Living Proof

It makes me very sad to think that there are people out there still in the closet, afraid to come out and tell their family and loved ones that they're gay or lesbian. There can be many factors why someone would stay quiet about their sexuality. For me, the people I surrounded myself in the past would make derogatory remarks, like, "Eww, gross! That girl's a lesbian," or "She's a lesbo," --those types of things. I even heard someone mutter out, "But she's so pretty, why would she resort to dating women when she can get any man she wants?" So being a "lesbian" meant that the person wasn't "pretty enough" to have a boyfriend. And in this case, if she was pretty, then it just didn't make sense. "She mustuv' got hurt by some guy." Here's the thing --- what a dreadful life to live if your life cannot be lived to its fullest. What a dreadful life it would be if you couldn't be. ..you. How awful

Too much for the mind... Some say that when you reach your 40's, you're wiser and more spiritually in tune. Some believe you need to reach the age of 40 in order to read the Torah, otherwise the words will never be fully understood. They say it would be too much for the mind to handle. For me, I believe it's more of a spiritual sense whether you've developed it like a muscle or if you were truly blessed to reach that level of understanding. I guess for years I was more of a closet spiritual person, more of a closet Christian. Not to say that I was ashamed of my religion, but I didn't want to bump heads with anyone who believed differently than I did until I was well into my adulthood. At that point, I didn't care. I didn't care if people thought I was a "crazy Christian" or some kook who just had hallucinations of God Himself. It's funny, because I have friends that ask me a million questions about my beliefs and how to read the bible to wh

Ever see one of those posts people plop onto Facebook where it says someone you may know may have an invisible disability of some sort? Most of it is like, anxiety, depression, fibromyalgia or other chronic and sometimes debilitating ailments. As I've written many times before about my dysmenorrhea, I've gotten to the point where I can no longer live with it any longer. These days, it's not only the pain from dysmenorrhea, it triggers my sciatica pain as well. Double whammy. I am not willing to give up 2-3 days of my life per month (which is when the pain is excruciating) in order to nurse this condition or end up in the hospital with Dilaudid -- a medicine ten times stronger than morphine. The main side effect: death from respiratory depression. At that point of pain, you're begging for death. The other night, I watched the clock slip hour by hour as I screamed in pain. 10 o'clock...11 o'clock...1 o'clock...4 o'clock. Madelene finally said, "Let&

Sometimes it's strange when you look back at your life from just a few years ago to a decade or even twenty plus years ago. It rolls out like a movie. You see all the characters who came in and out of your life, and you also see the characters who still remain in your life. From friends, lovers, and even family members who drift in and out of your 'movie'. It plays out with no explanation. Sometimes, when it has a good enough explanation, I always question every single action that led to the break in the relationship. Whether it be the lack of communication, or perhaps too much 'negative' communication, the fact is, it severed the ties. "A reason, a season, a lifetime," comes to mind and I have to wonder which one fits with each person. Do you ever think back to a time when you were sitting with someone you love(d) and thought the relationship would never end? I think many people take their relationships for granted, thinking that same concept, until

One day you're here and the next day, you're not. You wouldn't know it because you've never experienced it, only people you once knew or loved have. Do you think life plays out like a movie and we're all the actors trying to fulfill our part? What makes a 15 year old kid decide to commit suicide by running into the wrong lane, ending up killing two healthy men who each had their own family at home? What explains a kid getting killed playing baseball in the park all because the pitcher threw the ball right into the middle of his chest giving him cardiac arrest? What explains a mother's loss of her child for no apparent reason whatsoever while taking a nap in his crib? What explains woman losing her husband to a heart attack at the age of 35? Is life one big test? What explains cancer? What explains suffering? What can explain the horrible things that go on in this world? Perhaps scientifically and medically we can explain it all, but our spirits are still ago

Last night I got to finally watch American Horror Story. I have to say it was really interesting with a bit of seediness to it, but they gathered a bunch of great actors in this show. Anything with Kathy Bates in it is worth watching. The bulk of it was about witches -- mainly, witches who didn't appear to be witches. They weren't your average frizzy gray-haired zaftig broads, well except for Kathy Bates, but they were your everyday average women, from young to middle-aged. But isn't that how it is in real life? Do you believe in "witches"? I always came across "good witches" ---so they said. They were only to cast "good spells" and "good karma energy" as well as prayed to goddesses or 'the universe' for good fortune and health for all. Even though my faith is in Christianity, I never excluded people of different faiths, even faiths I was warned about. I remember a friend of mine who was Wiccan. She was also one of the local

Even to till day, I'm still not used to it. I have no "alone" time when I'm home, if you're not counting humans that is. I'm stared at, jumped on and when I lay down to watch TV, I have a chihuahua sitting on top of me trying to snuggle. She's almost become more of an appendage. At night before I sleep, there's no such thing as settling in without my dog curling up either between my legs or on my chest and even under my arm. I'm a bit flip-floppy in bed cause I have insomnia issues, so Madelene usually slides her over to her side. Lola and I have a routine together. After breakfast, I have to sit outside on the deck with her to finish my coffee as she plays with her toys happily. If I go inside, she comes back in to get me. We are hardly ever without each other, unless I have to leave the house. She knows what I'm saying too. I never thought dogs were "intelligent" or even had an ounce of understanding other than "commands"

Back in 2008, I converted from Myspace to Facebook. I wasn't used to the blandness of Facebook, oppose to its counterpart, with all the music, glitter and tacky picture displays, (dare I say, bells and whistles), but I switched over because all my friends were on it. It was user-friendly for everyone. On Myspace, most profiles were of public display. It was even possible to track down people who visited your page by a simple stat counter or site meter. It told you the town they were from, a half ip address and the name of their internet provider. So basically, you can guess. If they were still logged into their Myspace account, you would get their picture and profile as well. You can't do that with Facebook due to the lack of html coding. Myspace was strictly based upon html codes, where if you wanted to add a feature to your page, you would have to add a code in the template itself. It was pretty technical for the average Joe. I think that's why many people just went wit

On many occasions, I've heard that adapting to change is a sign of maturity, or perhaps becoming "wiser" in some aspects. The types of changes, such as a new job or a new relationship can seem exciting and fun, and for the most part it is. Changes such as moving from one home to a lesser home, divorce or even a death in the family are seen as the most stressful events in our lives. Those are huge changes. We have to adapt, or at least try. We have to learn to ride the storm out grudgingly. I call those the "downgrade changes". I remember when Madelene and I had to rent an apartment downtown. We had no backyard, old twisted up plumbing and a furnace older than the hills that kept spilling out carbon monoxide to which the utility company had to fine my landlord. That wasn't fun because the landlord used to get pissed off at me for reporting it. Well, it was either report it or die in my bed. Although there were a lot of frustrations with that place, there

Between Facebook and Twitter (mostly Facebook), this government shutdown is really shutting down many friendships online. Here's my belief: nobody knows anything about what one party is doing and the other's not. They can go on and on about how Obamacare is affordable, while the other one can go on about how expensive the coinsurance and out of pocket deductibles are. On top of that, it's been said on the news that if we don't opt for the insurance, we'll then get fined for it. Everything is debatable. My question is: if the insurance is good enough for us, then why isn't Obama and his family going on it? But that could be a good explanation of some sort of private insurance the POTUS receives. I don't know enough about that. I'm not even sure if Obama handed in his birth certificate. Did he? Who cares, right? And if you've been reading me for some time, you know I have those "tin foil hat" conspiracy theories of mine and that I can be a