There’s no love for a poor man...

“There’s no love for a poor man,” ahhh, now there’s a Google search term that just broke my heart. It isn’t true, you know, there is lots of love for a poor man, poor in riches, but well off in spirit. I married such a man, on purpose, and it was the best decision I ever made. He has a good heart and soul, comes from a large family, and built himself a business that has always kept food on the table and the lights on. How can I not admire such a man? He’s made something out of nothing. Besides having raised four kids, we’ve taken trips, gone camping, bought a house, had some great fun and good memories.

One of the best things about my job is that I get to work with a lot of widows and widowers and they tell me the most beautiful love stories, the stuff of fairy tales and romance novels, and yet very raw and real. They speak to me of how “he didn’t have two sticks to rub together” not “two nickles to his name” and yet they knew he was the one. They tell me tales about the Great Depression and WW2 and how they started with nothing, how poor they were, how they put their babies to sleep in dresser drawers.

The men tell me about having spied the most beautiful creature they had ever seen, about being scared and yet being hopeful. Some who never doubted for a moment that she would love them back, and some who doubted so much they rubbed their eyes every morning wondering if she was for real.

In hospice work they like to give you helpful handouts designed to comfort those in the grieving process with some useful “facts.” One such fact is that when you lose your wife or husband you tend to idolize and idealize them. A woman in her 90’s with the language of a sailor, told me that was a bunch of hooey. “I worshipped the ground he walked on while he was alive,” she said. “It’s only now, for the first time in my life I’m angry with him because he left me.” Painful stuff, but bittersweet, too. We have a great capacity to love.

That search term got to me because I know how important it is for many men to provide, to have a sense of self-worth that comes from their work. I see the toll a bad economy and limited opportunities take on men. Yes, women suffer too, but there is just something so innate to men that makes their work important to them. It goes farther than simple provision, it becomes a part of their identity, how they define themselves, their sense of self-worth and value. Pride, the good kind, often comes from having work you enjoy and being employed.

Times are changing and in spite of all the hype, the economy is not doing so well. Businesses are collapsing, people are being laid off. It is tough out there and there is collateral damage strewn about all over the place. We in the current age do not have the same economic opportunities all my widows and widowers had. It is far more challenging for us even earn a living let alone to rise up from poverty and create what our parents or grandparents did.

We are not our wealth or our work. We are not even our ability to produce and provide, we are so much more and we are all greatly loved. These are hard times that call for many of us to become rich in spirit, to store our treasures up in heaven. Traditionally men have often gotten their identity, their value, through their ability to provide and to provide as lavishly as possible. That is The World however, the materialistic way we learn to define ourselves. That is not who and what we are, that is not what God sees in us.

Now here’s something that men could actually learn from women, “work” is not always about money, work is about what we do and who we are and how we love.

It’s a serious issue, lots of suicides out there, financial stress breaking up families, young men feeling lost and unsure what their role is supposed to be. Be gentle with yourselves and oddly, look to your mothers and grand mothers. They are the one’s that understood that “work” is not always about money and that being “poor” does not have to mean being poor in spirit.

So, there’s no love for a poor man, yes, yes there is. All those great romantic stories I am so blessed to hear, all those long and happy marriages, began with a poor man who was greatly loved.

Scream the Truth

So, addiction, meth and heroin, is something that weighs heavy on my heart where I live. It’s everywhere, it’s just so much more up close and personal in a small town. I have a sister and a nephew who are both in a permanent meth induced psychosis and will never recover.

There is a great deal of denial within the community, we call these people “mentally ill” as if they just suffer from some kind of organic brain chemistry problem and self medicate. It isn’t really true, but few people want to actually name the problem. We say the “mental health community,” because it sounds so much better and it’s a way of avoiding the problem entirely.

We have a needle exchange program here and recently the paper reported that we handed out 14,000 needles last year. In a town this size that is a staggering number, but rather than declaring we have a serious problem, this program is praised and promoted as a great success, a solution to what ails us. There is additional funding that is now going towards overdose kits we plan to pass out, in the hopes of preventing some deaths. I’m not opposed to either of these things, just endlessly frustrated that we deal with the symptoms of a problem and never actually get to the root cause.

It is absolutely devastating for a mother’s heart to watch kids I have known since they were infants and watch them change over night. They are babies, they have no idea what they are involved in, what a thief and destroyer that is. Often I think those of us on the outside looking in suffer more than they do. They can’t see their own misery as clearly, they are anesthetized. Those of us who love them are forced to feel all the feelings, to bear witness to all the destruction. Addicts are often very self absorbed, narcissistic, so it doesn’t occur to them how many other people they are hurting in the process.

It’s not all kids either, it is adults too, parents who pretty much emotionally abandon their children with their addiction issues. Those kids often become the adults, the caretakers, losing their own childhoods and carrying a burden much too big for them.

It’s not all “poor people” either, or “tweakers” or “those kinds of people.”  There are many well off, well connected people, who get caught up in addiction themselves, who sell, who entice, who keep the cycle going. It is just an entangled mess of misery, that ripples out and impacts every area of our community.

Here’s a blog that speaks more to the issue, Heroin. Stop the Silence. Speak the Truth.

How to Keep the NSA Amused

Step One: Use a consistent IP address and unsecured public wifi so every darn pervert and hacker has access to your stuff. It’s a bit like creating a six lane traffic jam for spies. The NSA will be so distracted trying to weave their way through all the weirdos spying on YOU, you’ll be left in relative anonymity.

Step Two: Drunk blogging. Wait for a full moon, get yourself a box of cheap wine, and let the skeletons in your closet come out to play…Try to use plenty of melodrama, much like an episode of Dark Shadows. The goal here is to keep them hanging on the edge of their seat, wondering what the heck that crazy girl is going to reveal next…

Step Three: To prevent identity theft resulting from the swiss cheese vulnerabilities our security people have left on the intertoobz, destroy your own identity first. Seriously foul it up! Credit card debt, transposed SS numbers, paternity suits, whatever floats your boat. Make it so bad that a hacker actually has to pay YOU to take it back. Go ahead, steal my identity, I dare you…

Step Four: Go on facebook to that little place where it says, “what’s on your mind today?” Really let them have it. None of this “Fine” stuff. FB wants to know how you feel, really let them know exactly how you feel. Then be sure to click like on every lawyer and public defender’s website in all 50 states. How do I feel? I feel like I’m going to need a #%& public defender in about five minutes, that’s how I feel!

Step Five: Visit the website of some cute celebrity and completely humiliate yourself. Declare your undying love, confess your deepest fantasies, practice your erotica writing skills. They’ll either kick you out or take you up on your offers. It’s win/win.

Step Six: Drunken haiku. Need I say more? You know darn well that’s code for something…

Step Seven: Be moody and unpredictable. You know, act like a girl…Make your comments irrational and in opposition to each other. Be a kind gentle spirit on one website and within seconds… a raging inferno of bitchiness on the next. Keep them guessing.

Step Eight: Create multiple online identities and email address. Translate the US Constitution into Pig Latin and spam yourself with it daily. Chances are good they’ll eventually break your code, but on the bright side, they might actually read the thing.

Do it people, do it for your country. Think of the poor NSA people forced to play Candy Crush with bored housewives all day. Think of the poor guy who has to monitor the phone sex lines…..

Of red satin bathing suits and turquoise eyes...

Work has been busy the past few days. Sitting in the doctor’s office the other day, I was privileged to chat with yet another women recently widowed, who needed someone to talk to about the miracle of love, a love she lost just 8 months ago.

The awe and wonder in her voice is something I share, feeling a bit bedazzled by the miracle of love, the synchronicity of events that must line up to make that happen. Grieving the loss yes, but also pouring over those memories and wondering how in the world she ever got so lucky. So many women have such a great need to try to explain what happened to them, to tell me who and what this man they married was all about, to pay tribute to their lost loves and to the miracle of it all.

She told me a lovely tale of having been engaged to this devilishly handsome doctor with turquoise eyes, well off, who often took her skiing to exotic places on dates. Although he had never actually proposed they were discussing wedding venues, guest lists, and china patterns. Everyone told her she had landed Mr. Right, he was the catch of the day, God’s gift to women, or so people said. She told me she was quite attractive herself, had a great figure, and a red satin bathing suit that was the envy of all. They were a golden couple indeed, and she felt like a movie star. It was a fairytale right out of Hollywood.

She was a nurse and one day while she was working in the hospital, a man came to the back door, where she would toss out stale water from the patient’s bedsides. When she opened the door she nearly doused him. It was still the tail end of the Great Depression where she lived and he was a salesman, selling paint brushes. He was a sad-looking man, torn suit, carrot orange curls in need of a cut, freckles and splotchy skin, the precise opposite of handsome.

Having nearly doused him with water, she apologized and shook his hand, and in that moment she just knew instantly that her life would never be the same. He was quiet, poor, unattractive, but there was just something there that called to her.

Bold as brass, he showed up at her door a few days later, with a huge bouquet and a box of chocolates and the man with the turquoise eyes was all but forgotten. Only a few months later, they got married. She had her whole life planned out, was doing everything “right,” and then along came carrot top and turned her world upside down. He went on to make his fortune and they spent 60 blissful years together.

Five years later when she had just gone back to work after her first child, she encountered the remnants of her man with the turquoise eyes. He had gotten married, abandoned his wife with two little kids, and he was God’s gift to women alright, as in he was gifting himself to women right and left and leaving a trail of collateral damage in his wake. “That could have been me,” she said, “if love had not blindsided me at the back door of that hospital so long ago.”

That evening she burned the red satin bathing suit on a rubbish pile in her backyard. “I don’t miss the man with the turquoise eyes,” she tells me, “but I sure do miss that bathing suit.”

“I don’t understand people who say marriage is hard work,” she tells me. “You just count your blessings everyday and don’t try to change people.” 

Words of wisdom from a fine-looking woman in a red satin bathing suit, who once thought she loved a man with turquoise eyes.

"Real Men"

It has been suggested that I shouldn’t use the term “real men” because it is shaming to men. After giving the matter some thought and considering it from several different perspectives, I have decided to rather defiantly double down on the term. Apologies in advance if it makes anyone uncomfortable, but tough luck.

 First of all, in theory if one is truly in Christ, I should not have the power to shame anyone. Anyone who has laid their pride down at the foot of the cross and received the Blood of the Lamb should know who and what they are, which is not a wounded bird full of pride and shame just waiting for someone to cause them offense. That particular ideology is to be found more within feminism, social justice warriors, and internet culture at large, and it is a complete deception. It is an ideology of chronic victimhood where one competes for offense points. Blech.

If you do not feel like a “real man,” figure out what that means and become one. Harsh words of tough love perhaps, but being a “real man” is your rightful inheritance, walk in it for goodness sakes.

Second of all, I am surrounded by “real men,” as in they are the majority. It does not matter if they are standing in line at the food bank, living in their cars, or off the grid, or hitch hiking across America or disabled or raising families or becoming fathers to children that aren’t even theirs, the point is, they are all good and honorable men, “real men,” if you will. What marks them? I don’t know, kindness perhaps, authenticity, an awareness of their humanity and the humanity of others? There are many flawed and imperfect men but they are “real,” as in their hearts are in the right place.

What is not a “real man?” Throwing over a liquor store, abandoning children, abusing wives, promoting hatred, preying on the weak and vulnerable, or attacking random strangers on the internet with words that would peel paint off the walls. Those things are “unreal” as in, they fall way short of what it means to be a “real man.” And yet even in the midst of those human foibles and failures, there can be forgiveness, redemption, and healing. At any given moment one can turn things around and walk in one’s rightful path. Yes, your rightful path, your inheritance, pull it towards yourself and embrace it. It belongs to you.

If it comforts anyone, there are plenty of women who have failed at the “real woman” thing, too. This is not a gender competition here or if it is to be so, we should be competing to see who can best represent all that is good and golden about the nature of ourselves, not engaging in a race to the bottom.

There’s a little secret to shame that perhaps some people don’t know, but when particular words or ideas make one uncomfortable, there is often something going on within ourselves, something unresolved, that has made those words sting. It’s happened to me many, many times. Ouch, over and over and over again. It doesn’t necessarily make those words wrong or shaming however, they are keys to what areas and issues we need healing and strengthening in.

To run around trying to ban words and ideas that make one uncomfortable is as silly as feminists trying to ban the word “bossy” because it makes some women feel uncomfortable. Puh-lease. If we try to rid the world of all offense and conviction, we will still not be perfect, we will still be uncomfortable, and we will still fall short.

 

Using the term “real men” is not about shaming men at all, it is about calling them to their higher selves. It is about truly knowing and seeing your real potential with great love, even when some themselves cannot see it at all. It would be dishonoring to men as a whole if we were to all deny the fact that there really is a standard there, an expectation for them. To whom much is given, much is expected.

So, be real.

Things I Wish I'd Known as a New Wife

1. Men and women are different and do not speak the same language. 

There’s an old joke in our house, once while I was cleaning the oven my husband got frustrated with me and said “I don’t care about the oven, all I need is bacon, sex, and the remote control!” It’s a funny memory because he was totally serious, but my brain at the time could not conceive of anyone having such simple needs. I honestly believed he should be pleased with my oven cleaning efforts. Why? Because I would be pleased if someone cleaned my oven! But men are not us, men tend to value different things.

2.Men and women perceive love differently. 

 It’s a terrible injustice but what men tend to need in a marriage is respect, encouragement, and sex. All I really need is provision, protection, guidance, wisdom, someone to address my emotional life, identify my needs, build intimacy, establish trust, create loyalty, provide romance, encourage, nurture, support…..are your eyes glazed over yet? Oh, and also I am insane, so in my case those issues are going to be a bit more complex.

All in good humor here, but those needs of mine seem perfectly reasonable to me. That is how I relate to other people, that is how I express love. That is often how women relate to each other. Should be a piece of cake, we do it all the time. This is a perfectly normal way of being in the world! Men however, are not women and it is not reasonable or fair to expect them to be. Men have their own way of loving women and it is really rather sweet, but we have to give them room to express it.

Good husbands often get to know their wives very well and will grow into being able to meet many of those needs, over time. Just as I learned that cleaning the oven was not an effective way of earning my husband’s favor, men too adapt and learn how to respond to their wives. My husband now knows me better than I know myself.

3. Men really need to feel respect to feel love. 

To this day, nearly 3 decades into marriage, this one still throws me sometimes. It is simply not my world so sometimes I forget, but it is genuinely important for men to feel respected by their wives. It is so easy to make a glib joke or an off hand remark and hurt them. It is so easy to unconsciously undermine them. Men need to know that they have great value and worth in our eyes and we have to show them. How we perceive husbands means everything to them. To not have a woman’s respect is actually painful.

4. Men have to teach their wives. 

That’s probably politically incorrect to say in a world that seems to want to resist all implications of authority, but how else are wives to know what husbands need and want? We are not mind readers either (although we are better at the mind reading than you are.)

Consider this young man I know wryly telling me recently how his wife looks at him with such disgust in her eyes when he comes home from work. He’s now avoiding her, he’s becoming unhappy, there is tension there. So has he talked to her? No! Well sorry, but you’re going to  have to actually talk to your wife! I honestly have no idea what is going on there, maybe he is tracking mud in the house, maybe her face is just frozen that way, or maybe she’s trying to get a reaction out of you. Regardless, ignoring it won’t make it go away and she may well be twice as frustrated as you are simply because you are completely ignoring her. Do  not try to live that way, speak up.

Hubby and I are quite playful these days and know each other well, but there have been many times he’s had to speak up because I had no idea I was doing something to offend him. A few times I knew perfectly well and just didn’t care. Turns out he doesn’t like that either.

4. Contempt is the enemy. 

 There are some studies coming out now that seem to verify that precise thing, that the leading cause of divorce is actually contempt. I see that reflected in the world around me, too. Contempt can be a sneaky bugger, women especially can slide into it, because it’s a tool we have, it’s the opposite of respect and it has the power to wound. Also, our culture currently promotes a great deal of contempt towards men, almost as a way of life. Contempt however, kills love, on both sides of the equation. Men do not feel respected and women do not feel safe.

One thing I did get right, I knew to put my relationship with Christ first. There is a hierarchy there and Christ is always at the top. When people get that wrong, we can start to put unrealistic expectations on our spouses, start to believe that they should be able to fulfill us and meet all our needs in a way that really only God can. Marriage really can be the most amazing tango and spouses can become very near and dear to us, but we love from an overflow, not a deficit.

                              

"Biblical submission is Not Passivity"

I promised another post on submission within marriage, but the Peaceful Wife has many lovely articles that address these issues even more thoroughly. Here is a link to one I enjoyed in which she dispels some misconceptions “Biblical Submission is Not Passivity.” Here is a key phrase I really liked, “from this position of great strength in Christ, we submit to our husbands.”

My own words often reflect that  idea too, submission is actually strength in Christ, it is not weakness before men. It is actually an empowering tool for women that allows you to have a more peaceful marriage, enables communication, and helps to facilitate more love and empathy between husbands and wives.

There are many misconceptions about wives being doormats or Stepford wives and marriages being dictatorships, prone to abuse. It’s kind of sad, biblical concepts of submission are so maligned and misunderstood, some people reject them out of hand, and some women reject faith entirely based simply on those misunderstandings.

Another way to look at the word “submit” is that it simply means “to yield.” The opposite of submit is actually “to engage in battle.” There’s nothing wrong with a bit of friendly competition between the genders, a good water fight or wrestling match, but to be “engaged in battle” as a way of life within marriage is exhausting and tends to make everyone miserable.

Submission plays well with natural biology, even outside of the context of faith, and it tends to bring out the best in men and women. There are two forces at work there, the male and female. All in good humor here, but those two forces play very well with each other when they are in harmony and working in a complimentary manner.

When a wife says something like “I will never, ever submit to his authority!” it kind of makes me laugh, because you already have, or at least you are halfway there if you have married someone! “Authority” however, is another word that tends to conjur up all kinds of resistance and negativity. Like it or not however, there is authority granted in marriage. Just from a legal perspective you have now granted a husband authority over your debts and finances, authority over your health care decisions, authority over many aspects of your health and well being. They are now responsible for those things simply from a legal perspective. From a Christian perspective, their responsibility extends even farther.

To grant somebody all of the responsibility and yet to deny them any authority, is actually somewhat cruel. I’ve been in that situation myself, where I have been expected to take on all of the responsibility for everything that can go wrong, but was granted none of the authority that might have enabled me to actually have some influence and say in the matter. It’s kind of an exploitative, unpleasant situation to find oneself in. I referred to my job title as scapegoat, because that is really what I become, someone  designated to take all of the blame with no power or influence.

It can be really beneficial for wives who resist the idea of submission within marriage to really explore what that means and what is going on within you. There can be great healing that comes from taking that journey, from facing our fears, from exploring our perceptions about authority, and from contemplating our trust issues. It not only can help us to get to know the nature of our own selves better and lead to happier marriages, it can strengthen our relationship with Christ Himself.

Listen Up Wordpress

I really don’t appreciate you decorating my blog and wordpress reader with the gay pride rainbow. I get it, you’re happy about the Supreme Court ruling on same sex marriage, but what about tolerating those of us who don’t share your views? What about allowing us the freedom to celebrate or to not celebrate, as we see fit?

Why would you presume it was okay to force everyone to display a symbolic icon declaring our support and celebration on our very own blogs, whether we want it or not? Did we consent to this? Isn’t that dishonoring to individuals and choice? Do I step into your house and tell you how to decorate, what issues you are mandated to agree with?

WordPress is supposed to an open blogging platform that encourages people to share their views. You’ve taken my choice away from me and decorated the platform with a political statement that I disagree with. That’s not fair and I’m not pleased. I wasn’t even planning to blog about the Supreme court decision on same sex marriage, but now you’ve forced my hand.

No, I do not agree with the decision nor am I in a state of celebration. I consider your mandatory rainbows a total violation of my right to form my own opinions.

Why E-Books Stink

Actually e-books don’t stink, they smell like nothing. Gone is the stale musty scent of times gone by, the faint hint of vanilla and old ink.

You cannot get disgusted at an e-book and hurl it against a wall. There are people walking in the world who will never know the deep satisfaction that comes from slamming the receiver on an old telephone down, or hurling a book against the wall. That is sad.

You cannot comb garage sales and back alley bookstores seeking some ancient and well-loved copy of a rare e-book, some obscure piece of pulp fiction or a trashy little bundle of sci/fi, covered in dust and yellowing about the edges.

With e-books, there’s no reason to leave your home at all.E-books, well they self destruct. They cannot go missing for 40 years in someone’s attic only to be discovered among the cobwebs like some rare and priceless treasure, long hidden in a desert tomb.

You cannot tear the pages out of an e-book. This is an exceedingly cruel situation to find oneself in, especially when the author has done something with a character you do not like. How can I fix it for you, if I cannot tear out your pages and shred them?

You cannot write in the margins of an e-book. How can I possibly correct your grammar and cheap editing if I cannot scribble all over your work? There are things that must be said, notations made, sentences underlined. Who pours indifference over a book and refuses to converse with it? Who does that??!

E-books can die on you right in the middle of the best part! There is nothing worse than being threatened with a low battery right when you are about to get to the crux of the matter.

With a paperback one can always light a candle or get a flashlight when the power goes out. With an e-book, one is compelled to travel for miles just to find a public restroom with an electrical outlet so as to continue the story.

E-books lack the scars of love, the stretch marks and coffee stains that come from being well-loved and well shared. There are no torn covers, no wrinkles and finger prints that reveal this delicious little book once shared intimacy with others.

There are people who will never catch a whiff of an old cigar, the stale musty scent of times gone by, the faint hint of vanilla and old ink. People who will never know the joy of blowing off the dust, tucking those brittle yellow pages back into their spine, and lovingly caressing your new-found treasure.

That is very sad.

I, however, have known all these things and have inhaled the joy to be found there, devoured the contents within, and when disappointed, hurled the thing at the wall. How do I explain these things to my children and grandchildren, these secret things that are being lost and stolen, these moments they will never understand?

My Biological Clock is Freaking Me Out

My biological clock is freaking me out, not mine this woman, Erin’s. The only thing that freaks me out about my biological clock is if someone were to find a way to rewind it. Now that is the stuff of nightmares. A doctor recently told me, you could conceivably have another child and I thought, you could conceivably become the bad smell coming from my attic too, but we don’t need to address every possible hypothetical here, do we?

So Erin’s post has annoyed me and feeling rather cranky today, I must lament the matter. How bloody stupid do you have to be?? I mean, seriously! Our ancestors managed to figure out how to reproduce without sex education, government reproductive policies, or an entire institution called feminist academia.

Also, talk about First World Problems of your own making! Woe is me, people in the world are starving, getting torn apart from war, and I’m horribly oppressed by my own inability to figure out how to have a baby. Wahhhh…..

Now genuine fertility problems are one thing, but I’m so smart and edjumacated I’ve managed to think and reason my reproductive choices into a corner, not so much.

I should cut the poor woman some slack, she acknowledges that she doesn’t just want to have a baby, she wants to have a husband to have a baby with, too. The problem is she wants a husband entirely on her terms and the guy is really nothing more than a fashion accessory, a handbag that is going to accessorize her baby making adventures.

I think what ticks me off about this woman is how self-absorbed she is. She declares herself to always have been pro-choice, but now that it doesn’t benefit me and I’m actually discussing getting pregnant on “accident,” I’m not so pro-choice anymore. What is this, like some sort of subjective morality? Why yes, yes it is. My own values and desires have now shifted so morality just magically shifts, too. Yeah, that little pro-choice thing, never mind, I want a baby now. What was once just a meaningless clump of cells, is now my future baby. Mine!

Also, how does one accidentally-deliberately get oneself pregnant in the hopes that some man will feel trapped to marry you and is that even ethical? No, no of course it is not, hence her hesitation. Of course, that’s what her own mother “had” to do.

She goes on to say, “I feel like a bad feminist, like a baby-crazed lunatic for even thinking that falling in love and having a family is what I want instead of having a powerful career, inner peace or what have you.”

I am filled with empathy. No, no I am not. I am actually filled with memories and twinges of resentment over all the things my fem friends used to say to me when I decided I wanted to be a wife and mother.

“That’s for women who have nothing valuable to contribute to the world!”

“Well, if that’s all you think you’re worth.”

“Why are you throwing your life away?”

“What a waste.”

“All I can say is, I hope the sex is worth it.”

Okay, that last one makes me laugh. It’s been many years, but a woman I once called a friend actually said that to me. She met my husband, completely nixed him, and then implied I was incapable of reason, a sell out to my own sexual desires which had obviously clouded my brain. It was rather hurtful at the time, but today I embrace it with good humor. Yes, I married for sex. Yes, it was worth it! Also, the fuzzy dice hanging from the rear view mirror simply enchanted me. What can I say, I am a vain and shallow creature.

Said friend went on to marry a man herself, then decided she was a lesbian and divorced him. Than ten years later started dating men again. Apparently knowing my own heart was a very shameful thing.

There’s been a frolicking internet debate over evolution, evo/psych theories, and the movie Idiocracy was mentioned. In the movie all the smart and edjumacated people stop having babies because they are so busy calculating cost effectiveness and proper timing. They edit themselves right out of the reproductive equation entirely and only the “stupid” people keep making babies, creating a world composed entirely of stupid people. It’s a somewhat humorous piece of sci/fi.

Now, I really don’t subscribe to theories of evolution or survival of the fittest or assorted pop science nonsense like evo/psych, but using my imagination here, what if the wealthy, successful, edjumacated people where actually the least fit? What if they were really the ones mother nature was editing out of the equation? What if those of us in the trailer park were actually the fit, smart, and adaptive ones?

What of our entire perceptions of reality were wrong? What if our materialistic Western values and endless emphasis on intellectualism and stuff, were actually a de-evolution?? What if those we perceive to be the elite, the fit, the best that humanity has to offer, are actually a bizarre genetic fluke about to get kicked out of the gene pool? Of course in order to believe this we also have to believe there is no Lifeguard on duty.

What if those of us who really took those words to heart, “He which made them at the beginning made them male and female……Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth,” what if we accidentally stumbled into a plan for human beings vastly superior to our own attempted designs? What if those words were actually given to us as a guidebook to happiness and fulfillment? What if the One who made us, knowing our nature, knowing how we will feel towards the middle of our lives, the end of our lives, handed us a recipe designed to bring us the most contentment and peace?

What if our silly brains and relentless quest for intelligence was actually a disability, a genetic defect that causes us to create problems for ourselves that don’t even exist?? What if the “stupid” people are actually vastly superior to us??

I say this all in good humor because I am one, one of those intelligent people more than capable of thinking myself right into the corner. A corner God has frequently placed me in so I will discover the error of my ways.

Thank God, because if not for that constant intervention, I would be in the middle of my life, surrounded by a dozen cats, explaining to everyone how gender is only a social construct while bemoaning my inability to reproduce. Seriously Erin, but for the grace of God, there go I.

By the way, how come sexual orientation is written in stone, something you are born with, while gender itself is something so fluid you get to choose??

Never mind, I hear the corner calling me again.