jilldomschot

How to Evangelize to Catholics

Don’t. That’s the simplest possible answer. This subject came up the other night at the adult education class held in the library of my parish. We were discussing the story of Clovis, a Frankish king, who famously promised God that he would convert to his wife’s Catholic faith if he was victorious in battle against the Alemanni army. God granted him this petition, and Clovis followed through by being baptized. In response, several thousand of his troops followed him in baptism.

One of the class’s skeptics asked how real the conversions were for these several thousand men. Did they understand Christianity? Were they given any kind of catechesis? These are worthy questions, as even Billy Graham stated that only a certain percentage of people who went to the “altar” to be saved at his revivals retained the faith they’d experienced that day. There is a shared social contagion at such events, and if you add in the loyal nature of military men to their leaders, the social contagion might very well be even stronger than the average group emotional response.

The day before, I had watched (through a YouTube prompt) a Ray Comfort video, in which he preaches the gospel to Catholics and, in fact, I believe the video is called How to Evangelize to Catholics. I brought this up and got a few snorts of derision from the room full of cradle Catholics. But I gave them the sad truth: the Catholics whom Ray Comfort had evangelized seemed to know nothing of their faith. They couldn’t even tell him the meaning of the word Gospel. To this ignorant Catholic couple, the Gospel was something read at Mass. While this is true–the reading of one of the four testaments to the gospel happens at every Mass–the word means “good news.” This good news, obviously, refers to Christ coming to the world and laying down his life for mankind, and subsequently defeating death by rising again.

“Many Catholics are ignorant of their faith, even with ‘good catechesis’,” I said, as that was my only point in bringing up the video.

Several hands shot up around the room. At least three of these cradle Catholics had experienced the same kind of ignorance before they’d made the effort to defeat it through education they’d chosen to pursue of their own free will. While I’ve long honored the notion of catechism, as its aim is to ensure that young people (or old people) understand what it is they are saying “yes” to at their confirmation, too often it is done simply because parents or grandparents are putting the pressure on. I would guess that the vast majority of Catholic young people don’t attend religious education classes because they want to; they are going because their families expect them to. This leads to a situation where whatever education gained is lost through disinterest and no further seeking out of knowledge…until faced with a charismatic Protestant force like Ray Comfort.

On the other hand, it must be remembered that Protestants and Catholics speak a different language, and I don’t mean Latin vs English. I mean that they understand the gospel in a different way. You don’t have to understand that the word “gospel” is the good news of Christ coming to earth to save mankind; you simply have to understand that Christ did this. And I’m still willing to bet that most Catholics do indeed understand this. It’s hard to tell what Catholics do or don’t understand due to the fact that the Catholic spirit is so very different from the Protestant spirit. Protestants will wrangle over doctrine and argue every last syllable in their Bibles; most Catholics won’t do this. They are taught to respect their church authorities, and even if they do at some point decide to engage in their own studies of the Bible, learning about the apologists, Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic (e.g., the students in this adult education class), they will most likely still not argue with you. Therefore, when faced with a man such as Ray Comfort who has his own script down to a T, Catholics might appear ignorant and in need of true salvation. The way he talks to people reminds me of a lawyer in court who wants specific answers so that he can then continue with his script. In a courtroom, this is to subvert actual truth from emerging because it might interfere with the goal (conviction or acquittal). That might not be Mr. Comfort’s goal, but it is the inevitable result. Nobody watching the video will ever know what those Catholics actually know because they aren’t allowed to speak using their own language and understanding of Christianity. They are only allowed to answer Ray’s pointed questions.

The responses in the comments section revealed what Protestants believe about Catholics. I do shared ministry with Catholics, and it’s as if they don’t even open their Bibles… The comments like this are rife under Comfort’s videos when they are of his evangelizing Catholics. Of course, it might never occur to these people that Catholics are involved in ministries because they actually take their faith very seriously, but it’s a faith invested in ministry instead of arguments. And they might very well be trying to keep the peace with the Protestants they work alongside. They also might very well might be telling you in a nonconfrontational way to leave them alone. Truth be told, it’s actually galling to be literally living out your Christianity in the world and then to have other Christians try to evangelize you as if you weren’t.

That’s a real gripe, though, isn’t it–that Protestants believe they own the term “Christian”? It’s gotten to the point where Catholics won’t use the term at all, as they might come across as being Protestant instead of Catholic. The other week, we had a confirmation retreat in our parish hall. One of our volunteers, who has a learning disability but is always curious and earnest, reported to me that one of the young teenage students at the confirmation retreat had written on the question board: “What is the difference between a Catholic and a Christian?”

This volunteer asked me, “So what is the difference, she who knows everything?” (Yes, he does call me that. I’m good at fooling people.)

However, I did have an answer for him: “None. There is no difference. Catholics are the original Christians.” You might argue with that, and I encourage you to go right ahead. At the very least, I hope you’ll admit that Catholics called themselves Christians long, long before the Protestant Reformation came around.

I stick to my original answer above. It’s arrogance to believe that Catholics aren’t Christians and need to be evangelized. So, if you were looking for the simple answer to that question, you’ve come to the wrong place. As with any group of people who grow up in a traditional faith, there will be those who will reject their faith when they are at an age of accountability. It’s the reality of the seeds of the gospel scattered on different soils and landing places. Some fall on rocky ground. Some, surprisingly, lay fallow for years before the soil is ready for a little bud to emerge from the dirt. For the soil that is simply lying fallow, God will provide the means for its new growth. You might very well be the means for another person, whether they grew up Lutheran, Catholic, Quaker, or Southern Baptist, or even outside the church entirely. But I would encourage you not to assume without any knowledge that Catholics aren’t Christians and need you to bring them the Gospel. After all, they do indeed hear it weekly at Mass, and I don’t just mean the reading from one of the four testaments about Jesus. I mean they hear the entire gospel message spoken through the liturgy at every Mass.

I Want to Be Human

Being Spock is overrated. Spock is an alien; he isn’t human. Captain Piccard is human, with all his impetuousness and emotions. The loveable robots who are always trying to be human are attractive for a reason, and it isn’t because they’re being cold and logical. It’s because they try out emotions and human intangibles like love and bravery, even when it doesn’t make sense. Their logic must update to a new kind of sense that uses counterintuitive truth. Aliens can’t do that so much, though.

Our society really lost something when we chose to walk the path of the Enlightenment toward reason as an end to itself. I’d much rather hear “Come, let us laugh together” than “Come let us reason together” any day. In fact, I could fill in “dance” or “sing” in that spot, too. Reasoning together is a dull way to live, and that is in addition to the fact that most people aren’t as smart as they think they are, which makes their reason even more yawn-inducing than it might be if they actually said something that made others think about the world differently. I’ve run across thinkers like that, highly intelligent people who give the contrary answer because they are smart enough to do so — G.K. Chesterton is a prime example. But that’s not altogether reasonable, is it, to always be contrary for the sake of contrariness? Most people don’t have Chesterton’s IQ and can’t pull it off, anyway.

Reasoning with most people is a mind-numbing experience. You know what isn’t? Laughing. Dancing. Singing. Obviously, I would never throw reason entirely out the window. I wish that it were used more by politicians and scientists. True reason. Honest reason. Reasoning that goes beyond the easy answer. I simply don’t want to live with it as a high ideal in my daily life. When it’s idealized, we end up with psychotherapists jabbing icepicks into women’s eyeballs and jiggling around until they’ve cut something in the brain that will make the women stop expressing pesky human emotions that husbands don’t like. I mean, come on, every husband knows that expressing any emotion but sweetness to him when he gets home from work is a definable mental illness. Even if icepicks aren’t the popular cure-all they used to be, drugs that largely don’t work when put to scientific, uh, reason, are the new reasonable approach to address the expression of negative emotions. Such an enlightened way to view the world! Let’s reason together, bro! Okay bro (fist bump), but first I need to cut my wife’s brain or have her swallow a handful of mind-altering pills. She’s upset that the baby’s been up all night and the toddler’s been throwing up and she can’t seem to get the dishes done! How unreasonable! Be with you in a jiff!

It’s funny because pre Aristotle, it was normal for men and women alike to be overcome with emotion, tearing clothes, beating chests, weeping. At least people are described that way in the Bible — David, especially, and it isn’t lost on me that he’s called a man after God’s own heart. He could be quite impetuous, more like Captain Piccard than Spock. Would that I had never been trained to be like Spock. I hate that. I hate the dullness of myself with that mindset. Thankfully, I have enough contrariness that it never went too far.

I suppose this yearning to be fully human is also why I play the accordion. Mexican music has a lot of drama in it. I love that drama to the core of my being. I would exist inside the music, if it were possible. In the early days, I described the sound of many norteño and banda songs as being happy-sad. The accordion sounded happy, but the singing sounded sad — or the reverse. But there is a full spectrum of emotion and sound in the genre; it’s very complex. The focus on accordion and brass support the complexity.

And there it is, I’ve brought it all back to my favorite music. I’m very emotional about the music, you see. Little robots can learn to be human, after all! Thank goodness my little robotic core resisted the alien Spock training. Spock should be deported back to his planet by a bunch of emotional yahoos I like to call humans. The song I’m going to post below is one of my favorites to sing at full volume, really emotional-like. There’s no accordion, but there’s plenty of brass, and it can be played on the accordion. Obviously! ¡Vivan ya!

Sueño en español

(English translation below, as much for the English speakers as the Spanish speakers who can’t understand my bad Spanish.)

Voy a escribir una canción — tal vez más de una! — en español para cantar mientras toco mi acordeón. Será como la de Los Alacranes, el grupo de Alemania (no el grupo mexicano, Alacranes Musical), quien cantaban sus canciones en inglés. Sus letras eran un poco extrañas; que es decir, eran obvias de una manera un hablante nativo no las habría escrito. Creo que podré traer una perspectiva diferente, como “The Scorpions”, aunque no escribiré de perras que tienen hambre de pecados en la turbulencia de un huracán.

Mis canciones serán de pajarillos y amor porque estos son los temas que yo prefiero. Tal vez, escribiré una canción de mariposas, tambien. Las mariposas, los pajarillos, y el amor. Tengo romance en el alma, incluso cuando no existe en la vida actual…y casi nunca existe (ser honesta). Es como una fantasma que se siente pero pocas veces se ve. Y ahora, estoy triste y llena de melancolía por tantos pensamientos.

Hace muchos años yo escribí muchos poemas en español. En esos días, estudiaba la literatura tradicional española, y estaba aprendiendo a reconocer las formas de la poesía tradicional. Por eso, escribí unos romances y sonetos y unas decimas, letrillas, etcetera. Estas formas no se pierden en la niebla de la vida diaria, claramente no. ¡Mentirosa! Por el contrario, se pierden, pero puedo encontrarlas de nuevo. ¡Ahora, es el año del acordeón y de encontrar la poesía y de escribir español muy malo!

I’m going to write a song — perhaps more than one! — in Spanish to sing while I play my accordion. It will be like that of The Scorpions, the group from Germany (not the Mexican group, Alacranes Musical), who sang their songs in English. Their lyrics were a little strange; that is to say, they were obvious in way a native speaker wouldn’t have written them. I believe that I’ll be able to bring a different perspective, like The Scorpions, even though I won’t write about bitches that are hungry for sin in the turbulence of a hurricane.

My songs will be about little birds and love because these are the subjects I prefer. Perhaps, I will write about butterflies, too. Butterflies, little birds, and love. I have romance in my soul, even when it doesn’t exist in real life…and it almost never exists (to be honest). It is like a ghost that is felt but rarely seen. And now, I’m sad and full of melancholy because of such thoughts.

Years ago, I wrote numerous Spanish poems. In those days, I was studying traditional Spanish literature, and I was learning to recognize the traditional Spanish forms of poetry. Because of that, I wrote some decimas, sonetos, letrillas, etcetera. These forms aren’t lost in the fog of daily life, clearly not. Liar! On the contrary, they are lost, but I can find them again. Now, it’s the year of the accordion and of finding poetry and writing really awful Spanish!

Organization!

If it seems that I’m trying to write more on my blog, yes, I have been. I get overwhelmingly busy, and this is the first to go. I no longer wish that to be the case. As today is a day off, and I’m being lazy more than I am productive, I thought I would write a simple note here on productivity. It happens through A. hard work and B. organization.

I’ve long been organized with my exercise routine. I walk for 30 minutes every evening, and do a focused exercise for 30 minutes in the morning. I follow a routine: cardio, strength, stability, repeat. That makes 6 workouts a week, with Sunday reserved for one long, relaxing walk only. This combination, which has some overlap — e.g., some stability workouts are combinations of cardio plus balance and standing abs — works. I’m only exercising an hour a day, but my organization keeps me fit.

As I’m staring at my laptop from the office shed I rarely have time to use, I’m wondering why I can’t apply this kind of organization to finishing my current novel or playing the accordion. To be fair, I subscribed to the Acordeonisticos website to try to create a more focused approach than playing an hour a day of whatever I feel like playing. But I’m still prone to playing whatever I feel like playing, even after subscribing. I need a focused plan! An example might be: music theory, practice old songs, learn a new song, repeat, with Sunday my anything-goes day.

Re writing, my organization amounts to writing 1000 words a day. This is an extremely disorganized plan. I need those 1000 words to be focused. I need to do more mapping and editing. My mapping exists, but it is very slapdash. I will provide a pic, so you can see how slapdash it is. I will also provide a pic of my beloved office that awaits me, a dusty place shut up most days because I have an office at the parish I use 45 hours a week. But I can’t use that office to write; my only shot at that is to sit in the office kitchen on my lunch hour and slam out a few words.

I’m not one for outlining. It gives me the horrors and bad memories from failing at English class in my childhood. I probably should have paid more attention to it. I need to start outlining. Following an outline is the only way to write a book, unlike the pattern of threes that could work for music, as it does for exercise.

*My shed, with Jesus as the Good Shepherd and a poster from one of my favorite films.*

SCIENCE TODAY!

Maybe some lightning bolts should be worked into my title. You think you’ll have a Eureka moment when you read the news, but instead, you end up frizzling your brains on their magic bus.

I’m generally like a moth to flame regarding absurdist article titles like this: Study receives $3.3 million grant to address COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy among people with anxiety or depression. What kind of Suzy Do-gooders are the new generation of scientists, anyway*? But maybe it has more to do with feeling relevant when there’s a several million dollar pricetag attached to your research. The article went on to discuss how they would use weakened forms of disinformation to inoculate doubters against — I guess? — strong disinformation:

“The intervention will work the way some vaccines work: by exposing people to weakened forms of mis/disinformation, which can strengthen their ability to identify and resist mis/disinformation when they encounter it in the future.”

After this quote, the article listed several articles titles, and I genuinely thought they were providing examples of weak disinformation:

Of course, I did notice after a few moments’ contemplation that these were other articles on their site. That is to say, they weren’t provided as examples. They all sound too hard to believe, though, and I suspect that’s what’s meant by “weak disinformation.” The last article might have some validity, as long as it properly defines “overly processed foods.” Most food we eat is processed in one way or other; that’s what sets us apart from animals. Cheese, for example. Cheese is a highly processed food. Or maybe some weak disinformation is disseminated through ambiguous language, which would put the last article back squarely in the camp. I mean, I don’t know what they mean. For millions of dollars, I hope they do. And good luck learning anything from this article on what constitutes weak disinfo, as it’s mostly gibberish, almost impossible to comprehend — itself an example of weak disinformation?

Funny thing, as I spent my Friday night watching videos of Jose Torres El Rey de Alto Mando (accordion player), I realized I could learn as much from him about health as from science articles. He’s an accordion player, and he posts recipes of health elixirs. He also seems to enjoy helping and encouraging people, which is very important for mental health and the world in general*. Unlike many pasty-faced doctors, he looks fairly healthy. And if you want a good laugh, watch his La muchacha interesada video. Millennial-style cumbia? I honestly don’t know; maybe they are Zoomers. I don’t know where these arbitrary lines are anymore, but they do look young to my eyes.

Yes, I can bring everything back to the accordion. Just wait and see.

*The difference between do-gooders and normal people who help others is actually quite large. Do-gooders are controlling of and diminishing towards others’ humanity; the others are not.

Spanish, Dalí, & a Little Lorca

Imitations or reproductions of Dalí’s famous painting are rife in the Catholic world, with an imitation in the office where I work. It takes me back to high school, when I loved Dalí’s artwork. Also, I had just started taking Spanish in school and therefore believed I could read my dad’s battered paperback of Federico Garcia Lorca’s poetry. These are related subjects, I promise, and not simply because I’m discussing Spaniards who, obviously, spoke Spanish.

We had to study a language; it was mandatory in high school. It doesn’t make much sense at that point, however. Learning a second language should have been mandatory from kindergarten onwards. I have an elderly friend at my parish who attended a private American school where they spoke Polish in classes. She still understands and speaks Polish to this day because of her early exposure to it, despite living in an English-only culture. I will never understand the English-only cultural philosophy. It’s not just xenophobic; it’s an example of my least favorite personality trait in individuals, let alone entire cultures: proud ignorance. Generally, I call this the Cult of Stupid. You can spot members because they roll their eyes and complain if you use words with more than two syllables. They think it’s snooty or some such, without recognizing the irony that syllables has three.

Could I actually read the Lorca book? Sure. It had English translations on the right hand-pages. My dad is not a Spanish speaker, after all. I loved learning the pretty vocabulary in the book, as it set me apart from other first-year learners of Spanish. I’ve always had a big vocabulary, and even though I failed pretty badly at English classes in school, I do have the ability to dissect words to determine what they mean. This gives me an even further edge regarding an intellectual grasp of a second language. It’s too bad this process often confuses words for me rather than making them clear. I ran into a funny example this morning. The word equivocarse and its various forms are related to the verb in English to equivocate. By the way, this might not be a commonly used word in English, but it is a common word in Spanish — like so many Latin words that have more than two syllables. In English, this word takes on the meaning of obscuring the truth. To equivocate is either for the purpose of being circumspect or being deceptive. In Spanish, it has the connotation of simply being wrong. I came across a video with the title, Estos policias se metieron con la chica equivocada… It took me a pretty minute, being in an English frame of mind, to realize a correct translation would be “The police messed with the wrong girl…!” My mind wanted it to be deceptive instead of wrong, but it was clear from the context of the video that the girl was innocent, and the police were the deceptive ones. Context is the best guide to learning a language, and so much for my intellectual, dissecting approach. In fact, although this is a bit of a digression, the only way to understand someone speaking Spanish to me is not to be myself, and to listen without focusing on any one word, picking up the sense from the context. If I stop to pick apart words, I have already lost the rest of the conversation. And unlike a language test in school, I’m not going to earn points for translating a few words correctly.

Lorca and Dalí were close friends, albeit I didn’t know this when I was in high school. I only knew I liked reading through my dad’s books, which also included art books featuring Dalí. I’ve loved Spanish ever since I was first introduced to it; that’s all I want to say about that. This post was meant to be about Dalí. But there is a point of overlap with my previous discussion that is much greater than my dad’s bookcases, as it’s clear from reading about Dalí and studying his artwork that he also took the analytical approach to life. He studied the master artists and picked apart the elements in them in order to understand them, and then he spent some time imitating them. Because of this, he’s known as a master of craft. When he created surreal art, he was playing with ideas that intrigued him. For much of his young years, Freudian psychoanalysis was a large part of what intrigued him. He met Freud; Freud didn’t like the surrealists and couldn’t understand why they were fascinated with him. He liked Dalí, though. He liked his genuine fanaticism.

Dalí was also intrigued by the physics of time and space. This in turn intrigued me as a young person. Beauty is timeless, and I will never cease to appreciate landscapes and portraits that capture the personalities inherent to people and places. But playing with ideas perhaps appeals to me even more. Another artist I appreciate for this is M.C. Escher. They both clearly loved playing with what is possible in flat geometric spaces. These two artists have a number of similarities in thinking, to be honest. They both loved the ideas they were representing and loathed politics. Neither wished to be pinned down politically, during a time when being a surrealist artist meant something political. Dalí was actually voted out of the surrealists because he eschewed Marxism and, especially as he grew older, defended Catholicism, eventually returning to his nation’s historical faith (he even had his longtime civil marriage “convalidated” in the church.) Escher was apparently part of a Christian religious order, as well, but he was as quiet about that subject as he was about politics. Dalí enjoyed creating controversy; Escher did not. There are other artists I love because they have an absurdist, intellectual approach — William Hogarth is one that long predates surrealism.

What about Lorca, though? I don’t know; for me, he was simply the first Spanish poet I read. He and Dalí were artistic friends, but Lorca’s approach was different than Dalí’s. He was a gay socialist, fitting neatly into the world of the avant garde. Dalí never fit in, and nor did he want to. He lived to a ripe old age, changing his psychoanalytic approach over the years to bizarre perspectives of Jesus on the cross. Meanwhile, Lorca was assassinated under a fascist regime (though there is some controversy regarding why and by whom).

Like Dalí, ideas are really what drive me forward. Because of that, I will probably never arrive at a place where I’m an artist at storytelling or making music, or a natural with language and communication. But every time I see Dalí’s crosses in my environment, I’m reminded that there are famous artists who don’t approach the world with a traditional artistic temperament. So, perhaps, I still have a fighting chance. By the way, I have tried to subvert the intellectual approach in learning the accordion, but mostly because I don’t have time to give it an extensive study. I want to live in the magic of the instrument and play the songs I love. However, I’ve determined that taking a more intellectual approach will work better for me, having the emotional artistic state of a gnat. So, I’ve stepped back to think through music theory. In Spanish. The problem with my accordion playing is that it’s always been in Spanish. Switching to English would not be a great idea now that I’m used to Do Re Mi Fa Sol La Si, mi acordeon en tono de Fa, and hearing ahora, tocamos la escala de Sibemol en terceras. I know what that is and can play it. If someone switched to now we’ll play the scale of B flat in thirds, I’d probably panic. Intellectuals just do not switch gears with ease, I’m sorry to say. That’s why we’re often labelled fanatics (see Freud on Dalí above). We get obsessed and taken with an idea and must hammer it out to its conclusion.

Speaking of El Diablo…

As I’ve said before, I don’t do social media, unless this counts. I listen to podcasts and accordion tutorials on YouTube, but I have very low desire to engage with others in the comments. Therefore, I’m sheltered from much of the toxicity in the world right now. But I know it exists — it’s out there damaging others’ lives instead of mine.

Imagine my lack of surprise that while I was joking about cultural appropriation here on my blog, a long-time writing friend was cancelled for it. I suppose I can say what her penname was, as it doesn’t really matter at this point. She was writing under the name Jessica Tescher when she invoked the wrath of the black romance hashtag folks on TikTok. She had the gall, you see, to write about a black couple in her sweet romance southern-themed books.

Naturally, she thought that she should write from the diversity that exists in the South. But this is not okay because she’s white. Whites can only write whites. She was hit so hard by trolls that she trended on TikTok for a day and now, to rescue her sanity or career or both, she’s shut down all her social media. Of course, white writers can’t win in this rigged game. The narcissists on TikTok have to get attention and harm others at the same time. Narcissists do that. They play victim at the expense of other people. If Jessica were to have written her series with no black romances, I’m sure she would be accused of whitewashing. I’ve heard that accusation, too. It’s a balancing act I don’t care to participate in of having a diverse backdrop to a white-prioritized book. The diverse characters have to be given voices…just not too loud and descriptive, so as not to pretend that an outsider can know someone else’s perspective. They must still remain visible in the background, however, and yet not be stereotypes. I don’t know why anyone would bother trying to please narcissists; it’s an impossible task that will get you nowhere.

When you can’t win, anyway, you might as well just write what you want. Write from a perspective that all people are humans who feel the way humans feel and love the way humans love. Write from the understanding that not every member of an ethnic or racial group has the same experience. And also understand that racism is real because people are hateful and tribal and will ostracize others if they perceive it will give them social credit. Most people have been ostracized and rejected if they’ve lived in the world long enough, even if it doesn’t rise to the level of oppression. Therefore, write from that understanding. Write about how hard it is to fit into a majority culture.

I’m not sure if TikTok is aware of this, but when observational people like writers try to understand the world, they are opening their minds and hearts to people different from themselves. This is something we should want. We should want more empathy in the world, not less. Empathy begins with you. And me too, but now I’m simply addressing those people on TikTok who haven’t expressed any empathy towards an author who was trying to develop an audience. She certainly didn’t have that yet; she was no JK Rowling that you just stuck it to. No, you harmed someone who had a very small voice. You punched down, in other words.

What if her book was really that bad, though and deserved the hate? I doubt it. I haven’t read the book she’s being cancelled over, but I’ve read her other work (published under a different name). But let’s just assert for the sake of argument that she screwed up royally with this book. Should you have brought a mob to destroy her, or given her honest criticism? Stop! I already know the answer.

I’ve long given up hope on people being reasonable. Most people just aren’t as a rule. It was a frustrating realization I had to come at about age forty. I’m not even sure why I’m writing this post, since I know people are unreasonable. I guess hope still lives inside my soul.

I’m currently writing this post on my lunch hour; that’s how upset my friend being destroyed has made me. Normally, I use my lunch hour in better pursuits, such as staring at the wall and thinking of that moment later when I can clock off, drive home, and play my accordion for an hour. Yes, I’ve changed my schedule such that I play seven hours a week. I manage this by playing as soon as I get home instead of cuddling my doggies and slowly changing my clothes for my evening walk. The dogs can listen to my music, and the evening walk will still happen eventually. One must have priorities. Because playing gives me great joy lately, I’m living day to day off the excitement of it. I’ve solved my chronic insomnia by replacing sleep with excitement! Try it out! See how it works for you!

I can’t wait to go home and watch the sun disappear through my enormous front window while I squeeze and extend my bellows. From my window, I can actually see the whole world! Or at least my tiny portion of it. There’s so much to discover out there that doesn’t involve worrying about cultural appropriation. Please pray for my friend, as the future must look dark for her at this moment. If she hadn’t already shut everything down, I would instead exhort you to buy her book and give it an honest review. Too bad she caved under the intense pressure — would I have, too? I don’t know. I don’t particularly like being visible. It brings up bad memories of childhood bullying.