Recognizing When You're Bad at Something
This has been something of an odd week. Not only has the asthma gone from bad to crazy bad in the last few days, but I'd developed the crazy bad heartburn I get when the asthma is bad. I'm not always very good and recognizing that it's not regular occasional heartburn and when it's immune system haywire heartburn, but eventually I figure it out and start tossing in proton pump inhibitors with the other stuff.
I cam be slow to see things, things that I'm not expert at. Just last night i was reading one of my Amazon freebie books. This was about the gold rush in the Yukon back in the late 1800s. One second I'm reading about the mining process, claim jumpers and traversing the Chilkoot and the next second I'm reading a homosexual love scene. I was about sixty percent into the book and up until that point had seen no hints whatsoever that the two characters were gay. I was pretty surprised. Not that I care about that stuff.
What I do care about is when writers and others ignore the build up, or obvious red flags and spring stuff on us. There was a hetero love scene a few pages beyond the gay one and I was just as puzzled by it. No hint, no sexual tension, de nada and they started merrily screwing.
Kind of related to a situation I saw online earlier in week that I eventually completely removed myself from. I've been following the crazy train wreck that is Mae Thomas on Facebook for some months now. I've sat through Mae's claims of having surgery when it was obvious the photos were fake as can be. I've watched as Mae thrashed about and threatened the mod of a Facebook group I belong to, and as Mae moved in with her former in laws, living on a dirty broken down mattress in what looks like a shed. With no sheets.
I've watched and felt vastly superior, even when I know feeling that way is false and not right. I started to really get judgmental when the ex mother in law showed up in the group, and I said something rather mean to her. I realized almost immediately a couple of things, and apologized to her very quickly.
I realized that many times I am now operating from a place of wealthy white privilege. I sure was when sniggering over her beat up trailer and grooming choices. Have I really gotten so hide bound that I cannot imagine living any other way than the way I live now? I hope not, but I am afraid I am.
Somehow I've become completely as without a clue as the man that wrote that stupid book I was just reading. I started to leave the group then, thinking it was bringing out the worst in me, but ultimately decided against it because the things the ex mother in law had to say were interesting. Particularly when asked why she was allowing a mentally deranged lying drug addict to live rent free with her. She said because she had compassion for the struggling.
I don't get it how some people can ignore obvious red flags and enable others any more than I can get completely out of character leaps in novels. I don't think I'll ever understand people.
Well, I can honestly say I'm not there yet. I have little compassion for the likes of Mae. Once Mae joined the group and those that had been talking trash about Mae Thomas for months started fawning all over her and running the fundraiser to give Mae Christmas presents I was out of there.
I'm still not there yet.
I am starting to think that the advent of the online charity fundraiser was a very bad thing. This poor mother in law, working hard and living paycheck to paycheck, yet sharing what she has would be a good and worthy recipient of charity. Someone that openly imbibes prescription and illegal drugs like the breakfast of champions, refuses to work and spends much of her time filming strip tease videos and drugged up rants for YouTube should not be rewarded for her bad behavior.
I cam be slow to see things, things that I'm not expert at. Just last night i was reading one of my Amazon freebie books. This was about the gold rush in the Yukon back in the late 1800s. One second I'm reading about the mining process, claim jumpers and traversing the Chilkoot and the next second I'm reading a homosexual love scene. I was about sixty percent into the book and up until that point had seen no hints whatsoever that the two characters were gay. I was pretty surprised. Not that I care about that stuff.
What I do care about is when writers and others ignore the build up, or obvious red flags and spring stuff on us. There was a hetero love scene a few pages beyond the gay one and I was just as puzzled by it. No hint, no sexual tension, de nada and they started merrily screwing.
Kind of related to a situation I saw online earlier in week that I eventually completely removed myself from. I've been following the crazy train wreck that is Mae Thomas on Facebook for some months now. I've sat through Mae's claims of having surgery when it was obvious the photos were fake as can be. I've watched as Mae thrashed about and threatened the mod of a Facebook group I belong to, and as Mae moved in with her former in laws, living on a dirty broken down mattress in what looks like a shed. With no sheets.
I've watched and felt vastly superior, even when I know feeling that way is false and not right. I started to really get judgmental when the ex mother in law showed up in the group, and I said something rather mean to her. I realized almost immediately a couple of things, and apologized to her very quickly.
I realized that many times I am now operating from a place of wealthy white privilege. I sure was when sniggering over her beat up trailer and grooming choices. Have I really gotten so hide bound that I cannot imagine living any other way than the way I live now? I hope not, but I am afraid I am.
Somehow I've become completely as without a clue as the man that wrote that stupid book I was just reading. I started to leave the group then, thinking it was bringing out the worst in me, but ultimately decided against it because the things the ex mother in law had to say were interesting. Particularly when asked why she was allowing a mentally deranged lying drug addict to live rent free with her. She said because she had compassion for the struggling.
I don't get it how some people can ignore obvious red flags and enable others any more than I can get completely out of character leaps in novels. I don't think I'll ever understand people.
Well, I can honestly say I'm not there yet. I have little compassion for the likes of Mae. Once Mae joined the group and those that had been talking trash about Mae Thomas for months started fawning all over her and running the fundraiser to give Mae Christmas presents I was out of there.
I'm still not there yet.
I am starting to think that the advent of the online charity fundraiser was a very bad thing. This poor mother in law, working hard and living paycheck to paycheck, yet sharing what she has would be a good and worthy recipient of charity. Someone that openly imbibes prescription and illegal drugs like the breakfast of champions, refuses to work and spends much of her time filming strip tease videos and drugged up rants for YouTube should not be rewarded for her bad behavior.
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