Monthly Archives: June 2016

Something Good

pacific

1. 15+ People Who Deeply Regret Shopping Online. So hilarious.

2. The Funny Parents Of Twitter On $#*! Kids Say. More hilariousness.

3. Good stuff from Dances with Fat: If You’re Concerned For Your Fat Loved One’s Health and Her Big Fat-Shamed Wedding.

4. How You Know You’re Done Dieting from Rachel Cole.

5. If You’re Scared Of Islam, Meet A Muslim, a great video from Refinery29.

6. Her friend was struck down by gun violence. Here’s how she made peace with his loss. A striking video, especially in light of resent events — that’s EVENTS plural, people.

7. Recipe I want to try: Roasted Veggie Salad With Avocado Dressing.

8. Minimalism on the Rise in Japan. “This man has 3 shirts, 4 pants and 4 pairs of socks. That’s all.”

9. He found a way to build mini homes at no cost, and he’s donating them all to the homeless.

10. Story Slices an online writing class with Laurie Wagner starts soon, only lasts for four weeks. “We’ll chronicle the odd and small moments of our lives with our phone cameras and then create small pieces of writing – a paragraph at most – to accompany them.”

11. The Unquestioned Pursuit of Weight Loss Had Us Eating Wrong for Years. “Our quest for thinness is actually making us far less healthy — even killing us — and not for the reasons you’d think.”

12. just call me bridget jones, without the massive knickers and hunky boss on wonderings & wanderings.

I guess what I’m saying is this, one journal doesn’t tell the whole story. If you feel like you’re in a rut, that you keep banging your head against the same old, tired wall, that you’re a failure, that you’ll never get to where you want to be, that you’re not growing… chances are you’ve actually come a long ways, kiddo. Give yourself some credit. But if you are stuck, start a journal today. Start with these words: I’m stuck. And write where you’re stuck. Then start getting unstuck. And keep writing for a year. If you’re still stuck, try again, try differently.

13. Pose harder. “Competitive yoga is catching on in America. But is it still yoga if you’re scoring points?”

14. The Hardest Part of My Eating Disorder Recovery Is the Part Nobody Talks About. #same

15. Renegade Writers’ Group: Where Excuses Die & Manuscripts Rise, a workshop with Janelle Hanchett.

16. Fully Appreciating Culture Without Appropriation: A Guide in 15 Steps.

17. JCPenney’s New Brand Campaign for Plus-Size Clothing Is SO Magical. Now let’s see if they can manage to make some good clothes.

18. Under Our Skin: What do we mean when we talk about race?. “Under Our Skin grew out of conversations about how we at The Seattle Times cover race at a time when national and local events — the furor over police shootings, the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement, protests on college campuses and charged campaign rhetoric — dominate headlines.”

19. Democrats End Sit-In After 25 Hours, Drawing Attention to Gun Control.

20. Felted Fido, on Facebook and Etsy. I want…

21. Why the “health” argument for dieting is kind of a moot point from Isabel Foxen Duke.

22. 19 Snarky Tweets That Prove #NoWomanEver Enjoys Being Harassed.

23. These Little Girls Totally Dominate In Awesome Dance Video. So much cute, and so fierce!

24. This too shall pass on A Design So Vast.

26. Jesse Williams: Read the actor’s BET acceptance speech in full. “The Grey’s Anatomy actor received a standing ovation for his empowering speech on racism in America.”

27. Supreme Court Strikes Down Abortion Restrictions In Texas.

28. James Veitch: This is what happens when you reply to spam email, a funny TED talk.

29. Buenos Aires to close 140-year-old zoo, move 2,500 animals to nature reserves.

30. Here’s Why Refusing to ‘See Color’ Doesn’t Actually Mean You’re Not Racist.

31. Syrian Refugees List Their Campsite on Airbnb. “In an effort to draw attention to their plight, refugees offer a stay in the ‘most unique neighborhood in Greece.'”

Day of Rest

happydexterI can’t help but think a lot about Dexter right now. Four years ago at the beach he had his first symptoms of the cancer that would eventually take him. The quilt in the second bedroom here still has the tiniest stain from that first nose bleed. It’s faded to gray, but I still recognize it.

Tomorrow is also the anniversary of his death, three years ago. One of the reasons we got Ringo Blue is because we guessed that Dexter was part German Shepherd, part Blue Heeler. Having been surprised by Sam’s DNA test results, I realize now that Dexter may have been something entirely different than we’d guessed, but I can’t help but see Dexter when I look at Ringo — his sense of humor, his athleticism and grace, his endless energy reserve, his smile — and I’m so happy to have the reminder.

Every year
everything
I have ever learned

in my lifetime
leads back to this: the fires
and the black river of loss
whose other side

is salvation,
whose meaning
none of us will ever know.
To live in this world

you must be able
to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it

against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes to let it
go,
to let it go.

Mary Oliver, from In Blackwater Woods

It’s that last part I have a hard time with, the letting go. For me the only thing that really does anything to ease the grief is the passage of time. With time, I get used to the absence. I’m still sad and still miss them, but that ache becomes somehow normal, incorporated. I allow other things to fill up the emptiness. I am comforted that they aren’t in pain anymore and there’s now space for another dog who needs a place to go, someone to love.

The thing I can’t get used to is never seeing them again, ever. I realize that some people have the comfort of a belief system that allows for some reunion at a later date. I don’t. That moment in time is over and will never be again, and I can’t quite get over that.