Libre

I'll just be forthcoming, I'm a judgmental person. Mentally, I observe and adjudicate on everything. I like to feel as if every person does this in some capacity, but I probably do so more than most. Once I have passed judgment, my ruling usually stands like firm concrete. I typically keep these judgements to myself, primarily because no one really ever wants to hear someone else's opinion. Secondarily, verbalizing one's judgement about another person is usually just a weak mind attempting to sway the opinion of others in its favor.    I find that usually within the first five minutes, of interaction with a new person, I have mentally formed an accurate image of their moral character. At that point, I either continue getting to know them, or decide to keep my interactions superficial. These rulings need not be entirely logically based. In fact, I find a good amount of time, that I can't quite put my finger on my reasons for why I feel a particular way. Maybe it's some subconscious observation of nano-behaviors. Perhaps I process body language on some level. However the result is achieved, my judgements of persons has yet to let me down.   In the practice of keeping an open mind, I'll go one record as saying that I do not think of a person as good or evil as a whole. I process my judgements more in terms of how they relate to me. The best way I can explai is to say, "this person is a bad influence" or "this person will be a positive influence".   A percentage people are just out for number one. Additionaly, a portion of that percentage is more aggressive in the means towards that their end. These people are almost always judged as a bad influence for me. While looking out for your own self isn't a bad quality, utilizing people as no more than mere commodities, to be consumed, for your own benefit is.     My partner has a friend; someone he's known since before he and I met. This friend is one of those people who are only out for their own benefit. My partner doesn't seem to see it, even through a still-failing business transaction. Part of his clouded  view is out of naive optimism for the human spirit.  Part of it is because of an emotional past. I could postulate that there is still some want for a continued sexual and emotional connection from my partner, in regards to this other man. I can't deny that my knowledge of this past connection, does weigh on my judgement. I can, however, state that I wouldn't have trusted this guy, regardless.     There is a large part of me, that wishes this guy was no longer a part of my partner's life and, by extension, my own. I don't want to be that manipulative person that forces the hand of my mate. I also don't want to say I told you so. All I can do for now is be supportive to my partner and keep my judgment to myself, even when this friend complains that someone put sugar in his gas tank..  How's that for reinforcing my judgement? 

Epiphany

I feel that I can't quite ever let my guard down; that I, alone, must erect and maintain a series of braces and butresses to preserve the ephemeral armor. Question is, why did I feel the need to construct such heavy fortifications in the first place? This unrealistic fear that any change, no matter how minute; could be the catalyst of absolute implosion, needs to stop.

Dogmatronic Politics

Personal Opinion: A politician evoking Religion and Prayer to Bolster their campaign for president is like an American Idol contestant singing “God Bless the USA”. Tacky, Risky, and Shallow. Sadly, it doesn’t garner quite the same end result. Over the last twelve years, the Republican party has slowly shifted into this bizarre Evangelical Christian Party; by pandering to a base of working class, presumably politically ignorant masses, and presenting this image that their freedom to express religious beliefs is being taken away from them.

The fulcrum point of this argument is, of course, marriage. I refuse to use the term ‘gay marriage’. It’s marriage, period. The argument is over the definition of the word, and NOT over legalizing or legitimizing a different form of it. The right side makes a lot of arguments to solidify the definition of marriage, and make it exclusive to heterosexual couples, by thumping the bible. Those arguments are really invalidated by constitutional requirement of separation of church and state. Honestly, there was no constitutional definition of marriage for a reason. The government shouldn’t really be giving benefits for the forming of personal contracts between people. That said, if government is going to dish out benefits for such a thing it has a legal and moral obligation to do so in a fair and equal manner in every instance.

I enjoy the argument by a couple of court clerks, in NY state, that signing marriage licenses for homosexual couples tramples on their freedom of religion. When you work for the government, you are accepting all of the constitutional requirements thereof. That means you’re not acting as a person, you’re acting as a representative of the government. Signing a legal document does not constitute a personal moral approval of the contents within it. If you can’t be professional enough to realize that, well then, you really shouldn’t be officiating state business in the first place.

The other insane argument, and it’s sadly one that works rather well, is that ‘legalizing’ marriage equality will result in homosexuality being taught in public schools. I must have missed the lesson plan in school about marriage. In fact Moral and social concepts were not a part of my curriculum at all. I’m sure if there was a class on the topic for students to take, parents would have the power to request their child not be a part of it. Morals and ideologies are not things ‘taught’ in school, unless your parents elected to enroll you in a private school of the religious variety. It is the responsibility of the parents to impart these concepts, and the right of the child to build or deconstruct them as they deem necessary.

Lastly, a corporation is *NOT* a person in spite of what some politicians believe. I feel that corporations are a monster unto their own and require political oversight to ensure that the monetary freight train doesn’t obliterate the masses when it derails in it’s insatiable quest for money and power. Politicians wouldn’t feel so compelled to pray for resolution to our debt crisis if the corporations, pouring gold into their pious pockets, would pay their fair share of the tax burden. The sad truth of the matter is that the ability to avoid having to pay taxes is a luxury only the wealthy can afford.
Posted 14 seconds ago

insult to injury

Sometimes I just feel lost, you know. Why can't the path for life be a little less obscure?

mentis dissonantia

"It's bothering you, you should say something about it." "I shouldn't impose my stress and worry on others. I'll get over it." "It's going to continue eating at you." "I'm overreacting, because of ingrained insecurity." "Anyone else would just lash out and express how they feel." "that's because other people are less in control, and thus less civilized; less understanding of the true impacts of their actions on others." "you have every right to feel this way." "I have every right to feel this way, but no right to burden others by it." "what if things continue down this road?" "I'll observe and if/when it reaches a point that I can't hold it inside any longer, I'll say something." "No, you'll keep pushing it deeper, burying it, packing more powder in the keg." "Hey, at least when it blows, it'll make an impressive show." "you're deflecting" "yea, but that's how I handle things best." "One day, you'll let someone in." "if someone tries that hard to get in, they'll deserve to see the darkness they find."

Peripheral numbness

Why do I feel so dulled today? I knew yesterday, I knew a week ago, what today is and didn't suffer any I'll effects. So why today? Mentally I feel and process the same, but physically every sensation just seems muted. Maybe it's just the cumulative weight of the psychological crab armor dulling the outside world in effort to protect me from the expected pain of the day. I feel isolated from reality. Like only a few things are able to pierce the aethers and touch me today. I long for the comfort of home and embrace of my partner.


Happy birthday Gram. I love and miss you. I know that wherever your soul has flown, it's better than the worldworn cage of reality you fled from. <3

Transportation

One of the last gifts my grandmother imparted me was to help me finance a reliable means of transportation. When I moved back to rural Florida, it became necessity to have a car. Decent work was at least an hour's drive from home, still is (but the pay is better, right?). The family car, a Ford Taurus from 1988, had seen it's fair slice of roadway; over three hundred seventy seven thousand miles to be exact. So we retired her, and used what little equity was left in her bones to make a down payment on a semi-shiny nearly-new car. Gram was happy that she could help me finance something that would help rebuild my credit, and I was happy to have a car that wouldn't leave me stranded on the roadside like a cheap hooker after an all-nighter.

Right about the time the Accord started to settle in, a flyer came from the dealership. It promised to get me in a shiny new car and wipe the slate clean. Gram fell for it hook line and sinker, and she garroted me with the line in the process. The dealer reeled us both in on the hope that, while we would be paying more over a longer period, the car would be newer and last me longer. The truth was, that in order to get the newer car, Ihad to be taken off the paperwork. The bottom had fallen out of the bottom of the economy at this point. My first boyfriend used and abused my credit and my emotions like an old hand towel in a cheap motel room. They told me my credit was toxic, and that any hope there was to make a deal would require me to not be on the paperwork. Gram fretted about it, but decided it was best to proceed anyway. She said a short time after, that she probably wouldn't be around to see the car paid off. I shrugged it off, because I didn't want to think about it.

Here we are, less than a year later. When gram passed away, one of the first things dad brought up was what we should do with the car. I figured, and was told, that we could basically just continue paying on it until the financing was matured and then change the title over to my name. I've been paying on the car, as I should. The tag renewal comes in, and dad mentions that it still has the details for the Accord on it. In and among the details of the purchase, apparently, the dealer neglected to follow through on transferring the tag from the accord to the civic. They transferred the title into her name, just not the tag. After fishing through some paperwork, I find a note from the dealer guaranteeing that that were going to do so. I take this note, my proof of insurance, and the renewal notice to the local tax collector.

This is where my entire day went to hell. I explained my situation to the clerk. She pulls up some stuff on the computer. Apparently, she could transfer the registration to the new car but, because gram is deceased, she can't legally renew it. Additionally, since the registration was never officially changed, I've been driving around with an invalid tag for ten months (something you can be taken to jail for). I am, at this point on the verge of crying. In my head, all I can see is that I'm going to have to turn the car in, and that I'm going to lose my transportation (and by extension my livelihood). In the middle of my panic, I call dad then my partner. My dad was, as usual loud and manic with minimal actual help. It's always an absolute sense of urgency with him, and that just doesn't help. My partner on the other hand, gets angry. My partner deals with cars, sales and whatnot. He's mad, because the dealer screwed up, and failed to fulfill part of their end of the contract. He tells me what I need to do, and tries to instruct me how to do it. Unfortunately, I'm not the confrontational type, so ultimately he has to be the angry voice for me.

It's difficult for me to ask for help, from anyone. I have a deep-seated need for independence. Not purely out of wanting to be so, but more out of want to not be a burden. Often times, I'm resigned to let the business world shit on me because I can't voice myself. I enjoy that he wants to help me; that he's trying to help me. It doesn't make me feel any less guilty for accepting the help however. Still, it's a wonderful change of pace, to have a partner that is just that. Someone who will accept my gifts, but wont abuse the source until it's dried up completely; Someone who will try to help, even against my own willful urge to resist assistance.

I say thank you, but I never feel like I adequately convey how much I really do appreciate it....