Hello!
For a long time, I have been posting my stuff here, on Medium, and on the Daily Kos. I am going to start using Medium as my main site to post and will make a bunch of edits here soon enough.
If you are interested in following me there, great.
Thank you and if you have any questions, let me know!
Today, a man set off two smoke bombs in Brooklyn. Opened fire and spit out 33 rounds into passengers commuting to work. After the train was cleared, police found three extended ammunition magazines, consumer-grade fireworks, a hatchet and a jug of gasoline. Twenty people were injured, some critically. It is amazing no one was killed.
This incident comes as violent crimes across the city and MTA system rise. A lot of people compared what happened today to 9/11. Early reports were that it might have been an act of domestic terrorism so it really makes sense to be reminded of that awful day.
Of course, it’s something I think about often now that I am back. Growing up on Long Island, I used the World Trade Center as my point of reference to get around the city. To this day, I do that and have gotten lost more times than I would like to admit. It’s kind of pathetic to get lost in your home city.
The current crime wave hitting the city and the attack this morning reminds me of the New York City I knew when I was a kid. It was seedy and dangerous. Then, Mayor David Dinkins and Disney remade the place. I don’t think we will go back to those times but it is hard to see where we are headed.
Today, I had an amazing day walking around Stony Brook. I worked out of a cafe in the Village. I got more creative writing done than I have all year.
Yet, looking at the blue sky, I thought of Ukraine. Myanmar. The Uyghurs in China. Paul Rusesabagina falsely imprisoned in Rwanda.
Why are someone’s rights to own a gun more important than mine to stay alive? Someone told me that it was because of the Second Amendment. So the Second Amendment trumps the Declaration of Independence? Don’t I have the right to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness?”
I want to think something has happened to us. Something has happened to make us hate each other so much. But whatever hatred we are seeing now it’s not new. It’s just been hidden. As long as people we had oppressed since 1619 stayed ok with it — or rather, didn’t get “uppity,” things were good. Sure we subjected millions with slavery for hundreds of years and then the Jim Crow laws for another hundred and continue to use systems made by white men to keep white men in power. Even if people in the system are not racist, it doesn’t matter because the system is. Every single white person in America benefits from white privilege.
A person I went to junior high school with commented on a post about BLM protesters with this, “We will treat you like humans when you act like humans.” When you can look at another person and think you have the right to dictate what is and is not human behavior, you are proving my point. This person is not alone in thinking that. This is the attitude we have to change.
One part of almost every job I have has included me sending out mass emails. This is something that happened at almost every job I have had. There was always a big back and forth with my boss (or bosses) about when an email was ready. This is the origin of this PTSD.
Then I would go back to my desk to send out the message. Five to ten minutes later, my boss/es would rush in — Did that email go out? I found a problem! Don’t send it!
Eventually, the conversation turned into:
Sometimes, even after that conversation, I would be asked to unsend a mass email. This got to me after a while and I used to even miss mass snail mail. None of my bosses ever expected me to chase down the mailperson to get back the letters we were sending. NOT ONE!
Today, I was working on a mass email for No Business with Genocide. To save a draft, I have to save and send myself a test. When I saw that, I thought I had already sent it and nearly had a stroke. The good news is that the person who proofs and okays my emails has NEVER freaked out and demanded messages be unsent.
Will I ever get over this strange problem? I guess if Jada Pinkett Smith can survive being married ot Will Smith, I will survive this!
You can always get it here. Every day, my heart breaks time and time again when I see typos and grammar errors. Do these people know they are making these mistakes? Is it just because the medium they are using makes it way too easy to commit one too many language faux pas? Maybe but there are also a lot of intelligent people who don’t know if you have two cats, you do not have two cat’s.
So, if you have anything written that you want to look great, contact me! I LOVE copy editing! Let me help you put your best foot forward!
Over the weekend, a friend gave me a book written by an acquaintance of his. Before I go into what I thought about it, writing a book is a major undertaking. I have nothing but respect for people who follow through with this. This particular book was self-published. I see no issue there. There was a day when that was a bad thing but NOT TO ME.
This book broke my heart on just about every level. I had to look up the plot online because there is so much exposition and it was so poorly constructed I couldn’t follow it. As a lover of the English language, it felt like that author took it, beat the pulp out of it, microwaved it, ripped it up, and beat it some more. Rather than make this into a rant only about how bad this book is, I am going to offer my suggestions on basic stuff:
Writing resources that rock:
And if you want, I can always help.
Wow. Before my hernia surgery on January 21, I was expecting to go in on Friday, undergo an operation that would take about an hour, and be home in the afternoon. That was NOT even close to what happened. Instead, the surgery was like three hours and I went home four days later.
It has taken me nearly seven weeks to get back to feeling “normal.” I was sleeping like 14 hours a day for about a month. And because my mood is directly impacted by my energy level, I have been a bit depressed since this all started. My sense of self-worth is often determined by how productive I am and it’s hard to be productive when you are sleeping for 14 hours a day so I was kind of depressed from that. I am never going to have energy again. Of course, that’s not true but if you had asked me about that a week or two a go, I would have said that you are nuts.
The good news is I am feeling nearly normal now.
Of course, I have been watching what’s happening in Ukraine and my heart is with the people of that nation but there are a lot of hours in the day and I think about other things from time to time. Here are some of the things on my mind this week:
