Sunday, January 29, 2017

Gray Gardens

Everyday I wake up in Donald Trump's America and prepare myself for the news. It takes all of my courage and backbone to move forward through my anxiety and depression and face the day. Being on the West Coast means that by the time I get up, our President has already done two, maybe three, heartbreaking and horrifying things.

I feel like I've got my own armor now. I put it on as soon as my foot hits the floor of the bedroom and I don't take it off until I'm back in bed at night.

The world looks different now. Being outside, things have changed. Everything looks grayer. Things seem bleaker. The air is colder.

The reality of living this life is so much worse than the awful I thought it would be. As soon as the tide turns, everything becomes desolate. I don't have to wait to see the gestapo in order to feel them coming.

This is an America that I never thought I'd live in but I realize now that was naive. I realize now that I was seeing the world through my own blinders, my own white privilege. Of course we wound up here, how could we not? The freedom that I've so easily taken for granted hasn't ever been given out to all of our people. And our own hypocrisy is coming for us now.

It's still not fair though. Not all of us deserve this fate. There are people who have been standing up for themselves and for others for lifetimes and the air is just as polluted for them as it is for me.

There's a part of me that knows the happiness I felt just last year is something that I'll never get back again. You can't reach this stage and go back, ever. Once you see this version of the world, you never come clean. And knowing that I could've, I should've, done more in my lifetime is something that I'll never forget.

I look around and things that are supposed to be green are gray. Skies that are supposed to be sunny, are overcast. Clouds that are supposed to be light are dark. Our world has become a gray garden. The colors on our TVs are so much brighter now than the ones outside.

In order to see the best of humanity we find we have to keep staring at screens, desperate to find voices as vivid as our own and hearts that still know the brilliance and beauty of color.

Black Lives Matter

Women's Rights are Human Rights

Today, I am Muslim

Science is Real

No Human is Illegal

Love is Love

Brown Lives Matter

No H8

Kindness is Everything

#NoBanNoWall

Climate Change is not a Conspiracy

Let Freedom Ring

Give Peace a Chance

Friday, January 27, 2017

New America

Everyday I watch as my country turns into Nazi Germany.

Say that I'm exaggerating. Say that I'm taking my dislike and distrust of Donald Trump to new heights. Say that I'm employing scary tactics.

None of that surprises me. And none of it stops my thoughts, either.

Why?

Because the same thoughts and feelings were told to those people in Nazi Germany that were watching in horror as Hitler took hold and destroyed their country.

Many would say that Germany still hasn't recovered from it.

Because no matter the state of things inside that now-unified country, the rest of the world still uses them as the ultimate warning. We still use them as an example for the absolute worst that can come out of the world. We still vilify them. We still recoil from their history. And we still have trust issues.

And now this is where we, in the US, are.

The country that has this as their Preamble to the Constitution...

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

...is now the country that has done all of this in the FIRST week of Trump's presidency.


  • Lied about the size of his inaugural crowd...for days...as if that was important and deserved this time and concentration.
  • Put in the executive order to repealed the Affordable Care Act without any alternative for the millions of Americans that will be without health insurance. 
  • Put down the Women's March and dismissed the voices being heard there.
  • Reinstated the Global Gag order for scientists and the EPA, trying to silence the voice of truth and keep educated people from sharing their knowledge.
  • Issued an executive order to allow the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline through the Standing Rock Reservation.
  • Began funneling federal resources to build a wall on the border with Mexico. Not only is he instituting his isolationist agenda but the wall is now being paid for by American tax payer money and his only plan for getting the money back is to tax Mexican imports, that would essentially still mean the American taxpayers would be funding the wall. 
  • During his first televised interview, said that he supported torture and believed in its effectiveness. This includes being specific about being pro-waterboarding.
  • He also said in this interview that Chicago was worse than Afghanistan. That people were being killed right and left. And that if Chicago didn't do something about it, he'd "send in the Feds".
  • In this same interview where he stated that Chicago was worse than Afghanistan, he also said that no place was worse than the Middle East. He said that people were being beheaded all the time there. Christians and even Muslims, all kinds of people, were having their heads chopped off all the time.
  • Declared that Sanctuary Cities would not be tolerated, prompting Miami to be the first to fall to Trump's demands and instruct its police force to not protect illegal immigrants. 
  • Declared war on the media.
  • Threatened to publish a paper listing the names of illegal immigrants and the crimes they have "committed", taking an actual page out of the Nazi instruction manual. 
  • Sent his VP to the March for Life, the first sitting VP to attend, and continuing to push the sentiment that this is a Pro-Life presidency.
  • Continues to obsess over his incorrect belief that he won the popular vote (that he lost by over 3 million people) and insists that this voter fraud is due to illegal immigrants voting. Will continue to spend the government's time and resources research this, despite the fact that it doesn't matter. 
  • Ban refuges and issuing visas to people from several Muslim-majority nations. 


And this is not a complete list. This is just the overview. 

This list is our country now. This is the New America.

Unless we stop it.

Thursday, January 26, 2017

Enough

I'd like to take a moment to address Senator Chris McDaniel and his recent FaceBook post. After much thought, I've decided to do it with the same condescension that Senator McDaniel employed since I feel it must be the tone and attitude he understands best.




Well done, Senator McDaniel. You must be so proud of the fact that you've conveniently missed the point of a march that you couldn't be bothered to understand in the first place. It's such a good feeling when we hit one of our goals and can swipe another task off our list and you've done just that.

Go on, pat yourself on the back.

And now, tell me some more about how I desperately and violently want to end the lives of the unborn and just be able to put the abortion on my SNAP card! Cause that's totally my motivation and the motivation of all the women at the march. Hell, if I could eat the young afterwards that'd be even better. Nutrition, and all.

Please, tell me more about how all I want are free abortions and free birth control and free cell phones.

Show me more evidence about how once those embryos become human beings you couldn't give a fuck about them. Please, continue to go on and show me more proof that once a baby is born you not only won't do anything to ensure that baby has equal right and an equal voice but that when that human being is speaking, you won't even have the decency and respect to listen to what it's saying.

And please, point out to me that some of those babies would be little girls. Please assume that I care more about girls than I do boys. Please assume that your little sarcastic comment means more about me than it does about you. Because buddy, the fact that you think women standing up for themselves is fucking selfish is the most hypocritical thing I've ever heard.

Why is our standing up for ourselves somehow offensive to you? Is it because our standing up for ourselves is getting in the way of you walking all over us, Senator McDaniel?

Let me ask you a question...would you be more comfortable with abortion if we could prove the gender beforehand? Cause you don't seem to give a fuck about women anyway. How about black or brown babies? Maybe we just don't abort the little white boy babies, would that work for you?

Because those are the only fucking people you seem to have a desire to build a country around.

Do you give even the littlest shit about all the rape or incest victims who you don't want to be able to have an abortion? Tell me, would it be okay for them to have the procedure as long as they rehashed every detail about their attack so that you could have the most vivid picture you can get and they can spiral into self-destruction? Would it be okay then? How about if they get their mom (cause they're 15) to drive them out of state to the closest place that would provide them the procedure? Would it be okay, then? How about if they had to pay for it themselves. I mean, the kid was already raped. And now, she has to relive every detail for your benefit...to prove that what she says is true. And to top it all off, even though a crime was committed against her, even though her body was physically violated, even though she is a little girl on the verge of losing her entire self-worth and esteem, NOW her family has to somehow find a way to pay for the procedure outright because you don't believe that their insurer should cover anything...because her RAPE is now entirely her responsibility.

You must sleep so soundly at night knowing that you've stopped these godless heathens from committing the ultimate crime.

BECAUSE THE ONLY CRIME YOU SEEM TO SEE IN THAT SCENARIO IS THE KILLING OF AN UNBORN BABY.

And now seems like a good time to talk about this whole "killing the lives of the unborn" issue. In this country, science is supposed to matter more than religion, in terms of our government. Know how I know that? It's called freedom of religion and separation of church and state.

Now...

If your reasoning for calling an embryo "the unborn" has anything to do with your faith, religion or spirituality it DOES NOT belong in our governing body.

You can wish it did all you want. But it doesn't. That's against the law.

You canNOT force me or anyone else to take on your belief system and live our lives according to what you dictate. That violates separation of church and state and is therefore unconstitutional.

So now that I've given you, a senator, a quick yet desperately needed lesson in American civics and government, let me also give you the other lesson you so badly need.

A lesson in compassion.

You, sir, talked to me as if you knew me. You assumed the worst because that was most helpful and convenient to you and then you mocked me. I don't want anything other than what you, a man, have. I want to be treated equally. I want to know if someone rapes me and they're convicted in a court of law, that the judge won't give him a light sentence so as not to ruin his life...meanwhile he's already ruined mine. I want to know that my medical issues are just as important as yours. If I need a procedure to save my life, I'd like to know that I can have it. I'd like to know that my insurance would cover my life-saving procedure that involves my lady parts the same way they would cover a life-saving procedure involving any other organs. I want to be paid the same as a man with equal education doing the same job as I am. I want to not be mocked and laughed at when I stand up for myself.

I want the same level of compassion that you give so willingly to "the unborn". You know, if that's not too much trouble, Senator.

P.S. I hope you're enjoying your free, taxpayer-provided, all-inclusive, super awesome health insurance that no one else in the country gets. You're welcome.

Wednesday, January 25, 2017

Our New Normal

Everyday when we wake up in Trump's America, there's something new and horrifying to behold. It's overwhelming. I'm sure it's meant to be.

Scientists are on lock-down.

The EPA isn't allowed to speak.

The Wall is beginning.

The Affordable Care Act is being repealed without an alternative.

Medicare and Medicaid are under attack.

A group of men met inside a woman's uterus to ban insurance use for procedures she might desperately need.

We're being bombarded.

Trump is advertising his hotel in DC.

His staff have private RNC emails and he tweets from on unsecured Android phone.

Paul Ryan declared this to be a pro-life congress, essentially throwing it's unconstitutionality in our faces and ignoring the health of more than half of the country's population.

Nothing that's happening right now is okay. Our country and it's people are being drowned as our rights and freedoms are taken away. If you don't see this as a war on the truth, you're not looking hard enough. Facts are becoming illegal. Truth is becoming a felony. And soon we, the people, will be the detainees in Gitmo. We will be shut out from reality and the rest of the world. We will be isolated and vulnerable, attacked by our own government and being weakened by a life without educational nutrition. Our public schools are in imminent danger and that's exactly as they'd like it.

The dumber we are, the more they'll get ahead. The more ignorant we are, the more power they'll gain. And the more passive we are, the more we will become a country of hate and evil: a country at war with its purpose.

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, must move forward without hypocrisy and hold our government and our country responsible for the tenants that we are supposed to hold dear.

Monday, January 16, 2017

My Apology

This blog is just for me. It's not about anybody else. These are my feelings about myself and I need to own them.

I need to apologize.

I need to apologize to all my human brothers and sisters for letting you down.

I just turned 41.

I wasn't blind. I wasn't unaware. I didn't think Donald Trump would win but I also knew it'd be a close race.

I knew what our country was like.

And I failed you.

I failed us.

It was like I was hoping that if I behaved like everyone was equal then that would be reality. Well, I guess what I really meant was then that would be my reality, emphasis on the "my".

I'm planning on going to the Women's March on Portland the day after the inauguration. It will be my first march but it shouldn't be.

I should've been marching for years.

I may have been voicing my opinions all my life but I should've been speaking louder. I should've been using a megaphone or a microphone or the writing skills that God gave me. I spent a long time making things up to go on the page and I still love that. But, my own thoughts and my own words and my own reality should've accompanied it. My own hopes for our universe. My own hopes for our country.

I've been selfish.

I've written about what's most interested me.

Mostly fiction. Mostly funny. A little smut.

But years without anything meaningful.

I've tried to give people a means of escape and that has real merit. But I needed to do more than that.

I needed to try and help make the world something that people needed to escape from a little less.

I've always believed that was my purpose but I stopped looking for it at some point and started just thinking of myself.

I'm so sorry.

I'm so sorry that I was so selfish for so long. I'm so sorry that I lived in a world that was so one-sided and I didn't really do anything to stop it.

I'm so ashamed.

Every time I write a blog or work on my book or write something down about how we can't live like this anymore, I can feel my stomach roll a little and know that my nausea is my own shame.

I can't imagine being on the other side of privilege and not being at least a little pissed that it took so many people so long so say something. And that gives me shame as well.

I wonder if I've hurt my friends that aren't white with my silence. And I know if I have, it's totally justified.

And I apologize. I wish I could apologize everyday for my silence. I've thought of you as my friends. I've cared so much for you. And I've let you down. Not because I'm so powerful that I alone can change the world but because it's the right thing to do and I haven't been doing it.

I can't let this shame stop me now, though. It may make me feel like a partial hypocrite for taking so long to do the right thing but I'd rather do the right thing now even if it means I feel like shit about my past inactivity than only feeling better because I'm ignoring my own truth.

It's officially after midnight, so I can say:

Today is a new day.

Today, I am a new me.

Today and going forward, I pledge to be the me that uses her voice for change. I pledge to be the me that is brave enough to speak up for what she believes is right. I pledge to be someone I'm really proud of and I pledge to have higher standards for what makes me proud.