KNITWORTHY

My family is TOTALLY KNITWORTHY. Consider the following mug shots, with a description of their particulars.
My Gran: She teared up when I gave her the Bitterroot. She really loved it and it looked incredible on her. I am well chuffed. (Anglophiles, did I do that rite?)

My dad's wife who hooked me up with two GIANT bags of stash this summer. I gifted her a worsted weight Springtime Bandit - just like my banned anna tres except in brown heathery natural type wool like Eco wool or Fisherman's Wool. I suspect the latter, but it is afghan-y; she's a small lady and gets chilly if it's below sixty degrees (F) outside. She loves animals and my dad and used to knit so I like her really well. She's had a tough year and LOVED her shawl.

My mom - we were both pretty loopy by the time I gave her the mini-kellokukka. Not enough yarn, or time; I would have liked to have made it larger. The shawl is still fantastic and so is she. She wrapped it around her head and neck and smiled.

My partner and step sprog got new hats (a usually yearly tradition. Turn a Square and a Felicity striped up like TaS stuffed their stockings. Both grinned. Gave my incredibly wonderful 13 year old cousin a little dark bluish grey Paton's wool beanie with an owl cable. It reminds me of Athena - good for her grades and self-esteem. (There's nothing wrong with either, as far as I can tell.)

venting - message in a bottle.

because this is not my blog.

I recently decided to cut internet ties with people who were making their opinions known in a particular medium. Some of these people were family.

Everyone's entitled to opinions, and they ought to feel comfortable airing them. But - I don't have to listen/read them. I was confronted about cutting someone off yesterday and I did not respond in the way I would have liked. I would have liked to have said:

When you say ignorant things about "People having all the kids they want on *my* tax dollar," it hurts me.

I work my ass off, but despite how hard I work, the simple facts are that I am only eligible for part time work at my place of employ. In the present state of jobs and the economy, I should think it obvious why I would stick it out; I also love my job fiercely. Love, however, doesn't make me eligible for health insurance through my employer. So that has to be handled privately, and at a cost.

To discuss the other adult in the household - he did what everyone calls "serve our country" and gets thanked by lots of people every November 11. He used to get thanked all the time, because of the haircut. But being sent to war twice does not make him eligible for good, low-cost health insurance, for some reason, despite everyone's lovely, abstract "gratitude".

We are in the position of trying desperately to get a child on some sort of state sponsored health insurance. We want to be able to get the preventative care for her that she needs in order to keep her from suffering from anything we didn't catch later on. There is also the practical fact that a health emergency on her part would absolutely, literally, no joke about it, bankrupt us. I feel I'm tempting the devil by even mentioning it, but it's a huge burden to carry around. When I write, "trying desperately," I do mean that we are fighting to get her some coverage, because a fight is what it requires.

Also, back to that private coverage I've got - the insurance understood quite well that I am ostensibly of reproductive age and capability, also plus, I'm biologically a woman. However, the cost of maternity coverage is ridiculously high, and considered to be an "add-on," even for a person of my condition. Therefore, if I were to conceive, the theoretical offspring would need to be covered somehow - what with the necessity of prenatal care for healthy babies and mothers - and that would probably involve someone's precious *tax dollars*.

This should make all the facts clear. This should be helpful in understanding why, in my position, I feel personally attacked when people who are "better off" than my little family is, rail about their fucking tax dollars. Because dollars are so much more valuable than education, health care, and children, right? Because the ability to go buy a new phone or laptop because it has been released in a new color is much more important than the health of the poor child sitting next to yours at the coloring table, right?

Sure. Keep thinking that, and say it all day long. But I don't want to listen.

momentary fear

a cessna, flat black like dried spray paint
in an otherwise blameless blue sky.

groundhog's lament

oh
i don't want to come out of the cave
the cave the hole has got me.
it's dark and i can't see the end of my little tunnel
but also if i found it, it would be raining.
so
i tuck my little head in my cave
the cave the hole that's got me.
i can pretend that the little tunnel would take me elsewhere
but if i got there it would be raining.
tho
i could make a letter or paint a picture
on the wall of my cave
it's dark and i cant see it, it would be a surprise.
when the rain let up and the sun lit up, my handiwork might glow.

lessons

i don't know if we are friends, exactly
but you've taught me ever so much
about how boldly ambitious leeches suck.

the joke ruined itself

something about 33 chilean miners being turned away from the underground bar.

whatever. it was my favorite news story of the week.
a drink or whatever to celebrate the workers, everywhere, appreciated and not.

but far better would be improving conditions for people at work everywhere.

rape is worse than

just bad sex.

there. i said it. i'll say it another time:
rape is worse than just bad sex.

sexual assault is literally assault with a deadly weapon.

these are things that people, particularly the ones who make laws and interpret them, should understand. these are things that people who operate in the world with a variety of people should understand.

i'll take off my fuckmepumps w/ platform heels made from soapboxes now.