Let it Be

I'm almost finished with my "Religion on Steroids" painting. No one likes it. I guess that's OK, I mean, I don't really paint for anyone but myself anyways, but I think that it gets a bad rap.
I just think it's misconstrued.
Wifester frumps up her face and says "It's kinda scary, hunny..."
My friend L tilted her head to the side and said "getting in touch with your darker side?"
Others say nothing at all, while Cole patted me on the back and said "I get where comes from, but it's just not for me, but it's definitely gonna piss some people off."

Sigh.

I don't know why it's so important to me for Religion on Steroids to be understood. Or if it really is important for that specifically to be understood, or just everything I do, generally, to be understood as I originally intend. Why do these things even linger in my mind for so long? I should be able to do my thing and never look back at how others interpret and fret over some imaginary or self imposed need to explain.

I need to learn to just put things out there and let them just be. Not just with art, but with writing, with my thoughts, whatever.

I've been thinking about Michael Jackson Mania. You know, I will say that I had my moment of awwww...the guy that taught me to moonwalk is gone. I had flashbacks of my Thriller Trapper Keeper. I get it. He was a pioneer in the music industry. But we must also remember that for many, he conjures very dark and horrid memories.
A week before his death, mention his name, and most people had a negative response to him and the controversy that enveloped his media coverage for the later part of his life. Suddenly, in death, he has been elevated to sainthood.
I know I'll probably get some backlash for this one, but all I'm saying is that we need to keep in mind that the jury never said that they found him innocent, just that they could not prove beyond a reasonable doubt...and there is a difference.
I know what it is like to wish you could remember your virginity. I know what it feels like to be doubted because you didn't say something right away, or within some prescribed time frame. I've heard those words "It's not that I don't believe you, its just that I can't believe HE would do this..."I know what it feel like to watch this man who stole your innocence rise up to become a pillar of society, celebrated on the news and see billboards around town with his face on them, touting what a wonderful person he is. And when he dies, I'm sure local stations will go amuck and thousands in this area will mourn, but I and a half dozen others that I know of will think, one thought in solidarity; " Now the kids are safe"
And all I'm saying is that weather Michael Jackson did what he was accused of or not, his image reminds a lot of people, just like me, of their situations and how someone, just because he is popular and seen by so many as good, will go unpunished, at least during this lifetime. So please, take a moment and remember all those kids that so bravely spoke up and said, hey, I know you love this guy, but let me tell you something ...Because kids should always be listened to.

And there I go again, explaining my position, rather than just letting it be...so today's feelings check Sunday song is of course, Let it Be


and the bonus, with Religion on Steroids in mind, is :

A couple of things before the Sunday Morning Feelings Check

First: When did Domino's Pizza become religiously affiliated? The last two times that we've ordered from them, we've received religious propaganda attached to the pizza box, in lieu of coupons for future orders? Shouldn't they advertise that so that when you are choosing who to order from, that information can be a part of your decision making process? I mean, honestly, I think that organized religion already rakes in enough big bucks, without my extra $20 here and there. And we all know how I dislike supporting corporations or entities that I have grievances with. Not that Domino's is good pizza, per say, but considering where I live, there's really not too much to choose from.

Next: Why the hell won't my milk froth anymore? My wonderful little espresso machine that the Wifester gave me for Christmas works brilliantly in every other way, but when it comes to frothing my milk, well, it get's a D- right now. Used to be that I could whip up a frothy mug for my cappuccinos in under a minute. Now, no matter how hard I try, seems that all the little machine can muster is warm milk with a few bubbles on top. I WANT MY FOAM! I NEED my foam. I love the foam, it's the best part of my morning coffee.

Next: Wifester came home from work on Thursday with a big frown on her face. I asked what was wrong and she said "NPR says we're gonna lose our house this year."
me: really? NPR said "(Fortune Cookies) and (Wifester) will lose their home this year." That's what they said?
her: YES! Well...they said that now even the people who didn't get the sub-prime mortgages, and who have been keeping up with their bills and doing things right are starting to be affected because of the job losses and inability to find new jobs, by the end of the year a lot of people like you and I will have lost their homes too."

Great. So on top of everything else Wifester worries about, she is a Class A Worrier, NPR had to go and give her this. It's what I get for hounding her about expanding horizons beyond that of Desperate Housewives and Super Nanny TV shows. She took the radio and when the complete opposite direction; With substance and brain food.

This talk about the housing market and our situation (we have been planning on moving to Ohio) and how it may affect our plans and blah, blah, blah...

Friends will ask us "Why are you moving there?" And you can see it in their faces, they've seen the photos of a Cleveland winter. But here's the thing. As we discuss the suburbs where Wifester's family lives, where we would be moving to, and the suburbs here, where I've grown up and compare and contrast, it's a no brainer.
I can remember multiple instances of our house or items of our shed outside of our house being burglarized. The neighborhood I grew up in, I would almost be afraid to walk down the street alone today. The neighborhood corner market that I used to ride my bicycle to and play video games at is now a hang out for drug dealers.

Where Wifester grew up, is still pretty much exactly the same as it was back then. There's little to no crime. There's no thugs. There's no low riders with rims at the stop signs just hanging out waiting for people to come up to their windows to make transactions. It's just Norman Rockwell-ish middle America. We go to visit and we take the Sunny dog for walks, and there's not 15 dogs running loose, chasing you down the street growling and snarling. There's not garbage all over the sides of the street. People smile and say "Hi" as you pass them because they aren't suspicious of you, nor you of them. We use to keep an eye on who's living in our area. If you are a parent, or planning to be, or you just want to know the status of the sex offenders and other criminals in your area, this is a great site. It searches the registry that they are supposed to keep up to date with current addresses and work addresses, etc, and lets you know, categorically, what type of offenders live in an area, by address. You can even search for someone by name, if you suspect they may have a past conviction and want to check it out.

here's our Ohio area:




Here's where we live now:




Honestly, where would you feel safer?

And now for my Sunday Feelings Check




and now for the real deal

Social Networking and a Rant on Morons

Wifester and I met online.
It's true. We chatted and emailed and eventually talked on the phone for a while until the day we decided to meet in real life. So right off the bat, I'm quite grateful to the wondrous joys that Social Networking can bring into one's life.
There's another side to it though, I mean, besides the icky stuff we hear about on Dateline...
I'm talking about the finding of old "friends" from long ago... getting reacquainted, seeing photos of each other's respective families, and then, as is often the situation in my case, NEVER hearing from them again. Or, worse yet, being bombarded with religious propaganda eluding to the sure detriment of my soul's very survival should I continue my homosexual lifestyle.
GAH!
I'd rather just never hear from you again. Even if we WERE BFF's way back when.

But recently, I stumbled upon an old friend from high school who I knew was not going to be quite so judgmental and, to boot, happens to be an artist, himself. I was quite thrilled when we made contact with each other and began conversation. His art was always some of my favorite. In high school, he did all of the graphics for our year book. He worked at Opryland sketching those funny charactures of people, so if you ever got one done there, High School Buddy may have drawn it.
Well, High School Buddy took some time and looked over my blogs and photo albums and wrote to me saying that he liked my art and thought I should give it a go with some galleries. He even gave me email addresses and names to contact... The first one told me they like my stuff, but it's just not what they are looking for at this moment. Yadda, yadda, yadda...High School Buddy says he's amazed that they are showing who they are showing right now, yet not interested in my Divas and City scapes. I'm just flattered that someone, anyone thinks anything I have is gallery worthy.
The second gallery has emailed me back, but they would like for me to have a professional portfolio with an artist's resume made up. They will show my art, and are excited to be able to say that I am an "untrained artist", but I need to do these things first. The exciting news is that the gallery is in The Arcade, which is the epicenter of Nashville's Arts district. It hosts a monthly Art Crawl which draws thousands of people. So I could get a lot of exposure. The bad news is, it costs money, a pretty good amount of money, to have a professional portfolio and artist's resume done. Another gallery responded that they really like the divas, and would like to place them in a show in the future, and will keep in contact with me for a later date. To me, that's a "don't call us, we'll call you..."
I've submitted my digital portfolio to a few more galleries, asking if they are accepting new artists. I've burned candles and chanted into the wind. I've asked Isis, Allah, Buddah, and Ani Difranco for some positive energy to flow my way and help me gain the break I've been looking for.
Regardless of how all that turns out, I'm happy to be back in touch with High School Buddy. And I'm grateful that he's been so quick to want to help me advance my art.
I was amazed, yet also not surprised to find out that High School Buddy and his High School Sweetheart married 15 years ago and are still blissfully wed. That makes it like 20 years that they've been together, and I think that is a rare thing these days. Kudos to High School Buddy and his High School Sweetheart!

I don't know where all of this is going, except I just wanted to fill you in on why I've been a bit absent and missed another WWC...
Trying to talk to and submit to galleries is a lot more work than I realized! Keep me in your thoughts and send some good vibes on over this way, if you get a moment to spare, I can use all of them I can get! :) Maybe one day, before we're all too old to read blogs, just maybe I'll get my foot (or art) in the doors of one of those galleries.
Hey! Let a girl dream!

Now, on to the Moron Rant:

I'm taking a sociology class right now. Well, we have to post an answer to a discussion topic each week on the discussion board. This week''s question was in reference to the "changing family unit" and how we felt about it, ie: should we as a society adapt our image of family to adapt with the changing times.
Weeeeeel....
This gal posted her response, or I should call it her tirade about the changing family unit. Referring to our text book, she said, among other things, I've narrowed this down to the really offensive stuff and left out a lot of the babbling:
note:stuff in ****BOLD ****are just my thoughts/interjections ;)

"The author says "We need to unmask the rhetoric that insists that affirmation of civil marriage and church blessings of holy unions somehow demeans marriage for heterosexuals.” (Ruther’s page 284.) Wow who died and made this women god? There is an obvious reason for a family structure that exists around a man married to women. Two a child whose parents love each others this teaches the childrens that selflessness leads to true happiness. Children learn mostly by examples. The other option would be the selfish path you know the me, me me life style or just the opposite of what Jesus Christ taught, like the homo's live. I mena, Did God give the women a vagina and the man a pennies by mistake? ***** ( Pennies? Really? I mean, it has been a while since I've seen a man's penny, but I would have given them quarters, at least) *****Honestly what the hell is this society coming to? Every time I turn on the TV I see to guys kissing each other or worse yet, two women having sex with each other. ****{ I want to know what channel she's watching, because I need to call comcast and get it!} ****What on earth does all that crap teach our kids? Hey life’s about you and your sexual desires not much else really matters. You can tell your son hey instead of having sex with a women try it with man the only thing that really different is the plumbing. Yeah right! I am sure it is our selfish desires that allude to this kind of stupid bull crap of raising kids in these other immoral ideas of the family. Anyways that my thoughts and feelings I hope I did not offend anyone, if I did let me have it. I do however think its important to stand up for what I believe is right. And I do not believe that two queers calling themselves a family is right. They can't just go around and give themselves rings and call that a marriage. God didn't sanctify it so its bull crap, its a sham, and worst of all, its a sin."

**********************************************************************

Yeah. First of all, learn to spell before you start condemning people in a public forum, right? So anyways, the next part of our assignment is to respond to at least three people's posts...hmmmm...I wonder who's post I chose to respond to first? :)

So here's my response to her:

I have to take many issues with your post. 1. The argument is often made that same sex marriage would threaten the institution of marriage. This is a contradiction, in and of itself. Allowing people to commit themselves to each other regardless of gender, is not a threat to marriage. When homosexuals are allowed to marry, they are less likely to attempt heterosexual marriage first, just to fit in with society's norm, causing them to be matched with an incompatible partner and possibly raising children in a loveless home, only to end in divorce. Further, studies have shown that children of divorce are more likely to have failed marriages themselves. Denying gays the right to marriage contributes to the divorce rate, rather than protecting the institution of marriage. And then what does that teach those children? That it's OK to be in loveless marriages? That it's OK to end a commitment made "till death do us part"?
2. The argument that marriage is a sacred institution is biased in design and based on the assumption that the state has the responsibility to "sanctify" marriages - a fundamentally religious idea. This is an example of one set of people trying to enforce their religious doctrines upon others. In this instance, it is an attempt to do so through weakening the separation of church and state, by undermining the Bill of Rights. (Sullivan, 2008) Although this is not a new concept in American politics, the attempt itself opposes the foundations, the very fiber of the First Amendment - one does not truly have freedom of religion if one does not have the right to freedom from religion as well. The only marriage affected by two people marrying, is the marriage being entered into by the two people marrying each other.
3. The General Assembly of the United Nations unanimously adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, which cited the "right to marry" as one of the fundamental rights of humankind. (U.N. General Assembly, 1948) In 1967, the historic Supreme Court decision was made in the case of Loving v. Virginia. It proclaimed that the ban on interracial marriage was "designed to maintain White Supremacy" and therefore, unconstitutional. Further, it said that in denying the right to marry the person of one's choice, the fundamental civil right to marriage had been denied.
There is no difference between my marriage to another woman today, and the interracial marriages that the Supreme Court ruled in favor of in 1967. (and yes, it is a marriage, we flew to Canada where we were issued a legal license that is recognized in over 20 civilized countries) It still boils down to two consenting adults who love each other, wanting to commit to each other for a lifetime of togetherness and nurturing. Contrary to what you believe, it has much less to do with sex and much more to do with love. And if you think love and sex are one in the same, well, that is a whole different discussion for another day.
***********************************************************************

So then she comes back and responds to me with :

I believe you may have misunderstood where the scared institution actually started, and it has nothing to do with the state's ruling on what a marriage is. The scanty of marriage came from the bibles instruction of what a marriage should be. A man and a woman. How do you figure denying gay rights to marry would increase the rate of divorce. It sounds as if you may have some issues your self about homosexual relationships. Are you in that type relationship? It has nothing to do with religious doctrine read the bible for yourself and see what it says concerning gay relationships. No one is forcing religion on any one, you do have the freedom to not be religious. Have you ever heard of anyone going to jail for believing in God. ****( Um HELLO?? Have you ever taken a HISTORY class, like EVER??) ****Yes everyone has the right to marry whom ever they want to. ****(No, honey, not everyone. That's why all us queers keep marching the streets!)**** Society stereo-tpyed those relationships(blacks and whites) It had nothing to do with religion. I hope my comments have not offended you in any way.

**************************************************************************

OMG! Am I really in school with this person?? I can't begin to tell you how agast I am that someone would even say Have you ever heard of anyone going to jail for believing in God...So apparently she had a conversation or something with the Prof. because the next day there was this:

it appears that I may have offended you with my question and comments and I want to publicly apologize to you before the class and Professor Dr. Jones.. I am asking that you forgive any offensive comments to your post. I need to hear back from you to know that my apology has been accepted. A speedy reply is requested.

*************************************************************************

Maybe I'm being petty, but I think that if I am being asked to accept an apology, I shouldn't be given time constraints on that apology. But in the spirit of good nature, here's what I said next:

Of course I accept your apology. I note that you questioned if I were myself, in a homosexual relationship,and that gives me cause to believe that you may not have fully read my post. Yes, I am in fact in a same sex relationship, and was married to my partner two years ago. I do not misunderstand where the institution of marriage originated, if you conduct your own research, beyond that of the bible, and use some scholastic journals and historical references, you may be surprised to find that marriage was around long before religion and had nothing to do with anything sacred, but was more so a barter and trade system.
If you would like to discuss what the bible says, I would recommend you do so in bible study class, not in a college level course in a public school. Again, we come to a separation of church and state issue. You asked if I've ever heard of anyone going to jail for believing in God, and, as a matter of fact, yes, history is ridden with tales of people being imprisoned for their religious beliefs, and for their opposition to popular religious beliefs. That was one of the reasons that the United States was founded. Again, research conducted on this topic via scholastic journals and historical references will help you to find this information. It really is quite intriguing and well worth the read.
I have not been offended by your remarks, I simply look at them as an opportunity to educate a fellow citizen and help illuminate some facts around an issue that is in fact, near and dear to my own heart.
************************************************************************

I received an email from my Prof. today asking if I want to file a formal complaint against the student. I'm contemplating if it's even worth my time.

*cough, choke, hack*

...just found out the cost of my prescriptions without insurance...
...may be having a cardiac event at this very moment...
it was nice knowing you all

A lesson in proper sign placement

OK, so Police Chief Boyd says that three officers spend 40 hrs a week each in Lake Forest, and that they are patrolling the streets of LFE. I have my doubts about those numbers, but alrighty, we'll go with it. If that is in fact the case, why are Stop signs being illegally occluded by random Yard Sale signs?

that's not all, a few blocks up, there was this one:

Both of these were within about three blocks of each other on La Vergne Lane, which makes me wonder, if there are police patrolling so faithfully, why is something like this allowed to stand? I mean, not only is it tacky, come on, there are plenty of light poles around to stick your signs on, but isn't it also illegal to cover up traffic signs?

Besides, even if the light poles are truly so full, there's always the very inexpensive wire sign holders that can be purchased for next to nothing at Home Depot or Lowe's or most any office supply store. They're great, you stick em in the ground, pop your sign into it, and viola, a free standing poster for your yard sale!

And if that's just too much for you, there is the free service of notifying us at The Rutherford Co Yard Sale Directory, and we'll be happy to update the Yard Sale List with your event's date, time, and address.

There are just so many ways to do it the right way, that there's just no excuse for covering up stop signs in a neighborhood where there are constantly children out in the streets. I mean, wasn't there recently a child struck by a car here in LFE?? Isn't that reason enough not to go around sticking your yard sale and garage sale signs over the Stop signs?

Which brings me around to Sunday Feelings Check Video:




*Soapbox removed...Fortune Cookies climbing down*

Sunday Feelings Check

WWC A & Favorite Song

Guess what time it is again? That's right! It's Tuesday and that means it's time for the
Brought to us by Tink, over at Pickled Beef. Click the graphic above to go to the master participation list so you can visit all the regular players.
This week, Tink asked us to interpret, with the aide of our cameras, "A" and "Favorite Song" This was difficult, because I love so much music, it's quite hard to pin down a favorite song. I have a few. Here's my submission to this week's challenge

A:

patriotic A

magnetic A

A is for Ani Difranco!

Favorite Song:
(click on the song titles to hear the songs and see the videos)

This one represents two different favorite songs, Beatles: Yellow Submarine and Greatful Dead: Truckin'

Jack Johnson: Banana Pancakes

This one also represents two songs, Ani Difranco: Overlap and Lou Reed: Walk on the Wild Side

Ani Difranco: Coming Up

Ani Difranco: Gray

Ani Difranco: Dog Coffee

You didn't think you'd get out of here this week without me subjecting you to a TON of Ani did you?

Now, hop on over to Tink's and check out everyone else's submissions!