You Can't Always Get What You Want

Some of my peers are hugely dissatisfied. 

With everything, really.

And if they aren't currently dissatisfied with something, you can be sure they will find something to be dissatisfied with. Like private businesses enforcing mask-wearing on their premises even though the governor has been bullied into saying it's okay now. Or the fact that healthcare and schools and public transit still require them. Or that we don't have in-building learning for as many hours a week as our neighboring districts. As though butts in seats in a school building is the only useful criterion for learning.

Look, folks, my kids hated distance learning, too, and they aren't particularly good at it, either. As per their usual, Abby coped and Liz complained, but they both made it this far. And although Liz is having issues even during hybrid - she has gone a bit (more) feral, lol - they are still doing okay. I like to think that this is because I was focused on how to help them cope (see below) more than I was on who to complain to and about to get things "back to normal." Normal wasn't great either.

They will get through this.

They have been through worse.

But there are a number of my peers who are so focused on their kids not having The Perfect High School Experience (or Perfect Middle School Experience, or whatever) that they are behaving poorly to other people. This is, of course, their perception of The Perfect School Experience, which is probably only loosely connected to reality even when we were not in the midst of a global pandemic.

I didn't have The Perfect School Experience.

Did you?

And if not (and I understand wanting your kids to have it easier and better than you did) why on earth do you think that the usual round of sports and dances and teenage drama as seen in the movies is The Perfect School Experience?

These people have actually threatened people, doxxed people, and tried to get people fired for not providing (their expectation of what should be) The Perfect School Experience during a global pandemic.

This is not how rational people behave.

Nor is it how ethical, moral, or reasonable people behave.

I mean, I understand vaccine hesitancy, especially when people have been bombarded with incorrect (and also correct-but-rapidly-changing) information. It's too new, or it's a different kind of vaccine, or it has a scary acronym in it that sounds vaguely like DNA, or they didn't test it long enough... these reactions I understand. I don't agree, but I can understand. Change is hard and scary and real. And that's okay.

But the people who will use those scary bits of misinformation and combine them with reluctance to mask up? Or count heads and determine acceptable losses in their own minds? Or think that death is the only bad outcome? Or even lie about their vaccination status? Those people scare me.

I've heard horror stories, too.

There are people who claim to be vaccinated so they don't have to wear masks in public spaces. They are liars.

There are people who claim to be vaccinated so they don't have to wear masks in private spaces, like their clients' homes and businesses. They are liars.

There are people who proudly say that they are not vaccinated, they won't wear a mask, and you can't make them, nanny nanny boo boo. At least they are honest.

There are somewhat more reasonable people, of course, who are uncomfortable with vaccination but are willing to mask, stay out of public spaces, and stay away from people as needed.

The thing is, though, our governor saying, "You don't have to wear the mask in most public spaces (excluding healthcare, schools, and public transit) if you have been fully vaccinated plus two weeks waiting period," is not the same thing as "Masks off, everyone!" 

And yes, I do still trust the science. I don't trust people who grasp every opportunity to willfully misinterpret it as "I do what I want."

And most businesses where people (usually other customers, not business owners) are being assholes about those of us playing it safe and wearing our masks are not public spaces in any case. The majority of them are private businesses that can still kick you out if you refuse to mask up.

And that is their right.

And honestly, their responsibility.

Maybe that's what it comes down to; people want their rights but are unwilling to behave responsibly. Duty is a thing too.

Me?

A picrew cartoon of me, a pale woman with green
eyes, brown hair with grey streaks, and 
a blue shirt & grey cardigan, wearing a
neurodivergent rainbow infinity button.

I'll be here at home when I'm not working, helping my kids with their homework, keeping them occupied by indulging their arts and crafts and online interests (Lizzy taught me to use Picrew today!), and staying away from people when I can.

And when I can't stay away? Like when I go to Abby's high school graduation ceremony? I'm going to wear the mask my friend Sharon is making me. 

I trust science.

I don't trust YOU.

It's Not Always About That

A cartoon of me, a fair-skinned, brunette-with-grey
person, wearing blue and sitting at a table with
a microphone and a coffee cup. The caption reads,
"HEAR ME OUT."

This post may cost me if I don't phrase it just right. So if I don't, and you feel defensive, take a break, take a breath, and try again later.

Because this may come across as controversial. 

Not that I'm any stranger to that in the past several years.

So here goes...

~~~~~~~~~~

It's not always about your pet thing.

Is it often about your pet thing? Yes. If your pet thing is racism, or misogyny, or transphobia, or ableism, or some other injustice in the world, then yes. It is often about your pet thing.

Maybe even usually.

But not always.

Certainly not always, or usually or even often if your pet thing is about some random conspiracy that has been disproven time and time again but you still believe. :cough:takingourguns:cough:

You may have heard a phrase something like, "if all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail..." and I think that's a common cognitive bias in play for a lot of us. I include myself; I'm not immune.

And of course, we can try to be intersectional (more about that in the link below) but we all still have our pet priorities. Not to mention that with as much injustice as we see and/or experience, especially as interconnected as we are these days, sometimes we need a break from the constant unrelenting outrageous things happening for our own mental health. And that's okay, as long as we get back in there and fight the good fight once we've regrouped.

All the pet things are different, of course. All the -isms and -phobias and miso- this and that... I've talked about this before, just over four years ago, but I like to think that I've refined my views somewhat, grown, and gained more perspective. And I've gotten an inkling into how this seems to other people, especially when speaking with 13yo Liz, because she's, well, thirteen. 

So when she makes a blanket statement, like "My teachers should know this thing because they're teachers," she isn't always taking into account that a) teachers are human and therefore fallible, and b) they may have been taught differently themselves and don't know the latest research... it's developmentally appropriate for her to think that way. 

When full-grown adults do it, notsomuch.

This is how we get conspiracy theories of the type that suggest - say - that Apollo 11 never landed on the moon and if you show evidence then they say it was planted by shadowy figures whose sole purpose is to confuse the general populace. For an equally shadowy unknown reason, I suppose.

In any case, I'm really really tired of the assertion that all things are a spectrum, except for this one thing which is inviolate (and may change over time to an equally inviolate thing) and if you argue the point you're somehow the enemy. 

There is a reason I keep my mouth shut on certain subjects; it's so I don't alienate people with whom I agree on most issues, but I have a more moderate stance on their one pet topic, about which they are often rabid. 

There's that protecting-my-own-mental-health thing again, I suppose. I value my relationships with these people overall more than I do "being right."

But it sure is tiring.

Country Roads

Cartoon of a fair-skinned, green-eyed,
brunette-and-grey-haired smiling
woman wearing a blue top and bunny
slippers, playing a black grand piano
with a single rose in a bud vase.

So Miz Liz has been doing the Take Care of Mom thing all day (Abby, too, but she was also doing her and my mom's usual Sunday afternoon TV-together thing).

Liz wanted to go for a drive after dinner, to listen to The Devil Went Down to Georgia on the surround sound I have in my van, it being one of the few "countryesque" songs she likes, "like, unironically, Mom."

So we did so, after she made a playlist called "Those countryesque songs I like, plus a few parody ones I'll add later."

These consisted of the aforementioned The Devil Went Down to Georgia, Honey I'm Good, Grandma's Feather Bed, Timber (Featuring Ke$ha), and Faster Car. 

Naturally, I have a rather larger repertoire of country-songs-I-enjoy-unironically than Liz does; I'm 52 to her 13. So after we were done with this playlist, still several songs away from home, we tried Kenny Rogers' The Gambler (which she pronounced to be "a bop" and was suitably impressed that The Gambler had gone out in his sleep as he'd wished) and Ghost Riders in the Sky (which I explained that a character of mine in a Mage: The Ascension game had once used to summon The Wild Hunt).

So we're much closer to home now, and we have time for one more song. I ask her if she's heard about the meme going around Tumblr (and therefore Reddit and Pinterest and so forth) about the titular character from Piano Man playing in a gay bar, primarily because of Paul the Real Estate Novelist and Davy who's still in the Navy. She hasn't, but she's interested, so we listen to that.

Those last three have now been (unironically) added to her playlist. Achy Breaky Heart didn't make the cut.

It was a nice, chill sort of weekend for this Mom.