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kirliancamera1 · 3 years

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Rede Vamp Brazil (https://redevampirica.com) interviews Elena Alice Fossi of Kirlian Camera (English text attached hereunder) 🔥🔥🔥

Question 1: Be very welcome to AcessoRedeVamp, it's a true honor to realize this interview with you Elena Alice! You are a great singer and more every time we see you on stage your performance transmits great emotion and this electrifies all of us! You tell a real story with your performance and this is amazing and rare these days! At the same time, we perceive an expressive revolt against an old world and its stagnant postures. How have you handled 2020?

*** EAF – First of all, I wanna thank you for your words. Being able to communicate with the people who follow us is the most important thing to me. Singing becomes ephemeral if doesn't convey a message. Also for this reason I consider that the stage is the base of a musician, so you can imagine how I miss it. In this sense, it can be said that the category we belong to is very unlucky, not only because it's forced not to work, but rather 'cause concerts are pure lifeblood for a musician's soul. In any case, both Angelo and I can't stand self-pity people, so we immediately jumped into new musical projects, putting top concentration on composition. At any rate, we couldn't be simple observers of an event on this scale, so right from the beginning we tried to dig deep, looking for, and comparing news, data, statistics, whether they came from mainstream channels or from alternative sources. In Italy, for example, the economy has been torn to pieces and furthermore, the same politicians who mourn the dead on TV... cut so many funds for health facilities for a long time, so they may be considered taking part in such a mess. This situation has created a real drama, especially for families who have lost their loved ones without even having a chance to say goodbye one last time. But, it's also true that the worldwide exploitation of this pandemic has given us, we citizens, an opportunity to wake up. No need to use words such as anarchy or rebellion to understand that the old world is showing all kinds of holes. "Divide et impera" is the motto of several governments, so we citizens must not fall into the trap of making war on each other, each nonsense comes up! This is the time to show ourselves united. And, most of all, it’s time not to turn ourselves into servile dogs of a “Power” becoming more and more antidemocratic.

Question 2: Do you feel that the marks left by the year 2020 will bring some effective changes to this "abstraction" called humanity? Will there be a "new normal" or will we just return to an average 2019 when this whole pandemic passes?

*** EAF - If I’d been told about what we have experienced for almost one year, I’d have thought it was a joke, bullshit. But unluckily this is not the case. Such an event has brought much grief and is ruining the economic system of many nations, as already said. But in addition to the injury, here it comes the insult from the absurd and chaotic dictates imposed on us. I'll give you some examples of what's happening here in Italy. “Don't go out after 10 pm”. While people keep on getting sick or even dying, here comes the policeman with a ticket 'cause you left home for a goddam moment. I have this picture on my mind, of a person in pajamas, carrying the garbage bag full of stinking mussel shells at less than one hundred meters from home in a totally deserted night. At that point a flash on him. It’s the police who writes a ticket to that dangerous criminal. And then, for everyone's sake, the Christmas mass was moved from the usual midnight to 8 pm. How the hell can you think it's not a mockery? And... the last “gag”! Before Christmas, our Minister of technological innovation made an appeal to telephone companies so that video calls were free on Christmas days... But what year does she live in? But... is she not able to understand that in Italy almost everyone has either unlimited gigas or wifi? Nothing changes if the telephone companies for a couple of days give us video calls because we already use free services such as Whatsapp, Skype, Zoom, Telegram, and so on and so forth... Ok, in a vain attempt to avoid death, they are putting us in an induced coma! Seriously, all this offends our intelligence! And, when you realize you are inside a joke, you don't like to discover you're the main character, do you?! So, to answer your question, I couldn't foresee how a post-covid society will be reshaped, but the severe weakening that now is burdening us will have some major impact, no doubt. Currently, most folks are obsessed with fear, so are unable to reflect on the consequences of unconstitutional actions such as those foolishly propagated by many States. Furthermore, the pharma companies, the giants of the online shopping industry and many other powerful satanic puppet masters who are used to appear as philanthropists are ready to get their hands on everything, well pleased with the next “big reset”. So, after the pandemic, things will change a lot! For sure, from a human point of view, the feelings will be devitalized.

Question 3: Hologram Moon is a great name! Evokes conspirations like what really is the moon and this strangeness opens a vast creative field to find answers or even new questions... please tell us a bit more about this album, his name, songs...

*** EAF - "Fake is your face" is one of the phrases that most resonate in me when I sing "Holograms", or when in “Lost Islands” the old world said “Goodbye”! It's as if you had to face a new reset, as if you discovered everything you've always believed is swept away in an instant. There's the awareness that in the face of a new and suffocating truth, when the sky collapses, only true love can resist and guide you. In this sense, the final track of the album, “Travellers’ Testament” is a real stone on my heart, as it describes a fantastic journey to a planet. The astronaut is now impatient to fulfill his dream, but he will never arrive on that planet. The landing will take place on a space station. The moon landing's been questioned over and over again and certain evidence of the fact's inconsistency eventually seems credible. But we cannot say what reality is in any scientific way, especially when we're already prepared to believe a reassuring source. This is a simple starting point to embark on our history. More than finding answers, our sacred duty is to open the door to new questions, ask doubts, not take anything for granted. “Hologram Moon” is a purely poetic vision, but also a way to question everything. The mind can atrophy very easily. Habit, for example, can be complicit in this and the so-called comfort zone can be just complicit as well. The hypnosis that we suffer every day without realizing it, also grinding so many and bad TV shows, and so on... So, let's remain thinking and dreaming! This is a message from us.

Question 4: How was the experience of working with Covenant's Eskil Simonsson on the beautiful "Sky Collapse"?

*** EAF - We had come across Covenant several times before doing this collaboration; on festival occasions, in the dressing rooms... But it was a chaotic situation, so... we gave each other a fleeting smile, a kind greeting, but nothing more. Then, when Angelo and I wrote “Sky Collapse”, we immediately thought that a deep and sincere voice like Eskil's would add something precious to the song. Even before recording the two-voice song, we met at a charity festival. We had called him as a guest just to sing this song together, which was yet unreleased. He made himself available immediately. It was a nice gift for us and when the moment came, I think that on stage you could feel my strong emotion all the way down the hall!

Question 5: Well, I think now we will have our fan moment! Let's talk about some Kirlian Camera songs that our DJs and the audience of the REDE VAMP love it? Do I speak the name and may you tell a little about the meanings, influences, or a curious story?

*** EAF ***

>>> NIGHTGLORY. It refers to the triumph of the night, perhaps as a momentary spiritual retreat. I'm talking about that precious moment that regenerates your very existence into yourself. The music of this song was born in a symphonic form, very different from how Nightglory was then arranged. This is a song and an album that has been appreciated by many people only after some time, partly because of a promotion that described the album as the most commercial in our history, which is absolutely harmful and misleading. Invisible Front and Eclipse were even more listenable, for example... Sometimes words spoil your work. It would be better to listen to music only, ignoring its promotional presentation. Fortunately, Nightglory has recovered over time till becoming one of the most requested live songs of ours.

>>> BLACK AUGUST. In this song there are various hints coming out from a dark moment in my life, I mean a period that risked devouring me. Wounds that take time to heal. Sky Collapse can be considered the final act of that period, even if the music of the two songs sounds very different, as you know. Black August blends various stylistic dimensions in a single “body of music”, so many didn't know how to label it at the time, as it effectively goes running free, out of the box. A very atypical song that has gained some actual success despite its distinction, which has also brought us closer to fans of dark metal and so-called electronica.

>>> HELLFIRE. I chose this piece to add an echo to the dark period I was talking about above, in order to exorcise all that negativity, so we went to deal with a theme showing gospel traits but containing some demonic references in the lyrics. Then I didn't know THE 8th PRESIDENT was waiting for us at the SCARLET GATE OF TOXIC DAYBREAK, with his COLD PILLS! A wordplay whoever is following us will understand!

>>> K-PAX. I wrote this piece in a night when everything seemed dreamy and I almost didn't realize where I was anymore. No, I wasn't under the influence of drugs or alcohol, but all my memories were mixing in tremendous chaos that needed to reinvent itself and turn into an immaterial fog, in a light but lost dream. Angelo literally translated the music and melodies I had written on the staff, giving both them and my voice the perfect terms to guide the journey. In fact, it's not a complete and static text, but a sequence of dreamy and painful phrases at the same time. I felt that Angelo listened to me attentively since he knew how to translate my notes so perfectly into written sentences as if he were sending me back into my music. It was magical and at K-Pax Angelo and I discovered the other life of ourselves, bringing to light so many breathtaking emotions and it was just the departure, after the suffocating mists of Still Air, an album we love, and the crepuscular decadence of Stalingrad Valkyrie.

Question 6: There is a cover of Comfortably Numb by Pink Floyd from Kirlian Camera that is a true work of art. The Mad World cover performed by Spectra Paris is fascinating. Are there more covers from other bands that you would like to record?

*** EAF - Well yes, there are ideas, but we prefer to evaluate which are the best. Meanwhile, I tried to produce a version of a Johnny Cash song and I made Angelo interpret it: I really like the result. It may be used by Stalingrad Valkyrie.

Question 7: I love your lyrics! What can't Elena be missing when creating new lyrics or musical arrangements? Are there any poetry, films, books, comic books, or other influences?

*** EAF - Mostly everything happens unconsciously. You don't know how many times I realize why I wrote a certain phrase only after a song was released! But I can say that my imagination works mostly by processing images. So, the movies are very helpful in this. Similarly, Angelo and I tap into imagery that could be part of the quantum physics new era, where multiverse and multidimensionality are both playing an important role. This world appears like a really tiny thing when compared to everything else.

Question 8: Elena, I read in an older interview about a "Young Ladies Homicide Club" I found an undeniable reference to the films Noir and the figure of the characters called "Vamp" and all the charm and spectral magnetism ... but I was a little curious. .. what is this "Young Ladies Homicide Club"?

*** EAF - Let's say I imagined an unreal club created by apparently dead or so to say "disappeared" models in order to get rid of fashion people who were acting a bit too naughty! The work to clean up that world wouldn't be lacking, as, after all, it happens in all professional areas. As for myself goes, I gladly opted in a flash and without second thoughts for singing and making music, leaving everything behind, buying a couple of synths and a decent microphone, which I then enriched with various electronic devilry, kicking away possible easy money, foolish nights, cocaine, heroin, stereotyped relationships, and absurdly worshipped wines! Every so often I like to play with the ridiculous and grotesque ghosts of some fashion designers, photographers, and evil spirits, then going to recreate noir stories in which everything happens. I also drew some digital comics with a noir-glam flavor, a few years ago... It was a fun pastime, while with Kirlian Camera I'd been exploring deeper and more fundamental universes.

Question 9: Is there more news on the way for the incredible Spectra Paris and also for Stalingrad Valkyrie? May you talk a bit more about them?

*** EAF - Stalingrad Valkyrie is a project I am very fond of, in a special way. So I insisted on getting it back to life after a period of hibernation which lasted too much in my opinion. "Martyrium Europae", the most recent album, proved me right, even if it’s not a commercial project. Well, it seems our listeners have appreciated the attempt to combine different musical sources in a unique style, certainly linked to the more symphonic and dramatic Kirlian Camera pages, but also quite free to express itself on his own, trying to avoid the most standard patterns of neofolk, progressive and industrial, without on the other hand completely ignoring their now distant origins. So, in its small way, the new album turned out to be a success and I'd really like this project to keep on living with further fresh ideas. We're currently working on a new chapter that will be released on vinyl and some digitals, which contains previously unreleased songs and versions.

Question 10: Elena, our Rede Vamp is a platform about Cultural Vamp and Vampires production ... and there is a question that our interviewees never escape. Is there a character or perhaps a vampire story that you never forgot?

*** EAF - Needless to say the vampire who most impressed me over time can't be anyone other than... Angelo Bergamini!!! Not many know that Angelo was the leading actor in a short film entitled "Himre Bakai", shot in the late nineties or so, directed by Antonio Bocchi, the later owner of the dark-electronic project Lux Anodyca and author of detective books. I don't think the film is regularly available or downloadable at the moment, but I know it was also screened at the time in various festivals and reviews, also getting some good feedback! Angelo (Himre) and Antonio told me that one day the film "will see the light ”, but at the moment... he lies in the dark, by the book, of course!!!

Question 11: Elena, thank you so much for your time and generosity! You and Kirlian Camera have many fans on our events and radio shows, please leave a special message for our audience! Are there plans for a new gig in Brazil after all this pandemic?

*** EAF - While it's true that we've never been able to play in Brazil so far, I'm sure your Land is actually right for us, 'cause I can feel that's full of feeling and passion, so we'd love to perform for you very much, 'cause in spite of the fact it's so far away, I feel a deep affinity and a certain familiarity with your world. And while we wait, confident that sooner or later we'll succeed in our aim, I wanna greet all those who had the kindness to listen to me, with a quote from the American scientist and politician Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."

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nyrator · 3 years

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another long vent post about depression/anxiety

extremely depressed tonight

first made the mistake of driving myself to the grocery store at 6pm, first I had to try scraping the ice off the windshield with nothing but a broom and bare hands, then driving itself was nightmareish, the car feels like a death trap to me, very loose and sloppy compared to my last car, so loud and uncomfortable with no audible music to calm my nerves. My eyes have worsened to the point where I can’t see anything at night- glare takes up my whole vision, even with anti-glare shades. I was driving well below the speed limit the entire time and still almost hit three pedestrians who were all recklessly out on the roads in all black for whatever reason. My nerves are completely shot from it, my chest feels like I’m in a vice and can’t breathe, my eyes are wide open and hunched over the steering wheel, and my body feels both like I’m about to wet myself at any moment and that I’m too stiff/tense/frozen to function as a human at all, it’s that fight-or-flight response at its extreme. Meanwhile, my skin must be weak- my knuckles bleed when driving, and my wrists bled just from carrying in bags of groceries.

then getting home and just dealing with personal drama of someone I know who is so depressed and self destructive and too smart to reason with, who refuses/is unable to seek professional help, who just doesn’t understand or just can’t help venting to me nonstop, no matter how much I beg them not to over and over- their life is so terrible that suicide seems like the only option to them, and I don’t want them to do so, but I can’t keep suffering like this either and I feel like the only thing preventing them from doing so, as poor a job as I do as a human being anyway. But I can’t help them if they can’t help themselves, even if they were just ate a bit better, or just had a journal or someone anonymous they could talk to, but it seems inescapable and impossible to change anything and all we do is argue over it until I snap at them to leave me alone. That person is probably reading this right now and probably hating it, but I doubt anyone on this site even knows who they are.

Tuesday morning, I couldn’t sleep at all from anxiety- it was so severe and inescapable, I laid in bed for four hours feeling like I was dying until I was finally able to sleep for two hours. I can’t seem to stay asleep longer than two hours anymore. Was supposed to hang out with friends that day, but between lack of sleep, depression, and my absolute terror at driving in a snowstorm, I ended up just staying home.

Anxiety has gotten so bad again. I know a lot of how the mechanics work behind it, I know a lot of pains are from tension and lack of breathing. But my old coping mechanisms don’t work anymore. I can focus on breathing for several minutes straight and then fall right back into suffocating. Music, counting things, meditating, none of it helps anymore.

One way to describe the feeling of anxiety- it’s kind of like when you fall asleep on your arm, and you feel all the blood rushing back into it and that tingling sensation. Imagine that, maybe a bit less, but throughout your entire body (especially chest), your body is stiff and not numb, and your entire body is vibrating or shivering/shaking or something.

I still spend 16+ hours laying in bed every single day. When I got home from shopping, the walking around (and the stress of driving) was enough to send me straight to bed, I was so tired and weak. It’s probably why I don’t sleep properly, I’m half awake in bed all the time, what need is there for sleep

I have mail I haven’t opened, taxes I still have to do, messes to clean, and don’t care for any of it. Can’t even talk about some things I’ve been doing to myself out of spite or general depression, the way I’ve been abusing. I promise to try not to do anything too crazy or directly harmful, but even then I worry about slipping up- I tried one thing I shouldn’t talk about, which wasn’t too serious, but still seriously concerning how easy it was to try doing

still haven’t contacted a therapist, my fear of calling someone is so strong I can’t overcome it, especially not after just waking up. Talked to some friends, some agree that I should, at least one thinks it’s a waste of time and money- up to $125 per session to just get a glorified phone call thanks to covid restrictions. I just don’t see the point if I’m still stuck in my apartment at my computer, especially if I have an internet addiction already.

The lack of doing anything is driving me insane, I think. I’ve played four single player games in 2020- ACNH, KH MoM, Panel de Pon, and Picross. In terms of things watched on my own, probably just Japan Sinks and whatever else was on Netflix the few months I had it. Don’t feel motivated to play or watch anything anymore, nothing seems interesting, and mostly just do things with friends if at all

Even ACNH, the game I play the most, I barely do anything in it- mostly just get new items from stores, that’s it. My island decorating has come to a hard halt, mostly because I barely have any furniture I’d like to embellish it with, and mainly because I have no ideas to layout most of it

I want to create, but don’t have the energy to make anything at all. Rotten Nyan is still my current goal, but anxiety has made it next to impossible to work on. I’ve tried several times the past few weeks, all met with failure- the anxiety’s too much, half the time I don’t even know what’s causing it, but my body just gets too tense and cramped without even doing anything, and I just can’t breathe at all while working on it.

Thought about making an omake comic for it, then realized what a terrible idea it was, and how hard it is to draw comics in general. Or anything in general. Wrote down the entire comic while laying in bed one day, went to draw it, was unable to, tried making it a yonkoma, gave up, and felt sick thinking of all the gross things in it that I just made a vent description of Middle Lave and just posted that to the RN tumblr instead.

I can’t think of any ideas, I feel like my art has regressed- I’ve taken more shortcuts for the sake of my hands tensing so fast from anxiety, and I’ve gotten decent at drawing middle Lave I feel, but anything besides a character standing is impossible for me- any environments or character interactions that I’d love to do just feel impossible, let alone my inability to write good ones. Anything I try to think of writing-wise always ends up the same gross content that burned into my memories that I just can’t feel comfortable talking about much at all, nor do I think it’s content people want to see at all.

There’s a lot of detailed kind of art I’d like to do. I kind of want to loosen my restrictions on myself and just draw whatever suffering I feel like, maybe once I use the RN twitter more I might get a little more courage to do so. I see many artists draw detailed scenes in single images, and no matter how hard I try, I just can’t capture that feeling.

Part of me feels torn about it being an autobiography for people to relate to, and being a suffering experience for people to find some weird enjoyment out of. I feel like I’ve lost sight of what it was originally meant to be and now just enjoy “bullying” Middle Lave half the time I guess, but unfortunately for me, bullying makes me feel like vomiting and is hard to draw consistently- maybe I’m too nice. I don’t know, I’m just rambling at this point. The comic is still laid out and just meant to explore the life of Lave, but it’s just so hard to work on.

In terms of other things, I have no idea what to do

Vtuber/streaming? Hate my voice, can’t focus on learning what I need for it in terms of rigging and texturing models. I only know the basics of making 3D things and nothing else.

Console art? I already designed all the ones I’m mainly interested in, but like I mentioned before, can’t think of any character interactions at all that I feel like drawing.

Making a game? I know 2k3 well enough to make anything in it event-wise, though never got over my map failings, and I can’t commit to anything long-term. Godot or another program, or programming in general? Good luck.

I just want to make something, work on a project without losing steam or letting anxiety prevent me from learning. Can’t focus on anything long enough to learn it- Japanese, making a game, programming, a new hobby, anything. I just don’t have the drive to do anything and will give up anything I even try to start, so what’s the point in even trying anything. I have books I haven’t read that I’ve been meaning to read for years, and still don’t have an ounce of energy to want to even organize them on their shelf, let alone open it

At the very least, I got my first big commission (second one ever), designing an OC for someone, and it’s going well, though tonight I’ve lost steam to finish it, and I hope I can get it back tomorrow to try to finalize it.

I’ve mentioned it before, but I really wish I just had someone guide me with art- I miss doing those 30 day challenge kind of things, or “send a number/emoji” kind of asks for OCs, but tumblr’s so inactive that I don’t see them on my dash anymore, and don’t know how to even look for them, especially not on sites like twitter these days. Though, the problem is, no one knows exactly what I like, and I feel awful letting people down if they ask for something I don’t want to draw

I can’t focus on exercise long term, and I’m so out of practice that exhaustion is too strong to beat. I’ve been trying to walk up and down on a step stool for exercise to get me back into basic movement, but even that’s too tiring. Want to do it while watching something, then I realize, I don’t watch anything at all, not even youtube, just an occasional artist stream that I mainly chat with rather than watch

I feel like I’m going to collapse if I turn or move too suddenly, and my eyes are absolutely terrible- glasses are okay, but without them I’m completely blind now- not just blind, but it’s like my eyes see at two different angles sometimes, like one is slanted or something, very disorientating.

It’s 7:30AM, and no desire to sleep at all. Terrified of laying in bed and letting anxiety take over me again. Part of me wants to become completely nocturnal and just avoid everyone during the day and just respond to messages in the AM hours, just wake up at midnight each day and avoid dealing with people. Go to sleep when everyone starts to get active and just isolate myself entirely from society.

I feel like I exist with no purpose whatsoever, and it’s driving me insane- not that life is meant to have a purpose, but I could at least be doing something more than laying in bed all day every day for a year

#text stuffs #nyrants

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garyherstein · 4 years

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Year of the Plague, #1

(From early March, 2020): As I write, Governor Pritzker’s “Shelter In Place” (SIP) order is scheduled to go into effect at 5:00 PM. (I live in Illinois.) As I already live an exceptionally quiet, sheltered-in-place life, Pritzker’s order has very little effect on me. I can still shop much as I always did, for all the things I would otherwise have purchased. The only difference for me is that now I will forward my shopping lists in advance for curbside pickup, rather than in-store browsing and purchasing. And this isn’t even part of the SIP, simply my choice to add an extra layer of caution. (A comprehensive discussion of Illinois’ SIP may be found HERE. The Chicago Tribune has waived its paywall for this story.) The biggest impact on my life will be the canceling of the in-person meetings of the Dungeons and Dragons game I was involved with.

As noted, I expect there to be a series of posts related to the novel corona virus and COVID-19 in the coming months. But this first shot out of the gate, I don’t plan to dwell on the metaphysics of pandemics, nor do I intend to rail against those steaming piles of maggot excrement who continue to spew indefensible twaddle about how “it’s only the flu!” I’m sure the times (plural) will come for that. No, this time I want to focus on my own, immediate intellectual and emotional reactions to the early stages of “all this.” This is for my own clarity of mind; writing it down helps me. Perhaps sharing it will help others, but I don’t know. Right now I’m just struggling to understand what I feel, what it means to me, to find myself living in this Year of the Plague.

As I noted, the immediate disruption to my own life is almost non-existent, which is no small part of what lends the whole thing an air of the surreal. Yet the reality could scarcely be more stark. Under worst-case scenario (WCS) projections, the United States is looking at over one million – 1,000,000+ – dead by the end of this summer of 2020. For context, that is well over twice as many Americans as died in combat in WWI, WWII, Korea, and Vietnam combined.

But those deaths will all take place in the span of ONE YEAR, and all on our own soil!

As I already live a very sequestered life – and have now changed my shopping habits, and am even taking my temperature twice a day – despite my age being toward the higher risk category, I am and have been at relatively low risk for contracting COVID-19. The issue for me is something more about, how do I live in a world in which a million of my neighbors are just gone? With the global economy in ruins (for that is coming)? When the hollow, empty shell I live in is no longer a shell, but the world itself?

“We will get through this!” people tell us. And, indeed, we will, for even the WCS has only about 0.3% of us dying, suffocating to death on our own bodily fluids. But the scale of 1,000,000+ people dead in one year is something we humans are ill-equipped to visualize. So, think of it this way: If those million people died one per minute, continuously until they were all gone, it would still take almost two years (just short of 694 ½ days, actually) to chew through them all.

Where were you 694 ½ days ago? Because that is what 1,000,000 million minutes looks like.

The economic issues, still to hit us in force, are as far beyond me control and imagination as they are for any retiree collecting social security. But thank whatever gods you do or do not believe in that the Republicans were never allowed to stove-pipe the fund into the stock market!

In any case, the effect is very much the sort of thing one would describe as Twilight Zone, the old-school, black&white television show that has since been variously rebooted and modernized. In particular, the first season episode “Time Enough At Last,” starring the great Burgess Meredith as an intensely introverted bank worker, whose only real love is reading. He sneaks downstairs to catch a few moments of reading while hiding in the bank vault, when a nuclear holocaust essentially kills everyone in the world except for himself. But the New York City Library is left more or less intact, and finally, it seems, he has time enough at last to read all and as much as he desires. More than a few folks have shared images and memes created from this episode, conscious all the while that the show does not have a happy ending. And so it seems, we all have time enough at last, because it is as if the external world is no longer permitted to be there.

How empty the world sounds right now, with so many sheltering, so few moving.

Even with the music stopped, I can hear nothing – no traffic, nothing – from the state highway not fifty meters from my door.

The phenomenology of sound is far more layered, far more multi-dimensional, than most of us consciously realize. No matter how loud the music from your home speakers, there is still an ambient background of sounds from the world beyond your little enclave. The very act of trying to drown those sounds out only emphasizes their original presence. But when it is no longer even there, no amount of drowning it out can ever serve to erase the simple and absolute absence. Create all the noise you want, and the world still sounds empty.

Whitehead understood this, though not in these terms.

Rather, he understood that we are relational realities, relationally incorporating the world into ourselves, and then projecting ourselves relationally back out into the world. Truncate that first step, and you’ve truncated the second. But, in any absolute terms, “truncate” is the wrong term. The world is just as relationally full now as it always was, just full in a different way. Male cardinals getting their “yo’ baby” freak on are certainly more pleasant on the ear than a semi gearing down as it comes into town on the highway. But “pleasant” isn’t necessarily the same, or even better, than “full.” We are social, communal creatures, down to the very marrow of our bones, down to the last particle of our genetics. And no matter our love of reading and solitude, to have the world suddenly empty itself of that relational human ambiance is a shock.

Unlike Burgess Meredith’s character, when I most want to read in complete focus, I will seek out a busy bar, preferably one where I am recognized (by the wait staff, primarily) but no one wants to talk to me. The shuffle and hum of people around me is something I can easily tune out, but only when it is there.i When absent, my mind becomes as distracted as the automatic tuner on a radio that can’t find a channel to lock onto.

And so, right now, there is a profound emptiness in the world.

– – – – – – – –

iI understand this is not a common experience, but when I was writing my dissertation I most frequently had bands like Metallica playing in the background.

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nancydhooper · 3 years

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Behind Closed Doors: The Traumas of Domestic Work in the U.S.

Like other essential workers, domestic workers are bearing the brunt of the COVID-19 pandemic without the luxury of being able to telework, social distance, or even take a sick day. They also face unique and challenging circumstances due to the nature of their work, which is undervalued and under-regulated by the U.S. government. As a result, domestic workers often endure horrific abuses that go unchecked. Many are brought to the U.S. by employers promising a better life, only to find themselves subjected to forced labor, denied wages, and threatened with deportation.

Today, the ACLU joins a coalition of workers’ rights organizations calling on the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights to acknowledge and address the U.S. government’s failure to protect the rights of domestic workers. These workers are overwhelmingly women of color and/or migrants, and include house cleaners, nannies, caregivers, and others who work out of public view and in their employers’ homes. Below, four domestic workers explain in their own words the all too common abuses that continue unheeded because of the government’s failure to act.

FAINESS

My trafficker was a Malawian diplomat to the U.S. I had known her for years back home in Malawi, where I worked for her as a nanny before coming here. When she was stationed in D.C., she asked me to come with her, promising better opportunities — I could get an education, get a better job, get out and see the world. As a young person, what else could you want? She gave me a contract and travel documents and rushed me to sign them even though I could not speak or understand English at the time. After I was granted an A3 visa, which is a special visa for diplomats’ domestic workers, we left for the U.S., where we moved into a home in a beautiful neighborhood in Silver Spring, Maryland.

Everything changed when we got to the U.S. My trafficker was no longer the person I knew in Malawi — she turned into a tiger. She forced me to work more than 16 hours per day for less than 40 cents per hour, cooking and cleaning and doing laundry, even ironing the family’s underwear. Who does that?

I lived in my trafficker’s home, but not as an equal. I lived like a slave. She made me sleep on the basement floor and forbade me from using any of the family’s soaps or other items, so I would not “contaminate” their belongings. She cut my phone access, so I was not able to communicate with my family at all for three years. I was refused medical care when I was sick. The only food I could eat were leftover scraps. Many times, I had to watch the family eat while I was starving and malnourished.

While I lived there, I was raped by a family friend. I could not receive any help because I did not speak English and did not know what to do. Whenever I tried talking to my trafficker about anything, she would call me ungrateful because she had taken me from my poor home village. Often, she would say “I can do anything I want, I’m a diplomat, I have immunity.” She also accused me of sleeping with her boyfriend.

The pain was too much. I was dying slowly, and I could not take it anymore. I wanted to die, but I knew that if I died in that house, my trafficker would throw my body in a dumpster and no one would ever find out. So I thought maybe, if I die in the street, people will find me and my family will learn of my death, maybe on the news.

One day, I found my passport and snuck out of the house through the garage. I was so thin, I managed to squeeze myself through the gap beneath the garage door. Then I ran away, leaving everything behind.

Today, I am a survivor. What happened to me doesn’t define me. While I still have not overcome my traumas 100 percent, I empowered myself through learning about who I am, my rights, and trafficking laws. I learned that trafficking is not just sex trafficking, and it was labor trafficking that brought me to the U.S. and entrapped me. Now I am a leader. I am a member of the National Survivor Network and a board member of the Survivor Alliance. I have spoken before Congress and at conferences. I work alongside NGOs to change policies, including a labor statute in Maryland that I advocated for.

Still, I am angry that domestic workers are invisible to many people. The whole time I was suffering, nobody saw me. I remember shoveling snow in my trafficker’s driveway, without gloves, boots, or warm clothes, watching cars pass as everybody missed those red flags.

It’s hard to identify trafficking of domestic workers since it usually happens behind closed doors, but the community should learn how to identify these situations and hold labor traffickers accountable. Domestic workers deserve fair treatment, decent pay, and benefits. The government, Congress, and our communities need to make sure survivors always have a seat at the table. Nothing about us, without us. It’s our pain and our story. You cannot fight trafficking without survivors, period.

CARLOS

When I first came to the U.S., I didn’t realize I was being trafficked or that my working conditions were not normal. I had come here for the same reason as a lot of Filipinos — a simple dream, especially as a father, to bring my family out of poverty. I didn’t know about my rights. All I knew is that I came here to work. I was just so happy and excited to be in America.

Before I came here, an employment agency in the Philippines found me a job as a cook at a country club in Florida. I had to pay them $3,000 just for all the paperwork to get here. Once I arrived, I stayed in a small house with a bunch of other workers, about six or seven of us in each room. I thought it was all normal. I believed in the lies my employers told me about the contract, the salary, the house, the visa. They told us we would get green cards and be able to bring our families here.

After working for a few months in Florida, they moved us to another country club in Arkansas. They told us our visas had expired, so there was no contract and no paycheck, just a cash advance of $500. My pay was only enough to cover my basic needs in the U.S. I had no money left over to send back home to my family.

They threatened that if we tried to leave, they would call the police and report us to immigration. The treatment was so bad that some of us ran away anyway, but I was too afraid of being deported. I said to myself, I’m here in America for my family. They were still suffering so much to get food on the table. All they could afford to eat was rice and soy sauce.

One night I decided to do it. I got on a Greyhound bus at 3 or 4 a.m., with just my passport and $500 in my pocket, and traveled from Arkansas to Texas, where I stayed with my aunt for a little while until my uncle found me a job in California. I took that job, but it ended shortly after. I had no work for three months. I felt homeless and that I had ruined my family. That’s when I became an alcoholic. I wanted to be drunk all the time, to fall asleep and forget everything that had happened in America. Every time I try to remember everything, it all comes back to me, all the depression and fear.

I thought about going home, but I knew I could not go back to the Philippines for a very long time. I told myself I was already here and that I needed to be patient. Back home we call America the land of opportunity. At that moment, I didn’t know if I could call America that, but I never surrendered or stopped looking for a job. I kept fighting for my family. The only thing I had to hold onto was my faith. I prayed that one day it would all be okay.

My life restarted again when I found a job as a cook and housekeeper in a big house in Beverly Hills. Now I am in another job, working as a caregiver. I still have anxiety every time I see police and fear being caught. I still have trouble sleeping. But I got help for substance abuse and treatment for my depression and anxiety. Today, the trauma is still there, but it’s not as heavy anymore.

It has been 13 years since I was home in the Philippines. I still have hope to bring my family here and get a fresh start. I don’t want what happened to me to happen to my children.

SAM

For me, coming to the U.S. was the realization of a dream, not only for myself but for my family. I was a physical therapist in the Philippines so I was really happy when an employment agency got me a job doing the same work in the U.S. But when I got here, it was nothing like they promised. We were thrown into a hotel in a rough neighborhood. There was no work, no visit to the jobsite, no employer nor a representative who came to welcome us and see how we were doing. We were left on our own. We survived for 14 days eating noodles from the 99 cent store.

I endured the treatment because I had no choice and I didn’t know the laws in the U.S. It was tormenting and traumatic being in a foreign land with no knowledge of the laws, specifically laws about employment and immigration. I also didn’t know before I came that I would have very, very limited job choices as an undocumented immigrant resulting from my trafficking. Living in fear of being deported was stressful and suffocating. Even more because I cannot afford insurance or medical care so I had to just take vitamins and pray to God, and by God’s grace I was able to stay well.

I learned a little from a childhood friend who has been a U.S. citizen for a long time and also works as a physical therapist. He told me that he learned about four physical therapists who had reported their agencies for violations of human trafficking and that they won their cases and got justice. At the same time, my Filipino values of perseverance and faith somehow deterred and delayed me from seeking help for myself.

Information about domestic workers’ rights and human trafficking abuses should be readily available to immigrant communities. It should be easy for workers to contact authorities, even their local embassies, and get help. Labor rights should be plainly black and white and both employers and employees need to adhere to them. There should be a collaboration between the host country and the country of origin of trafficking victims so these predators are stopped from the very beginning. We must treat each other with respect and humanity. We are human beings too and not just nominal subjects for profiteering.

MELANIE

I came to the U.S. from the Philippines to support my family. One of my children had cerebral palsy and was prone to pneumonia, and was always in the hospital, which was expensive. I could not afford his treatment. So when I found an opportunity for a job abroad, I tried my luck and took it.

An employment agency in the Philippines connected me to a job in a chicken factory in Washington State. To get here, I had to pay the agency $5,000 plus airfare. All the problems started when I arrived. The agency told me and other Filipino workers it would cover housing, but when we got there we found out we had to stay in another employee’s home for the first three weeks, and during that time we had to do her housekeeping and take care of her three children, on top of going to work at the factory. Finally they moved us to a housing unit. We were 20 people with one bathroom and no furniture. The women slept in the attic, about 10 of us.

Working at the factory was difficult and dangerous. My job was to debone chicken with an electric sensor on a conveyor belt. We had to work fast, which made it hard to protect ourselves. Fingers were always being cut. There were also immigration raids so we were in constant fear of being caught and deported. I had a visa, but some of the other employees did not have papers. All of us were afraid.

After six months, the company let us go even though our contracts were for a year’s work. Some of my other coworkers from the Philippines were afraid they would lose their visas from being out of work, so they went home. I missed my family and wanted to go home, too. I wanted to provide for them but at the same time, I have to pay my debt. I am still paying off the loans I borrowed to pay the employment agency fees.

In the Philippines, we have this idea that going to America will bring you a bright future. So even though I wanted to go home, I knew people would treat me like a failure if I did — I had been planning to bring my family there and I had failed. All of a sudden you’re back with nothing but debt. People think only criminals get deported. So I stayed.

To get another job, I had to pay the agency a $500 processing fee and they placed me at a resort in Sedona, Arizona. Our living conditions were better there, but the work was physically exhausting. We worked in teams of two to clean 20 rooms per day. I got sick with high blood pressure and vertigo, which made it very difficult to continue working, but I didn’t go to a doctor because it was expensive and I didn’t know about insurance. I decided to resign, but when I told my employer, he threatened to deport me. I ended up staying for three months before I finally broke free. Then I started looking for another job, one that would not take a toll on my health.

My friend found me a job as a caregiver in California. That’s where I live now. I share a place with a senior who needed help paying rent. I spend most of my salary on phone cards calling home, and while the job is steady, the landlord threatened to evict me because I am not on the lease. California’s eviction moratorium has prevented that for now.

I came here to support my family, but I am still trying to save up enough money to see them. My son passed away from his illness last year and I was not able to be there. Many times, I wished that I never came here, that I never had to go through what I did. Had I known that what my traffickers had promised were lies, I would have stayed in the Philippines in the first place.

All I want as a domestic worker is recognition. Domestic work is seen as a lowly job but it’s a decent job and it’s vital to society. We should not be ignored. We are important.

There are potentially thousands of domestic workers living across the U.S. right now, who have been trafficked and forced into labor while being subjected to many of the same inequalities other essential workers face. In fact, COVID-19 has only laid bare the dangers and abuses of domestic work that long predate the pandemic: low wages (often below local minimum wages), overwork, unhonored or nonexistent contracts, employer surveillance, lack of access to healthcare, and more.

The ACLU’s petition demands immediate action to address these abuses, and draws from the expertise of four individual domestic workers as well as workers’ rights organizations including National Domestic Workers Alliance, Adhikaar, Damayan Migrant Workers, Centro de los Derechos del Migrante, Human Trafficking Legal Center, Fe y Justicia, and Pilipino Workers Center.

from RSSMix.com Mix ID 8247012 https://www.aclu.org/news/immigrants-rights/behind-closed-doors-the-traumas-of-domestic-work-in-the-u-s via http://www.rssmix.com/

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sciencespies · 3 years

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Why PTSD May Plague Many Hospitalized Covid-19 Survivors

https://sciencespies.com/nature/why-ptsd-may-plague-many-hospitalized-covid-19-survivors/

Why PTSD May Plague Many Hospitalized Covid-19 Survivors

While neuropsychologists Erin Kaseda and Andrew Levine were researching the possibility of hospitalized Covid-19 patients developing post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), they heard reports of patients experiencing vivid hallucinations. Restrained by ventilators and catheters, delirious from medication and sedatives and confused by the changing cast of medical professionals cycling through the ward, intensive care unit (ICU) patients are especially prone to trauma. For Covid-19 ICU patients, a combination of factors, including side effects of medication, oxygenation issues and possibly the virus itself, can cause delirium and semi-consciousness during their hospital stay. Kaseda says as these patients slip in and out of consciousness, they may visualize doctors wheeling their bodies to a morgue or see violent imagery of their families dying. Such instances, though imagined, can cause trauma that may lead to PTSD in patients long after they have physically recovered from Covid-19.

In addition to hallucinations during hospitalization, some Covid-19 survivors describe a persistent feeling of “brain fog” for weeks or months after recovery. “Brain fog” is an imprecise term for memory loss, confusion or mental fuzziness commonly associated with anxiety, depression or significant stress. As scientists grappled with whether such brain damage could be permanent, Kaseda and Levine warn that cognitive issues often attributed to “brain fog” may, in fact, be signs of PTSD. Kaseda, a graduate student at Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science in Chicago, and Levine, a professor of neurology at the University of California Los Angeles, co-authored a study published in Clinical Neuropsychologists in October intended to alert neuropsychologists to the possibility of PTSD as a treatable diagnosis for those who survived severe illness from Covid-19.

“You have this unknown illness: there’s no cure for it, there’s high mortality, you’re separated from your family, you’re alone,” Kaseda says. “If you’re hospitalized that means the illness is pretty severe, so there’s this absolute fear of death that even if you aren’t having the delirium or the other kind of atypical experiences, just the fear of death could absolutely constitute a trauma.”

How Post-Traumatic Stress Develops in Covid-19 Patients

PTSD arises from experiencing or witnessing a traumatic event, specifically exposure to actual or threatened death and serious injury, according to the American Psychiatric Association.

Historically associated with combat veterans, PTSD was called “shell shock” or “combat fatigue” before it became a named disorder in 1980. But in 2013, the definition of PTSD broadened to include more common place traumatic experiences.

Psychiatrists are now increasingly seeing PTSD develop after traumatic stays in the ICU for any health problem, but researchers are still unsure of the scope of this issue. A paper published in 2019 in the Lancet reports that roughly a quarter of people admitted to the ICU for any health issue will develop PTSD. Another study found that between 10 and 50 percent of people develop PTSD after ICU discharge, and, in a 2016 study of 255 ICU survivors, one in ten reported PTSD within one year after discharge.

Before hospitalized patients are diagnosed with PTSD, their symptoms may be described as post intensive care syndrome (PICS). PICS can manifest as a number of physical, cognitive and mental health problems that a patient may experience in the weeks, months or years after being discharged from the ICU.

Kristina Pecora, a clinical psychologist at NVisionYou in Chicago, sees a variety of patients, including frontline medical professionals and Covid-19 survivors. Pecora was a contributing author of a brief submitted to the American Psychological Association in May describing the signs of PICS and urging psychologists to prioritize screening and referral for behavioral health problems related to hospitalization for Covid-19. At that time, some of Pecora’s patients showed signs of the lingering trauma typical of PICS within six months of their ICU discharge. Because a PTSD diagnosis can often only be made after this period, it was too early to tell then whether her patients’ PICS symptoms could be classified as PTSD. But the impact of the virus on their psychiatric health was clearly substantial.

“It becomes this gradual realization that what they’re experiencing is persisting week after week and ‘oh my goodness, this is a longer-term experience than what we thought it would be,’” Pecora says.

Restrained by ventilators and catheters, delirious from medication and sedatives and confused by the changing cast of medical professionals cycling through the ward, ICU patients are especially prone to trauma.

(Photo by Sebastian Gollnow/picture alliance via Getty Images)

A “Delirium Factory”

One major factor in whether patients develop long-term psychological effects after ICU discharge is whether or not they experience delirium during their stay. Delirium is a state of severe confusion and disorientation, often characterized by poor memory, nonsensical speech, hallucinations and paranoia. Patients who experience delirium may not be able to differentiate between real and imagined humans or events.

Side effects of sedatives, prolonged ventilation and immobilization are common factors that put many ICU patients at-risk for delirium. A study from 2017 found that up to 80 percent of mechanically ventilated people enter a hallucinogenic state known as ICU delirium.

Add isolation and the unknown cognitive effects of the virus to the mix and an ICU becomes a “delirium factory” for Covid-19 patients, as authors of a study published in BMC Critical Care in April wrote. In a different study from June, which has not yet undergone peer review, 74 percent of Covid-19 patients admitted to the ICU reported experiencing delirium that lasted for a week.

“Any time anyone is in a fearful experience and they’re isolated—they can’t have anybody in their rooms—they wake up in a strange experience or a strange place, or they know already while they’re in there that they can’t have anyone hold them or be with them. All of that is going to attribute to the emotional impact,” Pecora says.

Such intense visions and confusion about the reality of hospitalization can be especially scarring, leaving patients with intrusive thoughts, flashbacks and vivid nightmares. If such responses persist for more than one month and cause functional impairment or distress, it may be diagnosed as PTSD.

To help reduce ICU-related trauma, doctors may keep a log of the patient’s treatment to help jog their memory once they have been discharged. Having a record of the real sequence of events can help a patient feel grounded if they have hallucinations and flashbacks to their hospitalization experience.

But even for patients experiencing Covid-19 symptoms that aren’t severe enough to warrant a hospital visit, the fear of death and isolation from loved ones can be sufficiently distressing to cause lasting trauma. They may experience shortness of breath and worsening symptoms, fueling a fear that their condition will quickly deteriorate. For several days, they may avoid sleeping for fear of dying.

“Some people are more resilient in the face of that sort of trauma and I would not expect them to develop lasting psychological symptoms associated with PTSD,” says Levine. “But other people are less resilient and more vulnerable to that.”

Learning from SARS and MERS

Covid-19 isn’t the first epidemic to cause a domino effect of persisting psychiatric health problems across a population. The current pandemic has been compared to the severe adult respiratory syndrome (SARS) outbreak in 2003 and the Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) outbreak in 2014 in Saudi Arabia—both diseases caused by coronaviruses. In an analysis of international studies from the SARS and MERS outbreaks, researchers found that among recovered patients, the prevalence of PTSD was 32.2 percent, depression was 14.9 percent and anxiety disorders was 14.8 percent.

Much like those who fall ill with Covid-19, some patients sick with SARS and MERS developed acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), which causes patients to experience similar feelings of suffocation and delirium during treatment in the ICU. Levine says that many of the people who developed PTSD during the SARS and MERS epidemics were hospitalized.

By contrast, Levine anticipates Covid-19 survivors with relatively mild symptoms may experience traumatic stress too, due to an inundation of distressing images, frightening media reports and a higher expectation of death.

For those who recover from Covid-19, their trauma may be compounded by social isolation and physical distancing practices after they are discharged from the hospital. “If you did experience a trauma, it can make it so much harder to naturally recover from that when you lack the social support from family and friends that maybe would be possible to receive in different circumstances,” Kaseda says.

Screening for PTSD in Covid-19 survivors soon after recuperation is important, Kaseda says, so that patients can receive the right treatment for their cognitive difficulties. If PTSD is treated early on, it can speed a person’s entire Covid-19 recovery.

“If we can treat the PTSD, we can see what parts of the cognition get better,” Kaseda says. “And that will give us more confidence that if problems persist even after the PTSD is alleviated, that there is something more organic going on in the brain.”

A Constantly Shifting Landscape

As more information about the traumatic effects of Covid-19 treatments become clear, neuropsychiatrists and psychologists can shift their approach to dealing with the cognitive effects of Covid-19. Scientists don’t yet have a full grasp on how Covid-19 directly affects the brain. But by maintaining an awareness of and treating PTSD in Covid-19 patients, psychiatrists and clinicians may be able to minimize some cognitive problems and focus on the unknowns.

“Part of the problem is that all of this is so new,” Pecora says. “We’ve only really been seeing this for six or seven months now and the amount of information we have gleaned, both in the medical and the psychological worlds has increased so exponentially that we have a hard time keeping up with what were supposed to be looking out for.”

Deeper understanding of which symptoms arise from brain damage and which are more psychological will help both clinicians and psychologists address patients’ needs in their practice.

“The social and emotional impact of Covid-19 hasn’t even dawned on us yet. We clinicians and doctors are certainly trying to prepare for it.,” Pecora says. “But the way this has impacted society and mental health is going to be so vast.”

#Nature

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areyoureadingthis8 · 3 years

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To all the tears I’ve cried in 2020

2020 What a dumpster fire eh?

I want to start off by acknowledging that we’ve ALL had a shitty year. I don’t think I’m special, I just like it when people don’t pretend to be something they are not.

I don’t know where to start and what to leave in and leave out at this point so let’s start from the beginning and you can trapse with me through the sewer that is 2020.

New Years Eve 2019-

After a horrid couple months of our baby being sick and almost dying Matt and I treated ourselves to a night out. We started off at Little Miss Brewing and then went to The Grand, where we originally met. We enjoyed the loud music, jello shots and a midnight kiss.

New Years day we took Shiva to Lake Murray.

January

My coworker and I joked that there would be a plague since historically that seems to be what happens every 100 years. As Dwight from The Office would say “I state my regret”.

There also came a day where there was an active shooter outside my work. Our building went on lockdown but for only about 15 minutes. Being in that type of situation really makes you look at things. It’s enough to say I was scared and blessed that it didn’t escalate any further then it did. Only one person died that day, I’ll let you speculate who.

March

You know what happens next.

Shit hit the fan. Everyone flipped the fuck out.

At my work, once HR said okay let’s get everyone working remote and home safe people grabbed their desktop workstations off their desk and ran out of the building. It looked like a bomb went off in the office. They took it home and then called the helpdesk asking why it wouldn’t work.

The experience was rather unsettling, and one I don't care to relive.

Matt’s clinic went into disarray with yells of “coronavirus!”. For the first couple weeks they didn’t have access to any tests then later rationed 10 tests. Person number one came in, fresh back from Spain, fever, cough, shortness of breath. Matt was scared but also kind of excited. They gathered all their PPE , strapped up and went in.

Matt’s phone rang about every 5 minutes between calls from his boss, his boss’s boss, Corporate, and HR. Full on crisis mode activated. It was only a couple days before all the PPE was gone.

April

Depression, devastation, drinking and TikTok lol.

We still didn’t know how serious Covid was but l prefer to err on the side of caution. It’s not like we could go anywhere anyways.. Since we were both essential workers our day to day didn’t change much. At my work we got most everyone on laptops and completely remote. I would FedEx hardware components where needed, and when things got stressful I would look out the window at the 805 at the same view I had for the last year. The cars still buzzed around doing whatever it was they were doing.

May

The parks opened back up. We were able to get Shiva out again.

I still didn’t know anybody that gotten covid.

There was a lot of noise now about masks, freedom, and that covid was bullshit.

People got bored with the lockdowns and closures.

My dad is a hard conspiracy theorist so I always had it in the back of my mind that there is something else going on here. Trying not to get too far down the rabbit hole; I had told myself “ I’ll know it for sure when I see it.”

That day came in late May.

I was at work and then all the sudden social media blew up.

There was a police officer with his knee to a man's neck. He killed him.

My first reaction “that’s fucked up”. Then I froze. I watched the police officers' expressions.

There was nothing behind their eyes. They almost seemed amused with themselves.

Deep state got George Floyd that day. Still at my desk it was like I blinked and I saw it. I saw cities burning, cias, death, and destruction all before it happened.

Our government publicly executed this man with the intent of starting a race war and even encouraged people to go out and protest in the middle of the so-called pandemic.

One could only assume they wanted more people to get covid and die but that’s not what happened. Despite the rioting and the protests, it didn’t seem to drive up the case rate.

About 3 weeks in, more people like myself who were on the fence were now convinced and ready to call our government’s bluff. You lied to us fuckers. You lied, locked us down, and destroyed our economy. You killed a man for sport. I have no problem saying I hope every politician and elitist burns in hell for all of it. Time for the sheep to wake up.

Summer

I took to using my platform to express my disdain. Shocker, people don’t like conspiracy theorists. They can’t handle it. They prefer to live in a world where everything is peachy and their government is good. Believe me when I say it’s not like I want any of these horrible things to happen, but i think it’s important to be open and prepared for the worst. Still I’d have people comment “how sad” I am. Really? Well I think you’re sad for being so closed minded and not opening your eyes to what is right in front of you. They aren’t even hiding it, and yet you defend them.

On a lighter note, we got Shiva a stroller to get around better.

My 40th birthday consisted of a beach trip, take out mexican food and mojitos.

October

We’re now to that part of the story.

We celebrated the anniversary of Shiva throwing up all that blood with a trip to Lake Murray. We had taken her to the hospital that night expecting to have her put down but somehow fate intervened. The anomaly was never explained but Matt I believe Shiva knew she was on her way out and she wanted to prepare us. She was trying to say “Mom, Dad, I’m going to have to leave you soon and I need to know you’ll be okay” because that’s the kind of dog she was.

The last year had not been easy though. Our schedules pretty much revolved around Shiva and her care; Matt left early in the morning for work, and I would leave closer to 9-9:30. We took turns watching her on a house camera from our phones. Matt would get home earlier to be with her and so on. Looking at Shiva in the moment, I could see that she wanted to be here with us but her body was failing, she was tired.

Shiva began to have episodes of coughing and pacing at night. Her lungs were filling with fluid. The lasix and the diuretics were no longer working on her. She was officially in the danger zone, at risk for heart attack, stroke, and assfixation.

I’m grateful I got to spend her last four days with her.

We had one last consultation. Shiva was slowly suffocating to death and there was nothing that anyone could do about it.

On that last day we pushed her on her stroller for a few hours at Liberty Station. She had steak and eggs and then one of the nicest guys I’ve had the pleasure of meeting came over and did the deed. She closed her eyes and gave us one last famous Shiva smile.

Such an anti-climatic end to this chapter in our lives.

November

Eight months later now Covid is hitting. Suspicious much? Matt’s clinic went into disarray again as he started going to the county facilities twice a week to test.

We went to Arizona for Thanksgiving; had a nice dinner , went for a hike and a walk around the lake.

December

More covid. I know quite a few people that have gotten sick.

No one knows what the future holds. I hope none of these theories come true but we have to be prepared for the worst . When I get dark Matt tells me not to worry “For every beginning there is an end, and to every end there is a beginning” and that part I’m sure about.

2020 definitely made me realize I didn't have enough appreciation for the little things before.

To steal Pam’s last line from The Office “There’s beauty in ordinary things.”

And now it’s New Years Eve

We were outside our house , getting ready to go to Little Miss Brewing when Matt saw a loose dog running up and down our street. We gave him his space in case he runner. Matt called him over “come here boy”. He came right over. He followed us. He came inside the house without hesitation. Such a sweet dog. I have posted in multiple groups. His picture has been shared a 100 times tonight already. Waiting to see and hear if we find the owner. Call me kookie, but I have no doubt Shiva sent him here. Whether it be just for the night so he has shelter or chance at something else.

Wishing better things for all us in 2021!

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