COME TO JESUS, SISTHREN & BRETHREN

OK FOLKS- You read the headline, here's the deal. I've been wanting to hold some kind of forum online for people of privilege, specifically, to come forward and fess up to the fact that all of their entitlements, adventures, wealth, good things in general are due to their wealth and privilege and NOT due to any specialness that they have themselves created. Then I thought, wow, won't that be a dead forum. THe blog equivalent of crickets chirping, essentially. Plus, just a wee bit negative on my part since I do tend to rail about trustfunders and how they drive me absolutely bonkers (perhaps because my beloved home state of Colorado is OVERRUN with them.)
Also, it's just a little bit narrow.
Really, all of us have things we need to Come to Jesus about. Coming to Jesus, for those unfamiliar with the phrase, is about giving up your grand illusions/delusions about yourself or something/someone dear to you, and receiving the sweet embrace of forgiveness in the arms of the "lord", or in my mind, the bosom of the Virgin Mary. (She's the mythical unconditionally-loving mother to all who will always hold a distraught child to her breast to comfort them, no matter what stupid accident they've just caused or crawled out of- more on that later). In the Baptist American tradition, it's the term for when congregants literally crawl on their knees up to the pulpit, weeping and sometimes rending garments, asking the preacher but more importantly their co-religionists to forgive them for ______________. Usually, some version of "living a falsehood." For example, perhaps you are unemployed, and desperately broke, but for some reason are still holding out for that $100k a year job, rather than facing reality or "coming to Jesus" and getting some sort of temp job so that you can pay your bills and put food on the table.
Yes, it generally involves giving up on a small dream, or more accurately, fantasy, and although I would NEVEr tell anyone to give up their dreams, I do encourage people to place their dreams within reality, not outside of it.
If you've ever "Come to Jesus" about anything, you know there's a profound sense of relief that washes over you when you finally do.
Here's a small example of some folks that need to Come to Jesus.
http://denver.craigslist.org/fur/321282370.html
I'm sorry, but honey, your PLASTIC PATIO FURNITURE CIRCA 1984 IS NOT WORTH $100!!!
Come on now, Come to Jesus. Rest your tear-stained, weary head on his forgiving chest, and admit it. You'll be lucky to get $20 for that stuff.
Seriously man. The world would be a better place if more people came to Jesus on a regular basis.
That's it for now- i'll figger out a way to make this a more accessible, regular forum so that more people can use it as an online sort of confessional. :)

VISUALIZE A NEW HOUSE

FOR US. Suffice it to say, we need to move. The sagging market has prevented us from selling our place the last two summers, but third time's a charm, right? Since I want to keep this blog positive, I will refrain from complaining about our atrocious duplex neighbor who is driving this urgent need to move (that might appear on my Myspace blog) but for here...
picture a snug, cute, peaceful house... surrounded by a fairly large yard, with either a garage or basement for storage... close to a park, with great neighbors on either side, and friends just blocks away. it's on a safe street, where my baby girl can learn to ride a bike someday and not worry about high school kids drag racing et.al.
and where if our future dog gets out, she won't be almost instantly killed by traffic.
There's some stuff planted in the gardens, but not so much as to present a huge "removal" problem. the back yard is enough of a blank slate for us to build an addition without guilt, and for me to play around with xeriscaping and do my little plant experiments.
Maybe I should draw a picture.
thanks in advance for all your good thoughts.

SHOUT OUT TO THE SPYDR MAN

So before this blog gets too old and crusty, I have to give props to my co-worker, Spydr Wren, who unwittingly inspired this. He's a photography dude (more like photography GOD) here at CHS who, a couple weeks ago, and with the help of friends and family, started a blog complete with photos, AFTER nearly cutting one of his legs off by walking into a brush-cutting machine on his family farm in Louisiana.
That's right. While they were sewing him back together, and before the ambulance helicopter even got out to their remote location, he was croaking out commands for his brother to take a picture for posterity.
THAnk the gods, he's doing AMAZINGLY well now, back in Denvah, and it looks like he'll regain the full use of his leg.
So naturally, I thought, ok- if he can blog while his leg is being sewn back together, than by golly I can too. I may have a toddler in the house (which we're trying to sell, yada yada) but by god my legs and arms are fully attached.
So in the full spirit of full props, here's the link to his blog so y'all can check on Spydr. http://community.livejournal.com/jaydoh/

hello! Hola! Bonjour! Ya'a tahey, shboy! Namaste!

Wow, this is so exciting, my first post on my first blog! I can hardly believe that actual websites/hosts offer this service for FREE to the general public. Do they realize what they're doing? Well, while the internet is still a "free" democratic place to air opinions, I figure it's stupid not to take advantage of this amazing technological service. Seriously? I can vent and air my opinions on everything from the best travel mugs to the current Bizarro World situation, post my writing, shamelessly self-promote myself, my friends, anything i want.... for free? It seems too good to be true.
So, on with the mission statement of this blog:
My intention is for this to be a place of positivity, both with my postings and with any comments that might be submitted (yes, they will be moderated). I believe that whatever you focus on, visualize, dream about, etc, grows. We can all name examples of how ourselves or people we know have gotten caught in "negativity vortexes" at one time or another (e.g. a traumatic event happens, and then bad things keep happening to that person) and attest to the "truth" of that phenomenon, but what about "positivity vortexes?" For some reason all of us have a harder time "believing" in those positive blessings coming true for us... I could write a thesis on how our Puritan-Christian based culture has overlaid its own moralistic beliefs on this basic law of the universe to twist and subvert it to its own ends... but i won't. Instead, let me sum it up: no haters! I've stumbled onto some blogs where the posters and commenters basically advocate genocide of whatever group of people they're currently hating, or being told to hate, and while I celebrate free speech, that type of thing will NOT be tolerated on here or any thing i might link to.
I intend to use this as a free space to hone and re-sharpen my writing skills, and critical thinking skills, with the future intention of very soon (hopefully!) launching a new stay-at-home career of freelance writing.
This will also be a space to publish excerpts of that writing, poetry, reviews, articles, etc. and also for personal stuff, like family updates, pictures, links to projects my friends are doing that I think are way cool, other stuff that i think is way cool and needs promotion, and of course, a gallery of my travel mug collection.
Let me just say this now and get it out of the way: If you have a travel mug that I don't already own, you can be sure that i'm coveting it. I love travel mugs. They are the sacred vessels that usually and generally contain my friend (addiction) coffee. Ojala que si, they contain some form of mocha, with lots of whipped cream on top. I will try and post pictures of my favorites on here from time to time, as well as new acquisitions. yes, i already have a stainless steel one engraved with the words, "Queen of Travel Mugs, Suzy-Q" but thanks for asking. ;) Of course, it would be unspeakably rude for me to reject ANY travel mug given as a gift, so bring 'em on.
Anyway, that's enough for now, more later!
Oh, and I love to DISCUSS things- let's just keep it civil, shall we? As Al Franken so astutely put it in his book, "Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot" - the decline of civil discourse in this country is just appalling. :) :) TTFN!