Let's Normalize Common Sense

 People. We need to start a grassroots campaign for making common sense common. As the tech-smart folks say, let's make that trend!

I've come up with a basic platform. Feel free to add to it, but here goes:

• Let's start acting our ages. Tweens, enjoy being too young to be adults. Stop worrying about developing your online persona and start worrying about developing a solid personality.  Enjoy not having to worry about sex and drama and trends. Enjoy being able to giggle, be silly and be kids.
• Spend more actual face time with each other. Families and friends: pick up the phone and call each other. I like to get my news personalized and direct to me - not with every person on your social media "friend" or "family" list. Sometimes, I just like to hear your voice, tell you a secret, and share a laugh. Sometimes I want to really actually connect just one on one.
• Let's start writing letters again. On paper. I miss being able to retrieve letters from that one friend or "special someone". I miss having that stash of old love letters or birthday cards. I miss the very personal touch and knowing that someone took the time to sit down and write me a letter I could keep and hold after they are gone.
• Let's bring back 2-parent families. I'm not saying that single parenting is bad, I'm saying that, when possible and healthy, 2 parents are generally better. Even if those parents are separated or never were in a relationship, both mom and dad can be involved. And, let's include the grand and the aunties and uncles. Let's include trustworthy friends. Raising children is a big job for 2 people, let alone for one person. (I come from a "broken" home but I had both parents involved in my life and I had extended family to teach and help raise me.)
• Let's bring back family and/or friend dinners. Doesn't anyone else miss that one day when a special group gets together at one home or in a backyard or park? That day when it's just "us" having a meal and watching the kids run around together. Maybe you will have a night when it's just family and another when it's just friends? Maybe you can have a couple's night or a single friends' night?
• Let's bring back respect. Respect for those older and wiser than yourself. Respect for each other as human beings. 
• Speaking of respect, let's bring back self-respect. Respect yourselves enough to not objectify your own bodies. Respect yourself enough that others will also respect you. Respect yourself enough to be respectful toward others. 
• And even more on respect: let's get back to respecting public places. Respect enough not to curse and talk loud and foolishly. Respect enough not to litter and destroy places that others would like to enjoy. Respect enough to be civil in public even to those you don't agree with or like. 
• Let's bring back graciousness. Be polite and courteous. Be helpful when you can. Look out for the other person who might need looking out for. Let's forget the "girl code" and "bro code" and have the same care and concern for each other no matter your gender.
• Let's stop stereotyping and generalizing each other. Not all men or women or kids or blacks or white, etc are ~fill-in-the-blank~. Even when something is generally true, it's not universally true. People are all individual people. Not all people of a certain gender, generation, or race are the same as the worst person of that gender, generation, or race that you ever met.
• Let's bring back useful education - and not just for children. Let's bring back teaching how to do basic math and understand basic science and geography. Let's make it normal to pursue education outside the classrooms - for all ages. In this day and age, most of us have a wealth of resources to learn or re-learn basic classroom and/or life skills. Just because most of us have access to devices that multitask as maps, calculators, and phonebooks, let's not lose the ability to function without them. 
• Let's bring back holding politicians and other public figures accountable for good character.  Let's bring back scorn for blatant lying and moral failures. Let's stop labeling rudeness as being "brave" and "blunt". Let's stop making it admirable to be horrible. 
• Let's bring back civility in politics and public debate. Let's not normalize (any further) being nasty to each other in public forums.
• Let's bring back respect for the actual truth. Let's normalize having "alternative truth/facts" and everyone having an individual truth. There is such a thing as true and false. Everything else - your truth, my truth, etc. - is an opinion, theory, or individual belief.

Am I just being naive? Maybe. My parents used the saying about not being able to unring a bell. I get that. However, can we please muffle the echo before it destroys everything that is halfway decent about society?

Minus the racism and religious bias, I know why each generation longs for "the old days". Every generation has horrible social scars and embarrassing events. However, in spite of all the "progress" it seems that with each passing year, we are getting worse in more areas than we improve. 

(By the way, I am going to start with myself for everything on this list. For example, if I ever lost access to my phone, I wouldn't be able to provide a phone number for a kidnapper to call in a ransom demand. Not that I would have a ransom fund because I can almost no longer do simple math in my head when dealing with my budget. I was never good at math but I once was proud of my grammar and spelling prowess. Today, I rely on Grammarly and my phone's auto-correct. That's just sad.)

Peace

--Free

P.S.: I know that some parts of this post might be offensive to some. I hope that's not the case. I'm not trying to hurt or offend anyone. I am just doing some wishful thinking.

Today I Learned

 That Reddit... Every time I stroll down the page, I find something that sends me off on a hunt for more information.

In a Today I Learned (TIL) post, there was this:

TIL Music is a 'Cultural Universal', which means it is a thing that is common to all known human cultures worldwide. These include: Personal Names, Sexual Jealousy, Proverbs, and Incest Prevention or Avoidance. 

The post linked to the Wikipedia page "Cultural Universal".  

And, as is often the case, I learned more from reading the comment section than I did from most other sources. For one thing, I never imagined that there are cultures where birthdays are not a thing.

Of course, everyone has a day of birth - a birth day. Just not everyone uses them as life markers the way we do in our society. This never occurred to me.

One commenter noted that "birthdays are not a thing in Yemen." Another commenter (North African) noted that they don't know their grandmother's birthday and "can’t even really guess anything other than the month and year. its not really important to us once the new year comes you are that new age, doesn’t matter if you were born december or january".

Shut. Up. 

People, this needs to be a universal thing. 

Probably the ONLY time
I will agree with Yoko

Just think of the negative issues this would eliminate in so many areas of life. Jobs, dating, education of all types - just to start.

So, I'm not going to dive deep into it here, but please do go running down all the rabbit holes you want. Right now, I am just busy thinking about the entire idea of not being defined by the number of years I have been alive.

I will leave you with the first article I saw while doing my own info-dig. This one caught my eye because it reinforces why I think birthdays have a life-stifling effect on us. This article is about a specific place - one apparently known as "the world's happiest place". The reason for that happiness?

The country believes that ‘’leading a happy life is much more important than how many years you’ve been alive on this planet.”

If there isn't a biblical reason for tracking our individual age (and I'm not talking about Jehovah's Witnesses here), I will start with the practice today. 

Peace

--Free

If I Had A Hammer

One of my black clouds started descending on me last night after watching the news. There is a good reason that I almost never watch, listen to, or try to think about the news anymore and the person reason is one word, five letters. (It's Trump, okay. It's Trump.). However, I somehow clicked onto a newscast.  Big mistake. After about 5 minutes, I was so depressed that I felt like crying. Seriously. I had to switch away from that news channel before I sunk any deeper into a funk.

So I was just sitting in front of the TV, vegetating in my misery, and switching from show to show when I ran across one about magic. Teens and spell-casting. I switched again and caught another show, this one about medieval teens and spell-casting.

source

Now, I am a Christian so I don't dabble with any kind of sorcery - not dark or light or shades in between. However, I did start to wonder what kind of magic or superpower I would choose if I was into that kind of thing. Or what if I just found a genie in a bottle?

I'm pretty sure that, even in a make-believe world, asking for more wishes would be dirty pool. So with just 3 wishes, I'd need to be careful. Of course, I could wish to feed the world's hungry or to cure diseases. But I think there are more important things to worry about. 

My first wish would be to make sure that positive things were more popular than negative things.

I know that there's a lot of social ugliness going on these days. Thanks to that loose cannon in the White House and all his butt-sucking minions, we seem to be living in some kind of parallel universe where all the wrong guys won all the big wars. Okay, maybe that's a bit harsh. I don't know, but my point is that reports of the deaths of civility and decency are greatly exaggerated.

There are more kind people than we hear about. There are more examples of selflessness and neighborly concern than we will ever hear about. Nice is not news. Just like fully clothed and ordinary-looking people don't usually have million-plus Instagram followers or Facebook Likes.


But nice is out there. Kindness is out there. There are people who check on their neighbors (while we only hear stories of the person who was lying dead in their home for weeks). There are parents who still raise their children to be decent adults without turning them into self-entitled brats who would murder someone in their sleep. There are poor and disadvantaged people who aren't selling drugs or doing drivebys or addicted to opioids and being idiotically racist. There are wealthy people quietly using their money and position for positive and selfless reasons.

There are men and women still looking for a solid relationship in which they can be faithful and loving, lifetime partners. There are men and women who don't fit every negative sexual and social stereotype we put on them. There are young people who have goals and dreams that they are willing to work hard for. There are people who have made really bad mistakes who are trying to work past those mistakes and do better.

Yeah, so that would be my first wish. To have people focus on the positive. I just want to live in a world where all the good things about people are more celebrated. It might kill off the genre of reality television but, well that's another positive. And, with everyone focused on the uplifting and positive things in the world, I'm sure we could take care of hunger and diseases.

I do have some ideas for my second wish but I will hold that for another post. I'll just save the third wish for an emergency. You never know, we might need that one down the road.

Peace
--Free

Can't See For Looking

Okay, folks, I'm going to "go religious" on you but, hang with me because there's something in here that even atheists might like.

How do you picture Jesus? I'm sure people of all faiths (or none) would be interested in knowing what he actually looked like. I have started reading other versions of the Bible in my personal studies. This weekend, I read passages from some of the Messianic Bible versions.

Years ago, my mother regularly watched a show called Zola Levitt Presents. Every now and then, I would sit and watch with her. That was the first time I ever thought seriously about the fact that Jesus was Jewish. As silly as it sounds, up until then (and I had to be at least 22 or 23) in my mind's eye, Jesus looked like this:

That's not Jesus.
That's Robert Powell

The actor Robert Powell isn't a savior but he played one in Jesus of Nazareth. Such a beautifully done movie with an amazing cast. Before that movie came along, I had imagined Jesus looking like the classic painting that was hung somewhere in the homes of most black families. You might remember the ensemble of paintings your grandma gave pride of wall space to - Jesus, MLK, and JFK.

 However, my mind's eye (and the movie and paintings and so many church fans) got it wrong.  Jesus was a Jewish man so he most likely did not have those brilliantly blue eyes and I'm pretty sure he didn't have the whole rock star look. Looking back on that movie now all I can think is that the late Michael Hutchence would've wished to be that fine. I'm not being flip. Just look at that photo again.

According to the Bible “He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to Him, nothing in His appearance that we should desire Him.” (Isaiah 53:2 NIV) It's been opined that based on his racial makeup and manual labor occupation as a carpenter, he was probably of a darker complexion and had some sun damage to his skin. Along with the Bible identifying him as being not very handsome (whatever that means), he may have looked more like this:

Source: Popular Mechanics

That's more plausible, right?  The article at Poplar Mechanics makes a lot of good points. Our minds are so polluted with stereotypes about people that we want to think good people must be physically attractive. Just think of that so-called black doll/white doll syndrome - as true or untrue as that might be. Or the fact that attractiveness can play a huge role in our lives.

Listen, I am not pointing fingers at anyone else's ignorance here but my own. Not only did I have the wrong idea about Jesus's appearance, but I just about had heart failure when I heard the Lord's Prayer spoken in the languages Jesus used.

Uh, why doesn't he sound British!?!?!? I'm just kidding. Some filmmakers aren't kidding.

Now, it had at some point in my much younger life occurred to me that we Westerners had the wrong impressions of Jesus. And some people were just completely stupid on the subject. I can remember some kind of anti-semitic rally or demonstration taking place near wherever my family was living back in the mid-'70s. My mother and her friends stood in support of the Jewish people. What was so silly is that there were only about 6 Jewish people in that community. Maybe the racist idiots just wanted something to rally about. Who knows? But I remember my mother shaking her head in disgust at the people carrying crosses while they chanted about "dirty Jews". Much like the Klan and other so-called 'Christians' who hate just to hate or judge in hate, these people forgot, I guess, that their Savior was Jewish. (And, by the way, the saying is not "Judge not" with a period at the end. It is "Judge not lest you be judged."  People always forget that last part. So, you can judge others if you're free of sin. Anybody? Go ahead. I'll wait. I'll just be over here taking this plank out of my eye.)

My whole point is, I have never fully appreciated everything about the Lord I serve. Like most people (I'm assuming), I tend to think only in flavors I know of. Now that  I have it in the forefront of my mind that Jesus talked, walked, ate, prayed, and lived Jewish, I get it. I can see a little deeper into my study of what he said and did while on Earth.

Just like I did in seeing Jesus in my shallow and one-dimensional way, I do the same thing in other areas of my life. I have got to work on that. I need to start viewing people as they are and not how I want or imagine them to be. Same goes for life and situations in general.

One of the sayings I remember from my childhood in Texas was "Can't see for looking." It was your response when you saw something shocking and someone asked if you "saw that". I apply it to my life in other ways. Sometimes, when I make an immediate judgment about a person or situation based only on shallow information, I later realize I missed the bigger picture. Can't see for looking and sometimes, can't hear for listening.

I'm not the only one with this weakness. This is the reason that a lot of us have shallow and ever-changing standards of beauty. It's why we assume intelligence based on slick looks or words. It's why we so often don't see the full worth of people and life. We're too busy looking at the cover to read the book. Because that takes time, doesn't it?

At any rate, I'm really enjoying my Bible studies now more than ever. By the way, for those of you who may not own a Bible - or a lot of Bible study resources - you might want to check out eSword or My Sword  Both have a variety of Bible versions, concordances, commentaries, and other help. Both are free (with expanded options for purchase). I've been using eSword and I'm amazed at the number of tools available in both the app and pc versions.  Usually, when studying my Bible, I have to sit by my computer with 20 browser tabs open to all the different resources. A single app or program is more productive. Actually, the modules for the two 'sword' products are somewhat interchangeable and updates are being made all the time. Check out both no matter which operating system you use. I'm currently using eSword on both my Windows pc and Android phone. Here are the links:

• eSword for phone and computer
• MySword app and for computer

By the way, there are huge selections of language options in both programs. There's a slight learning curve but, hey, I managed to figure it all out so...

That's it for now. I hope that at least some of this information is useful to you guys out there. Even if you're not "religious", information is always good to have.

Peace

--Free

Sharing a few of the songs I've been listening to this evening

Amazing, amazing, amazing grace

I have loved this song for years

Oh, blessed Prince of peace

"Stop fighting a fight that's already been won."

All Up In My Head

I've run through most of my stashed posts so I figured it was time to slide back into real-time mode. It's been a minute since I've felt clear enough (well, mostly) to write about anything real. For the past couple of weeks, I've been living all up in my own head. 

I just realized that I used "I" 4 times up there. Yeah, so that's the mood I am in lately so if you are still reading, you're going to have to deal with it. Also, I might ramble in this post and slide all over the place. It's that kind of day.

Some more warnings: this is going to get weird, it's going to get religious, and it's going to get sad. You might want to leave now.

So.

The world around me is not as bright and beautiful as I wish. People, politics, the whole tide of society - it just feels very weird right now. We've got a vigilante president who I hate to discuss because the mention of his name either makes people way too defensive or way too angry.

America should just be such a much better place. Those of us here, in the better and more blessed part of society, should be working harder to lift up those who are not as blessed. But we're not. We are like pigs gorging ourselves with food and sex and luxuries while the starving and oppressed watch and wait for us to notice that they are there. And we are still having to spend too much time talking about race and equality and humane treatment of others, especially the children. I can't even think too hard about the way we are treating (or mistreating) the babies right now because it makes me dizzy with grief.

Yeah, folks, this is what I mean about being in my head right now. It's like wandering around in some kind of enchanted land of What the Hell?

Things don't change enough

When I was laid up last week for my regular session of being laid the hell up, I tried watching some of the TV shows I've heard so much about. I watched a few episodes of "The Musketeers", then spent way too much time on "Spartacus". Way too much. Have you seen this show? I don't know what fascinated me more - the soft-core porn or the way-too-graphic violence. In one of the fight scenes, a guy lost an eyeball. An EYEBALL, people. It popped right out in extreme detail. I was making sure to look away or fast-forward through most of the gorier scenes but was too late to miss that one. What I don't understand is, why so much attention to the gore? It was as if, since they couldn't get more graphic with the sex - which got pretty graphic - they went all out on the blood and guts. Just nasty. Extremely nasty.

I learned nothing from that bout of TV intoxication but I was reminded that we keep living in a cycle of sex, power, and suffering. Society always consists of Insiders and Outsiders, Elite and Underdog, First World and Third World, 'Master' and 'Slave'.

What's that saying about those not learning history being doomed to repeat it? Apparently, we never learn - or we just ignore the lessons. Look around at the repeat of madness we live in right now. The Bible says:

The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun. (Ecclesiastes 1:9)

The critical commentary (Holden) on that verse just highlights the misery we create for ourselves:

Rather, "no new thing at all"; as in Numbers 11:6 . This is not meant in a general sense; but there is no new source of happiness (the subject in question) which can be devised; the same round of petty pleasures, cares, business, study, wars, &c., being repeated over and over again [HOLDEN].

How depressing is that?

Anyway, (speaking of depressing) I have a birthday looming and zooming toward me like a bullet train!  I was thinking that if making birthday wishes worked, I have a list. I wouldn't wish for world peace and all the usual jazz; I'd wish that we could learn from history. I'd wish that we all wanted something better for everyone. I'd wish that we could, just for a day, look around and really see where we are going wrong. But would that be best?

One of my sisters-in-law said something interesting not long ago. We were talking about all the misery and struggle so many people live in. We groused about the state of turmoil in politics and religion and so on and so forth. I said something about wishing it could all just be better. My SIL said that she didn't. That stopped me cold until she explained.

To paraphrase my SIL, this world isn't going to get better. For those of us who believe the Bible (and we both do), we are taught that things get progressively worse. Ultimately, there will be an end game battle. And since, as Christians, we know the outcome, we should be looking forward to it.

That makes sense to me because we are too far removed from Eden to remember what Paradise was like. I don't want to get used to the world we now live in. I want to get acquainted with the better life we've been promised.

Sorry. I didn't mean to go dark so fast there. That's what happens when I'm blogging and let my coffee cup get empty! Time for a refill.

Okay, I'm back and re-caffed.

All the travels through my mind haven't been so dreary. Once I stopped getting drunk on "Spartacus" and "The Musketeers" I went in a more uplifting direction.  As a matter of fact, I went in a direction I usually avoid: toward math. Ugh. Yeah.

We all used so much math back when I worked in import brokerage that it amazes former co-workers that I now can't even deal with the basics. Just looking at too many numbers at once makes my brain hurt. Thanks, sarc. But, I made it through the first few minutes of this video to get to the beautiful part about fractals.

Dr. Lisle is one of my favorite "teachers"  along with Dr. Ross - though the two Christian physicists don't always agree in their viewpoints. I don't always agree with these guys, but I am grateful for their intelligence and ability to share it with laymen. Although I provided links to the book pages of Lisle and Ross, that wasn't to plug their work. I just like linking to scientists who happen to share my faith. What I do want to plug is the Bible Tools page (also the Tecarta Bible app) that I use all the time.

And since I am still on the topic of my faith, I have to add this short video that deals with the question of where God came from. Ken Ham is not a favorite personality of mine for a few reasons, but his answer here lifts my heart every time I hear it. And, believe it or not, we Christians sometimes need to be reminded. (I need to be reminded of lots of things. Which is why I deeply regret writing this post.) I read something that clarified the negative impact of using bad language - even in humor. I am working on that area of my life.

Well. now wasn't this a fun post? I did warn you.

Anyway. I have detoxed from the blood and gore of TV shows and feel that I'm back on solid mental footing. I have spent enough time in my head for now. This week I am deep-cleaning the apartment. That's not because I enjoy deep-cleaning. What happened is I have misplaced my Echo pen and once I started looking for it, I dumped drawers and emptied closets that I have to now clean up. What better reason to really clean?

Now I have to get back to my cleaning because I need to get out of my head for a while. Here's hoping everyone has a good upcoming week. (And, yep, I probably will have to come back and do some editing...)

Peace
--Free

I have always loved this song for so many reasons. RIP Donny.

I love the version done by H.E.R. but it's part of a longer video that I.may have already posted.

Let me tell you, baby girl sang the hell out of this song. 

As Seen On TV

WARNING: I feel a rant coming on and I've had a lot of coffee.

Remember back when Dove started doing those ads showing "real" women? I kind of loved that, but... I kind of didn't.

I have a love-hate thing going with commercial media - television, films, advertisements. I love being able to temporarily and vicariously experience things I probably never actually will. I have to face the fact that, with all my phobias, I'll probably never fight off gangsters, monsters, or zombies. I have trouble dealing with cranky store clerks and sullen teenagers trigger my anxiety.

I'm fascinated by female actors who can immerse themselves into a fictional world and become these badass characters. They go in as Mary Lou, originally from Cleveland, and appear on screen speaking a foreign language and using 3 different types of martial arts, all while wearing perfectly fitted leather body suits so smooth and shiny that I could use them to apply makeup. Just getting into one of those suits would be the last superhuman feat you'd see me perform.

Still. we all sometimes need to have a Walter Mitty moment because a little escapism can be therapeutic.

On the other hand...

I think that we've all gotten a little too lost in the world of make-believe. We forget that actors are real people and that we are too. Life is not a fictional thing (for most of us) and it's so toxic when we forget that. This is the part I hate about commercial media.

You have to pity the person who has managed to make a living on stage or screen. Notice I didn't say that you couldn't be jealous of them. But can you imagine other people not being able to separate who you are in your real life from who you are on stage or screen? For us "commoners" that would be like your boss calling you by your job title and always expecting you to be on the clock. I once almost quit a job because my boss asked me to work on my birthday.

But that is my sorrow for the famous. For myself, I hate what media has done to the world I have to live in.

As a dark-skinned black woman, for years I was opposite to the standards of beauty portrayed in media. When I was a teenager, the only thing I had in common with the girls on the covers of magazines was that I was skinny and flat-chested. Until my late thirties, I had the build of a boy taking small hits of estrogen.

Not only was "white" media not my friend, neither was Jet or Ebony. The only black girls I saw in movies that looked like me were the "field" slaves in "Roots" or the hookers in Blaxploitation films. The men could be dark skinned. Think Richard Roundtree as Shaft or Jim Brown as Gunn (and what the hell was up with all the phallic names?). But the ladies could usually pass the paper bag test.

Diana Ross was kind of my image hero because she was thin and (kinda) dark like me. Except, she could sing and act and, eventually, her skin seemed to lighten up a little. Or is that just me? That cannot just be me, people.

She's bad to the bone, but... c'mon now

By the way, I still dig Ms. Ross. If you're going to be a diva, be one of the first.

I will be damned if, by the time my dark skin came into vogue, I had suddenly grown hips and boobs. And the total "boy" look was still in. Son of a bitch!

Still, dark skin stopped being the biggest stigma for black girls. Sometimes, it reversed itself. I dated one guy who admitted that he liked me because I was "exotic". Not because I was funny or nice or just fun to be with. But because I was exotic. I wasn't sure what that meant. Every time he came around I wondered if he felt like he was on the Serengeti or dating a chick from his National Geographic fantasies. Once again, son of a bitch.

That was the heavy stuff. On the lighter (um hm) side of my love-hate affair with the media, let's deal with the commercials. Race and color aside, when it comes to straight advertising, I can find at least 3 other issues to discuss with a therapist. Size, height, and lifestyle. This kind of brings me back to the Dove "Campaign for Real Beauty". Shows how much attention I pay, I didn't even know that was the name of the campaign until just now.

It's too late for me to acquire more self-esteem. If I haven't learned to accept myself by now then, to paraphrase The Blue Notes, I will never never never... But kudos to Dove for lifting up the heads of young women. That's some needed air to bring into the conversation about self-acceptance.

Then there are the commercials I grew up with. The ones that didn't make me feel excluded by race and ethnicity but just confused me.

I never did understand why there had to be a commercial about a  mother and daughter discussing vaginal freshness. That was right up there with other things to be discussed in the privacy of my bedroom with my mother. That's where we had our talks about sex, smoking, drugs, and that one play auntie who likes women and I was supposed to respect and stand up for nonetheless "because we don't care if Wilma Jean lives with Martha Sue Townsend. That's your auntie and you aren't supposed to be up in grown people's bedroom business anyway."  (~deep breath~) Somehow this last bit derailed my initial question about what exactly was French kissing and was it okay for American girls to do it too. (I hoped so because I didn't want to think that my cousin Candy was breaking some kind of international law.)

Also, there were the commercials showing how some families in some apparently fictional land called "not at my house" lived. In these commercials, kids ate a lot of Twinkies and McDonald's French fries whenever the hell they felt like it. In our home, we ate homemade cakes for desserts and once every other anniversary of Halley's Comet we got to go to What-A-Burger. In our house, kids did not just run and grab stuff out of the fridge whenever they had company over or wanted a snack. No no. If I had company (it was usually some kid related to me), Mama served us what she wanted us to have. If I wanted a snack, I'd have to ask permission and my mom would most likely look at the clock first to judge how much time it had been since the last meal. We weren't deprived but we did not run the house. Mama ran the house until Daddy got home, then they tag-teamed the crap out of us.

I watch commercials now and wonder how the heck these people have their lives so together. Everyone's car is spic-and-span clean. All the furniture in their homes matches everything else in their homes. They wear clothes that are new and color-coordinated down to their underwear and socks. They manage to have their hair done, house cleaned, dinner ready, children well-behaved (or adorably mischievous), and their spouse only looks at them with all the love in the universe. No one wakes up with morning breath, eye boogers or hair shot up on their heads. Oh, and their bedrooms are always sun-filled and (apparently) fresh-smelling because (again, no morning breath) and (damn it) color-coordinated.

Here's the part I hate most about those commercials. For one thing, even if I had the kind of money it took to live in the universe of perfect homes, you'd never see me lolling around in it. I'd be so busy working my high-powered job or turning tricks or selling drugs or being a politician to pay for all that perfection. Because, let's face it - I can't sing or dance and I won't do the sex- tape thing. When the hell would I have time to enjoy my sun-filled, fresh-air smelling, color coordinated, impossibly always perfect home? Tell me that.

What I am saying is, it's all a lie. One way or another, some evil power is playing all of us against each other. They or "it" keeps us all so busy wanting what someone else has that we have to remind ourselves to be happy where we are. I firmly believe that there is some "celebrity" out there who envies my ability to go to Walmart without fear of being stalked by fans or photographers. I just know that there are days when someone who lives in one of those perfect, furniture coordinated, always fresh smelling homes wish they could trade places with me. Well, maybe not me because my life is pretty crappy right now, but you know what I mean.

Now, just for added fun and cruelty, we have the internet, pushing us into the same cracks of self-doubt and dangerous comparisons...

Speaking of the internet and trends, I was reading a book the other day that made a great point about the relationship between the words "Influence" and "Influenza". Now think "viral" and "virus". We currently use those terms to convey positive things. (And, yes, I am over here point a finger at myself for that joining into that silliness.)

Here's my message to all my brothers and sisters out there - ALL of you, regardless of race, color, ethnicity, or gang  social media affiliation - let's use media for what it should be. Let it entertain us, bring us together, take us away for a while, show us something we didn't know, and just be our temporary entertainment. Don't try that TV pretend sh*t at home. That goes for the commercials too. Buy what you need and what you want - not what someone tricks you into thinking you need or want. Be kind, be funny, be loving, be healing, be helpful, and be as healthy as you can in your mind, body, and soul. And always, always be you.

Peace
--Free

RANT: Keeping It Real

Let me start by saying that this post might "trigger" some folk. I'm sorry but I have to do this. I just finished trying to shop online for some makeup and hair products and I somehow ended up water-sliding down a rabbit hole of madness.

Ladies, when did we get so extreme about trying to be beautiful? Is it because of the selfie mentality brought on by Facebook and Instagram? I think that must be it. I can do a whole pre-rant rant on how sick I am of seeing people pooching up their lips and squinching their eyes to look "sexy" in their photos. I admit that I am jealous of photogenic people but that has nothing to do with how much I hate the way we have perverted the simple act of posing for photos. In my opinion 'posing' for a photo means making sure you don't have food in your teeth, your nose is not shining to light a room. and you are sucking in the belly pooch. I don't know when it because such a thing to make "duck lips" (how f**king stupid does that even sound?) and squinch-eyes. Only Marilyn Monroe could get away with that and she's gone now so stop it. Just stand there and try to look like you are glad to be alive and smile. That's it. Simple. And even if you want to cute it up by pretending to be a lingerie model, that's cutest when it's an every-now-and-then thing. I don't even know some people anymore when I see them in person because they are so impossibly glamorous in every single photo. (I can swear that I am not lying when I say there are people I met online through the family that I did not recognize the first time I saw them in person. I'm dead serious.)

And I get it. We all want to look our best - in photos and in person. Why the hell do you think I was shopping for makeup and hair products? I want to look my nicest. Usually. Most of the time though, I am a what-you-see-is-what-you-get kind of gal. If I'm not being stubborn, I will put on some foundation and lipstick and reacquaint my body with something other than jeans and a t-shirt. At my finest, I will even try to wear hose and heels. (The heels part is a little tricky with my balance these days, but...)

I once watched a makeup tutorial video that reminded me of something my mother used to say about people just running out of sh*it to do. What I wanted was to understand what "contouring" is since I had heard so much about it. Have you seen this kind of thing before? It's like trick makeup. If you are skilled enough at this contouring stuff, you can abracadabra a person into a whole other entity.

When I was writing this I got so tickled because I remembered something from an old movie. The best part starts at the 3:40 mark.

That clip reminded me of one from the Fresh Prince:

I no longer find Will Smith, sexy or charming these last few years but this clip still cracks me up.

Some women are going to hate me for saying this but... I think it's a little unfair when ladies paint themselves into another face, Spanx up a whole other body, and go all weave-a-go-go. A guy has no idea what a woman really looks like. Sooner or later, all the special effects are going to have to be washed off. And I totally get wanting to look good your best for your man, but reality is still the name of the game. If you are jazzing yourself up in online pics to maybe meet a mate, remember one thing: you eventually have to show up in person. I just think honesty is too important in a relationship (said the woman who, when younger, got up before her husband, apply full makeup, get back in bed and "wake up" again looking lovely) and going too far with the makeup and everything is basically a lie. There's a reason my first marriage failed.

 Another reason I don't understand the obsession with makeup is how messy it can be. I wear a little bit of foundation and am lucky when I make it through the day without it transferring onto everything. When I clean my face at night - and this is just for a tiny bit of foundation mixed into some sunscreen - that baby wipe comes away looking like I used it to stain furniture. That's not sexy.

Maybe I'm just being so critical because I no longer wear much makeup. Even when I was younger, I was no good at using anything beyond the basics. I'm always kind of amazed at the talent some people have at changing their whole look with makeup.

I was talking to a guy in line at the store not long ago. He complimented me on my eyes, saying they were pretty. Before I could even thank him, he asked if my contacts were colored. They are not. I have a strange genetic thing going on that gives my eyes a blue tinge. But I can't blame the guy for asking (but I kind of can) since, these days, you never know what's real or purchased. ~shrug~

I don't know. I'm bitching and criticizing but I am probably a little bit of a hypocrite. I have been known to wear braided extensions and I am not above slathering on makeup for formal photos. One time, I tried wearing some Spanx-like undergarment to work. Two hours into my day, I had to go into the bathroom and completely disrobe to peel myself out of that contraption. I was so constricted I felt like I was about to stroke out...

So, okay then. I guess we all can be a bit vain at times. I just wish we could be more accepting of each other straight, no chaser, no coverup.

One reason I try to never doctor online photos of myself is that I'd rather you be pleasantly surprised when you meet me instead of thinking of me as a photo-shopping genius of a cheat. Oh, wait - was that vain of me?

Peace
--Free

**RANT** Life and Identity

It's been a while since I have done a rant post, but...

Recently, there's been a lot of discussion about the various pols gearing up to run to head the country. Kamala Harris is one person that gets a lot of love and hate from citizens who vote. I honestly don't know much more about her than what I saw during the Kavanaugh hearings. I would have to educate myself before I could voice a fair opinion. But let's talk about the underlying conversation. Let's talk about the whole idea of "identity politics". That's something I can chime in on. I've been wanting to chime in for a while but had to wait until I was having a day when I could think clearly and on point. Here goes.

I abhor "identity" anything: politics, religion, society, etc. We as human beings don't seem to be able to do anything in moderation. We turn enjoyment of everything into addiction or crime. We start out wanting to "identify" with each other to form connections and before you know it, we are forming dangerous religious cults, political hate groups, and crime syndicates. We have worried so much about grouping together - identifying - with one another that we are starting to not think as individuals.

(Before I get this rant properly started, let me admit that I have gone back and forth on some subjects of race and nationality. I'm human and I sometimes have "waffled". That is because I am always maturing in my opinions.  I've talked about race/nationality and things of my blackness here, here, here, and here, and probably in a couple more posts. This post though is going to be one I won't mind having thrown in my face in the future. So, let's go on.)

During a conversation with a family member a few months back, I explained why I wish we could all get over using race to identify each other. In my opinion, when we identify by race (or nationality), we automatically fall back on stereotypes. Ideally, we will learn to identify by cultures and I will speak more on that later.  If we start identifying each other based on other things, we can be more intelligent about socializing.

Now, about the "identifying as cultures" thing. I know that there are different cultures within cultures. As a black American, I know that I have lived or experienced being  so many different kinds of black that I can hardly keep up: black Texan, black Southerner, black Yankee, black G.I. brat, black Alaskan, black Iowan, black woman to a black man, black wife to a white man, black wife to a white Englishman, and a  black divorcee. I can self-identify all over again as all those things as just a woman. Therefore, I can largely identify with other women who have been Texan, Southern, Yankee, etc. We would have things to talk about and relate to. And the race issue matters, of course, but it wouldn't be what brought us into a dialogue.

My best friend is a woman who is 20 years my senior. We only met because we worked together and happened upon a friendship due to some random happenings. Left to our own devices, we might never have been anything more than nod-and-smile co-workers. I am so thankful this woman is in my life. Imagine how many more people are out there I could have been connected with. 

There are plenty of people who check the same boxes I do for gender, race, religion, and nationality with whom I might have nothing else in common. Out of about 10 billion people on the planet, there have got to be hundreds of thousands I can seriously relate to based on other things. Hobbies, phobias, quirks, humor, skills, goals, hopes - if I met someone right now, these are the things I want to talk with them about. These are the things that will connect us. 

Anyway, I am losing some of my coherence so I will wind down but I hope you got the gist of my point. Stereotypes divide us and are just a lazy way to look at the world and justify some of our own behaviors. Stereotypes only "have some truth" because of statistics: out of 10 billion people, you can find an argument for any stereotype. 

I really hope we can all learn to approach each other (or not) in a more sensible way. After all, Ted Bundy and other dangerous people have used stereotypes to their advantage.

Peace

--Free

**REVIEW** Dirty Money: Payday

The Netflix series "Dirty Money" has covered some interesting stories that make the average-to-poor person gape at the screen. The episode that floored me though was the one about Scott Tucker. Aptly titled "Payday", this one got to me because of the moral blindness of the 'bad guys'.

**SPOILER ALERT**

(if you don't have Netflix, check bottom of post for some links to info)

To sort of recap (difficult with my memory and such), Scott Tucker was the leader in the field of "payday loans" that target the down and out and hard up. I've been down and out, Lord knows, but I never got caught up in that scam. What I do know about them is that, like pawn shops and liquor stores, they are usually found in the OSOTT (other side of the track) and lower-income working neighborhoods. Matter of fact, just like some neighborhoods are marked by the lineup of a Bed, Bath & Beyond, Hobby Lobby, Burlington Coat Factory, some are marked by the lineup of a liquor store, payday loan office, and pawn shop.

Back to the show though.

Tucker and his brother were a couple of smart dudes. Driven and ambitious, they worked together to take the payday loan business out of the strip malls and onto the Internet. And business exploded. Tucker made enough money to buy himself the life of a race car driver. Apparently, this was a dream of his. He likes cars and speed but, mostly, he seemed to like the celebrity of it all.

During the film, you get to see Tucker spending a lot of time on his exercise bike. The man and his wife are both fit people. They seem to be concerned with having a certain look - even while they are being sued to pieces, having the government taking away cars and other material possessions to satisfy a gigantic settlement. The wife is nice-looking but in that tight, managed way that doesn't seem to speak of just having good genes. I thought it was pretty weird that she walked around the house in a jacket with a fur-lined collar. She was, even at such a dire and trying time, worried about presenting a certain image to the cameras. Completely vain and silly.

I always have a hard time understanding greed and selfishness, but the part that made me saddest was how oblivious the Tuckers seemed to be. It's like there are just black holes where their hearts are supposed to be. I wanted to feel a little bit bad for these people and I just could not, God forgive me.

When Tucker got busted for shady business practices - basically all kinds of lying and covering up to fleece customers - he actually tried to play the victim himself. The worst part of the film for me was when I learned that his brother actually committed suicide when all the cards started falling in on the scheme. I began to feel bad for Tucker and his family until he did this whole fake-crying thing for the cameras. After about 3 minutes of trying very hard to look as if he was wiping away tears, he managed to squeeze out a couple, but...

you will love his answer...

It was sad that his brother took his life, but that didn't seem to make Tucker think of how he may have driven his customer to that same fate. I'm sure that some of the people he ripped off and drove even further into debt (under the guise of helping them, mind you) had thoughts of suicide. He certainly some of them into a worst position than he'd ever been in.

When all was said and done, Tucker (and his lawyer) went to jail and supposedly lost everything material. Who knows what they had set up beforehand to protect some assets. Tucker's wife sure seemed worried about that! At one point in the film she's upset that because she's married to him, her money and credit is on the line along with his. Well, boo hoo, honey. You were sure glad to claim the marital bond when it suited you.

The blindness of Tucker (and his lawyer) is just stunning. They both seem to make the argument that they shouldn't be punished for making money by dirty tactics. After all, it's just smart business.

The Netflix show did a good job of covering a complicated and layered story. There was a lot to this - the racing, the loans, involvement with an Indian tribe, and stories of some of the victims.

Peace
--Free

LINKS:

• Newspaper article about Tucker's sentence
• Scott Tucker's Wikipedia page
• Older article that gives some background

My New Old Neighbors

This new place I'm living in is just fantastic. It's a beautiful hotel-style building that's entry-secure, and clean. Living here, I'm  close to shopping and banking. I can get basic groceries from a store that is literally less than a 5-minute walk away.

If I were a more social person, I could stroll down to a couple of nice bars and restaurants. If I were social! If I could swim, the lake and a beach are a block and half away. Of course, people who know me know that I'm most certainly not a social butterfly. I am a hermit crab of a woman.

So, yes, I love the building I live in.

Except.

Okay, see here's the thing. I live in a building that's for seniors. The minimum age is 55. I'm 56. The median age for the residents currently living here? Oh, I'd say that would be about 75.

Now, I'm not an ageist. How can I be? I'm 56, which is not young but it's also not exactly "middle age" - unless I expect to live to over a hundred. (I don't, by the way.) The oldest person I've met here is 93. And she's not the only 90 year old here. I bet there are a couple of centenarians. (And I can't believe I had to look that word up!)

One of the things I've learned about this Iowa (or at least the Northern part I live in) is that the people live a looong time. Not only that, these old folk are pretty healthy. There's one woman here (I'll call her Lucy) who usually walks everywhere. Every day. Granted, 'everywhere' is close by like I mentioned before but, still, this woman is ninety. To look at her and the way she gets around, you could guess her age to be somewhere in the early 70's. She moves better than I do.

 Of course, some of my really old neighbors don't get around as well as Lucy. There's one old lady who still drives and that scares the crap out of me. She uses both a cane and a walker. She uses the walker to get to the car. She puts the walker in the trunk, then uses the cane to get to the driver's seat. It then takes her a couple of minutes to get in and get situated. And then the nightmare starts because this slow-moving nonagenarian (yeah, I looked that one up too) drives like she's in a police chase on an L.A. freeway. I've never seen anyone not headed to an emergency back out and take off that fast.

Thankfully Maria Oldretti doesn't drive that often. This town is small enough that most people probably recognize her car and know to get the hell out of the way... I won't even go out into the parking lot when she's anywhere near her car, bless her heart.

There are a lot of benefits to living around the elderly. They are like walking history books. First-hand history at that. I've heard some of them talk about growing up on farms. A few of them come from places outside of Iowa. I don't spend as much time with any of these people as I should - ironically because of my health issues - but I am getting a glimpse of what could possibly be my future.

I was talking to one of the older gentlemen the other day, telling him that I'd be soon looking to get a used vehicle. He said, "I wish I'd met you a month earlier because I just gave my car away." (He is pretty much bound to one of those motorized chairs for his mobility.) I asked why he gave away his car. "They took away my license. I couldn't use the car so someone might as well have it."

The first thing I thought was how nice it was that he gave away car to someone who needed it. Then I saw how sad he looked when he talked about losing his license. (Another resident told me that it was his kids who lobbied for him to lose his driving privileges. I want to know if Maria Oldretti has kids I can contact!)

See, the thing I'm noticing is that we look at the very elderly as if they aren't whole human beings. We sometimes only notice the stooped postures and sagging skin and voices that creak a little. That's all I used to pay attention to. Now I'm learning that no matter how old a person lives to be - 80, 90, or even 100 - they still possess the soul they had from birth to the present. I know for a fact (because I've heard them talking) that some of the old folk are still having, um, intimate relations. All I can say is they are getting more action than I am!

What's sobering to me is that their are younger people who look at me the way I've looked at older people. And I've learned something about myself: I'm not sure how long of a life I want to live. I say that and worry that I'm offending God, so I want to clarify what I mean.

No one wants, I don't think, to be old and lonely and forgotten. That's the one thing I didn't understand when I was married to a pretty decent guy. I think that's why you should get a good mate and hang on for dear life. Some of these people have been married for 60 and 70 years. Then again, some of them have been married for less than a decade.

Then there are the widows and widowers. Those are the ones I feel the most pain for. I can deal with being an old single - because I was a young single - but I don't know what it must be like to lose someone you spent many, many years with.

I'm a loner but don't ever want to get to the point where I feel lonely. Some of my neighbors seem to be forgotten by family and friends. There are a couple of people here who never come out of their apartments. They don't come down and sit on the lanai (or whatever you call our front porch area) or use the common room. For some of them, if it weren't for the personal housekeepers, they'd never have company inside their apartments. And that is very sad to me.


When I was in my teens, I thought anyone over twenty was 'old'. In my thirties, I couldn't imagine being fifty. I'm in my fifties and I look at the 80 and 90 year old people and realize they aren't simply old, they are survivors. I don't know how long I want to be in the battle of being mortal. Then again, every time I attend a funeral, I am always glad to still be alive.

Peace
--Free

The Devil Is a Liar (Part 2)

Old folks used to be wise folks. These days, old folks are those silly young folk I grew up with. In today's world, we have too much political correctness and not enough wisdom. That makes it easier for the Devil to tell his lies. I'm about to tell the truth about some of those lies. Let's look at some of the serious lies:

• Not everyone who disagrees with you is a racist. They have their opinion and you have yours. The Devil would like to keep the two of you from having a civil conversation because you just might end up respecting one another.
• Being free and over 21 does not give you permission to be an idiot, despite what the Devil says. Being free and over 21 gives you the responsibility to act your age and be an example to your children.
• Black lives do matter. White lives matter and no one in their right mind ever said differently. Red lives matter, Yel- Wait. Maybe our biggest problem is that we have to talk about the color of the lives that matter. The Devil likes to keep some facts out of the conversation. For instance, why aren't we working toward a day when we only have to worry about life and not the color?
• Don't let the Devil tell you that you can dress like a punk and act like a punk, then be mad when you are treated like a punk. If someone sees you wearing a Klan hood,, they'll think you're part of the Klan. If you walk around trying hard to look "hard", then people will think you are trouble to be avoided. The Devil never makes you think about any of this. Trust me, though, if the Devil tells you to walk into a bank dressed like a robber, make sure he agrees to pay your bail when you get arrested.
• Being good-looking does not give you the right to be rude. Being rich doesn't give you that right. Being old or disabled doesn't give you that right. The only right you should care about is the right to be a decent human being. 
• Being a bully - online and in real life - doesn't hide your own problems. The Devil is the biggest bully there is. You might not want to take his advice about how to treat people who are weaker, kinder, different or just more civilized than you are. 

The Devil doesn't just get into our heads about the serious stuff. He loves to help us make asses of ourselves.

• Dear Walmart shoppers: Do not dress as if you have membership in the place. You are not the only ones out there when it comes to public displays of "I don't give a damn", but you are becoming the poster people of that syndrome. The Devil who told you not to be worried about what other people think of you? Well, he's got a point, but you should still care what you think of yourselves.
• Dear Broke people: You are impressing anyone with your Fucci purses and Folex watches. We see you in the layaway line just in front of us. The Devil is trying to make you think that you can fantasize your way out of poverty. You can't. You can work your way out, you can dream and motivate your way out. You can even save your way out of poverty, but not as long as you're spending money on designer bags that you keep in the closet of your rental home.
• Dear good looking guy (or gal): Yes, you were really hot-looking when I first saw you. Then I smelled your nasty ego. I got a second glance at your low self-esteem when you were looking down your nose at everyone around you. The Devil gave you good looks, but he didn't teach you that the world will see you through their own eyes, You're not looking good enough to cover up the ugly of your ways.
• Dear Selfie Nation: Posting photos of your loving relationships with friends and family is not a substitute for actually showing love to your friends and family. The Devil may have told you how cute you and your mate look in all those couple selfies. He may have told you that taking cute photos with your kids can substitute actually spending time with them. Or that posting hearts and flowers in honor of the dead substitutes honoring their memory with your actions. Don't know if he told you that you aren't fooling those of us who know you in real life. 

The Devil wants us to imagine him as a little red imp with horns and a pitchfork. He doesn't want us to see him reflected in our own behavior. The Devil is hidden in our own cruelty, arrogance, selfishness, and willingness to always put ourselves ahead of someone else.

I think one of the biggest lies the Devil tells good people is that we are not good people and that we are not of value to anyone else. To the people living in fear and ignorance of decency, the Devil probably tries to convince them that they are more valuable than others.

The bottom line is, the Devil doesn't want you to be happy unless it's at the expense of someone else's happiness. The Devil is a liar and we all have to be smart enough not to fall for his deceit. 

The Devil is a liar, but he sometimes to use our tongues to speak. Silence him every chance you get.

Peace

--Free

The Devil is STILL a Liar

Six years ago, I wrote a semi-humorous post about a saying I grew up hearing in church: "The Devil is a liar!"

This is the not so humorous sequel about what the Devil will and won't tell us.

He'll tell you that all money is good money because any money will spend.
He won't tell you that you can't spend money as well if you're dead or locked up.

He'll tell you that money can buy everything you need to look good, eat well, live high and mighty..
He won't tell you that the money that bought your clothes can't buy self-respect; that the money that lets you travel the world can't tell you where to find peace of mind. The money that makes people want to be around you can't buy you one true friend.

He'll tell you that we should try everything at least once. Life is, after all, for living to the fullest.
He won't remind you about the person who OD'd the first time they tried drugs, or got pregnant the first time they had sex with a stranger. He won't tell you that you can go to jail the first time you do something illegal. He won't tell you that the very first time you do something stupid you could end up with a life - your's or someone else's - changed for the worst. He won't tell you that living life to the fullest doesn't have to mean living life to the stupidest and most reckless. He won't tell you that you could end up brain dead, all dead or just wishing you were dead.

He'll tell you, when you are at your peak, that you can do it all, have it all and be it all.
He won't show you how to cope when you hit your lowest point and can't do, have or be anything that you once could.

He will tell you, when you are at your lowest, that no one loves you, needs you, or wants you.
He won't tell you about that you have mattered, or can one day matter, to someone. He won't tell you about a God who loves you. He won't remind you that you aren't the only one who has felt this way and lived past the feelings and the struggle.

He will tell you that because some people who are doing stupid, ignorant, illegal or immoral stuff and seem to be happy, unconcerned, or getting away with it, that you should too.
He won't' remind you that there is a reason some things are considered stupid, illegal or immoral. He doesn't want you to think about the people doing those things who aren't happy. unconcerned or getting away with anything.

He will tell you, especially if you are very young or very vulnerable, that YOLO (You Only Live Once).
He won't tell you that how you live at any age matters and has consequences. He won't remind you that you only live this life once.

He will tell you that you should want to be like the celebrities you see in the media. That you should be living the life they are living.
He won't tell you that, just like the rest of us, those people get sad, sick, worried, heartbroken and, eventually, dead. He won't remind you that feelings - good or bad - are the same whether a person is wearing designer clothes or handed down rags. He won't' remind you that some things cost more than money and that some people have paid for what they have with something more precious than gold.

He will tell you that you'd be happier "if only". He wants you to think that you'd be happier if only you were coupled up, or single; childless or a parent; black instead of white; rich instead of poor; this instead of that....
He won't tell you that there are people just like you who are happy, content, successful and fulfilled. He won't tell you that everything he is saying to you, he is saying to someone else.

Most of all, he will tell you that where you are now in life - whether in success or failure, joy or sorrow, wealth or poverty - is you will remain.
He doesn't want you  to know that everything he tells you is a lie. He doesn't want you to have hope or true happiness. He wants to hold us hostage to our present so that we don't think past it. He will hold our past over our heads so that we live in regret of mistakes or past glory. Most of all, he doesn't want to think that there is any more to life than what we have gained or lost.

Peace
--Free

Politeness Is Not a Weakness

Since I've been slacking on the blog due to some extreme fatigue issues, I thought I'd drop in for a rant. (Sorry. I will be back up with some reviews in the next week or so. In the meantime...)

What ever happened to manners????

I was on the phone with my niece earlier. She lives outside of Dallas and she was shopping at a local Costco. As she was cruising through the lot searching for a parking space, someone actually gunned around her to get to the one she had her signal on for. (By the way, my niece always uses a hands-free phone accessory!)


We were still discussing how rude people can be when my niece got into the store. As she was pushing her cart through the aisles, someone in front of her slowed down to look at something so my niece slowed down. She happened to notice that the lady behind her was not slowing down. She sort of lifted her hand to catch the front of that lady's cart. The woman just pushed into her hand and ran over the back of my niece's heel with her cart.

source

I heard my niece yelp. She told me that the rude lady only issued a " Sorry" because other people gave her curious looks.

This is not uncommon for someone living in a bigger and more crowded city. I think that my niece has just gotten used to it. Matter of fact, I think that she expects people to be rude.

Here in Alaska, one of the most positive aspects used to be how friendly people were. That all changed. I would say that in the past 10 years, Anchorage has started to resemble many of the places residents came her to escape.

What always makes me shake my head is that people have confused what's important. It's important to most people to be intelligent, high-earning, attractive - whatever they think is impressive. This is what children are being taught. However, not enough people are teaching (or using) good, basic manners.

I was with my little nephew in Walmart one day when he started coughing. I reminded him to cover his mouth. A moment later, he did something that prompted me to remind him to say "Excuse me." I hadn't noticed a woman standing nearby until she approached me to say how glad she was to see someone teaching a child common courtesies. We then had a brief discussion about the subject.

source

How crazy is it that something so basic as being a decent person can incite commentary?

It seems that the smarter and more intellectually advanced we become, the less we value basic decency.

Anyway, that's my little rant for the day. Let's go out and be kind to each other.

Peace
--Free