Logical Empath

So, I’m a teensy weensy obsessed with personality tests such as Strengthsfinder, the Enneagram, and the Myers-Briggs Personality Type Indicator. Long story short, I’m fascinated by what makes people tick. 

Long story long, while I understand that humans are complex, adaptable, and prone to the types of self-deception that ultimately make the results of personality tests flawed, I enjoy them immensely. Taken with a grain of salt, these tools help me understand myself and other people a little bit more than I otherwise would without them.

By the way, for those keeping score, my top 5 strengths are:

Ideation

Input

Learner

Individualization 

Connectedness 

My enneagram result is a 4w5.

My Myers-Briggs result has historically varied slightly over the years from INFP to ENFP.

What I’ve always wondered, though, is how our health, our moods, and our current life situation influences these types of tests. For example, if I’m sick, or feeling anxious/depressed/overwhelmed, or I’m, say, living in a post-pandemic world where after nearly 3 years of a lot of social isolation, I am just beginning to dip my toe into the pool of community connections once again, I would think my personality test results would be a little different than they would be if I were healthy, energized, and gracefully gliding across the surface of the water of community connections like a nearly-perfectly thrown skipping stone.

Do the results of these tests vary? Yes. I think so. Does that mean these tests are silly nonsense pseudoscience? Maybe. Do I care? No. Not if if helps me better understand myself and my fellow humans.

All this is to say, last night, I had an opportunity to test out my hypothesis that the results of personality tests do indeed change, depending on things such as health, mood, and living situation.

I won’t go into too much detail in an effort to only air my own dirty laundry and not my entire family’s. I mean, come on. It’s 2022. Modern American women are no longer necessarily in charge of their laundering their entire family’s actual dirty clothes, so it should follow that we are also not responsible for airing the entire family’s metaphorical dirty laundry. If the people in my family want to go into detail with you about their part in the argument we had last night, that’s their business. In a Rashomonesque fashion, I can only share details of my side of the story.  I get to control when and how I share my dirty undies. I mean laundry. OK. This mixed metaphor is getting weird and creepy. Let’s move on.

So, last night, my family got into a fight. It was honestly pretty mellow by my standards. No name calling. Only one teen (Kat) flipping off one elder (me) and really it was done mostly in jest. Nothing like the family fights I experienced as a teen, with my dad yelling at my mom and me, calling us stupid, calling me a commie, me flipping Dad off completely serious and unjestlike, calling him an asshole and mom turning, silently, walking down the hallway to her bedroom and shutting the door, shutting us crazy confrontational people out and avoiding conflict at all costs. Being involuntarily committed to the psych ward after having a “nervous breakdown” after finding out your first husband—not my dad, who, sure, he could be an asshole sometimes, but at least he wasn’t a cheater, too—was having an affair, and receiving electroshock therapy on two separate occasions in the mid-1960s might do that to you. Turn you into a conflict-avoidant person. That was my mom, for sure. I don’t agree with conflict-avoidance at all cost, but I understand.

So, now I’m 52. I’ve learned a thing or two since I was a confrontational teen. I’ve learned that there is a difference between being confrontational and being assertive. I’ve learned that avoiding conflict at all cost is a normal coping mechanism for someone who feels powerless and unheard. I’ve learned that yelling and name-calling is also a normal coping mechanism for pe who feel like their grasp of power is slipping and they are beginning to feel unheard. I’ve learned that with so many things, the middle way is the best. At least that’s how it is for me. Embrace conflict, clear the air, talk about feelings, unearth the depths of misunderstanding, but do it all as calmly, as rationally, as empathetically as possible. 

So my 16-year-old Kat (Gen Z,) and my 66-year-old mother-in-law (Boomer,) were getting into a disagreement last night about generational differences and our society’s history of corporal punishment. There were some phrases being thoughtlessly thrown around such as, “back in my day” and “well nowadays that’s called abuse.” My 41-year-old husband Will (Millennial,) put in his two cents, which I interpreted as, “Hey, guys, it’s been a long day and I’m trying to watch this comedy show to lighten up a bit, and you’re being confrontational is harshing my mellow so could you cut it out and get back to doing the dishes and getting ready for bed?”

I could see the look in Kat’s eye. She’s got her daddy’s blue eyes, but she’s inherited my emotive stare. She looked like what I imagined I looked like when I was 16, looking back and forth at my mom and dad, thinking, “Two more years! Just two more fucking years and I can get out of here and get away from these stupid people and live the way I want to live.”

It’s funny, because I don’t want Kat to think such things about me, but I completely understand that she does. I try not to take it personally. I know some day she will realize, just like I did, that my parents loved me and raised me to the best of their flawed, sometimes stupid, sometimes brilliant abilities.

But in that moment, when I saw it in Kat’s eyes that she was on the verge of saying something she might regret to her dad, who she adores but who also exasperates her, I, being a 52-year-old GenXer, and therefore in the middle of all these other generations, stepped in and said, “Can I share my thoughts.”

We had, what I think, was a good family discussion about generational differences, disagreements, respect, speaking your truth with empathy and calm rationality.

The air cleared. No one shouted. A few feelings were hurt, but nothing irreparable. Grandma said, “I love you all,” and went to bed. Kat went back to doing the dishes and later came out to the living room to say she thought she should apologize to grandma. I said, “Yes. That’s probably good idea. But I’ve gotta say, I’m also proud of you for being confrontational. Probably because I was also confrontational at your age. It’s developmentally appropriate. Being confrontational can be good, but it can also make life hard for you. Some day you’ll learn how to confront people who disagree with you without sounding like you’re attacking them. You’re already much more evolved than I was at your age. It’s hard to get along with older generations. Every generation thinks the older generations are stupid because in many ways we are. We grew up in a different time than you, and our world wasn’t as open as your world is now. But we also have a lot more experience living than you to, and with experience comes wisdom, which is good, too.”

Kat’s eyes softened. Her mouth twitched slightly. Was that the beginning of a smile? Some semblance of understanding? I’d like to think so. But what Kat said was this: 

“Can I go back to doing the dishes now?”

“Yes!” Will, and I said, in unison.

Will unpaused his comedy show. 

I took the Myers-Briggs test for probably the tenth time. 

It was the perfect opportunity to test my hypothesis. I was feeling healthy. I was in a stable mood. My family had bravely faced conflict head on and managed to avoid getting into a wreck. Let’s see if the results of my test change when I’m in this state of mind.

In the past when I’ve taken the test, I was always going through something. Sick. Grumpy. Not in a good place in my life. Each of those times, I always scored either an ENFP or an INFP. Here are some blurbs about those results:

This time, I actually did score slightly differently: INTP. The logician. Here are some blurbs about that:

Honestly, I can see myself in both.

Maybe I’m a logical empath?

CockLESS: this amBIGuous life

***Trigger warning: poetry***

The thing about healing is the ing 

Healing is a to-be-continued kinda thing

A cliff hanger 

Not healed. Not health. 

Not a lotta hells yeah we done

More like put a pin in it, be prepared

Cause the it from which 

You think you've healed 

Can pop back up

When you least expect it--shit!

Dropping you face down on the ground

Flailing, failing

Again and again and again

Shit!

Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit. Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit!

I'm a tough bitch

A built up bigger, better bitch

A Nietzschean, that which didn't kill me makes me stronger big bitch

I am a GODDAMN heavyweight champion 

Of this ambiguous life

I've got decades of defenses

Brain trained

Skills to kill dementors trying 

To torment me into oblivion

But, I know no champion 

That has ever learned how

To block a sucker punch

***Trigger warning: sexual abuse. Early childhood, young adult, and, evidently, even middle-age-bordering-on-old-lady sexual abuse.***

It was getting close to closing time. Please do not cue that 90s era rock song. We weren't at a bar. The lights were about to go from bright to dim, not the other way around. Just a regular Saturday late-afternoon at the public library, ushering families out the door, stickers in the hands of the littlest kids, stacks of books in the arms of older siblings. Parents jingling car keys, trying their best at this parenting thing--moms and dads and grandmas and grandpas and nannies and neighbors and foster care guardians collecting their kids, heading to the parking lot, and on to dinner at home or to their next errand. 

I paint an idyllic image of my neighborhood public library. Some of you more cynical folks might say it's fake. Art and memories are often subjective, but that doesn't make them untrue. Sure, it's not all happy families spending time together on a Saturday at the public library. We have many adults and teens I suspect are struggling. Sitting alone on the public PCs all day, searching for jobs, friends, and even dates on a box with a screen and a connection to the world wide web. Not the real world, but that doesn't make it untrue. 

I begrudge solo surfers nothing. If I hadn't somehow stumbled into this self-assured version of myself, I am certain I'd still be searching for a found family of my own. I spent the first three decades of my life mostly miserable, searching for connections lost before my memories were fully formed. 

You know the story. I'm the youngest of six, the baby of the family. My birth order connotes a child with doting parents, rigid rocky rules smoothed to skipping stones over the years by the forces of my older siblings' acts of defiance and compliance. By rights I should have been a completely spoiled child, and in some ways I was, but not completely. My parents had both been married to other people before they each divorced and married each other and then had me. My oldest sister, Glenda, is my dad's child from his first marriage to Shirley. Glenda was 15 when I was born, and I never lived with her, since her mom got custody after our dad left their family. My mom had custody of her kids when she married my dad, two years after she had divorced her first husband, Jim, the father of her other four children--Jay, Kit, Pat, and Jenny, who were 12, 10, 9, and 7 when I was born in late November 1970, just a few weeks before Christmas, a live baby doll gift from Santa to my sisters Kit and Jenny if you believe the tales they tell me. I do. 

Kit says she couldn't sleep the night before I was born, so she got up and went to the dining room to practice walking back and forth, positioning her hands so she could hold a pretend new baby's head upon her shoulder. Trying to get it just right. As Kit practiced her steps, Mom was in the hospital, scheduled to have her labor induced the next morning, since I was overdue. Instead, after fifteen minutes of painless labor if you believe my mom (I do and I don't,) at 4:45am, I came into this word naturally, caught by two nurses before Mom's doctor had a chance to get there. Female nurses. If it were still 1970, that would be implied. But it's 2021, and now male nurses are not an unusual thing. Gender lines are blurry now. Gender discrimination is still real, but with these blurring lines, like the best Impressionist paintings hanging at the Nelson Atkins Museum, the views lead to profound beauty and deeper understanding.

Here's a sad story with a happy ending:

Mom said she only saw my Dad cry twice. Once when his mother died, and once when I was born. I could stop there and let you assume what you will. Tears of grief for the death of his mother. Tears of joy for the birth of his baby. But no, both times the tears fell from grief. I was not the son Dad had been hoping for. Patriarchal bullshit like this used to hurt my feelings. But, now, time has passed, and so has my dad. When he died in my living room at the age of 90, his last words were, "I love you all." 

I am extremely difficult not to love, despite my missing penis. 

Actually, isn't it the other way around? I'm not missing anything. A girl is not simply a cockless boy. Am I misremembering Biology 101? Isn't it true that we all begin as fetuses with tiny little clits, and only if our mothers release androgenic hormones do our sex glands grow into penises? Or do our X and Y chromosomes figure out all that bullshit beforehand? Honestly, I don't care. Whether born with a cock or not, we should all be so lucky as to have our last words be, "I love you all."

Also, I love who I am. It's taken a long time to do so, but I do. And I don't just love myself. I like me, too. I'm kinda ecstatic sitting here thinking about how much I've overcome to be the badass that I am today. Everybody loves an underdog. As I've said a time or two, high self-esteem has not always resided inside me. Those first three decades of my life were rough. I was a cockless child living in a patriarchal society. I was a fat kid living in a fat phobic world. I was neurodivergent before such jargon was in the common lexicon. I was repeatedly sexually abused from the ages of three to five. I began developing breasts in third grade and soon thereafter began catching cocky people staring at my chest as we conversed, as if my eyes had migrated to where my nipples are. I was sent to Weight Watchers in third grade. I was diagnosed with anorexia in fifth grade. I lost my breasts! Hallelujah! But then they grew back when I began eating again. 

You have to eat to live, my friends.

I'm currently at the beginning of my sixth decade here on earth, and my breasts are still growing. My bra size is brought to you today by the number 48 and the letter H. Evidently, breast development--at least mine--is not something you outgrow in adulthood.

Fortunately, most days, I feel confidently that my body is nobody's business but my own. I hear my peers complaining that, as the decades pass, they feel like they're losing their looks. My fellow women in their fifties feel overlooked by a culture that deifies youthful beauty. Honestly? I welcome it. Look elsewhere. This show is closed. I am so ready to settle into my happy role as a big fat babushka. 

But that's the trouble. No matter how hard I fight it, I am a product of my culture. The fact that I relish my fat rolls, my heavy breasts, my cankles--my role as a fabled babushka--shows that I believe that getting older and fatter means I'm automatically disqualifying myself from the dating game. Because certainly no one's looking to tap this grey-haired saggy ass.

Wrong. 

I found out yesterday that even if I don't want it, I still got it.

It was closing time. Idyllic public library. I'm too busy helping patrons check out to notice I'm being checked out. But there he was, standing in front of me, holding out a piece of paper. I had been helping him off an on all afternoon, thinking nothing of it. I took the note from him. I looked at it. It took a minute for me to find that sweet spot on my progressive lenses where I can read small print up close. The note was hand written. OK handwriting, legible enough. Is that a call number? What section of the library's Dewey Decimal System begins with 913? Isn't that the travel section--wait--the ancient world? Or, wait, is that the African origin of civilization section? Mitochondrial Eve? Venus of Willendorf?

My ADHD brain--with the emphasis on the H as in hyperactive--easily bounces all over the place, making connections more typical brains often miss. It can be a blessing or a curse. It's a blessing when I beat your ass at a rousing game of Scattergories, or when I'm trying to interpret a patron question asked with a lack of clarity. But it can also be a curse, as in when my brain is heading to ancient Africa instead of paying attention to the African-American man standing right in front of me, smiling in a way that looks like the only thing he's interested in studying is my body. 

Oh. That's not a call number. That's a phone number.

Oh. That's his phone number.

I continued reading below the number, holding the slip of paper out far enough that my progressive lenses could focus on the words.

If you would like to experience waves of pleasure throughout your beautiful body by my big black cock, give me a call.

I looked him right in the eye--or rather, I tried to make eye contact, which is difficult when the other person is looking at your nipple-eyes--and shrieked, in my best Alexis Rose voice, "Ewwwwwww! No!" And then I turned to walk away, saying, "I'm married." As if I had to give him an excuse for why I was reacting to his suggestion with revulsion.

Let me stop here a minute. Here's a lesson for those of you who somehow missed the day when it became obvious to the rest of us: 

It is not OK to hit on someone at work. Whether you are also at work or not. I suspect this situation happens to other cockless people a lot, too, if they work with the general public, and the cocky people in particular. Restaurant servers, nurses, librarians. There we are, just trying to do our jobs. Feeding you, healing you, body, mind, and soul. We're not here for your sexual advances. That's what bars are for. That's what Tinder is for. You hit on me a my job at the public library? Nope. That's a big swipe left. I don't care how big your cock is.

I wish I'd had the gumption to say all this to my nonconsensual, not-so-secret admirer. But he caught me off guard with his cocky sucker punch.

I began proceeding through the Kubler-Ross Grief Cycle, which I've noticed also applies to sexual abuse survivors who are suddenly confronted by newly unwanted sexual aggression. At least that's how it is for me. 

Denial. Anger. Bargaining. Depression. Acceptance.

Denial: Certainly this 30-something guy can't possibly be making sexual advances toward me, a 50-something, fat, grey-haired babushka. I must be misunderstanding this situation. That's a call number. Not his phone number. He's looking for a book about Ancient African fertility goddesses. He's not looking at this modern American library goddess. Right?

Anger: Who the FUCK does this cocky bastard think he is? I'm a GODDAMN children's librarian. I'm wearing sensible shoes. My cardigan is hanging right over THERE.

Bargaining: Oh, I see. Maybe if I hadn't taken my cardigan off none of this would have happened. 

Anger again: I mean, I was running around trying to help everyone get out of there. I'm fat, perimenopausal, and the Sertraline I take for PTSD has a side effect of excessive sweating. I'm not out here flaunting my body. I'm just a sweaty old lady here trying to do her job.

Depression: Ugh. I mean. Jeez. Here we go again. I've been objectified by cocky bastards since I was three years old. When is it all going to end? I'm so tired. So, so tired. Of it all.

Acceptance: 

Nah. Nope. Never.

I will never ever ever accept unsolicited sexual advances from anyone. My body belongs to me.

My fat, old body is not for society to shame.

My big boobs and booty are not for cocky bastards to ogle.

I will never, ever accept it.

When I was young, I was told not to talk about it. 

Now that I am older and wiser I write about things you're not supposed to talk about.

I had to get home. To clock off and get to my blog. If I can get home and start to write about how I feel, I will feel better.

But I have another job. On the drive home, I began to cry. I'm a mother. That's my real job. I make a living by working at the library, but my number one job is being Kat's mom. I'm crying. I'm upset. What am I going to tell her when I get home? She's so empathetic. It pains her to see me in pain. I have never told her about my history of sexual abuse because I know it will hurt her, and this pain is not hers to feel for me. She is not my therapist. She is not my spouse. She is not my friend. She is my 15-year-old daughter, and one of these days she's going to find out that her mother is the victim of early, ongoing childhood sexual abuse and it's going to make her crumble. She knows I have PTSD, but she thinks it's from other trauma I experienced as a kid--verbal and emotional abuse from my angry father, my parents sending me to Weight Watchers in 3rd grade, growing up with a mom who herself had been involuntarily committed to the mental ward at the hospital on two separate occasions where she received electroshock therapy, before I was even born. Told by my grandmother and siblings to be careful not to hurt mom or she'll have to go back to the hospital. Smile. Don't cry. Don't get upset. Everything is fine. Protect Mom from your hurt.

And now I'm trying to protect my child from my hurt.

I pulled into our driveway. I went inside and told my husband what happened. Kat was in her bedroom, so we were able to talk quietly in the kitchen. There was no time to blog, yet. But I had to talk to someone. A professional. Someone who would understand. I took my phone out to my car and called the employee assistance program mental health line.

The phone rang, and a robot answered.

A guidance consultant will be with you shortly. We have been the premier employee behavior health management system for more than thirty years. Please hold for the next available guidance consultant...It's the holidays, which means it's harder to stay on top of our diet and fitness goals, which is leading to a healthcare crisis. Did you know that the CDC estimates that over 40 percent of Americans are obese? 

 You don't say? Wow. I had no idea. Thanks, Robot, for reminding me, once again that I'm a fat fuck who is going to die early and be a drain on society's health insurance industry.

We can schedule an appointment with a guidance consultant to discuss healthy weight management...

 Nah. Nope. Never. Please just connect me with a guidance consultant so I can discuss how I FUCKING HATE LIVING IN A SOCIETY THAT SEXUALLY OBJECTIFIES LITTLE GIRLS AND OLD WOMEN AND EVERYONE IN BETWEEN AND THAT ALSO CONSTANTLY BOMBARDS US WITH INFORMATION THAT OUR BODIES ARE UNHEALTHY AND A BURDEN AND JUST WRONG.

After waiting on hold for ten minutes, and hearing the message about scheduling an appointment to discuss healthy weight management five times, I hung up the phone.

I cried a little. I took deep breaths. I tried to push aside six decades worth of flashbacks of unsolicited cocks in my face. I wanted to go into my bedroom closet and cry myself to sleep like I did when I was a little girl. 

Instead, I called the MOCSA crisis hotline: 913-642-0233. Someone picked up the phone right away. We talked. She listened. I cried. We laughed. She reminded me what a GODDAMN HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPION of my own life I am.

She's connecting me with a therapist who specializes in helping survivors of sexual abuse so I can talk some more and continue healing.

Someone’s Special Reward

At the public library where I work, a mom and her kiddo, age four-ish, stopped by to check out some picture books.

Mom explains that they are big fans of my Friday evening online storytime. In fact, “If [insert kiddo’s name] has a good week at preschool, his special reward is to get to watch Miss Becky's Friday evening online storytime with his little brother.”

My heart burst. Right there. In the middle of the public library.

I am someone’s special reward? 

What an honor. I swear, if I could go back in time and talk to teenage-me, the awkward, socially anxious, angsty outcast who fantasized about being a famous singer, author, or movie star to fulfil the emptiness and self-loathing I actually felt inside, I'd tell that girl that everything will work out just fine. I might never get to recite my "thank you" speech at the Grammys, the Oscars, or when I pick up my Nobel Prize for literature, but my storytime is someone’s special reward.

I remember how much I loved my own storytime librarian when I was this kiddo’s age. Grownups, remember: everyone has an important role in this village. Raising kids is a heroic act. You might not see yourself as a hero, but some kid out there sure does. Be the hero that kid thinks you are.

Alcoholism is on the rise

Alcoholism is on the rise.

My brother died at age 49 of alcoholic liver failure. I do not see his case as an individual failure, but as a systemic societal failure. 

Here are some ways I have learned that those of us who do not struggle with alcohol abuse can help our brothers and sisters, friends and neighbors who do:

Encourage our federal and state governments to pass Medicare for all legislation. Alcoholism is a disease that needs a team of doctors and mental health care providers to treat the whole person. If a person has no affordable health care, they will continue to struggle.

Encourage local, state, and federal governments to legalize the medical use of marijuana. Many people, including my brother, began self-medicating with marijuana but turned to alcohol after getting into legal trouble. Marijuana prescriptions from doctors are safer treatments for pain and anxiety than alcohol.

Work with church leaders, educators, and families to dismantle the patriarchy. Toxic masculinity and femininity teaches us to repress natural human emotions. Often people abuse alcohol as a way to numb uncomfortable emotions.

Work with our communities to dismantle classism. Encourage working class people to feel pride in their jobs. Every worker deserves a living wage and the knowledge that their work is a piece of the whole that supports our economy. Encourage upper class people to focus their talents and strengths on making the world a better place for humanity rather than solely focusing on their individual bank accounts.

Cultivate a sense of belonging for all individual people. Alcoholism, like drug overdose and suicide, are “deaths of despair.” Work with your community to be inclusive so more people feel the support and love that all humans need to survive.

QAnon Shaman Jake Angeli to host third reboot of The Biggest Loser, unreliable sources say [satire]

This just in, Trump TV has brokered a deal with USA Network to hire Jake Angeli, aka the QAnon Shaman, to host a third reboot of The Biggest Loser, one of reality TV's most lucrative franchises.

 

An ureliable source tells us the idea came to President Trump after staffers read him a quote from Angeli’s mother, Martha Chansley.

 

"He gets very sick if he doesn't eat organic food—literally will get physically sick," the suspect's mother explained.

 

Angeli refuses to eat while being held in federal custody.

 

Another unreliable source has retrieved a leaked document from the Trump Administration, which appears to be a script. Here is the full transcript:

 

Episode 1: After a physically demanding insurrection workout, Jake demands organic-only food as he recharges in federal custody.

 

Meanwhile, Ku Klux Klan members challenge The Proud Boys, Anti-Vaxers, and QAnon supporters to lose ten pounds by Inauguration Day.

 

Klan Member 1: “This was not the year to buy the new slim cut robes with the face-hugging hood. As it is now, I can’t be seen wearing it. Not that I’m not a proud white power fighter. I just can’t even! If any pictures of my fat face get leaked to the public. Ugh! Eight days. That’s all I need to fast so my cheeks will be nice and hollow for the Insurrection Day red carpet on January 20.”

 

QAnon Supporter: “Same, girl! We might be opponents on this Biggest Loser challenge, but I feel you. I can barely show my face in public too. Not that I’m ashamed of being outed as a white supremacist. What I’m ashamed of is this pandemic-15 that’s all gone to my ass. Thank God the pedophiles picked a pizza joint to run their satanic cabal. It’s really helped my willpower to stay away from all those carbs and grease.”

The Marvelous Miss Carleton

From a young age, Kat has been drawn to irreverent comedy. Starting at age seven, she binge-watched the entire series of “Futurama” multiple times. Next came “Phineas and Ferb,” “Bob’s Burgers,” “Uncle Grandpa,” and “Rick and Morty.” I didn’t love it when she moved on to Jim Gaffigan stand-up specials, not because he talks about adult themes—I mean, just because her former comedic obsessions were cartoons, they aren’t exactly full of child-like innocence—but because I worried Gaffigan’s incessant self-deprecating fat-guy jokes would influence Kat into believing the anti-fat bullshit fed to us from the billion dollar diet industry. Gaffigan’s funny, though, and I’ve found that the more I restrict Kat’s pop culture consumption, the more she sneaks. I’d rather she watch with me instead of behind my back so I can chime in with counter arguments. 

“He’s got great timing and what he is saying is funny, but I don’t like how he equates fatness with disease. If you dismiss the studies paid for by people who profit off the billion dollar diet industry, most scientific research shows that fatness does not necessarily lead to disease. Correlation is not the same as causation. Some thin people can be unhealthy just as some fat people can be unhealthy, so really—“

“—Mommy, I know. I know," she’d interrupt. "Can you please unpause it? I gotta leave for school in a minute. If I don’t see where he goes with this bit it’s gonna drive me crazy all day.”   

“Well, you don’t need that kind of distraction to ruin your school day, now do you?” I'd say. 

After plowing through Gaffigan’s life work, Kat moved on to other stand-up specials by Demetri Martin, Josh Johnson, and the like. Then, she discovered John Mulaney. She’s been on a Mulaney kick for a solid two years now. 

“Bojack Horseman” is a recent addition to Kat’s playlist. Instead of replacing her love of all-things-Mulaney, she’s learning that it’s possible to fangirl over multiple pop culture icons at a time. She’s evolved from being an irreverent comedy serial monogamist to being an irreverent comedy polygamist. 

In fact, now she’s toying with a third current comedy crush: “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel.” 

The other day, Kat was watching a YouTube video about fashion and décor trends from past decades. 

“I’m really getting into the whole 1950s-era look," she said. "Ya know, like, bullet bras and clean lines in furniture."

“I think that’s called mid-century modern,” I said.

“Well if it’s from the 50s, it’s not exactly modern,” Kat said.

“It was modern-ish a couple of decades ago when that term came about,” I said. 

Kat shrugged.

“Oh, I know! You’d like Mrs. Maisel,” I said.

“Who’s Mrs. Maisel?” Kat asked.

 “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel," I explained. "It’s a series on Prime. It’s about this upper-middle class Jewish housewife who befriends Lenny Bruce and hires this butch lesbian manager who helps her get gigs at crappy clubs in Greenwich Village that launch her stand-up career in the late 50s."

Before I finished my last sentence, Kat had turned on the Roku, queued up the first episode and plopped her butt next to me on the couch. Her feet were freezing under my blanket, but I didn’t complain for fear I’d scare her away. It’s nice when she wants to spend time with her old lady. Watching “Mom’s shows” is not exactly a 14-year-old’s first priority. I get it. When I was Kat’s age, my mom used to call me out of my bedroom.

 “Come watch ‘Moonlighting’ with me,” Mom would say after knocking on my door. 

“Mom. Ugh. I have homework,” I’d counter. Honestly, I was mostly likely just sitting in front of my mirror popping pimples while listening to The Smith’s “The Queen Is Dead” for the thousandth time. I always technically had homework. I just wasn’t technically good at doing it. I wonder why.

“Do it later! Come on, it’s starting!” Mom would say, shuffling off down the hall.

I always followed.

This sort of directness, this “Mom’s show” manipulation, doesn’t work with my daughter. At fourteen, she’s already smarter than me and has no problem advocating for her own alone-time needs. When I invite Kat out to the living room to watch most of the shows I like, she has no problem saying no. So, when she does sit next to me on the couch, I accept her, gleefully, icy feet and all. 

We’re now on season 1, episode 4 of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. Actually, I’m already on season 3, episode 5, but I’m re-watching the first season with the marvelous Miss Carleton. As I write this, I’m on the couch next to Kat as she sits in front of her school-issued MacBook doing school work. It’s all I can do not to queue up an episode of our show on the Roku and convince Kat that she can focus on school later. But I can wait. She'll be done with her school work in no time.

The good thing about remote learning during a pandemic is that there’s no such thing as homework anymore. I mean, all school work when you’re in online school is technically “home” work, but it’s not extraneous busy work you’re expected to keep up with after school, while Mom's knocking at your door, pleading with you to come watch TV with her. I’m luckier than my mom was. With streaming series on Prime, and online school, my kid and I aren’t committed to a one-hour block of prime time on network TV like my mom and I were back in the 80s. If I took time to finish my homework instead of heading out to the living room at the top of the hour, I'd miss the show. No replay. No rewind. Just have to wait til summer reruns. What a disappointment to my mother. It’s easier to parent patiently in the era of on-demand.

Oh, look! Kat closed her MacBook. It's showtime.

The scourge of humanity

I write this post while simultaneously overhearing my 14-year-old daughter's video for remote school health class about the ill effects of drinking alcohol, and reading a news report that our County Commissioners continue to allow bars to remain open during this escalating pandemic, even though our public schools are struggling to keep staffing levels optimal for both in-person and remote learning.

Our priorities are turned upside down. 

From this post:

New Johnson County health order draws mixed reactions | Coronavirus | kctv5.com

Part of the new order in Johnson County requires restaurants and bars to close at midnight instead of 2 a.m...

“I think it sounds like it’s an attempt to do something without really doing anything. To be honest,” Dr. Larson said.

“While I applaud the fact that something is being done, I think we need to go further,” Dr. Larson said. “A gathering of 49 is just as dangerous as a gathering of 51. Especially if it’s inside. So I think it’s an attempt to do something without angering the base of people who are adamant about not doing it.”

“I think that the medical community would be all in agreement that we need to do what we can to stop the spread of the disease. Obviously nobody wants to see an entire lockdown, but we also understand that we need to do what’s right, even if it’s hard,” he said.

If I were in charge, we would do what's right, even if it's hard. 

• We would close everything except essential services for our community as a whole.
• We would keep open schools, police, fire, and other essential public service departments, public libraries, gas stations, and grocery stores until we get control of this novel coronavirus. 
• Everyone else in the community would be furloughed and receive unemployment insurance. 
• If former bar, restaurant, and retail staff preferred to work instead of staying at home, they could be on a team directed by County Health that focuses on a coordinated home delivery system for food, medicine, and other essentials that would be provided to everyone in our community.
• Workers who are not on unemployment would receive the first batch of vaccine for free.
• Once we have more vaccine available, everyone would receive it for free. 
• Once we have eradicated the coronavirus, bars, restaurants, and retail stores could open again, and workers could get off of unemployment.

This puts the priority on education, basic needs, and the community as a whole.

Instead, our County Commissioners prioritize profit over people. They give in to adults who whine about the inconvenience of not being able to drink wine with their friends in a bar as scientists, parents, and educators soberly face reality. My daughter learns about the dangers of alcoholism in remote school at home, unable to socialize with her peers or experience high school life in-person, while selfish adults gather at bars to drink and socialize with their peers. The scourge of humanity is not the disease itself, but our inability to unite and fight against it.

I love you, whoever you voted for

Excellent analysis from Ari Melber, quoting Shakespeare and Tupac:

 

Trump is going, going, gone. Still, we're stuck with ourselves.

The most disturbing ah-ha moment in the clip above is when Melber points this out: when you walk into a room full of registered white voters, most of them voted for Donald Trump. Not in 2016, but in 2020. After all Trump has done to disenfranchise our BIPOC brothers and sisters during his four years in power, a majority of white people still chose hate over love.

White people: we can do better.

White people: now is the time.

White people: listen.

Now is the time for us to stop and listen to Black, Indigenous, and People of Color. We need to unlearn the biases and bigotry ingrained into us since birth as citizens of a country founded on the morally reprehensible ideas and actions of white supremacy. 

Now is the time to open our hearts and our minds, to accept the call to love our neighbors—ALL our neighbors—as we love ourselves. 

White people: if you struggle to love your BIPOC neighbors, start with yourself. A person who truly loves themself has no room for hatred of others. 

Despite my political beliefs, I love you, whoever you voted for. I have no room in my heart for hatred. Let’s listen and learn and grow, together. Love is an action verb.