I am not surprised but I am sad and disappointed that this Administration is using hate as a foundation for its services. Things, like suicide prevention and crisis intervention shouldn’t discriminate because the conditions that cause mental health struggles, ideation, and crisis don’t discriminate.
Today’s planned posts will be postponed by this PSA from NAMI:
Posting this for no reason at all
Fourteen days ago, I started a 100 Day Project. I had no intention when I was setting my goals for 2026 to do something like this. I can usually do about a week in a row, maybe, or one day a week for maybe two months, I will write everyday but I won’t stick with this type of commitment. I’m not sure why. I love to sit down in front of my computer or my Kindle. At the moment, I’ve just finished lunch at Cracker Barrel and this is the third thing I’ve written. I know that part of that is that I’ve started this 100 Day Project. It has really motivated me to write and to write more.
This is also a book rec. A couple of years ago, I read Suleika Jaouad’s memoir Between Two Kingdoms. I had heard of the book through an interview with Jon Batiste, Stephen Colbert’s former band leader, and I thought this book would be fun. The author had leukemia and went through treatment, and reading it was not fun. I am under no illusion that it wasn’t fun for her either. It was an emotional roller coaster. I felt it, obviously not the trauma and debilitating circumstances of cancer, but Suleika’s writing drew me in, and she will draw you in. I think the best writers keep you in suspense. As she told her story, knowing that she must have survived – she wrote the book, she got married – through the book, I still wondered if she was okay. That is the mark of a great writer.
When I saw this book on an email advert from Indigo Book store in Canada, I was intrigued. I recognized her name right away, and when I read the title (without the subtitle), I thought it was fiction. I learned very quickly that it wasn’t. It was a journey, one that I take myself on often but this was a nice guide to take me on that journey through other people’s thoughts, ideas, and inspirations. I borrowed the book from the e-library and started reading.
I have been reading for two weeks now, and the book is due. I gave myself ground rules, and I will share them with you, but there are no real rules until you make them for yourself. They have to work for you or else what’s the point?
In choosing to follow the guides in the book, I soon realized that it can be done in any medium. It is not restrictive to writing, even though that is my vocation. Even if the prompt directs you to write, you should do whatever feels creative to you. Again, for me that’s writing, but I also like to sketch and for one of the past fourteen prompts, there was a mind map activity. I made the mind map. I could have easily listed the items, but the mind map is a visual way of writing. I’ve done that before (and taught them to other writers by the name word webs). There was a ten image prompt that could easily be done with a camera or a sketchbook. I wrote a vignette for ten images in my life, which was very much like a writing prompt i received from my regular writing group about choosing five nouns and writing about them.
If you’re the kind of reader looking for the numbers, I have written every day using the prompts in this book for a total of 6730 words.
That’s an average of about 480 words a day. Not great, but also 480 more a day than I would have done otherwise.
I am still keeping up on my blog writing, on my book writing, on my writing groups prompts, and my work writing.
My rules are simple.
I haven’t decided if I’ll share any of the writing, perhaps in a few more days.
Now that my library loan has expired, I wasted no time in buying my own copy of The Book of Alchemy: A Creative Practice for an Inspired Life by Suleika Jaouod. I didn’t want to miss any of the days and I wanted to keep to the 100 days in a row.
If anyone’s interested in joining me on this project, let me know.
Perhaps there’s some way we can work on this together. I’m open to ideas and suggestions.
Please see the Correction on the most recent Election Connection about Renee Good. When I publish a mistake, I correct it as soon as I’m aware it exists. I apologize for any confusion.
I thought for the first Friday Food of the new year, I’d share two amusing ones. Just below is an Advent Calendar I got just after Advent started. It was half price on clearance. It really is a cute box.
I had no intention of saving it for next year, but I wasn’t sure how to distribute the candy until this week.
We sat at the dining room table after dinner and had my family each choose a number between 1 and 24. We did this twice, and had fun seeing which of the candies we got. We’ll keep doing this until the box is empty and then I’ll save the box for next year and fill it with different candies to surprise us throughout Advent.
This is your average, everyday Morton salt that I believe everyone has in their cupboards. What is so special about this one really illustrates how little salt our family uses. This is only the fourth cannister that I’ve had since I was married more than thirty-one years ago.
My family is tired of hearing this, but I am really amused and fascinated by it. I can’t think of any other food item in our house that has lasted that long and is still good to eat. We really only use salt in baking and in our mashed potatoes!
We do have a microwave that we got for my bridal shower in 1994 that is still working well, but the salt is the only food. For added trivia, this is only the third one that we’ve bought – my mother gave us the first one with a loaf of bread, which is a tradition in Jewish families.
I’m struggling today.
Yesterday and this morning have been very difficult for me; my spoons have clattered to the floor, and the idea of picking them up and beginning again isn’t there yet.
I’ve called this Election Connection because it is connected to our recent past elections and the two future ones in 2026 and 2028. It’s the people.
And it’s also more than the elections and the consequences of an illiterate and ignorant electorate.
It’s that the lack of fundamental thought processing is gone. Media literacy is gone. Impartiality on behalf of our journalists is gone.I’m not sure if we will ever get any of this back.
There are not always two (or more) sides to every issue. Sometimes there is the fact side and the anti-truth side. Good versus evil.
A woman and her spouse were driving home with their dog after dropping their six-year-old off at school. They never arrived home. That trauma will never go away.
I watched in real time as side-by-side, the video of the murder next to the government lying about it, and I was stunned. I truly was. I still am.
Anyone who’s watched the video saw what happened. A woman, trying to follow the direction of one ICE agent and leave was murdered by another ICE agent who then calmly walked to her car, turned around and walked away. Not limped. Not taken to the hospital. Not injured in any way. He walked away.
The federal agents on the scene refused to let a doctor attend to her. The federal agents on the scene refused to allow an ambulance to reach her.
The EMTs had to walk into the scene and them carry her limp, dead body back to the ambulance.
At the same time that her spouse was sitting on a snowy curb sobbing, the President of the United States, the Director of Homeland Security, and other federal officials claimed that the driver was a terrorist, that she attempted to harm the ICE agent. We know this is not true. It has been described in the media as the government gaslighting the rest of us.
I will say it more clearly:
The federal officials, the director of Homeland Security, the President and Vice President of the United States are lying to us. They are, in George Orwell’s words, asking us not to believe what we see, but to believe what they tell us. They are lying. Over an over again.
And this morning, we are being told that the FBI, led by a corrupt, unqualified director will be solely in charge of the investigation; that they are refusing to share any evidence found with the Minnesota State Police or the Minneapolis City Police. We cannot be expected to trust them. Not one iota when they’ve been lying to us as we watched the video of Renee Good’s murder.
We know her name because she was a white, middle class suburban woman, a mother of three.
I ask you to search the internet for the following two names:
Silverio Villegas-Gonzalez (Chicago).
Keith Porter (Los Angeles).
We know of others who’ve died in ICE custody, several not wanted on any charges, not undocumented immigrants. We don’t hear their stories because they are not white suburban women, but men of color, and we should be following their deaths and their stories equally as close.
The first man (Villegas-Gonzalez) was allegedly killed by the same ICE agent that killed Renee Good, at least that’s what Director Noem seemed to say in her press conferences.
CORRECTION: While the ICE agent who killed Renee Good was dragged by a car, it was not Mr. Villegas-Gonzalez who was driving. These were two separate incidents with two different ice agents.
The government went too far on January 21. It continues to push us to the brink of the end of democracy, the end of civil rights, the end of life in the United States as we know it.
CBS has capitulated. CNN has capitulated. AP News, the NY Times, the Washington Post have all capitulated. Who will be left to tell the true story? When will actual journalists stand up and remember their commitment to unbiased, truthful reporting, of speaking truth to power, of not showing two sides of a single truth?
I hope it’s soon, but I won’t be holding my breath.
When I recently saw these two pictures they struck me deeply. I was seeing things that I hadn’t considered before; hadn’t noticed, but then when I’d finally seen what was there all along, it was like a revelation. A sunrise. A shining spiritual moment.
Continue reading
New what?
Every thirty-first of December, I keep my next year’s calendar close. A long time ago, my mother-in-law told me that you’re not supposed to fill in your new calendar until after midnight on the first, and I have adhered to that every since. My annual ritual is to fill in all the dates that I’m aware of and begin to plan my year, both personally and professionally. I get comfortable on the sofa after all the cheering and kissing have stopped, and test out my best handwriting, and while others in the house are getting ready for bed, I stay until all my known dates are placed in their correct squares in their correct months. Of course, the first is almost always blank, and my daughter’s birthday is just four days later, so she’s usually the first name that gets written with a cute birthday sticker in her square. Then, after her birthday, I go through the whole calendar year and fill in the rest of my kids’ names and my husband along with our anniversary and then go back to find the appointments that I’ve made and listed in the front of the book. I know: very detailed and quite possibly a little silly, but it gives my year a place to start.
To begin.
Again.
I often write about holiday traditions, and I lose track of what I’ve shared already. We have several holiday traditions for several different holidays. Usually when asked about holiday traditions, the expected reference is Christmas. We have those, and I’d guess that practically all of them revolve around food, but we also have holiday traditions for Easter, Passover, Cinco de Mayo (despite not being Mexican), St. Patrick’s Day, Thanksgiving, Chanukah, birthdays, and New Year’s, and I’m sure I’m forgetting some.
My birthday this year was meh, and it was barely meh. I was sick for days before, and I wasn’t quite right on my birthday, so everything went downhill. I didn’t want a cake because I couldn’t eat it. I usually spend the day by going to Starbucks for breakfast and a leisurely trip to Target to look at the ornaments and see what other treats I can find for myself.
I did go to Starbucks for my free drink, but I got it with no ice so I could save it for the weekend when I (hopefully) felt better. The rest of this month continues in slow motion. Some Christmas gifts will be late.
Since my son was working all week, I may light the menorah again when he comes for Christmas dinner.
Our usual Christmas morning tradition will be postponed to the afternoon since he will also be working an overnight and staying at work until mid afternoon. We usually have Dunkin’ Donuts and our favorite seasonal drinks and then open our gifts. I know the kids are littles anymore but I’m not sure how they’ll feel about not opening their gifts until the afternoon. Our traditional dinner is based on my husband’s family. His mother is from Belfast, and they always had roast beef for Christmas dinner, which is what we do. Roast beef, roasted onions, gravy, mashed potatoes, carrots, green bean casserole. The one thing we don’t have is her amazing trifle – I was never able to master that. Maybe one day we’ll give it a try. This year’s desserts are two pies – one apple streussel (from Cracker Barrel) and one Very Berry or Triple Berry from a local bakery. We have a nice vintage of whipped cream chilling in the fridge.
On Christmas Eve we get Chinese take-out and the day after Christmas I make a Shepherd’s Pie with the roast and mashed.
Our Christmas cards are hung up as of Monday, but our own cards won’t go out until the new year, and our tree isn’t up yet. It seems to go up later and later each year. We’re hoping for tonight. No Doctor Who this year, but maybe I’ll finally watch Fantastic Four and/or Superman on streaming. I also have half a dozen (or so) books to read, so there is no reason to be bored while waiting for present-time.
One of the traditions that we no longer do is a Christmas Eve gift. When the kids were small, they were given (wrapped) a new pair of pajamas and a book for bedtime. That way I guaranteed that they’d go to bed, and when they woke up, they would look nice for the Christmas morning photos. We do still bake cookies for Santa, and he’s kind and generous enough to bring us stockings with a nice selection of candy and usually a small gift card.
I think for the next few weeks, I’ll choose a holiday and write a small thing about how we celebrate and what our traditions are. I’ll probably start with New Year’s next week. What would you like to see after that?
Despite these last twelve months, I am trying to remain optimistic and positive and hoping that things can be better in the coming year.
Have a Happy Christmas, Happy Holidays, Joyous Greetings of the Season, a Blessed New Year, and longer light-filled days.
On a road near my house, there are two of the same sign directly across from each other. For months now, I’ve been trying to take a photo because I loved and agreed with the sentiment. I finally got that photo, which you can see in this post. Once I got the photo however, the more I looked at it, trying to decide where to use it, and the more I thought about it, I realized that it’s a nice thought, a way to absolve voters, and get them to speak out and stand up. I agreed that even people who voted for the current president didn’t want this to be the outcome. But I’ve only just recently realized that it’s a lie.
“Nobody voted for this.”
That is a lie.
People did vote for this, greedily, happily, with determination and glee at what the other side would get, and indeed “get what’s coming to them.” I don’t have to give them the redemption arc they so desperately crave because the bad things are happening to them, and they’ve suddenly decided that the monster in the room is actually the monster in the room.
I can’t possibly list all the depraved, petty, destructive things this president and his Congress cohorts have wrought upon us.
Just because they’ve changed their minds because their landscaper was deported or their cousin the farmer is going to lose his farm because of tariffs or your health insurance is going up, like we told you it would, doesn’t mean that you get a pass because you’ve joined the suffering.
What did they vote for exactly if not for this?
They voted for lawlessness, for terrorism in our streets, for pulling people out of court hearings when they’ve immigrated “the right way,” for canceling citizenship swearing in ceremonies when these almost citizens met every hurdle, for “papers please,” for higher taxes, for lies upon lies upon lies, for pettiness that would put a toddler to shame, for misogyny, transphobia, antisemitism, and white supremacy. Yes, even if you’re not white, you voted for white supremacy. You’ve allowed him to denigrate our press, and the press has allowed him to do the same also by ignoring his outlandish and despicable behavior and their complicit silence. You’ve allowed him to call our women journalists names, and ignore the questions he dislikes. You voted for war, and disrespect for our country, our military, and put our citizens here and around the world in danger. You voted for murder and the destruction of the East Wing of the White House, the paving over the Rose Garden because the dementia-addled resident of the White House can’t remember where he is or what he’s doing. His made up grievances are on repeat, his whines are pathetic, his falling asleep at the cabinet table would be cute if it was Grandpa at Thanksgiving dinner sated by the turkey, but not for the President of the United States.
He’s so narcissistic that he needs to deface a national monument, a memorial to a fallen President; yes, it’s sad, even for this joyless man, but it’s also pitiable.
His need to pull himself up by tearing everything and everyone around him down would be sad if he wasn’t also pulling down the future for my kids, for your kids. Will the next generation have a country to be proud of? Will they even have a country? Will we be able to recover from the nastiness he unleashed? Will the White House recover from the sad, gold accents that reduce this once great house, the people’s house to a tacky golf club?
Nobody voted for this.
Lies.
*I* didn’t vote for this. Many of the people reading this didn’t vote for this. But others, there are others who DID vote for this. They’re only upset that it affects them too and not just the brown skinned people they were “punishing” simply for not being white.
But make no mistake – this is exactly what you voted for, and for those of you who didn’t vote because “they’re both the same…” shame on you.
I, and many of us, won’t forget, and forgiveness is a long way off…if it ever comes.
Griffins and Ginger Snaps 