Hi!

You're most likely here because you've been following (or hating) forever and just cant quit me, you're a friend or family member and want to collect dirt on me, or you're new and have no idea what you've stumbled into (run!).

I started my blog over a year ago, and back then, times were FUN. The shit that was getting posted in mom groups was bonkers. AMIRITE LADIES? I meaaaaan, women wanted to know if we could tell them they were pregnant via an online diagnosis. 

We all laughed at, and with one another, and pretty much just collectively had our jaws dropped on a daily basis. I enjoyed the camaraderie -- I wasn't alone in thinking this shit was b-a-n-a-n-a-s!

Of course, over time, my conscience got the best of me. Even in lightness, a joke about something becomes a joke about someone and that is never an easy line to tango. Eventually I knew I wanted to shift away from mom group chatter... sure it's fun to joke about things we don't understand, but there was some level of not wanting to be the conveyor or messenger of hurt. 

Alas, you were all following me for the funnies. My little ego was boosted. I laughed. You laughed. We all laughed... I mean except for the person who made the post that was blog fodder for the day. And while I had so many convincing me it was funny, I stopped buying into myself.

I knew I always wanted to write MORE than just that, but I knew it wasn't going to be handled well. For many, my page was an escape (myself included). We all love a bit of drama, whether we participate or observe and my page became that source of reliable entertainment, and so I understand why it's hard to accept that that's not the basis of my page now, and the frustration that comes along with that.

And it's not that I'll never be funny again. At least I hope that's not the case. It's just that, as much as you want me to be, I'm not a character. Trust me, I wish I could be the Anonymous Mommy you all wanted me to be. It'd be so much easier and I'd probably be making BANK with this concept. I just don't have the heart or personality for it, and I realized that fairly early on. It'd be easy to post what I know will get likes, but then that wouldn't really be me. Besides, likes don't pay me anyway.

I'm probably sounding like a broken record right now, but considering the backlash, I figured a legitimate blog post was worth writing. Also, I think and overanalyze everything to death and the only way I process something is by writing. Yay life! Also, writing is self-serving, and right now I'm being selfish and processing my emotions. DEAL.

I hope you'll stay along with me, and we can laugh when we laugh, be angry when we're angry, and be sad when we're sad. But I'm not here to be anything other than me. And I'm tired of feeling like I have to apologize for it. 

And now, I'm off to lather myself in coconut oil and Guinness, and try and whack my funny bone back into shape.

When you keep writing to make sense of things...

I think I may have written about this experience in the past but it sits present in my mind, especially now.

If you're familiar with my writing, or me, you probably know that I was raised in a conservative, Christian, republican household. My parents are good people... the sort of people who always have the door open. The house that all the kids came to after school. Even now, my friends and I often bbq at my parents' house. My father is an engineer - a very, very smart man. Growing up, when I had questions about politics, he answered in such a way that made sense to me, I think probably because back then I wasn't asking the right questions, at least to form my own opinions. And so, I held staunchly to my beliefs tied to the right party.  I whole-heartedly believed we were the party of morals. Truly, in every way. I was against abortion - I even made a speech about it in my high school speech class that made someone who had had an abortion cry. I was pro pro pro the death penalty. I  "supported" gay people, and wanted them to have rights... just as long as they didn't married. That wasn't their right. I had antiquated beliefs and judgements about women and sexuality. I could go on.

I remember sitting in class one day, when a classmate found out that I was a republican. His response: "I'm sorry. I thought you cared about people." It stung. Big time. I was offended and angry. Instead of pressing, I rolled my eyes, told myself I was way too classy to need to insult someone for their politics, and bunkered down even tighter on my conservative views and party loyalty.

It wasn't until later in life, when I started traveling the country for work, and meeting and interviewing a variety of different people with all sorts of upbringings and backgrounds, that I realized that there was a whole world outside of my white, conservative conejo valley bubble. It was sobering. And embarrassing.

Why did I care who had sex with who? Honestly though. It's not my decision what anyone else should do with their body. Ever. I became overtly aware of how damaging the words "slut" and "whore" are. They make me cringe to this day when I hear them being used in a derogatory, judgmental way.

Why did I care so much about determining who got to get married? It's a concept not even "owned" by the bible. Who am I to tell two people who love each other that they don't get to enjoy the same rights I do, because of my own set of personal beliefs?

Is it worth it to have the death penalty if even  ONE innocent person dies as a result of it, my husband asked me once. I had never thought about it that way. It's not foolproof and it never will be. And I realized I wasn't willing to sacrifice an innocent life for vengeance. 

Anyway, these are the questions I started to ask myself and the more people I interviewed -- kids raised by single moms, raised by two moms or two dads, kids who had been sexually assaulted, kids who had been beat up for their race or culture, kids who raised their siblings while their parents worked four jobs, kids who didn't have food to eat or electricity, etc, the more my views started to shift. It really opened my eyes and despite how anyone else feels about reality television, nothing has been a bigger lesson, or influence on the person I am today and the things I value first and foremost: social causes and human rights.

My point in writing all this is that when I was in high school and that classmate said what he did, it didn't encourage me to hear what he had to say, it turned me away. And I vowed to never be that person who jabbed instead of listened.

And somewhere along the way, I think that's exactly what I've been doing recently. I've jabbed instead of listened. In all seriousness I truly can't fathom how we're here today with a Donald Trump as president, based on the campaign he ran. But something tells me, that all the "me's" didn't help our cause as much as we'd like to believe. Sure, we're steadfast and passionate in our views, and we obviously feel we are right in every sense of the word on this particular matter. That's probably not going to change. I think sexism is wrong. I think bigotry is wrong. I think racism is wrong. I think mocking handicapped people is wrong. I think mocking cultures and promoting discrimination is wrong. I think enabling this is ANY way, shape or form is wrong. Soooooo, we're probably going to be at impasse if you support someone who boasts these views.

But, with that being said, almost half the population felt it was possible to support a man who ran a campaign based on these ideals, while stating that they didn't support those ideals. So, that leaves us asking why? How? And what message did we not convey that would reach these voters and allow them to embrace humans and make humanity and equal rights an actual priority? 

I look back at that high school incident and ask myself now, what could he have said that would have led me to have an open and productive conversation with him at that time? And honestly I don't know. I don't think he could have said anything differently. I think he said exactly what I needed to hear, but I was too defensive and too stubborn to hear it if I'm being quite honest. I needed to go and live my life and have life experiences to come to the perspective I have today.

But clearly, however conversations are happening...they aren't working for anyone. Now, I'll never pretend that I'm going to "understand" how one can enable and support a candidate who preaches hate, but not take responsibility for that support, but I have to get better about listening and attempting to understand how to have a conversation with the other half of this country.  I'm not sure how, or when I'll get to that point where I can be a better listener, without conveying that I think it's in any way acceptable to turn a blind eye to the hatred that's (always existed) but has now become popularized, but I'm going to work hard to work to inform, and provide a space for open dialogue, so that maybe one day, others will join me in supporting equal rights for everyone. I'll hope that one day, this will be a priority for more people. Until then, it's time to get to work.

​

Dear friends and random people I don't know telling me to "get over it",

Kindly shut the fuck up. (And I say that with all the love I have left in my blackened soul-less heart after last night's fiasco of a culmination of this election season).

Here's the thing. For most of you posting your gracious, positive-filled posts of hope, your candidate won. I get it. It's inconvenient for you to gloat and goad when your friends are like totally bummed out for realsies, amirite? I mean, major mood kill. Why are these people harshing on your "all love" and "come together" vibes that came from out of the deepest point of the center of the earth all of a sudden?! I mean your candidate won the electoral vote, so it's time we alllllll completely erase our memories and forget the entire platform on which he ran, because psssh -- just because you voted for a guy whose entire campaign was molded on hate, fear-mongering, and discrimination of minorities and women's rights... you totally don't actually back all of the that stuff.  So, your friends need to get over it. Now, you think it's time for unity. I mean not really, since that's not what Trump has been preaching for the last year in a half-- but it sounds nice to say, doesn't it?

Plus, let's be honest here... you like listening to yourself pretend to be the voice of positivity and reason and guiding light. You're like totally above the negativity and hate that transpired during this election season, right? I mean, doesn't it feel good when your friends comment on you post and compliment you for being "so positive" and writing "yaaaaaassssss queen!"?

But lets real talk for a second.

You have got to be out of your fucking mind if you're going to demand on insisting how everyone react to the election results. OUT OF YOUR MIND.  How about I decide how I'm going to grieve the death of the idea of what I thought America stood for? I think I'm certainly allowed to have more than, oh I don't know, 24 HOURS, to get over it, ESPECIALLY since I've heard you bitching for the last eight fucking years solid about your contempt for our current President, Barack Obama.

And speaking of "coming together," um, we were with the candidate whose literal campaign slogan was "stronger together." We're pretty aware of what "needs" to happen. You're not enlightening us in any way. You're asking us to silence ourselves so you can stuff your face with hate-filled cake and feel good about it. But don't worry. I get it -- just because you voted for a man who discriminates against minorities, assaults and objectifies women, wants to number and ban Muslims, has suggested censoring the media, mocked a disabled reporter, and has suggested that voters use their "second amendment rights" to show Hillary what's up --I'm supposed to know that just because you're eating the celebration cake... you don't actually embrace all those things. So you tell me.

So do me a favor. Don't dictate to me how I should feel about something I'm passionate about. Have some of this grace you talk about and understand that the majority of the population that voted for the other candidate just had their dreams and hopes for the U.S. crushed and stomped on in every imaginable way possible. Let us be angry. Let us grieve. Let us process what in the actual fuck just happened while you drink your Mazel Tovs mmmmmkay?

I've been called a liberal cunt today from a Trump supporter because I had the audacity to still be disgusted by Trump's pussy grabbing comments. I've been called a democratic bitch because - GASP I'M A WOMAN WHO HAS DARED TO POST MY OPINIONS ON MY OWN FUCKING PAGE UNAPOLOGETICALLY.  I was told to "grow up" when someone asked for just "one example of Trump being racist" and I provided three different resources. Some absolutely BATSHIT insane stuff happened with a woman who disagreed with me that I actually am not at liberty to discuss. My friend's hispanic nanny had a rock thrown at her car yesterday while she got out to vote.  An American-Muslim acquaintance of mine was shouted at from a car, telling her, her days are numbered. Gloating Republicans were actually hash tagging #letthehatebegin.

This is not the America I know and love. These are not people I'm proud of. While you celebrated electing a man who calls women to ugly to assault, uses charitable contributions for lawsuits, and bragged about the size of his penis.... I'm crying that my daughter is living in a time where people still behave like this and hate everyone else so much. LET ME FUCKING HAVE A GODDAM MINUTE before you jump down my balls about being a gracious loser.

Don't challenge me to be whatever the fuck you want me to be today so it's convenient for you.