(no subject)
This Sunday was the anniversary of United’s InJoy campaign. Pastor Bill’s sermon was on vision for the future. (United’s big on the proselytizing thing now. Pastor Bill said that some people say “The two things I don’t talk about are politics and religion,” but that this isn’t religion this is a relationship with Jesus blah blah blah. My reaction was that of course you’re talking about religion; lots of people feel they have a relationship with Jesus but you would claim they are doing it all wrong.)
We also had communion. (We didn’t last Sunday due to its being Children’s Sunday.) Communion isn’t something that’s particularly meaningful to me because while in theory i think it’s a powerful ritual, in practice it feels like something everyone does by rote. (I do appreciate the litany at First Churches, about how this is for those for whom the ritual is familiar and those for whom it is strange, etc. etc. and if you don’t want to take communion, please pass it between your neighbors so that you can still participate in the community.) I took communion at the Anglican services i went to in Oxford largely just to see what it was like, and if communion were ever introduced with spoken restrictions i didn’t feel i fit i wouldn’t take it. But mostly i just take it.
This Sunday, though, i just couldn’t do it. It wouldn’t feel right. This is not my community. It hasn’t been for years, of course. I have difficulty letting go, since everything has redeeming qualities, and especially with my grandmother still going i don’t foresee my mother and i cutting off all ties anytime soon, but it really isn’t my community and any pretense that it is seems less and less honest as time goes by.
who says i like right angles? these are not my walls laws. these are not my rules.
John P. was one of the ushers and i kinda wanted him to be serving my side communion, so he could see that i didn’t take it, so he would ask me about it. It’s not that i particularly wanted to argue or to hear about how really they are on the true path. I just... everyone assumes that if you’re there then you belong there and you’re happy there, and i’m sick of being assumed to be something i’m not, and okay there is a little bit of wanting to argue, to at least say, “You think i am a good and valuable person, but i really think you’re wrong, and certainly this is wrong for me.” Isn’t that what i do all the time - say “you think i’m one of you, but i’m not - doesn’t that give you pause about what additional Others might be like?” But yeah, definitely a big part of it is that i’m sick of feeling like i’m living a lie (the assumption of the people of United that i’m on board with all that United is doing now, all that United is now).Why is the possibility of "passing" so insistently viewed as a great privilege ... and not understood as a terrible degradation and denial?
-Evelyn Torton Beck, Nice Jewish Girls
Marilyn wants her tins back. Granted, she has a right to some residual bitterness since they fired her daughter for bogus reasons. She’s also not a fan of the anti-gay sentiment, which my mother was pleasantly surprised by, and of course she has lots of spotty history with the people who now run what used to be our church. But my mom was kinda thinking, “You’re griping about how you want your tins back? Can’t we grow up and let go?” In contrast, she thought my refusal to take communion was a sad painful powerful statement. It’s funny; i wasn’t even really thinking of it like that at the time, i just knew that it wasn’t right for me to take communion in that place at that moment. I literally couldn’t stomach it.
My mother and i are thinking the Congregational Church for next Sunday, Father’s Day.
Conversation with my mother about my going through all my boxes of crap.
“A box a day and you’d be done in a month. And you could feel so proud.”
“Pride goeth before destruction.”
“Okay, you can be destroyed, but I’d have more floorspace, and less crap.”
George Carlin aims to offend everyone, huh? And there’s only so much angry i can take, in any context. I’m sometimes amused while/despite problematizing what he’s saying, though. And of course sometimes i agree.
He said if someone has a loved one who is comatose and that loved one is a homosexual, you can comfort them saying: “He used to be a fruit, now he’s a vegetable. At least he’s still in the produce section.”
After that he talked about how people get in trouble for using “bad words,” “bad language,” and how words in and of themselves are neutral; it’s all about the context. He said it’s not the word “nigger” you should be worried about but rather the racist asshole using it. He said we’re scared of these “bad words” because they point to unpleasant truth -- “the truth that there’s a bigot in every living room on every street corner in the country.”
Railing against euphemistic language he said he’s waiting for a rape victim to be called “an unwilling sperm recipient.”
Watched “The Best of Both Worlds” Parts 1&2, the supposed best cliffhanger ever and its supposedly shoddy conclusion (TNG eps 3.26 and 4.01). I’m not sure i’d say it’s the best cliffhanger ever, though i admit i have little to compare it with, but i for one was quite pleased with how the writers managed the conclusion.
Went to Perks with hedy on Monday. Thursday night we were figuring out what we wanted to do, and she said it was difficult since she was dealing with SheWhoSpendsNoMoney (i.e., me). I said the idea that one needs to spend money in order to hang out has always struck me as odd. After Perks we went to the library. I’m horrible at recommending books to people because there’s so little i actually like. I came home with a stack of books i’d been meaning to read, though.
We also had communion. (We didn’t last Sunday due to its being Children’s Sunday.) Communion isn’t something that’s particularly meaningful to me because while in theory i think it’s a powerful ritual, in practice it feels like something everyone does by rote. (I do appreciate the litany at First Churches, about how this is for those for whom the ritual is familiar and those for whom it is strange, etc. etc. and if you don’t want to take communion, please pass it between your neighbors so that you can still participate in the community.) I took communion at the Anglican services i went to in Oxford largely just to see what it was like, and if communion were ever introduced with spoken restrictions i didn’t feel i fit i wouldn’t take it. But mostly i just take it.
This Sunday, though, i just couldn’t do it. It wouldn’t feel right. This is not my community. It hasn’t been for years, of course. I have difficulty letting go, since everything has redeeming qualities, and especially with my grandmother still going i don’t foresee my mother and i cutting off all ties anytime soon, but it really isn’t my community and any pretense that it is seems less and less honest as time goes by.
who says i like right angles? these are not my walls laws. these are not my rules.
John P. was one of the ushers and i kinda wanted him to be serving my side communion, so he could see that i didn’t take it, so he would ask me about it. It’s not that i particularly wanted to argue or to hear about how really they are on the true path. I just... everyone assumes that if you’re there then you belong there and you’re happy there, and i’m sick of being assumed to be something i’m not, and okay there is a little bit of wanting to argue, to at least say, “You think i am a good and valuable person, but i really think you’re wrong, and certainly this is wrong for me.” Isn’t that what i do all the time - say “you think i’m one of you, but i’m not - doesn’t that give you pause about what additional Others might be like?” But yeah, definitely a big part of it is that i’m sick of feeling like i’m living a lie (the assumption of the people of United that i’m on board with all that United is doing now, all that United is now).Why is the possibility of "passing" so insistently viewed as a great privilege ... and not understood as a terrible degradation and denial?
-Evelyn Torton Beck, Nice Jewish Girls
Marilyn wants her tins back. Granted, she has a right to some residual bitterness since they fired her daughter for bogus reasons. She’s also not a fan of the anti-gay sentiment, which my mother was pleasantly surprised by, and of course she has lots of spotty history with the people who now run what used to be our church. But my mom was kinda thinking, “You’re griping about how you want your tins back? Can’t we grow up and let go?” In contrast, she thought my refusal to take communion was a sad painful powerful statement. It’s funny; i wasn’t even really thinking of it like that at the time, i just knew that it wasn’t right for me to take communion in that place at that moment. I literally couldn’t stomach it.
My mother and i are thinking the Congregational Church for next Sunday, Father’s Day.
Conversation with my mother about my going through all my boxes of crap.
“A box a day and you’d be done in a month. And you could feel so proud.”
“Pride goeth before destruction.”
“Okay, you can be destroyed, but I’d have more floorspace, and less crap.”
George Carlin aims to offend everyone, huh? And there’s only so much angry i can take, in any context. I’m sometimes amused while/despite problematizing what he’s saying, though. And of course sometimes i agree.
He said if someone has a loved one who is comatose and that loved one is a homosexual, you can comfort them saying: “He used to be a fruit, now he’s a vegetable. At least he’s still in the produce section.”
After that he talked about how people get in trouble for using “bad words,” “bad language,” and how words in and of themselves are neutral; it’s all about the context. He said it’s not the word “nigger” you should be worried about but rather the racist asshole using it. He said we’re scared of these “bad words” because they point to unpleasant truth -- “the truth that there’s a bigot in every living room on every street corner in the country.”
Railing against euphemistic language he said he’s waiting for a rape victim to be called “an unwilling sperm recipient.”
Watched “The Best of Both Worlds” Parts 1&2, the supposed best cliffhanger ever and its supposedly shoddy conclusion (TNG eps 3.26 and 4.01). I’m not sure i’d say it’s the best cliffhanger ever, though i admit i have little to compare it with, but i for one was quite pleased with how the writers managed the conclusion.
Went to Perks with hedy on Monday. Thursday night we were figuring out what we wanted to do, and she said it was difficult since she was dealing with SheWhoSpendsNoMoney (i.e., me). I said the idea that one needs to spend money in order to hang out has always struck me as odd. After Perks we went to the library. I’m horrible at recommending books to people because there’s so little i actually like. I came home with a stack of books i’d been meaning to read, though.