nakedjen

There's More Than One Way To Have It All

 

"There must be those among whom we can sit down and weep and still be counted as warriors."

 

• What I am reading   Proving that everything that is old is always new again.  Or, perhaps I just got really bored and stopped paying attention and this industry never actually died.  I'm sure there's at least one person who remembers when I worked for Camera Cafe.  I knew this world. It actually was part of the impetus behind #nakedfridays and my own wish for everyone to love themselves as they are.  I'm not surprised that the world is dangerous.  It was then, it can only be more so now.  We forget that people are actually HUMAN BEINGS. 
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• What I am eating  I have to make something to take to a party.  Who doesn't like chocolate and caramel?  I mean, some people obviously do not, but I'm pretty certain this will just disappear and I won't have to deal with bringing home leftovers. 

• What I am Listening To Stella is missing her brother. I'm thinking she might even need a heating pad with a heartbeat in it, if I can find such a thing.  She used to sleep wrapped around him and now, well, now she sleeps with her head burrowed under her blankets. Times are tough.  The music helps. 

• What I am watching   Feeding my Gilmore Girls habit. However, it's even better because Amy is not constrained, has a far bigger budget and, well, we get to go on a deep dive without commercials.  Stella joins me on the couch for every episode. Also, the New York Times gives us this fab list of reading material to add to the fun.  

• What I am thinking about The money quote: “I hope — I pray — we don’t have to use this fund,” DeAngelis said. “But odds are we will.”  
  
  What they do not really mention in this article is that the State of Colorado is creating a 501(c), based on the generosity of others, to take care of victims of mass tragedy in their state.  While I know that we're human and we all respond with caring hearts when mass tragedy happens, what bothers me most here is that why not also fund this fund by collecting additional dollars from the sales of guns?  Maybe?? Or does that cross some line drawn in the sand.  Or even with additional fees for gun licenses?  And, yes, I know that most mass tragedies occur at the hands of people who probably had illegal access to guns in the first place.  However, I'm a big believer in helping to make the entire community (in this case gun owners) take responsibility.  
  
  If you're going to need a FUND for the victims of Mass Tragedy and you want people to donate to fund the fund in advance of the tragedy that you know is inevitably going to happen, why not also ask for money from the makers of the guns that will probably also contribute to the tragedy.  It just seems like common sense to me. 

• What I am really feeling: Like I want to throw up. Pleasant, I know. However, it's the truth. And I'd like to think when I read this however long from now in the future that I'll perhaps not feel like throwing up because things will have somehow sorted themselves out.  A girl can hope. 

Like Story Time in Preschool

 

"Our stories don’t fit on a newspaper page. I’m tired of newspaper pages, Elisabeth. Life is a spiral, not a line."

• What I am reading I read my first John Irving novel when I was in high school. Setting Free the Bears is still one of my favourite books although, of course, so many of us have a soft spot in our hearts for Owen Meany and Cider House Rules and Garp. I have read all of his words that are published. I feel a bit about John Irving the way I feel about Tom Robbins. It's almost like putting on your favourite onesie and knowing that there's a hole in the elbow but it doesn't matter, really, because you know exactly how it got there and that it still fits and it is soft and it will keep you cozy while the world burns down around you.
• What I am eating  Tea. Cookies. Couch. Black dog. The rest of you can go get your lives sorted. Or come and join me for tea and cookies on the couch. I'll share.  

• What I am Listening To  Give in to love and just listen. 

• What I am watching  We're bingeing this as a family.  So we only watch every other week when the teenager is actually present.  We're almost caught up and then we'll actually have to wait and watch it in real time with the rest of you! 

• What I am thinking about Last century when the Grateful Dead was still the Grateful Dead and Jerry was still alive, I found myself one evening standing in a parking lot in Sacramento, California just after all the songs had been sung looking at an empty VW Bus that had once held all my worldly possessions.  The VW Bus was not mine, but my backpack that held my life at the time, had been locked inside and while we were inside the venue dancing like hippies dance someone had decided to avail themselves of all the things in the bus and, well, that included my backpack. 
  
  It was the late 80's and so this meant that inside my backpack were things like a big wad of cash from selling my cookies and a checkbook with blank checks and even a plane ticket.  I stood there and cried and felt sorry for myself until NakedIan, who owned the van and had lost far more than I had lost, put his hands on my shoulders and said, "Nakedjen, you can stand here and cry or you can think of this like a gift!  Someone else just took all of your problems!" 
  
  It's all about perspective.  The next morning while we were standing in the police station to report that someone had taken all of our stuff from the VW Bus, NakedIan looked at the officer and said, "I mean, honestly, everything! The only thing I have left to my name is this fluffy pink skirt I'm wearing right now."  
  
  When times are tough, I always think about that moment.  Sometimes you find yourself standing in nothing but a pink fluffy skirt and those are the moments when there's nothing left to do but smile, smile, smile. xo

• What I am really feeling: I wish people could be grown-ups and own their own bull shit.  I understand that it's hard to do and I also understand we're making it far easier as a society to award BAD BEHAVIOR.  However, there's no need to be an arrogant asshole. Ever. 
   

Gifting does not contemplate a return or an exchange for something of equal value.

 

"Something is significantly wrong with a world that sacrifices its children’s lives to settle its differences."

 

• What I am reading   Farmers are my friends.  Especially small farmers who grow sustainably and provide food with a mind for not only our bodies but our future and the health of the planet.  Those farmers are the farmers we should be supporting.  You can learn a lot about your own government when you read something like their Farm Bill. Hidden in the pages are exactly what corporate interests want to see and what small farmers never are going to get.  

 

 

• What I am eating  Coconut Apple Ginger Dal. Again. This time with feeling. But, honestly, snow's in the forecast. The air is ugly in Utah. Sustenance is on the menu. 

 

• What I am Listening To  Pitchfork gives us an intimate conversation with musicians we may not actually have heard before. Give a listen with a cuppa. 

• What I am watching  

• What I am thinking about It feels like ages ago, and it is over 15 years ago, when I was blogging regularly, I had imaginary friends whom I loved fiercely and visited regularly at their own blogs. Our blogs were literal portals into our lives at the time and we really were like a small love army who knew one another (or thought we did).  The thing is these were the days before GoFundMe existed and if someone NEEDED something, we just all pitched in and made it happen.  One way or another.  Because it is the season, today I thought of Blue Witch. Who also blessed me with Feast of the Cash Register a very long time ago. She is the one who put it down first and I have whispered it aloud to those who will even bother to listen to me as I fuss about how I do not CELEBRATE THE SEASON. 
  
  I prattle on and on about how I gift in other ways. When I choose to gift. That I'm a stealth elf.  Showing up with just what is needed when it is needed or JUST BECAUSE, not because the calendar has flipped to the day we deign PRESENTS should be presented.  Ahem.  
  
  I'm thrilled that Blue Witch is still blogging. I'm still there in her sidebar as a friend.  Reading her today was, well, good medicine.  FOTCR, indeed. 
  
  P.S.  If you ARE in the mood for giving right now, I will suggest that you participate in THE NINTH ANNUAL JAMES GARFIELD MIRACLE. I do participate every year. It's totally worth it. xo  

• What I am really feeling: In the too much information department, I'm tired of waking up every night at 3:00 a.m. wanting to rip my clothes off and wandering the house like a mad woman.  Why haven't women told each other about menopause and all the things that happen to our bodies when it happens?? Why?!?!? What purpose does it serve to keep all of this a secret? I feel like there's some big conspiracy that says, "Right, let's not talk about THIS!!"   
  
  Well, I'm here now. I've arrived. So you know what?  I'm going to talk all about it.  

Snow is Falling

I'm not ready to be old yet. 

• What I am reading I honestly have not been paying any attention and had no idea that Instagram was such a money-making machine that it has created a cottage industry of apps to create more money for the money makers! 


• What I am eating  Well, not exactly right this minute. But I am thinking that it would be fun to host a party with the professor. Something for everyone and the pancakes can just keep coming!


• What I am listening to I've been listening to this since before JVN sprung into our collective consciousness in the revamped Queer Eye. Jonathan is generous, he's fun, and he is curious about lots of really interesting things! 


• What I am watching  Truly escapist television for me. More like watching a film, each evening, about deplorable people with deplorable problems that do nothing to make me feel better about myself or the world, but do allow me not to think really at all for a little while. 

• What I am thinking about Do we meet at The Gorge or Boulder or do we also go to Wrigley, too. I know, I know, Jerry is still dead. 

• What I am really feeling: Lonely, cold, and a little bit sad. It's December, it's snowing and I don't do well when the days get shorter.