each day an adventure in alaska: the downside of becoming "woke"....

you have to deal with those who are left behind. who refuse to examine the worlds realities. who refuse to question. who refuse to be curious.

woke just means to be socially aware. it's been made into a sort of swear word of late by the right.

if woke means that i am trying to accept others in the place that they are, then i accept that task.

when it comes to racism. i really had no idea initially how racism has impacted so many aspects of our culture. there was very little we were taught in school about the truths of those times of slavery and after slavery. it was washed away. we were learning at a young age i think in school that we were being taught a very watered down version of history. at least i seem to recall getting that impression

i spent quite a lot of time in the library selecting books to read that i'm sure good Christian parents would refuse to allow. my parents were pretty hands off in many ways. parents are much more hovering these days, or have been. my parents had very little impact on what i read outside of the bible and book of mormon. my Mom was just happy we read. she was a big reader...though much of her reading was romance novels. she was reading. that was all that mattered. she had an amazing vocabulary

you can be exposed to and read a variety of things, you can travel to nations far and wide and still remain in a box of your choosing though. we choose these things.

it makes me both sad for and angry at times for those who seem to remain entrenched in a thought process that many are leaving behind.

it's just so hard to imagine intelligent people choosing to stay in a box of ideas that were standard when we were kids. never really breaking from the beliefs about gays, race, religion, the world order.

the people they support in office are doing some really horrendous things and yet, they choose to really just look the other way. they have their things that they want to have happen, gun rights and abortion restrictions. in truth abortions are less under dems because they encouraged and made available birth control and other supportive things that decrease abortions.

i'd still say that the gop needed and depended on those fetuses being aborted more than the dems got from them. they needed those fetuses to be taken in order to motivate their base to vote. now with that gone, they are going after others. sadly, no battle will be as easy a win for them than fetuses. the fetus is totally dependent on the person carrying it so no money needed to be spent by the gop. proof of this is that the gop votes over and over not to support pregnant women. they don't support the fetus financially in any way. those nuts at abortion clinics aren't paid, they volunteer.

a post on fb by a niece this week through me in to a bit of a rage. it was a supposed "study" with mice. the mice were given everything they needed...in the end they extrapolated that the results of this "study" is what is happening in society with humans. the last paragraph..."we are currently witnessing direct parallels in todays society, weak, feminized men with little to no skills and no protective instincts and overly agitated and aggressive females with no maternal instincts" who then destroy society by killing off the others. i was just about to leave for work and it just enraged me really.

as i tend to fly off on these ridiculous things i just hit block so that i wouldn't comment and get into an online battle with yet another family member. right after i did that, her mom called me. i said i was feeling pretty angry and explained why. she started to defend this "research" and that just angered me more. i wasn't calm, i was over reactive so in the end i did send a text apologizing, saying in the state i was in i should not have answered the phone. also that i shouldn't have taken my anger out on her on something she didn't post.

in the heated discussion i did mention that the Jesus i had learned about would have been kind to people, whether they were gay/trans...whatever. then she had said, Jesus would say, "go and sin no more".

so being more "woke" you have to find some way to accept those who think being "woke" is a scary and bad thing. then the next day yet another school shooting happens. a reminder that the non woke vote in people who support the nra and guns rights so completely that death by gun is now the most common way to die as a child here. so they see the news about a shooting, send their thoughts and prayers and then go back to attacking the lgbqt+ folks, drag queens, books, actual history...stuff that isn't killing kids.

that they espouse to be prolife and yet look away at all the death, is an irony they are incapable of grasping.

these state governments would rather these transgenders and all others just disappear. i do not know what they want of them really. they do not want to believe or admit they exist. what are their choices at that point...if a whole segment of society wants them to pretend to not exist. i have heard many times that there is just xx and xy. this is simply not true.

there are a lot of chromosome variations to this. xxy, xyy, xxyy, xxxy....

if anomaly's can happen on all the chromosomes. i'm baffled why many can accept this on all the other chromosomes but not on those that determine sex characteristics and sexuality.it just doesn't seem too far out there that if you can be born with a penis and uterus than there is a wide variety of things that can happen.

so i haven't called to talk because then the shooting happened and i can't promise i won't become angry at a discussion that can't possibly go anywhere useful.

i saw a clip that was talking about trauma and trauma response. i didn't have any specific trauma's as a kid. we had a pretty protected and fun existence. i have had some experiences later...and i often feel like my entire career is a trauma. dealing with others traumas and deaths over and over has to have an impact on us care givers. covid was an added trauma on top of it all. sexual assaults, bear close encounter, close calls in boats and planes...it all adds up.

working in critical care you learn to remain calm. so big things are happening and you just stay calm. the clip was saying that often we are calm when these big things happen but as a response we tend to over react to smaller injustices/situations. i guess because we have the space and freedom to react. when the shit is hitting the fan you have to deal with it and you can't let emotions run wild. makes some sense i think.

these are the last from sept 21. the last fall with Tusk. i will always feel badly for how his life ended but i try to focus on all the fun times we all had together. my dogs have great lives overall. still so hard to let them go.

my work week last week was one night of on call and two nights in pcu. not bad nights really.

the most annoying was the second night the tech i had was pretty busy with some study work. mostly just sat there on her ipad, not doing tech work. i'm pretty good at doing much of my own tech work, we had no tech the first night, but it is frustrating having a tech who isn't doing much to actually help you. watching someone sit around getting paid to not do work. irritating.

these trees are at the kincaid park. i'm feeling a lazy day here before i head back to work tonight.

the dogs would prefer a nice walk. we did put in over 5 miles yesterday. it was really nice. the trails are still great and the weather is perfect. warm. into the 30's.

there was a pretty great aurora the other night. i was on call so i was sticking close to home. should have gotten out there i guess. i fell asleep and never got called in.

watching a series called "Manifest". so far it's pretty good. their flight hits some turbulence and after they get through that they land but apparently 5+ years have passed and they are trying to leap back into a life that left them behind.

two nights of work ahead though.

the post has been taken down. my bil was much calmer and more capable of having a discussion. apologies by the niece to him. i'll just stay unfriend for now. i unblocked there have been other questionable posts. better to just slide away from that stuff to prevent over reactions in the future. no social media info/battle will change views on those who ardently do not want their views to change.

it will sadden me and frustrate me until my last day though.

sad that they won't accept things that others do, sad that they refuse to look into the truths that others live with and try to find some way to at least be more accepting and at least less demanding that those people hide from their own existence. what are they to do? live a life in the closet, in shame and self loathing just so the people on the right don't have to feel uncomfortable or see the reality.

acceptance. it's really what any of us want. i think i gave up on much of that need through covid and the other circumstances i've dealt with. i know others still hope for that full acceptance and it will never be granted.

never...because full acceptance, even basic acceptance at many levels just isn't something they are capable or or choose to do....i'd say choose more than capable though, which is why it makes me angry.

clinging on to the old ways of thinking. not being able to evolve...it's a choice

living in a box. some comfort for the individual but that comfort will surely be rocked. someone will marry the wrong color or the wrong sex. someone will come out as a member of the lgbqt+ community....then what happens? do they change? some do, some don't. what happens when they don't...? even more family/friends walk away, some will commit suicide, some will bend to the will of their families and live a made up, unhappy life, while quietly loathing themselves because they can't find a way to make that life work for who they are. it's a mismatch of epic proportions

sadly, you can't make people walk the road and see what is happening across the street from their protected lives. if they don't want to they will not.

occasionally, i will release the rage, no matter how futile it is when directed at those who are so deeply in their box. i'm a human. imperfect. i love, but i also can rage at times.

i apologize for the times i rage and am grateful for those who accept me for who i am.

i guess, in the end, a little rage outburst is needed. you have to try to get through the box. you hope that one of those efforts will be successful, if just for a moment. guess it's like the sperms and the egg...those little suckers ram like crazy and every so often, by some miracle one gets through. it may be a totally screwed up sperm though, which causes havoc and creates a genetically flawed human.

we are all flawed. is it the battle to exist? that battle takes its toll on us all. whether we hide in a box or walk out into the wild. none of us can protect ourselves, whether we are woke or not. nobody is shielded by prayers, bad stuff happens to all. if God was going to protect kids from these school shootings, God would have already done it. this is on us. so knock off the thoughts and prayers and get make changes.