Get Mad

A friend of mine posted this on Instagram recently and I thought, "Oh no, please don't."

A gradiated purple and pink background with text on it that says "I don't get mad anymore. I just accept it for what it is and move on." It is from a website called Simple Reminders.

I get the appeal. Saying, "it is what it is" and then letting it go and moving on is the ultimate in non-attachment right? You'd be a zen little duckling, just letting everything run off your back and living your life.

I guess the problem is that some of the things that make me the most angry are social justice issues and inequalities, and people accepting those for what they are and moving on is exactly what's made all these problems in the first place.

So no, I'm going to keep getting mad.


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Vaccine Hospitalization

If you're looking at rates of hospitalization among vaccinated people and getting scared, here's something that might help!


The short answer: a tiny percentage of vaccinated people still wind up in hospital, but it ends up being a larger proportion of hospitalized people due to the fact that so many people are vaccinated, so there's a way larger pool of people to draw on!


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The Billionaire Space Race

Thinking about this today.


A rat done bit my sister Nell.
(with Whitey on the moon)
Her face and arms began to swell.
(and Whitey's on the moon)

I can't pay no doctor bill.
(but Whitey's on the moon)
Ten years from now I'll be payin' still.
(while Whitey's on the moon)

The man jus' upped my rent las' night.
('cause Whitey's on the moon)
No hot water, no toilets, no lights.
(but Whitey's on the moon)

I wonder why he's uppi' me?
('cause Whitey's on the moon?)
I was already payin' 'im fifty a week.
(with Whitey on the moon)
Taxes takin' my whole damn check,
Junkies makin' me a nervous wreck,
The price of food is goin' up,
An' as if all that shit wasn't enough

A rat done bit my sister Nell.
(with Whitey on the moon)
Her face an' arm began to swell.
(but Whitey's on the moon)

Was all that money I made las' year
(for Whitey on the moon?)
How come there ain't no money here?
(Hm! Whitey's on the moon)
Y'know I jus' 'bout had my fill
(of Whitey on the moon)
I think I'll sen' these doctor bills,
Airmail special
(to Whitey on the moon)


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Can't Be Trusted

You know when people say, "I can't be trusted around X," where X is probably some kind of delicious food but may be another vice?
 
And then, because we can't be trusted with it, we develop a complex set of rules in our lives to control our access to it? We hide it, freeze it in a block of ice, never keep it in the house, make ourselves to exercise before we consume it, go on cleanses or fasts or abstain for a month at a time, tell ourselves what days or what times we are allowed to have it?

On one hand, great. If that feels good for you, great.
 
On the other hand, I have a "what if?"
 
What if... we learned to trust ourselves?
 
Not that we learn to trust that our will is iron-clad and we will never overdo it when it comes to X because we now inherently follow these rules, but to actually be in tune with our bodies, with our wants and needs, with compassion, and so trust ourselves to do whatever is actually right for us.
 
It's harder at the outset. It's more complicated. But living life where you can trust yourself seems a lot more enjoyable than a life with a bunch of arbitrary rules to keep ourselves in line.


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To Every Thing There is a Season

About a year ago I announced some ch-ch-ch-changes. At the time all I knew was that I was unshackling myself from the strict guidelines I had given myself for writing daily on this blog and some of the structure and format I'd put into place here and I didn't know what that would look like.

Well, what it did look like was that I still wrote posts every day and probably poured more out into this blog than I had before.

Now, all of a sudden, I feel kinda done?
 
Not done in a forever way, but definitely in a "my life actually doesn't revolve around this blog" way.

If you like having my musings in your life and want to find out when I've written something, you can sign up from my newsletter or follow me on ye old socials (receptionist insta, personal insta, twitter, tiktok, or facebook but I never post there).
 
So... see you around? Or when I suddenly feel like my life is empty and I come crawling back here?


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The Coldest Summer of the Rest of Our Lives

A meme composite image using Bart and Homer Simpson. The first panel shows Bart, looking disturbed, with a picture of a map of the US west coast burning and the text "this is the hottest summer of my life." The next panel is Homer, leaning in like he's correcting Bart and saying, "This is the coldest summer of the rest of your life!"

A couple weeks ago, I was telling some friends how we have to enjoy this time in our lives: COVID is (theoretically) getting under control and climate change is only just ramping up. Pending other disasters (still totally likely!), we'll have some decently-enjoyable years in here before things get really bad again.
 
Honestly, my friends seemed a little perturbed by this. They called me cynical.
 
Buuuuuut after a heatwave in BC that resulted in over 700 sudden deaths (where the only way to make life bearable for most is buy an AC and contribute to making global temperatures worse, and will result in even more forest fires than usual, one of which already fully destroyed a town in a day) PLUS the ocean literally being on fire and whatever ecological effects come of that, I'm thinking I was wrong.
 
I think I was too optimistic about how "sweet" this "sweet spot" between COVID and Climate Change: Full Throttle will be.
 
I guess time will tell: as the planet becomes less and less habitable in the coming years, what will we look back on as the lull? Or will we be too busy hating our past selves for not fighting this harder? (Or, most appropriately, hating the ultra-wealthy oil barons who fully knew about climate change in the 70s and hid it?)
 

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Everyday Chores

It's hot and it's taken all my energy to just do my dang job these past few days.
 
Here's some cool art by Tatsuya Tanaka.
 
An art photograph of a miniature figurine of a woman in an old fashioned maid uniform with an ancient iron, she is ironing ripple chips and making them flat. There is a stack of ripple chips on one side of her and non-rippled on the other side.

I prefer my chips un-ironed, if given a choice, but whatever you've got is fine.


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Giving Beauty the Middle Finger

Photographer Waleed Shah is obviously the coolest and has a book of photographs called Rock Your Ugly: A Middle Finger to Toxic Beauty Standards. He had people pose featuring their biggest insecurities about themselves and the result is powerful and gorgeous and you could probably write a dissertation about it.

A black and white photograph of a woman standing sideways and holding her shirt up to reveal a scar on her ribs.

A black and white photo of a woman sitting on the bathroom floor next to her toilet. She is facing away from the camera, holding a small mirror that reflects her eyes back to the camera so she is looking at us.



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This Week's Gratitude & Delight

An animated gif illustration. There is a black background and a white speech bubble with the text "thank you" inside it that blinks on and off. Around the speech bubble are two white stars that wiggle back and forth.
Ivo Adventures
 
The last week I have been grateful for:
 
Hanging out on the beach with a friend for her birthday and still got home in time for my usual bedtime even though it was a beach allllllll the way on the other side of town.

The person who hit my balcony with their moving truck because they were super proactive to deal with it right away and so I didn't have to fight anyone to take responsibility.

My neighbourhood bike shop for quickly repairing my bike's snapped cable even though they were so busy.

The somewhat last-minute opportunity to go backpacking with a friend in the MIDDLE OF THE WEEK and sitting by a river, drinking rose, and even being able to make a little campfire.

Gertie coming in for cuddles every time I lie down.
 
Seeing my dad for Father's Day! He had a surgery recently and it was good to see that he's recovering.

THIS WEEK'S DELIGHT: Tried a new thing and the results were DREAMY!


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Forget and Forgive

Forgiving is hard, right? Some people seem to be able to very easily get past being hurt but it's a big ol' thing for me to turn off the part of my brain that relives the pain over and over again.

Well heeeeeerrrrrrrrre comes SCIENCE with some answers!!!

Apparently there are two kinds of forgiveness: decisional and emotional. Like the names say, in the former you decide to forgive someone and in the latter you try to release the negative emotions related to the perpetrator of your pain and even usher in positive ones.

Here's the cool part: people who opt for emotional forgiveness tend to forget the details of how they were harmed. They'll still remember the gist of it, but those details that might otherwise recycle themselves over and over in your brain get fuzzy around the edges.

And guess what makes it easier to forgive someone??? Yeah, FORGETTING all those dang details.

So really, the saying should be, "forget and forgive."

(If you're wondering how the heck to even do emotional forgiveness, in the study the participants were instructed “wish that the offender experiences something positive or healing and to focus their thoughts and feelings on empathy," so apparently that's it.)


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Tweet Like It's Free

Last week, Palestinians were using the hashtag "tweet like it's free" (#غرد_كأنها_حرة), tweeting about what they would be doing if they weren't living under Israeli oppression.

Their tweets imagined a world where they could freely go for a run and then get fresh lemonade in the square, drive directly between Beirut and Haifa along the coast, and see a shooting star without ducking for cover.

It reminded me of when they ask women what they would do if men disappeared from the world for one day, and mainly it's things like wearing whatever they wanted and going for a walk at night.

Obvious statement of the day: it's just not right.


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In Your Own Image

"You can safely assume you've created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do."
-Anne Lammott

I weirdly feel like this applies to the people who don't even believe in God, although it's probably a little less relevant to their day-to-day lives.


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Visions of Motherhood

Honestly, in my little corner of the internet, it's nothing but nuance about the experience of motherhood. And yet, apparently, a lot of people still hold a monolithic view of what this means to be a human who had a baby. Photography collective The Luupe's series of 100 visions of motherhood is on.

A portrait of pregnant woman. She is wearing a large pink sombrero with a veil on it, she is wearing a pink Nike sports bra and pink pants and is holding her exposed, pregnant belly. It seems like a take on Beyonce's pregnancy photo.

A photo of a woman looking out a curtain from behind. The curtain takes up the whole wall and is 70's style paisley. She is standing with her back to us in a red dress, holding a baby, and looking through a crack in the curtain.


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