The Collective

So the last few weeks months years have been hard on a lot of people. To be blunt, many of you who are used to being on the winning side of issues have lost. Repeatedly.

This has been hard for you to take. On top of that, some of you have learned some disappointing things about people you thought you knew.

Well, I have two things to say about this: First, as a person of color, I can tell you it’s not the end of the world. POC have been disappointed by our government and people we thought we knew since we’ve been here. But we’re still here and we’re still fighting. As a woman, I make the same statement.

My second thought: I think we’re at a point where things could change if we’re willing to take a step back, put our personal biases and opinions to the side and look at the bigger picture.

Instead of separate groups fighting individually, we need to be one huge force.

People who kneel. People in pussy hats. People who fly the rainbow flag. People who are in the thick of the immigration fight or battling the opioid epidemic…

All of us.

At some point, we’re going to have to come together as a collective. The issues might be different, but the foe is the same: We’re fighting the power. Until those of us who are being oppressed in one way or another come together with one voice, we’re just going to keep spinning our wheels. Sure the power might give us an inch or two once in a while to make us think we’re making progress, but in actuality, we’re not getting anywhere fast.

And for those of you who say, “Yeah, we’ve tried that, but when causes group together the meaning of the causes lose their impact,” you are missing the point. Do you know why the impact was lost? Three words:

Divide and Conquer

And here’s three more:

Separate but Equal.

Individual causes stood side-by-side, yes. But they still fought their battles separately. And this allowed the people with the power to whisper in each group leader’s ear that the other groups really didn’t care about their issue, they were just using their platform, resources, etc. So the leaders of each group turned on each other.

Separate but equal and divide and conquer. The oldest tricks in the book and we fall for them both time and time again.

So, one more time for the latecomers, and a bit louder for the people in the back:

WE NEED TO WORK TOGETHER. We need to quit with the crazy, “Well you should have been with us when it didn’t directly affect you,” nonsense and join forces. And for emphasis, more examples:

Did you join the #MeToo movement, even if you weren’t personally involved or directly affected?

Did you kneel even if you weren’t a target of police brutality?

Are you voicing your concern about how immigrants (legal or otherwise) are being treated in this country? Or are being denied entry?

How about the LGBTQ+ community, the homeless, veterans or the mentally ill?

The opioid crisis?

If you’re not front and center on every last one of these issues, I don’t see how you can shoot down the idea of all these groups banding together. Matter of fact, I think you and your opinion should take several seats.

This is all about power, folks. The ones who have it don’t want to relinquish it. It’s obvious that the balance of power is not equal and it’s just as obvious that each group taking a turn on the scale isn’t enough weight to tip the balance in anyone’s favor.

But if we all stand on the scale…that would be the tipping point.

Anyway, those are my thoughts. Agree? Disagree? Let me know in the comments.

 

 

Big announcement about my future! *not clickbait*

LOL…I’ve always wanted to do a headline like that.

But seriously, I think I have figured out what I want to do.

There are a lot of problems in this world, and a lot of people need help with a lot of things.

I am going to help them.

There’s a reason I started teaching…and there’s a reason I got an advanced degree in Adult Education.

There’s a reason that I honed my copy writing and product description writing skills.

And there’s a reason I keep coming back to this Valley, when it would make way more sense for me to live elsewhere.

Finally I think my actual purpose has been revealed to me. And I am *stoked*!

I think I have found a way to be a real resource and help to the people in the Ohio Valley.

But that’s all I can say for now. All I can say is…

46(?)/46/46 – Day #8: Drama Llamas…the only animal that needs to become extinct

I have nothing to say.

Actually, I have plenty to say, I just can’t say any of it at the moment.

Why? Because I have “friends” who are posers and are attempting to cause issues for me. FYI, I know who you are, and you will be dealt with when the time is right. Until then, certain subjects are off the table.

You know, you’d think that people would have the guts to confront a person to her face if there’s a problem. But, obviously some people don’t have the guts to do that, so they go behind a person’s back and whisper crap in other’s ears. The only thing worse are those who believe what they are being told and never bother to verify anything.

Anyone who knows me realizes I am about as transparent as you can get. I don’t hide my emotions. First off, my face gives me away every time, and second, I don’t see the point in hiding them anyway. If I don’t like something, I don’t like it. If I love something, I love it. If I have no opinion, I have no opinion.

Oh hush, it has too happened. LOL

Anyway, I’m pretty incapable of hiding my feelings, which means unless you’re completely clueless, you know how I feel about things about ten seconds (if I’m distracted) after you mention it. So, there is NO REASON to make up or guess how I feel about an issue. Ask me. You’ll know while the question is still hanging in the air. There’s no reason to speculate or guess.

But some people just like to cause issues. They like drama. It’s more fun to spread rumors. I don’t know if these people realized the problems they were causing, but thanks to them, I’ve a mess to clean up and I don’t really appreciate it.

But anyway, that’s all I’m going to say about things. As soon as things are straightened out, I’ll go back to my regularly scheduled zany posts. Until then, this blog is probably going to be a whole lot of nothing about nothing. Sorry y’all, blame the idiots with too much time on their hands.

What I learned in logic class…

When I was an undergrad, I took a philosophy/logic class. On one of the professor’s first exams, he asked this question:

“Why?”

No one got the answer right.

As we went through the semester, the answer he was looking for became more clear. When the professor posed the question on the final exam, we all got it right.

The answer: Because

Many of us are still reeling over the events of Friday. Many are angry. Many are gut-wrenchingly sad. Many are asking “why?” What would make a person do such a heinous thing?

These are fair questions, but in the overall scheme of things, the concrete answers don’t matter, and more to the point, we will never know, since the only one who could provide the answers is no longer here.

So we are forced to live with the fact we will not get the answers we want. Notice I said want, not need. We already know what we need to know, we just aren’t willing to accept it.

We know 20 families are not tucking in little ones tonight.

We know 27 families are making funeral arrangements tonight.

We know several dozen parents are living with the agony of outliving their child

We know children have lost their parents.

We know too many people died on Friday.

We know all this, yet we still ask why.

Well…

Because there has always been craziness on the planet.

Because there has always been evil in this world.

Because it is human nature for a person in pain to strike out at others, to not only inflict pain, but as a desperate attempt to lesson his own.

I don’t know if Adam Lanza was crazy, evil, in pain or a combination of the above. What I do know is that we are wringing our hands and banging our heads against the wall, trying to figure the “whys,” when the answer is simple. Painfully simple:

Because he wanted to

Because he could

Because he did

Because

The Great American Debates have already started. Both sides of the gun issue will be bantering back and forth for several weeks, both pointing fingers and sharing pearls of wisdom such as “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people,” and “If guns were banned, this would have never happened.” The religion debate will heat up, with school prayer being trotted out again (Yeah, I know, already happened.) Others, I’m sure, will find a way to make this tragedy work for their niche political agenda.

But if these are the only takeaways we get from this horrific event, then we’re doomed. Because even in our darkest hours, there are still rays of light and hope. Platform people can demand changes until they are blue, but those changes won’t make the crazy sane or the evil disappear. You can’t legislate it,  you can’t will it out of existence, but no one wants to talk about what could be done about it.Sure people want change, but the proposals are cosmetic. (I’m avoiding the political aspects right now…)

So, the best we can do (for now) is realize that these things exist and live our lives knowing that at any given moment, crazy and evil can land on our doorstep. That does not mean we are to go trough our lives in fear. It actually means the opposite. We should embrace every day and everyone we care about. None of us knows when we will speak our final words to someone, kiss our last kiss or give our last hug to those we love.

Because none of us are promised a tomorrow.

Because bad things happen

Because we’re all human

Because

I Struck Down the Soup Nazi!

Well, I helped, anyway.

I’m going to keep this short — I’ll probably post more about it tomorrow.

Every Sunday for the last year and a half, a friend of mine and his wife have been making soup for the local freeze shelter (that’s a shelter that takes in homeless people when the weather is cold). Well, this past week, my friend was told by the Health Department that he could no longer provide soup to the shelter because he didn’t have a commercial kitchen or a permit.

This upset my friend, and as people often do, he posted about it on Facebook. And we were rather annoyed for him.

After doing some research, my friend discovered that although he couldn’t take a whole pot of soup down to the shelter, there was nothing illegal about an individual taking a single serving of soup to another individual.

See where I’m going with this?

So, tonight, I participated in some civil disobedience. Yes, it was technically still not legal for him to serve the soup, but since individuals delivered it, it was okay.

Sorta.

Well to me, and the rest of us who pitched in, it was perfectly okay. Matter of fact, a good time was had by all.

Anyway, that was my first act of rebellion since college. Felt good. Might have to see what else I can get myself into…

🙂

A Day in Pictures

This was my day…

I think we can all relate to this kind of day.

I could rehash it, but honestly, I don’t wanna, and there’s no sense in dragging all of you down with me, so I won’t.

Let’s just hope tomorrow is more like this:

Cute and furry and full of fun. Cuz I can’t take another picture #1 kinda day.

Of course, I wouldn’t turn down this kind of day:

I’m not choosy — clients could pay me, I could win the lottery, whatever. But even if that doesn’t happen, I will HAPPILY settle for this:

Here’s hoping tomorrow is a better day!

Yet Another Lesson Learned

I received several comments and private messages regarding my post yesterday. Although you were kind enough to not say it directly — the message was received. Yes, I was whining. LOL

I didn’t accomplish what I *thought* I should, but I didn’t exactly sit around and eat bon bons all day, either. I did do a lot. And I really really need to remind myself that, had this been this time two years ago, I wouldn’t have been able to accomplish what I did accomplish yesterday. [I’ll fill you in on that some other time.]

So, thanks for calling me on my crap. I appreciate it. The next time I have a day that didn’t go as planned, I will just refer to it as that. I didn’t do what I intended to do, but it wasn’t a total waste.

Today has been a much more productive day writing-wise. I’m just about caught up with everything, so things look good for the week. I’m plotting planning what I’m going to write about here — not sure if it will be more conversational or educational but I hope it will be interesting for you.

So, I’d love to stay and chat longer, but deadlines await. Ah — the life of a writer — it doesn’t get much better! 🙂

It’s Not Supposed To Be Easy

Today has been an interesting day. It seems like every other conversation, every other tweet, every other Facebook status has been someone complaining about a situation — they don’t like their jobs. They don’t have enough money. They can’t get x,y, or z. The gist of it all is: Life is hard.

Well, no s&*^, Sherlock. Yeah, life IS hard. If it wasn’t would you appreciate those brief fleeting moments when it isn’t?

If you had a truly easy life: all the money you ever needed, all the friends in the world, a job you loved…would you appreciate it?

No, you wouldn’t. You would grow to expect it. If you can’t be honest about it, then I’ll have to be honest for both of us, because I know I’d take it for granted.

That’s why, even though it bugs the hell out of me at times, I’m glad I have to work for what I have. Every new skill I gain, every new client I land, every check I cash — I know I worked for it, and I worked damn hard to get it. Nothing has been handed to me…ever.

And if I had to choose between working for it and having it handed to me, I’ll take the work. I don’t want to live on Easy St. Easy makes you complacent; it takes away your motivation and your drive. And when you are no longer motivated or driven, that’s when the rug can get pulled out from under you. Don’t believe me? Reread this.

So, to those who are complaining that life is hard — yep, it is. Accept it and keep pushin’. If it gets easier, find out what else you can do. Cuz, as soon as it gets easy, it can all slip away.

And We’re Back!

And what did we learn?

Were you inconvenienced by the Blackouts today? Cranky that you couldn’t access Wikipedia to answer that burning question, who played Sgt. Howie in The Wicker Man?(Edward Woodward in the original, Nicholas Cage in the remake.) Couldn’t get your Redditt fix? Were some of your favorite Flickr pics unavailable?

If any of this bothered you, if you had to change the way you did one thing today, then you can begin to understand why SOPA and PIPA need to be stopped. Now, I agree that piracy is a pox that needs a vaccination — I’ve had my fair share of articles, essays, columns, etc. pilfered. But not at the expense of losing everything. Just because one idiot opts to steal software, music or someone else’s work does not mean all the sites on the ISP he happens to use should be wiped off the planet, nor should it mean an ISP or DNS should be blacklisted as a pirate.

So, now that things are back to normal, what will you do now? I hope you contact your congressman and tell him/her that there must be a better way than to give in to some lobbyists. Lobbyists who aren’t looking out for the public good — just their own bottom lines. There has to be a better way.

Get Involved!

In case you haven’t heard, tomorrow is going to be a big day for the Internet. Wikipedia, Readdit, and other pretty popular sites are gonna go black for 24 hours to protest SOPA/PIPA.

Don’t know what that is? Read about it here and here.

(Hope you did that quickly, since they were Wikipedia pages. Ha ha.)

Seriously — read about it here. And check out a video about it here.

I don’t do censorship in ANY sense — when the KKK wanted to protest in my hometown, I was all for it, because it meant I could stand across the street and heckle them.  Westboro Baptist Church? Let ’em protest and hope a house or one of those frozen blocks of airplane waste fall on their heads. If they are allowed to say what they want, then that means I’m still allowed to as well, and you all know how I love to express myself.

In short (yeah, I know too late, but stay with me!), SOPA and PIPA are censorship and blacklisting. I’m not for either of those things. And you shouldn’t be either!

So, thanks to WordPress, who is also a participant in the Blackout, The Classic Quill will be taking part in the formal protest. From 8am to 8pm tomorrow, you will be greeted with a message instead of some snarky remark from me. You’ll live, and I promise to come back with some extra snarky goodness tomorrow night!

Til then, if you can find a way to participate, you should, because this involves all of us, and we should all stand up for our Internet freedoms.