortable circumstances, materially never wanting. You got allowances where some kids have to work newspaper routes to earn enough for a movie. You were loved by your relatives. They weren't on dope, alcoholics, and you didn't have to witness domestic violence. Your mom was not a great role model as "strong women" go, and could have done a lot of things better, but she was there for you and the family. You had a brother you were/are close to. You had a community, even though you took issue with some of it. Your peer network sucked for many years, but part of that was because you were smarter and more enterprising than them, and they had to take their petty personal dramas out on a "nerdy" kid. Some of this, you have submerged in the amnesia that time grants us; the rest of it, you don't count. No, it is not "anyone" who can go to law school. Not everyone could go to law school, even with ALL the rest there that I listed to start them with a leg up. Even people who have your raw IQ, which is probably upwards of 150, could not go to law school because their brain areas are not suited to the tasks or ways of thinking that law requires. Not everyone could carry, be entrusted with the financial responsibility for the wealthiest corporations that exist, which is what I believe your job entails. I could never do that, and I think I can hold my own, intellectually in most respects. Some people like me are just bad with figures, numbers, and money, and that's an aptitude. Likewise, I don't think you'd be able to have a career as a biological researcher, even if you had equivalent IQ's. We are BORN with aptitudes. I have an aptitude for logical reasoning, one of my best friends does not, even though he's smart enough to work a decent job as a City employee, hanging artwork, organizing events, and being the sound man, which require mechanical skills I think I would suck at even if trained (and there is no one who works harder than he does, and he's been very well educated, but he still relies on his parents for a roof over his head because of the astronomical rental and housing where were live -- so, he's not on any public subsidy, but he's still a "taker" within his own clan, and needs them to stay afloat and have the things he does, with discretionary spending). Not everyone could write the way you do here, with your brains and wit and style. No, not anyone. Lolita is pretty good, but she was born with a good aptitude for verbal, written expression. I'm guessing she hasn't taken extensive graduate courses in creative writing (which still wouldn't guarantee talent and/or success, and those do not necessarily correlate, either, often due to, again -- LUCK, and who you know). If she ever gets, "The Memoirs of a Redhead" published, maybe she'll get on Oprah, but it won't be because "anyone could have done it." And certainly, landing a husband who will take care of you with no qualms, who relishes you being his "kept wife" in this day and age, is only a choice inasmuch as it was given to be chosen. Peruse the dating sites to see how many men are okay with women who don't work, and don't want to, and you'll see what I mean. I'm not here to attack you, Lolita. (And I'm posting to respond to PTH's post.) I'm here to speak truth to the situation, and separate the fiction from the non-fiction. And you said you value a certain world leader's "plain-speaking" so in that vein, I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt, despite your last post. PTH, you have also missed the slightly more dicey point that it is highly ironic to wish and enjoy for people to take care of you, but by simple dint of having the luck to have a significant other swoop in from the heavens out of "happily-ever-land", where those seemingly arbitrary decisions are made (by...God?) to do this bidding, that clears you of the label "taker." This is not about where the taker is taking from. It's about "takers" calling others "takers". And those who "rely on" and have "relied upon" calling out those who "rely on". I have a problem with that -- in fact, I have a problem with the labels and the concept overall. I would rather we just discard the whole damn idea. Or, admit that everyone is a taker, just from different sources and people at different times. These words judge everyone in an ugly way and distort the deeper realities. But some like to selectively apply the term and concepts, so I am using their language and their worldview to make my argument. If you can take in a way that touches only your spouse's bank account, I have no issue with that. I only have an issue with the telling others who work all day and still can't make ends meet because they are not adequately valued, being called "takers" by that first group. And finally, there is the question of, if the "anyone" became "everyone" and were doing exactly what you are doing, PTH, society as you know and like it to be would quickly become an insufferable and unlivable place for lack of services and diversity of economic opportunity. Your life would be unlivable if "anyone" became "everyone." So a more realistic, down-to-earth way to view people who are lower on the status totem pole is that they allow the very stratification that both allows you to sense your own comparative value and take pride in that, and also, you are afforded the comfort you are because they never had it in them -- genetically, temperamentally, socially/support structure-wise, whatever -- to get there. Every time a service person brings me food, drops me off at a bus stop, or mops the floor so I can use the restroom without it being filthy, I think, thank god someone is willing to do what they are, that someone is there to do this for me. 'Cause I certainly as hell would feel depressed if I had to do this every day, and furthermore, it would be very draining to me physically. Thank god they have a niche to do what they have to do to (try to! with the tools they have, and the only ones they know) feed their family, and I can have a meal served to me/get transported somewhere when my car's broken/not slip on pee and toilet paper in the can. This is a major win-win. And we are not talking just about low and min-wage people in this whole thing. People of all strata are about to be screwed in massive ways, many of them educated and in the middle on the curve. We need each other. If they all disappeared, I'd be SOL. And so would you. That doesn't mean they merit the same pay as a lawyer. But we actually are accountable to them, not just vice versa. We are accountable for making them matter, because obviously THEY DO (unless you want to slip on pee.) Gratitude is what's missing in your scorn. Ingratitude is what prevents fairness and incumbent respect. Gratitude recognizes the facts, it's not some cotton-candy ethereal spiritual thing. There is absolutely nothing -- not my intellect, not my hard work, not the good and bad circumstances of my birth, all things volitional or not volitional -- that, when all tallied, makes me better than them or more entitled (a funny word, in that it's only used by the elite to disparage those with need, when elitism carries with it an aristocratic sense of entitlement) to anything, because my need for them does not diminish by any faculty I posses or effort I made. Of course, their stories are as different as the persons themselves, which is another thing lost here. If a billionaire could be poorer than someone who is homeless, what right things has that homeless person done that the billionaire has not done? What mistakes has the billionaire made that the homeless person has not? Your (ironic and laudable) modesty about being nothing special would give you 5 gold stars in my book, if you just redirected it 180 degrees.
  6. One final thing, so it's clear: We agree on that, with a caveat. I am fine with anyone who has enough money and security that they can sit by a pool all day and call it satisfying. In that sense, I really am low on judging. I admit that it would not make me happy, and it's because I value being active in various ways. I do not judge such a life as good or bad, in a moral sense, though I do judge it as less constructive/productive than some other type of life, say, someone who is actively engaging with the world to contribute something (or, if they are doing some kind of concerted internal work with/on themselves). This is again, the different types of "judging" at play. I don't judge this person as a bad person, but I factually judge them for not doing a whole hell of a lot for the world outside their pool deck. That's an observable fact. I certainly don't condemn such a life (if that's all they did), but nor do I hold it up as an object of admiration. They have as much right to be happy and if that makes them happy, all the more power to it. But because I value contributing (or doing something with one's solitude for growth in some fashion), it's not something I gravitate towards, and I certainly wouldn't say they have "merited" something other than the enjoyment they can take in the bathing and sunbathing. Where this goes all afoul is when people who have the luxury of sitting by a pool all day take the ironic liberty to think of others as not contributing, simply by virtue of having less to luxuriate in; and then, asking to be given a loophole, a break, for having these luxuries, as tangible reward, at the expense of others. And contributing to the economy is of course right and good, as long as that economy is used as equitably as can be used. But yes, that's by my playbook.
  7. ^Exactly (Faraday) Lo, you said that you did not re-read my post to you, which I posted over 3 months ago. When I read something that triggers me as much as you are clearly triggered to defend yourself, and especially if so much time has elapsed, I think it is prudent to re-read the thing that you are reacting to. I have often done this, and found my reaction, or my read of it to be different. If you are simply going on the emotions you felt at the time, you have not allowed any perspective or re-examination to take place. Also, distortions in the reading remain, because when we read something for the first time that can trigger us (I've had that experience), we glom on to certain things, and lose other things, both in tone and content. It is clear that you are going off a memory of what I said, where you say: I never suggested any such thing -- that you make this journal private. Going on memory like I said, is questionable. I have taken more interest in your journal that in some. Argumentative threads here often don't end well, existentially, so I would not want to make this a combative rejoinder. I will say that I sat for quite a while with my thoughts after reading your post (so we agree -- considered response rather than knee-jerks are the way to go, amen), considering what best way to present my point of view, as someone who ardently leans in the opposite direction of you sociopolitically, without making this a "political post' (which would endanger our posts and your journal), without creating an adversarial tone, but nonetheless offering a philosophical critique of your views in the spirit of a discourse which can be divisive. I began by saying that it was something for you to consider, to create a tone of contemplation and examination rather than hostility. And none of it was personal. In response, you have delivered a scathing stream of ad hominems, calling my question(s) "silly", calling me a "hypocrite", saying I am "rude" (where? where am I rude? If you find my very collegial tone here "rude" because I am challenging your worldview, which is that people who think like me "OFFEND (YOU)", how is it you find DJT palatable? He is quite rude in his style of retort, no?) Also, I was not addressing the part of your post about your family, so I wasn't "twisting" your post. I was merely interested in responding to the part about socioeconomic status and the allusion to the political climate we're living in. Your family planning was simply not my focus, though I wish you well in that endeavor, now that I have a chance to say so. So I am not going to engage in personally defending myself against your personal character accusations and your reading of my post. That's not going to get us anywhere. You are free to think of me as a Constant Critic because I have written a couple of challenging posts on your blog, in my 10 years on this site. You are free to size up my entire being based on these posts; something you yet seem to be arguing against doing to another. I will say that judging people's ideas and concepts is natural to all of us. One thing I can't stand, and it happens a lot these days in a sort of counter-psychological one-upmanship, is people who are given to saying, "I don't judge." BULLSHT. I have even observed that those who bandy about saying, "Don't judge" tend to be the heaviest judges. EVERYONE judges, and even though I am an ardent admirer of those who are able to see past exterior appearances, or who are able to admit they do not know everything to be able to make a fair assessment (and I try to do this actively), it is a process we are all engaging in all the time, however sanctimoniously some would like to think they've risen above it. And while some types of judgment are purely based on moralizing and projecting, fully invested in a hateful and totalizing orientation, which are toxic to the soul (such as, "What a sl.ut!" or "What a loser!"), there ARE judgements that we should be making. Otherwise, we would have no court system. We judge people as having committed crimes. We judge people as having lied, when they do. We judge that those who are giving fat incentives to the corporations that will then fund their power over the nation are corrupt. And all these judgements are sound reflections about reality. We need them to act, and to protest certain actions. So there is a place for condemnation. And not so much condemnation of people, as their actions. This is the tricky part. Jesus got that one right, when he said, "judge not the sinner, but the sin." He was still condemning SINS, though -- wrongful acts against other people, injustice, lack of mercy, cold-heartedness, not treating your neighbor as you would want to be treated. I'm not Christian, but this is a secular set of commandments as much as any could be, as society functions better when we all have skin in the game, but also, are helped to ACCESS to skin in the game through the social structure that we choose as our MO. I think it's really hard for most of us to separate condemnation of an idea from condemnation of the person with the idea, and the reason for that is obvious. How many ways can you hurt someone through a "sin" or "sins" before you become "a horrible person"? An "assh0le?" It's a really tough yet fuzzy line. It's a spiritual matter to wrestle with that, as Jesus admonished people to attempt to do. In the spirit of your taking offense at "social justice warriors" (a label that is tacked on to people to rid them of individual identity, in their pursuits), I was condemning certain ideologies, and I was very mindful to keep personal attack out of it. You are then free to interpret that as you wish. I have conservative friends, even one or two who identify as "alt-right". It's not easy. But because the ones I relate to take critique and condemnation of their ideologies as a debate of ideas, we remain on good terms. I would have it no other way, because I do not learn anything by insulating myself in an echo chamber of self-righteousness with like-minded people. Unfortunately, I believe many of them are operating on a set of assumptions about how reality works for people who remain disadvantaged. I know this because I see it all the time and because my life is living proof that you can do just about everything right, work as hard as anyone, be as ambitious as anyone, and still end up on the losing end of a Trump agenda. You say, "You make your own luck." Really? Luck is, by definition, not something you can order by your own hand. Here is the dictionary definition of it: "Success or failure apparently brought by chance rather than through one's own actions." So, let's replace your sentence with the word, "chance": "You make your own chance." If you agree with me that this is inherently self-contradictory, then perhaps you'll agree with me that anyone, at any time, may be subject to the whimsy of the hand of fate in such a way that too many factors can possibly be involved in a given result to run on a predictive model and come to such predictive conclusions. Someone may start with the "hiccup" of poverty, but what does that mean for a given individual? Those who have gotten past that hiccup like to assume that their trajectory through life is the only one that can exist. "I made it, and if I made it, anyone else could have made it." WOW. Presumptuous, much? What if on top of being poor, you were neglected and had no role models? What if you were sexually and physically abused? What if you were born with genes for depression, or your parents were alcoholics, and you inherited those genes, which make you susceptible to what is considered a disease, not a question of will power? What if your entire career depends on your eyesight, and in an accident, you are totally blinded? We have a power structure now that will soundly smite many people who were in the wrong place at the wrong time, even in adulthood. Fortunes are made, and fortunes are also lost, and it's not always because of a personal failing -- which of course is harder to discern when someone else is so rich, they are too big to actually fail. I don't spend my time in an ivory tower on an imperious throne pointing out the corruption and greed, and self-centered power plays that allow those with an upper hand, however they got it, to keep others from ascending. I spend my time working in ways that I hope will improve the chances for those who have been left behind for dead, in the dust, (including myself), because "They couldn't get past their hiccups." I see what goes on when LUCK continues to work insidiously against them, and then the systems that are created continue to pound further nails into those coffins. To expound: You are presenting a false choice: "either you say everyone is a victim and we throw up our arms helplessly, or else proclaim that everything that happens to us is ultimately volitional, and anyone has the choice in their hands to 'make their own luck', and that no one else is needed to make a success of yourself". I don't have to feel resigned to my fate as a "victim" or abdicate responsibility, just because I recognize I have been victimized by people or oppressive circumstances; I don't have to give up on myself just because I know some things are externally out of my control, and continuing to victimize and harm me; and, if I manage to make it out of whatever disadvantaged situation I'm in, to prosperity -- here is the MOST humbling, and therefore distasteful part for people with your type of thinking process -- I also have the choice to view it as, "I am not solely responsible for that, and 'it took a village.'" I don't believe this is an opinion, even though it seems to present as one, in such discussion. It's a fact: there is no one who makes it in this life to "the top" who can claim that "no one else was needed." It's ALL relational. Any other story is a fantasy. Fantasies are stories we like to believe that make us feel good. Faraday's cartoon, which I've also seen and shared on Facebook, exposes the flaw of this thinking pretty well. So, your point of view is riddled with flawed dualistic thinking and either/or, black/white choices that I don't have to make in order to take the positions I do. I can choose neither/nor, and it's a combination of unimaginable complexity how each of us stumbles along to find our path. I respect people who have honestly prospered, for their hard work, and they deserve the credit that is due them. Good for your husband for the hard work, and making it from such difficult beginnings! I applaud his resiliency, motivation, work ethic, and drive. Some people get things on a silver platter and still manage to wreck their lives, so we can give him kudos for doing whatever was under his control to achieve something better than that, as an outcome. I believe in merit, and reward for merits won. But the self-lauding and "self-made" concept crosses a line. He did not make it with no one's help. I don't know his whole story, but for one, YOU helped him. He had stepping stones along the way, either that others offered him, or that that hand of Fate/Luck presented to him. Any other stand is not a humble one, but worse than than that, it does exactly what you yourself are railing against by using this as a measuring stick for others. It forces them to ask you: "How do you know what I've been through? How can you judge me when you don't even know my life?" Well, dear Lo, that is what you are doing to every person you feel has "allowed" their circumstances to keep them in a lesser position in life. They have "failed" somewhere, haven't they? As compared to the people who "pulled themselves up by their bootstraps." The so-called "social justice warriors" wouldn't have so much fodder if people in secure positions didn't equate the desperate and needy situations of others as a mark of personal failure, completely ignorant of the causes and multitudinous factors that may have resulted in those. None of this would be an issue of course if it money wasn't at stake. It all comes down to that in the end. If you perceive someone as a failure, however true or untrue that assessment, or how blind to the causation of that, or how callously lacking in empathy (which is, being able to see that it could have been you), why would you want to support them in their existence in any way? It's easy to discard people like this. The fantasy works well to justify this. You asked if you are a "monster" in your post, so clearly, I am only mirroring something you were already questioning within yourself. I realize you were asking it rhetorically, to yourself, with no need for a reply. And in the future, I will probably let the silence be. But I felt compelled to reply to that "call". Of course you're not a monster. But right now, we have an institution that is going to snuff out many, many people who have worked as hard as your husband, with just as devoted and loyal wives, and that is not fair. And it is largely because their lives are being judged in the same manner that has made you furious when you were equally judged for your contributions to society. And it is not a political statement to say, any Joe Blow billionaire in bankruptcy half a dozen times, mired in dozens of lawsuits against hard-working people, who says, "I'm more broke than this homeless person" has probably not played his or her cards very well. That's their own affair, if it stays their affair -- so long as it's not played out on the world stage, where the world becomes a giant casino. I thought you would not be as insulted as you are. I was banking on "if you're in the kitchen, you can take the heat." In hindsight I do not think you would have responded more congenially to my post no matter what I wrote, as I think I kid-gloved it as much as possible without holding back on my stand. There simply would be no way of denouncing your perspective without angering you. I also think given the times I've read in your posts that you "had everything" and that life has unfolded for you in all the ways you wanted it to, that material was being factored in when I wrote. If you speak of splendor and leisure, fortune and ease, that is what I will take from your posts, not all the hidden sufferings that you have surmounted. Precisely. Hopefully, we will both be doing that in an accounting of others' lives and lots, as we navigate what kind of society we want to live in, and how we wish to put this principle to best practice. I certainly wish for others to be happy. I believe everyone deserves to be happy. However, the means to that can turn a person's character dark, and in those cases, I question whether it is even happiness they have found, or rather, the enjoyment of pleasure. Which I think of as different things. This is a general statement aimed at no one. My final word is that happiness and liberation from feeling at the mercy of life are birthrights I believe in, but if anyone should forget that they were blessed with these things as much as they "earned" them, a modicum of truth is gone.
  8. Sounds like you have a wonderful event planned, one that she would be absolutely thrilled with.
  9. My deepest sympathy for the sorrow of this loss and the hole it leaves you with. But you are right, she will be with you for a lifetime, and will continue to give to you through your memories. ((((HUGS))))
  10. HUGE HUGS, IAG!! ((( ))) I know this is such a hard time. It's such a major transition. I'm sure you're letting her know that she is free to go...sometimes, that is the reason people cling on. They really don't know if it's okay to leave. And even if in your heart right now, you feel unsteady, that you might not be okay for a while...you ARE going to be okay, as you go forth and cultivate a more subtle kind of connection with your mom, which will last the rest of your life. So the best thing you can do is just what you are...reassuring her that you will be fine, and knowing that it is the truth. I wish you strength and peace, even though you're sad. You've done well by her, and she has fought valiantly. This is not a surrender...this is freedom, and a journey for her that is hers to own. MORE HUGS. ((( )))
  11. Oh, really?? Oh no!! Aww, that is so sweet, IAG. I'm so sorry I missed out. I'm sure they are lovely ornaments! Well, there is next year...though any day can be a celebration, and an occasion. Thank you so, so much for thinking of me! And for the kind thoughts. I miss you, too...and being here in general. My life has taken some seismic turns, and will continue to. I have felt so many times like taking up my "pen" to write here again, but then just find myself so overwhelmed with the thought of all that's happened, and lies on the horizon...I just end up withdrawing into myself. It's hard to put words to things these days...though once I started, I'm sure it would be hard to stop. There are so many distractions. But I will try to update in some way...I feel strangely that all that's been familiar to me is fading. And that in some ways, I'm just watching it go. It's a sad feeling. Maybe I'll just post this much. I'm glad you had such a meaningful and close Christmas, IAG, and I'm wishing you another "beautiful in its own way" -- and all ways! -- 2017. Happy New Year!
  12. I get it. The notion of parents leaving with unfinished business and some broken pieces you'll still be mending when they are gone. I'm going through the same right now...it's the second time around, now. Which means, the last. One down. And one to go, and she will slowly be going. No longer having "one left" makes it so much harder to wrap my head around. It makes me feel like a child again, in so many ways. Separation anxiety setting in...it almost seems like yesterday that it felt like this, on my first day of Kindergarten, when she kissed me and waved goodbye, leaving me with smiling strangers promising to take good care of me. How would I know? It was like she was leaving me forever. Now, she will be. God, I hate unfinished business. Business that is going to be up to me and me alone to reconcile. Yet again. Later, in my own time, as it's always been. The idea that we won't be able to work things out anymore, or make all things right, have time, more time, to build tenuous bridges back to one another. The good and the bad will somehow have to work out to becoming okay. Somehow. It seems the take-home here is that imperfection is the mark of being mortal, and mortality seals that truth. But nothing can take away the beauty of any given moment. Every little moment is mortal, too, so each of them must be as precious as a life itself. So I hope you have a beautiful Christmas, IAG. Make it the very best Christmas that a Christmas can be.
  13. Hey, Lo. I haven't been here for a while, but have just stopped by and noticed your last few posts. Every so often, I try to challenge myself to not post in a thread where I feel I would best practice the art of restraint. I'm feeling that right now, as I crack and post against my better judgment. But since you do have this journal in a section that allows others to comment... Facebook can be brutal, and I have had my bitter feuds there as well. I certainly feel that ENA is a safe haven from all of that, and have no intention of bringing all of that toxic energy here, especially in a journal that is more like you just expressing yourself out loud. But I do feel compelled to say this -- maybe as something you might take away to think about. To consider in the whole picture, and examine as a perspective. There are women out there who don't have a D. They could never write that they grew up with everything they ever wanted coming true, as you have. They grew up with broken homes and families -- tears, punches, and in cases, sexual abuse. They did not choose these things -- these were chosen for them, as a circumstance of their birth. And now, the person they thought would be a "D" to them has walked out on them after professing the kind of love your D professes. Despite their despair and depression, they also wanted to start a family, just like you -- and they did. But they are doing it without having gone to college, because their first priority was to work to feed their children, to just put food on the table. They are working 2-3 jobs that they detest as much as the job you worked for a while and detested, and thankfully could walk away from. They will never hope to own a beautiful home, much less have the means to decorate it. Late at night, they turn on the TV to catch a bit of reality shows, the lives of the rich and famous, just to escape for a while. They watch reality shows of beautiful fancy ladies decorating their homes, to visit dreamland for a few minutes. Then they wake up to do it all over again the next day, breaking their backs. They know that it will not end, not for 18 years, 3 times over. But it's still not enough. Their children are still hungry, and don't get things for Christmas. The food they do eat is cheap crap and sickens them. Their school is without books and supplies. Their children's medical care is not supplied by any employer, and they can't spend time with their children or they will lose the money supply, their jobs. Food, medicine -- it's money they need and don't have. They are trapped no matter how you slice it. They work all day to provide for children that don't see them. Their kids grow up learning from the other kids on the block whose innocence has already been shattered by all this, and they sink into bed each night praying that their children don't end up like them -- at the edge, on the edge, every day, never a moment to rest, to feel secure and safe. Abandoned. And in many cases, they stay up worrying about their children eventually getting in trouble with the law because they had no cohesion in the community and a dearth of people to rely on as good role models. Every animal society on the planet -- from elephants to fish, move and work in herds, in schools, in flocks, because they know that they are stronger together and can only survive together, not separately. We are the only species that now has members in it that believe and act otherwise. I find it wondrous to think that someone who does not have to work, doesn't work, and is subsidized by the rich has no active sympathy for another person who is equally without their own means -- yet who does have to work, and does work. One thing I've learned from being in the trenches as a "social justice warrior" is that for the most part, life is a matter of luck. There are those who have much and didn't earn it. There are those who have much and did earn it. There are those who have little and didn't earn it. There are those who have little and earned it. That means that about 50% of the people on this planet got unlucky (that's of course a gross underestimate) -- and about 50% of those people are unlucky enough not to even have the means to get more lucky, even with the most valiant efforts. These are not hard statistics, but a way to conceptualize this. What kind of world do you want to live in? One that rewards only the lucky? The ones who got lucky and didn't even earn it, moreover? What if you were one of the unlucky? Born into a different fate, for it to unfold with its raw and mean realities? How would you wish to be treated? What if? What if? The one thing missing, the common denominator, in the minds of those with privilege, as I've discovered -- and it's the kernel that separates those who embrace social justice and those who deride or just simply dismiss it -- is that the latter seem to not be able to wrap their heads around the concept "what if...?" And the famous line, "If not for the grace of God, there go I." This divide is not determined by sex or age. It's determined by status and class. And that's absolutely, entirely unoriginal. Wealthy people with nice things aren't inherently bad. What's worth reconsidering, if I may be so audacious, is not being able to ask seriously, not whimsically, "what if?" Especially if there is nothing more that you are contributing to society than anyone else looking to be taken care of. I don't mean to sound harsh, but these issues keep me up at night. I'm sure you understand the feeling.
  14. Oh, that sounds SO beautiful....I hope you have a wonderful time. I've been dreaming of swimming in freshwater lakes for a long time now...aren't they pretty cold where you are? Especially now with fall approaching?
  15. I'm curious about something... In choosing between being at work, looking at the clock and just waiting for lunch and the end of the day, hoping the time will go fast so you can leave, but having something to do all day that puts you in contact with people, produces something of value even if its drudgery to perform, and makes you feel part of "the rest of the world".... and having all this freedom to do whatever you please, and not having to do dreadful tasks each day that are asked of you, but feeling a beast of boredom constantly at your ankles, prodding you to find this or that to stave off loneliness, the malaise of idleness, feeling cut off from the rthythm of the rest of the world and hyper-aware of aloneness when you are not distracted by some passing pleasure... which of those states is more endurable for you? Being pre-occupied by the fight to find something meaningful through the boredom...or doing concrete things that you dislike doing that give your life structure?
×
×
  • Create New...