Warning: Potty Mouth Approaches & Get A Happy Head Now
Every time I write the weather above I think about the movie Smoke Signals and that man sitting at the crossroads of the Res and giving the play-by-play of the day. I fully expect that at Bend Road and The Way intersection one of my dear Salish Tribal members should do that for us. Give us back some of the charm of real rural life that the goddamn fuckity fuck developers keep trying to steal. I told my husband that the urban farm acquiring chickens and a goat will be necessary to help push back the money-grabbing community-wrecking developer whores at bay.
My soldier mouth is showing this morning. My apologies. But, I cuss. It’s part of my charm.
Yesterday I spent four hours trying to make one of the writers in my writing group understand that an entire phrase in her short story for our Word Jazz event was racist and could not be allowed to remain. I will not detail it here. It begins to boil my blood again. And I don’t want to relive those hours of yesterday. You know her response? That it was a fact! You can’t call facts, racist. /rolls eyes and screams. I wanted to scream at her: The fact is you’re racist! I remained calm and professional. Fortunately many years of discrimination based upon my gender, beliefs, etc. gave me plenty of experience dealing with this. Still was not pleasant. But, I managed and the outcome was at least acceptable as far as what I needed to accomplish for the organization. I just cannot believe that this individual graduated from the same University I did. Did she not get the whole Privilege, Power & Diversity class, at minimum? I could sound ethnocentric myself and say she was a product of the 50s in a predominantly Irish neighborhood in Chicago. But, I know others who grew up blocks from her and are human rights workers. So all I can do is shake my head. Normally I don’t go about censoring people’s work, but as I told her have to move here from an organizational level, which is difficult. It also makes the creative confines, especially in a small town, that much narrower. I have to anticipate worst-case as well as best-case scenario. Everything we do and publish reflects on the group as a whole. Also, the section had NOTHING to do with her story. It didn’t reveal anything about the character; it was just a flippant aside from within the author’s head. That’s what really got me. This, is the same woman, I’ve blogged about before that I’ve had to hide and remove from my personal NotToYourFace page because of her hateful statements about Muslims. She ate the Post 9-11 fear-mongering hook, line and sinker. And she is welcome to her freedom of expression on her own blogs and self-publishing - as much as I despise them; but this is a group publishing and a family-friendly community event. I had to be diligent. Fortunately, four other people commented on it as well. So, she changed it, finally. I cannot wait until her time on our board is complete. I will not abide by her remaining as an official representative of the group. She may remain as a member, but not as a board officer. She is too inflammatory. Problem is that she is crazy enough to bad-mouth us all through town, which is too bad, but any one who will matter will likely know that she’s not right in the head.
On the heels of that I finally completed, edited and revised my own piece for this event. Endless Trains of the Faithless came in at a whopping 1544 words - it’s supposed to only be 1500. But, I’ll let it sit for a few days and then go back and tighten it up more. The original was nearly 3000 words, so I’ve done well kicking it back to 1544.
I also realized that from the hours of 1400 to 1700 hrs. are extremely high stress and I’m not dealing with it well. It’s the whole get the kids from school and go through homework hour and chores and activities and then BAM! I have to start dinner. It’s like my personal work day is wrapping up and then I just start another one. I have to figure out - maybe I have to meditate before I pick the kids up, not sure. Regardless, I have to be more mindful and not get so agitated. I do not want to turn into my mother.
Dinner with the out-of-town sister-in-law went well. I made my dear friend Kymberlee’s luscious Spinach & Strawberry salad and Penne verdure arrosto e salsiccia (roasted vegetables & sausage over penne pasta). I used soy sausage, however. So much healthier than the real recipe.
She did say something about how sorry she was that my husband is unhappy - that’s more about his job, I’m sure is what she meant. But it haunted me all night. And after she and Dad-In-Law left, I felt the need to point out to my spouse all the wonderful improvements we’ve had with the kids behavior since I’ve been home. I may as well said, “look don’t resent me because I’m not working outside the home…” But he understood and hugged me and said he was glad I was doing what I was doing and won’t I come and snuggle with him on the couch, because the best part of his day is spending time with me.
Is he a keeper or what?
Time to hit the gerbil wheel.
I leave you with this for your day:
This entry was originally posted at http://caszabrewin.dreamwidth.org/35568.html. Please comment there using OpenID.
My soldier mouth is showing this morning. My apologies. But, I cuss. It’s part of my charm.
Yesterday I spent four hours trying to make one of the writers in my writing group understand that an entire phrase in her short story for our Word Jazz event was racist and could not be allowed to remain. I will not detail it here. It begins to boil my blood again. And I don’t want to relive those hours of yesterday. You know her response? That it was a fact! You can’t call facts, racist. /rolls eyes and screams. I wanted to scream at her: The fact is you’re racist! I remained calm and professional. Fortunately many years of discrimination based upon my gender, beliefs, etc. gave me plenty of experience dealing with this. Still was not pleasant. But, I managed and the outcome was at least acceptable as far as what I needed to accomplish for the organization. I just cannot believe that this individual graduated from the same University I did. Did she not get the whole Privilege, Power & Diversity class, at minimum? I could sound ethnocentric myself and say she was a product of the 50s in a predominantly Irish neighborhood in Chicago. But, I know others who grew up blocks from her and are human rights workers. So all I can do is shake my head. Normally I don’t go about censoring people’s work, but as I told her have to move here from an organizational level, which is difficult. It also makes the creative confines, especially in a small town, that much narrower. I have to anticipate worst-case as well as best-case scenario. Everything we do and publish reflects on the group as a whole. Also, the section had NOTHING to do with her story. It didn’t reveal anything about the character; it was just a flippant aside from within the author’s head. That’s what really got me. This, is the same woman, I’ve blogged about before that I’ve had to hide and remove from my personal NotToYourFace page because of her hateful statements about Muslims. She ate the Post 9-11 fear-mongering hook, line and sinker. And she is welcome to her freedom of expression on her own blogs and self-publishing - as much as I despise them; but this is a group publishing and a family-friendly community event. I had to be diligent. Fortunately, four other people commented on it as well. So, she changed it, finally. I cannot wait until her time on our board is complete. I will not abide by her remaining as an official representative of the group. She may remain as a member, but not as a board officer. She is too inflammatory. Problem is that she is crazy enough to bad-mouth us all through town, which is too bad, but any one who will matter will likely know that she’s not right in the head.
On the heels of that I finally completed, edited and revised my own piece for this event. Endless Trains of the Faithless came in at a whopping 1544 words - it’s supposed to only be 1500. But, I’ll let it sit for a few days and then go back and tighten it up more. The original was nearly 3000 words, so I’ve done well kicking it back to 1544.
I also realized that from the hours of 1400 to 1700 hrs. are extremely high stress and I’m not dealing with it well. It’s the whole get the kids from school and go through homework hour and chores and activities and then BAM! I have to start dinner. It’s like my personal work day is wrapping up and then I just start another one. I have to figure out - maybe I have to meditate before I pick the kids up, not sure. Regardless, I have to be more mindful and not get so agitated. I do not want to turn into my mother.
Dinner with the out-of-town sister-in-law went well. I made my dear friend Kymberlee’s luscious Spinach & Strawberry salad and Penne verdure arrosto e salsiccia (roasted vegetables & sausage over penne pasta). I used soy sausage, however. So much healthier than the real recipe.
She did say something about how sorry she was that my husband is unhappy - that’s more about his job, I’m sure is what she meant. But it haunted me all night. And after she and Dad-In-Law left, I felt the need to point out to my spouse all the wonderful improvements we’ve had with the kids behavior since I’ve been home. I may as well said, “look don’t resent me because I’m not working outside the home…” But he understood and hugged me and said he was glad I was doing what I was doing and won’t I come and snuggle with him on the couch, because the best part of his day is spending time with me.
Is he a keeper or what?
Time to hit the gerbil wheel.
I leave you with this for your day:
Click to viewThis entry was originally posted at http://caszabrewin.dreamwidth.org/35568.html. Please comment there using OpenID.