Body Love

Being the current events junkie that I am, I’ve been reading a lot of articles about rape culture and the kind of body shaming that can go along with it where victims are concerned, especially women and girls. It hits me in a strange way because I have a teen daughter who is, shall we say, not ashamed of her body. I have to admit that after growing up uncomfortable un my own skin, thinking for years that I was ugly, having been picked on for being small, for having boobs that were too big, for having hairy legs, or whatever, I don’t want my child to grow up hating her body. As far as I’m concerned she’s the most beautiful girl in the world and should feel good in her skin.

The only issue I have is this: she likes to dress somewhat provocatively. I wouldn’t classify her as an exhibitionist; that description comes with the connotation that she dresses the way she does for attention. I think she’s just comfortable as she is and doesn’t care what anyone thinks. She ran around naked all the time as a baby. Her dad used to take her to the beach in just a bathing suit bottom because he didn’t want her to have a tan line. She’s just always been kind of naked. I don’t find nudity especially disgraceful or disgusting, the way some people do, but she is just a kid. I want to give her the freedom to dress however she wants, but I admit that I’m not comfortable with my teen traipsing around in public in shorts where her bum sticks out the bottom. So I’m kind of at an impasse. She has a tendency to hear what she thinks I said rather than what I did say, and if I say “you’re not grown enough to wear those shorts,” I don’t want her to hear “put your body away. You have no business showing it.” I don’t want to body-shame her into wearing whatever everyone else in the world wants to see her in, but now that she’s growing up and changing her style to be more provocative than perhaps a teen should be, I do have to set some boundaries. But I don’t want her to think it’s because she’s gross or unattractive, and I’m concerned that that’s how she’ll take whatever I say to her.

My mother-in-law said to me that “some dirty old man is going to think she’s asking for it,” which makes me sick to my stomach. If a dirty old man thinks that about a child that is not yet sixteen then that’s what makes him a dirty old man. That’s rape culture talking. She could be wearing a parka and still be raped. Would she be asking for it then?? Or only on warm days when she wears shorts?? What rapists and pedos and abusers think and do is what makes them what they are: not what a woman wears. I sure as shit don’t want to tell my daughter that she’s responsible for what “dirty old men” think of her. By all means, she should be aware that there are people out there that are like that, but it’s not her fault if they do something bad.

Anyway, it’s the last week at school. I know they have some manner of a dress code there, and she’s got her last finals to keep her busy, but after the end of this week I have to have a whole new body talk with her, and I’m not sure how to do it without sounding like I’m telling her that her body is somehow inappropriate, although there is a time and a place for a bare butt, and I don’t want to give her the message that whatever nasty people say or do or think of how she looks is not her fault.

Quandary . . .

The Skinny Girls vs. The Fat Girls

I’ve been trying to write about this subject for a long time. As someone who has lived to see thirty years as thin, curvy, and athletic, most people tell me I have absolutely no business commenting on “fat women.” Well, too damn bad, because we all have to live in these bodies we’ve been given.

I have a hard time reconciling this culture of fat hatred with my own life experiences. I mean, it really pisses me off when people make fun of my fat friends; when people are cruel because they don’t like the way someone looks. It’s really scummy and shitty, and I’m pretty sure most of us have called someone fat just because they pissed us off or hurt our feelings. I know I have, and it makes me feel bad to think about now. If you wanna throw shade, I mean really throw shade. If you can’t do any better than to insult someone about their weight, then what are you even doing?? You suck at this game. But I’ve seen those deep wounds that bubble to the surface when a word that should be nothing more than a descriptor is used as a weapon, and I choose not to do that anymore. To put someone down because of their appearance is petty, especially when it’s attached to who you are as a person. Like someone can, or would even want to, change their size to be beautiful to some obnoxious asshole who can’t even be bothered to come up with a real insult. But when people call us those names, it can, and it does hurt.

As women, we’re socialized young to appreciate pretty things, and to appreciate being pretty, and the most ubiquitous message we receive is that thin equals beauty. I figure that in some ways that’s fine: being thin can be a beautiful thing. But it’s surely not the only thing, and to believe that it is can do more harm than good. It’s refreshing to see so many people embracing the kinds of grassroots media that we have now that celebrate beautiful women of all shapes, sizes, heights, weights, races, ethnicities, abilities, intellects. It wasn’t that long ago that athletic women weren’t considered sexy. Now we have entire media outlets dedicated to women who are beautiful and talented and hard-working athletes. As a short, skinny, curvy girl, I love that women with bodies like Kim K. and Christina Hendricks are considered beautiful. They have big boobs and broad shoulders and small waists like me. I think Christina Aguilera looks freaking fierce with curves. After years of eating disorders and self-harm, Demi Lovato has grown into a very beautiful, curvaceous woman. Don’t even get me started on Mindy Kaling. We’ll be here all day.

So why can’t I think of myself the same way??

In magazines and on tv, we see rail-thin women who look as tall as skyscrapers being glorified as icons of beauty and femininity. In real life, skinny girls are picked on, too. Maybe that’s why so many of us fell onto that destructive bandwagon as kids, teasing the fat girls. I remember being poked and pinched and having people comment on my weight my entire life. It made me uncomfortable. People accused me of having eating disorders, because apparently a woman or a girl can’t just be thin: there must be something wrong with her. It’s insulting when people comment on what, when, or how much a heavier woman eats, or to grab her body and tell her to lose some weight, right to her face. Why isn’t it more widely considered just as insulting to do the same thing to thin women, telling them to eat something, or that they exercise too much, or whatever?? Because it is insulting. It’s like unless you fall into some demarcated Supermodel category of being thin, then you’re weird and must be examined. I don’t want to sound like that crazy workout lady in California, whinging about the plight of unfortunate, put-upon skinny girls. I’m not going to try and get all “poor me” on y’all, but in this way we do have a culture of thin hatred, as well.

If you’re fat, there’s something wrong with you. If you’re skinny, there’s something wrong with you.

You know what?? Go fuck yourself!! These messages make us envious and suspicious of other women for absolutely no good reason, and it needs to stop.

I don’t even know how much light I can shed on the subject because no one wants a thin woman’s opinion; like skinny girls are just for decoration. We’re just garnish and don’t need to have thoughts or insecurities or life experiences. That kind of shit just draws lines between women who actually do have things in common. I don’t know whether these negative mainstream media outlets are trying to shame us into all being the same size so we’re easier to figure out or if society is trying to keep women fighting with each other so we won’t noticed when we’re being treated badly: when our rights are being taken away, when we’re being shamed and blamed and guilt-tripped, or when we experience institutionalized sexism, racism, violence, or poverty. It’s like as long as we’re busy trying to be hotter-than-thou we’ll be too busy to notice income inequality, or the fact that the Violence Against Women Act went buh-bye, or when crusty old white male politicians try to tell us what we may or may not do with our own bodies. We won’t notice when we’re being slut-shamed, or like we’ll think it’s cute and funny when we’re objectified as nothing more than sex toys for men.

I’m hot, so who cares??

Dude.

That’s horrifying.

Feeling beautiful on the outside is difficult enough in this world. As I turned 30 and my body began to change, it was such a culture shock for me. I’ve always been skinny. WTF?!?! I mean, now I’m a whole entire size 7, so wah, right?? But the transformation was so foreign that it made me feel ugly; dare I say, fat. Not that I AM fat and I should be ashamed of myself, or whatever. Just feeling so different from the skinny I’ve always been. And then my friends who actually are overweight get all up-in-arms and say “well, if you’re fat then what am I?” And then there’s no way I’m going to be heard. I’ve been shut down. They don’t know how beautiful I think they are and how out of place I feel, like I’m walking around in someone else’s body; that what I feel has nothing to do with how I see them.

One of my best friends growing up is a self-proclaimed “fat chick.” She used to say, in a not-so-complimentary tone, that I was “perfect.” It made me so self-conscious when she would do that, like now I have to be perfect. And I thought the world of her. She has great skin and the kind of long, thick hair most women would kill for. She never had braces and yet she has the most perfect smile. She has this laugh that is so booming and infections that just being in the same room with her makes you want to laugh, too. And she has a big, fat ass. And if you insult her for it, I would soundly kick yours up and down the street for an hour.

So, how did we get here?? How did we get so resentful of one another?? What’s more, how can we get out into something more welcoming and constructive??

In Jamaica, the word “fat” is used as an adjective. I know they use it as an insult, as well, but you hear someone describe some as big and fat and you can tell they’re just describing that person’s appearance, not commenting on their physical beauty or lack thereof. A child came walking up the road one morning looking for her mother. When we asked what her mother looked like she said, without any hint of meanness in her voice, “she’s a big, fat woman.” And we laughed at that. And now I think about it and how demeaning that would be in our culture.

So, I don’t know what the universal solution is. Self-love is so hard to accomplish, for all of us. Even Supermodels and Rhodes Scholars and humanitarians have insecurities. I guess that as an individual what I can contribute is to try to love myself as I am, make improvements as needed, and be nice to other women.

To wrap this up, I have a question for you: have you ever noticed that the people who say that they’re perfect and fabulous all the time are the most asinine people to be around.

Thank you, and good-night.

Why I'm Not a Grammar Nazi Anymore

I used to be one of those Grammar Nazis. I had no patience for what appeared to me to be other people’s stupidity and complete disregard for language. Eventually I realized that there were a few flaws in my logic and considerations to be made therein.

Now, most recently I’ve struggled with math. I mean, I have for years, but it’s only gotten worse as I’ve gotten older. Most recently I managed to flunk out of college 3 credits away from receiving my Bachelor’s degree in communications because I can’t do algebra. And people don’t understand math illiteracy, and they can be unintentionally mean about it. People who are bad at math are treated like idiots. Hey, before I tanked my grades by doing poorly in math, I was getting mostly As and Bs. And it doesn’t seem to matter what I do, because I have access to resources and have had amazing rock star tutors and great teachers. But you put a problem in front of me and try to get me to remember which g.d. formula I need to use to solve it, you may as well be asking me to translate the Bhagavad Gita.

And so, through all my trials and tribulations of taking and failing college-level math an unprecedented nine times, it got me to thinking about people and writing. Are people who aren’t good at writing just automatically stupid?? I don’t like being treated like I’m stupid because I struggle with math, so why would I treat someone else badly because they struggle with writing??

I once got an email from a young woman who was working for me at the time, and I’ll be damned if the entire thing wasn’t in textese. I had to say to her, “sweets, I’m your boss. I love you and I love that we’re friends, too, but in a professional environment you should write like the educated young person you are.” She was not then, nor is she now, a stupid person. She was young and misjudged what would be appropriate. Some of the most intelligent people I’ve met are dyslexic, and as such they’re absolutely terrible at spelling and grammar. What, am I going to put them down and insult their intelligence because they forget which one is “there” and which is “their??” Hell no. That would be mean a.f. There was another woman I got to know in an online classroom who struggled with English a great deal, and I probably would have thought she was a complete dumbass if I didn’t know that English was her fifth language. Fifth!! Okay, she gets a pass for even being able to take, let alone do well in, college credits in her fifth language. Mistakes or no mistakes, my hat is off. We had a chuckle now and then over some of her sillier blunders, but it would be shitty of anyone to flat out make fun of her or put her on blast for being stupid. Just the fact that she speaks five languages proves she’s not stupid.

Sometimes it will drive me crazy when I’m in a class with someone who just comes across as clueless as to their mistakes. We all make typos, and that’s one thing. However, when you’re in a 400-level college course and haven’t figured out how to use spell check, you come across looking like an idiot. And I admit, I’ve made mistakes and made myself look like an idiot. None of us are immune. I’m a decent enough writer and I still can’t remember which one is “effect” and which is “affect.” I have to look it up every time. I think we all have our things, but do they really make us stupid??

"So-Called Women's Rights"

I’ve been thinking about something someone said when she commented on a post my mom made on Facebook on election night. It kind of ties into my last blog, which is I guess why I’m thinking about it again. I don’t even remember what my mom’s post was about. I think it said something to the effect of “whew, election season is over!!” So, anyway, this woman replied by saying that she was sick of hearing all this garbage about what she referred to as “so-called women’s rights.” My knee-jerk reaction in my head was something along the lines of “fuck you, bitch. What do you know about it??”

And then I got to thinking about it myself. What would possess a woman my age to not even have the slightest deference to the movement that has given her so many rights?? I mean, she votes. She drives a car, and she and her daughters are not considered the property of her husband. Where does she think all that came from?? Really, that’s just the tip of the iceberg for me, because what she said really kind of did piss me off.

So, I asked my mom, “what do you think she meant by that??” I don’t know this woman very well. We’ve met a handful of times, though I’ve known her husband’s family since childhood. She and her husband are uber-conservative, obviously, but in such a way that when they talk they sound like they’ve been living in a plastic bubble, sheltered from what the rest of the world outside their smart little self-made enclave have to work with. And, yes: I do think there is something wrong with that. She and her husband believe that no woman should be allowed to have an abortion; anywhere, anytime, ever, so obviously their opinion should be the law. Now, I don’t take issue with people who don’t agree with abortion, but I do have a problem with women who think that all other women’s rights should be taken away from them because she thinks abortion is wrong.

Roe vs. Wade is about so much more than just abortion. I wish more people understood that. It’s about women having the agency to make our own reproductive choices, which sometimes includes abortion. We can take birth control or leave it. We can have an abortion, safely and legally, or not. But there’s this attitude like being pro-choice means that we should all have abortions because they’re so much fun, and that is simply not true. I wish people like that, like her, would sit up straight and pay attention instead of just deciding that because she doesn’t like abortion that no one should be able to use birth control at all. Because that’s what her candidate said, out loud, multiple times.

My mom mentioned that this woman thought that some of the language surrounding “so-called women’s rights” is too vulgar; for example, they say vagina. Now, I get that not everyone wants to have their personal anatomy discussed on the public forum, but come on. Crusty old white guys want to tell women what to do with said vaginas, yet they make women leave the room because they’re so disgusted with the word being said out loud. It’s just a word. Vagina. Vagina. Vagina. It’s an anatomically correct descriptor. Act like a big kid and deal with it instead of hiding from it behind some patriarchal 1950s idea of what women are allowed to do and say. I don’t get it. It’s not even a dirty word. Even if we’re on the shy side and only say the word “vagina” to our doctors, it’s medically accurate and still not a bad word. I’m left to wonder if the real problem she has is that strong, independent women who make decisions for themselves scare her because she’s not one.

In any case, I think the word itself is just a precursor to what the issue may actually be: perhaps the women aligned with “so-called women’s rights” are too aggressive for her?? I mean, I love Margaret Cho, but she’s definitely not for everyone. I mean, I think that’s kind of a wimpy stance to take on being a woman, but to each her own.

She and her husband are nice, sweet people. They have a home and two beautiful children. They’ve cultivated the life for themselves that they wanted, and for that I genuinely commend them. I know they’ve had some heartache and scary times, and I thought about them all the time while they were. I’m not at all trying to malign this woman or her husband for being bad people. But does that mean everyone should live their lives exactly as she had, because if we do we’ll never have to think about our rights because everything will be taken care of by our husbands?? It’s a lovely idea, but not all of us want husbands. What would she do with that idea??

My mom also mentioned that this woman was in favor of equal pay for women, which struck me as odd. So, reproductive health care is “so-called women’s rights” but pay equality is a real women’s right?? For most of us, repro health care is an economic matter; not just equal pay. Is it because she remained a virgin until marriage and has purely procreative sex that it’s what we all should do?? I’m mystified.

Sometimes I try too hard to get into other people’s heads.

Thanksgiving and Jacoby Miles

Six days ago, a fifteen-year-old gymnast named Jacoby Miles sustained a life-alerting injury at a local gymnastics gym. She fell off the bars doing a dismount she’d done hundreds of times, pinching her spinal cord and paralyzing her from the chest down. I haven’t stopped thinking of her since I heard about what happened. I had tears in my eyes watching the news video clip, and it’s probably for a number of reasons.

When I was fifteen, I torked my back doing a beam dismount I’d done hundreds of times. Five months later, I was diagnosed with a severe stress fracture in a vertebrae most people don’t have: the congenital abnormality of a 6th lumbar. It bored the living shit out of me, but I was out of the gym for ten months. I hated it. I didn’t want to sit still. I wanted to be in the gym, where I had friends and had a good time. I spent as much time hanging out there as the staff would allow, because for me it was the only place I felt like I fit in. As I went from agonizing back pain every day to feeling physically regular, mentally I was angry because the only thing I really loved to do, other than write, was taken away from me.

The injury never completely healed, but eventually after those ten boring-ass months of rehab I was able to come back. I went on to compete a few more years, eventually becoming a gymnastics coach, which I’ve been for fifteen years, and now I have a fifteen-year-old daughter who is a competitive level 7 gymnast.

Sometimes my back still hurts. It’s a signal of something I never knew how to do when I was a kid: stop. I used to just run through everything until I was so sore I couldn’t move, and as I’ve grown older I’ve had to learn how to slow down and listen to my body.

But I remember how often I cried and how sad I was without gymnastics, and that’s a huge part of why my heart goes out to Jacoby. According to the articles I’ve read, the doctors are saying it could take a miracle for her to walk again. As my mom said, “if anyone can do it, it’s a gymnast.” We’re strong and determined. I can’t imagine what it would have been like at fifteen to be injured so badly that I had to be in a wheelchair. It was enough hell at such a young age to go through rehabbing the injury I have. I can’t reconcile in my head what Jacoby’s experience will be like, but my heart most certainly goes with her on her journey.

As I’ve said, I've coached gymnastics in the Seattle area for fifteen years. If Jacoby had been one of the kids I’ve coached, or any of the kids on my daughter’s gymnastics team, I would be absolutely beside myself. My daughter’s recreational optional team has competed against Roach Gymnastics, Jacoby’s home gym. It’s horrifying enough to hear that such a rare accident as this even happened, but to have it happen locally, to a member of our gymnastics community, really brings reality home. It could be any of us, at any time. But hearing how many people have rallied behind Jacoby and her family, seeing how many news organizations are spreading her story far and wide, encouraging folks to give donations to the Miles family, is 50 shades of awesome. Tweets from American gymnastics royalty like Gabrielle Douglas, Nastia Liukin and Chellsie Memmel, and support from people all around the nation: it’s phenomenal. It reminds me that my little incestuous gymnastics community, where everyone knows everyone, is a part of a larger gymnastics community. And we stand together with our own.

It’s been an especially difficult few weeks for me personally. Without oversharing, I can tell you that no one died but it’s still been hard to get up in the morning. My own fifteen-year-old daughter sprained her ankle at a gymnastics competition, and the same week she also got a sinus infection. Small proverbial potatoes compared to Jacoby’s circumstances, and un-fucking believably hard to watch. We want our kids to be healthy and happy, and to have the things they want (within reason). To watch them in pain is nothing short of hell on earth. One of the things I’ve focused on, even as my life has become more complicated recently, is that my daughter’s injury and illness were not that bad. It was little more than an uncomfortable and temporary annoyance. The ankle turned out not to be as bad as we’d initially thought, and antibiotic knocked the sinus infection out for now. For that, I’ve been thanking my lucky fucking stars every day. While she dodged a bullet, another kid is taking one, and it breaks my heart.

I’m not going to end this post by spewing irritating platitudes about how everything happens for a reason. I remain unconvinced that it does. Some days you just feel like the universe is conspiring against you. Maybe it is, though I tend to think that the universe has bigger shit to deal with than most of our little lives. In any case, some things happen for no reason other than that they happen. And we get up the next day and move forward whether we feel good or not. It happens to all of us, in a myriad of different ways, every day.

So this Thanksgiving, instead of the usual “I’m thankful for my family and friends and God,” or whatever everyone’s 30 Days of Thankful on Facebook says, I remain thankful every day for a healthy kid, and to be a part of a gymnastics community that truly does take care of its own.

And I wish nothing but health and happiness for Jacoby, her family, and her teammates.

Happy Thanksgiving, y'all.

For more information on how you may show support and make a donation to Jacoby's family visit www.goteamjacoby.com and show a little love this shopping season.

Drug Testing the Poor

I’m going to address something that’s been bothering me for some time. Last night I read an article in the New York Times informing readers that the state of Florida’s mandatory drug testing for those seeking public assistance hasn’t been effective in saving money, catching drug offenders, had an effect on the number of folks applying for assistance, and in fact has cost the state tens of thousands of dollars in just four months.

And yet, all over my Facebook page I read friends’ posts about how more states should do this, and that is what I’d like to talk about.

Being poor is not the free ride right-wing politicians and pundits will have people believe it is. In fact, it’s hell. I hate it. It’s a waking nightmare, and in addition to being depressing, difficult, and terrifying, sometimes unbearably so, poor people are called names. Freeloader, moocher, idiot, slut, and now we’re being told that somehow we must be poor because we’re spending all our money on drugs.

Pardon me, but fuck you. Fuck you for your sweeping and erroneous generalization. We’re not all crackheads any more than we are all sluts or freeloaders, and I resent the implication. Of course there are exceptions. I don’t think anyone would dispute that. But to lump all poor people together and shame them into having their privacy disturbed is not only shitty but is also being called unconstitutional.

And don’t give me that nonsense about how your employer makes you take a drug test. Boo-fuckin’-hoo. At least you're fortunate enough to have an employer. And, if I’m not mistaken, you chose to be employed by them. Purely anecdotal, but I’ve known plenty of people who have turned down jobs because they felt like mandatory drug testing is a violation of privacy. And, yes, I have made a series of miscalculations in my life that have resulted in my being poor, but that is a far cry from making a conscious decision to be poor. Your argument is invalid.

Think about all this for a minute. I’m not really expecting to change minds, but pause for a moment and let what I’ve said sink in, and think about the people in your life who are struggling just to stay afloat in this world before you post something that passes judgment on those of us who have had to ask for help. It's not fun. It's not a joke. We're not laughing at the taxpayers who help us out. If you pay attention you'll find that most people like me are humbled and grateful that our government does sometimes help people when they need it, because it's not easy out there. For anyone, I know that. Just think about it for a sec.

"The poor are there just to scare the shit out of the middle class."

George Carlin

Election Season: I Didn't Come Here to Argue

Election season is almost over. If you know me, you know I’m a bit of a current events junkie, and seeing as though my hours at work have dwindled down to three a week, I have a lot of time on my hands to read. And I do. At great length. Now, I’ve heard some complaints from friends and loved ones that I would like to address. Mind you, none of these complaints have been directed at me, personally, but I’d like to take a moment to say a few things anyway. I like to share the information I come across. I love blogs and opinion pieces, even ones I don’t necessarily agree with. Listening to other people gives me an opportunity to think, not only about other people’s opinions and why they hold them but about my own, and why I hold them. It’s food for thought, if nothing else. I think it’s good to be culturally aware.

But: here comes the big “but,” I know that sometimes I offend people, or people disagree with me. If I’ve offended you then I’m all on board with having a polite conversation between two grown individuals. I’ve even been known to apologize for hurting people’s feelings. And if you disagree with me, that’s fine. I’d rather talk about that, too, if you want. I’m not going to start saying mean things to you, or insulting your intelligence, even if sometimes I may want to. I did not come here to start an argument, but a discussion would be great.

There is a guy who I am no longer friends with because the politicking got to be too much. We vehemently disagreed with each other, and eventually I got tired of him telling me how stupid and uninformed I am (for not watching enough Fox News or reading the GOP website). I just got tired of the insults and decided I don’t want to be friends with someone who behaves like that over disagreeing about something. I think it’s incredibly petty, and I don’t need friends who call me stupid. Call me out on my bullshit, sure. I can hang with that. But if you really think I’m stupid, why are you friends with me?? And why the fuck am I friends with you?? If you call me stupid on my Facebook now, I have a lot of great friends who will gladly come to my defense. But my policy is not to engage in a flame war because it so often accomplishes nothing, and I have other shit to do. I’m not going to try to change someone’s mind. I’m busy.

I do try to kind of get into people’s heads sometimes. I don’t know if you knew this about me, but I’m not a Romney person. I’m not even a little bit conservative. There are too many reasons why not, and the Obama administration has done a great deal to help people like me. I appreciate that, whether the Romney camp thinks I’m a moocher, or a slut, or an idiot, or whatever. There are some Romney supporters, though; I just can’t get there. Why would a teacher, a single parent, or someone who is sick and on government funded medical assistance in order to stay alive vote for Romney?? These are all people I know, and I don’t get it. Because he’s anti-choice?? Because he’s white?? Because he’s a businessman?? What is it?? I cannot figure it out no matter how hard I try. But I’m also not going to pick a fight with a friend over it, either, or tell them they’re stupid or uninformed. I think that’s mean, and I’m not out to low-blow my friends. Like I said, I’ve had that done to me and I try to have a little more integrity than to act like I get to shit-talk people and expect to be treated with respect.

Anyway, I know people are exhausted by this election and ready for it to be over. I’m kind of excited to see how the whole thing plays out. There are bound to be some great jokes and, hopefully, some inspired activism on the horizon.

In any case, go out and vote – or stay in and vote. Help someone else vote, if you can. I promise I won’t call you an idiot in front of all your friends if I disagree with you.

The end.