Niiiick of The Living Dead

unlearning homophobia is a fucking chore but the relief is sweet, talking with another man similarly situated and feeling the closeness of a fellow traveler is a wonderful thing

And there's an internal struggle sometimes. But when I think about this quote of yours all the time, "God is always bigger than the boxes we build for God, so we should not waste too much time protecting the boxes." RR: The boxes. That's the job of a clergyman. He thinks. She thinks, I guess. Yeah. God has to obey our laws. I mean let's take the whole gay issue. How dare we say to God, in effect, "You may not love gay people. You're not allowed to, God. We have decided." And that's what we're saying because... BB: Wow.

RR: We can't deal with infinity. The human mind can't form the notion of infinity. So, as all the mystics say, "God is infinite love." Infinite. We don't know how to process that. We just don't. So we pull God down and make an anthropomorphism out of God so he loves like we do, very conditionally, with threats and punishments. BB: And ego. RR: Yeah, and ego. BB: We create a God that loves with ego, which is like the opposite of God.

On saving God, brenebrown.com/podcast/spir...

Once again in the weird psychological space of being an atheist but being fuckin furious at godbothering theocratic hatemongers who look at the trappings of power and use the word Jesus or Christian or God as a magic wand to sell domination as holy

Delightful! Yeah a standing rib roast (or more probably 2 or 3 rib bones with the steak) is a Christmas/ New Year’s treat at our house. I like to preheat the oven and broil for 5 minutes per pound and then turn off the heat and let it sit for 3 hours. I can warm with jus for serving if needed.

What cut do you roast? Cold sliced eye of round is the cut that might be my favorite beef of all.

Depressed that autocorrect doesn’t suggest “I’ve” from “ive” and instead floats “ivermectin”

Got me texting my retired preacher dad about Paul’s letter to Philemon.

I don’t know if I’d seen this photo before but the utter smokeshow with dark hair is the uncle who just died. The whole time I knew him his hair was long and usually in a pony. Man was gray and faded but had still had such bushy dark eyebrows to shame the grinch.

Mom, getting out of to car to see her dying brother: “I’m going to need you to help me.”
My sister, ready: “I will.”
Mom: “I meant God.”

And mom, having seen him just day before, wouldn’t have been in town again so soon but for my sister catching a serendipitous flight.

So mom was there in the immediate aftermath with her sister and the local brothers and her SIL and her mother.

My sister and my mom didn’t get to uncle’s house before he died. Missed by a few minutes but as we make meaning from the stuff of our experiences, aunt & uncle had his final moment alone together. Also, as sis tells a surviving uncle who says he’s sorry she missed him “Oh but it’s funnier this way!”

Heard Duncan Sheik’s Barely Breathing on spouse’s Everything Playlist and when I went to put it on my 90’s Playlist I saw he wrote the American Psycho Musical.

Thanks

My sister flew in today to see him. I’m at a wedding reception and she texted to say he’s died.

Everything happens so much, indeed.

Pirate uncle is on pain management, anti anxiety drugs, and 02 now. Gasping, wraithlike on the hospital bed in his living room. We didn’t stay long, went to dinner with grandma & my aunt and were all glad to have that buffer experience. Aunt went this a few years ago with her own husband.

Doing small acts of kindness as gifts, whether difficult chores or no skin off your nose errands with the doing itself as the reward can be helpful. Paradoxically, it’s forgetting about yourself while doing it that helps let the sad noise fall into the background.

partner’s safety to focus on the exercise and leave everything else aside.

There’s also the time honored practice of trying to help someone else - whether volunteering or doing the dishes for grandma.

My extremely wise sister (crisis line operator & volunteer trainer for a SAVA center) told me to literally say “I’m putting [this] down for a while, it will wait for me.” And go do something other than rumination for a little while. For her, it’s Muay Thai - it demands her attention for her & spar

See also Russ Harris’ Dropping Anchor skill and book The Happiness Trap.

If mindfulness and radical self compassion are totally new to you, look up Tara Brach’s RAIN exercise and give it go. She and Jack Kornfield have a 40 day mindfulness practice that my therapist recommended to me and I’ve used those skills to avoid being shitty to the people closest to me.

I love your vacations. I am susceptible to the “do too much” trap.

dropped my spoon into my soup and lost it, now i cant find the wizard dropping his orb on his face in bed like a phone meme because that’s how i feel

“Learning to sit with joy or praise can be just as hard as learning to sit with pain”

Local poetry collective releasing a book this weekend, wherein I have at least one little poem. It’s a thrill and I’m horrified and I’m grateful for the community and I’m nervous and I miss these folks and my work is learning how to do my work

Lighter note, I’m in a wedding on Saturday and I’m very excited for my friends. They are very cute and I wish them all happiness.

Family with terminal illness. Let’s get a camera between me & those feelings while we visit this evening.

wings for dinner, after having fluoride tape stuck in my teeth all day now I remove it and chicken with floss

Didn’t even gag in then dental cleaning chair.

Can’t wait to rinse this fluoride treatment with coffee.

awful, i love it

@corgiteatime.bsky.social you have to see this too, this dissolute Roman senator lookin blorbo twin

Oh it’s information, just cluttered and when /search/ doesn’t work, impossible to navigate.