RedHead Confetti

This was the basis of a “daily meditation” with an app I use. I do strive to meditate every day, as I feel it’s good for my brain. My brain is always going a million miles a minute, and I’m always thinking about different things, paths of thought and pondering, so meditation forces me to stop—just stop the rumination—something that feels like ice skating up Mt Everest sometimes. But rumination, or the propensity to ruminate, has been found to be a signifier of depression, or perhaps a symptom of depressive people—and so it’s something that I try to keep a handle on.* Rumination is, at its most basic, “chewing over a problem” but never actually dealing with it, or finding a solution. Depression is good at this one; all you can see is the problem, but you can’t actually problem-solve your way through whatever triggered that ruminating. So, my meditation today. Authenticity with compassion and restraint… can you be authentically yourself and still be compassionate, still show

Warning: This blog is ranty, it contains sarcasm, anger and profanity. It discusses abortion rights. If you can't handle that, this one isn't for you. So, I’ve been thinking about this for a few weeks now. It started with the Ohio and Missouri heart-beat bills, compounded with the travesty coming out of Alabama, and came to a boil with Georgia’s “Hold my beer” bill. Each of these, and mind you this isn’t all of them, are bills that specifically ban abortion care. Each of these is couched as a way to “protect babies”, but treats women like an afterthought—if they think of us, at all! We have been reduced to incubators, to hosts, to objects. And to say I’m angry, or pissed, is probably the understatement of the century. [NB: You can see an article here , discussing all abortion bills that have passed, or are being taken up, on state level. Not all of them ban it. Some actually protect it. For your edification.] I read “The Handmaid’s Tale” when I was a kid. I had t

I was up at 3am, feeding kittens, when out of nowhere the thought hit me: SWERFS and TERFS aren’t really radical feminists. In the nature of middle-of-the-night thoughts, much like shower-thoughts, this one seemed apropos of nothing, but there it was. Fully formed, almost like a rallying cry. As I tried to still my mind and go back to sleep, this thought spun around and around my mind. And I know, I’m setting up a No True Scotsman here, so bear with my while I explain what I mean, and why I believe that deliberate exclusion is the antithesis of feminism.   (NB. I also believe that unintentional exclusion is the antithesis of feminism. However, unintentional exclusion is easier to rectify, and usually the persons doing the excluding are eager to address that marginalizing behaviour and take steps to ensure it doesn’t happen again.) The way I hear these acronyms is: Sex-Worker-Exclusionary. Radical-Feminist. And Trans-Exclusionary. Radical-Feminist. [Pe