#it was a woman looking for funds for her sick kid with cancer. i try not to be skeptical of fundraisers anymore | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

mrsmamathompson · 5 months ago

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[female she/her] Welcome to Aurora Bay, [ANTOINITA “ANN” THOMPSON]! I couldn’t help but notice you look an awful lot like [RETTA]. You must be the [FIFTY ONE] year old [OWNER OF KIDS COTTAGE DAYCARE CENTER]. Word is you’re [WHOLESOME] but can also be a bit [OVERBEARING] and your favorite song is [SONG AND ARTIST]. I also heard you’ll be staying in [SEABROOK QUARTER]. I’m sure you’ll love it! [Squishy, 30+, NZST, she/her cancer]

Triggers: Miscarriage, infertility, death.

Ann had a rough upbringing, she grew up in an era used to separation and pain for her family. She learned very quickly the value of having a family that would stick up for you without question. Ann had to learn the value of a dollar too very quickly. She cites her upbringing as the reason she now has such a good grip on her humor, because she grew up feeling the pain and she doesn’t want others to feel any kind of pain.

People in her life always found her humor something they gravitated toward, she always is a light and she used that for the longest time to help as many people as she possibly could. She tried earlier in her life to adopt children in and take care of them. She very quickly found she was rejected in this regard, living in a world where despite the fact that these kids were unwanted, the current system would rather have them living in an orphanage than living with a single black woman.

She knuckled down and for years she worked toward trying to get change to happen, all she wanted was to take care of people. She made a point to take in unwanted black kids and make sure they had the best possible experience in life. She soldiered on, realizing very quickly the only way she could prove that she was the best option was to give the children she could the best chances in life. Children who passed through her care were always given the best time, and she always used humour in their lives to make sure they were on the right path.

It wasn’t long until Ann found her first love, they were on the same wavelength and both wanted to make a difference in their community. Their love burned strong and within a month he had proposed, within another six months they were married. Within the first year Ann was pregnant and everything within the marriage seemed to be wonderful. A cruel blow came one night when she began feeling pain and a miscarriage took away their child, to make the pain worse Ann almost passed away from a vicious infection after the miscarriage. While she survived and made it through, it took her fertility with it.

Ann heard of a place not too far from where she was around thirty years ago, at the time it wasn’t viable for her to move, but she gathered the funds and twenty years ago she moved to Aurora Bay. She had no formal degrees but she submitted testimonials from children she knew had been raised by her and she took up a job at the kid’s cottage daycare. She proved herself so quickly that she was moved to lead teacher, and then when the previous owner passed on she was handed the reins of the daycare.

Ann, despite never having her own children never found herself wanting for them either. Her life was filled with so much joy just from looking after the children who came into her care. She heard recently an older relative had recently passed and left her a large sum of money, she keeps it quiet but it’s how she’s managed to continue pouring love and support into the children she adopts and takes care of. It’s also how she manages to help people in town, she’s very money savvy too, knowing where and when to spend and making sure she invested her money to keep the cash flow going.

Ann's husband recently got very sick, within a month he was barely able to control his own motor functions. Ann did her best to take care of him as well as she could but it took him faster than she could fathom. His funeral was held and Ann disappeared for a month, she couldn’t take the pain of losing her husband. She remained in contact as the owner of the kid's cottage, but she took the month to grieve.

Now she makes sure everyone is comfortable and if anyone is struggling she will find out and make sure they are taken care of. She treats the town like it’s filled with her own children and makes absolutely certain no one is suffering. She’s thrown herself back into work, but she doesn’t know what to do without her husband.

#aurorabay.intro

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manontrashbeak · 6 years ago

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Complicated

So this is my fic for @angelesblackqueen for the KoA fic swap. She said she liked Malide and AUs. If I can write gay imma write gay y’know? Also tagging the amazing accounts who put this all together @bookofmirth and @rayonfrozenwings

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Manon was downright pissed. The Yellowlegs bitch somehow took her ward and is now asking for twice as much as her supplier was asking for. Her gang, her grandmother, was counting on her to collect the newest batch of laced heroine and get it dispatched to their sellers quickly. Their clients were getting pissy and when clients get pissy they stop paying.

Walking towards the Grunge and Glory, she knew two things. The first being that her grandmother was going to be at her door in no less than a week. The second being she should kill the entire Yellowlegs gang so Iskra can stop making her life a shit hole. She walks into her tattoo shop that she and her close knit group run to pay for their house. The rest of their money, which is quite a lot, comes from the smuggling they do for her grandmother’s business. Manon was raised by her grandmother and didn’t feel like only having her to fall back on so she got trained in tattooing.

“I don��t know, maybe you shouldn’t have had sex with a guy in the back alley of a bar in Moncrief.”

“He was attractive and, besides, you could tell from across the bar he was packing.”

“Packing what? A gun?” Some of the Thirteen laugh at Kaya’s innocence. She has only ever been with one person, something only she can say inside the confines of their friend group, and that would be Thea, her lover and reason for joining a drug dealing gang.

“No, you dumbass, a big dick actually,” Vesta says once Manon pulls back the curtain. “I see you guys are doing work,” She says, rolling her eyes at the women slumming around their shop. “We work very hard, thank you very much,” Her cousin and closest friend, Asterin says without any hint of sarcasm.

“Mmhmm, I’m sure,” Manon sets down her bag. She knew from the moment she saw a tattoo gun she wanted to learn how to use one. Her grandmother didn’t approve of course, but she could do both.

“What do you think our FBI agents look like?” Asterin asks from her own work chair. “I think they are all gross, old, white men who jack off while we’re changing.”

“Asterin, ew, can you not? I’m eating?” Sorrel says while indeed eating a salad. Manon shakes her head and slightly smiles at their conversation. The joke that the FBI watches people is absurd. If they did she would be in prison along with everyone else in a this dark world.

Elide disliked a lot of things. Her uncle, her boss, her lamed leg, but more than anything, she disliked this godsdamned diner more than anything. Her parents died when she was eight and left her with a trust fund, but it had all been spent by her dick of an uncle way before her eighteenth birthday had arrived. The consequences of her uncle being a drunk are that while she was working her internship she needed to pay rent, buy food, and basic necessities by working at this shit diner in the middle of D. C. The people who frequently visited the diner were either stressed, but kind, college kids and drug addicts who made her want to spit in the already watered-down coffee.

She had just gotten to work and changed into her short, skimpy uniform when the cook decides to start throwing a fit. She walks into the dirty kitchen and sees the one of the waitresses dropped a plate. She watches the cook yell in a language she never quite identified and walked out to start on her tables.

The food was cheap, and they did have running WiFi which were the only reasons she could ever reason for someone wanting to voluntarily eat or even breathe here. Elide limps over to table five already writing down Johnny’s order, but when she looks up it is not Johnny sitting there. White hair, leather jacket, long black nails, sitting in her shitty diner. Elide drops the order pad and the beautiful woman looks at her with a completely blank face. She blushes up to her roots and bends down to grab the pad from it hit the cracked floor.

“Um, uh, sorry... what can I get you?” Elide has never been more flustered, or terrified, in her life.

“Anything not made by the back alley rats,” The woman’s voice was low and soft, almost as if she were in a bedroom with her. “That might not be possible,” Elide says and regrets it immediately. The woman, the only exchange in her facial expression a raised eyebrow, look out the window as if wondering if she would drag Elide herself to the back alley she just mentioned.

“I was joking the turkey club is actually some strange fish from South America that I’m fairly certain is poisonous,” She’s joking now, wanting to not be murdered by someone so beautiful, but when the woman looks at her again she has a softer expression. Not a smile exactly, but Elide doesn’t think she’s going to be sliced into anymore.

“I’m sure just the air in her makes me feel as if I’m going to have to go to the hospital for lung cancer,” She looks back out the window when she says,”Give me what you’d risk your life eating here.”

Elide is sure she’d eat anything but the French fries, and the blonde female sitting in booth five didn’t seem like she ain’t those often. She goes to the order shelf and puts in a order for French fries, hoping the woman doesn’t want actual food. Of course, she came here there’s no way she wanted food. So what is the reason that someone with perfectly toned blonde air and what looked like a very expensive watch doing sitting in this place?

~~~~~~

The plate of very greasy fries comes out in a just a few minutes, and Elide didn’t realize that she should have prepared herself for having to interact with the blonde again. Elide has known for a while that women have been as much as an interest as men for her, but after dating one of her cousin’s boyfriend’s friends she hasn’t been interested in anyone. Until now apparently. She didn’t know what is was, well she knew she was undoubtedly hot, but the combination of grace and violence made her antsy, in a good way.

“Here you go,” Elide sets the plate down, hoping she doesn’t drop it as she dropped her note pad. She didn’t want to get yelled at by Cook either. The woman looked at the plate and smiled. Elide almost collapsed. “Thank you,” She says turning the smile toward her, “Join me? I can’t eat all of this by myself.”

Was she flirting?

“Oh, I shouldn’t, I have other tables,” Even she didn’t believe that, with just a glance around the blonde could see that she was only one of three people in the restaurant. “You know what, sure.”

“My name is Manon,” Manon says and smirks while biting into a fry.

Shit.

~~~~~~

Elide had never wanted to stay, or go, to her shitty place of work until Manon started to stay at the place until closing every time she came in, and now she wanted to go every time her shift came around again. Walking down the street, she was just leaving her internship at the capitol when she ran into someone with very hot coffee.

“Oh, shit, watch it,” Elide whispers and looks down at one of her very precious, very expensive blouses she wears only to her internship. Much like her cousin, Aelin, she had been interested in how their country works since she was little. Before everything had happened, when she, Aelin, and Aedion were still little, they would play kingdom. Aelin the Queen, Aedion the Warrior, and Little Elide the Lady. Throughout the years her and Aelin decided politics was the best career choice for them, so they both went and got degrees in Political Science.

“Well, you- Elide?” She looks up to see the one person she was thinking about. “Manon, hi.”

Hi?

Manon’s lips turn up at the corners, and Elide blushes like the love-sick puppy she is.

“Hi, I didn’t mean to bathe you in my coffee, but you weren’t looking either,” Manon says still looking at Elide in a way that makes her think she won’t be able to talk right. “Oh, yeah, I was just thinking about y- my internship.”

Dumbass.

“Where do you intern?” Manon asks, tilting her head. The last thing Elide needed right now was for Manon to look... like she does. Elide has been thinking about this woman non stop since she met her. Which she should stop. It’s making her life an inconvenience.

“The capitol. Me and my cousin are interning with senators,” she has never in her life felt stupid, and usually, people don’t think she is, but Manon was so much. Her shoes cost more than Elide’s entire closet. And she’s never seen her wear the same ones.

“You want to be a politician?”

“Maybe, but I would rather work press or something. My cousin is the more controlling one.”

“Well, next time I see you I’ll pay you for the dry cleaning,” Then she’s off, walking away before Elide can refuse the money.

~~~~~ It’s a few weeks later, and her and Manon had argued a few times over the money she kept trying to give her.

“I owe you,” She says, thrusting money towards her.

“No, you don’t. It was a mistake,” Elide says waving the money away.

She had even tried to put it as her tip. Manon was persistent. Elide couldn’t figure her out. She would come in a 2 A. M. completely dressed in brands Elide probably couldn’t even pronounce. The real question was why come to a shitty dinner when you could just Postmates lobster bisque to your house?

“I never asked. What do you do?” Elsie’s was sitting in a booth with Manon eating French fries when she asked. Manon stills for a second before taking a bite of the fry she was holding.

“I smuggle drugs for my grandmother. I also own a tattoo shop with my friends,” Manon says as if she didn’t just admit to a felony. Elide doesn’t know what to make of what she just learned. She could be joking, but Manon’s face always changes when she kidding, and her face didn’t move. That doesn’t mean anything she could be trying to trick her. So elide decides to go with it.

“You don’t strike me as a professional criminal,” Elide says keeping her face neutral.

“That’s what makes me so good at it,” Manon finally breaks as her face morphs into the smirk that makes Elide shiver. Elide wouldn’t have known what she would do if Manon really was a drug runner. She very well could be with her clothes, and demeanor, and money she clearly has.

Elide laughs, and they move on and talk about Elide’s internship. At one Elide get Manon to admit what her tattoo shop is called, and she makes a vow to stop by. Aelin has been wanting a tattoo and that could be a great excuse.

~~~~~

It wasn’t until a few weeks later that Elide finally grew the balls to go by Manon’s store. Aelin refused to go because apparently she didn’t want to get a tattoo by someone who showed up at Elide’s diner at 2 in the morning. Makes sense.

Elide walks in and sees no one in the waiting room or by the reception desk. She walks towards the curtain about to call out Manon’s name when she hears a a voice. Elide knows she should just turn around and leave, but she’s always been nosy.

“The clients want their supply. We can’t just ignore the problem we have.”

“If we just killed the Yellowlegs we wouldn’t have a problem.”

Elide can’t tell if they actually mean murder or is that’s just a hyperbole for dealing with them. But the thought is still there: what if Manon really did deal drugs?

The voice attached to the very person she’s thinking of pop in, “We can’t kill them. Not now, anyway. There’s to many eyes on all of us right now for an entire sixty people to go missing. Killing them is the last resort,” The voice doesn’t sound like the one she’s been talking to four nights a week. This one is cold, dangerous, and deadly. This one would deal drugs and kill people.

Oh, shit. Shit, shit, shit. Holy shit.

Manon wasn’t kidding when she said she smuggled drugs. She actually smuggles drugs.

Why has she been talking to me? Does she think I’m connected to these Yellowlegs people? Is she going to kill me soon for knowing?

Elide gasps and suddenly realized she needs to get the fuck out of there when the talking stops. She turns around and doesn’t bother being quiet when she slams the door open and sprints. She can’t run as fast as she wished she could with her ankle, but she damn well can get far enough away to get to civilization and disappear in a crowd. She hears the door to the shop hit the wall again and someone running after her. The footsteps close in fast, and she realizes just how much she underestimated the drug runners ability to run.

The person behind her grabs her arm and slams her hard in the building next her. She closes her eyes against the impact.

“Whoever you are, you better have an explanation for why you were in my shop,” Manon says right into her ear. Elide decides she’s probably going to die anyway and thinks to hell with being demure and says, “I came for a tattoo, but now that I’ve seen how you treat your costumers I’m going to give you zero stars on Yelp.”

Manon turns her around most likely recognizing your voice and just stares at her for awhile. Elide crosses her arms and waits not wanting to completely aggravate the murderous drug dealer.

“Well, it would be only fair for me to then report that diner for being shitty,” Manon says relaxing her body and smiles as if pretending she wasn’t just talking about mass murder. Elide uncrosses her arms and looks sideways thinking about if it was worth it to try to run. Manon motives and says, “Don’t, Elide.”

Elide doesn’t know what to do except stay still. Manon doesn’t y’all for a while and just stares at her more. Elide starts to fidget. She doesn’t know what she even came. Manon has never really shown interest in her, maybe she just wanted to get away from the luxury.

“If you’re going to kill me can you do it fast?” Elide says and Manon looks genuinely shocked.

“I’m not going to kill you,” Manon says.

“Why not?” Elide should really stop.

“Because you... you already know what I do,” Manon looks down at her hands as if embarrassed.

“I thought you were joking! I didn’t actually think you dealt drugs, for God’s sake, Manon!” Elide lost it at that point. Throwing her hands, yelling, pointing.

“Well, I wasn’t,” Manon says looking at her with the same expression she had when she looked down at her hands. She looks kinda... scared. As if Elide was going to kill her.

“Oh, really? No shit!” She should stop yelling.

Manon flinches at her tone and that gets Elide calm down. Elide starts fidgeting again until she quietly asks, “Why?”

Manon answers knowing what she meant. “The first night I came in I just wanted quiet. This other... gang took our supply that day. Everyone had been arguing and I was down listening so I started walking till I found your diner. You came out with that plate of just French fries and figured you would be good company. Then I found out you were connected to the government so I backed off. I didn’t want you to worry about having to protect me while also keeping the career you’re working toward.”

Elide doesn’t really know what to do with that. Of course her career would make this complicated, but there should be nothing to complicate. But Manon said she backed off. Did that mean she really was flirting for a while?

“Okay,” Elide says.

“Okay?” The other woman said back, “I’m sorry I’ve made this so complicated.”

Elide snorts. Complicated is one way to put this. “So you like me? You’re interested?” Elide asks finally just wanting a full, blunt answer.

Manon smiles and says, “Yes, I was going to ask you out the night I ran into you, but with you working with in the government... well, again it complicates things.”

Elide nods. She never really believed this woman would ever be interested in her sexually, let alone romantically, but she is. And Elide is still interested even though she isn’t sure what that says about her character. Manon was talking about killing people, she deals drugs, but she is still disappointed that she was never asked on that date.

“So... if I said it wasn’t a complication for me would you still ask?” Elide looks up at her as Manon’s small smile turns into a grin.

“Well, that depends...” Manon steps closer.

Elide smiles now too, “On what?”

Manon gets into her personal space, and Elide now has to look up to see her eyes. “Would you say yes?” Manon is basically kissing her now.

“Yes,” Elide breathes and fills the small distance between their lips.

Elide knows that this is going to be hard, but she can’t bring herself to care. She never knew how much she likes complicated until this moment.

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@cosmicrhetoric I feel like you would want to see this too.

P.S. don’t do drugs

#malide #tog #the thirteen tog #manon blackbeak #sjmaas #elide lochan #mentions elorcan #manon x asterin #gang au

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yoolee · 7 years ago

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If lee wrote otome | #2 - Boss

The Heroine (MC)

CEO MC: Never gets enough sleep, which makes her sarcastic but is also semi her own fault given the amount of caffeine she consumes. Sort of obsessive about long-term planning, unwaveringly believes that a company’s value comes from its employees and will choose them over shareholder dividends every time. Determined to run an ethical company even if it means it’s not the most profitable company. Super duper Type A – aggressive and fearless because she has to be. Sometimes really just wants a cupcake in her hand and a cat in her lap, but then she’s bored and goes back to business planning. Creative risk-taker, decent negotiator. Smart enough to know where she needs help and hire people who can do the things she can’t (or, more to the point, doesn’t want to do). Gets back up every time. Will definitely fight you. Might feel bad about it later but only if someone reminds her it happened.

Love Interests

The BARISTA: Peppy, optimist (or so MC thinks) but it turns out they actually switch up their personality depending on who they’re serving (sometimes they are the chill, hipster philosopher, sometimes they are the rude New York get-it-done eye roller, etc.) actually somewhere in the middle of it all – but really IS an optimist despite themselves. Kind of slippery and hard to pin down. Big family, used to being what their other siblings/parents need from them. Fairly certain CEO MC is headed for an early heart attack with the amount of espresso she imbibes. Probably an author. Maybe an ex-broadway personjust because. IDK.

The PR LAWYER: Worked-three-jobs-put-self-through-college story. Patience, tact, good at calming people down. Detail oriented, a little fussy about appearances. Perennially exasperated by CEO (Please don’t promise to have a cure for cancer In the next three years with no data to back it up. No, you can’t punch the reporter for being a dick. Look, I know you WANT to donate 100% of proceeds to charity but please pick a friendlier one than ‘punch reporters in the face foundation’ that’s not gonna fly) never gets enough sleep. Has a key to MC’s house so they can come yell at her for making their life difficult at whatever hour of the night she insists on doing so. Is on MC’s speed-dial, which means they also get called to DD, though they’d rather not.

FLAKY MODEL(s?): Trust fund kid? Pretty face? Floats through life? The sort of person who will get on the wrong subway train and then just ride it all day people-watching never mind that they had an appointment six hours ago. Pose with a boa constrictor? Sure, as long as it’s being treated humanely. Tarantula on the face? Awwww, it’s fuzzyyyyy. No filter, no worries. Probably drags CEO MC along on a Caribbean shoot and PR Lawyer has to call and yell because that does not look good, okay? And poor MC is like, I thought we were getting a drink and model is like WE ARE we are getting tropical coconut water from the SOURCE here oh wait I don’t know how to drink out of a coconut…who knows why they are attracted to CEO MC, probably because she’s there and sticks around and no one else does. Human puppy dog.

CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD: young hotshot venture capitalist, thinks CEO MC is a bleeding heart (your employees do not need that many sick days, lost productivity blah blah blah why do we need a daycare onsite that’s a waste of shareholder money), kind of a math whiz, naturally lucky, doesn’t get along with family (gambling problem in the fam – which manifests in him in investment risks and unresolved issues) butts heads constantly with MC, frequently tries to get her fired – in part because his attempts to do so get her fired up and she does great things, which ultimately is better for the company than when she’s just doing her normal ‘good’ job. She is going to be royally ticked when she figures that out. Manipulative, but relatively benign under it all. The sort of person who smirks instead of smiles. All the time.

CHEF FROM HER FAVORITE RESTAURANT: Also a CEO though on smaller scale, because, running a restaurant IS running a business. Probably under the impression CEO MC is actually like, a graduate student with no money because she tends to get takeout at weird hours. Gruff, grumpy, abrupt, but heart of gold. Basically—will grumble about you coming in late but will add extra veggies to your pasta because you’re looking a little pale and need the nutrients and if you call them on it will snarl that they had to be used up they were going bad and he wasn’t going to waste extra, expensive, PROTEIN on you. (MC asks them out and then realizes the only nice restaurant she knows is the one the chef owns)

PRESCHOOL TEACHER: JUST A DECENTLY NICE PERSON. Checks in to make sure MC has eaten regularly, staying hydrated, needs anything fixed around the house (she can do her own plumbing but doesn’t like the electrical and hey it’s nice to have company). Good with kids. Maybe divorced and wanted them but ex-spouse didn’t? idk. Calm, not easily ruffled, sweet as pie, except when he’s playing video games and suddenly MC understands how he can get through the day without any aggression – he unleashes it on fictional zombies. Blissfully normal, all things considered.

PERSONAL TRAINER: “fine, whatever, EAT THE DANG CHEESE if you’re just going to ignore my nutritional advice we’re doing ten more reps” athletic, happiest when DOING versus saying or reading or sitting. Not as impulsive as you’d guess at first glance, because they tend to use working out as a meditative time to make decisions. Didn’t finish college because they realized they just didn’t enjoy it, but they did enjoy working with student athletes, which is how they got into training. Enviably fit. Wants to expand the gym so wheedles business advice out of MC in exchange for not harassing her about her tendency to drink coffee instead of water (she insists it has water IN it, it should count) not particularly intimidated by her, which is a pleasant change of pace.

Supporting Cast (non LIs)

ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT: Keeps MC sane, has her back, schedules everything. Good at details, even better at smiling at angry people and making them not-angry through sheer force of sunny personality (actually a ruse, MC is convinced she’s actually the most delightfully evil person ever, but like some kind of fairy tale where when you acknowledge the thing it goes away, refuses to ever dive into figuring out). Older than the MC because we need to stop making middle aged women invisible in stories?? Sometimes has to remind MC of how much she does by holding silent protests (in part why MC thinks she is secretly a supervillain in the making) which are always, always successful.

PARENT COMPANY ADMIN ASSISTANT: Bane of MC’s existence. Smarmy, smily pain in the tush.

CFO: We have put in an official request with the company credit card management to start declining purchases at that coffee shop you go to, no this is not negotiable, it’s not in the budget anymore drink so darn water woman. Completely willing to go toe-to-toe with MC, meetings often involve a lot of yelling, but they’re always productive and no hard feelings.

CIO: Serpent-y, but not in a bad way. Just a very cool-tempered person, very contained, very guarded, very introverted. Never happy when she has to do presentations, so super willing to share knowledge with MC so she does it instead (she is not a great teacher, kind of judgey and shows her frustration when MC doesn’t ‘get’ it right away, but very brilliant, and there’s no malice in the judgement, just no filter). Extremely logic-oriented and process-oriented over people-oriented. Picks up and assess tech very quickly, and good at finding affordable, fast solutions.

RANDOM MARKETING EMPLOYEE: Set up to be a villain but is actually like gung-ho on MC’s side. Literally an ex pageant queen, went to college on scholarship from it. Out of the workforce for awhile as a stay at home mom when her kids were young, but picks up the new trends fast. Now a single mother, so will literally fight the chairman if he tries to take away the company daycare. Some days uses the ‘people see a pretty face and assume no brain’ to her advantage, some days it wears her out. Unofficially drinking buddy with MC, even though they both feel weird about it given the fact MC is technically boss’s boss’s boss.

BARTENDER: also an ex-girlfriend maybe? Current best friend? Who she turns to when the barista cuts her off from coffee and the chef’s restaurant is already closed. Sharp-tongued, bristly, generally disgusted with MC’s six inch heels and slacks in her leather-jacket, cigar smoke bar. Like lady, you’re lost. Probably on the mob payroll at some point in her life.

ROUTE PLOTS:

(Chairman route?) MERGER – company has just bought another company, which is a major risk move for CEO (can only be one, so do you keep the old one on as a VP? Do you let them go? Will they be bitter/try to sabotage you?) you have to fend off internal sabotage, get everything running smoothly without either company falling apart in the process.

(PR Lawyer route?) Parent company did something massively shady and it’s tainting your company’s name too, so you have to scrounge to avoid having to fire half your employees and keep the company alive.

(Model route?) New product launch – hence why models are entering the picture. It’s a new business venture in the sense it’s targeted at a completely new audience your company hasn’t catered to before.

(Personal Trainer route?) Company is in its infancy, hugely risky time, and you’re doing everything you can to ensure it’s a success (maybe including putting your own salary back into it, which means you can’t afford PT so they agree to work with you as long as you give them business advice)

FROM @han-pan- they keep trying to buy new retail space for the gym and MC keeps buying it instead because it’s SUCH GOOD PROPERTY and they sort of exasperatedly are like ugh fine whatever you owe me since you keep swiping prime spots out from under my nose

See the rest here

#if lee wrote otome

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sinceileftyoublog · 6 years ago

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Amanda Palmer Interview: There Should Be No Misinterpretation

Photo by Kahn & Selesnick

BY JORDAN MAINZER

“No one’s gonna tie surprise balloons / Onto your desk at work / And no one’s gonna ask how you’re doing,” Amanda Palmer sings on “Voicemail for Jill”, a standout track on her new album There Will Be No Intermission. She’s talking to a friend about an abortion, something you think may be the case throughout the song but that’s--importantly--revealed explicitly at the end. As someone who has had three abortions herself, Palmer didn’t wish to steep the subject in wink-and-nod metaphor or any sort of ambiguity. Let’s just talk about it, she’s arguing.

This lack of grey area exemplifies the album as a whole, a stark affair consisting of mostly Palmer and piano, alternating between long, but structured tales and instrumental interludes. The subject matter of the songs isn’t necessarily tragic, if something has to achieve a certain level of rarity to be considered tragic. Rather, they’re common even if not part of every life--miscarriages, cancer, and abortions--and as such deserve to have their stigmas eliminated, something Palmer helped to do the best way she knew how: by writing songs. Likewise, the live tour accompanying the record will be similarly minimal, Palmer’s voice and a couple instruments the vessels for telling vital stories.

Last month, I interviewed Palmer over the phone (in preview of her show at the Chicago Theatre next Friday). In addition to talking about Intermission and “Voicemail for Jill”, she spoke about working with John Congleton and crowdfunding using Patreon. Read our conversation below, edited for length and clarity.

Since I Left You: How is the new record unique as compared to anything else you’ve ever released?

Amanda Palmer: It’s the most direct, for sure. [laughs] There’s not a whole lot of room for interpretation or misinterpretation, although I’m sure there will be plenty of people out there who try to misinterpret it. It’s about as forthright as my songwriting has ever gotten, and it’s certainly the most therapeutic record I’ve ever made. I’ve made some therapeutic records, but this one takes the cake.

SILY: Would you say that whatever ambiguity there is, it might lie in the perspective from which you’re singing?

AP: You know, I don’t know. I always think my songs are easier to figure out than other people do. A lot of these songs are just very direct storytelling. They don’t leave a whole ton up to the imagination. And that’s really deliberate. I didn’t want to couch these experiences in a whole lot of metaphor for a reason. It felt like I could do a better service to the world and to the sorts of people who will probably listen to my music who are already collected if I didn’t take the easy way out and didn’t decorate these subjects. That’s reflected in the record cover. It’s a very blunt, naked record.

SILY: That doesn’t mean that you can’t toy with different modes of storytelling. A song like “Voicemail for Jill” has that very explicit reveal in the end about the abortion shower. Do you think you were still able to change up the way you told the stories?

AP: That’s such a great question because I struggled for so, so many years trying to figure out how to write about abortion. The place I would always get really tripped up when trying to sit down to write about that subject was I just couldn’t figure out who was talking. For a subject as dicey and as personal as abortion that’s at once completely intimate and heavily political, I just couldn’t find a voice who was inarguable. I needed to somehow find that. It took me a really, really long time, and I always had a pot on the back-burner of my songwriting brain trying to figure out how to write a really, good, solid, unsentimental abortion song. Interestingly enough, it was finally landing on a perspective that worked for such a powerful and obvious reason, which we’re seeing reflected in all of the movements that are springing up right now, which is a woman telling the truth to another woman. Shamelessly.

SILY: A line that sort of sticks out to me--and maybe it’s no coincidence it becomes at the beginning of the record--is, “Isn’t it nice when we’re all afraid at the same time?” Is that solidarity in fear a very important theme of the record?

AP: I think that’s a question for you. [laughs] I think that’s why we make art. We don’t want to feel alone. That’s why we make it and why we listen to it and look at it. It’s why we continue to need it. Art does something that nothing else can really do. It doesn’t matter how educated you are. It doesn’t matter what your human experiences have been. It doesn’t matter what you believe. There’s this incredible core truth that art can bypass all of these systems and give a shared human experience that nothing else can give us. This record for me feels like my most direct contribution to that pile of stuff.

SILY: I want to switch gears to the structure of the record. It switches between stories and interludes, or short instrumental bits. The title was named after one of these instrumentals. Obviously, people are going to concentrate more on the words of the longer songs. But what’s the importance of the shorter, in-between tracks to you?

AP: They’re strategic breaks so that you can get more wine and Kleenex. [laughs] They’re there to give you a breather and also thread the record together so it feels like one album instead of a bunch of random fragments.

SILY: Is this the second album you’ve crowdfunded?

AP: Kind of. It’s interesting. Nobody has said that before. This record wasn’t really crowdfunded. You can look at it either way. It was either entirely crowdfunded because my entire life right now is crowdfunded, or it wasn’t because I didn’t use Kickstarter and I didn’t raise funds for this one standalone album. I’m using Patreon now, so everything in my life is crowdfunded from the album to the salary that I pay my assistant to the bananas I bought this morning for my kid. It’s all crowdfunded. And I love it that way. My audience has put in an immense amount of trust in me, and I pick my Patreon salary every month and spend it on the entire work of my life, which is the cost of this album and a huge studio in L.A. and a string section and producer and the mastering and the artwork. It’s endless. There has never been less of a beginning and end as far as that kind of stuff is concerned. My art and life and business has achieved a complete figure 8. I love it. It’s working beautifully.

SILY: It’s almost a model for other people to follow themselves if they see it working for you.

AP: Yeah, they are slowly, but I’m still an early adopter, and I’m also a weird kind of unicorn because I really deeply love being in constant touch with my audience. I love sharing my process. I love having very few boundaries between my so-called personal life and my work. And that makes it much easier for me to jump the crowdfunding hurdle. It doesn’t mean that it’s impossible for very very private artists to stand up and say, “I’m fucking sick of the major label system; all I want to do is put out a record every five years. Will you promise to contribute 25 bucks every time that happens?” The PJ Harveys and the Jeff Mangums of the world are perfectly capable of doing that and would probably be showered with hundreds of thousands of dollars. But there’s still a real emotional stigma around the idea of going directly to your audience instead of going up to the head office of a label.

SILY: Is this your second record working with John Congleton?

AP: Yeah. He’s my soul brother. There was nobody else I wanted to make this record with.

SILY: What does he bring to your creative process that’s unique and continues to help you grow?

AP: He brought two essential things to this record--and I’m so glad you asked, because you’re the first journalist who’s asked about John, and he deserves a lot of credit for this record. First of all, he and I have a rapport personally with one another which was an essential ingredient of an ability to go into a studio, sit behind a piano, and do this kind of material. There was no fucking way I was going to go into a studio and do this with a stranger. I had to be with a friend. It was just a non-starter. And John and I haven’t just worked together--we’ve worked together and have become friends. That was important. I needed to go in that studio and feel completely safe. To cry, to be frustrated, to feel completely un-self-conscious. I knew John could allow me that space and help create a harbor that I could dock in and do whatever it was I needed to get wherever I needed to get to make an album this honest. It's important to point out that there was nobody else in the studio. There wasn’t an assistant engineer. We locked the doors. It was just me and him. And mics and instruments. Later, we had lots of people coming in and doing overdubs, but when we were doing basic tracks, it was a lockout.

The other thing was everything added to the record beyond the basic tracks. John and I had a really strategic, deliberate approach to how we wanted this record to sound. I have made records with full orchestration, full 30-piece orchestra with strings sections, full bands, full kicks, full everything. And I’ve also made a bunch of music with the Dresden Dolls. I’ve experienced the whole spectrum at this point of what you can and can’t do when you’re starting with a piano song. John and I discussed this over email and over the phone for a year. What we agreed on was that the album needed extra ornamentation, but it needed to be extremely minimal and it needed to have rules. We were going to create that set of rules and then stick to them like our lives depended on it. The rules were: No band, no strings, anything else goes. I trusted John. He hired Max Henry from the band Suuns from Montreal to fly out to L.A. to experiment with me in the studio to program and create extra sounds. My really good friend Jherek Bischoff, who orchestrated the last record, came in and did really minimal upright bass overdubs. We prepared the piano and he created all of those intermissions. That was it. And there was one other, Joey Waronker who played drums for about 25 seconds. He was off tour for two days and was like, “Sure, I’ll play drums.” Jason Webley played some accordion on “Mother’s Confession”. That was it. If you’re a music geek and really care about production, all of our choices in terms of the overdubs or adding extra vocals were super careful and very deliberate. Anything that didn’t support the story was jettisoned. We ended up leaving a lot on the cutting room floor. We were trying to leave with the most tasteful, minimal sound we could achieve.

SILY: How are you adapting this album to the live stage?

AP: Solo. [laughs] It’s just me, a piano, and a ukulele, and that’s it. There’s no support. No special guests. I’m not fucking around on this tour. I’m just getting on stage and delivering a really meticulous, powerful show.

SILY: Do you find it weird doing that in big theaters?

AP: Well, I have to do that in big theaters because even though I would probably prefer to do this in 300-seat clubs, I don’t want to tour this record for 5 years. I can sell about 2,000 tickets per city. Unless I wanted to tour this record every night in every city for 8 nights, I needed to play large theaters. But they’re not so large that they can’t feel intimate. I think it’s gonna work. And that’s part of the challenge. It’s a lot easier to play to a room of 300 people and make it feel totally fucking real. It’s harder to do when you’ve got 2,000 souls in a room. I think I’ve figured it out. Check back in with me in a couple months.

SILY: You’re playing the Chicago Theatre on your tour, and I think it definitely fits that description.

AP: Yeah. And you know, I watched Nick Cave play Skeleton Tree to a room of, I don’t know, 7000 people in Sydney. And he pulled that off. And I thought, “If he can pull that off, I can pull this off.”

SILY: Do you have a favorite song on the new record?

AP: Yeah, I think I do, but I think it’s gonna keep changing. [laughs] Right now it’s “Voicemail for Jill” because I’m putting it out tomorrow. I’m surrounded by it. I’m really really attached to and proud of all of the material on this record in a way that I never have been before. Unabashedly. But this song and what it means and what it says, it’s like if you held a gun to my head and said, “Okay, you can put out only one of these in the world,” that’s the one I would pick. As a survivor, that’s what I would stick in the life raft when escaping from a sinking Titanic. That’s the song that may help and heal the greatest number of people. That’s the one I’d give my organs to.

#amanda palmer #interviews #Kahn & Selesnick #john congleton #max henry #jason webley #chicago theatre #there will be no intermission #kickstarter #patreon #pj harvey #jeff mangum #the dresden dolls #suuns #Jherek Bischoff #joey waronker #nick cave #skeleton tree

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simple-girl-of-huge-imagination · 8 years ago

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The kid of Mars – chapter 66 - Selfish

When they returned home Jared immediately left Ricky in Shannon’s care and ran to Catherine’s office, where his brother said she could be found. He was feeling more nervous that he would have liked to admit but after some deep breaths and mentally repeating the speech he wanted to deliver he knocked.

“Come in.” He sighed in relief when listened to Catherine’s voice. He opened the door and quietly stepped inside. They stared at each other for a couple of seconds until Catherine broke the silence. “I’m so sorry Jared. I didn’t mean to say those things. It’s must be the hormones…Not that I’m trying to excuse myself” Jared wasn’t expecting that response however he walked to her, pulled the woman of his life into his arms and deeply kissed her. “I’ll forgive you if you forgive me. I’ve been acting like an overprotective maniac in the last couple of weeks.” He interrupted the kiss to say. “All you have been doing is understandable. All I said was selfish and stupid…” Catherine had reflected during the afternoon and came to the conclusion she couldn’t expect any other behavior from a guy who had been under the amount of pressure Jared did. “It’s everything ok now. Let’s not talk about this any longer.” He decided to end the conversation. “I already made a reservation for both of us in a restaurant, tonight will be just for the two of us. We have some make up to do.” Catherine stared at him in confusion. She wasn’t expecting that invitation at all. “What about Ricky? Did everything went fine at the doctor?” She had forgotten to ask and was once again feeling like a selfish bitch. “He’s still doing fine. Shannon will look after him tonight. Now we’re both gonna stop worrying about stuff, you’ll get ready and we’re going to have an unforgettable night.”

Later in the evening they were both arriving at the restaurant. Catherine was wearing a beautiful dress she had bought a couple of days ago. Jared behaved like a true gentleman, opened the car’s door to her, helped her stepping out and walked by her side, always with a hand on her waist. “Look Jared. They’ll annoy us…” Catherine warned him when spotted some paparazzi near the restaurant entrance. “Just ignore them.” He advised as he pushed her even closer to him. As he did so they were immediately attacked by what felt like millions of camera flashes. “Jared, is your son better. Does he have cancer? How sick is he? What about your girlfriend and her pregnancy? Is it a boy or a girl?” They were bombed by questions regarding Ricky’s health and Catherine’s pregnancy. They faced that scenario every time they got caught by paparazzi, but their mouth always remained close. “Is it true you conceived the baby so your son can have a transplant?” Jared was almost reaching his destination when stopped, shocked by that question. “What the fuck? That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard.” He answered while looking at the paparazzi. The others used that chance to also surround him and make more questions he couldn’t even understand. “Jared, please let’s get out of here.” Catherine begged him, holding his hand. Her words kind of brought him back to reality and they resumed their way to the restaurant.

“Don’t you think you should say something to the press?” Catherine asked him when they were already comfortably installed at their dinner table. “They won’t stop bothering us every chance they get. The more we tell, the more they want to know…They will keep making up stories.” Jared tried to explain his point of view. He clearly got a little shaken by that particular question. “But there are some respectable media that have been asking for interviews. Actually, I wanted to ask your opinion on that…” He looked at Catherine, some apprehensiveness in his big blue eyes. “You’re the professional celebrity in here. I know nothing about it.” She joked, making him line out a smile too. “I can’t just confirm your pregnancy without your consent. You’re one of the most important people in my life and the mother of my baby. You’re like a mother to Ricky. Your opinion matters.” She got all shy with his declaration. “If that’s your wish you can talk about the pregnancy. It isn’t like we can hide it..” She caressed her belly as she said so. It was already pretty clear something was going on in there. “Are you going to talk about Rick too?” She knew it was a very hard topic for him to talk about. “Maybe. But I won’t go into details, just tell what it’s going on. I’ve been also planning a kind of campaign to raise awareness and maybe collect some funds to help other kids, so maybe an interview will help.” That was the first time he was talking about his plans. “I’ll need your help. Can I count on you?” He asked her. Catherine was one of the few people he could trust such a personal project with. “It’ll be my absolute pleasure. That’s a very sweet and brave thing to do.” She smiled at him and held his hand above the table. The waitress choose that moment to bring the dishes. She was clearly trying to grab Jared’s attention but he only had eyes for the brunet sat in front of him. “Enough talk about these things tonight. Let’s eat so I can show you the plans for the rest of the night.” He immediately suggested the moment they became alone.

He kept acting like a true gentleman for the rest of the night to the point of getting Catherine a little bit suspicious. Usually by that time, whenever they went on romantic dinners, his hands had already traveled to all the suggestive places in her body. They had their meal, Jared not once complained about her not so healthy food choices. “Far from me to deny a wish from a pregnant woman.” Was all he said with a smile when she teased him about it. Quickly enough they finished dessert and Catherine had to excuse herself to the bathroom while Jared payed the bill. She was composing her dress when Jared surprised her and walked in. She didn’t had the time to ask him what he was doing there, since he immediately pulled her for a kiss. Their kissing was very passionate and he couldn’t stop thinking of how good she felt in his arms. They paused for a moment so he could place her up on the counter, just to resume their kissing session. Eventually she started feeling her heart rate increase and his manhood stiffening in his pants. He moved his hand up and down her neck, her back and then moved them down to her ass, what he could conclude she enjoyed taking into consideration her moans.

“I can’t wait to have you naked on bed.” Jared said, when they finally broke the kiss. “Let’s go then. Unless you want to do it in a restaurant toilet.” She chuckled at her own suggestion. “You deserve better than that. But you can be sure that I’ve struggled to contain myself during dinner.” He grabbed her by the hand and led both of them out of the restroom. Some lady gave them judgmental looks “She’s pregnant, I had to check on her.” Jared innocently replied as they left. By then Catherine already knew he was going to make it up for the last couple of weeks.

#Jared Leto Fanfic #jared leto fanfiction #jared leto fan fic #jared leto fiction #The Kid of Mars #30 seconds to mars fanfic #30 seconds to mars fanfiction #30stm fic #30 seconds to mars fic #thirty seconds to mars fanfic #thirty seconds to mars fanfiction #thirty seconds to mars fan fic

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airoasis · 5 years ago

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My son was a Columbine shooter. This is my story | Sue Klebold

New Post has been published on https://hititem.kr/my-son-was-a-columbine-shooter-this-is-my-story-sue-klebold-10/

My son was a Columbine shooter. This is my story | Sue Klebold

The final time I heard my son’s voice was once when he walked out the entrance door on his technique to college. He known as out one phrase in the darkness: "Bye." It was once April 20, 1999. Later that morning, at Columbine high university, my son Dylan and his buddy Eric killed 12 pupils and a trainer and wounded more than 20 others before taking their own lives. 13 harmless humans were killed, leaving their adored ones in a state of grief and trauma. Others sustained injuries, some resulting in disfigurement and permanent incapacity. However the enormity of the tragedy cannot be measured handiest by means of the quantity of deaths and injuries that took situation. There is no approach to quantify the psychological injury of people who had been in the tuition, or who took phase in rescue or cleanup efforts.There’s no technique to assess the magnitude of a tragedy like Columbine, primarily when it may be a blueprint for other shooters who go on to commit atrocities of their possess. Columbine was once a tidal wave, and when the crash ended, it would take years for the neighborhood and for society to appreciate its impact. It has taken me years to take a look at to take delivery of my son’s legacy. The merciless behavior that defined the tip of his life confirmed me that he was a utterly exclusive man or woman from the one I knew. Afterwards folks requested, "How would you not be aware of? What variety of a mom have been you?" I nonetheless ask myself those same questions.Before the shootings, I notion of myself as a just right mom. Helping my kids turn out to be caring, healthful, responsible adults used to be the most important role of my life. But the tragedy satisfied me that I failed as a father or mother, and it’s partly this experience of failure that brings me here today. Except his father, I was once the one man or woman who knew and adored Dylan probably the most. If anybody might have known what was taking place, it should had been me, correct? However I didn’t recognize. In these days, i’m right here to share the experience of what it can be prefer to be the mother of any individual who kills and hurts.For years after the tragedy, I combed by way of memories, making an attempt to figure out precisely the place I failed as a mum or dad. But there are not any simple answers. I are not able to give you any solutions. All i will be able to do is share what i’ve discovered. Once I speak to humans who did not recognize me before the shootings, i have three challenges to fulfill. First, after I walk right into a room like this, I certainly not be aware of if someone there has experienced loss because of what my son did. I believe a need to renowned the struggling brought on via a member of my family who is not here to do it for himself. So first, with all of my heart, i’m sorry if my son has prompted you discomfort. The 2d mission i’ve is that I must ask for figuring out and even compassion after I talk about my son’s death as a suicide. Two years before he died, he wrote on a section of paper in a pocket book that he was chopping himself. He stated that he was in discomfort and desired to get a gun so he could end his lifestyles.I did not learn about any of this until months after his dying. When I talk about his loss of life as a suicide, i’m not looking to downplay the viciousness he showed at the end of his existence. I am looking to realise how his suicidal pondering ended in homicide. After a number of reading and talking with gurus, i’ve come to consider that his involvement in the shootings used to be rooted not in his desire to kill but in his want to die.The 0.33 project i have when I talk about my son’s murder-suicide is that i’m speakme about mental wellness — excuse me — is that i’m talking about intellectual wellbeing, or mind well being, as I prefer to name it, on the grounds that it can be extra concrete. And within the identical breath, i am talking about violence. The final factor I want to do is to make a contribution to the misconception that already exists round mental illness. Most effective an extraordinarily small percentage of people who have a intellectual sickness are violent toward other persons, but of folks that die by means of suicide, it’s estimated that about 75 to maybe more than 90 percentage have a diagnosable mental well being situation of some form. As you all be aware of very well, our intellectual wellbeing care approach shouldn’t be geared up to support each person, and no longer everybody with damaging ideas suits the factors for a distinct prognosis.Many who’ve ongoing feelings of worry or anger or hopelessness are not ever assessed or treated. Too most often, they get our concentration provided that they reach a behavioral difficulty. If estimates are right that about one to 2 percentage of all suicides entails the homicide of an extra man or woman, when suicide charges upward thrust, as they are rising for some populations, the murder-suicide premiums will upward push as well. I wanted to realise what used to be occurring in Dylan’s intellect previous to his loss of life, so I looked for solutions from different survivors of suicide loss. I did research and volunteered to support with fund-raising routine, and each time I would, I talked with individuals who had survived their possess suicidal situation or try. One of the crucial useful conversations I had was once with a coworker who overheard me talking to any one else in my administrative center cubicle. She heard me say that Dylan would now not have adored me if he would do something as horrible as he did.Later, when she observed me by myself, she apologized for overhearing that conversation, but informed me that I was once incorrect. She stated that after she was once a younger, single mother with three small children, she became severely depressed and was once hospitalized to keep her trustworthy. At the time, she was designated that her children could be if she died, so she had made a plan to finish her life. She assured me that a mother’s love was once the strongest bond in the world, and that she loved her children greater than some thing on the earth, however considering of her sickness, she used to be sure that they might be with out her. What she stated and what I’ve realized from others is that we are not making the so-referred to as resolution or alternative to die by suicide within the equal manner that we pick what automobile to pressure or the place to head on a Saturday night time.When someone is in an incredibly suicidal state, they’re in a stage 4 scientific wellbeing emergency. Their thinking is impaired and so they’ve lost entry to instruments of self-governance. Even though they are able to make a plan and act with logic, their sense of truth is distorted by means of a filter of ache by way of which they interpret their reality. Some persons can also be very good at hiding this state, they usually usually have good explanations for doing that. Many of us have suicidal thoughts at some point, but chronic, ongoing thoughts of suicide and devising a means to die are signs of pathology, and like many illnesses, the condition must be famous and handled before a life is misplaced. But my son’s death used to be no longer purely a suicide. It worried mass murder. I wanted to know how his suicidal considering became homicidal. However study is sparse and there aren’t any easy solutions. Yes, he most commonly had ongoing depression. He had a personality that used to be perfectionistic and self-reliant, and that made him less prone to seek support from others.He had skilled triggering movements on the college that left him feeling debased and humiliated and mad. And he had a intricate friendship with a boy who shared his feelings of rage and alienation, and who was once significantly disturbed, controlling and homicidal. And on high of this interval in his life of severe vulnerability and fragility, Dylan determined access to weapons even though we might under no circumstances owned any in our dwelling. It used to be appallingly handy for a 17-12 months-old boy to buy guns, each legally and illegally, without my permission or expertise. And by some means, 17 years and many institution shootings later, it is still appallingly convenient.What Dylan did that day broke my coronary heart, and as trauma so most of the time does, it took a toll on my physique and on my mind. Two years after the shootings, I acquired breast cancer, and two years after that, i started to have intellectual wellbeing issues. On top of the regular, perpetual grief I was terrified that i’d run into a family member of anybody Dylan had killed, or be accosted with the aid of the click or by means of an irritated citizen. I used to be afraid to turn on the news, afraid to listen to myself being called a horrible parent or a disgusting character. I started having panic attacks.The first bout started four years after the shootings, after I was once getting in a position for the depositions and would need to meet the victims’ households nose to nose. The 2nd circular started six years after the shootings, when I was once preparing to converse publicly about homicide-suicide for the first time at a convention. Each episodes lasted several weeks. The assaults occurred all over: in the hardware store, in my office, or even even as reading a publication in bed. My intellect would out of the blue lock into this spinning cycle of terror and regardless of how I tough i tried to calm myself down or intent my manner out of it, i could not do it.It felt as if my mind was once seeking to kill me, after which, being afraid of being afraid consumed all of my thoughts. That’s once I realized firsthand what it feels prefer to have a malfunctioning mind, and that’s after I real grew to become a brain wellbeing suggest. With healing and remedy and self-care, lifestyles ultimately back to whatever might be thought of as common beneath the situations. After I looked back on all that had occurred, I would see that my son’s spiral into dysfunction most commonly took place over a period of about two years, plenty of time to get him help, if most effective any individual had identified that he needed aid and recognized what to do.Each time any individual asks me, "How might you not have recognized?", it feels like a punch in the gut. It consists of accusation and taps into my feelings of guilt that irrespective of how so much healing I’ve had i will on no account thoroughly eradicate. But here’s whatever I’ve learned: if love have been ample to stop any individual who’s suicidal from hurting themselves, suicides would hardly ever occur. But love shouldn’t be sufficient, and suicide is generic. It can be the second leading cause of dying for persons age 10 to 34, and 15 percent of yankee adolescence report having made a suicide plan within the final year.I’ve realized that no matter how so much we want to suppose we are able to, we cannot understand or manage the whole thing our loved ones feel and think, and the cussed belief that we are in some way distinctive, that any one we adore would certainly not consider of wounding themselves or anyone else, can cause us to overlook what’s hidden in simple sight. And if worst case eventualities do come to move, we’ll have got to learn to forgive ourselves for no longer realizing or for now not asking the correct questions or not finding the correct remedy. We should continuously count on that any individual we love may be struggling, in spite of what they are saying or how they act. We should listen with our whole being, with out judgments, and with out offering options.I do know that i’ll live with this tragedy, with these a couple of tragedies, for the rest of my life. I know that in the minds of many, what I lost can’t evaluate to what the other households lost. I know my struggle doesn’t make theirs any easier. I know there are even some who feel I shouldn’t have the proper to any affliction, but handiest to a lifetime of everlasting penance. Eventually what i do know comes all the way down to this: the tragic truth is that even probably the most vigilant and in charge of us is probably not competent to support, however for love’s sake, we need to certainly not stop seeking to recognize the unknowable. Thank you. (Applause) .

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batterymonster2021 · 5 years ago

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My son was a Columbine shooter. This is my story | Sue Klebold

New Post has been published on https://hititem.kr/my-son-was-a-columbine-shooter-this-is-my-story-sue-klebold-10/

My son was a Columbine shooter. This is my story | Sue Klebold

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maxihealth · 5 years ago

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Health Care and the Democratic Debates – Part 1 – Medicare For All, Rx Prices, Guns and Mental Health

Twenty Democratic President candidates each have a handful of minutes to make their case for scoring the 2020 nomination, “debating” last night and tonight on major issues facing the United States. I watched every minute, iPad at the ready, taking detailed notes during the 120 minutes of political discourse conducted at breakneck speed.

Lester Holt, Savannah Guthrie, and Jose Diaz-Balart asked the ten candidates questions covering guns, butter (the economy), immigration, climate change, and of course, health care — what I’m focusing on in this post, the first of two-debate-days-in-a-row.

The first ten of twenty candidates in this debate were, from left to right:

Bill DeBlasio, NYC Mayor

Rep. Tim Ryan, Ohio

Julian Castro, Former Housing Secretary under President Obama

Sen. Corey Booker, New Jersey

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Massachusetts

Beto O’Rourke, Former Texas Congressman

Sen. Amy Klobuchar, Minnesota

Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, Hawaii

Governor Jay Inslee, Washington

John Delaney, Former Maryland Congressman

Health care, and issues related to it, featured prominently throughout the two hours. The first part of the discussion focused on the economy and income distribution.

Income and the growing wealth-poverty gap is a relevant place to start a debate with a strong health care theme because health and social problems are worse in more unequal countries as the line/dot graph illustrates — the greater the income inequality, the higher the index of health and social problems. See the U.S. up and to the right on the high-high axes. [This, the impact of social determinants of health beyond health care, is the underlying theme of my book, HealthConsuming: From Health Consumer to Health Citizen].

Elizabeth Warren assertively and transparently backed Bernie Sander’s Medicare for All proposal. She spoke in a larger context about the national economy, asking for whom is the economy working? She believes the economy is, “doing great for giant drug companies, just not for people trying to get a prescription filled.”

Beto O’Rourke shared his view that, “we have an economy that works for people who can pay for access and outcomes.”

Julian Castro called out the pay gap between men and women, growing up with a Mom who raised his brother Joaquin (a Congressman serving Texas’s 20th District) and him, and was paid less simply because she was a woman, he recollected. He called for passage of the Equal Rights Amendment and to pursue equal pay for equal work across the nation.

Tulsi Gabbard spoke about American people deserving “a president who puts your interest ahead of rich and powerful,” and would invest tax dollars serving “your needs (including) health care.”

Bill DeBlasio called out the “greatest gap between wealthy and poor” and addressing income inequality. As Mayor of New York City, DeBlasio said he is raising wages, benefits, putting dollars back into the hands of people, and funding Pre-K education for all New Yorkers.

Governor Inslee spoke from his Washington State experience, looking to “reinvigorate collective bargaining.” As the candidate running first and foremost on addressing climate change, he asserted, “Trump is wrong – wind turbines don’t cause cancer, they cause jobs.” Inslee is working to pivot Washington state toward the green economy.

Tim Ryan of Ohio spoke about the post-industrial economy there, noting that the state lost 4,000 jobs in a GM facility which, in his words, “rippled through the community, then got a bailout, and now moving car production to Mexico.” He observed that this is not new-news: the trend has been going on for 40 years in Ohio, where the “bottom 60% haven’t seen a raise since 1980.”

Moving from the macro economy, Lester Holt segued the debate into health care, recognizing that “many at home have coverage with employers.” He asked the ten debaters to raise their hands to answer the question: “Who would abolish and do a government-run plan?” Only two raised their hands: DeBlasio and Warren.

Every one of the ten debaters supports universal health care coverage, with the eight who didn’t raise hands arguing for different flavors of a mixed public/private system. Klobuchar argued for a public option which was baked into the original Affordable Care Act. She is concerned about “kicking half of America off of health insurance in 4 years,” pivoting to the “much bigger issue” of pharmaceuticals pricing. She recalled that President Trump “went on Fox and said peoples’ heads would spin when they saw dropping prices” for medicines. She went into the data citing that 2,500 drug prices have gone up since President Trump took office, and that there have been in her words, “$100bn in giveaways to pharmaceutical companies.” Later in the debate, Klobuchar raised the issue of health disparities and in particular, how African-American women get less effective maternal health care.” [This sad truth about U.S. health care outcomes was recently described by the CDC].

“That’s what we call at home all foam and no beer,” she quipped. Let’s take on pharma, allow negotiations of prices under Medicare. “Pharma thinks they own Washington, but they don’t own me,” she added.

Warren said she has signed on to “Bernie care,” saying, “I’m with Bernie on Medicare for all. I spent time in my life studying why families go broke…this happens to people who have insurance…the business model of an (health) insurance company is to bring in as many dollars in premiums and pay out as few dollars as possible,” Warren described. “I understand a lot of politicians say it’s not possible – what they are telling you is they won’t fight for health care as a basic human right and I will fight for it,” Warren promised. [Here’s a link to her published research into the relationship between health care costs and personal bankruptcy in America written when she was at Harvard].

O’Rourke ran for Senate praising a bill that would replace private insurance. His stance has moved to the center away from single payer, to a private/public mix. He believes in “getting to guaranteed universal health care, featuring primary care, the ability to see a mental health provider,” noting that in Texas, the single largest provider of mental health care is the county jail system.” He went on to say that women should be “in control of their own body,” getting applause. When Holt asked O’Rourke if he would replace private insurance, O’Rourke said that, no, “if you are uninsured you can enroll in Medicare, if you are in a union plan and it works you can keep it.”

DeBlasio chimed in saying that private insurance isn’t working well for anyone, which drives his believe in a single payer government run system.

Delaney recognized that 100 million Americans like their current insurance and said, “we should keep what works and fix what’s broken – give everyone free care as a basic human right,” but with an option to buy more or “up” from a basic plan. He critiqued that Medicare for All bills would pay hospitals at current Medicare rates which, Delaney warned, “would kill the hospitals” financially.

Gabbard’s take was that, “We are talking about this in wrong way,” saying that she would give every sick American the quality health care they need. Look at other countries, she recommended, noting that every one with universal health care has a role for private insurance.

For Booker, “it’s not just a health care issue — it’s an education issue,” he believes. “If you don’t have care, you can’t succeed at school.” This is also a retirement issue, he asserted, where people have lower life expectancy due to poorer health care. This is “not just a human right but an American right,” calling out that, “too many people are profiteering off of the pain of people” in the U.S., pointing to pharma and health insurance.

Warren added that, “insurance companies $23 bn of profits out of the health care system,” detailing the pay to executives, lobbyists, and, “a giant industry that wants the system to stay the way it is — not working for families, but working for them.” But families must come first, Warren believes.

Inslee said that insurance companies should not have an option to deny women choice. In Washington State, he passed legislation protecting the right of women for health insurance and a law for a public option, promoting health insurance access for everyone, he said.

“Three women up here have fought for women’s right to choose,” Klobuchar noted, prompting applause.

Castro discussed women’s right to abortion and emphasized the concept of “reproductive justice” versus “reproductive rights.” It’s “justice” because women of lower incomes don’t have health equity or access — nor do trans people, which also got applause from the audience. “Just because someone is poor doesn’t mean they shouldn’t have the right to choose,” Castro believes, identifying eroding women’s health rights in Alabama, Georgia and Missouri.

Jose Diaz-Ballard moved to the topic of opioids, asking Booker if companies manufacturing opioids should be help criminally liable. Booker said, yes, they are liable and responsible. Booker noted he would not take contributions from a pharma company. “In Newark, we’ve tried to arrest our way out of addiction for too long…we need national urgency to deal with this problem and make pharma companies responsible to pay for this.”

Chuck Todd ushered in the second hour of the debate with the public health issue of guns, describing that this meet-up was being held less than 50 miles from the Parkland shooting. Todd described that gun activism is now a part of high school life in Broward County, Florida. “What do you do about all the guns out there?” Todd asked Warren.

She recalled that while running for President, she has already conducted over 100 town halls. The hardest questions have been from kids asking, “when you are president, how are you going to keep us safe?” She responded, “That is our responsibility as adults,” adding that seven young people die from gun violence each day in the U.S. “Gun violence is a national health emergency in the U.S.” Warren would double-down on research to find out what really works in stemming gun violence to find “where can we make a difference at the margin that will keep our kids safe.” She said we should treat gun violence like a virus killing our children and treat this like a serious research problem. It’s a public health emergency, as she called it, and as such we should, “bring data to bear whether politically popular or not.”

Booker added that he has a Federal government buy-back program in his plan, adding that he hears gunshots in his neighborhood on a regular basis. Seven people were shot in his neighborhood last week. “People are tired of living in a country learning reading, writing, arithmetic, and shooting in school,” Booker passionately argued. “We let the corporate gun lobby frame the debate. This is not policy — it’s personal” to him.

Ryan said we need trauma-based care in every school, featuring social and emotional learning. He cited the statistic that 90% of shooters who wreak gun violence in their own school feel traumatized and bullied. We need a mental health counselor in every school because, he has observed, “kids are traumatized.”

For more details on other aspects of the debate beyond health care and financial wellness, here’s a link to NBC’s live blogging from the event.

Here is Kaiser Health News’ coverage of the event through their health policy lens.

Health Populi’s Hot Points: You’ve just read Part 1 of my listening to the first Democrats’ debate for 2020 President. Tonight, I will listen to the second half of this discussion, leading to tomorrow’s follow-up for Part 2 and synthesis of the major themes and implications for U.S. health care.

In the meantime, I’ll sign off from Part 1 of the Dems Candidates Debate coverage with a riff from Paul Simon on candidates’ debates…from his song, Mrs. Robinson…skip to 3:15 seconds to get to this stanza…a wonderful live version of this song which seems well timed for this moment…

Sitting on a sofa on a Sunday afternoon

Going to the candidates’ debate

Laugh about it, shout about it

When you’ve got to choose

Every way you look at this you lose

youtube

The post Health Care and the Democratic Debates – Part 1 – Medicare For All, Rx Prices, Guns and Mental Health appeared first on HealthPopuli.com.

Health Care and the Democratic Debates – Part 1 – Medicare For All, Rx Prices, Guns and Mental Health posted first on https://carilloncitydental.blogspot.com

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facesofopioids-blog · 6 years ago

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💜💙💚This Post Can Be Shared!💚💙💜 Spotlight Sunday "Escaping the Shadows" By: Amanda Skye My name is Amanda and I was born in California on June 30th 1990. To protect the information of family, I will not get into too much detail about my early years aside from key components that lead to the decisions I made as an adolescent. My parents had 4 children, my two older brothers, me and my sister. We were raised in a drug filled home and my parents struggled to feed us. My aunt, uncle and grandparents did their best to help where they could but ultimately both of my parents were hooked on methamphetamines so you can imagine, it wasn’t the best upbringing. In 1995, my grandparents moved us all to New Jersey. My sister and I lived with them for a while until my parents were able to afford an apartment for all of us. They got off of the meth at this point. We moved to Franklin NJ where I was made fun of for being overweight and wearing dirty hand me downs. My brothers both being a few years older than me, made friends and began partying. My sister and I were the best of friends. I smoked weed with my oldest brother at around age 9. By the age of 11, I was blacked out drunk for the first time. It didn’t take long for me to get involved with the wrong crowds and activities. I hung out with other kids who couldn’t quite find their place and we would get high on whatever was available. At around age 13 I had a flashback. I stopped in place and spaced out remembering horrible details of being molested by my dad. I wanted to believe it wasn’t true, but I still can’t explain where such vivid memories came from. After some digging around, I found out that these memories were in fact true and was still living in a home with the man who did this to me. My father passed away last year on August 20th 2017. I do not want to speak ill of him but I also am tired of keeping my story a secret. This is my first post admitting what he did to me for strangers to read. I can’t recall each time that it happened, but he wasn’t the only one. I had been sexually abused many times before I hit my teens. Like any person would, this lead to me acting out, cutting myself, failing all of my classes and becoming your typical “product of her environment.” I hated my dad and on top of the abuse he’d already put me through, he was also mentally and physically abusive as well. By the time I was 18, I had done handfuls of different drugs but had some how turned all of my grades around and graduated high school with honors. In 2009, my dad moved to North Carolina and this is where things really went down hill. After graduation, I no longer had choir (which was basically what had kept me motivated to stay in school) my house became the party house it always was when my dad wasn’t around, but this time there was no stopping it. I had been doing opiate pain pills not realizing the affect they were having on my life. I thought I could stop at anytime. I met a guy in December 2009 who introduced me to heroin. I cried my first time sniffing it because I knew what I was about to do to my life but I couldn’t stop myself. I was shooting up within a week. That relationship was not only physically abusive, but I was sure he would kill me. When I’d try to leave, he would hurt my animals, try to drive my car into on coming traffic or beat me so bad that I would stay. He once threatened “I could kill you and no one will ever find your body.” One day I had had enough and I escaped him. I turned myself into jail on warrants I had accumulated to make sure I stayed away from him. I thought for sure with him out of the picture that I would stop using heroin. I was wrong. My addiction grew even more fierce. At this point I was about 22 years old. My family and I were evicted from yet another apartment and my mother, brother and I decided to make our way to New York. We found a shelter to reside in for a while, and I was able to stay away from dope for the most part, but it didn’t last long. Fast forward, I found myself in yet another toxic relationship (he did not abuse me) where we were constantly getting high together. I bounced around from place to place, state to state, shelter to shelter. Till eventually all of my luck ran out and I wound up homeless. I milked my mom for every penny that she had, would throw fits and threaten her if she didn’t give me cash or bribe her anyway I could. A lot of my story is jumbled at this point because it would be very hard to go in depth about all of these years. After a lot of hardship and pain, that boyfriend and I decided sleeping on the streets was our best option, no rules, we made hella money panhandling and it was still kind of warm out. The weather started to change and it got colder and colder, the money started to stop being as good and the next thing I knew, I was crying everyday of my life wondering how I was going to continue living that way. The highlight of everyday was praying I had enough of a cotton shot left to get me through long enough to pan handle some money to cop. Waking up was so hard. It was soooooo cold. We would bundle ourselves under the blankets people donated to us and breathe in them to produce heat. We were sleeping on a mattress that we dragged from Brooklyn to Manhattan in a park by the Brooklyn bridge. Every day I’d wake up cursing God for waking me up again. Getting out of those blankets was horrific. I’d be so dope sick that I’d have to get up, find a tree to urinate as well as defacate behind, while bystanders walked all over the place. It was humiliating. I had stooped to the lowest of low and saw no way of making it out. I contemplated my suicide daily. I nearly got frost bite on my feet from walking around in shoes a size to small that were soaked from the snow. We would sometimes try to sleep in the subway station when it rained or snowed but would be woken up by police saying we had to get out. One day we had gone to go cop some dope. It was January 21st 2015. I was so dope sick that I could hardly walk so my at the time boyfriend went to get the dope while I waited in front of a bodega near the projects we shot up in. A man with the kindest eyes I have ever seen approached me and began to ask me my story. I lied to his face, but he was persistent. He eventually got my story out of me and took two pictures along with it. I had no idea this guy was well known and had a blog/page called Humans of New York. Long story short my photos and story went viral. The people who didn’t know the truth now did and I found out when a young girl approached me as I was panhandling in the subway station. “You’re the girl from humans of New York!” Confused and embarrassed I asked what she was talking about, she then proceeded to show me my photos that had gone viral. I was livid and mortified. That day we went with the little money we had collected and were on our way to cop. While sitting on the subway platform I began to plot my suicide. I was crying but could no longer feel. I was numb. I was weighing out my options, either I jump in front of the next subway that comes through, or I continue on living a miserable life. My mind was made up. I pictured my mom identifying my body, how much pain I would cause my family and thought about what I would never get to do. In the midst of that pain, God reached out to me and I felt a glimmer of hope. I decided in that moment that tomorrow was no longer an option, I was going to a state funded detox. I explained it to my boyfriend and told him I couldn’t wait anymore. I shot up that night looking for a vein for 45 minutes as blood gushed down my arm. He looked at me and said “you’re really done aren’t you?” I didn’t have to answer his question. I went into a detox where I stayed for 6 days. As soon as I got out, I was high again. I decided to look at the comments on my photos and all of the horrible and mean comments were replaced with strangers telling me they believed in me and offering hope. Among 15,000 comments I came across one from a woman who owned her own treatment center. She offered to fly me out to California and help me for free. I agreed but still had a hard time believing I would go through with it. I postponed for about 4 days and in those days I drank, shot heroin and cried. My last shot of heroin was on 2/7/2015. The next day I was flown to California. My life has completely changed. I had some bumps in the road with my behaviors but ultimately did not relapse at all. I stuck with it, got involved in my program and started working. I have been able to build a life I never thought I would have. As I shared in a previous post, I lost my brother Michael to an overdose on 3/12/2017. I did not get high. I wanted to but I did not. I miss him everyday of my life. I try to live sober in his memory. 5 months later my dad died from lung cancer. I had been able to forgive him and my last words To him just days before he died were that I loved him. I was able to be there to help my family through both of these tragedies. I was able to show countless others that there is no reason to get high again. I was able to prove to MYSELF that I am worth it. I have 3.5 years completely sober. I have a daughter due any day now and a wonderful boyfriend, home and relationships with my family. I call to check on them. I work in recovery and am blessed to be able to live a sober life without the need for drugs or alcohol. Some days are hard, just because you get sober does not mean life gets easy. In fact, it gets harder. Adulting is tough, walking through deaths of loved ones is horrific but I feel so much more accomplished than I ever have in my life. Today I live for so much more. I may not be perfect but I like who I am. Recovery isn’t easy but it’s 100% worth it. Sorry for the length of this story but it feels good to let it out. Thank you for taking the time to read this and god bless everyone. If you’re still struggling, you can make it out too. Never give up. https://m.facebook.com/groups/1685500114824029?view=permalink&id=2331108240263210

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grettamaskell-blog · 7 years ago

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Tips Going Shopping For Managing Shoes.

The additional on your read, you'll start to understand that everyone needs electricity and also the most ideal source from power is actually coming from carbs. Some folks witnessed that he brought their Ex lover back, some indicated that he brings back womb, cure cancer, as well as other sickness, some proved that he can easily cast an incantation to quit separation and more. i likewise discovered one particular testament, this had to do with a female contacted Sonia, she testified about just how he rejuvenated her Ex-boyfriend aficionado in under 7 days, and by the end of her statement she dropped Prelate ADODO's e-mail address. Start offer me a breather, nobody found this happening till today, these are actually scare tactics, the $700 Billion Bailout plan are going to offer the nation confidence for a while, yet must we really have that, I presume certainly not, why since if it happened once, it can take place twice. Offer Me a. 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isaacscrawford · 7 years ago

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Matthew Holt’s EOY 2017 letter (charities/issues/gossip)

Right at the end of every year I write a letter summarizing my issues and charities. And as I own the joint here, I post it on THCB! Please take a look–Matthew Holt

Well 2017 has been quite a year, and last year 2016 I failed to get my end-of-year letter out at all. This I would like to think was due to extreme business but it probably came down to me being totally lazy. On the other hand like many of you I may have just been depressed about the election–2016 was summed up by our cat vomiting on our bed at 11.55 on New Years Eve.

Having said that even though most of you will never comment on this letter and I mostly write it to myself, I have had a few people ask me whether it is coming out this year–so here it goes.

2017 was a big year especially for my business Health 2.0. After 10 years my partner Indu Subaiya and I sold it to HIMSS–the biggest Health IT trade association and conference. And although I used to make fun of HIMSS for being a little bit staid and mainstream, when it came to finding the right partner to take over Health 2.0’s mantel for driving innovation in health technology, they were the ones who stepped up most seriously. From now on the Health 2.0 conferences are part of the HIMSS organization, and Indu is now an Executive Vice President at HIMSS. I’ll still be very involved as chair of the conferences and going to all of them but will (hooray!) be doing a lot less back office & operational work. (Those of you in the weeds might want to know that we are keeping the Health 2.0 Catalyst division for now at least)

That does mean that next year I will have a bit more time to do some new things. I haven’t quite figured out what they are yet but they will include a reboot of (my role at least) on The Health Care Blog and possibly finally getting that book out of the archives into print. But if you have any ideas for me (and I do mean constructive ideas, not just the usual insults!) then please get in touch. You can of course follow me on Twitter (@boltyboy) to see what I’m thinking with only modest filtering!

On the home front we are now firmly established in San Anselmo, which is a nice little suburban town about 40 minutes north of San Francisco. I have been trying to ride my bike into the city via the ferry a few days a week but unfortunately I’ve had two stolen in SF this year, so I’m ending the year being a couch potato. We do have big plans for the winter, and from early January will have a place in Tahoe City. If you and yours are looking go skiing, we probably have a bed for you, so get in touch.

Amanda continues to amaze me in that she manages to get Coco (6) and Aero (3) organized and active, into their respective first grade and preschool classes, all the while doing great things to the house. She’s also taking part in a really serious exercise class called the Daley Method more or less every day (I make it to yoga about once a month on average!). She tells me it’s essentially a religious cult and I’m waiting to see when she will bring home the orange juice for me to drink. Meanwhile she is in fantastic shape and making me look feel extremely flabby. Okay, so that’s enough about me and the family. There tends to be lots more with pictures on my Facebook page

For those of you who don’t know I started writing this letter way back in 2000 when I didn’t have a wife or family and presumably had a lot of spare time on my hands–not that I can remember exactly what I did with it. The main point of this letter is to tell you about the issues that I think are important and and which charities I support. In fact back in 2000 I used to find that my friends and acquaintances was so ill-informed about the world and politics that I was on a little bit of a crusade to tell them more. The good news is that in 2017, everybody seems to know everything, and everyone has an opinion. And yes it’s not too hard to figure out what mine is. The bad news is that many of us seem to have arrived in that state of greater awareness by living in countries that have either elected the worst populist buffoon of all time as president, or seem to be voluntarily committing economic suicide. And yes I am referring to the country I moved to and the country I moved from in 1989.

My views will become apparent in the way I divide this letter up. Please feel free to poke around and look at the links, and maybe even donate to one or two. Let me know any comments or insults!

Health care & (poor) women’s & kids care & safety, and supporting patient activism

In the US this past summer there was a very serious attempt to destroy the Affordable Care Act. It failed–only just–but the rug is being pulled from under it by a bunch of mean spirited administrators put in charge over at HHS by the asses in the White House. Not to mention that the Congress (and we know who is in charge) has NOT RENEWED funding for the health insurance plan passed in the 90s for poor kids called CHIP. If you want to stay informed on all this I urge you to follow ex-CMS administrator @ASlavitt & blogger @charles_gaba on Twitter. @charles_gaba in particular is a one man band doing remarkable work classifying the actual on the ground impact of all of this on everyday Americans, and he gets no support for it. So you might join me and toss him a few bucks. The US health care system is still extremely screwed up, and if you want to know more you could do a lot worse than reading former NYT reporter Elizabeth Rosenthal’s An American Sickness. Other than hoping we get a Democratic sweep in 2018 & 2020 (and working and contributing $$ for that) I’m not sure what we can do to improve the system–other than to keep exposing the idiocy of current policies and the bad behavior of many actors.

For my next health care issue I’m just going to repeat what I wrote in 2016 and multiply it by a hell of a lot —What sadly has come into focus this year is the desperate attempts to attack women’s access to health care. If you’re a woman– especially a young or poor one who needs access to contraceptives, mammograms, cervical cancer screening, sexually transmitted disease testing, and all kinds of health procedures including safe abortions, it’s become the mission of mainstream Republicans to stop you getting them–using disgusting, deceitful, and downright illegal methods. And that’s as polite as I can say it. So my biggest bump in funding this year went to the one organization that consistently not only campaigns for but actually provides reproductive health services (including contraception, STD testing, counseling, pregnancy support and, yes, safe abortions), Planned Parenthood. I cannot believe that men want to live in a world where women cannot get these services, although I guess the evidence shows enough do….especially in Texas, Louisiana, Indiana and many more.

Given the #MeToo movement we can no longer ignore sexual assault as both a health and a social issue. A brilliant young entrepreneur called Jessica Ladd runs a non-profit called Callisto which enables victims of assault to report it without going through the harrowing ordeal of reporting it to the police or college authorities. Of course if several people report the same perpetrator then that helps bring them to justice. Now imagine this more widely used, say in Hollywood about Harvey Weinstein. Something like that is Jess’ aim. You can see her on Seth Myers’ show and also donate here.

Also worth noting is another great female CEO (Emily May’s story is here) who founded a non profit called Hollaback which helps report and prevent street harassment. There’s an app you can download to report harassment and of course they could use a donation too.

Finally in this section are two related entities supporting patients in dealing with the health care system. I’m a corporate supporter and personal member of the Society for Participatory Medicine which is moving from being a small core of activists to a major organization creating partnerships between patients and the health care system. They had their first conference back in October and it was excellent. The other is The Waking Gallery of which I’m also a proud member. Artist and activist Regina Holliday literally paints patients’ stories on the back of jackets and over 400 people (including me) now wear them at health care conferences. You can support her work here.

Other long time health care issues I like to think about/support:

Engage with Grace founded by my friend Alex Drane. No donation needed–use the 5 questions you can download to start that hardest of conversations about what you want for your care at the end of life.

Jeremy Nobel’s Foundation for Arts & Healing is engaging patients in arts, aggressively tackling loneliness support here.

YTH, a really cool organization that helps use technology to educate young people about sex and other health issues. The YTH Live conference is in San Francisco in May & it’s great and cheap (and somehow despite desperate efforts to quit I’m still on the board).

Poverty in developing countries

The good news is that in the long run things are getting better. The bad news is that there are plenty of trouble spots from Myanmar to Syria to Africa and lots of forces and people trying to repress the long arc towards equality, peace and freedom.

I’ve supported Mercy Corps for over a decade now–at least that’s according to the card they just sent me. They do a remarkable job all over the world focusing on educating girls, supplying clean water and directly intervening in crises. It’s worth noting that this year those crisis spots included Puerto Rico because of the appalling ongoing incompetence of the US government in failing to get help to that stricken part of its own country!

Heifer International gives animals directly to the very poor in order to get them out of the cycle of poverty. Every year I hand out goats and chickens! Hey, my father has a farm on which he feeds the chickens and that’s about as close as I get any more. (OK, this year it was a pig)

I’ve always supported a few smaller charities. They are all teeny in the grand scheme but a lot of little things add up, and for each one of these any donation or support means a lot.

Saigon Children’s Charity is a small charity (approx $1m a year in donations) focusing on providing rice, bikes and books and pens to the families of very poor children in Southern Vietnam so they stay in school. I support a few individual pupils.

Sadly the rapids where I went rafting on my honeymoon in 2008 at the source of the Nile in Uganda are gone, but kayaking doctor Jesse Stone’s clinic and charity Softpower Health is still there. It sells cheap mosquito nets, and provides a health center and family planning outreach. Here’s an article about their first ten years and a really great case study from Jesse about how they saved a girl’s leg.

Also supporting direct medical care, We Care Solar makes a suitcase-sized portable solar powered generator and supplies it to health workers in off-grid clinics across the world–one frequent user is my friend Dr Enoch Choi who’s on the scene of basically every disaster. and right now is on his way to Cambodia. You could alternatively give to Power the World which provides Nokero solar lights, the WE CARE Solar Suitcase, SOCCKET (all of which I’ve featured in previous years) and clean cook stoves–of which I bought a few for people in Nepal.

In the same vein, Health eVillages is a charity launched at Health 2.0 by Donato Tramuto which delivers iPads & smartphones with preloaded medical information to clinicians in remote parts of Haiti, Kenya, South Sudan and elsewhere.

One of the worst trouble spots in the world is the genocide going on in Myanmar. 600,000 Rohingya people have been systematically driven from their homes–with thousands raped and killed by the Myanmar military. A small Muslim lead charity (very highly rated by Charity Navigator) called the Zakat Foundation of America is in the camps in Bangladesh working with the refugees–they are also working in Syria.. For the price of a bottle of good champagne I feel my donation made a bit of a difference and you might too.

Poverty in the US

Income inequality in the US is increasing, leading to systematic pressures on those at the bottom end of society’s ladder. This year the UN actually sent an investigator to report on extreme poverty in the US. The Guardian article about it was harrowing.

These organizations try to help in my locale. You of course may have your local favorites–Here’s the list I support:

San Francisco & Marin food bank. Put your zip code in here to find out your local equivalent

Hamilton Family Center, is a small shelter offering emergency and transitional care, as well as getting families into permanent housing. If you live in San Francisco you know that the housing situation is dire at any income level and is getting worse. Think about those at the bottom. You can help by clicking this link.

Homeless Children’s Network supports care services for homeless children. No one should have to start life that way. You can help here

Disasters

This year has of course been terrible for disasters in the US–hurricanes in Puerto Rico and Texas and fires in California. I gave to the Hispanic Foundation for Puerto Rico, the greater Houston Community Relief Fund, the Redwood Credit Union Community Fund (for N. Cal fires) & the United Way of Ventura County fund for S. California. (Yeah, I know it has a bad rap but the United Way pledged that 100% of the funds will go to victims).

I also met a bright young social entrepreneur called Jason Friesen from TrekMedics which is building a 911 system where there are none. I was thrilled that we could feature him at Health 2.0 this year. You can donate to their work in Puerto Rico here.

Torture and human rights

Imprisonment without fair trials and torture doesn’t work to improve safety and it increases the amount of future terrorism. My own grandfather was tortured as a British POW in WW2 in the far east. And yet we now have “strong” men in charge increasing the use of torture, unwarranted imprisonment, and in some cases selected or mass vigilante executions in Russia, Turkey, Hungary, Poland, the Philippines, and (if he gets his way) in the US.

These organizations help those being tortured (or who have been) and protest those governments who should act better.–which basically means all of them

Amnesty International campaigns on behalf of prisoners of conscience everywhere

The UK-based Freedom from Torture (used to be called Medical Foundation for the Care of Victims of Torture) helps people from many countries who have been tortured. I’ve been supporting it for many years

The American Civil Liberties Union. If you’re not a card carrying member, you should be–this year of all years.

The environment.

While the clock ticks, the planet and the sea warms and we can but hope that technology in the form of renewable energy and replacements for animals being used as food get here in time. Our grandchildren will be ashamed of us. And of course we now have an actively anti-science administration in the US that is making the problem much worse. While I’ve been the biggest meat eater I know for many years, I’m cutting way down on beef which is responsible for 50%+ of global warming from agriculture worldwide & hoping that Impossible Foods and Memphis Meats come good on their promise to replace meat entirely. BTW the Impossible Burger is pretty damn good.

Other bad news is that the Japanese continue illegal whaling to a great extent and have essentially seen off the attempts by Sea Shepherd to stop them.

I give to both the Sierra Club (respectable) and Greenpeace (more radical) and locally to the Marine Mammal Center–a wonderful facility that helps seals recover, including most years one or two that get shot!

Drug prohibition—a terrible idea that is closer to being toppled

I’ve been protesting drug prohibition forever. It’s a terrible policy. You only have to witness Portugal’s experience decriminalizing all drugs and supporting those who want to get away from addiction to realize that there are much better policies actually working in real life. Probably lunatic US attorney general Jeff Sessions will be too busy trying (and hopefully failing) to avoid jail on perjury charges to try to block legalization of marijuana in California (and Washington, Oregon & Colorado). But we certainly don’t have anything like a rational approach coming from the Federal government even though the argument is basically won in the court of public opinion and science. A system of taxed and regulated drug distribution is the only solution to removing the criminality associated with drug taking, much of which is relatively harmless anyway. I support:

DRCNet home of the best blog and email newsletter, the Drug War Chronicle. They also look at the stuff others miss, like the massacres currently going on in the Philippines. Their review of the last 20 years of the drug war is well worth reading.

The Drug Policy Alliance — the main lobbying organization promoting “harm reduction”

A Dog’s Life

Charley is 14 now and finally gets to hang out in a big back yard and doesn’t go into the office any more. Funnily enough as soon as he left, Health 2.0’s landlord rewrote the building’s rental agreement to make it a lot less dog friendly. Coincidence? Maybe not! For dogs that aren’t as lucky, Amanda and I support Rocket Dog Rescue $50 pays for an adoption.

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OK, that’s it. Thanks for reading and please feel free to email me or tweet me or FB me or whatever to give your comments, or see if there’s some other charity I should support. Or just to get in touch anyway

Cheers & have a great 2018!

Matthew

Article source:The Health Care Blog

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wocfeminists-blog · 7 years ago

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Eva Longoria

Eva Jacqueline Longoria grew up on the ranch her family has owned in Corpus Christi, Texas for nine generations, coincidentally in the same neighborhood as Selena Quintanilla. She identifies as a “Texicana” a Mexican-American whose descendants have lived in Texas before it was even part of the United States. In interviews she speaks with pride about her family who have owned their ranch for over a century under five different flags, “They were Spain, then they were Mexico, the republic of Texas, then the Confederacy and now the United States of America” (Lopez interview). As she states in many speeches and interviews, “We didn’t cross the border, the border crossed us.” Despite their land-owning privileges, Longoria came from a humble family and worked her way through high school and college. She planned to become a physical therapist and studied kinesiology at Texas A&M University. A change of plans occurred when she visited Los Angeles after graduation and decided she wanted to try and be an actress. Longoria is best known for her role as Gabby in the ABC hit show, “Desperate Housewives.” For 10 years she played a pompous, rich, “self-hating Mexican” woman that everyone loved. But outside of her role, she began her philanthropic and activist career and soon became a spokesperson for Latinx immigration issues. In 2013 she graduated from California State University Northridge with a master’s degree in Chicano studies where she wrote a thesis titled, "Success STEMS From Diversity: The Value of Latinas in STEM Careers” (Saad).

Longoria has specifically chosen to focus her attention on Latina women because of the insurmountable odds stacked against them. For the last century women have been migrating, both legally and illegally, to the United States from Latino countries devastated by war and poverty in search of a better life for them and their family members that stays behind. A lot of Latin American nation’s economy is now dependent on remittance as it has become more common for a person in each household to seek a job in the United States. Although the majority of the time it is men who immigrate on their own, many women also leave behind their families to work in the States. Many women when they arrive don’t know English and have no option but to work as domestic servants where they are often exploited by employers who threaten them with deportation. Their work is not as valued as Latino men’s, who have also historically been exploited, and they earn far less than their male counterparts. Although undocumented Latino men are statistically more likely to be deported, many women live with the anxiety of being deported or having their male partners deported. Often families are split apart because the children are U.S. citizens and their parents are undocumented immigrants who can lose custody of their children if found out. Because of these, and many other institutional issues, Latina women are falling behind in American society. As stated on the Eva Longoria foundation website, “27% of Latinas live below the poverty line; 1 in 3 Latinas drops out of high school [and] only 15% of adult Latinas hold college degrees.”

Because of this, Longoria has decided to invest in Latinx education. After a decade of taking part in Latino centric philanthropic projects such as “Padres Contra el Cancer” (parents against cancer, a nonprofit that offers financial aid to Latino families with sick kids) and publicly speaking out against racist immigration reforms, Longoria started “The Eva Longoria Foundation” in 2012. Based in Los Angeles, California, Longoria’s self-titled foundation is dedicated to “empower[ing] Latinas to reach their potential through education and entrepreneurship…we work to provide Latina entrepreneurs with career training, mentorship, capital and opportunity” (Rodriguez). The foundation offers classes for Latinx parents to teach them how to navigate the American education system. After four years the program has proved successful and 90% of students whose parents graduated from the 9 week program, graduate high school. In addition to her passion for Latinx education, Longoria also advocates for disability rights. Her oldest sister was born with an intellectual disability, which led to her mother becoming a special needs teacher. Because of them she founded the program “Eva’s Heroes” in San Antonio, Texas, which offers after school activities that enable disabled children to interact with able-bodied children to destigmatize disability. She also recently founded the “Latino Victory Project” to raise funds for Latinx candidates and “get-out-the-vote” efforts in Latinx communities (Castaneda). Though Longoria’s character may have been ashamed of her heritage, Longoria is beyond proud of who she is and hopes to inspire other young Latinas to embrace their identity and succeed in a country they are told they do not belong in.

Works cited

Castenada, Laura. “Eva Longoria knows no limits.” USA Today, Gannett Satellite Information Network, 10 Sept. 2016, www.usatoday.com/story/life/2016/09/10/eva-longoria-knows-no-limits/89949228/

“The Eva Longoria Foundation.” The Eva Longoria Foundation, www.evalongoriafoundation.org/.

“Eva Longoria: Charity Work & Causes.” Look to the Stars, www.looktothestars.org/celebrity/eva-longoria.

Lopez, Mario “Eva Longoria Talks Hispanic Heritage” Mario Lopez: One on One 2012 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3yOWkkVc7qM

Rodriguez, Priscilla. “The Ultimate Advocate: Eva Longoria's Projects & Causes.” LATINA, www.latina.com/celebrity/eva-longoria-projects-causes#2.

Saad, Nardine. “Eva Longoria graduates with master's degree in Chicano studies.” Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Times, 23 May 2013, articles.latimes.com/2013/may/23/entertainment/la-et-mg-eva-longoria-graduates-masters-chicano-studies-20130523

Zimmerman, Mike . “Eva Longoria: Hardly Desperate as Actress, Producer and Restaurateur.” SUCCESS, 22 Sept. 2015, www.success.com/article/eva-longoria-hardly-desperate-as-actress-producer-and-restaurateur.

(Information in second paragraph comes from sociology course on gender and migration with professor Leah Schmalzbauer. For more information on women migrants see “Sacrificing Families” by Leisy J. Abrego 2014)

Images:

1 http://that-imta-blog.blogspot.com/2014/10/

2 http://www.eonline.com/news/776994/eva-longoria-honors-selena-quintanilla-she-was-the-reason-i-even-dared-to-dream)

#Paola Garcia-Prieto

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