Oh For Heck's Sake

Once upon a time, a friend on a mailing list with me, seeing that we both are veterans, added me with my permission to a mailing list of fellow veterans.

And it got weird.

See, I'm a US veteran. My friend is a South African veteran. These other folks are from South Africa and neighboring countries.

I got ... some perspectives. And didn't stay on the list long.

Imagine the audacity to be outraged that someone's owned property was seized by the state and given to someone else. When the someone is a settler from Europe and the someone else is of people who had been there the whole fucking time.

This week I learned about Rhodesia and now I more fully understand why the people in that list were so appalling. At the time, they seemed just violently opposed to returning land to black people, which seemed horrible enough to me to leave.

Ugh OMG. We are all decompressing now after a visit from loose dogs. Two small white staffies were out loose and my insufficiently caffeinated ass let them into the back yard without isolating my own dogs first.

They tried to put an end to Sophie.

I had only a treat bag so I beat them with it to distract and confuse them long enough for her to get inside the house.

The owner and a helper came around looking for them. Kai came out the dog door and I told him to get back in. The helper said, “It's okay, they aren't violent.”

“Oh yes they are! They tried to kill my other dog!”

These dogs didn't come when called. One had slipped their collar and the other had broken their chain. I caught them myself and handed them over.

I hadn't seen any blood so I figured Sophie hadn't been severely wounded yet, and I wasn't in a panic to get in there.

She was cowering in my room. I looked her over and found a lot of drool in her fur. Once more, her thick fur saved her. I cuddled and stroked her until she felt better.

You may think your dog isn't violent. But depending what dogs they meet and maybe instantly dislike, they might be. They need training and constraint.

I keep forgetting this blog exists and I reflexively blog to Mastodon. Which is silly. It's ephemeral.

I was taught to believe that the definition of a miracle is that which is impossible but happens anyway. Growing up as an avid student of science, I couldn't believe in miracles. Because impossible is a word that has meaning.

Now I'm over 50 and I've seen a lot of miracles. But now I define miracle differently.

A miracle is that which is wildly improbable but happens anyway at precisely the right time to do the most good. It's possible. But not very plausible.

I wish this were a more widespread viewpoint. And I wish people were on the lookout more for the miracles that happen all the time. And share them and appreciate them.

I'm thinking today about people who are raised as boys. I think maybe they struggle with identity in a different way than those who are raised as girls. They seem to look at their fathers and ask, “Am I like him?”

Maybe my memory is faulty, but I don't remember asking that about me and my mother. I do remember swearing not to be like her.

My children's father seems to be a self hater who lashes out at everyone else. Inconsistent. Rageful. Pontificating. Insecure. Craves authority and makes a complete mess of it every time he gets some.

He also lights up on everyone's gaydar but adamantly proclaims he's hetero.

And he tried to raise my children “right” – impose his values and identity on them through controlling their behavior. Disastrously.

I've watched my children, raised as boys, struggle with these. They still struggle well into adulthood.

I wonder if we'd had AFAB children instead, would they have been so tortured. I think not, because the model of maleness my ex follows doesn't invest its own identity in how girls turn out, but instead in how well they are protected. They would have been expected to follow my pattern instead of his.

My pattern is its own hot mess. A different hot mess.

So maybe, yes, they would still have big struggles, just a different set.

“Oh for fuck's sake!” I thought, after several thoughts occurred in a fraction of a second.

I had dropped the keys while hanging them up, and they fell into my boot. Without thinking I reached into the boot.

“No, don't!”

“Stop! Are you crazy?!?!”

I pulled the keys out quickly, it being far too late.

“There could have been scorpions in there!!!”

Sigh.

“We don't even have scorpions here.”

I guess this is what happens when you live a lot of places. I'll be accumulated habits and warnings sort of blur together don't they?

When we talk about using people's pronouns, we usually mean third person pronouns. The ones we use to talk about people.

I recently interacted with someone with preferences for second and first person pronouns. That was new.

Obviously, first person pronouns are entirely within that person's control. But second person pronouns are in-your-face, so to speak. This was a fun and interesting challenge!

This person's pronouns are it/its.

So a conversation might go...

Person: It would prefer you use its pronouns for second person too.

Me: Thank it for sharing this.

I do have oppositional feelings about using “it” for a living being, but guess what? That's not my place to enforce. I don't get to pick that. The other person does.